Timeslip

by Bruce Stewart

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

  ‘Honest, I’ve discovered some good old Leonard Bernstein in the repertoire. We could have a go at it together.’

  ‘Larry,’ Beth informed him, making sure the patience showed, ‘you must know I’ve got better things to do tonight than listen to music.’

  ‘You’ve always got better things to do.’

  So Liz said brightly, ‘I’ll listen to some music with you tonight, Larry.’

  Larry blinked at her. ‘Liz honey — I didn’t know you cared.’ Then he called to the computer room at large, ‘Hey, what do you know? I finally found me a girl. Be mine, Liz. We’ll make such wonderful music together.’

  He swung her round in a mock Viennese waltz, and Liz screeched delightedly. Beth turned away in a mixture of contempt and uncomplicated bad temper. Light-mindedness, or what she chose to think of as light-mindedness, always filled her with dismay.

  Another spectator to the drollery who didn’t much care for it either was Simon. Even though it was nothing to do with him, since Liz would one day be Beth and that seemed to be effectively that, he still thought people, and especially young girls whose parents were elsewhere, shouldn’t make exhibitions of themselves. Liz had qualities, he reflected soberly, and she should really make the most of them before that dread night came down when she would turn round and find she was Beth. Yet looked at coldly, just like that, the proposition in itself seemed derisory. Liz becoming Beth! The two obviously had so little in common ... A chinking of glass made him look round. Bukov was at a wall cupboard farther over, examining some odd-looking phials. Simon went across.

  ‘What’s that. Doctor Bukov?’

  ‘This, Simon?’ Bukov was holding up the phials one after another, inspecting them closely. ‘Well — this is what you could call our last ditch...’

  ‘Oh,’ said Simon, clearly no wiser.

  ‘We have to provide for every emergency here,’ the Russian went on, ‘and if by any unlikely chance the computer should one day blow up or the reactor fall to pieces, then these little bottles would be our salvation. You must understand they contain ... anti-freeze.’ Simon didn’t know exactly how to take this. But then Bukov’s sharp eye was on him, and he gave a big laugh. ‘Good joke, eh? You see, if everything failed here, we’d ice over. So we’d swallow these, and then manage to survive till help came.’

  ‘Honestly?’ asked Simon, impressed.

  Bukov nodded. ‘Short-term hibernation. We’ve solved the problems of that, yes. But as for long-term hibernation ...’ He sighed, replacing the last bottle and closing the cupboard over. Simon’s curiosity abruptly took another turn.

  ‘There’s so much here to make you think,’ he remarked. ‘This HA57, now — it must be a pretty extraordinary formula.’

  ‘Only the Director knows the secret,’ Bukov grinned, tapping his head significantly. ‘And he keeps it up here in his head, where it can’t go astray.’

  Simon would have had to be a trained diplomatist to have avoided his next question. ‘You mean there’s nothing written down?’ he inquired.

  Turning away to busy himself with other matters, Bukov stopped. He looked back at Simon, the hard look in his eye again — the one that Simon had not observed before. Suddenly a little fearsome, he demanded, ‘Why should you ask a thing like that?’

  ‘Well—’ began Simon, duly rattled.

  ‘You want to know too much. You’re too curious for a boy who’s just a volunteer for an experiment...’ Then, curiously, as though he did not particularly like himself in belligerent mood, he added grudgingly, ‘You can only know this. There’s a testament somewhere. I said we provide for every emergency here. Well, so we do. So if anything were to happen to the Director himself — there’s a testament. The work will always go on, you see, Simon. No matter what. The work matters more than us ...’

  Simon nodded, puzzled at length by this man who seemed at such pains to be kind to him, and yet clearly could be a dangerous adversary if the need arose. A loud buzzer sounded on a computer bastion.

  ‘Come and get it! ’ sang Edith Joynton cheerily.

  ‘Doctor Joynton,’ Beth complained, ‘do you really have to behave on all occasions as though you were calling cowboys home to the ranch for supper?’

  Edith chortled. ‘Don’t mind me, Beth,’ she responded. ‘Rough-as-bags Joynton, they used to call me at International Medical School in Geneva. But I still turned out a better physician and surgeon than most of the smoothies around the place.’

