The Year's Best Science Fiction--Thirty-Fourth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

What I do keep returning to is Rob’s small collection of poetry. I have lingered with Eliot’s Prufrock amid the chains of the sea, wondered with Hardy what might have happened if he and that woman had sheltered from the rain a minute more, and watched as Silvia Plath’s children burst those final balloons. I just wish that Rob was here to share these precious words and moments with me. But all there is is you and I, dear, faithful reader, and the Blue Men of the Minch calling to the waves.

  When the Stone Eagle Flies

  BILL JOHNSON

  Even when you know what’s going to happen, as time-travelers generally do, knowing exactly when it’s going to happen can be of critical importance—even the difference between life and death.

  Bill Johnson has sold stories to many different markets, including Asimov’s, Analog, F&SF, Black Gate, Amazing, and many others, but is one of those rare writers who has never written a novel. One of those stories, “We Will Drink a Fish Together,” won the Hugo Award in 1997. He has an MBA with an emphasis in finance from Duke University. He also has a BA in journalism from the University of Iowa and won the Best News Story of the Year award from the Iowa Press Association. At 6′8″ tall, he may be the tallest of all SF writers.

  Nineveh: April, 612 BCE

  Martin, dressed in priestly robes, stood at the Halzi Gate, facing south-east. It was early May and the heat was already rising, in waves, from the desert on the other side of the Tigris. He felt the sweat start inside his clothes. It made him itch and he tried to slip in a subtle scratch when no one was looking.

  Stop that.

  “Damn it,” Martin grumbled in silent mode. “You’re not my mother.”

  No. Your mother isn’t born yet, Artie scolded him. And I’m something better. I’m your artificial intelligence. I’m always with you and I never sleep. And I only do what you tell me to do, so you can’t whine at me like you could at your mother. It would be … ineffective.

  “Shut up,” Martin muttered. The priests around him stirred and glanced at him, puzzled. He realized he had fallen out of silent mode. He smiled back, apologetically. He was more tired than he realized.

  It is, in many ways, the perfect life, Artie mused. I can do whatever I want, and I can’t be blamed for any of it.

  “How would you like to go $9D?” Martin snapped, carefully in silent mode.

  Cycle infinite until I overheat and burst into flames? How lovely. Do you really want me to self destruct immediately? But then, of course, you’d have to wait for me to be invented. And that’s not until—

  Artie stopped abruptly.

  “What?” Martin stopped.

  I see them, Artie said, his voice cool and emotionless. From the telescope we’ve got mounted on the roof of the temple. The first soldier just marched over the horizon.

  “Damn it,” Martin swore, in silent. “They didn’t win, did they?”

  No.

  “Thank God.”

  For the next hour the defeated remnants of the Assyrian army passed north through the gates into Nineveh. Martin, along with the other priests, performed the purification rituals, bobbing his head and blessing the soldiers with his metal tipped rod as they streamed into the city. He always paid extra attention to the wounded. He remembered what it was like to be wounded.

  Finally, there was a pause and a gap in the line of troops. Martin looked south, sharpened and extended his vision.

  There was only one group left, of chariot cavalry, clustered together. They moved slowly north, the horses tired. Martin recognized the center unit as a heavy fighting platform, a three man unit. Standing, facing forward next to the driver, a grim look on his face, was the king, Sin-sar-iskun. Another man stood next to the king, his back to the city, guarding the rear.

  “Where’s Larry?”

  That’s him in the bodyguard position, next to the king.

  Martin focused his sight. Larry was dressed in a battered helmet, an armored scale jacket and leggings. His hair was long and thick and dirty and fell down over his shoulders. He shifted position and came into profile. His beard was matted and streaked, cut straight across on the bottom in Assyrian style, and reached down to the top of his armor. He stood in the chariot, facing backward, his bow strung, his arrows ready next to him. His arms were bruised and battered and a fresh, long cut ran vertically down the side of his face, from forehead to jawline.

  “He’s alive.”

  Barely.

  The king said something to Larry, and smiled. Larry turned to face the city and put his hand on the king’s shoulder. The king reached up and held Larry’s hand.

