Visitors

Chapter 2 Council in Larfold

“What are we waiting for?” asked Param.

“We’re not waiting at all,” said Olivenko. “Go. Do whatever it is you’re so eager to do.”

“There’s nothing to do,” said Param.

“Then we’re not waiting,” said Olivenko. “We’re merely purpose­less. Find a purpose, and go accomplish it. You don’t have to wait for anything.”

“What purpose is there? We know the world ends in a very few years. What’s the point of starting anything?”

“I’m sure Umbo will take you back in time, as far as you want,” said Olivenko. “You can marry and have babies. Raise an army and conquer a wallfold. Assassinate General Citizen before he meets your mother. So many exciting possibilities.”

“I’m not going to marry Umbo or have his babies,” said Param.

“I didn’t suggest that you do so,” said Olivenko. “I said he would take you back in time. You’re the one who leapt to the conclusion that Umbo would be involved in any marriage or baby-making you might embark on.”

Umbo spoke from the other side of the fire, where he had been dozing. “Thank you for finding a way to insult me in a conversation I wasn’t even part of.”

“I’m not having your babies or Olivenko’s,” said Param. “Or Loaf’s, in case anyone wants to include him. The world is ending no matter what time period we go back to. So what if it’s twenty years or two hundred? Knowing the whole world burns makes the whole enterprise…”

“The whole world always burns,” said Loaf. “Or it floods. Or some insect eats the crop and you starve. Or a disease ravages the wallfold, killing nine out of ten, and the survivors eat the dead. Every baby you have dies eventually, no matter what you do. Yet we have babies and we try to go on.”

“I’m not sure,” said Umbo. “Is that your idea of inspiring us with new hope?”

“It’s my way of telling you that only a child thinks that anything you build will last,” said Loaf.

“What we’re waiting for,” said Olivenko, “and we all know it, is Rigg.”

Since they all knew it, there was no point in commenting.

Umbo commented anyway. “He could have returned to us at any time. For instance, a half hour after he left, he could have walked back into our camp and told us what he had just spent the last week or month or five years doing. When somebody can jump from one time to another, it’s just rude to make other people wait.”

Nobody said anything.

“That was not just me being resentful of Rigg the way I used to be,” said Umbo into the silence.

“Nobody said it was,” said Olivenko.

“I’m just tired of waiting,” said Umbo. “And it is rude of him.”

“On the other hand, maybe he’s dead,” said Loaf. “In which case, our wait is truly pointless.”

“Who could possibly kill Rigg?” asked Param. “He already stopped Ram Odin from assassinating him.”

“And now he’s gone back to stop himself from stopping Ram Odin,” said Loaf. “Which means Ram Odin might still find a way to kill him.”

“Even with the mask?” asked Olivenko.

“He won’t try to kill me again,” said Rigg.

If anyone was startled by his sudden appearance, they didn’t show it. Umbo had to laugh, though. “How many times did you make a later entrance till you decided on this moment?”

“I came, I heard, I answered,” said Rigg. “I don’t have to time my entrances. You’re always arguing, and there’s always something to say that’s smarter than anything you’d come up with.”

“Good to have you back,” said Param. “To remind me that Umbo isn’t the only annoying boy in the world.”

“So Ram Odin is alive again,” said Loaf.

Rigg nodded.

“Is that a good thing or a bad?” asked Olivenko.

“Decide for yourselves,” said Rigg. “Because the way I fixed it resulted in more than saving Ram Odin.”

He raised a hand. Immediately two others emerged from the edge of the woods and came to stand beside him. An old man and… another copy of Rigg, facemask and all.

“This is so untidy,” said Umbo.

“Says the one who made two copies of himself already,” said Rigg.

“At least my copies are dead,” said Umbo.

“And mine is alive,” said Rigg. “He has chosen the name Noxon, so you’ll have a way to speak of us separately. But in a way, he’s a purer version of myself. He never killed anybody.”

“But I would have,” said Noxon.

“But you didn’t,” said Rigg.

“The Rigg twins even argue with each other,” said Loaf.

“Rigg probably had arguments with himself all the time,” said Olivenko.

“But we didn’t have to overhear them,” said Loaf.

“So you’re the one who planned all this,” said Param to Ram Odin.

