Anvil of Fate (Meridian Series)

by John Schettler

  Maeve breathed deeply. “One of two things could happen,” she said. “If we are indeed essential imperatives to the discovery of Time travel, then Time must find some way to preserve us. But given the enormity of the transformation that will occur after Tours—no America, no San Francisco, no Lawrence Berkeley Labs—I find it difficult to imagine how Paradox could give us a pass here. What, would we just be standing here in the transformed city after the Heisenberg Wave passes us? What would we be wearing? Levis? Calvin Klein? Van Heusen? Geoffrey Beene?” She pointed at them, one after another. “I don’t see how it would be possible. The change is too dramatic.”

  “And the second outcome?” Nordhausen leaned heavily on the console table. His brow furrowed, eyes hard and set.

  “Well,” said Maeve flatly. “If Columbus doesn’t discover the New World, it’s clear that someone else does.”

  “A Moroccan Berber,” said Kelly.

  They all took her point. But Nordhausen still held forth with a hint of protest in his voice. “See here. You mean to say that we’re replaced by other founders in the altered Meridian? We just become insignificant nobodies in the flux of Time?”

  “I’m nobody. Who are you?” said Maeve.

  “Are you nobody too?” Kelly finished.

  Nordhausen folded his arms unhappily. Now he looked at Paul, hoping he would elucidate some aspect of the physics of Time travel that would make this outcome impossible. The thought that he had been indispensible, a First Cause and Founder, had been a comforting shield to him through the trials of all these recent months. For the first time the renewed appreciation of his mortality yawned in his soul again. It was a humbling feeling of vulnerability, and he could see it growing in the eyes of Kelly and Maeve as well.

  “Paul?” he said, the unanswered question dangling like a loose shirttail.

  Paul sighed. The weariness of the hour weighed heavily on them all. “Technically,” he began, “what Maeve says is theoretically possible. Many major breakthroughs had instances where there were concurrent discoveries and development of the technology that resulted—the discovery of the atomic bomb being one example.” He could see a deflated look settling over them. “But there’s a third possibility,” he said with a note determination.

  Nordhausen perked up. Maeve cocked her head to one side, hoping Paul’s next argument would also stand the test of her own judgment.

  “Well,” said Nordhausen impatiently. “What is it, man? Out with it!”

  “It’s obvious,” said Paul. “They fail at Tours. Their intervention does not succeed. The Grand Transformation is averted. There is no Heisenberg Wave, and when the Nexus dissipates all is well, because we find a way, here and now, to stop them.”

  The silence was palpable. Then Kelly started typing again. “I’ll bring up everything I can on the battle,” he said. “Something tells me the Pushpoint is there.”

  “Good call,” said Paul, already heading for the door. “I’m going down to the garage to siphon that fuel we may need for the backup generators. Robert, you can still read the damn hieroglyphics, right? So get with Maeve and see what you can dig up in the history about that stela. And would somebody please make some more coffee?” Paul was through the door and down the steps.

  “We’ll need to look at data from this Meridian,” said Maeve—the Prime Meridian. It’s the only place we’ll find anything on the stela unearthed at Rosetta. It never existed in the pre-Palma time line. Kelly, is there a way to filter this resonance Paul is talking about and isolate information to a given Meridian?”

  “Well it’s all one big duck soup,” said Kelly. “I can’t focus on one potential Meridian or another. But if the information is in the soup somewhere I can program a special search.”

  “Please,” said Maeve.

  “They would have made rubbing of the stone immediately after its discovery,” said Nordhausen, “just like the Assassins were doing with their messengers. So I’ll bet there’s an image of this stone, or some copy of the hieroglyphics that appeared on it somewhere in the data. Let’s start with that.”

  Maeve was already at a workstation, rapidly typing in queries as Kelly fine tuned the search algorithms. “Right again, professor,” she smiled. “Here’s a nice photo of the stela.”

