Visitors (Pathfinder 3)

“Might be possible.”

“But if you can’t slow down enough to see his path,” said the expendable, “then we’ll know that’s an approach that doesn’t work.”

“And then I’d have to figure out how to get myself to a complete stop.”

“Death,” suggested one of the helpful mice. “Works every time.”

“From your expression,” said Ram, “a mouse said something you didn’t like.”

“It was very funny,” said Noxon. “To anybody who didn’t actually have to do this.”

“So are you going to do the experiment?” asked Ram.

“I’m going to try,” said Noxon. “The trouble is that speeding up is easy, now that I learned how from Param. Slowing down—I always do that by sort of watching the paths and doing whatever I do that makes them visible. It was really hard to learn. It’s the thing Umbo does naturally.”

“So follow my path. Here in the ship. Or your own.”

Noxon grimaced. “I hate using my own path to slow down. I have to see myself. And I’m always worried that I’ll attach and then there’ll be two of me.”

“Umbo slows himself down and sends himself messages,” said the expendable.

“Because he can’t see the paths,” said Noxon. “He can’t actually see in advance if the person he’s talking to is there. He finds the exact time another way, some inner time sense, and then he speaks the message to the place where he knows the person will be. At least that’s how it was for him, starting out. It’s why it was always easiest for him to send messages to himself, because he knew where he had been.”

“So he has no risk of attaching to himself,” said Ram.

“But if I use my own path, I always risk attaching to myself and making two of me,” said Noxon.

“So use my path,” said Ram. “Would it help if I sat in the pilot’s chair? Or near it?”

“It doesn’t matter what you do right now. It’s your past self that I’m working with.”

“So I can sing? Dance?”

“I thought all the sarcastic ones were in the box,” said Noxon.

Ram began, “I’ll be as quiet as—”

“A mouse,” said the expendable. “Your sense of when to drag out some old saying is deplorable—and the saying is contradicted, I might add, by the mice we have with us, who are not quiet.”

“We are right now,” said a mouse. “We don’t want Noxon to get distracted and screw this up.”

Noxon held up a hand. “I’m not going to attach to the path. But that’s my reflex, so I have to concentrate on not attaching. Which means staying completely calm.”

“Unlikely,” said the expendable. “Your vital signs are showing all kinds of stress.”

“As calm as possible,” said Noxon, “but thanks for instilling me with confidence.”

“You needed to know,” said the expendable.

“The warning would have been necessary if I didn’t have the facemask to calm all my vital signs whenever I need it to,” said Noxon. “And to shut out all sensory information from you folks, if I need it to.”

“Very useful,” said Ram.

Then Noxon heard nothing, saw nothing. The facemask responded, not to his words, but to his will. All he could sense now was Ram Odin’s path through the ship.

It had been only a few days since the time of splitting, so the paths weren’t all that extensive. That was good. Fewer alternate paths to distract him.

Noxon watched but did not attach. He concentrated on making the path into a person, and then into a person who was moving very, very slowly.