Timeline. Part 20

"That's right, yes."

"More than one at a time?"

"Almost never. Very rarely two."

"Then why do you have so many machines?" Stern said. "I count eight in there. Wouldn't two be enough?"

"You're just seeing the results of our research program," Gordon said. "We are constantly working to refine our design."

Gordon had answered smoothly enough, but Stern was certain he had seen something-some buried glint of uneasiness-in Gordon's eyes.

There is definitely something more.

"I would have thought," Stern said, "that you'd make refinements to the same machines."

Gordon shrugged again, but did not answer.

Definitely.

"What are those repairmen doing in there?" Stern said, still probing. He pointed to the men on their hands and knees, working on the base of one machine. "I mean by the machine in the corner. What exactly are they repairing?"

"David," Gordon began. "I really think-"

"Is this technology really really safe?" Stern said. safe?" Stern said.

Gordon sighed. "See for yourself."

On the big screen, a sequence of rapid flashes appeared on the floor of the transit room.

"Here she comes," Gordon said.

The flashes grew brighter. They heard the chattering sound again, first faintly, then louder. And then the cage was full-size; the humming died away; the ground mist swirled, and the woman climbed out, waving to the spectators.

Stern squinted at her. She appeared absolutely fine. Her appearance was identical to what it had been before.

Gordon looked at him. "Believe me," he said. "It's perfectly safe." He turned to the screen. "How'd it look back there, Sue?"

"Excellent," she said. "Transit site is on the north side of the river. Secluded spot, in the woods. And the weather's pretty good, for April." She glanced at her watch. "Get your team together, Dr. Gordon. I'm going to go burn the spare nav marker. Then let's go back there and pull that old guy out before somebody hurts him."

"Lie on your left side, please." Kate rolled over on the table and watched uneasily as an elderly man in a white lab coat raised what looked like a glue gun and placed it over her ear. "This will feel warm."

Warm? She felt a burning rush of heat in her ear. "What is that that?"

"It's an organic polymer," the man said. "Nontoxic and nonallergenic. Give it eight seconds. All right, now please make chewing motions. We want a looser fit. Very good, keep chewing."

She heard him going down the line. Chris was on the table behind her, then Stern, then Marek. She heard the old man say, "Lie on your left side, please. This will feel warm...."

Not long after, he was back. He had her turn over, and injected the hot polymer into her other ear. Gordon was watching from the corner of the room. He said, "This is still a bit experimental but so far it works quite well. It's made of a polymer that begins to biodegrade after a week."

Later, the man had them stand up. He expertly popped the plastic implants out of their ears, moving down the line.

Kate said to Gordon, "My hearing is fine, I don't need a hearing aid."

"It's not a hearing aid," Gordon said.

Across the room, the man was drilling out the center of the plastic earpieces and inserting electronics. He worked surprisingly quickly. When the electronics were in place, he capped the hole with more plastic.

"It's a machine language translator and a radio mike. In case you need to understand what people are saying to you."

"But even if I understand what they're saying," she said, "how can I answer back?"

Marek nudged her. "Don't worry. I speak Occitan. And Middle French."

"Oh, that's good," she said sarcastically. "You going to teach it to me in the next fifteen minutes?" She was tense, she was about to be destroyed or vaporized or whatever the h.e.l.l they did in that machine, and the words just popped out of her mouth.

Marek looked surprised. "No," he said seriously. "But if you stay with me, I will take care of you."

Something about his earnestness rea.s.sured her. He was such a straight arrow. She thought, He probably will take care of me. She felt herself relaxing.

Soon after, they were all fitted with flesh-colored plastic earpieces. "They're turned off now," Gordon said. "To turn them on, just tap your ear with your finger. Now, if you'll come over here ..."

Gordon handed them each a small leather pouch. "We've been working on a first-aid kit; these are the prototypes. You're the first to enter the world, so you may have a use for them. You can keep them out of sight, under your clothing."

He opened one pouch and brought out a small aluminum canister about four inches high and an inch in diameter. It looked like a little shaving cream can. "This is the only defense we can provide you. It contains twelve doses of ethylene dihydride with a protein substrate. We can demonstrate for you with the cat, H.G. Where are you, H.G?"

