Vestiges of Time

by Richard C. Meredith

  “Let me say here, Master HarkosNor, that we of the BrathelLanza—the Brotherhood of Life—are not anarchists or wild-eyed radicals out to destroy the caste system entirely. Not at all. We merely wish to purify it, to restore it to the state of cleanliness that made NakrehVatee the great nation it once was not so many years ago.”

  KaphNo looked up briefly, a crooked, unpleasant smile on his face as if he had just bitten into a lemon and didn’t want to admit how sour it was.

  “Our goal,” AkweNema said, “is to return a better life to the castes, to the people, of our nation.”

  As he talked further of the evils he saw in the present society of NakrehVatee, as he further enumerated the wrongs that must be put right and how the BrathelLanza would go about doing it, his words came more quickly, more harshly, and there came into his eyes a gleam I didn’t Uke, a glow perhaps of fanaticism, or of madness.

  And when I glanced at the other faces, I saw reflected in their eyes that gleam I’d seen in AkweNema’s.

  I’d gotten myself mixed up with a bunch of fanatical revolutionaries, by God!

  But the Shadowy Man had said . . .

  It may have been thirty minutes later when AkweNema finally came to find a specific direction in his harangue.

  “So we have banded together in the BrathelLanza,” he said, “the Brotherhood of Life that will set things right in NakrehVatee, Lord DessaTyso and Professor KaphNo and myself, Ladies OrDjina and EnDera, Drs. ThefeRa and SkorTho, psychologist GrelLo, and the many others whom you will meet in the coming days, if you agree to join us in our sacred cause.

  “We have formed cadres all over the nation, and the people who believe as we do, who believe that the time has come to cleanse the nation, have come to us, have joined us. We are training them and arming them so that when the day comes we can rise as one force, solidified in our resolve and our commitment, and put down those in positions of ill-gained power.”

  He paused, licked his dry lips. I wondered how much of his speech had been memorized and how much of it had come to him as he spoke.

  “We have already formed the nucleus of the new government,” AkweNema continued, his voice calmer now. “Lord DessaTyso will be our chief of state, for such has been his training from birth and such is the right his lordship has inherited from his magnificent ancestors, the founders of our state.” Lord DessaTyso smiled broadly and basked in OrDjina’s obvious admiration. “With humility, KaphNo and I will do our best to serve as his ministers Sinister and Dexter. The cabinet largely has been appointed and will join us here when the time comes. Ibe people will supply the new parliament when the castes have been purged.”

  “And when will all this take place?” I asked when he paused again.

  “We will rise a year from now, perhaps,” AkweNema said. “I hope no longer in time than that. You, Master HarkosNor, can be a factor in helping us determine the date.”

  “Okay,” I said. “So you’ve got a place somewhere for me in all this. But where it is I can’t imagine.”

  “We need a fighting man to lead our troops,” AkweNema said, “and we need the nucleus of a fighting force that we hope to make superior to anything the government presently has in the field.”

  “And I can do that?” I asked incredulously.

  “We believe you can,” he replied. “We have studied you from the day you first approached our agent RyoNa,” he admitted. “For example, the girls you have slept with—they are all our people, and they have studied you well.”

  “Oh?” I said.

  He nodded. “We have also checked your background, and we find it of the sort we need. Your experience in combat is greater than that of any other man your age in all of VarKhohs, perhaps all of NakrehVatee,” AkweNema told me.

  And I thought: The guy who sold me my computer identity said it would be everything I’d ever need. I guess he was right. It had cost enough.

  “We are satisfied with you, HarkosNor,” DessaTyso said. “You are the sort of man we need.”

  “Then will you join us?” AkweNema asked.

  “What exactly do you want of me?” I asked in reply. “You shall be our general in the field. You and your private army”—he smiled as he said these words— “will spearhead the takeover of the central government buildings of VarKhohs.”