“I’m the one who made decisions when they had to be made,” said Ram Odin. “Sometimes good ones, sometimes bad. Most of the important decisions were made by someone else. But I accept responsibility for what I’ve done wrong. For things I’ve unleashed on the world. Like the mice. And, in a way, the three of you. Four of you now. The timeshapers.”

“Look how happy he is,” said Loaf. “Almost quivering with excitement. After studying you remotely all these years, he finally gets to meet you face to face.”

“Quivering?” asked Ram.

Noxon answered him. “It’s a subtle vibration,” he said, “but the facemask makes it as obvious as breaking into a jig.”

Umbo could not understand why having two Riggs made him so angry. Was it his old envy coming back? Was he so foolish as to be jealous because there was only one of him? Or frightened because now there were two timeshapers more powerful than him and Param? “I’m glad you were able to undo the killing,” said Umbo. “What now?”

Rigg shrugged. But Noxon answered, “I know what I’m thinking of doing, but I can’t decide for anyone else.”

Umbo thought: The two Riggs have already diverged.

Or maybe it was just that Rigg, the one who had killed Ram Odin, was stricken silent by Umbo’s reference to undoing his “killing,” while it meant far less to Noxon, who had no memory of the deed.

“So… are you going to tell us?” asked Olivenko.

“I’m going to Earth,” said Noxon. “If I can master the skills it will take to get there. Because I’m not going with the Visitors. I’m going back eleven thousand years and hitching a ride on the twentieth starship, backward in time.”

“If it exists,” said Umbo. “It’s only a mathematical guess.”

“If he can learn to reverse his direction in time,” said Rigg. “To hook on to something moving the other way.”

“I’m thinking that Param and I might be able to help each other learn some new skills,” said Noxon.

“I can’t help anybody,” said Param. “My talent is almost worse than having none at all.”

“No it isn’t,” said Olivenko.

“Mother made sure my enemies know how slowly I move,” said Param, “and how vulnerable I am when I’m invisible. The mice know it, too. It used to be I could always get away from anyone who tormented me. But now, it only makes me weaker.”

“That’s how I think we can help each other,” said Noxon. “I need to learn how to slice time—how to match the rhythm and duration of each increment. It’s become second nature to you. I’m not as sharp as Umbo—he learned how to jump without me way faster than I learned how to jump without him.”

“And what will you teach me?” asked Param.

“How to do it backward,” said Noxon. “Because that’s the direction I need to move, too.”

Param shook her head. “I skip time, I don’t change directions.”

“That’s my point,” said Noxon. “What if, when you disappeared, you could slice your way backward in time? When Umbo and I… and Rigg… when we jump in time, we skip over everything in between. I… and Rigg… we can see the paths, and the facemask lets us see them as people in motion. Extending backward in time. But they’re always moving forward. So when I attach to them, I attach in the direction they’re going. I need to know how to go upstream. How to slide backward in small increments, and you need to learn the same. I’m hoping we can help each other.”

Param shook her head again. “I can’t do anything like that.”

“We know you can’t,” said Rigg. “That’s what ‘learning’ means. Now you can’t; with work, maybe someday you can.”

“And what will you be doing while Noxon and Param are working on doing new impossible things?” Olivenko asked Rigg.

“I’m planning to go through the other wallfolds, one at a time, and see what they have. We’ve seen Ramfold, Vadeshfold, Odinfold, and Larfold. Fifteen to go.”

“And then what?” asked Olivenko.

“Then I’ll have some kind of idea about what will happen if we bring down the Wall.”

Loaf chuckled. “I can imagine General Citizen and the Sessamoto army trying to make war against the mice of Odinfold.”

“I can also imagine Ramfolders spreading into Vadeshfold and having an infestation of facemasks,” said Olivenko. “Not the fancy versions you and the Riggs have. The original, devastating, bestial ones.”

“That’s an argument right there in favor of never bringing down the Wall around Vadeshfold,” said Param.

“Not that we don’t find the three of you lovely as wild­flowers,” said Umbo.

“I’m a lot prettier than Rigg and Noxon,” said Loaf. “My facemask has had time to grow to fit my original face.”

“That doesn’t always lead toward prettiness,” said Olivenko with a smile that showed he was merely putting Loaf’s own irony into open words.

