Isaac Asimov - The End of Eternity

“Grant everything,” said Harlan sullenly. “They’re out of our reach and we’re out of theirs. Live and let live.”

Twissell seemed struck by the phrase. “Live and let live. But we don’t. We make Changes. The Changes extend only through a few Centuries before temporal inertia causes its effects to die out. You remember Sennor brought that up as one of the unanswered problems of Time at our breakfast. What he might have said was that it’s all a matter of statistics. Some Changes affect more Centuries than other. Theoretically, any number of Centuries can be affected by the proper Change; a hundred Centuries, a thousand, a hundred thousand. Evolved man of the Hidden Centuries may know that. Suppose he is disturbed by the possibility that someday a Change may reach him clear to the 200,000th.”

“It’s useless to worry about such things,” said Harlan with the air of a man who had much greater worries.

“But suppose,” went on Twissell in a whisper, “they were calm enough as long as we left the Sections of the Hidden Centuries empty. It meant we weren’t aggressing. Suppose this truce, or whatever you wish to call it, were broken, and someone appeared to have established permanent residence upwhen from the 70,000th. Suppose they thought it might mean the first of a serious invasion? They can bar us from their Time, so their science is that far advanced beyond ours. Suppose they may further do what seems impossible to us and throw a barrier across the kettleways, cutting us off—“

And now Harlan was on his feet, in full horror, “ They have Noÿs?”

“I don’t know. It’s speculation. Maybe there is no barrier. Maybe there was something wrong with your ket—“

“There was a barrier!” yelled Harlan. “What other explanation is there? Why didn’t you tell me this before.”

“I didn’t believe it,” groaned Twissell. “I still don’t. I shouldn’t have said a word of this foolish dreaming. My own fears—the question of Cooper—everything— But wait, just a few minutes.”

He pointed at the temporometer. The scaler indicated them to be between the 95,000th and 96,000th Centuries.

Twissell’s hand on the controls slowed the kettle. The 99,000th was passed. The scaler’s motions stopped. The individual Centuries could be read.

99,726—99,727—99,728—

“What will we do?” muttered Harlan.

Twissell shook his head in a gesture that spoke eloquently of patience and hope, but perhaps also of helplessness.

99,851—99,852—99,853—

Harlan steeled himself for the shock of the barrier and thought desperately: Would preserving Eternity be the only means of finding time to fight back at the creatures of the Hidden Centuries? How else recover Noÿs? Dash back, back to the 575th and work like fury to—

99,938—99,939—99,940—

Harlan held his breath. Twissell slowed the kettle further, let it creep. It responded perfectly to the controls.

99,984—99,985—99,986—

“Now, now, now,” said Harlan in a whisper, unaware that he had made any sound at all.

99,998—99,999—100,000—100,001—100,002—

The numbers mounted and the two men watched them continue to mount in paralytic silence.

Then Twissell cried, “There is no barrier.”

And Harlan answered, “There was! There was!” Then, in agony, “Maybe they’ve got her, and need a barrier no longer.”

111,394th!

Harlan leaped from the kettle, and raised his voice. “Noÿs! Noÿs!”

The echoes bounced off the walls of the empty Section in hollow syncopation.

Twissell, climbing out more sedately, called after the younger man, “Wait, Harlan—“

That was useless. Harlan, at a run, was hurtling along the corridors toward that portion of the Section they had made a kind of home.

He thought vaguely of the possibility of meeting one of Twissell’s “evolved men” and momentarily his skin prickled, but then that was drowned in his urgent need to find Noÿs.

“Noÿs!”

And all at once, so quickly that she was in his arms before he was sure he had seen her at all, she was there and with him, and her arms were around him and clutching him and her cheek was against his shoulder and her dark hair was soft against his chin.

“Andrew?” she said, her voice muffled by the pressure of his body. “Where were you? It’s been days and I was getting frightened.”

Harlan held her out at arm’s length, staring at her with a kind of hungry solemnity. “Are you all right?”

“ I’m all right. I thought something might have happened to you. I thought—“ She broke off, terror springing into her eyes and gasped, “Andrew!”

Harlan whirled.

It was only Twissell, panting.

Noÿs must have gained confidence from Harlan’s expression. She said more quietly, “Do you know him, Andrew? Is it all right?”

Harlan said, “It’s all right. This is my superior, Senior Computer Laban Twissell. He knows of you.”

“A Senior Computer?” Noÿs shrank away.

Twissell advanced slowly. “I will help you, my child. I will help you both. The Technician has my promise, if he would only believe it.”

“My apologies, Computer,” said Harlan stiffly, and not yet entirely repentant.

“Forgiven,” said Twissell. He held out his hand, took the girl’s reluctant one. “Tell me, girl, has it been well with you here?”

“I’ve been worried.”

“There’s been no one here, since Harlan last left you.”

“N—no, sir.”

“No one at all? Nothing?”

She shook her head. Her dark eyes sought Harlan’s. “Why do you ask?”

“Nothing, girl. A foolish nightmare. Come, we will take you back to the 575th.”

On the kettle back Andrew Harlan sank, by degrees, into a troubled and deepening silence. He did not look up when the 100,000th was passed in the downwhen direction and Twissell had snorted an obvious sigh of relief as though he had half expected to be trapped on the upwhen side.

He scarcely moved when Noÿs’s hand stole into his, and the manner in which he returned the pressure of her fingers was almost mechanical.

Noÿs slept in another room and now Twissell’s restlessness reached a peak of devouring intensity.

“The advertisement, boy! You have your woman. My part of the agreement is done.”

Silently, still abstracted, Harlan turned the pages of the volume on the desk. He found his page.

“It’s simple enough,” he said, “but it’s in English. I’ll read it to you and then translate it.”

It was a small advertisement in the upper left-hand corner of a page numbered 30. Against an irregular line drawing as background were the unadorned words, in block letters:

ALL THE

TALK

OF THE

MARKET

Underneath, in smaller letters, it said; “Investments News-Letter, P.O. Box 14, Denver, Colorado.”

Twissell listened painstakingly to Harlan’s translation and was obviously disappointed. He said, “What is the market? What do they mean by that?”

“The stock market,” said Harlan impatiently. “A system by which private capital was invested in business. But that’s not the point at all. Don’t you see the line drawing against which the advertisement is set?”

“Yes. The mushroom cloud of an A-bomb blast. An attention getter. What about it?”

Harlan exploded. “Great Time, Computer, what’s wrong with you? Look at the date of the magazine issue.”

He pointed to the top heading, just to the left of the page number. It read March 28, 1932.

Harlan said, “That scarcely needs translation. The numbers are about those of Standard Intertemporal and you see it’s the 19.32nd Century. Don’t you know that at that time no human being who had ever lived had seen the mushroom cloud? No one could possibly reproduce it so accurately, except—“