  “See if you can get something closer…There, that image looks promising.” They were staring at a photo of the massive slab of stone, elegantly carved with the artistic hieroglyphs. The professor leaned in, squinting at the images on the screen. “That’s it,” he said pointing. “There at the top. I remember the translation… ‘Through the ages now he comes to a mystery: one death gives birth, a great wind upon the face of the sea, in a place forever hidden where the lions roar: ‘mine is yesterday, and I know tomorrow.’… it’s speaking about Kelly. His was the life that was to be sacrificed, or rather exiled to a distant and lost past. His was yesterday, but indeed, he knew tomorrow.”

  He ran his finger further down the image on the screen, whispering under his breath as he did so, sounding out the Hieroglyphics in his mind.

  “Now we get to the heart of it,” said Nordhausen. “Look here…’stirrings of unrest …Heed them not, or the mighty host flees before the enemy, and many will die.‘ There’s a break here… Then it reads: ‘Plunder taken… the road becomes the path of Martyrs. For he who would be slain must live…’ That’s not history,” Nordhausen shook his head. “That’s a damn warning! It’s telling them not to heed the distraction Charles created in the rear areas! It’s a clear warning that their booty becomes the source of their defeat.”

  “He who would be slain?”

  “Probably Abdul Rahman,” said Robert.

  “What more?” asked Maeve. “Can you read this line?”

  The professor ran his finger along the Hieroglyphics. “The weave undone… A loose twine… where horses were brought to gather…”

  “That’s sounds interesting,” said Maeve. “The weave undone? A loose twine?”

  “Where horses were brought to gather. Perhaps that means together” said Nordhausen. “Ah! Paul said this is primarily a cavalry army. They had been raiding hither, thither and yon with their light Berber horsemen. Abdul Rahman held the heavy horsemen close as his main force. But there were six days of raids and skirmishes back and forth before the main battle while he wisely gathered in all his other columns. Here, in this other source it reads: ’for six days each side had tormented the other, they finally arrayed themselves in battle lines and fought fiercely.’“

  “So both sides must have been jumpy, which is why we get this admonishment not to heed the disruption of the camp in the heat of battle….But that bit about the twine?”

  “I have no idea… Remember that this stela was presumably sited in Sais, the home of the cult worshiping Neith, the weaver of days by some interpretations. Could that bit about the twine be metaphorical?”

  “There’s more on the stela.”

  Nordhausen continued translating. “Hold them fast… those who drink the wind… lest they trample thy endeavor and the host is made to flee…” It breaks off there,” he said. “But the next time the cartouche appears it says this: “For the unseen one that comes in the dusk shall unseat all....”

  “That’s all,” he said. “There’s nothing more. And it’s clearly another warning. What do you make of it?”

  Maeve sighed. “It’s fairly obtuse,” she said. “Maybe you’re correct in assuming it’s metaphorical, but what could it be referring to?”

  “Very strange,” said Nordhausen. “What would they do with all these cryptic phrases? I don’t see how this information could be instructions on how they must act.”

  “It’s cryptic to us,” said Maeve, “but it’s a code, Robert. They may know exactly what each of those phrases refer to. Remember all the cryptic phrases the BBC was broadcasting to the French underground prior to the D-Day invasion? They were perplexing to the Germans, but made perfect sense to the intended recipients.”

  Robert n
odded, conceding the point. “And this is odd. That phrase, those who drink the wind, is associated with this cartouche. It’s a royal name, or at least it is being used to confer special status to the named person. If it was phonetic it would read Ke-hai-lan. I’m not familiar with any Egyptian deity by that name, or Pharaoh either.”

  “Well it’s probably referring to a person from the 8th century then. Perhaps one of the Arab generals or leaders?” Maeve was trawling for anything she could find.

  “Hold on a second….” The professor was scouring the image of the stone, noting any instance of that cartouche. “Yes,” he said. “Every time it appears it is accompanied by this determinative figure of a horse.”

  “A horse?” Maeve was struck by that, a gleam of recognition in her eye. “Could it read—“

  At that moment there was a shudder throughout the building, and the sound of an explosion. They looked up at the overhead lighting as it fluttered, then dimmed, then went out altogether. The room was bathed in red emergency lighting now.