“So you’re appointed to judge all the wallfolds?” Umbo asked Rigg.

“I’m not judging anything,” said Rigg. “I’m going to go and find out and then we can talk again.”

“And by ‘we’ you mean you and Noxon?” asked Umbo.

“Here we go again,” murmured Param.

“I mean me and you and Loaf and Olivenko and Param, with plenty of advice from the expendables and the ships’ computers,” said Rigg. “Though you don’t have to come to the meeting.”

“And what’s your plan for me?” asked Umbo.

Loaf put out a hand. “Don’t answer him, Rigg. If you have a suggestion, he’ll resent you for trying to boss him around. And if you don’t, he’ll complain that you think he has nothing to contribute.”

Loaf’s words stung, especially because a moment’s self-­examination told Umbo that this was precisely how he would have reacted to anything Rigg might have said.

“I’m the one who has something useful for Umbo to do,” said Loaf. “It’s time for me to go home to Leaky and show her what’s become of me. Give her a chance to decide what to make of my facemask, and whether I’m still the man she married.”

“What do I have to do with that?” asked Umbo. He hated the resentful sound of his own voice.

“If I have you with me, you can swear that it’s really me behind this mask,” said Loaf. “You can show that you accept me as myself, and by being there at all, you’ll prove I didn’t wander off and abandon you and Rigg—because if I come back without you, that’s what she’ll accuse me of.”

“It isn’t just your wife,” said Param. “What will all the other people in your town think of you?”

“They’ll think of me the way they think of burn victims who lived and are now covered with horrible scars,” said Loaf. “They’ll scream and run away for a while, and then, because I’m bigger than they are, I’ll beat the crap out of anybody who thinks they can drive me out of town, and then they’ll get used to me.”

“So you’re going to stay there,” said Param.

“Rigg and Umbo don’t need me,” said Loaf. “If they ever did.”

“We did,” said Rigg and Noxon at once.

“And even if we don’t need you on our particular errand,” said Noxon, “it doesn’t mean we don’t all need each other.”

“Even if nobody knows what they need me for,” said Umbo.

“I told you why I did, plus one more thing,” said Loaf. “I need you to take me back to Leaky just a few days after I left. The old lady’s not getting any younger. And if the reason we never had children was because some part of me malfunctioned, maybe the facemask healed me. If there’s a chance of having children, I don’t want to waste any time.”

“Very practical,” said Olivenko.

“Not to mention romantic,” said Param.

“Romance is for women who aren’t nearing the end of their child-bearing years,” said Loaf. “Leaky pretends she doesn’t care, but it kills her not to have children. I may not be pretty anymore, but she still is, and she can close her eyes.”

Umbo realized that just because he had never thought of Leaky as pretty didn’t mean that Loaf didn’t find her attractive. And, unusually for Umbo, he realized this before he made a jest that Loaf might never forgive.

“What about you, Param?” asked Olivenko.

“What about me? You heard Rigg’s plan. Noxon’s plan.”

“Either it will work or it won’t,” said Olivenko. “When Noxon goes to Earth, you’ll still be here. What then?”

Param shrugged slightly. “I’m open to suggestions.”

“I think you need to gather an army, destroy General Citizen, and depose your mother,” said Olivenko.

“Why?” asked Param. “So I can prove myself incompetent to rule in her place?”

“Maybe you can find a better way. You’ve read the ­histories—of Earth, of all the great eras of Odinfold. The cruelties of the Sessamids and the insanities of the People’s Revolutionary Council aren’t the only choices.”

“Mother made sure I was never trained to run a household, let alone a kingdom. I’m unskilled at every labor.”

“So what? You wouldn’t have wanted to learn her way of governing, would you? Figure out another.”

Param put a hand in front of her face. “I think we’ve all seen how well I handle problems.”

“I think we’ve all grown and changed,” said Olivenko. “And we’re not done yet. You’re going to need a general to lead your troops.”

“And where will she find one?” asked Loaf.

“You,” suggested Umbo.

