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In another instant, it was gone.
Seconds passed before Dowland gradually lowered the gun again. Dazedly, he
grew aware of something else that was different now. A miniature human voice
appeared to be jabbering irritably at him from some point not far away.
His eyes dropped to the little communicator attached to his harness.
The voice came from there.
Terra's grid power had returned to Lion Mesa.
* * *
A week later, Lieutenant Frank Dowland was shown into the office of the chief
of the Solar Police Authority. The chief introduced him to the two other men
there, who were left unidentified, and told him to be seated.
"Lieutenant," he said, "these gentlemen have a few questions to ask you. You
can speak as openly to them as you would to me."
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Dowland nodded. He had recognized one of the gentlemen immediately Howard
Camhorn, the Coordinator of
Research. Reputedly one of the sharpest minds in the Overgovernment's top
echelons. The other one was unfamiliar.
He was a few years younger than Camhorn, around six inches shorter, chunky,
with black hair, brown eyes, an expression of owlish reflectiveness. Probably,
Dowland thought, wearing contact lenses. "Yes, sir," he said to the chief, and
looked back at the visitors."
"We've seen your report on your recent visit to Terra, Lieutenant Dowland,"
Camhorn began pleasantly. "An excellent report, incidentally factual,
detailed. What we should like to hear now are the things that you, quite
properly, omitted from it. That is, your personal impressions and
conclusions."
"For example," the other man took up, as Dowland hesitated, "Miss Trelawney
has informed us her uncles were attempting to employ the YM-400 they had
acquired to carry out a time-shift to an earlier Earth period to the period
known as the Pleistocene, to be somewhat more exact. From what you saw, would
you say they had succeeded in doing it?"
"I don't know, sir," Dowland said. "I've been shown pictures representing that
period during the past few days. The scene I described in the report probably
might have existed at that time." He smiled briefly. "However, I have the
impression that the very large flying creature I reported encountering that
night is regarded as being, . . . well, er . . .
ah . . . ."
"A product of excited nerves?" the short man said, nodding. "Under such
extraordinary circumstances, that would be quite possible, you know."
"Yes, sir, I know."
The short man smiled. "But you don't think it was that?"
"No, sir," Dowland said. "I think that I have described exactly what I did
hear and see."
"And you feel the Trelawneys established contact with some previous Earth
period not necessarily the
Pleistocene?"
"Yes, I do."
"And you report having seen a spaceship in that prehistorical period. . . ."
Dowland shook his head. "No, sir. At the moment I was observing it, I thought
it was that. What I reported was having seen something that looked like a
spaceship."
"What do you think it was?"
"A timeship if there is such a word."
"There is such a word," Camhorn interrupted lazily. "I'm curious to hear,
lieutenant, what brought you to that conclusion."
"It's a guess, sir. But the thing has to fit together somehow. A timeship
would make it fit."
"In what way?"
"I've been informed," Dowland said, "that the Overgovernment's scientists have
been unable to make a practical use of YM because something has invariably
gone wrong when they did try to use it. I also heard that there was no way of
knowing in advance what would happen to make an experiment fail. But something
always would happen, and frequently a number of people would get killed."
Camhorn nodded. "That is quite true."
"Well, then," Dowland said, "I think there is a race of beings who aren't
quite in our time and space. They have YM
and use it, and don't want anyone else to use it. They can tell when it's
activated here, and use their own YM to interfere with it. Then another
experiment suddenly turns into a failure.
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"But they don't know yet who's using it. When the Trelawneys turned on their
machine, these beings spotted the YM
stress pattern back there in time. They went to that point and reinforced the
time-blending effect with their own YM.
The Trelawneys hadn't intended a complete contact with that first test. The
aliens almost succeeded in blending the two periods completely in the area
near the laboratory."
"For what purpose?" Camhorn asked.
"I think they're very anxious to get us located."
"With unfriendly intentions?"
"The ones we ran into didn't behave in a friendly manner. May I ask a
question, sir?"
"Of course," Camhorn said.
"When the Trelawneys' machine was examined, was the supply of YM adequately
shielded?"
"Quite adequately," Camhorn said.
"But when I opened the door, the laboratory was hot. And Miguel Trelawney died
of radiation burns. . . ."
Camhorn nodded. "Those are facts that give your theory some substance,
lieutenant. No question about it. And there is the additional fact that after
you shut off the YM flow in the laboratory, nearly ten minutes passed before
the apparent contact between two time periods was broken. Your report
indicates that the phenomena you described actually became more pronounced
immediately after the shutoff."
"Yes, sir."
"As if the aliens might have been making every effort to retain contact with
our time?"
"Yes, sir," Dowland said. "That was my impression."
"It's quite plausible. Now, the indications are that Paul Trelawney actually
spent considerable time perhaps twelve to fourteen hours, at any rate in that
other period. He gave no hint of what he experienced during those hours?"
"No, sir, except to say that it was night when he appeared there. He may have
told Miss Trelawney more."
"Apparently, he didn't," Camhorn said. "Before you and he went into the
laboratory, he warned her to watch for the approach of a creature which
answers the description of the gigantic things you encountered twice. But that
was all.
Now, here again you've given us your objective observations. What can you add
to them on a perhaps more speculative basis?"
"Well, sir," Dowland said, "my opinions on that are, as a matter of fact,
highly speculative. But I think that Paul
Trelawney was captured by the aliens as soon as he appeared in the other time
period, and was able to escape from them a number of hours later. Two of the
aliens who were attempting to recapture him eventually followed him out on
Lion Mesa through another opening the YM stresses had produced between the
time periods, not too far away from the first."
Camhorn's stout companion said thoughtfully, "You believe the birdlike
creature you saw arrived by the same route?"
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