  She had approached the bastion as the buzzer stopped, and now opened a central trap. Two small plastic packages were in evidence, respectively stamped with the names and physical data of Liz and Simon. Edith handed them one each. ‘Open and consume contents,’ she directed. ‘Come back every day at the same time for another delivery, having fed your statistics into the computer at 09.00 as per instructions.’

  Liz and Simon exchanged a nervous glance. Now that it had actually come to it, they wondered what they might be letting themselves in for. Edith chortled again, snapped open their packages for them. Each contained a large red pill.

  ‘Don’t be afraid, my children,’ she encouraged. ‘This is what men have searched for down the centuries. The elixir of life...’

  * * *

  Simon hissed, ‘He’s left his office now.’

  ‘Who’s left his office?’

  ‘The Director, Liz! You remember. Bukov told me there was a testament somewhere. Explaining about the longevity drug. Now if we can only get hold of that for Commander Traynor, we needn’t hang around here any longer.’

  ‘Are you really so anxious to be out of the place?’ asked Liz bleakly.

  It was night, and they were in the Fantasy Room. At the far end, Bukov and Edith were in conversation, laughing and joking. Closer to, Beth sat at a table with Jean, addressing the older woman with great earnestness. It made Liz unhappy. What were they discussing? she wondered. Her? What should be done about her? Or her father, perhaps.

  Yes, that was it. Liz fretted. What was the truth about her father, and why wouldn’t they say? ...

  ‘Now’s the time,’ insisted Simon in the same sibilant tone. ‘They’re all off duty.’

  ‘Look, do I have to?’ complained Liz, annoyed and suddenly a bit bolshie.

  ‘Yes! Unless you’d sooner forget about me and just wait for Larry to take you out dancing.’

  Liz glared at this unpleasant boy. ‘Oh, come on,’ she said blackly.

  There was no one in the corridor, but Simon looked carefully around before leading Liz swiftly to the Director’s door. ‘You wait here,’ he instructed conspiratorially. ‘I’ll go inside and see what I can find. Three loud knocks if anyone’s coming — right?’

  ‘Oh, I get it,’ answered Liz. ‘You have all the fun and I’m Rover the watchdog.’

  ‘Any better suggestions?’ snarled Simon.

  The door was not locked; it had never been a-custom in the ice-box to secure against intruders. Simon gently opened the door and disappeared into the shadows within. The lights were at half-power. Liz sighed and leaned back against the door jamb, preoccupied with her own problems.

  Once inside, Simon realized the dimensions of the task he had set himself. In a sense, it was even ludicrous. Where exactly did he start to look? He tried some drawers; these were hard closed. He moved softly to a filing cabinet against the wall, which opened at a touch; but within, there was just so much material that it seemed unlikely the testament would be kept there. He turned back, and as he did so his eyes fell on the door to the back room. In a flash, it seemed obvious. In there, in the strange darkness of ‘depth-research’ would surely be found all the secrets of the place. He moved to search for the hidden button that opened the door.

  Out in the corridor, Liz was just changing from one foot to the other, when Beth came out of the Fantasy Room and stopped short.

  ‘What are you doing there?’ she asked suspiciously, looking to Liz. ‘Didn’t you hear what I sa
id? What are you doing?’

  It occurred to Liz that sometimes in life occasions will go on conspiring against people, but she reacted to the emergency as she should and turned to rap on the Director’s door. To her alarm, however, Beth was beside her before her knuckles could strike the wood, seizing her arm in a powerful grip. ‘Leave me alone! ’ protested Liz. ‘I wanted to see the Director about something. I was knocking on his door.’ She began to struggle.

  A section of the skirting board snapped back under Simon’s hand; a large white button was revealed. Simon pressed this, there was abruptly a quick humming sound and the door slid back. Within, there was only the blackest of darkness...

  ‘What’s the game?’ cried Beth, retaining her grip on Liz though she writhed like a wild thing. ‘You’re up to something, and I mean to find out what it is.’

  ‘No! I just wanted to see the Director.’

