"Or a ruined, blasted land," Granville added.
"No, I thought we would find something really fine," Blake said. "A hundred years, maybe that's not enough. A thousand, three thousand maybe."
"More like a quarter-million, I'd say," Granville insisted. "Or more. A million. 'Creatures of pure energy' take time to evolve." The generalist turned to Vogel, who was next to him. "What did you think the future would be like?"
"I didn't think much about it," he said. "Like home maybe, only more so: more people, tougher."
"Then why did you come? Was it money?"
Vogel glanced at Jean-Michel Voss. "I was paid well."
"Is that the only reason?" Granville asked.
Vogel shook his head and took his time answering. "When times are tough, they need people like me." He didn't want to continue, and Blake saw Vogel's eyes swing to give him a hard look.
Granville turned to Rio. "And you, my dear, why did you come?"
She shrugged. "I was needed. And ... it was an adventure."
Granville snorted, then laughed. "Yes, indeed, it is that. And I suppose I must ask myself that same question, in all fairness. I came because it was a challenge! I had made certain public predictions, and I wanted to see..." He smiled around at the others. "We all wanted to see, I think. Man has always wanted to see what was on the other side. The other side of the time hill has proven to be most interesting."
"You think this is interesting?" Doreen asked incredulously.
"Oh, most interesting, my lovely lady, most interesting. It's less than a hundred and eight years, true, but the hundred years from, say, the end of the American Civil War to 1965 was a fantastic hundred years! Everything had accelerated tremendously! That's why I became a generalist – because the specialists were having such a hard time even keeping up with their own disciplines. Things were happening too fast, and had been, ever since way back in World War 11 My specialty is generality: seeing the bridges between specialties, the connections between isolated discoveries or theories, the spots where paths are sure to have crossed. I can also eliminate duplication of effort: often people in the same field go on making the same mistakes others have made because the field is so complex, and moving so fast, that they can't keep up, much less know what others have done."
Granville beamed at his fellow prisoners. "So I came to see what God had wrought with what Voss had bought."
Granville looked wryly now at Blake. "And you, our stowaway, why did you come? Was it just the semi-immortality?"
Blake hesitated. "No, I didn't really think about that at all. Did you?"
"Yes, a little. I thought it would be nice to have doubled or tripled my life span. I could study much more that way."
Blake looked at Doreen. "Did you think about the longevity benefits?"
"No." She brushed her hair back with both bands. "Not really. If I did, I guess I expected ... well ... a sort of very long youth. I came because, I guess, because Jean-Michel invited me." She gave the billionaire a quick look, but he was not paying her any attention.
"You haven't answered my question," Granville reminded Blake. "Why did you come?"
"Because of her," Blake said, looking at Rio.
Granville sighed. "Forgive us, Hernando! Forgive us Senor de Gama! Forgive us Captain Hudson! Forgive us, Sir Francis! Forgive us Cristoforo! We came not for gold, but with gold!" Granville laughed loudly. "We came for immortality. For the invitation. Because we were needed. Because of love ... And because it was possible." He laughed again. "Forgive us, Magellan, for we have sinned on the explorer's code! Forgive us, Lewis and Clark! Forgive us Admiral Peary! Forgive us, Leif!" Granville chuckled again. "Neil, Marco, Sir Edmund, forgive us! We are petty explorers, without noble dreams. What would Darwin or Cook think of us, hey?" He slapped Vogel's knee in delight.
"Shut up," Vogel grumbled, but the generalist only laughed again.
They fell silent, with only an occasional rumble of quiet, wry laughter from Granville Franklin.
At last the door opened and Colonel Calkins entered. He went straight to Voss. "The gold. You can get it from the vault with no trouble?" Voss nodded. "Good. The congregation will be pleased. It will surely count on your record."
And yours, Blake thought. Or will the congregation ever know?
They walked out single file, down the corridor, and were put into a security elevator while Calkins and several soldiers rode in a second elevator with television and gas controls. They rose to a twenty-fourth-floor landing deck and were checked out by the colonel himself.