A black cat jumped onto the table. Gordon stroked it, and then shot a burst of gas at its nose. The cat blinked, made a snuffling sound, and fell over on its side.

"Unconsciousness within six seconds," Gordon said, "and it leaves a retroactive amnesia. But bear in mind that it's short acting. And you must fire right in the person's face to ensure any effect."

The cat was already starting to twitch and revive as Gordon turned back to the pouch and held up three red paper cubes, roughly the size of sugar cubes, each covered in a layer of pale wax. They looked like fireworks.

"If you need to start a fire," he said, "these will do it. Pull the little string, and they catch fire. They're marked fifteen, thirty, sixty-the number of seconds before the fire starts. Wax, so they're waterproof. A word of warning: sometimes they don't work."

Chris Hughes said, "What's wrong with a Bic?"

"Not correct for the period. You can't take plastic back there." Gordon returned to the kit. "Then we have basic first aid, nothing fancy. Anti-inflammatory, antidiarrhea, antispasmodic, antipain. You don't want to be vomiting in a castle," he said. "And we can't give you pills for the water."

Stern took all this in with a sense of unreality. Vomiting in a castle? he thought. "Listen, uh-"

"And finally, an all-purpose pocket tool, including knife and picklock." It looked like a steel Swiss army knife. Gordon put everything back in the kit. "You'll probably never use any of this stuff, but you've got it anyway. Now let's get you dressed."

Stern could not shake off his persistent sense of unease. A kindly, grandmotherly woman had gotten up from her sewing machine and was handing them all clothing: first, white linen undershorts-sort of boxer shorts, but without elastic-then a leather belt, and then black woolen leggings.

"What're these?" Stern said. "Tights?"

"They're called hose, dear."

There was no elastic on them, either. "How do they stay up?"

"You slip them under your belt, beneath the doublet. Or tie them to the points of your doublet."

"Points?"

"That's right, dear. Of your doublet."

Stern glanced at the others. They were calmly collecting the clothes in a pile as each article was given to them. They seemed to know what everything was for; they were as calm as if they were in a department store. But Stern was lost, and he felt panicky. Now he was given a white linen s.h.i.+rt that came to his upper thigh, and a larger overs.h.i.+rt, called a doublet, made of quilted felt. And finally a dagger on a steel chain. He looked at it askance.

"Everyone carries one. You'll need it for eating, if nothing else."

He put it absently on top of the pile, and poked through the clothing, still trying to find the "points."

Gordon said, "These clothes are intended to be status-neutral, neither expensive nor poor. We want them to approximate the dress of a middling merchant, a court page, or a down-at-the-heels n.o.bleman." Stern was handed shoes, which looked like leather slippers with pointed toes, except they buckled. Like court jester's shoes, he thought unhappily.

The grandmotherly woman smiled: "Don't worry, they have air soles built in, just like your Nikes."

"Why is everything dirty?" Stern said, frowning at his overs.h.i.+rt.

"Well, you want to fit in, don't you?"

They changed in a locker room. Stern watched the other men. "How exactly do we, uh ..."

"You want to know how you dress in the fourteenth century?" Marek said. "It's simple." Marek had stripped off all his clothes and was walking around naked, relaxed. The man was bulging with muscles. Stern felt intimidated as he slowly took off his trousers.

"First," Marek said, "put on your undershorts. This is very nice quality linen. They had good linen in those days. To hold the shorts up, tie your belt around your waist and roll the top of the undershorts around the belt a couple of times, so it holds. All right?"

"Your belt goes under under your clothes?" your clothes?"

"That's right. Holding up your shorts. Next, put on your hose." Marek began to pull on his black wool tights. The hose had feet at the bottom, like a child's pajamas. "They have these strings at the top, you see?"

"My hose is baggy," Stern said, tugging them up, poking at the knees.

"That's fine. These aren't dress hose, so they aren't skintight. Next, your linen overs.h.i.+rt. Just pull it over your head and let it hang down. No, no, David. The slit at the neck goes in the front."

Stern pulled his arms out and twisted the s.h.i.+rt around, fumbling.

