Stephen Baxter - The Time Ships

As for me, I scavenged funnels and lengths of tubing and, in the privacy of an old lean-to, began conducting intense private experiments. The colonists were curious about this, and I was forced to resort to sleeping in the lean-to to keep the secret of my improvised apparatus. It was time, I had decided, to put my scientific understanding to good use — for once!

The day of the Feast dawned. We gathered before the Hall in the bright morning light, and there was an air of great excitement and occasion. Once more the remains of uniforms had been cleaned and donned, and the infants-in-arms were decorated in the new fabrics Nebogipfel had devised of a type of local cotton, colored bright red and purple by vegetable dyes. I passed through the little knot of people, seeking out my closer friends -

— when there was a crash of twigs, and a deep, creaking bellow.

The cry went up. “ Pristichampus — it is Pristichampus! Look out…”

And indeed, the bellow had been characteristic of that great land-running crocodile. People ran around, and I cast about for a weapon, cursing myself for being so unprepared.

Then another voice, gentler and more familiar, came floating to us. “Hi! Don’t be afraid — look!”

The panic subsided, and a sprinkle of laughter broke out.

Pristichampus — a proud male — stalked into the clear space in front of the Hall. We moved back to make room for it, and its hoofed feet left great pockmarks in the sand… and there on its back, grinning widely, his red hair flaming in the sunlight, sat Stubbins!

I approached the crocodile. Its scaly hide stank of decaying meat, and one cold eye was fixed on me, swiveling as I walked. Stubbins, bare-backed, grinned down at me; in his wiry hands he held a rein made of plaited lianas, wrapped about Pristichampus’s head.

“Stubbins,” I said, “this is quite an achievement.”

“Aye, well, I know we’ve set the Diatryma to dragging a plow, but this creature is far more agile. Why, we’ll be able to travel miles — it’s better than a horse…”

“Just be careful, even so,” I admonished him. “And, Stubbins, if you join me later—”

“Yes?”

“I might have a surprise for you.”

Stubbins dragged at Pristichampus’s head. It took considerable effort, but he managed to get the beast to turn. The great creature stepped its way out of the clearing and back towards the forest, the muscles of its huge legs working like pistons.

Nebogipfel joined me, his head almost lost beneath a huge, broad-brimmed hat.

“That’s a fine achievement,” I remarked. “But — can you see? — he barely had control of the brute…”

“He will win,” Nebogipfel said. “Humans always do.” He stepped closer to me, his white pelt shining in the morning sunlight. “Listen to me.”

I was startled by this sudden, incongruous whisper. “What? What is it?”

“I have finished my construction.”

“What construction?”

“I leave tomorrow. If you wish to join me, you are welcome.”

And he turned and, noiselessly, walked away towards the forest; in a moment the white of his back was lost in the darkness of the trees. I stood there with the sun at my neck, gazing after the enigmatic Morlock — and it was as if the day had been transformed. My mind was in a perfect turmoil, for his meaning was utterly clear.

A heavy hand clapped me on the back. “So,” said Stubbins, “what’s this great secret you have for me?”

I turned to him, but I found it difficult, for some seconds, to focus on his face. “Come with me,” I said at last, with as much vigour and good humor as I could muster.

A few minutes later, Stubbins — and the rest of the colonists were raising shells full to the brim with my home-made nut-milk liqueur.

The rest of the day passed in a joyous blur. My liqueur proved more than popular — although for my part I should have much preferred to have been able to improvise a pipeful of tobacco! There was much dancing to the sound of inexpert singing and hand-clapping, which impersonated a jolly sort of 1944 music Stubbins called “swing,” that I would like, I think, to have heard more of. I had them sing “The Land of the Leal” for me, and I performed, with my usual solemnity, one of my patent improvised dances; it evoked great admiration and mirth. The Diatryma was roasted on a spit — the cooking of it took most of the day — and the evening saw us sprawled on the scuffed sand, our plates laden with succulent meat.

Once the sun slipped below the tree-line, the party thinned rapidly; for most of us had become accustomed to a dawn-to-dusk existence. I hailed good night one final time, and retired to the ruins of my improvised still. I sat in the entrance to the lean-to, sipping at the last of my liqueur, and I watched the shadow of the forest sweep across the Palaeocene Sea. Dark shapes slid through the water: rays, perhaps, or sharks.

I thought over my conversation with Nebogipfel, and tried to come to terms with the decision I must make.

After a time, there was a soft, uneven footstep on the sand.

I turned. It was Hilary Bond — I could barely make out her face in the last of the day-light — and yet, somehow, I was not surprised to see her.

She smiled. “Can I join you? Do you have any of that moonshine left?”

I waved her to a place in the sand beside me, and I passed her my shell. She drank with some grace. “It’s been a good day,” she said.

“Thanks to you.”

“No. Thanks to all of us.” She reached out and took my hand — quite without warning — the touch of her skin was like an electric jolt. She said, “I want to thank you for all you’ve done for us. You and Nebogipfel.”

“We haven’t—?”

“I doubt if we’d have survived those first few days, without you.” Her voice, soft and level, was nevertheless quite compelling. “And now, with all you’ve shown us, and all Nebogipfel’s taught us — well, I think we’ve every chance of building a new world here.”

Her fingers were delicate and long against my palm, and yet I could feel the scarring from her burns. “Thank you for the eulogy. But you speak as if we are going away…”

“But you are,” she said. “Aren’t you?”

“You know about Nebogipfel’s plans?”

She shrugged. “In principle.”

“Then you know more than I do. If he has built a Time-Car — where did he get the Plattnerite, for example? The Juggernauts were destroyed.”

“From the wreck of die Zeitmaschine, of course.” She sounded amused. “Didn’t you think of that?” She paused. “And you want to go with Nebogipfel. Don’t you?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know. You know, sometimes I feel old — and tired — as if I have seen quite enough already!”

She snorted her contempt for that. “Baloney. Look: you started it—” She waved a hand. “All of this. Time traveling — and all the changes it’s brought about.” She gazed around at the placid Sea. “And now, this is the biggest Change of all. Isn’t it?” She shook her head. “You know, I’ve had a certain amount of dealing with the strategic planners at the DChronW, and I’ve come away downcast every time at the smallness of the thinking of such types. To adjust the course of a battle here, to assassinate some tin-pot figure there… If you have such a tool as a Chronic Displacement Vehicle, and if you know that History can be changed, as we do, then would you, should you, restrict yourself to such footling goals as that? Why restrict yourself to a few decades, and to fiddling with the boyhood of Bismarck or the Kaiser, when you can go back millions of years — as we have? Now, our children will have fifty million years to remake the world… We’re even going to rebuild the human species — aren’t we?” She turned to me. “But you haven’t reached the end of it yet. What’s the Ultimate Change, do you think? Can you go back all the way to the Creation, and start things all over again from there? How far can this — Changing — go?”