They walked together in silence perhaps ten paces, before Hairy Nose said, “Who is Annie?”
That one gave Mike pause. How could you explain Annie to a stranger—much less one from another century? Any capsule description of her seemed inadequate. So many things about her were unique, special, and right now these nervous time-travelers needed to understand all of them. It took a surprisingly long time for the words he needed to come to him, especially since they were so few.
“She’s the Mother Elf,” he said.
For only the second time since Mike had overtaken them, the Troll flinched—and then he stared intensely into Mike’s eyes, and slowly his face changed a little in some indefinable way, became infinitesimally less ugly. “We will go with you,” he rumbled. “Where?”
“Do you guys know about Johnny’s Tree, in Strawberry Fields?”
It turned out that they did not. He explained the salient fact: as they all entered the elevator and the door slid shut behind them, they—and everyone else—would seem to become invisible. They could touch each other if they wanted, but all any of them would see was an apparently empty elevator, with not even their own reflection visible in the mirrored walls. From that point on, the rule was to keep to the right, so you wouldn’t bump into people coming the other way. “But you don’t have to worry about that,” Mike added. “Once we get off at the top, I’ll make us really disappear.”
“How?” asked Squinty.
Mike started to answer—and suddenly wondered if some distant listener had a shotgun mike trained on them. “You’ll see,” he said evasively, and Squinty seemed to accept that.
As they waited for the elevator, he unwrapped his shirt from his left forearm, tied it around his waist, and offered each of them one of his hands. They looked at them. “So we won’t get separated when we get invisible,” he explained. They exchanged a glance and took his hands. The elevator opened, and they all entered together, along with two other kids and a grown-up with a beard. Mike was a little worried that one of them would notice he was wearing a Command Band on his wrist instead of the Dreamband a kid should wear—but it was awkward to hold someone’s hand with a shirt wrapped around your wrist, and he was going to need to get at that Command Band soon, and besides, the risk lasted only a few seconds.
Both Trolls squeezed his hand as they all went invisible. He was glad he’d warned them to expect it. He squeezed back, and discovered an odd thing: he was stronger than either of them. With his hands, anyway. It was so unexpected, it took him the whole ride up to be sure of it. Every time one of the other kids in the elevator spoke—which they of course did the entire trip—both of the hands Mike held tensed, giving him a chance to measure their grip. These guys were candy.
He confirmed it when they reached the top, by tugging them both gently but firmly out of the stream of traffic without difficulty. He led them silently to the inconspicuous alcove nearby. “Leggo of me for a minute,” he whispered, and after a moment’s hesitation both hands released his. He had a bad moment then. He had failed to anticipate how tricky it would be to operate a Command Band he could not see. But after a little fumbling, he was relieved to see the employee elevator door smoothly and silently slide open.
Almost at once he became alarmed again, as he thought it through. The service elevator was here, at the top, because the last time it had been used had been by…the Cousin presently on monitor duty up here! The monitor was as invisible as everyone else, circulating through the crowd watching for problems. If the monitor passed this way and happened to see the employee elevator door standing open, all or part of hell would break loose.
Mike groped on either side of him, reacquired his time-traveling Trolls, and hustled them into the elevator.
As soon as the door closed behind them, they all became visible again. Both started, and instinctively tried to break his grip. He allowed them to succeed. At once he untied his shirt from his waist and began putting it back on. “From this point on,” he told them, “we’re kind of safe. I mean, no goons can find us. And we’ll all pass for employees as long as nobody looks too close at my face. But in five minutes we’ll be really safe. In a place where we can talk and everything.”
Hairy Nose pushed his lower lip out even farther as he thought. Finally he took a deep breath and nodded. “Good.”
“My name’s Mike.”
“We are Edward and Francis.”
“No, you’re not,” Mike said positively. “Those are your cover names. People from the future aren’t named Edward and Francis.”