The aircar was big, but Blake was glad to see there was only one. The six of them climbed in, followed by Colonel Calkins and six soldiers, joining four crew members who were already inside.
The crew was in a sealed chamber forward, and Blake's heart sank. The new arrivals were put in seats and strapped in. Blake looked down and saw that the seat-belt harness was in reality an electronic alarm device that could only be unlocked by the crew's central control. Only a professional escape artist could wiggle out of this one, he thought darkly. Their fine plans of hijacking the aircar began to dissolve.
It rose swiftly and headed north.
Blake didn't have a good view, but the vehicle seemed to be moving very fast. After a half-hour it suddenly took a dive, and through a window Blake saw mountains rising around them. He heard Voss ask Calkins what was going on.
"Going below the Skypilots' radar sensors. We will fly just off the surface until we reach our destination."
Blake groaned. The surface from Salt Lake to the Sawtooth Mountains in Idaho was not too rough, but the Sawtooths ascended to the Bitteroot Range, which became the Rockies, and it was all up and down. Blake settled down for a rough ride.
The aircar swooped and fell, rose and plummeted for nearly four hundred miles – all at high speeds – with sudden, jolting azimuth turns as well, as they traversed canyons and valleys. Time after time Blake saw treetops and cliffs flash by right outside their windows. Rio, Doreen, and Granville became airsick, and he himself was on the verge. He looked at Vogel and Jean-Michel, who didn't seem particularly discomforted by the stomach-turning flying. Four of the soldiers had vomited all over themselves and were swaying weakly in their harnesses. One of the other two looked green.
The aircar suddenly lurched uncommonly hard, and Blake's head banged Rio's sharply. Sitting next to him, she was pale, with a greasy sort of sweat coating her face.
She smiled weakly at him and raised a feeble hand to pat his cheek. "Poor darling," she said.
Then the ship slowed and leveled, and there was a sigh from everyone. It descended, then touched down, and the rotors whispered to a silence. Several of the soldiers were ordered out, and they went, looking quite unmilitary.
After the "beachhead" had been secured, the prisoners heard and felt the seat locks click. Then they rose and exited from the aircraft, followed by Calkins and the rest of the squad; the four crew members exited, too, to stretch their legs, and walked off, chatting, away from the aircar.
The terrace was much as they remembered it.
Voss pointed out the lock entrance. "You had better let me go first, Colonel, as there are certain, ah, booby traps."
"'Booby traps'? Oh, you mean suckertricks. All right, but we'll be right behind you. Kroeg! Hayes! Cover him!"
Attempting to distract the colonel, Rio said, "My goodness, Colonel, was it necessary to make the trip that rough?" She looked sick and swayed on her feet.
Blake didn't know if she was faking or not.
"You people were quite lucky getting down to Salt Lake. We picked you up early, up near the Snake, but you just happened to come down the channel with the lightest radar coverage of the whole Skypilot state."
His eyes never left Voss, who was climbing over the debris and around the branches of the fallen tree. Blake could hear Voss direct the soldiers not to step on a perfectly harmless rock. They looked warily at it and edged around carefully.
He's setting them up ni
cely, Blake thought. He has them doing exactly what he wants them to do, like a salesman asked the kind of questions that generate a lot of "yes" answers. But we must generate our own schemes, in case his fails.
Blake decided to back Rio's ploy. "You look pretty sick," he said to her. He edged toward her consolingly, watching the laser rifles of the soldiers but not appearing to do so.
Voss and the soldiers, meanwhile, disappeared into the tomb.
After a few moments, Voss reappeared and called to the colonel. "All right, send everyone up."
Blake gave Vogel a look and they each took the elbows of one of the girls and started on ahead, without waiting for the colonel's order. Granville started angling slightly to the right, as if choosing an easier path.
"Get ready," Blake whispered to Rio. "I think he is–"
"Down!" Voss's cry from the lip of the air lock sent Blake and Vogel into the rubble, pulling the girls down next to them.