  ‘Beth — what’s the matter?’ They swung round. It was Devereaux, coming out of the computer room. Liz gasped, panic-stricken now. In the event, she lost her head. ‘Simon! ’ she shrieked. ‘Simon! ’

  What happened then was afterwards a bit of a blur. Beth struck her, Liz thought, dragging her bodily aside as Devereaux raced up and plunged into his office. Bukov appeared, apparently having emerged from the Fantasy Room. And from within, out of sight, came the Director’s shout of rage.

  ‘You!’ cried Devereaux, staring at Simon in unbelief. ‘You in here...’

  His eyes blazed. Suddenly and terrifyingly, something seemed to break in him. Before the still-open door to the black back room, Simon had no chance to run before the Director had raced forward and seized him round the throat.

  ‘Prying! No one dares pry into the Director’s affairs ...’ Simon wrenched and tore at the powerful hands. He could no longer breathe and his head was swimming.

  Blindly, he raised a clenched fist to smash it into Devereaux’s face — when all at once, astonishingly, he found he was free. Devereaux still held his hands in the strangling position, but had ceased to apply pressure. He simply stood there, a grim statue, his face a silent mask. His eyes were closed, and to all intents and purposes he had lost consciousness.

  Simon couldn’t understand what had happened. He reeled back, separating himself from his assailant, but nothing seemed to make very much sense. The broad figure of Bukov appeared in the office doorway.

  Director,’ he said. ‘I wondered if—’

  ‘Bukov,’ replied the Director at once. As suddenly as he had lost consciousness, or whatever had happened, he was himself again. ‘Yes. Yes, of course — the very man I wanted to see. That power failure in Section 4 this morning. It was your fault.’

  ‘No, Director.’ Bukov was mystified, but at the same time alert to accusation. ‘I checked the reactor, and—’

  ‘Human error!’ cried Devereaux. ‘You seem to have picked up the germ of carelessness from Larry. Am I never to get true cooperation from my staff in this place? Must I spend all my years bearing the burden of responsibility — alone?’ He moved round behind his desk, and saw Simon. He seemed puzzled for a moment, then asserted himself. ‘That will be all,’ he nodded, and sat down.

  Devereaux plainly had no recollection of Simon’s intrusion into his office, or his attack on him.

  26

  When a shaken Simon and Bukov came back out into the corridor, there was no sign any more of Liz or Beth. Bukov closed the Director’s door, looked to Simon. ‘So,’ he said, ‘what happened?’

  Simon realized he honestly had very little notion. ‘I don’t know,’ he ventured. ‘He — he got his hands round my throat. I thought he was going to kill me.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘He just... let go.’

  Bukov regarded Simon a further moment, then sighed deeply. ‘Simon, if you’re going to meddle in things here, there’s something you’d better understand,’ he said slowly. ‘Professor Devereaux ... isn’t quite like the rest of us in the ice-box.’ Simon was perplexed by this, and couldn’t think of an immediate response. ‘Oh, he’s a brilliant man. The finest scientific brain in the world. But he isn’t a human being as you and I use the term. He’s a new species. Devereaux is different, Simon ... a man of the future.’

  Simon’s eyes widened. The reaction seemed to gratify Bukov, for he came a little closer. Again, without betraying a certain essential reserve, he seemed kindly. ‘Perhaps you’ve a right to know what I mean. Do you know anything about imprint cells?’

  ‘No,’ confessed Simon.

  ‘For a long time it’s been known in biology that you can extract cells from a living person that contain his whole genetic structure. If these cells could then be cultivated, brought to maturity ... the result would be another person, exactly the same as the person the cells first came from. Someone identical.’

  Simon gave a low whistle. But the words came out in a bit of a jumble. ‘You mean — hold on — Devereaux is—-’

  ‘Professor Devereaux is a clone.’

  ‘A clone?’

  ‘That’s the word for it. And he’s the first in the world’s history, Simon. Identical with that earlier Devereaux — the one you seem to know so much about—’

  ‘Oh, I just heard of him,’ Simon put in quickly.

  ‘The famous biologist. Imprint cells were taken from him before his death, but because there was no technique available to mature them then, they were scientifically stored. Then, in the late ’seventies when conditions were right, a new Devereaux was given to the world.’