  Old KaphNo looked up from under his eyebrows. “You are familiar with the concept of cloning, are you not, Master HarkosNor?”

  “Of course,” I said, wondering why he asked.

  And as if I hadn’t answered, he continued: “Every

  cell of the human body—save only the sex cells designed for diversity in the next generation and a few very specialized cells like those of the blood—holds a complete genetic blueprint of the parent body. That is, every bit of genetic information that existed at the time of your conception, in the combined sperm and egg of your parents that grew to be you in your mother’s womb, is repeated in exact replication in the cells of, say, the skin of your left index finger, or in the cells of your intestinal lining.”

  I nodded, beginning to suspect. Sometimes I may be slow, but I’m not that dense.

  “From any one of those cells,” old KaphNo went on, “under the proper conditions, there can be grown an exact duplicate of you, HarkosNor, down to the last detail.” He paused, then added: “Except, of course, for the effects that environment has had on you. A clone grown from the cells of HarkosNor would have neither the scars you carry on your body nor the memories you carry in your head.”

  I nodded, then said, “I know.”

  “We propose, then,” AkweNema picked up after KaphNo grew silent, “to take sample cells from your body—a simple and painless operation, I assure you— and from them grow an army of your physical duplicates, an army which you will train and which you will command.”

  “There is a phenomenon called ‘resonance,’ ” KaphNo said. “Through it, so it appears, the senior member of a replicated partnership or group—in this case, yourself—is able to exercise a significant degree of, shall we say, telepathic control over the junior members. It is not yet well understood, although the same or a similar phenomenon—‘sympathetic awareness,’ it is often called —was long ago first observed in identical twins, which have many similarities to multiple replicates.

  “Furthermore, resonance is even more pronounced when the senior of a replicated unit is an adult at the

  time of replication. During the later stages of maturation, so it seems, the senior may totally dominate the ‘offspring’ replicates: that is, by moving in before the brains of the replicates have been exposed to any significant number of external stimuli—we’ll go into more detail regarding all this later—and by establishing a resonance pattern before these external stimuli have ‘awakened’ the brain and allowed it to begin to develop a distinct personality of its own, the senior may exercise complete mental, psychological control over the junior replicates, even when separated from them by great distances.”

  “An army of flesh-and-blood robots controlled by telepathy,” the lord DessaTyso said. “Something the fools in power today have feared to create. Fear of the anger of the gods. Ha! More likely fear of creating a power greater than themselves.”

  Ignoring his lordship, AkweNema said, “Such an army we propose to give to you, Master HarkosNor.” I remembered a dream I’d once had—it now seemed like a long, long time ago—a nightmare in which I was an army of duplicate people going up against a similar army that was even greater than mine. I shuddered in remembrance of that dream, tried to push it from my mind.

  “And in return for your services, HarkosNor,” AkweNema was saying, “we offer you a ‘time machine,’ if you still want it when the victory is ours. We offer you a place in the ruling cabinet of the new NakrehVatee. We offer you wealth and power such as you might never have dreamed of before.”

  “You have my word on this, Master HarkosNor,” the lord DessaTyso said, beaming in his magnanimity. “And ours as well,” AkweNema said.
/>   In the pause that followed, I refilled my wineglass and drank it empty again.

  “We shall not demand that you answer at once,” AkweNema said. “We will give you time to think, to

  decide. We will not rush you, but we hope that you can see fit to join us—and soon.”

  “We need your help, barbarian,” the dark woman OrDjina said, speaking to me as an equal, despite the title she’d just given me.

  “We do indeed,” her lord agreed.

  I nodded, grunted, and finally spoke. “It’s a tall order.”

  “It is late now, gentlemen, my lord, my lady,” AkweNema said, “and I am certain that Master HarkosNor is tired.” Looking at me, he said, “A suite has been made ready for you.”

  “And to show you that we mean you well,” the lord DessaTyso said, “the first of your rewards will be waiting for you there. Is that not so, OrDjina?”