Loaf shook his head. “Nobody will follow this face into battle. And even if my original face is finally restored, I’m a sergeant at best. A commander of twenty or a hundred, not of ten thousand. And before Umbo makes some joke about my lack of ambition, it isn’t just a difference in scale. Commanding great armies is a matter of planning and logistics. What I know how to do is lead a few men into combat. And drag them home from brothels between the wars.” Loaf then turned to Umbo, as if he were somehow the next logical candidate for the job.

“At least you know what the job is,” said Umbo. “I’m not even sure I could lift a man-sized sword. Or give great stirring speeches.”

“You could learn,” said Olivenko.

“I have no talent for it,” said Umbo. “And no interest in it. I don’t want to lead people.”

“Well, you certainly don’t want to follow anybody,” said Loaf cheerfully.

Umbo shook his head and looked away. That’s why he couldn’t even imagine leading people—those who knew him best had no respect for him.

“I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” said Olivenko. “I’m going to go somewhere with a library—Odinfold, or maybe the starship in Vadeshfold or Larfold—and I’m going to study military history and theory until a week or so before the end of the world. Then one of you time-shifters is going to come and get me, and if I’m not ready to lead an army, you’ll take me back and I’ll work for another couple of years in a different starship.”

“Why not the same one?” asked Noxon. “Then you could have really interesting conversations with the different versions of yourself.”

“Since I don’t know anything,” said Olivenko, “I have no interest in having discussions with myself. From Loaf I could get the common soldier’s perspective. That would be helpful. But even if I have to pass through the same two years ten times over, there’ll come a time when I might actually be useful to you, Param. If not as a general, then at least as a judge of other possible generals. As a counselor. Whatever scholarship and philosophy can make of me, I’ll become, and then I’ll lay my sword at your feet.”

Umbo felt an irresistible thrill at his words. Olivenko had spoken simply, but Umbo could hear how much fire lay behind his offer, and he saw how Param rose within herself and straightened her back. How Olivenko’s offer made her more queenly.

“I will never be worthy of such service,” said Param.

“Yet there is no other possible candidate but you to displace your mother and General Citizen,” said Olivenko. “If you don’t try, at least, then their tyranny continues. Or Ramfold descends into chaos.”

“It’s a good plan,” said Rigg. “I don’t know what I’ll find in the other wallfolds. It may be that Ramfold is the most dangerous, most aggressive civilization. If you can become mistress of that wallfold, Param, then a world without Walls might be safe. Or maybe there will be more dangerous places, and we’ll need the warlike character of the Sessamoto armies to curb the ambitions of even-more-dangerous peoples.”

“It’s too much for me,” said Param.

“If I can make a military counselor out of myself, why can’t you become a queen in fact as well as title?” asked Olivenko.

“We don’t know that you can become what you say you’ll become,” said Param.

“I know I can become far more than I was as a scholar serving your father in the Great Library. Far more than the city guardsman who set out on this journey. Rigg and Loaf with their facemasks, all of you with time-shifting, you aren’t the only ones who can learn and change and grow into something useful.” Olivenko’s voice became even softer, and his gaze at Param was intense. “The very fact that you doubt yourself, my lady, is proof of how much you have learned, and how greatly you have grown.”

At those words, Param burst into tears and covered her face.

But she did not slice time. She did not disappear.

“Thank you for staying with us,” said Loaf softly.

“We all have so much work to do,” said Noxon.

Except me, thought Umbo. Nobody has any plan for me, except to be Loaf’s character witness when he returns to Leaky.

Not fair, he told himself. They don’t dare find jobs for you, because you’re so childish and prickly they know you’ll take offense.

Yet a part of him—the childish, prickly part—still insisted, inside his mind: They aren’t finding a job for me, because now that Rigg has a facemask, and then another copy of himself, there’s no particular need for me at all. “I should get a facemask,” Umbo murmured.

Everyone fell silent.

“Maybe with a facemask I could see the paths like Rigg,” Umbo added.

“We already have twice as many pathfinders as we need,” said Noxon. “That’s why I’m getting out of town.”

“Off the planet, you mean,” said Olivenko.

“We need all the pathfinders we can get,” said Umbo. “And even if I couldn’t see paths, the facemask would make me better at the things I can do.”

“You’re just assuming you have the will to master the facemask,” said Loaf.

“Umbo,” said Param softly, removing her hands from her face. “How can I possibly marry you if you have a facemask? The people would never accept you as their king, if you looked like that.”