  There was now on Simon’s face an expression which seemed to say that, after all, he was not sure if he really liked what he had been told. Bukov added, in the manner of a qualification, ‘Mind you, we don’t know a lot about cloning yet. The kind of effects it’s likely to produce. So Professor Devereaux himself could be called an experiment under observation in the ice-box.’

  ‘But he’s running the place,’ objected Simon.

  Bukov chuckled. ‘Naturally, with abilities like his he had to be given complete control. But Doctor Joynton and I have been detailed by the International Commission who established the ice-box to keep him under scrutiny and report.’ The Russian looked direct into Simon’s eyes, his gaze a little more penetrating now. ‘And that makes an incident like this evening’s ... more important than it seems, perhaps.’

  Simon abruptly understood the reason for all these confidences. It had been in the back of his mind to ask why he should be so favoured, anyway. He returned his companion’s gaze. ‘He — he seemed to go mad for a minute,’ was all he could add. ‘Honestly. But a moment later—’

  ‘Yes?’

  Simon still hadn’t worked it out. ‘I don’t know.’

  Bukov sighed again. ‘Well, Simon, if ever you notice anything you think I should know, I hope you’ll tell me. It seems to me you’re involved now. For reasons I don’t completely understand...’

  Simon tried a weak grin. It got him nowhere with Bukov.The big Russian was nobody’s fool; nor the sort to remain content for ever with evasions.

  * * *

  Beth clattered some stuff down on to the transparent plastic block that served for a table in the little bedroom. 'Cassettes, music tapes, reading matter,’ she enumerated. ‘At least you can’t complain you’re being harshly treated. But this door secures electronically from outside, and I’m locking you in until there’s been a full inquiry into what you and Simon were after in the Director’s office.’

  ‘It’s just because it’s me, isn’t it?’ Liz bit back belligerently. ‘Anyone else you wouldn’t mind about. But me you’ve got to pick up.’

  Liz was sitting on the amorphous shape that became a comfortable bed when you laid down, an armchair when you just wanted to sit. Again the room had a contour rather than a strict form. The absence of windows was relieved by restful 3-D murals, which could be altered by twisting a dial on the wall.

  Beth took no notice of Liz’s little outburst. But at the door she looked back to say icily, ‘Just let�
��s get something straight, shall we? I don’t want anything to do with you. If the computer hadn’t summoned you, I’d take you by the scruff of your neck and shove you right back through that ridiculous time barrier of yours.’

  ‘But the computer didn’t summon me,’ Liz protested. ‘What are you talking about? I just came.’

  ‘The computer doesn’t make mistakes,’ repeated Beth, a religious devotee intoning her article of faith. ‘The computer doesn’t make mistakes.’

  And then she was gone. A brief whirring sound told Liz that some mechanism had shut the door fast. She sighed disconsolately. Then she got up and began to wander about the tiny room. It was funny how, just as in the Fantasy Room downstairs, it all looked different from different angles. She toyed with the dial that controlled the 3-D murals. Now she was beside a tropic sea, now in the mountains; but all at once, without warning, everything was green about her and tidily-fenced fields rolled away under a still grey sky. The illusion was so much of her part of England, of home, that Liz wanted to burst into tears. Indeed she would have done so if at this point there had not come a rapping on her door.

  ‘Liz! Liz? Can you hear me?’

  ‘Mummy,’ cried Liz. ‘I’m locked in.’

  ‘Just a moment...’

  There was silence for a second or two, then the whirring sound again. The door clicked open and Jean came in.

  ‘Child, why are you locked up?’ Liz ran to her and told her, grateful and anxious to spare Beth no future embarrassment. But when she heard that Liz and Simon had been prying about the Director’s office, Jean was deeply shocked. ‘Listen to me, Liz,’ she said earnestly, ‘you’ve got to be very careful while you’re here, dear. Believe me! They can be very hard when they like, these people.’

  ‘I can see they’ve got you believing it anyway,’ replied Liz fretfully.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘Mummy, you hate the whole place! Anyone could see it. So why did you ever come?’