“We should go,” I said with difficulty.
“Yep,” Sixkiller agreed and we turned and started walking away. “You know, I went back to my own universe once” she said, “and just like ya’ll, I found myself lookin at a window, and watchin my whole family inside around the supper table. I thought real hard about walkin in that front door and tellin ‘em everything.”
“And did you?” I inquired.
“Nope, I didn’t. I turned around and left. It wasn’t my home any more. That’s why I volunteered to bring ya’ll here. To see what I saw n’understand.”
I nodded, and my gaze wandered in the general direction of Elizabeth’s former residence. I was painfully reminded of my question to Professor Merriweather on the night of my Awakening, and his answer.
“Do you think it is possible,” I asked. “That Elizabeth survived like I did? That she lives?”
“Can’t rightly say,” Sixkiller replied. “Maybe so. Maybe not. It’s a big multiverse out there. I ‘spose anything’s possible.”
Yes, I assured myself. Anything is.
***
Back at Nazca, I found Edward, Manfred and Ziva waiting for us at the entrance to the dome. Just from their solicitous expressions, I realized that they knew where we had gone, and what I had experienced there. Keeping my chin high, I approached them.
“You went to Seattle, didn’t you?” Edward asked.
“I did,” I responded and he nodded his head sadly.
“It is always hard for you when you do that,” Manfred observed. “But now you know.”
“I do,” I replied, feeling a lump form in my throat. My only consolation was that like Major Sixkiller, I knew without having to ask, that they had all made the same futile journey, and learned the same terrible truth. That, and the fact that because they were my friends, they had not come to gloat as Pierce might have done, but to commiserate.
“Come and see us any time,” Ziva offered. “We’re always there to talk.” I inclined my head in acceptance.
“In the meantime, there is a mission to fly,” Edward advised. “The Sibyl will be meeting with the squadron, in the conference room.”
I rewarded him with a quizzical expression. Here, my half-memories failed me.
“She tells us where we need to go,” Sixkiller volunteered from over my shoulder, “and what to do when we get there.”
“Very well,” I answered. “I shall need to tidy up first.” Actually, I needed much more than that. I required some time to be alone in order to mourn my severance with the past. Fully understanding, my cohorts stood aside and let me pass.
By the time the clock was nearing noontide, I was reasonably whole again, and presentable. I had shed my flight suit in favor of the modified Bookman’s dress and reported to the conference room. On the way, I wondered about the Sibyl, and what kind of person she would be.
When she finally joined us, she was accompanied by four grey-skinned beings very like Bo and Peep (and for all I knew, they were in fact part of this group). They surrounded her like a royal entourage, but in comparison, they seemed rather commonplace.
Instead of being a robed prophetess and an adult, she proved to be a little girl of approximately 12 years of age. Her hair was blond and her complexion was extremely pale, made even more so by a severe black dress that emulated the Bookman’s uniform exactly as mine did. Then I realized that I recognized her features, for she was none other than myself, as I had appeared at that tender age.
Another clone, I thought. But with a much different purpose than mine.
The Sibyl was holding what looked like a perfectly round balloon, but then I observed that it was composed of some glass-like substance and filled with an odd, greenish mist. The tether that linked her to this globe was quite thick, and made of polished, articulated metal. And as she drew nearer, I noted that her gaze seemed to be quite far away, as if she were looking at something that no one else could see.
Perhaps the most disquieting thing about her though, was the fact that her feet did not touch the ground. Instead, like the Phaseships, she floated. I could actually see the tips of her small black shoes with their perfect silver buckles, dangling in midair.
She stopped at the foot of the table and then her escort stepped back. Leaving them, she glided over to take up a place near Hamilket. This was when the mist resolved itself into a human face and while its lips moved silently, the little girl spoke aloud. Her voice was not a child’s, but that of a mature woman.
“Nedeb’ her P'ter Adaan,” she said. “Greetings Wing Leader.”
Hamilket brought his fist to his chest and awarded her a respectful half bow.
“The Masters have a task for you.” the Sibyl informed him. “Those who defy their will are planning to alter the fourth strand, and bring ruin unto the 10th century. They will commit this atrocity on the 23rd hour of the fifth day of the third month of the 25th year. Make haste or all is lost.”
Again, Hamilket genuflected. “N'che se'dem,” he promised.
The face in the mists seemed to smile and then it vanished, and the little girl started back towards the greys. When she was parallel to me, she paused, and turned her head to regard me with a strange, inhuman slowness.
This time, when she spoke, she sounded exactly like a child, but what she said both confused and unsettled me. “The truth is in the desert, but the rose must fall to unmask it.”
Before I could ask what she meant by this, she had drifted away like some phantom, who having haunted us, was returning to the after-life until her next visitation.
“Extraordinary,” I exclaimed, realizing in the same instant that I had grossly understated the situation. ‘Unearthly’ seemed far more apropos.
“Indeed,” Hamilket agreed. ”She is the voice of the Masters, and her predictions are never incorrect. The Deviators will be exactly where she said, and we will foil their evil plans.”
At this stage, Edward and the Professor entered the room pushing a wheeled cart. It bore Refector headsets.
