Barrington Bayley: Collision with Chronos

But it was also evident that another civilisation, not of Earth, had established itself here side by side with the human one sometime during the past thousand years. It also had been wiped out – but much, much more completely. That a civilisation could be eradicated so completely was puzzling. The actual age of the ruins it had left behind it was still in dispute, but to the ideologues of the Titanium Legions the inference was unavoidable – the old human civilisation had died in a gigantic struggle to save Earth from the intruders. Though it had succeeded in its mission, the effort had been too much for it and had left it too weak to survive.

The argument was plausible. The alien remains showed every sign of having been destroyed in furious warfare, and nearly everyone accepted that the war between the two races had taken place. But as for the second premise… Heshke’s eyes strayed back to the archaeological chart on the wall. The collapse of classical civilisation was hardly a unique event in history. Rather there had been a whole series of such collapses at intervals separated by about two millennia, as if human civilisation were inherently incapable of supporting itself, time and time again falling under its own weight. Some extremists among the Titans attributed this pattern to successive waves of alien invasion, but there was no evidence to support the idea.

And neither, despite exhaustive efforts on the part of Heshke and numerous colleagues, was there really decisive evidence to show that the last, classical civilisation had in fact disappeared under the onslaught of alien attack. To Heshke’s mind the picture was more one of a rapid internal decline covering about a century and culminating in final violent collapse. Furthermore, there was an inexplicable lack of reference to the aliens in most of the records so far unearthed. Nevertheless he found himself having to accept the Interventionist Theory, with some reservations, even if only on the grounds of probability. After all, the aliens had been there, and they might have used weapons whose effects were not now discernible.

He hesitated, then opened his briefcase and took out a set of glossy photographs. “I wasn’t sure whether or not to show you these. They’re quite interesting in a way.…”

He passed the photographs across the desk. Brourne and Brask bent to inspect them. They were pictures, taken from various angles, of the alien ruins where he had his camp.

“These came into my hands a short while ago,” he explained diffidently. “They were passed on to me by a colleague making a study of the old town of Jejos – it’s due for demolition, you know. We think they were taken about three hundred years back, probably by an amateur historian of the time. At first we thought they would be instructive; however.…”

He dipped into his briefcase again and passed over more photographs. “These are modern pictures, taken from the same angles for comparison.”

Brourne looked from one batch to the other in puzzlement. “So?”

Heshke leaned across the desk. “See this conical tower here? Even today it’s in fairly good shape, as you can see. Yet in the old photograph – the one three hundred years old – it’s missing, except for a crumbled base.”

Brourne snorted. “That’s impossible.”

“Yes, obviously,” agreed Heshke. “There are other anomalies too – crumbled walls, generally deteriorated stonework; in fact if we were to believe these photographs it would mean that the ruins are in better condition – are – newer! – today than they were three hundred years ago.”

“So what do you make of that?”

Heshke shrugged. “Apparently, for some reason, the pictures have been touched up and generally faked to make the ruins seem older than they were.”

“And why would anyone want to do that?”

“I haven’t even the beginning of an idea. But that’s what must have happened. There’s no other explanation.”

“Obviously.” Brourne’s voice was sarcastic, and Heshke felt stupid for having raised the matter at all. “And that would seem to negate their historical value,” the Titan-Major continued, staring intently at the pictures. Finally he handed them to Brask. “Have copies made of all these,” he said.

The fakery, Heshke reminded himself, was extremely well-done. The old yellow prints gave him quite an eerie feeling.

Brourne coughed and returned his attention to Heshke. “We are wondering if you have sufficient enthusiasm for the task that has been entrusted to you?” he asked, sending a chill down Heshke’s spine. “Perhaps you fail to appreciate the urgency of what confronts us. Remember that the research you’re doing has more than one motive. There is the need for scientific knowledge, of course – the need to know as much as possible about the great war our ancestors fought with the aliens, so as to give our political attitudes a firm historical basis. But there is also another reason. Already the aliens have tried to steal Earth once: who knows when they might try again? We have to know where they came from, we have to know whether they might still be lurking out there in space. We have to know about their weapons. ”

Brask entered the conversation again. Into his icy blue eyes came a glint of steel, making their oddness all the more striking. “Have you heard the latest theories about how the deviant subspecies arose? It has always been a mystery as to why they should arise when they did, when the natural course of evolution is quite plainly in the direction of pure-blooded True Man. Radioactivity from warfare cannot be the answer, because the nuclear weapons used in the classical era were radiologically clean. Well, it has recently been discovered that the Earth’s magnetic field wards off high-powered particles coming in from outer space. If this field were interfered with so as to allow the passage of these particles the rate of biological mutation on Earth would increase to an unnatural level. Such a situation is consistent with the growth of deviant species.”

Heshke frowned. “But could Earth’s magnetism be interfered with?” he asked doubtfully.

“Theoretically – yes. We don’t know precisely how, but we’re working on it, naturally. I think there can be little doubt what happened – the deviant subspecies are the products of an alien weapon whose object was to destroy our genetic purity – to pervert nature itself!”

Brourne nodded his agreement. “We know for a fact that not only man was involved. Several breeds of dog existing today, for instance, were not in existence a thousand years ago.”

Heshke ignored this dubious item of reasoning. “If it could be established that Earth’s magnetic field did undergo changes at the appropriate time, then that would largely substantiate the theory,” he ventured. “But even then – could it not equally have been one of our own weapons that did it?”

Titan-Captain Brask’s response to this suggestion was indignant. “Would True Man have jeopardised the blood of the future? The idea is absurd, inconceivable. The interference can only have come from a nonhuman source, and the enemy that produced it may still exist, preparing himself for a fresh assault. We may yet be called upon to defend not only Earth, but our very genes!” And he fixed Heshke with an icy stare.

“And so there you have it, Citizen Heshke,” Brourne resumed in a tone of deadly seriousness. “ Now do you see why our archaeological work is of such importance?”

Wearily Heshke nodded his understanding. The endless ideologising of the Titans fatigued him, yet he had to admit the urgency of their demands. Unpleasant though their practices sometimes were, they were a necessary force.