Visitors (Pathfinder 3)

“But you already saw that the paths travel with the ship. So you won’t take the ship with us.”

“But if I can’t take the ship with us, we’re going to stay in this backward timeflow forever.”

“That’s a different kind of timeshaping, and it’s in the future,” said Ram Odin. “When we’re closer to Earth. Right? So by then, maybe Earth’s gravity will make it so you can take the ship with you.”

Noxon put his face in his hands. “I’m scared to try it.”

“You’d be insane not to be scared,” said Ram Odin.

“He’d be insane to try it,” said the expendable, “when there’s no recourse if your guess is wrong.”

“There’s no recourse no matter what we do,” said Ram Odin. “We’re cut off from the whole universe, and you’re worried that something might go wrong?” He turned to Noxon. “Just slice time for a little bit. Take my hand—that’s how you take me with you, right? And take us a second into the future.”

“A second or an hour,” said Noxon, “if we get out of sync with the original ship, it might get ugly.”

“Just do it,” said Ram Odin. “I believe that whatever you do, it won’t destroy you, because you’re the causer. Right?”

“Terrible things can happen to us,” said Noxon. “Being the causer only means that we can’t accidentally wink ourselves out of existence by changing our own past.”

“Take my hand,” said Ram Odin. “Slice time. See if it destroys us.”

Noxon took his hand and, with only a moment’s hesitation, sliced forward for only a second of perceived time.

But because he and Param had practiced slicing forward at a very fast pace, his “second” was more than an hour.

Nothing blew up. They were both there. And the expendable was exactly where they had left him.

“Well,” said Noxon. “I guess now we know that we can do that.”

“Please don’t do it again,” said the expendable.

“Missed us?” asked Ram Odin.

“No,” said the expendable. “The moment you disappeared, the mice started attacking the ship’s computers, trying to take control. They’re very good at it and very quick. They ignored my commands to stop. So I had the life support system drop oxygen levels so low that they all fainted. Then I found them all, put them in that box, restored the oxygen levels, and came back here to wait for you.”

Ram Odin gave a little bark of laughter. He thought it was funny, apparently, but that’s because he didn’t know the mice.

Noxon walked to the box, sat beside it, and leaned his head against it so he would be able to hear their tiny high voices, if they should feel inclined to try to explain themselves. “Well,” said Noxon, “you violated our agreement the moment you thought you could get away with it. I think you know what that means.”

There was begging and pleading, all the voices at once. And then one emerged stronger than the others. “You don’t tell us your plans, we don’t tell you ours.”

And another mouse voice: “We didn’t try to attack you. We could have.”

“Not twenty of you,” said Noxon. “And you know I slice much more finely than Param did back when you killed her.”

“And I would have removed any metal they placed in your space,” said the expendable. “They knew that, of course.”

“I assume you’re talking to the mice,” said Ram Odin.

“Human ears can’t hear their conversation,” said Noxon.

“But your facemask—”

“Loaf’s ability to hear the mice and keep track of them was one of the reasons I knew I needed to have a facemask of my own. For this voyage.”

“Kill them,” said Ram Odin. “I know they’re not ordinary mice, but this was treason.”

“I’m not king,” said Noxon. “Well, technically I suppose I am, in Aressa Sessamo, but that’s a dangerous thing to be. I’m not going to kill them. I might need them.”