"And finally," Marek said, picking up a felt outers.h.i.+rt, "you put on your doublet. Combination suit coat and windbreaker. You wear it indoors and out, never take it off except when it is very hot. See the points? They're the laces, under the felt. Now, tie your hose to the points of the doublet, through the slits in your overs.h.i.+rt."

Marek managed this in only a few moments; it was as if he'd done it every day of his life. It took Chris much longer, Stern noted with satisfaction. Stern himself struggled to twist his torso, to tie the knots at his backside.

"You call this simple?" he said, grunting.

"You just haven't looked at your own clothes lately," Marek said. "The average Westerner in the twentieth century wears nine to twelve items of daily clothing. Here, there are only six."

Stern pulled on his doublet, tugging it down over his waist, so it came to his thighs. In doing so, he wrinkled his unders.h.i.+rt, and eventually Marek had to help him straighten it all out, as well as lace his hose tighter.

Finally, Marek looped the dagger and the chain loosely around Stern's waist, and stood back to admire him.

"There," Marek said, nodding. "How do you feel?"

Stern wriggled his shoulders uncomfortably. "I feel like a trussed chicken."

Marek laughed. "You'll get used to it."

Kate was finis.h.i.+ng dressing when Susan Gomez, the young woman who had taken the trip back, came in. Gomez was wearing period clothes and a wig. She tossed another wig to Kate.

Kate made a face.

"You have to wear it," Gomez said. "Short hair on a woman is a sign of disgrace, or heresy. Don't ever let anyone back there see your true hair length."

Kate pulled on the wig, which brought dark blond hair to her shoulders. She turned to look in the mirror, and saw the face of a stranger. She looked younger, softer. Weaker.

"It's either that," Gomez said, "or cut your hair really short, like a man. Your call."

"I'll wear the wig," Kate said.

Diane Kramer looked at Victor Baretto and said, "But this has always been a rule, Victor. You know that."

"Yes, but the problem," Baretto said, "is that you're giving us a new mission." Baretto was a lean, tough-looking man in his thirties, an ex-ranger who had been with the company for two years. During that time, he had acquired a reputation as a competent security man, but a bit of a prima donna. "Now, you're asking us to go into the world, but you won't let us take weapons."

"That's right, Victor. No anachronisms. No modern artifacts going back. That's been our rule from the beginning." Kramer tried to conceal her frustration. These military types were difficult, particularly the men. The women, like Gomez, were okay. But the men kept trying to, as they put it, "apply their training" to the ITC trips back, and it never really worked. Privately, Kramer thought it was just a way for the men to conceal their anxiety, but of course she could never say that. It was difficult enough for them to take orders from a woman like her in the first place.

The men also had more trouble keeping their work secret. It was easier for women, but the men all wanted to brag about going back to the past. Of course, they were forbidden by all sorts of contractual arrangements, but contracts could be forgotten after a few drinks in a bar. That was why Kramer had informed them all about the existence of several specially burned nav wafers. These wafers had entered the mythology of the company, including their names: Tunguska, Vesuvius, Tokyo. The Vesuvius wafer put you on the Bay of Naples at 7:00 a.m. on August 24, A.D. A.D. 79, just before burning ash killed everyone. Tunguska left you in Siberia in 1908, just before the giant meteor struck, causing a shock wave that killed every living thing for hundreds of miles. Tokyo put you in that city in 1923, just before the earthquake flattened it. The idea was if word of the project became public, you might end up with the wrong wafer on your next trip out. None of the military types were quite sure whether any of this was true, or just company mythology. 79, just before burning ash killed everyone. Tunguska left you in Siberia in 1908, just before the giant meteor struck, causing a shock wave that killed every living thing for hundreds of miles. Tokyo put you in that city in 1923, just before the earthquake flattened it. The idea was if word of the project became public, you might end up with the wrong wafer on your next trip out. None of the military types were quite sure whether any of this was true, or just company mythology.

Which was just how Kramer liked it.

"This is a new mission," Baretto said again, as if she hadn't heard him before. "You're asking us to go into the world-to go behind enemy lines, so to speak-without weapons."

"But you're all trained in hand-to-hand. You, Gomez, all of you."

"I don't think that's sufficient."

"Victor-"