by Bob Mayer
Eagle remained still, waiting.
“A great request, my word. But Oppenheimer said the fate of the world, the entire world, was at stake. He is not a man given to exaggeration, one of the reasons he got the job running Manhattan. The science part at least. So I gave it.” Roosevelt spread his hands. “This, apparently, is the payback.”
There was no record of any of this in the download or in all the history Eagle had read, including the classified material he’d had access to as a Nightstalker. No mention at all of the possibility of a pile going critical at any of the Manhattan Project facilities. It didn’t happen. Whether because a Valkyrie intervened, which Eagle doubted, or because a Valkyrie started and stopped one, which he thought much more likely.
“Yes, I can see you are as confused as I am,” Roosevelt said. “An Angel magically appearing. Fixing a problem even Oppenheimer and his whiz kids can’t. Saving us from a major problem, based on what old Op said. Catastrophic, I believe was the exact word. And he’s not the religious sort. Not in the least. Actually, his wife is a communist as are many of his associates. We had the damnedest time getting him a clearance.”
“If I may ask,” Eagle said. “When did this happen?”
Watson answered. “Interestingly enough, a year ago today.”
Wrong year. Wrong place.
“This can’t be,” Eagle said. “The Shadow opens the bubble. This has to be the right year.” He’d spoken out loud words that shouldn’t have been uttered.
“’Shadow’?” Roosevelt repeated. “What’s that?”
“Nothing, sir.”
Watson spoke up. “It’s part of this thing, sir. We can’t talk about it.”
Roosevelt shook his head. “Keeping a secret from the man who knows all the secrets. But you were right, my old friend. He’s here, like you said he would be,” Roosevelt said.
“This Angel, sir,” Eagle said. “It’s not an angel.”
“Indeed?” Roosevelt didn’t seem surprised in the slightest. “But whatever or whoever it was, it held up its end of the deal. Oppenheimer’s problem, a dire one, was fixed. Oppenheimer told me that a great disaster was averted. From the words he chose and his demeanor, I have no doubt he was telling the truth.”
“What’s going to happen?” Eagle asked.
“I don’t know,” Roosevelt said. “That’s the funny thing about the future. We don’t know. We just make the best decisions we can with what we know and then muck about. I’m not the man I was. The man I was, many years ago, before my affliction, was full of himself. Certain of all the great things ahead in my future. I was taught a bitter lesson about anticipating the future.”
Eagle tried to focus on what the President was saying, but his mind was reeling from the implications that this mission was off by a year. That the Shadow was manipulating things in a way that hadn’t been foreseen and that Fate was also involved somehow.
“Then I was laid low,” Roosevelt said. “1921. For a long time they didn’t know what it was that took me down. But it was painful. Let me tell you that. People make much of the fact I can’t walk, but they have no idea of the pain I went through. It was the pain that changed me, not the lack of use of my legs. It was so bad, there were times I desired death more than life. There is pain that terrible.” Roosevelt peered at Eagle through his glasses. “I’m telling you this, son, because I don’t know what awaits you. But know this. The pain. It made me a better man. A better President. It made me get out of myself. Understand others. Understand the less fortunate in life.”
Roosevelt leaned back in his wheelchair.
For the first time, Eagle noted that the old man’s hands were shaking. He shifted his focus to Watson. “Do you know what’s going to happen, sir?”
“Just that the three of us are supposed to be here,” Watson said. “In this cabin. The Angel told Oppenheimer that.”
“What’s odd,” Roosevelt observed, “is that someone knew we’d be on this ship a year ago. Very strange, which is an understatement, since this meeting wasn’t set until a few months ago. No one could have known we’d be here in his place. On board the Quincy. Rather specific. So maybe we shouldn’t dismiss the concept of a higher power of some sort intervening.”
The hair on the back of Eagle’s neck tingled once more, stronger, a distinct feeling and he knew what was going to happen.
A Gate crackled into existence near the porthole.
“Time for you to go,” Watson said.
“Where?” Eagle demanded.
Watson indicated he had no idea. “Wherever it leads.”
Roosevelt was staring at the Gate. “What is it, Pa?” His use of his friend’s nickname indicated how startled he was.
“A doorway,” Watson said. “That’s all I know.”
“Curious,” Roosevelt, master of under and over-statement, said.
Eagle stared at the President.
“I gave my word,” the President said. “But that’s not your word.”
Eagle nodded. “It won’t be Berlin,” he said, then stepped through the Gate.
No kind deed has ever lacked its reward.
—Hawaiian Saying
Hawaii, 14 February 1779 A.D.
“Not to worry,” the other half-naked woman said. “Captain Cook will still die when he is destined, after the sun comes up. As history records. You helped set that in motion by protecting him.”
Another Time Patrol member might have considered the import of those words, but not Roland. He was focused on the immediate problem. His free hand drifted down to the hilt of the cutlass. “Who are you?”
“It should have been easy,” the other woman said. “Seriously, Roland. Why couldn’t you make this easy?” She indicated her body with both hands. “We had to go through all this and you still won’t participate?”
Roland’s hand tightened on the sword and he raised the boarding axe. “Who are you?”