The Troll frowned ferociously—then sighed and relaxed to the inevitable. “Hello, Mike. I am Hormat.”
“Durl I am,” Squinty said, looking more paranoid than ever.
“Hi, fellas,” Mike said. “Welcome to Dreamworld Under.”
“We…go…under the ground?” Durl asked.
An odd little nonverbal communication took place then. This was the first time Durl had put the verb anywhere but at the tail end of his sentence, and something in his voice and expression made Mike realize suddenly that it was a small strain for him. He knew people talked that way here, he must have been briefed, but where he came from (no, when he came from) it must be so odd to speak that way that he felt silly doing it. Mike imagined how he would feel himself if he were someplace where everybody spoke Pig Latin. Sure he could do it…but he’d feel really stupid the first time he tried it, even if everybody else was doing it. In that moment, Durl was vulnerable: Mike could have laughed at him. And their eyes met, and they both knew it.
“Yeah, a couple of levels,” Mike said.
“Thank you,” Durl said.
The moment passed.
“But don’t worry, it’s perfectly safe down here.”
He caught a flicker of expression on Hormat’s face, then, and sensed that he’d made some kind of small blunder. He’d revealed ignorance of something Hormat had thought he knew. He thought about it. He had expected the Trolls to find being underground a little scary. He should instead have expected the Trolls to find being underground reassuring. What did that tell him?
Nothing—and he was busy. “Excuse me,” he said, “I’ve gotta call Annie.” He put his Band to his mouth. “Do you read? Over.”
To his relief, she responded almost instantly. “Roger. Report.”
“I’m with my two. Two of Conw—of that guy’s goons tried to jump them in the Fields. I put Security on them and we got clear.”
“Jesus.”
“It’s okay, I tell you. There was no fuss. We’re Under. I’m taking them to where we met those other guys before. Can you meet me there?”
“That’s brilliant, lad. Yes, I can.”
“How did you make out?” he asked her.
“Not as well as you. There were three goons after my pair. I managed to neutralize all three—but I lost my quarry in the confusion.”
The elevator was slowing. “I gotta go.”
“ETA six minutes,” she said, and the Band went silent just as the elevator opened.
The trip went without incident. They passed only one other employee, who spent too much of his brief glimpse marveling at Hormat’s astonishing ugliness to notice how young Mike looked for a maintenance man. Mike spent part of the time savoring the word Annie had used. “Brilliant.” Secretly he didn’t see what had been so brilliant. He’d needed a place where they could all be alone and talk in safety and privacy—and of course he dared not take the enormous risk of letting the time-travelers know just where he and Annie lived, or the secondary risk that they might be followed there by more of Conway’s thugs. The underground vehicle depot was the only handy place he could think of that would serve. But if Annie thought it an inspired choice, who was he to argue?
THEY HAD TO briefly go above ground again, to get to the stairway that was the only practical entry to the garage. Mike looked around carefully during the brief interval of exposure, but saw no one who was paying the slightest bit of attention to them. Not surprising
: Firefall was in progress, and everyone was looking up. He yearned to stop and watch it himself. Nonetheless, he felt safer when the stairwell door closed behind them, and they were Under again.
He was also a little relieved that neither Hormat nor Durl had taken the opportunity to try and bail on him. For the life of him he couldn’t imagine how he might have stopped them if they had—he wouldn’t have dared to so much as yell after them as they faded into the crowd.
The garage was empty of thugs this time. The thought made Mike squirm just a little inside. Everything that was about to happen now would depend on convincing these time-travelers that he and Annie were the Good Guys…and here he was only meters from the very spot where he had almost shot a man, and where Annie had beaten and humiliated the guy.
He went over and checked, and the grille he’d used to enter the room the last time was still the way he’d left it: in place, but with its fastening screws missing. Good to know there was an escape hatch in case of need. When he turned around, the two Trolls were walking down the middle of the vast room, staring around as though it were interesting. They seemed to be muttering to each other under their breath. He had the odd idea that there was something odd about them, something strange about the way they walked, but he couldn’t figure out what. Trolls always walked funny.
