TW11 The Cleopatra Crisis NEW (23 page)

"The chariot race," said Delaney. "While we were watching it, Andre figured out that it was fixed and that all the drivers were in on it. Travers said that the only one in a position to put in that kind of fix was Marcian. So we checked and found out that a man named Sabinus, who came out of nowhere, was the big winner that day and that he was connected to Marcian."

"So you had someone watching Marshall, as well?"

"Lt. Donovan," said Castelli. "He's one of the new T.O.'s I just had brought in to help with the surveillance. Him and Sgt. Hall. Hall's asleep upstairs. He was due to relieve Donovan in about an hour."

"Well, you can tell him not to bother," Steiger said. “And you'd better check on Donovan, as well. They might've gotten him, too."

"Shit," said Castelli. "I'd better clock over there right now."

"Wake up Hall and Corwin and take them with you," Lucas said. "Make sure they're both armed. Then go check on Andell. If Donovan and Andell are both all right, bring them back here and leave Hall and Corwin on surveillance duty at Cleopatra's house. But tell them to be very careful. They're on to us."

"I'll get right on it," said Castelli, hurrying out of the room.

"What the hell happened, Creed?" asked Delaney.

"I'm not exactly sure," said Steiger. "But we've all been blown somehow. Like I said, your man Castelli was pretty good. I never spotted him until tonight, but I had this prickly feeling at the back of my neck and I knew something wasn't right, so I started looking. I went out for a walk to see if I could flush my tail, if there was one, and sure enough, after about five blocks, I spotted him. Just about the same time, they tried to hit him. There were three of them and by rights, they should've got him, but he was pretty fast. They missed their first shot at him and he clocked out right away. Didn't waste a second. I didn't know the players without a scorecard, so I didn't waste any time doing the same thing. I clocked over to Marshall's place, because I thought he might've had something to do with it. Only when I got there, he was already dead. Shot with a laser."

"Why did you think Marshall was behind it?" Lucas asked.

“Because Marshall’s a deserter, and he was scared. We went back a long way together. He used to be in the covert field section. I guess it got too much for him. He started slowing down and he decided to opt out. He just disappeared one day. But we'd both maintained contacts with the Underground, so it wasn't too hard to figure out what he'd done. Only I didn't know he was in Rome. When this mission came down. I started checking with my old contacts to find out if they had anyone back here and bingo, Marshall's name came up."

"Did I understand you correctly?" Travers asked with astonishment. "You maintain contacts in the Underground?"

"Occasionally. they can be very useful," Steiger said.

"But . . . but that's against the law! Those people are criminals!"

"Those criminals probably saved your life tonight," said Steiger.

“I still don't understand," said Travers.

"Marshall must've been holding out on me," said Steiger. "There's apparently a bunch of them back here. I didn't know that, hut it's the only explanation that makes sense."

"But you said you thought he was behind what happened tonight," said Andre.

"That's what I thought at first," said Steiger, "until I overheard you just now, before I came in. Which reminds me, your security stinks. Why haven't you got guards posted?"

"Because we didn't know that we'd been blown," said Lucas, “and because we couldn't spare the people, no thanks to you." He glanced up as Castelli came back in with Donovan and Andell.

"I need a report fast," he said.

"I didn't see anything tonight, sir," Donovan said.

"Me, neither." said Andell. "Nobody left Cleopatra's house after you'd gone."

"They must have clocked out to set up the ambush," said Lucas. "We'll fill you in later, but right now, we need some security around here in case they try again."

"Right," said Castelli. "Andell, you take the roof. Donovan, watch the back. I'll take the front."

They hurried to their posts.

"All right, get back to Marshall," Lucas said to Steiger.

"He wasn't thrilled when I suddenly popped in on him," Steiger said. “He was worried that I might turn him in when this was over. He should've known better, but he wasn't the man he used to be. He caught me off guard and drugged me the other night. I guess he meant to kill me, but he lost his nerve. He said he couldn't bring himself to do it. But after what happened tonight, I thought maybe he'd changed his mind. Only when I clocked back to his place, he'd been dead for hours. In his room, with the door bolted from the inside."

