The Shores Beyond Time

by Kevin Emerson

  So, what was he sorry for? Time traveling? No, maybe it was something else. . . .

  “I’m sorry you’ve had to feel that way, and that I never saw it,” Liam said. Phoebe bit her lip and openly sobbed, and Liam felt something open up inside him, like a massive tunnel, winds yawning into its darkness. This feeling that had been with Liam since they’d arrived here, the emptiness and fear of an utter unknown. . . .

  Phoebe had been feeling it all along.

  Liam dragged himself out of the pod, his limbs made of lead, and put an arm on her shoulder. When she didn’t shove him away, he carefully leaned over and hugged her. The bristles on her face rubbed against his shoulder.

  After a silent moment, he pulled back. Phoebe sniffed and glanced at the door. “What time is it?”

  “On the link? Just after noon.”

  Her gaze remained on the door. “How long after? Like, the exact time.”

  Liam checked it. “It’s twelve twenty-seven.”

  Phoebe nodded. “Do you know what I trust?” she said, wiping at her eyes and nose.

  “What?”

  She locked eyes with him. “Us. Even if you are being a jerk.”

  “I’m really sorry. I should have told you about the traveling from the beginning, or not gone at all.”

  “You should have trusted me enough to tell me about your fear, rather than hiding it.”

  Liam wondered if she was right. At least telling her might have made him feel less lonely.

  “There’s something else,” said Liam.

  Phoebe eyed him. “Uh-huh.”

  Liam hesitated—no, if he trusted her, then . . . “She—I mean, it’s been talking to me.”

  “You mean . . . Dark Star? It’s a she?”

  “It looks like a girl when it visits me. Her name is Iris.”

  “Iris.”

  “Dark Star’s mainframe computer. She’s always there when I step into the timestream, when I travel. She . . . All right, I know this is going to sound crazy, but she encourages me to work on seeing more dimensions. She says there’s a higher state of being for us.”

  “For you.”

  “For people.”

  “People including Telphons?”

  “I think so?”

  “Well, the time-traveling, mind-reading computer hasn’t talked to me. That’s what happened in the control room, isn’t it. Why Dark Star changed the supernova.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And why you’ve been sort of open to what the captain’s been saying.”

  “I don’t trust him,” said Liam, “but I think he might be right about Dark Star’s intentions. Or, at least that they’re not, like, bad.”

  “But how can you be sure? That thing creates entire universes. It might be from another universe. How can you possibly know what it really wants?”

  “It’s just a feeling. Like she cares about us.” Liam had said us, and yet what he’d first thought was me. Iris only ever talked about him, specifically. But if she cared about him, didn’t it stand to reason that she cared about his people, too? And Phoebe was one of his people.

  “So you trust her.”

  “Honestly? Yeah, I do. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, I just didn’t know . . .”

  Phoebe shook her head. “More like you wanted to know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You wanted to learn more about these time-travel things that are happening to you. I get that. You probably figured if you told me, I’d talk you out of it.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Well, you would have been mostly right, but a little bit wrong. Have you asked your new computer friend if she can get us back to our families?”

  “She says we need to be patient. That once more of her systems are online, she’s got something to show us.”

  Phoebe frowned. “So she wants us to wait. Captain wants us to wait. Meanwhile, who knows whether our people have started trying to kill each other again.”

  “If she can move that portal anywhere in space-time, we might not actually be losing any time here.”

  “Maybe. Have you asked her about doing that?”

  “Not exactly,” said Liam. “It’s been confusing.”

  Phoebe glanced at the compartment door again. “What time is it now?”

  “It’s only been like a minute—”

  “Check.”

  “Four twenty-nine,” said Liam. “And a half.”

  “Good.”

  “Why?”

  A slight smile seemed to come to Phoebe’s face. “Do you remember when we were at the chronologist’s office? She said you were starting to experience time differently?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, not all of us can just move around through time wherever we want, but you’re not the only one she was talking about.”