Each of us received one, and recalling the purpose of this, I put mine on and waited. Then the Professor entered the commands in a portable control box, and as before, my entire existence up to that instant replayed itself in a matter of seconds.
When it was done and my memories had been recorded, I handed my headset back to Edward and prepared to leave with my companions. Hamilket however, still had business to transact with me.
“Ms. Steele, may I ask you to remain for a moment?”
“Of course, sir.” I resumed my seat.
The Atlantean considered his words carefully, then, “I realize that none of what has transpired was by your choosing, but regardless of your feelings about the Masters, or Pierce, or your presence here, it is the lives of those that the Deviators attack that ultimately matters.’
“They are innocents, and deserve our protection. That is a noble calling, and I hope, something that will provide you with a small bit of consolation to help ease your transition. If nothing else, Ms. Steele, if you cannot champion the Master’s cause, fight for those who cannot fight for themselves.”
“I shall,” I replied, conceding his point. Even if it meant that I would be dancing to the Master’s tune, defending the helpless was a cause that I could not ignore. To have done so would have betrayed all that I believed in. Then and there, I made a silent promise; I would pledge myself to this new struggle, and engage in it with the same dedication and tenacity that I had once given to the monoplane matches. And in so doing, I would honor Elizabeth’s legacy.
Contentment however, was another matter, and something which I would have to arrive at in my own time. If ever.
We parted company on this note and I made my way back to my quarters where I changed into my flight suit. The moment that I was ready, I hastened to the tarmac. As I had expected, my squadron-mates were there, waiting for me, and we hurried out to our ships.
“Don’t fret,” Sixkiller said as she trotted beside me. “We’ll
be keepin an eye on ya’ll. Just do your best like always.”
“I shall,” I responded, grateful for her supportive words, and for stalwart friends like her to depend upon.
“Oh, and Penny--try not to let her get under your skin this time,” the Major added.
Her remark perplexed me, but she did not elaborate and I had no time to inquire. Instead, she went to her craft and I was compelled to do likewise. Once aboard, I seated myself, secured my harnesses and ascended with the others.
We flew out over the Plain of Nazca in perfect formation, with Hamilket leading the way. Seeing the sleek black ships flanking my own, I forgot all about Sixkiller’s odd remark. Instead, I found myself consumed with a growing sense of trepidation. This was not to be a game played for the amusement of a cheering crowd, but a deadly contest between determined forces.
That fight occurred less than an hour later. We found the enemy exactly where the Sibyl had said, and already hard at work. One of their number (whom my recollections insisted was called the weaver) was using the magnetic fields around their Phaseship to attract particles from a neighboring time-strand and drawing them into the one that we had been sent to protect.
Wherever the particles made contact, the luminous strands darkened, and seemed to curl in upon themselves like vegetation that was dying off from the influence of some pernicious poison--which in a sense was exactly what was occurring. The new temporal material that was being woven in by the Deviator was completely in opposition to the nature of the strand, creating a conflict that I was certain would ultimately result in disaster for those who inhabited that specific point in time. Unless we put a stop to their dastardly enterprise, and did what we could to heal the damage.
As for the Deviator’s companions, they were accompanying it at various altitudes, keeping watch for an attack, and seeing this, I smiled grimly. An attack was precisely what they would get, I told myself, and in spades.
A moment later, Major Sixkiller contacted me. “Penny, ya’ll go after the flanker on the left. I’ll take his partner. Manfred, Ziva and Hamilket’ll hit the other two and Pierce’ll take care of the weaver.”
“Affirmative,” I replied, sending my Phaseship into a diving roll. Although I had never been on a fox hunt in my entire life (or at least in what I believed was my life), I added in a spirited, ”Tally ho!”
In seconds, my displays indicated that my target was within firing range and I let loose with a burst from my chronoguns. Simultaneously, the Deviator went into a roll of its own, and my shots went wide.
I did not chastise myself, but corrected course and went after my quarry anew. Again, the reptilian pilot slipped away from me, and then attempted to turn the tables by going nose up into a loop.
A less experienced aviator might have fallen for this, but too many matches at Queen Mary’s Royal Aerodrome had taught me well. I broke hard to the right and then came around to meet my foe as they approached the nadir of their circle. This time, my weapons scored a hit, fragmenting a section of the Deviator’s wing.
This was enough to do the job; the craft wobbled and I could tell that the pilot was struggling for control. I did not show them any mercy however. My mind was filled with images of the wasteland, and this drove me to fire at them a second time.
My burst hit the wing again and destroyed it utterly. In response, the craft heeled over and pitched nose-down into the River of Time below us. Then it vanished into a strand.
I was tempted to cheer, but I restrained myself. My companions were still locked in struggles of their own and required my assistance. Pulling up and away from the River, I searched my displays and saw that the weaver-ship was no more, and that the rest of the Deviators were scattering like the cravens they were.
But one of them was still putting up a spirited fight with Manfred’s Phaseship, twisting and turning like an eel and then managing to come about. In an instant, it was on his tail, and I gasped in horror as I saw a replay of what I had just done to its companion. The Deviator shot, and Manfred’s wing was sheared off as neatly as if it had been cut away with a pair of scissors.