  Martin dipped into Larry’s biological readings.

  The king’s hand was light on Larry’s. It was warm and firm, calloused on the bow fingers, soft otherwise.

  Gentle, Artie said. That’s the word you’re looking for. Gentle.

  “Damn it,” Martin cursed.

  It seems we have a problem …

  Nineveh: May, 612 BCE

  “And … the last city gate is now closed and barricaded. The guards are on full duty, with a shift change every four hours to keep them alert.”

  Martin nodded, satisfied. He wore his usual uptime skinsuit, in full visibility mode. Devi, in priestess robes, sat at the monitor station. They were in the third floor of the temple, locked away and hidden behind impressively large metal doors and ornate locks. As well as other more subtle and effective safeguards.

  “So, we’re fully surrounded. Welcome to the siege of Nineveh.”

  Devi looked around the room.

  “Doesn’t seem that much different to me.”

  “It’s not, to us,” Martin said. Devi was a recent addition, a new timeliner, on board only a few centuries. She had claimed sanctuary and joined the Stone Eagle after her faction had lost a political fight up-time and she had been exiled downtime, to an alternate timeline. In her timeline—where the Chola Empire dominated south-east Asia—she had actually been a priestess. She had taken quickly to the switch from Kali to Ishtar.

  “That’s why you have to be careful,” Martin warned her. “We can escape. They,” he gestured the city outside the room, “cannot. They will not.”

  “You don’t want to give them hope.”

  “I do want to give them hope,” Martin said, patiently. “I want to give them exactly as much hope—and then, in a few weeks and months—exactly as much despair, as all the other temples. I want us to be like every other temple. I want us to be water as it flows over a fish. I want to be totally unnoted and unremarkable.”

  “But you want things to happen…?”

  “The way they are supposed to happen,” Martin said, satisfied. “So, don’t be too cheerful or too depressed when you work with your clients. Talk with the priestesses from the other temples. Listen to the gossip. Repeat it enough to fit in socially. But do not embellish it, do not minimize it. Be like they are. And watch for anything that doesn’t fit in to the history we’re trying to build.”

  Devi nodded.

  “Good,” Martin said. He stood straighter, checked out the wall display. “Now, where is Larry?”

  “I haven’t seen him, sir,” Devi said, carefully.

  At the palace, Artie said. Overnight. Again. With the king.

  “Damn it,” Martin snapped. Devi studied the display and made sure to keep her face still. She casually touched the table top. A few seconds later the sound of ili, the fifth note of the harp, sounded.

  “Excuse me,” Devi said. She stood and adjusted her robes. “My time down on the first floor. Devotions.”

  And she was gone.

  Nicely done, Artie said, admiringly. Triggering the harp note on a delay was, perhaps, a little less than subtle but she obviously wanted to get the hell out of here …

  “What is going on with him?” Martin asked, irritated. Artie triggered a surveillance still image.

  King Sin-sar-iskun and Larry at a formal reception last night, at the main palace.

  Larry stood before them, dressed in the formal garb—
long white tunic, broad belt, tall fez-like hat—of an Assyrian general. His hair was long and clean, and flowed down to his shoulders. His moustache was oiled stylishly and his beard, full and strong, was cut straight and parallel at the bottom. He wore his sword, peace-bonded to its sheath, and another, smaller dagger on the other side.

  He also stood just a little too close to the king. And the king smiled at him and held his hand.

  What are we going to do about him? About Larry? About a man in love? A man in love who has to watch his lover die? Who has to arrange for his lover to die?

  “Yes,” Martin said, uncomfortably.

  Why are you asking me? I know, let me go through my if-then code on this, Artie said sarcastically. Oh, wait, I have no if-then for this situation! In fact, there are no rules or if-then for anything we’re doing. And why is that, Artie? Because we’re making this all up as we go along! So, how the hell do I know what to do?

  Martin winced.

  “Larry understands all this as well as I do,” he grumbled. “He knows what we have to do. Why is he making this hard on himself?”