  There was a knock at the door. Three gentle taps.

  Phoebe slid off the desk and knocked back.

  “Who is—”

  Liam heard a strange hum, and orange light flashed from the controls. The door slid open, revealing the tall, narrow silhouette of the chronologist.

  “Hello,” he said to Phoebe. “Is now a good time?”

  10

  TIME TO DARK STAR FUNCTIONALITY: 11H:05M

  “Thanks for coming,” Phoebe said to the chronologist.

  “It is my pleasure,” he replied, his large pearlescent eyes blinking.

  “Wait,” said Liam. “When did you two talk?”

  “Back in the control room,” said the chronologist. “I introduced myself from a slightly lateral position in space-time, so that only Phoebe could hear me.”

  “That thing you described,” Phoebe said to Liam, “about pushing out of the moment? I can’t do even close to what you do, but I can seem to . . . I don’t know how to describe it . . . turn my head, I guess? And I can see this weird blur behind me, like a tunnel almost.”

  Liam’s eyes widened, and he couldn’t help smiling. “That’s your timestream. You can see it too!”

  “But only barely. And it’s really disorienting. Whenever I do it, I feel like I’m floating in zero gravity. But the chronologist was able to get my attention, and I was able to sort of turn around and talk to him for a minute.”

  “I would have said hello to you, too,” the chronologist said to Liam, “but you were busy having a conversation with that computer.”

  “Oh,” said Liam.

  “Guess you weren’t as sneaky as you thought,” Phoebe remarked, but she smiled.

  “I am not sure that speaking to the mainframe is the wisest course of action,” the chronologist added.

  Liam just shrugged. “So you guys set up this meeting?”

  “I asked him to come find us when it was safe for him to do so. We picked this time, but it was just a best guess.”

  “If I had arrived and found you with one of the crew, I would have had to improvise, which is not our strong suit,” said the chronologist, “but luckily that was not necessary.”

  “I thought you guys didn’t believe in luck,” said Liam.

  “We don’t.” The chronologist seemed to smile. “So, shall we?”

  “Let’s do it,” said Phoebe.

  “Do what?” Liam asked.

  “We’re going back to Dark Star to investigate. On our own. Or better yet, we’re getting out of here entirely.”

  “What if they figure out that we left?” said Liam. He glanced out into the core.

  “That’s funny, coming from someone who keeps leaving,” said Phoebe. “But we still have a half hour until Kyla comes back, and we have a time-traveling professional with us.” She indicated the chronologist.

  “But you don’t have your watch,” said Liam.

  “Neither do you,” he replied. “I can still move in four dimensions. The watch is nothing more than a tool we created to make travel more precise and efficient, especially over long distances, like between galaxies. Moving through this small sector of space-time is simple.”
>
  “What do you mean get out of here?” Liam asked Phoebe.

  “I thought we could find the hangar where Kyla said they got their Dark Star ship and see if there’s another one that we can use. Kyla said they don’t have a long range, but we could at least fly through the portal when the fuel ships come back. Once we’re on the other side . . . well, I’m not sure about that part. If the fleet is too far away . . . can you get us back to them?” she asked the chronologist.

  “Actually, I cannot. At least, not now.” The chronologist folded his hands together. For a moment they blurred, and then he opened them, revealing an orange crystal sphere, like the one Liam had found on Mars. “I have been hiding this a few moments back in time, to avoid the captain taking it. I am currently running multiple scans of Dark Star, and I cannot risk those scans being interrupted or worse, corrupted, by the high-energy trip through the portal.”

  “I thought you didn’t even want to be here,” said Phoebe.

  “I did not want to be taken somewhere against my will. And yet, now that I am here, I am presented with the possibility of finding answers to what has been a long and important inquiry by my colleagues. I need to figure out everything I can about this place. But, all that said, I am happy to bring you over to Dark Star and help you cross the portal.”