  “EnDera is there, my lord, awaiting the barbarian,” OrDjina said, and gave me a wicked smile, the meaning of which wasn’t exactly unclear to me.

  AkweNema rose to his feet, offered me his hand, and said, “Come with me, then. I will show you the way.” And as I followed AkweNema out of the luxurious suite and down the brightly lighted corridor, I hoped by all the gods of all the Earths across the Lines, including the dark ones of VarKhohs, that the Shadowy Man was really on my side this time. But hadn’t he always been?

  6

  EnDera

  The suite to which AkweNema led me was not as large as his or quite as luxuriously appointed, but there had been no stinting in it either—nor was there stinting in the first of the “rewards” offered me by the BrathelLanza for my future services.

  The girl named EnDera was in her early twenties, with a distinctly Oriental look about her, an almost yellowishness to her skin, and epicanthic folds that gave her eyes a slightly slanted appearance. My first thought was that she might have been Japanese, but I was mistaken about that.

  Her almond eyes were bright and sensual; her lips were curled in a smile; her hair was as long and as black as that of OrDjina, though it fell without curls do-lvn her back; her body was as rounded and as mature as that of the older woman, and the sight of it under the sheer, light blue gown she wore, a filmy thing more transparent than opaque, created for me nothing less than seduction. Between her breasts, visible through the fabric of her gown, dangling on a golden chain, was a looped cross of beaten gold, an ankh, an ancient symbol of life.

  Had I not just met the beautiful lady OrDjina, I would have said that EnDera was easily the most beautiful woman in all VarKhohs. She was the second most beautiful, then. Who was I to complain?

  AkweNema quickly made the introductions and as quickly left us, saying only that come morning we would talk again about the matter of my service to the BrathelLanza. I agreed, but I was in no hurry for morning to come—and in no hurry to feel the pangs of guilt I would feel when I thought of Sally, so far away. . . .

  “So you’re the barbarian?” EnDera said in a lilting voice that carried just a trace of an accent as she sat down on the floor cushions and gestured for me to do the same. Before her sat a tall bottle of wine and two glasses.

  I sat down as she poured the wine, and said, “I wish people would quit,calling me that.”

  “Barbarian?” She handed me one of the glasses.. “Well, you do speak like one. Your accent is worse than mine.”

  “Well, I’m sorry about that, but that doesn’t make me the next best tiling to a trained ape. I am house- broken, you know, and I rarely chew up people’s slippers.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “You didn’t really,” I said. “But I’d prefer you called me Harkos.” I’d really have preferred that she call me Eric, but I knew that was out of the question, and before she could say what I knew was coming next, I added, “I know that’s a barbaric name too, but that’s the name T’ve got.” You pays your money and you gets potluck.

  She smiled again and daintily sipped her wine.

  “You’re a NakrehVatea?” I asked, to break the silence that followed.

  She nodded. “I was bom in the West, near MaKohl. But my parents were immigrants from PalaBarhah.” That was the name, Here and Now, for southern China. “We moved to VarKhohs when I was very young. I consider it my home.”

  “And you’re a member of the BrathelLanza?!’ I asked, hoping I was pronouncing it correctly.

  “Of course,” she said, seeming surprised that I

  should even ask. “And what of you, Harkos? What have you told them?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing yet. They’ve given me time to think it over and make up my mind.”

  “I hope that you will agree to join us,” she said earnestly, looking at me with a frank, open expression. “Such a man as you is needed. NakrehVatee isn’t famous for its soldiers.”

  “Yeah, so I’ve gathered.”

  “And you would be doing the people a great service,” she said just as earnestly, though not so fanatically as AkweNema might have said it. “There is much that AkweNema and KaphNo and the lord DessaTyso would do to make things better for the people, but they need help.”

  “Is it necessarily my help?”

  “It could be your help. And the rewards will be great, although the knowledge that one has done the right thing should be enough.” There was a gentle chiding in her voice, I thought.