  “Power outage!” Kelly shouted. “I’m firing up the number one generator!” He flipped a switch and they could hear a turbine rolling over with a distant wine, somewhere far below them.

  “We’re off the grid,” said Kelly, watching the levels closely. The Arch spin-flux integrity had slipped to 45%, and it was still falling. “Come on, baby. What’s taking the auxiliary turbine so long?” The power level was falling, down to 41% now, but then it stabilized and began to climb. “That’s better,” Kelly breathed. “It’s a good thing we had it at 50%. That 10% buffer saved us. You can’t maintain a Nexus Point with less than 40% on the spin.”

  The red emergency lab lights winked off and the overheads came back on. “I’ll take it back to 50%,” said Kelly. “Hope that didn’t affect the Nexus field much. I better give Paul a call.”

  A moment later he was on the lab intercom system. Paul was down in the garage, just finishing up filling three fuel jugs with gasoline he had siphoned from the cars. He swore loudly when the power fluctuated, then the garage was suddenly plunged into darkness. A queasy feeling came over him, and he swayed.

  Off in the distance, near the entrance to the circular ramp that led out to the surface he caught a glimpse of something in the pale emergency lighting. It wavered, then resolved to the form of a hooded man holding a long object in his right hand and slowly advancing, peering intently at him as he took a step forward.

  “Who’s there?” he said, leaning heavily on his Honda for support. But when he looked again the figure was gone. “Guess I’ve been breathing too many gas fumes,” he said aloud to himself, still feeling light headed.

  The lights came back on and he heard Kelly on the intercom: “Hey Pablo, I just had to make a trip to the mound. Went to the bull pen for a setup man. Looks like the grid outside is down, and the number one generator is coming on-line as we speak.”

  Paul went to the nearby wall, toggling the intercom switch. He was very tired. “Good job, Kelly. I’ll be right up...” Then a wave of nausea swept over him and he fell.

  Chapter 9

  Arch Complex, Lawrence Berkeley Labs, Saturday, 4:15 A.M.

  When Paul failed to arrive Kelly went down to the garage level to look for him, finding him sitting on the floor, somewhat dazed. He called up to Robert and Maeve, and they soon had Paul up in the control room, a fresh cup of Peet’s coffee in hand. It was his turn to be swaddled in a nice warm blanket.

  “I thought I was the one suffering jet lag, Amigo.” Kelly quipped. “What are you trying to pull on us?”

  “It was very odd,” said Paul. “I thought it was the fumes from the gasoline at first, but then I got very light headed.”

  “The Nexus field weakened when we lost primary power,” said Kelly. “It’s very likely that it diminished somewhat, and you may have been dangerously close to the border zone.”

  Paul nodded. “That sounds like a plausible explanation,” he said. “But it was strange… Just after the power went down I thought I saw someone near the entrance ramp to the garage, peering intently at me—in fact, slowly advancing towards me, holding something.”

  “Holding what?” asked Robert.

  “Well… it looked like a sword!”

  They stared at one another, perplexed.

  “What would happen if someone encountered a Nexus Point in the outside world, Paul?” Nordhausen was curious. “What would it look like, a huge shimmering ball of light or something?”

  “Of course not,” said Paul. “We’ve had alerts before, and the Arch was up and running when we arrived here, walking right into the Nexus Point it was generating. So it has no unusual appearance at all. But the longer it stands, the deeper it goes. After a while people on the outside become out of phase with the Time inside the Nexus—or vice versa—so someone from the outside might have no awareness of the four of us, for example. We may be slightly out of phase with the normal vibration of their Time—there, but unseen.”

  “Can someone enter it from the outside? I mean, could a lab tech decide to come to the facility here early and just wander into the Nexus? What if that was a maintenance person holding a mop?”

