Pathfinder (Pathfinder 1)

CHAPTER 12

In Irons

The expendable and the computers worked out the math as best they could in only an hour or two. “If your extravagant and unverifiable guesses happen to be right,” said the expendable, “then yes, the stuttering of spacetime might have allowed all nineteen versions of this ship to pass through the fold to eleven thousand years in the past, but with just enough time elapsed between passages that they wouldn’t overlap and therefore wouldn’t necessarily annihilate each other.”

“So there might be not just one, but nineteen versions of this ship and all its crew and equipment, including your charming selves, and me, the pilot, proceeding toward the target planet in order to colonize it.”

“Or not,” said the expendable.

“Oh, but it’s too delicious not to be true.”

“Metaphorical flavor doesn’t influence reality,” said the expendable.

“But the elegance of reality has a metaphorical flavor,” said Ram.

“Suppose you’re right,” said the expendable. “So what?”

“So I’ll feel better as I spend the rest of my life doing nothing meaningful.”

“You’ll have time to read all those books you never got around to reading.”

“I think I won’t have time to do anything at all,” said Ram. “I think I will only live until we reach the place where this ship was constructed. Only the structure we now see around us is moving backward through time. When we come to the place where it was built, it will be unbuilt around us.”

“So we’ll get off.”

“How?” asked Ram. “We would have to get into a shuttle that would take us back to the surface of Earth. But there are no shuttles moving our direction in time.”

“There aren’t any stars moving our direction,” said the expendable, “and yet we still see them.”

“What an interesting quandary,” said Ram. “By all means, stick around and see what happens.”

“What will you do?”

“I’ll continue this voyage until I find a way to send a message to the versions of myself that cross the fold into the past and have to deal with their nineteenfold replication.”

“How do you propose to do that?” asked the expendable.

“Carve it into the metal of the ship somewhere that I’ll be sure to find it, but not until after I come through the fold.”

“No matter where you decide to carve it,” said the expendable, “the fact that it wasn’t already there when you arrive to start carving it proves that you cannot do anything to change objects that are moving in the ordinary direction of time.”

“I know,” said Ram. “That’s why you’re going to do it.”

“That changes nothing.”

“With your eyes closed,” said Ram. “So you can’t see in advance the proof that it didn’t work.”

• • •

Rigg and Shouter, clamped together at ankles and wrists, sat side by side on two stools in the pilot’s cabin as the boat made its way down the river. The current was carrying them, so there were no steady surges from the polemen. Instead, the boat would yaw to one side or the other as the polemen shoved them away from some obstacle—a bar, a bank, an island, another boat. Able to see nothing, Rigg and Shouter could make no preparation for these changes of direction, and so they sat constantly braced, trying to avoid lurching into each other or falling off the stools.

For the first several hours, Shouter said nothing, which did not bother Rigg—he was practiced in holding his tongue and forcing the other to speak first. And judging from the raw hatred Rigg could see and feel in the rigidity of Shouter’s body and facial expression, the beat of his pulse, the heat coming from him despite his being soaking wet, when Shouter spoke it was not going to be nice.

But it might be informative. General Citizen was practiced in self-control, revealing only what he chose, most of the time; Shouter, judging from his nickname, had no schooling in self-control—except, perhaps, in front of a superior officer; if he didn’t have that skill, he would never have become an officer. Still, Rigg might learn more about General Citizen, perhaps get an idea of which things Citizen had said were true. He might also stumble upon some information that would help him figure out a way to escape from custody, if he decided that’s what he wanted to do. And perhaps he could turn Shouter into an ally, or at least a tool.

Food was brought to them and placed on a table in front of them—but too far away for them to reach it without either pulling the table toward themselves or their stools toward the table. Rigg reached forward with his left hand and pulled slightly on the table. Then he held his hand there, waiting for Shouter to do the same on the other side.

He could see that it truly pained Shouter to have to cooperate with him, but in due time he must have seen the necessity of it, for he reached out his right hand and together, they drew the table toward themselves, so now the bowls of barley soup were within comfortable reach.