  Phoebe turned to Liam. “Can you get us back from there?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Liam. “It’s one thing to travel in my timestream, even to push away from it a little ways. But to get the two of us to the Scorpius, like physically? I mean, I could try, but it’s a long way.”

  “Well,” said Phoebe, “we could at least get our families a message, right? About where to find us.”

  Liam bit his lip.

  “What?” said Phoebe.

  “I kinda already did that. Remember before, when I talked to Iris about changing the portal position?” Liam explained about visiting Mina and relaying the information about the supernova.

  “I suspected you were involved in that space-time alteration,” said the chronologist.

  “Technically, Iris did it, not me.”

  The chronologist cocked his head.

  “I know,” said Phoebe. “Isn’t that a cute name for a world-destroying computer?”

  World creating, Liam almost said, but Phoebe did have a point.

  “So you already told your sister where to find us?” said Phoebe.

  “No, I told them to get away. Because of the rifting.”

  Phoebe threw up her hands. “Why didn’t you also tell them where to find us? Was it because you didn’t want to be interrupted while you were flirting with Iris?”

  “I’m not flirting. . . .”

  Phoebe looked around and lowered her voice. “It doesn’t matter. But that means you could go again, and this time tell them where we are.”

  “It might work, if they’re not too far.”

  “If we cross the portal like I’m saying, that will put you closer.”

  “True.” A new thought flashed through Liam’s mind: Would Iris want him leaving, even briefly? And was it wise to upset a multidimensional artificial intelligence? Except she said she wanted what was best for him, and clearly this was. . . .

  Liam pushed back slightly from the moment: Iris? No response. She had said she’d be busy.

  As he returned, he found the chronologist watching him. “I would advise against forging any relationships or pacts with such an advanced intelligence until we know more about its true nature and intent.”

  “Did you just travel again?” said Phoebe.

  “I was just seeing if she was around,” said Liam, his tone edged with frustration. “She’s the one who controls the portal, so it would make things easier if she helped us, right?” They both kept looking at him. “Well, she wasn’t around anyway, so it doesn’t matter.”

  “We should go,” said the chronologist. “I believe it’s best if we explore starting right after Kyla and Jordy brought me to my holding cell. Once they bring the two of you back over here, we will have only the captain to avoid.”

  “How do we come with you?” said Phoebe.

  “According to the long count, you two invented something called the hug function.”

  Liam felt his face reddening. “Oh, yeah.”

  “Come on.” Phoebe put an arm around the chronologist and pulled Liam close. Liam leaned into the tall being’s robes—they were smooth and smelled something like mint—and joined hands with Phoebe.

  The chronologist tapped his orange crystal. There was a pull and a rush of wind, a feeling of floating and separating—and then they were standing on solid ground again, surrounded by the smoky glass walls of a Dark Star corridor. Liam saw the chronologist—his past self—walking ahead of them, with Jordy in front of him.

  “Quick.” The chronologist shuffled sideways, and Liam and Phoebe stumbled to stay with him. They moved into the shadow of a branching corridor just as Kyla rounded a bend behind them. They had arrived in the briefest moment when Kyla had been out of sight, and they held their breaths as she passed.

  The chronologist motioned for them to follow him farther down the corridor, his many legs clacking lightly on the glassy floor. He led them through a series of hallways and then paused just before the entrance to the domed control room they’d been in earlier.

  There was Barrie speaking to Liam’s and Phoebe’s earlier selves, the maps of multiple universes spinning overhead. The scene made Liam feel dizzy.

  “I wonder if we were meant to find it . . . ,” he heard Barrie saying.

  “Stay back,” cautioned the chronologist.

  Liam sank into the shadow. Soon Jordy and Kyla returned from another corridor and escorted Liam and Phoebe out.

  Liam and Phoebe watched as Captain Barrie stood alone in the domed room. He had moved over to the collection of floating spheres, rotating them this way and that. He paused, turning toward the view of the eerie green nebula, the curved, hulking shadows of the Dark Star arms. There was a rumble through the walls, probably the ship with Liam and Phoebe in it returning to the Artemis. Barrie produced what looked like a small paper notebook. He flipped through it, ran his finger along a page, then strode out of the room through a passageway in the far corner.