  “Sure,” said Paul. “Aside from the fact that this portion of the facility is behind a gated security entrance, there’s nothing to stop someone on the outside from coming here. We could come and go, for example, but I don’t advise we try it. The longer you are in a Nexus Point the more out of phase you are with the world outside it. That’s what causes the odd dissonance when you first cross the border. You have to re-phase with Time and the dissonance can be fairly debilitating, as I can attest!” ”

  “So the Assassins could just rush in here and put us all to the sword?” Nordhausen was still digging.

  “If they could see us,” said Paul, recalling the vision he had perceived. “My guess is that Time has a way of dissuading them because a Nexus Point is protected from the effects of causality. It’s like a Time out, to turn a phrase nicely, or a kind of neutral zone. Who really knows? If this is correct the Assassins know it would be foolish to try what you propose. And, well, we’re still here, so we might be out of phase in here, and therefore protected by other means as well. They could walk in and yet be unable to even see us!”

  “Then who was that down in the garage?” The professor finally got to his point. “You say it appeared as if he was looking at you, coming toward you, as if aware of your presence?”

  “What Kelly just said is very likely the culprit,” said Paul. “The Nexus probably contracted slightly with the power outage. I must have still been inside, but very near the border, and it was a near run thing. Perhaps I was right at the edge. In such an instance I might have started to re-phase with the outside Meridian and become vulnerable to causality, if only for a brief moment. Yes,” he concluded. “Whoever it was seemed as surprised to see me as I was to see them.”

  “Someone with a sword?” Maeve had a dubious look on her face? “How likely is that in the Berkeley Hills at four in the morning?”

  “The Fedayeen commandos!” said Nordhausen, half jokingly.

  Paul raised an eyebrow, and gave him a serious look. “That may not be as far-fetched as it sounds,” he said. “Remember, this could be the only functioning Arch outside the control of the Assassins at the moment. They certainly know that, and I’m willing to bet they also know Kelly is missing from his exile at the edge of the Nile, ten thousand years ago. That means they know we’re up and running some kind of operation, and they also know who we are and what we’re capable of. This is their opus magnum—this operation against the outcome of Tours—and I would not put it past them to send someone here with bad intent.”

  “To assassinate us?” The professor seemed indignant.

  “We thought that impossible before,” said Paul, “but the fact that they might yet discover Time travel on their own if this operation succeeds makes us fair game. What was it De Gaulle said? Graveyards are full of indispensable men. You said it yoursel
f, Robert. They should have cut my head off when they had me at Castle Masyaf, and perhaps the Sami was intending exactly that. They have shown great respect and an unwillingness to do any harm to fellow Walkers, as they call us Time travelers, but that may have changed given the importance of this operation. The Battle of Tours causes such a radical transformation that even we, the Founders, become expendable as far as Time is concerned. The Golems clearly indicate the overwhelming possibility of a Meridian forming where our lives would most likely be extinguished, as if we’d never been born.”

  “But only if the transformation occurs,” said Maeve.

  “Correct,” Paul agreed. “Yet LeGrand taught us that both sides have operatives at key moments in the Time Meridian—agents in place. I wouldn’t put it past them to have agents here, in our time, to keep a watch on what we do.”

  They sat with that for a while. It was the second odd occurrence Paul had experienced that night, the first being the strange specter of Kelly walking through the glass door at the Harney Science Center. What was going on here? Time seemed to be fragmented, losing cohesion in the display of these odd effects.

  Paul took a last sip of his coffee, and looked at the time. He could not think about it any longer. “It’s 4:30!” he complained. “We’re wasting time, not to mention vital fuel stocks. Did you find anything in the research that could lead us to a fulcrum on this event?”

  “We found images of the stone they unearthed at Rosetta,” said Robert. “Thank God the information was still in the soup, as Kelly puts it. I was able to do a rudimentary translation. It contained an obvious warning about the battle, an admonishment for them to gather in all their cavalry and take no heed of the disturbance in the camp.”

  “No,” said Maeve. “I think there was something more there. What was that line again about the wind?”

  “The wind? Let me think. I believe it read: “Hold them fast… those who drink the wind… lest they trample thy endeavor…Or something to that effect.”