“I’m Vesta,” the first one said, “and this is Egeria. No man has ever been able to resist us.”
Roland noted that both wore just the grass skirts and they weren’t armed. At least not with the weapons Roland was used to facing: gun, claw, tooth, knife, bomb, etc.
“I don’t think Ivar or Doc or even Eagle could have resisted us,” Egeria said. She laughed. “Moms would have been interesting.”
“You’re not Gaia,” Roland said. “Not with Pandora. You’re with Diana. The bitch who shot at me with an arrow.”
The two women looked at each other. “Impressive leap. Close but not quite right,” Vesta said. “And we were told you might be a bit slow. Obviously, incorrect information.”
“We weren’t told you couldn’t be seduced,” Egeria said. “Who is Neeley? She must be someone very special.”
“Why are you here?” Roland demanded, holding his ground as they took another step forward.
“We’re here to take you on a journey,” Egeria said. “Won’t you come with us?”
“You’re working for the Shadow,” Roland said. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“And it could have been fun,” Vesta said. “You are quite the physical specimen. Neeley must enjoy you.”
“Indeed,” Egeria said. “This would not have been a burden at all if it had gone as planned.”
“Initially planned,” Vesta said. “But there are always backup plans.”
Roland felt a sharp jab in his chest and looked down to see a small dart embedded in his skin, right in the V of the open shirt.
“What—“ he began, but he was overwhelmed with a sudden wave of lethargy.
In his peripheral vision he saw a Gate coming into existence to his left.
As he went to his knees, and before he keeled forward unconscious, his last thought was he preferred HALOing in with weapon at the ready than this time travel crap.
And women--
“If I had to have the same thing again, I would do the same again, but I would hope I wouldn’t have to.”
—Air Marshall Ar
thur ‘Bomber’ Harris regarding the Dresden mission.
Dresden, Germany, 14 February 1945 A.D.
Doc came to consciousness in the midst of thunderous concussions.
Blockbusters he thought. Huge four thousand pound bombs going off. But what most awed him as he opened his eyes was the unearthly red glow. It wasn’t just coming through the shattered windows of the slaughterhouse, it was also inside, part of the very air. The world was burning and Doc was in the middle of the inferno.
He sat up, head pounding from both the butt-stroke and the concussions of the bombs. He didn’t see the guards or Vonnegut.
He had to get to the lower levels.
He scrambled to his feet, then staggered as a bomb blew in the wall behind the stairs, tumbling debris down on.
Fire roared in through the opening, forcing Doc to retreat. He spun about, hoping to dash out through the loading dock. He felt the wind pulling him in that direction as a wall of fire filled the street outside.
He saw a woman running, a child in her arms, just ahead of the firewall. The heat at the forward edge of the inferno caught the pair and they burst into flames, but she kept running for half a dozen strides before collapsing
It was an exit to hell.
Doc blinked, trying to see, as a black rectangle appeared between him and firestorm. Six feet high, four wide.
A Gate.
He looked about, knew he had no choice, and ran for it.
“Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine.”
—Alan Turing
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 14 February 1946
Moms did a quick assessment—bomb, room, women and computer below, mission-- which took four seconds.
:25
The bomb was steel cased, no seams she could see, and the digital display was buried under thick glass, which she had to assume, given the casing, was not easily breached.
She wrapped both arms around it and tried to lift, testing whether it was bolted in place.
The bomb moved, barely. Too heavy to pick up, but she could slide it.
A little.
:20
She struggled to move it once more and slid it about a foot and a half, before she had to stop for a moment.
She didn’t have many moments.
:15
Not enough time to get it out of the room. Tip it and direct the charge away from the room below? She tried to get her fingers under the bottom edge. Strained to lift.
Not going to happen.
:10
A Gate crackled open to her immediate right. A black rectangle, so dark it absorbed light.
The Fates helping? The Shadow? Pandora?
:08
There was no more time. Moms took the only option, shoving the bomb into the Gate, but the darkness reached out, wrapping around not only the bomb, but her too, snapping her into the darkness.
“He saw with his own eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the sun, and bearing the inscription: Conquer By This.”
-Eusebius: The Life of Constantine just before the Battle of the Milvian Bridge
Italy, 14 February 278 A.D.
“Why?” Scout demanded.
Pandora shrugged. “I don’t pretend to understand the Shadow’s motives other than it is evil and destroys all it touches.”
“So you’re here to help me?” Scout asked, looking about, half-expecting Legion assassins to come rushing forward. It wouldn’t be the first time. Or the second. Or the third.
“I’m here to find out what the Shadow has planned,” Pandora said.
“Gee, thanks,” Scout said. “Could I borrow your Naga?” she indicated the bladed staff.
“Not likely,” Pandora said.
“You’re not much help.”
“Join me and I will be of tremendous help,” Pandora said. “Be with us. The sisterhood.”
“Of Gaia?”
“Yes.”
“Not today,” Scout said, still looking out for an ambush. “After all, you said I shouldn’t be here. Now. Today. So not today.”
“Too bad,” Pandora said. “Then I’m done here.”
