Visitors (Pathfinder 3)

“Did we arrive before they achieved high technology?” asked Wheaton.

“Radio waves, broadcast not focused,” said the expendable. “Use of electric power. Illumination on the nightside.”

“So,” said Wheaton. “Not a minute too early.”

“Not if they follow the trajectory we followed on Earth,” said Ram. “Only a few decades between widespread electricity with radio and the development of space flight.”

“It may be even narrower because they have such a strong incentive to get into space,” said the expendable.

“What incentive is that?” asked Ram.

“Their binary,” said the expendable. “It is also inhabited.” The expendable seemed about to say more, but it froze for a moment. “A twentieth ship has appeared.”

“He did it,” said Noxon.

“Who did what?” asked Wheaton.

“Well, I did it,” said Noxon. “I was watching carefully during the jump through the fold. If we divided, I was going to try to snag the backward-moving ship and bring it back into the forward timeflow.”

“The ship reports that you failed,” said the expendable. “The backward-moving ship in fact moved backward, not making the jump through the fold. But the mice on that ship were able to reprogram the computers to avoid the twenty-fold duplication and then jumped the fold going backward, in order to separate the backward-moving ship from the outbound ship that was us just before our jump.”

“My head hurts,” said Wheaton.

“It does not,” said the expendable. “But your lie is apparently intended to express humorously exaggerated confusion which you do not, in fact, feel.”

“Exactly,” said Wheaton. “It’s nice to have someone get my jokes, even though you have to explain them aloud.”

“I wanted to confirm that I had understood,” said the expendable.

“If they jumped the fold backward,” said Ram, “how are they here?”

“Noxon was able to reverse timeflow and rejoin our spacetime,” said the expendable. “Very good work.”

“Thanks,” said Noxon. “But it wasn’t me.”

“It was you-ish,” said the expendable. “It’s within your capabilities.”

“And then what?” asked Noxon. “He jumped forward to our time?”

“The backward-moving ship had not made the 11,191-year pastward leap that these nineteen ships made. So it arrived in this space in the future, relative to our current timeplace.”

“What did they see there?” asked Ram.

“Not very much,” said the expendable. “The aliens immediately attempted to seize control of the ship’s computers, remotely. The mice were able to resist their reprogramming, which was feeble and unsophisticated compared to the one they will use near Earth several hundred thousand years from now. Then the Noxon of that ship attached to our paths and jumped back to our time, when the aliens are not able to project their computing prowess this far into space.”

“Narrow escape,” said Wheaton.

“It was a very good thing that we had the mice with us,” said Noxon.

“Thank you,” said the alpha mouse. “We’re glad to reward you for refraining from crushing my head.”

“I never wanted to do it,” said Noxon to the mouse.

“Talking to the mice?” asked Wheaton.

“I wonder,” said Ram, “if our presence here, now, accelerated the aliens’ development of the ability to make remote assaults on human computing systems. Having seen us enter their space . . .”

Wheaton agreed. “Why, it might be that our presence is what led them to attack Earth!”