"Suicide?" asked Andre.

Steiger shook his head. "No, his laser was still in its hiding place. He'd been murdered. My guess is the S.O.G. caught on to him somehow and took him out. His conscience must have bothered him, so he got his buddies in the Underground to keep an eye on us. Maybe that's what tipped the opposition. I don't know, but it's the only explanation I can think of for what's happened tonight."

"It would make sense," said Lucas, nodding. "The Underground doesn't want a temporal disruption any more than we do, so they're backing us up, only the paranoid bastards are staying out of sight so we won't know who they are."

He sighed. "Unfortunately, with Marshall dead, unless they contact us, there's no way we can get in touch with them."

"Sure looks that way," said Steiger.

"Well, at least we know one thing," said Delaney. "There's no question anymore that our so-called Egyptians are really S.O.G. Unless Cleopatra issues lasers to her troops."

“I'd just like to know what the hell gave us away," said Andre. "I can't think of anything we've done that should have aroused their suspicions."

“Maybe it wasn't anything you did." said Steiger. "Maybe it was something I did, or something Marshall did. Or maybe they've already been through this before."

"What do you mean?" asked Travers.

It's just an idea, of course," said Steiger. "but maybe they sent in Observers of their own in advance of the mission, to document the scenario as thoroughly as possible. figure out who all the players were and so forth. Then they could have simply clocked in their Special Operations Group back to the beginning, after they already knew as much as possible about the way things went down. If that's the case, then we obviously would've stood out like sore thumbs, because we weren't around the first time."

"Wait a minute." Travers said with a frown. "That doesn't make any sense. It would be impossible."

"Why?" asked Steiger, raising his eyebrows.

"Because it would violate temporal physics." Travers said. "This scenario occupies a particular temporal location in the timestream. If they clocked in Observers in advance. and then tried to clock in their S.O.G. team back to the initial point of the scenario they were observing after the Observers had finished their task and made their report, then they would have altered the very scenario they were attempting to observe in its unaltered state."

" You want to give me that again?" said Steiger, looking puzzled.

"It violates the Principal of Temporal Uncertainty," explained Travers. "Assume they clocked in their Observers first, say to the temporal locus of the night before Caesar crossed the Rubicon. The Observers have strict instructions only to observe, to do absolutely nothing that would in any way interfere with the scenario. In effect, functioning as a Temporal Pathfinder unit. We will leave aside for the moment the question of Heisenberg's Principle and assume that they did not significantly alter the scenario by being here to observe it. So they complete their period of observation, say up to the time that Caesar is assassinated, go back through the confluence point they're using, wherever the hell it may be, and make their detailed report. So then the S.O.G. team is clocked in to effect the disruption, going back to whatever optimum temporal locus point they have selected. Let's say it's the same point, the night before Caesar crossed the Rubicon. Only their Observers are already
there
. And what they will wind up observing would no longer be the original scenario, but the scenario as it's affected by the presence of the S.O.G. team! It's a temporal paradox."

"Not necessarily." said Steiger. "They would've had to receive a report of the original unaltered scenario before they sent in their S.O.G. team, so there would have to exist a space of time in which what their Observers saw was an unaltered scenario."

"No, you're wrong, Creed." said Delaney, who'd had much more training in the complexities of temporal physics. "Logic would seem to dictate that you're right, but logic breaks down when it comes to Zen physics. If we're to assume that's what they did, then the moment their Observers clocked back to this scenario, they became a part of it, just as we are now. They altered it to the extent of their presence here. And maybe what they first observed was the scenario as it had occurred before their S.O.G. team was clocked in, but the moment the S.O.G. team was brought in, then they became a part of the scenario and changed whatever their Observers had originally observed. Travers is right. They would've created a temporal paradox. They would've changed their own past. That would have meant risking a timestream split."

“Only they would have risked it in our timeline," Lucas said with a thoughtful expression upon his face.

It suddenly got very quiet.

"Ooops," said Delaney.

For a moment, no one said anything. Then Steiger broke the silence.

"Of course, it was only an idea. We don't know that's what they did."

"Ah, but that's exactly what they did do, my boy," said a new voice.