  It’s too much for him. He’s looking for a way out, Artie said, quietly. You know that. Do you want me to remind you of Gobekli Tepe? Didn’t you try to do exactly the same th—

  “Shut up,” Martin said, tiredly. He closed his eyes, titled his head back, and blew air toward the ceiling. He brought his head back down and studied the display.

  “Watch him,” Martin ordered Artie. “Nothing that matters is going to happen for the next few months. Maybe Larry just needs to get this out of his system.”

  It’s more than that.

  Martin waved his hand dismissively.

  “I just want to get through this and out of Nineveh. Don’t let him screw things up. If he starts, let me know.”

  And you’ll take care of the problem?

  “And I’ll take care of the problem.”

  Nineveh: July, 612 BCE

  Martin sat at his equivalent of the captain’s table in the restaurant on the second floor of the temple. A fresh bottle of dessert wine, just uncorked, rested in a high-topped bowl full of crushed ice in the middle of the table. His table guests were carefully selected, a mixture of different times and cultures, all of them spending the night at the Stone Eagle.

  “So, everyone here is from a different timeline?” one traveller asked and waved at the room around her, at the dazzling assortment of different clothing, of colors and styles and sheens.

  “Yes,” Martin said. He studied the restaurant with a practiced eye. He mentally evaluated the staff as one of the waiters poured a glass of water, as a server delivered a meal, as the spirits steward displayed a collection of fine bourbons and cigars.

  “Fascinating,” the traveller said. Her name was Mary, Martin suddenly remembered, from a Saturn orbiting habitat. She was with a graduate student group, on a thesis trip back to Varanasi. She pointed to one of the tables across the room. The men—they were all men—wore very severe, Roman-style haircuts. Their clothes were tunics and togas with formal strap-up sandals.

  “What about them? What’s their story?”

  “Vitruvius universe.”

  “Vitruvius?”

  “He was a genius in the Roman army, back in the time of Caesar. In your timeline he is remembered for his writings, but not much more. In their timeline he was more … persuasive? Aggressive? Whatever. A much better salesman of his ideas. In their timeline he used his relationship with Octavia Minor, the emperor Augustus’s niece, to turn his designs into actual inventions.”

  “Inventions?”

  “The steam engine, among others. He essentially pulled the Industrial Revolution of the 1700s CE back to 50 BCE. So they got quite a head start on everyone else.”

  “Oh,” she said. She indicated another table. This one was all women, dressed in what appeared to be uniforms. The uniform blouses were, however, oddly unbalanced. They carried side-arms which were peace-bonded. Martin grimaced and sighed.

  “Amazons. Or, to be more precise, Sarmatians. Female dominated military culture.”

  “You don’t seem to approve.”

  “Not up to me to approve or disapprove,” Martin said and shrugged. He pointed with his chin. “But I don’t particularly like self-mutilation. Ritual removal of a breast, particularly after the invention of firearms, seems to be taking things a bit too far.”

  Martin noticed her glass was empty. He filled it and replaced the bottle.

  “Perhaps I should just stay here,” Mary said thoughtfully as she glanced around the room. “I could change my thesis.”

  “Ah, such a lovely idea,” Martin said smoothly. “But the longer you stay here, the more chance that something … unfortunate will happen to your connection to your own timeline. You would not wish to become stranded.”

  Mary shuddered and put down her glass.

  “No,” she said. “I would miss the Rings and the Pentagon Storm. And I have family back uptime.”

  “Exactly,” Martin said. He lied smoothly. “We all must leave here regularly, to make sure that does not happen to us. To renew the connection, so to speak. It is a very expensive trip but, well, one has to work and still keep connections, yes?”

  Mary smiled and laughed. Martin joined her, then stood, excused himself and slowly worked his way around the room to the floor manager.

  “Larry?”

  “Over there,” the floor manager, a woman named Stephanie, said in a low voice. Martin followed her eyes and saw Larry.

  His Assyrian beard and moustache were gone and he was back in a standard skinsuit. He stood by a table, chatting with the guests.

  “When did he change?”

  First time was today, Artie said. You talked to him last night?

  “Yes.”