  Once he was gone, the three crept out into the domed space.

  “Can you find out where the hangar is located?” Phoebe asked.

  “I believe so. First there is something I’d like to study a bit more closely.” The chronologist moved into the center of the space, surrounded by the floating universe bubbles, and held up his orange crystal. He aimed it at one map, then another, consulted it again. “I think I understand how this works.” He made a wide, swiping motion, and the maps filled the dome above them. The chronologist gazed upward, waving his crystal in one direction, then the other. “Fascinating.”

  “Is it weird to you that this machine made us?” Liam asked. “Made you?”

  “The question of how our universe came to be has never been of particular relevance to us. After all, it has little bearing on how we actually live. What is more of a cause for concern is that none of my colleagues, nor I, had any idea that this place existed, nor in fact that its existence was even possible. We have all seen forward and backward in time; indeed, many of us have traveled to the beginning and the probable end of the universe. In all that study, there has been no mention of this machine whatsoever. And yet there is something even more curious than that. . . .”

  “What?”

  The chronologist consulted his crystal again. “Since my arrival, my future has ceased to be visible to me. That is unprecedented. I do not know how it can be possible.”

  “Iris told me”—Liam caught Phoebe eyeing him—“I mean, Dark Star’s mainframe said it’s because as she powers up, her systems create interference. Do you think that’s it?”

  “I am not sure.”

  “You saw the future of our families, back at Centauri,” said Phoebe.

  “Yes, I
can still perceive the future in our universe. It is only my specific view of any future that pertains to this place or those of us who are here that I cannot see.” The chronologist consulted his crystal for a long moment, its orange light flashing in his pearlescent eyes. “I will need to collect more information,” he finally said, and lifted his gaze to the maps.

  Liam suspected that his pause said something as well, but he wasn’t sure what. “What are you looking for in those?” he asked instead.

  “I’m studying the coding,” said the chronologist, “in order to ascertain what Dark Star might be working toward.” A section of the map blinked and changed into a square of streaming symbols. “Okay,” said the chronologist, “here is something: Dark Star is currently running a routine called ‘Operation Forty-Eight.’ It’s a base function of the system, but it has recently become the primary task, using a majority of processing power. It seems to have been reprioritized when . . . well, exactly when you two arrived.”

  “What is it?” Phoebe asked.

  The chronologist tapped the crystal, aimed it at the code, then frowned. “I cannot access those logs. Has it said anything to you about this, Liam?”

  “Not really,” he said. “Just that she has something she’s going to show us when it’s ready.” Something she can’t wait to share. “She said it would allow me to see my future again.”

  “Whatever Operation Forty-Eight is, it’s seventy-one percent complete.”

  “Can we look for a ship now?” said Phoebe. “Unlike you two, none of this is making me feel any better about staying here.”

  “Yes.” The chronologist brought his hands together, and the map of universes shrank down to a ring around him. He continued peering at the bubble that represented their universe.

  “What?” said Liam.

  “It is another curiosity: this portal has been in our universe for billions of years—I would guess since its very beginning—and yet my colleagues and I did not notice its presence until just recently—indeed, until you two found it. Nor had we seen it in our futures; in fact, just as I cannot see forward from here, I never saw any of these moments we are currently experiencing. And then, when we found the portal, we came to the conclusion that we could not pass through it, and yet here I am. These sorts of perceptive errors are not normal for us, especially when it comes to something as big, and as threatening to the universe, as this. It’s almost as if the portal, and by extension this place, were somehow hidden in plain sight. I do not know how this could be. Perhaps because our four-dimensional perception is based on the physical laws of our universe, it doesn’t extend into others, including the one we’re in now. But these moments I am experiencing, as well as the ones I will soon experience, are still a part of my timeline, and I should therefore be able to view them.” The chronologist seemed to laugh to himself.