Now it was his ship that was falling into the River. Enraged, I went after the alien, determined to get revenge, but the Deviator did not have the courage to face me and flew into the River instead. As it did so, I noted the insignia on its fuselage.
It was a perfect white rose, made even more pristine by the ebon skin of the Phaseship. Under any other circumstances, I would have found it to be quite lovely. But now, it only made my blood boil and I wanted nothing less than to see that particular Phaseship pulverized into dust, and by no less than my guns.
Thankfully, Sixkiller rescued me from my madness. “Penny! Ferget it,” she urged. “Ya’ll don’t know if there’re others down there. It could be a trap. Stay with the group. We’ve gotta go and get Manfred!”
It was a difficult order to obey, but obey I did. “Another day,” I vowed, wishing a silent curse upon the pusillanimous Deviator. Then I joined the others in the rescue effort.
We located Manfred’s ship easily enough; it had gone straight down into the nearest strand, which proved to be a portion of what in my world would have been the vast Gobi Desert. According to my read-outs, he had crashed in the year 1150 AD, in a thoroughly uninhabited area filled with nothing but sand and rock.
The wreckage of his Phaseship was scattered across the desert, and the only thing which was more or less intact was the main cabin, and this was a very sorry sight indeed. We all knew that it was highly unlikely that he had survived the catastrophe, but we still had to confirm this for a fact.
While I orbited the site with the others, Hamilket and Sixkiller landed near the wreckage and exited their craft, accompanied by their mechanica. They did not dally, but made straight for the cabin, and after going inside of it, announced that they had found Manfred’s body, still in its harness. Just as I had feared, he was dead.
There was no eulogy, nor any statement of regret uttered by anyone, even myself. Hamilket and Sixkiller merely returned to their vessels and we departed.
And as we did so, Hamilket activated a device that was standard to all Phaseships. It was a special charge, that when detonated, vaporized the wreckage and the corpse within it entirely. This was done in order to prevent the Deviators from gathering any post-mortem intelligence information, and to ensure that no one from that time-period obtained even a shred of our technology.
It was a sad, but necessary step.
As for my grief and anger, they were mitigated by the reality of my new existence, and also because of a tale that Manfred himself had told me about his universe. There, religionists abounded, and the gods of a place called Asgard held sway.
Their adherents believed that those who proved themselves worthy through acts of heroism went on to an afterlife where they feasted and fought. But whoever fell in these otherworldly battles did not truly perish. Instead, the gods ensured they were reborn to feast and fight again.
Our condition was really no different, I reflected, even if the field of battle was not located in some unearthly realm. Manfred would live again in a new body, just like the Viking warriors of his fabled Valhalla. It put a very strange twist on the entire concept of mortality, but as Merriweather had aptly stated after my own rebirth, death was not final for us by any means.
***
Back at Nazca, we were met by the Professor and Edward, and I was invited to accompany them to the laboratory in order to observe the Awakening procedure. Despite my despondency, I was curious, and accepted.
A new copy of Manfred had already been delivered, and it was awaiting us on a gurney alongside the Professor’s control console. Merriweather placed a Refector headset on the body, and entered a few commands on the holographic keyboard of his control station.
After a few seconds, Manfred’s clone responded to the treatment and began to come to life before my very eyes. Pulse, respiration, and heart rate were increasing, and most importantly, the brain’s activity
was rising. However brief, it was truly an amazing spectacle to behold, and my respect for the Professor rose ever higher. I had never imagined him playing the part of a mid-wife, nor being witness to such an unusual event.
“He will need an hour to become ready for the last stage,” Merriweather informed me as Edward and a mechanica guided the gurney away. “Go and freshen yourself. The presence of familiar faces is always of great benefit at times like these. And I know that Ziva will want to welcome him back with a little party afterwards.”
***
Manfred’s Awakening proved to be far less traumatic than mine had been. He had after all, died while consciously serving the Masters, and was well aware of his changed circumstances. It took him only a few minutes to adjust to things and reacquaint himself with us. Soon, he was in good spirits, laughing along good naturedly at the ribbing that he received for his mishap.
Which was just as well, for as soon as he was able, we took him to the conference room. Although my fellow Chrononauts felt little for death itself after suffering so many of them over the years, they had a very different attitude towards rebirth. They celebrated it.
Ziva in particular, had contrived to mark the occasion with food and drink, and had created a special banner as well. It had been placed prominently on the wall facing the entrance, and I gasped when I read it. It was in German, and said “Willkommen Sie zurück, dumme!”, or “Welcome back, stupid!”
Seeing this, Manfred was not offended, but let out a hearty laugh, and took his place beneath it in the seat of honor. Then Ziva took his head in both hands and gave him a long and passionate kiss.
“Next time, you watch your six,” she said scoldingly when they finally parted.
Wisely, Manfred did not attempt to defend himself, and merely nodded. “Yah. Yah,” he agreed. “Next time.”
Blackbird: A Warrior of the No-When Page 18