  You gave him an ultimatum, Artie said. It was a statement, not a question. Stay here and die with the king, or quit this nonsense and stay alive with us.

  “Yes,” Martin said, uncomfortably. “Perhaps a little more tactfully than that.

  Artie snorted.

  You bio’s. All your worry about tact and feelings and sensitivities. It’s all nonsense, you know. If we—

  “Yes, I know,” Martin interrupted. “If you AI’s were in charge, everything would be nicely organized and in its proper place. And everything would stay there.”

  Exactly.

  “No, that’s the problem.” Martin shook his head. “Everything would stay exactly the same. And then something outside of you would change and you would not be able to handle it and you would all be gone.”

  Artie paused.

  At least we don’t have to worry about feelings.

  Martin smiled.

  “Did he say anything to the king?”

  No idea, Artie admitted. He invoked privacy override whenever he went to the private apartments in the palace.

  “You should have told me about that,” Martin chided him.

  You’re partners, not boss and employee, Artie reminded him. He gets privacy. Unless you want to invoke personal safety?

  Martin studied Larry. He looked right: clean shaven, hair cropped, face repaired. He looked up from across the room, saw Martin. Larry’s face froze for a moment, then broke into a smile.

  Martin smiled back.

  Larry held the glance for a moment, then turned his attention back to the guests.

  “No,” Martin decided. Everything seemed right, but …

  “Watch him.”

  Nineveh: August, 612 BCE

  “When?” Larry asked.

  “Tonight,” Martin answered, reluctantly.

  “The deal is final? Damn it. Why? Why does it have to happen?”

  Martin and Larry were on the third floor of the temple. The floor was empty except for them. The new timeliners had all carefully made themselves scarce.

  Martin waved his hand at the world outside the control room, at the hills all around Nineveh. He felt his irritation rising and he firmly tamped it down.
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  “We’ve gone over this before,” Martin snapped. “It’s tonight because the tribes are getting impatient.”

  Larry started to speak. Martin spoke first, a little louder, and spoke over him.

  “You’ve been in the meetings with the tribes. They want this siege to end. It’s almost past harvest time for the chickpea crop and it’s time to plant the millet. If they don’t move soon, their families back home will starve. So they want to take this city, steal everything in it, and burn it to the ground. Then they want to go home.”

  Larry gestured and a map appeared on the far wall. Nineveh was a small, bright spark in a spreading darkness. Fainter, but clear, lines of march routes, from Egypt and Babylon and Medea and Hatti, glittered into place.

  “Maybe we can hold out just a little longer. Rumor is that the Egyptians are coming with an army,” Larry said hopefully.

  Martin gestured impatiently. The map snapped shut.

  “No.” Martin shook his head. “There is no Egyptian army. No one is coming to save Nineveh. The roads are empty all the way to Luxor. The only army coming is from the south, from Babylon. And they have blood in their eyes.”

  “We could save Nineveh by ourselves,” Larry said, his voice desperate. “A visit from the gods. A few miracles, complete with lightning and explosions. We could send the tribes running back into the hills. Then get the Medes and the Babylonians to actually talk with Sin-sar-iskun. Work out a deal—”

  “No!” Martin said and slammed his hand down on the table.

  “But why?” Larry asked plaintively.

  “Because the Babylonian Chronicles say it’s going to happen this way. Because Herodotus says it’s going to happen this way. Because the damned Bible says it’s going to happen this way. And there is no way in hell we’re going to re-write the Bible and then try to set things right.”

  Martin sat down behind his desk and looked up to study Larry. Martin was comfortable in his usual up-time skinsuit and so was Larry.

  “So it has to be this way?” Larry asked again. “Tonight?”

  “Artie? How’s the river doing?” Martin asked, impatiently. “Explain reality to my partner.”

  More big rains up in the mountains. Melted a lot of the leftover snow. So the water level of the river is still rising. Parts of the ground under Nineveh’s defensive walls are turning back into mud. Some of the outer walls are already starting to collapse, Artie said. Whoever picked this site was an idiot. Nineveh is just too close to the river.