“You’re an ass,” Scout said. “Not the best recruiting tool.”
“You’re not as smart as I thought you were,” Pandora said. “And perhaps not as gifted with the Sight.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Scout said. “You’ve been blathering that since I first met you in Greece. How did the Alexander the Great thing turn out? Like you envisioned? With your Sight?”
“You’re also not as funny as you like to think you are,” Pandora said.
“He wasn’t the ‘One’ was he?” Scout said. “You’re not as smart as you think you are.”
“Join us.”
“Moms got me my high school diploma,” Scout said.
“What?”
“She thought of me,” Scout said. “She takes care of me. And the rest of the team. Do you take care of your people like that?”
“You don’t know me and you don’t know what you’re really up against,” Pandora said.
“You keep telling me I don’t know stuff,” Scout said, “but you never tell me what I don’t know.”
Pandora turned, as if listening to the bustle of traffic on the bridge above. The creak of poorly lubricated wagon wheels, the clatter of horse’s hooves on stone, muted voices. “Oh,” she murmured.
“What?” Scout said.
“Fate.”
“Where?” Scout asked, trying to focus, to project her Sight.
Pandora shook her head. “So what will be, will be. That is what Fate decrees.” A Gate opened behind her and she stepped backward and was gone.
“Great,” Scout muttered. First Pandora with her usual vague warnings and now a Fate around. Somewhere.
Scout wasn’t picking up anything extraordinary, but she didn’t exactly know what she was supposed to pick up from a Fate since only some of her teammates had encountered one on a mission. No one even knew who or what they were. But if it scared Pandora off—that wasn’t good. Then again, maybe it was? Based on the debriefs, interventions by Fates were usually on the side of the Patrol, not the Shadow.
Scout scrambled up the steep slope of the Tiber embankment, narrowly avoiding a stream of urine from a man standing on the edge of the road. He didn’t seem embarrassed or concerned about the near miss.
When in Rome.
Scout got to the level of the road. The traffic was heavy as the Via Flaminia is the major road running north out of Rome and over the Apennine Mountains to the northeast coast of Italy. Edith’s download threatened to deluge Scout with information about the road, how it was built, who traveled on it and much more. Apparently, Edith had a thing for Roman construction. Scout was impressed with how smooth the road was and how tightly packed the stones; in better shape than many modern roads.
Scout shut that down and focused on the people, not so much what she was seeing and hearing, but the flow of the world around her; the stream of humanity. Mostly exhaustion from those trudging along, which appeared to her as a dull purple. Some flickering red as a cohort of soldiers tramped by heading north, their leather sandals a rhythmic slap against the flat, closely joined stones.
Lots of knee problems later in life for them, Scout thought, but she also knew the average life span wasn’t long enough to worry about bad knees in your 60s. And legionnaires had a shorter life span than most.
There was the slightly brighter glow from merchants heading south with their wagons. The expectation of making money. Of a good deal. Some of their auras were darker, fear of a bad deal. Worry was a pervasive emotion among almost everyone. Worry about this or that.
The human condition.
It exhausted Scout, but not as much as the darkest auras: The dull gray, rippled with black, of slaves passing by, nothing but despair filling their lives.
She picked up something different, vibrant, passionate. An old man in a red robe was coming acr
oss the bridge. People were parting for him, actually, not him but because right behind him strode an imperious man in a white robe fringed with purple who was escorted by a dozen tough-looking legionnaires. The man in the red robe had a fringe of white hair around his skull and his skin was deeply tanned and wrinkled.
He stopped at the midpoint of the bridge, next to a beggar who was seated with his back against the waist-high stone wall that bordered the roadway. The beggar had a wooden bowl in front of him and a dirty rag tied around his head, covering his eyes.
The old man looked about, inspecting the people passing by. The other man and his guards also stopped, waiting.
The old man, whom Scout assumed was Valentine, eventually to be Saint Valentine, leaned over and said something to the beggar. It seemed the beggar was blind, although the random thought crossed Scout’s mind that Nada might not have so easily believed that, putting the man to some sort of test.
Nada had been a bit cynical.
Valentine straightened and look around. His gaze paused on Scout. He smiled at her and she felt drawn in by his amazingly blue eyes, and was also unsettled that he’d noted her. But he looked past her and the smile disappeared.
Scout looked over her shoulder.
Fate.
An old woman in a white robe, a rod held in one hand across her body, the length of it in the crook of the other arm. Edith’s download kindly informed Scout the woman matched the description of Lachesis, the middle of the three Fates. The disposer of lots; the one who determined how long the thread of life that Clotho spun would last. The rod was to measure life. But she ruled not only the length of life, but also a person’s destiny. No one on the team had reported seeing Lachesis before: Clotho and Atropos, the spinner and cutter, but not her, the apportioner.
“Lucky me,” Scout muttered. Another first for her. It also appeared as if no one but her and Valentine saw the Fate.
“Do you wish to see?” Valentine’s voice was surprisingly loud and caught the attention of many on the bridge. A merchant halted his wagon, causing a minor traffic-jam when combined with the other man his military contingent.