  “But NakrehVatee isn’t my country,” I told her, “and its problems aren’t mine.”

  “Are you so much of a barbarian that you owe no debt to your fellow man?”

  “I have some pressing things to attend to, EnDera. I’m not sure I can spare a year or two to assist your people.”

  She looked doubtfully at me. “That pressing?”

  I nodded, though I wondered where I’d ever have another chance to get my hands on a time—correction, on a chronal-displacement device. I just might have to give them a year or two to get it. And maybe that’s what the Shadowy Man had been hinting at.

  Another thought that had been nagging just below my level of awareness surfaced now, and I put the question to her as she refilled our now-empty wineglasses.

  “Look, maybe you can answer something for me.” “I’ll try.”

  “Well, for the sake of argument, suppose I do agree to go along and give up a couple of years of my life to help the BrathelLanza. Okay, we’re speaking of maybe a year to complete the training and the preparation of the revolutionaries and then some months of fighting until the BrathelLanza has crushed all government resistance, right?”

  EnDera nodded. “That’s about right.”

  “Okay, then, how can this army of clones—replicates, whatever—that they’re talking about ‘growing’ from cells of my body possibly be ready in time to do any good? It takes almost two decades for a human being to become anything like mature. Are they planning on sending year-old babies out to fight a war?”

  She laughed, but gently. “KaphNo is getting old, Harkos. He didn’t mention the GATs—growth-accel- eration techniques—they’ve been using on animal and on some human replicates?”

  “GATs?—no, I don’t think so.”

  “He will. But it’s true that the BrathelLanza now has techniques that the government’s scientists and medical people know nothing about which can greatly hasten the acceleration of maturation.”

  “Hasten it enough to ‘grow’ an adult army in a year?”

  “In less than a year.”

  “Okay,” I said grudgingly.

  “I’m certain that KaphNo will tell you all about it. You’ll see.”

  I shrugged. There was a hell of a lot I had yet to learn about this world—for it was a oomplete world with centuries of history behind it about which I knew next to nothing, with patterns of culture I’d had only glimpses of, with technology and techniques I had encountered nowhere else across the Lines of Time. It

  would take a very long time for me to feel at home in it, if I ever did, and I knew
I couldn’t wait that long to make up my mind. I had to come to a decision on the basis of very scanty data and to act on that decision—and I had begun to doubt very seriously that with a negative decision on my part I would ever be allowed to leave the Underground alive. But I wasn’t telling anyone anything yet.

  “We want your stay here to be as pleasant as it can be,” EnDera said into my silent thoughts.

  “And that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

  She nodded. “You were told to expect a reward, weren’t you?”

  “I was. And you’re it?”

  “I’m it. Or rather the first one. There will be many more rewards, of various types, to follow, if you decide to join us.”

  “I’m beginning to wonder if I’m really going to be allowed any choice in the matter.”

  EnDera refilled both our wineglasses, took them in her hands, and rose slowly, gracefully from the floor.

  “Let me show you the rest of the suite,” she said as she turned her back on me, and I let my eyes follow the sweep of her dark hair down the curves of her back and hips to her ankles and feet. “It was carefully prepared for you. We hope you will find it comfortable.”

  She led me down a short hallway that branched off to two rooms, the one on the right a dining-room- cum-kitchen with what appeared to be automated food- preparation equipment, which she oflered to show me how to operate—later. The room to the left was a study complete with a small library of books, a library of disks and tapes and playing machines for them, and one wall that was some sort of holographic-projection unit that could re-create life-size three-dimensional dramas, comedies, concerts, and readings. Again she

  offered to show me how to operate the equipment— but later.

  The doors at the rear of these rooms led to hallways that joined and then in turn branched again and led to two more rooms, one a toilet with an enormous sunken bathtub, more nearly a pool; the other was a recreation room, in all appearances, fully outfitted with games, exercise equipment, and even a rifle range.