Travers jerked around, startled, and found himself looking at a tall, gaunt, dark-hired man with a neatly trimmed moustache, deep-set dark eyes, and a sharp, aquiline nose. He was dressed in a gray herringbone Harris tweed sport coat shot through with fine threads of blue and peach, light gray flannel slacks, black kidskin loafers and gray silk socks, a button-down collar white shirt of raw silk, open at the neck, and a light blue silk ascot with a gold paisley pattern. He was holding a blackthorn walking stick and there was a gray Irish tweed walking hat set at a jaunty angle on his head.

Travers blinked. He could see the rolls of books right through him in their cubbyholes on the shelves.

"Oh, dear," he said weakly. "I'm almost afraid to ask."

"Capt. Travers, meet Dr. Robert Darkness," Lucas said, "the man who's faster than light. And who is, unless I miss my guess, about to make our lives utterly miserable."

Suddenly Darkness wasn't there anymore. One moment, Travers was staring at him and the next, he was simply gone. Only to reappear an instant later standing directly in front of him.

"How do you do?" said Darkness, offering his hand.

Travers flinched. "Hello," he said uncertainly, taking the man's hand. It felt solid enough, but he could see his own palm through it as they shook. The man seemed to flicker faintly. "I—I've heard of you," said Travers. "But I also heard that you were dead."

"Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated, to quote Mark Twain," said Darkness. "I've read your book on Caesar. An outstanding piece of work. Highly illuminating."

"But ... I haven't even written it yet!" said Travers, thoroughly confused.

"Ah, but you will," said Darkness. "Assuming, of course, that things proceed on schedule."

Travers stared at him as it finally sank in. "My God. You're from the future!"

"I am from a future, Mr. Travers. About which, for an entire plethora of reasons, the less said, the better."

"Then if he wrote the book, the mission was . . .
is
going to be . . .successful," Lucas said.

"That will be entirely up to you," said Darkness. "I did not say how the book ends, did I?"

Delaney exhaled heavily. "Jesus, this is it, isn't it? The key point in time. The reason you came back. This is where it's all going to hit the fan."

"Only partially correct, Mr. Delaney," Darkness said. "This is
one
of the key points in time, but it is, or it is about to be, a highly significant one."

"You're saying we blew it the first time around?" asked Steiger.

"The first time?" Darkness said. "There is no
first
time. As Delaney was just saying, quite correctly, there is only time. A nebulous commodity that can be disturbingly fluid and unstable. This moment, right now, is in fact a temporal disruption.
I
am a temporal disruption. And if the time-stream has become a sea of instability, we are about to enter into the eye of the storm. What you are about to do, one way or another, will change the course of history. That you will effect a change is unavoidable. That you will effect the right change is conjectural. But you
will
effect a change."

They all remained very silent.

"I see I have your attention," Darkness said with a slight smile. But it was a smile that had no amusement in it whatsoever. "In the past," he said, "I have interfered, in one way or another, in each of your lives. Except, of course, for you, Mr. Travers, as we have never met before. Your role in what is about to happen will be minimal. Whereas theirs—“ he indicated the others with a sweeping motion of his walking stick-- "will be pivotal and crucial. You doubtless have questions that you'd like to ask, but I'm afraid that I have neither the time nor the liberty to answer them right now. However," he continued, addressing his comments to the others, "everything that I have done up to this point has had a purpose.

"There is a great deal that I simply cannot tell you," he went on, "but I can tell you this—something has occurred in the time period from which I came that has resulted from a series of pivotal events that took place in the past. Not all of those events involve you, but some of the most significant ones do. And this one is, perhaps, the most significant."

"Will it be the last?" asked Andre softly.

"That all depends, Miss Cross," Darkness replied. "If we pass this test—and it is very much a test, for you as well as me—then there will be at least one more challenge that we shall have to face together. But if we fail here and now, then it will all be moot, for I will have only one chance to attempt to set things right. Because, as you were saying just a few moments ago, to risk attempting it a second time would create a temporal paradox and the consequences of that would be dire, indeed. For we are already involved in one, you see. In a manner of speaking."