Mike studied the available vehicles, picked out a huge Glory Road float from Heinlein’s Worlds that had three seats up front to accommodate the performers who played Scar, Star, and Rufo. He went to it, climbed up into Scar’s seat, and waved the Trolls over to join him. After some hesitation, they did. Hormat chose Star’s seat in the center, and Durl took Rufo’s chair at Star’s left hand.
“So,” Mike said, “what year are you guys from?”
Durl made a strangled little groaning sound.
“We do not use your numbering system—,” Hormat began.
“Of course not,” Mike said, “but you must know. Jeez tell me how many years you came back and I’ll do the math myself.”
Hormat sighed. “We will not reveal that information.”
Mike nodded philosophically. “Yeah, that’s what I thought you’d say. You’ve got to avoid paradox.”
Hormat’s eyes narrowed, and Durl made another of those little gargling sounds. “The danger you understand?” Durl said.
Mike rolled his eyes and grimaced. “No. I’m like totally four-oh-four, and I want you to tell me which stocks are gonna go up next week so I can be the first child billionaire.” He saw their expressions. “Jesus, don’t they have sarcasm in your time? I know all about time paradox, nimrods! For your information, I’ve been reading science fiction since I was a little kid.”
This time there was nothing strangled about Durl’s groan: he just let it out. Hormat coughed into his hand suddenly and got all red in the face.
“Why us?” Durl moaned. “The worst possible—”
“Who were those two men,” Hormat interrupted. “Why were they trying to capture us?”
Just then footsteps sounded in the stairwell. Durl sprang to his feet and jumped down to the ground, then stood uncertain which way to flee. Hormat didn’t appear to move, but suddenly he was alert as a cat. Mike had been expecting footsteps, but his heart hammered nonetheless. Were these the right footsteps?
“It’s me,” his wristband said, and he let out his breath.
“Relax, guys,” he told his guests. “It’s Annie.”
They did not relax until she appeared alone in the doorway, and didn’t relax very far even then. They watched her very carefully as she approached.
Mike got down from his seat and waved Annie to take it, rolling a nearby battery-charging unit over to the float and perching on that. As she passed him, she caught his eye and slipped him a wink. Durl waited until she was seated before reseating himself.
Mike was terribly relieved to have Annie with him again. He had been doing a solo for too long, juggling heavy responsibility with no backup. Just the sight of her serenely twinkling eyes was enough to begin unknotting the muscles at the base of his neck. “Hormat and Durl,” he said, pointing out each as he named them, “this is my friend Annie.”
Somehow the way she was sitting made Mike think of a queen. She inclined her head to each of the Trolls in turn. “Hormat, Durl, I bid you welcome. Welcome to 2023, welcome to Dreamworld, and welcome to Dreamworld Under, my home.” She offered her hand.
Durl began to speak, but Hormat restrained him with a glance, took her hand, and clasped it formally. “Thank you, Annie.” Mike noticed he had begun to sit up straighter himself as soon as Annie had started speaking. “We are pleased to be here, but regret that our time is short. If you permit, let us speak at once of urgent matters. There are things my friend and I must know.”
She released his hand and nodded. “Of course, Hormat,” she said imperturbably. “What things?”
The Troll closed his eyes a moment in thought. He was much uglier with his eyes closed; something about them helped take a little of the sting off, it seemed to Mike.
“First,” he said, “do you understand the danger, if what we are were to become public knowledge?”
“Or even private knowledge,” Durl couldn’t resist adding.
Annie looked grave. “I do. All of history, perhaps all of reality, is at stake. Forgive me if I say that I suspect I may understand the danger better than you. In your place I don’t know that I would have made the trip.”
Hormat and Durl exchanged a glance. Mike couldn’t read it.
“You said time is short,” she reminded them. “Can you prioritize the rest of your questions?”