At the same moment the hiss of the laser rifle from the air lock burned the air over their heads.
Alert as they were, the unexpected move caught most of the soldiers by surprise. Several fired at the mouth of the air lock but the full sweep of Voss's stolen laser ripped into the flesh of the guards. A blast from a falling soldier flashed off a rock near Rio and another sliced into the clumps of dirt at Blake's side, but neither of them was hit. All was silent for a moment, then there was a clatter behind them and Blake heard a man moan. The laser hissed again from the air lock and there was a gurgle, then silence.
Blake twisted his head around and looked back at the soldiers and crew members. Two had been cut down flat by the heavy military weapon and another lay against the skid of the aircar with both legs gone and a pool of blood glistening around the stumps. He was alive, but stunned and unmoving. Colonel Calkins lay close behind Blake, his eyes staring open and a deep slash from shoulder to chest all the way through his body. Blood and bits of viscera were seeping slowly from the wide wound. He was dead.
"Are you all right?" Voss called.
"All right," Vogel answered, getting up.
He reached over, took the laser pistol from Calkins's hand and walked back to the legless soldier, who did not look up. His hands were twitching, and his eyes were open, but he didn't move. Vogel shot him expertly through the heart and the man died at once.
Now me! Blake thought suddenly. He thrust himself to his feet, and jumped a small rock to seize a laser rifle from a soldier with a blood smear where his head should have been. Blake hadn't the faintest idea how to use it, but presumed it would not have been on safety. He aimed it roughly in Vogel's direction and watched as the man turned.
Vogel's eyes went to the gun and he stopped. He looked up at Blake and a slow, evil grin crept across his face. "Smart," he said, and thrust the laser weapon into his belt. He started up the hillside to Voss without looking further at Blake.
A percentage player, Blake thought. The percentages were not in his favor, so why risk it?
"My God, my God!" said Doreen, sitting up and looking at the carnage.
Rio rose and dusted herself off. She seemed neither elated nor distraught at the bloodshed. Blake felt sick, but under control. He moved on up the hill to the air lock.
Voss's first furious firing had exhausted and partially fused the delicate laser, and he now held Kroeg, the other soldier's, weapon in his hand. His face started to twitch into a smile as he looked at Blake.
"Thank you for saving Rio," he said.
Blake noted the singular "object." The rest of us are spear carriers in your life, aren't we? Even Rio is only a character actress. An expendable bit player.
"They're both dead," Vogel told Voss, coming back out of the air lock.
Voss raised his eyebrows, and Blake had the uncomfortable impression the two soldiers had been alive when the financier had taken their weapons. "Of course," Voss said. "Drag their bodies out of here. Put them all in the aircar."
"Why not just bury them?" Blake asked.
"We're going to dump them in some lake so there will be no trace. The aircar, too. But first we'll have to find some other transportation. Mason, get down there and pull as many good uniforms off those men as you can. Clean 'em up. Move!"
Blake obeyed, a sinking feeling in his stomach. If low-necklines are trouble, what is multiple murder?
But as he went down to the aircar Blake argued with himself. What else could Voss have done? It was certain we were headed for prison, perhaps even for execution. Voss could have called out for the men to surrender, but would they have done so? They had five hostages right in front of them. What would Jean-Michel have done if they had put a gun to my head and ordered him to surrender?
Blake shook his head sadly. He knew what Voss would have done.
Chapter 15
They hovered over the Salmon River and shoved the mutilated and nearly nude bodies out of the ship. The bloody corpses fell forty meters into the stream below and trailed a bit of pink as they were swept toward a stretch of rapids further downstream. Vogel twisted the aircar, whose controls were not basically different from those of one hundred years before, taking it up to cliff height and over, toward the Snake River to the west.
Blake, Vogel, and Voss all wore uniforms of the Latter-Day Saints Air Force. It seemed to annoy Jean-Michel that the officer's uniform fitted Blake best.
"A gentleman at last," he sneered.
They flew quickly and close to the surface, frightening a few deer and not a few cows. They caused a beetle-shaped vehicle to swerve off the road as they came through a small valley.