Hormat turned back to her and nodded. He closed his eyes again. “How many know about us?” he began slowly. “How do you know about us? Who are those others who stalked us? What do they know? What do they want?” He opened his eyes. “Who are you, and Mike? What is your position here at Dreamworld? What do you want?”
Mike realized Hormat thought he and Annie really worked here, on the Dreamworld Staff, and he did his best to keep his face blank.
“Is that everything?” Annie asked.
Hormat gestured Durl into silence. “The important ones,” he agreed, and seemed to inspect one of his fingernails. Mike saw that there was a little digital display on his fingertip. “And I hope you can answer them all in fourteen minutes, for we must leave by then.”
“That will depend on how much of those fourteen minutes get used up first in answering my questions,” Annie said.
Hormat’s face did not fall, having nowhere to fall. But he looked unhappy. Durl’s squint became pronounced enough that he appeared to be trying to retract his nose. “Please list them,” Hormat said.
“I already tried asking them what year they’re from,” Mike said. “They won’t say.” He half expected to be glared at for interrupting the grown-ups’ palaver, but he’d felt she needed the information.
Annie apparently did not classify him as a child. “Thank you, Mike,” she said politely. “But that would not have been on my list. I can’t think of any good it would do me to know that.”
Hormat looked mildly surprised.
“My list is much shorter,” she told him. “I have only two questions for now.” She held up a finger. “One: what is wrong with you?” She held up a second finger beside the first. “And two: what is wrong with you?” Both fingers went down. “If you don’t mind my asking.”
The two Trolls exchanged a long glance. Finally Hormat shrugged and turned back to Annie. “I do not understand your question…or questions. Can you expand them?”
Annie nodded with grave dignity. “Certainly. First, what is wrong with you two—physically? Are you ill?”
For a moment Mike still didn’t get it, couldn’t see what she was talking about. And then all of a sudden he remembered his earlier, half-grasped intuition that there was something elusively wrong with the way Hormat and Durl walked, and understood what it was.
Trolls always walked funny. That was how you cou
ld tell them from Dwarves, even at a distance. They walked in a heavy slow shamble, bent-backed and weary, shoulders bowed and arms swinging of their own weight, like bears just awakened from hibernation and beginning to think about breakfast. They walked funny, and they moved ponderously, as if each move cost them an effort. That was the proper way to walk, if you were in character as a Troll.
But Hormat and Durl had walked and acted that way even after they were Under—even after they reached the garage, where there was no one to see them. Mike himself had stopped projecting I am a grown-up midget maintenance man the moment they’d arrived, without even thinking about it. But now that Annie called his attention to it, the Trolls, even sitting still, looked old, somehow…or sick…or maybe just very tired.
Even as Mike was grasping that, Hormat answered stiffly, “And your second question?”
“Is more general,” Annie went on. “It applies not just to you two but to all of your companions, and I don’t believe I can make it any clearer than that. Perhaps emphasis would be of some help.” Suddenly she was roaring at the top of her voice. “What the hell is wrong with you idiots?”
Each Troll, on either side of her, recoiled slightly from the whiplash of her voice. Mike flinched, too.
Annie spoke directly to Hormat. “You have risked every hope and dream there ever was or ever can be; you are gambling with a universe—with my universe—and you have the colossal effrontery to ask me if I understand the dangers? Ever since I learned what you are, I have racked my brains, trying to conceive of any possible purpose you might have that could justify such a monstrous irresponsibility, such criminal optimism, and I come up with nothing. I think there is no sane purpose for time-travel. I think you are all either nitwits or fanatics, and I am asking you which.”
Durl’s face had gone pale as she spoke, but Hormat’s had reddened; by now he was purple. He opened his mouth to speak.
Annie interrupted him. “I warn you in advance, if I don’t get an answer that satisfies me, I’m going to stop you. I’ll screw up your whole operation and send you all back home.”
The Free Lunch Page 13