"Keep going!" Voss ordered. "Perhaps he won't report it."
"But we're in the White Kingdom of Light," Rio said. "Are they going to shoot at us?"
"I'm not certain of their relationship with the Mormons," Granville said, "but I would imagine they are not too friendly. The Mormons were always considered a bit odd by other Christian sects. I wouldn't count on any friendly waves, not as long as we're in an LDS aircraft."
"Aircraft ahead," Vogel said, and everyone tried to see through the windscreen at once. "There!" he said, pointing.
"It's going west, too, almost," Voss noted. "Keep it in sight, but keep it just a dot. That way they won't be able to read our markings."
"Won't the Mormons be after us?" Rio asked.
"Not up here," Granville said. "At least I don't think so. There is probably no extradition treaty between these groups – that is, if all the country is as feudal as it seems to be, with each church or sect or order controlling its own little turf."
"Besides," Blake said, "if I read Calkins right he didn't file too careful a flight plan."
"He was trying to score points over this Sister Meaker," Rio suggested. "So nobody will miss them right away."
"Let's hope not." Granville peered out a side window. "If and when anyone finds those bodies after a few miles in the rapids they won't be able to tell how they were killed, much less who they were."
"But what do we do now?" Doreen asked, looking sick again from the dipping and lurching of the aircar as it hurtled into the growing darkness of late afternoon.
"We have to switch aircars, or disguise this one," Voss said.
"It might be safer to disguise this one," Granville suggested.
"We could turn southeast, get back into Mormon country, but west of Salt Lake," Blake suggested. "Then these uniforms might do us some good. If we are caught in these, we might be shot as spies by the White Lighters, or whatever they call themselves."
Voss thought a moment. "That's not a bad idea. Then no disguise would be necessary on the ship. Vogel, go south, toward Boise, but east of it."
Vogel leaned forward and traced a route on an illuminated map with an electric stylus. The ship turned gracefully and headed south by southeast.
"I'm hungry," Doreen announced.
"I'll get something from the supplies here," Granville said.
"I'll help," Doreen volunteered.
Rio sat next to B
lake and ran her finger along the thick tubular barrel of the laser lying in his lap. She looked very solemn as she murmured over the noise of the jet blades, "I'm sorry I got you into this."
Blake raised her chin and smiled. "Hey, I'm a volunteer, lady. Maybe I didn't know I would be getting into the middle of some kind of nutty holy war, but I volunteered. You did everything to discourage me." Blake glanced up into the cockpit, where Voss was examining some maps by the light from the instruments. "Jean-Michel wants you. I want you. You are grateful to him and feel needed by him. Perhaps you are even flattered that the great Voss chose you, I don't know. But I love you."
Rio's eyes grew large and shiny. Blake grinned crookedly and said, "I hadn't planned to tell you that again under such romantic conditions, but I've been thinking: maybe we won't have any other chance. I have no regrets about coming, Rio. None. Not if I can be with you. No, don't say anything, don't protest! I’m with you now. I'll be with you as long as you will let me."
Blake put his hand over hers, lying on the crystal chamber of the laser. "Back there, when Voss was going to shoot past us at the soldiers, I thought – all in a flash, an instant – I thought, Oh, God, don't let him hit Rio! I was angry at Voss for endangering you, but I don't know what else he could have done. I'm sorry those men died, but I'm not sorry we lived. And I'm very glad you lived."
Blake looked down at her hand and stroked the fine-boned back of it. "I love you, Rio, and ... and I'll kill for you if I must." He looked up at her. "I won't like it, but I will if I have to."
Rio's face was soft and wondering. Again, Blake stopped her words with a gesture. "You don't have to say anything. No promises, no lies, no words. I don't know what we are in for, or that will happen to us, but I love you. Know that. Rely on it. Use it. Make your own decisions. Don't feel guilty about me, or about Voss. You came along, into the future, into ... this. That cancels out any obligation. You are free, Rio. You can't even let Voss make your decisions for you anymore."
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