The Lord of the Sands of Time (3 page)

So Miyo did not return directly to the palace but brought the Messenger to kinsmen of Kan on the outskirts of the capital. Kan’s people received their unexpected visitors with astonishment, but when they saw Kan, borne on the Messenger’s back and gravely wounded, they dropped everything to tend him. Miyo watched silently from a corner of the tiny pit-house as Kan’s relatives boiled water, wiped the child clean, ground healing herbs, and applied a poultice to his injuries.

While they nursed Kan, his father and white-haired grandsire glanced frequently at the visitors. Miyo ignored them, pretending not to notice. But the Messenger—sitting hunched over in the confines of the tiny hut—seemed nervous. “Queen Himiko,” he whispered.

“Miyo.”

“Miyo. You rule this land, don’t you? The court physicians, or your maidservants? Couldn’t they just as easily—”

“The ruler of Wa does not leave her palace. The ruler does not leave, therefore neither do the court physicians.”

“Of course…but can’t you tell them the boy was attacked outside the palace?” He glanced at the old man, who was taking care not to look at them directly. “Can you trust these people?”

“Far better than my own ministers. We’ve known each other long, since I was a mere child.” For a brief moment, Miyo’s thoughts wandered back twenty years, to a time before the chiefdoms chose a shaman queen to rule over all. She had been the daughter of a village headman, covered with mud, playing hide and seek in the grass. Her family was very close to Kan’s, and they had showered her with millet cakes and gifts of fruit.

Traces of that closeness endured, and when Miyo made one of her frequent visits, Kan’s people received her warmly, without question. But now a barrier of reverence and fear divided them. Miyo was here not as friend, but as sovereign; now too there was the Messenger. Plainly this was someone extraordinary. And so as ever—if not so much as with her maidservants, who dared not even meet her gaze—Miyo was cut off from the warmth of human tenderness.

The firelight showed some color returning to Kan’s pale face, where not long ago he had seemed to be at death’s door. The Messenger turned to Miyo, who was staring fixedly ahead. “I think he’s out of danger.”

Miyo took the hint. She rose to her feet. “Let’s go outside. It’s too crowded here.”

They stepped outside and crossed the moat that encircled the cluster of houses. The chorusing of frogs enveloped them. No star gleamed through the thin cloud cover. The grainy moon, almost full, cast a gentle glow over the paddy fields. The Messenger sat down on the embankment.

“Agriculture is far ahead of schedule,” he said quietly. “You’re diverting the Yamato River, aren’t you? That wasn’t supposed to happen till the Edo era.”

“Eh-doh?”

“Far in the future. But this whole area—it’s very impressive. You should only just be starting to carve cropland out of the silt. Overall, I’d say this is three centuries, in some ways, maybe thirteen hundred years ahead of the root chronology.”

“I detected fore-and-aft rigged oceangoing vessels with keels in the harbor at Suminoé. The technology of seafaring is a millennium ahead of schedule.” Miyo heard the sword’s voice, but did not ask what it meant. Her lack of understanding frustrated her, but at the moment there was something she had to know.

“Messenger O, what did you mean about preparing for war?”

“Ah. That. Well, you must fight, or you will lose.”

“Lose what?” asked Miyo.

“In the near term, your lives. Ultimately, your species.”
The word of the Laws
, thought Miyo.
Disaster is inevitable. Join hands or die.
The Messenger turned to look at her. “You don’t believe me?”

“Who is the enemy?”

“They come from beyond this world. We call them ETs. Like the one you saw today, but traveling in packs. What you saw was real. So you must believe me.”

“But everyone knows the mononoké are real,” said Miyo.

“Do they, now?”

“Many tales are told of them, in Wa and in the Chinese empires. They are terribly strong. Merciless monsters, yet not invincible, not like the spirits one can neither see nor hear. We people survive only because we continue to slaughter and vanquish them. But today was my first encounter with one. The village headmen say a plague of the beasts happens every few decades.”

“They’re right.” The Messenger pounded a fist on the flat of his hand. “Wonderful. Excellent. If people in this era see things as you say, my task will be that much easier. Sometimes all I have to do is mention the creatures and people start making ready to flee. That’s not going to help. My message is this: the ETs must be destroyed. Instead of fleeing in fear, we must annihilate them.”

“But why?” Miyo slowly ran her eyes over the soldier’s well-muscled body. “Did you not dispatch it with ease? Why not do the same with the rest?”

“I could—fighting them individually. The one I killed was a stray, separated from the pack. Probably from a colony that arrived in ages past. What you saw today was nothing compared to the terror of the horde. Don’t you have records of anything like that?”

Miyo paused, then spoke. “Yes. They say the empire of the Hsiung-nu, in the far west of China, was destroyed by them. The Hsiung-nu joined forces with the surrounding kingdoms to stop a huge army of mononoké, but were wiped out. It seems our good relations with Wei, Kushina, and Roma came out of this. I never believed the story myself. So it was true after all.”

“Very.”

Miyo shuddered. An army of mononoké, strong enough to annihilate an empire? These were grim tidings indeed. “If these creatures are so frightful, I don’t see that we have the strength to vanquish them.”

“No, it’s possible. They don’t come in force initially. First they build small nests and build up their numbers. To find and destroy a nest before they’ve had a chance to multiply is within your capabilities. Cutty will handle search and location. I need you to mobilize your forces. But first you must learn to make steel. Bronze swords like the boy’s won’t do at all.”

“We know about steel,” Miyo said. The Messenger turned, his posture betraying disbelief. Miyo was glad of his astonishment, but checked herself from rejoicing. “Much steel was produced in Isumo, but it was forbidden. The mountains were left barren and rain washed down the poison. Is there a way to keep the poison from escaping?”

“No. Even if there were, we can’t afford to worry about your environment. I want you to lift the ban and start producing as much as you can. Well, well. So you know about steel.”

The Messenger nodded slowly, seemingly satisfied. Miyo suddenly sensed a deep fatigue behind his words and gestures, something she hadn’t noticed by day. The weariness didn’t seem physical—he’d carried Kan fifty
ri
, almost fourteen Roman miles—and she’d had trouble just keeping up with him. As far as physical fatigue was concerned, she needed rest more than he did. No, this was something deeper, a weariness of the soul. On impulse, Miyo leaned toward him. “Don’t you ever take off your helmet?”

“Of course.”

The Messenger turned toward her, grasped his close-fitting, bell-shaped helmet with both hands and lifted it off. Miyo was astonished to see a wiry, masculine face covered with stubble, close-cropped hair the color of dry grass, deep-set eyes, and a prominent nose. As he peered at Miyo—she couldn’t be certain in the darkness, but even his eyes seemed to be of some pale hue—the Messenger cocked his head amiably. “You don’t seem surprised.”

“I’ve seen foreigners before.” But she struggled to conceal her surprise. Somehow, this was exactly how she thought he’d look.
He’s exhausted.
His smile could not hide the shadow behind his sunken cheeks and the crooked line of his mouth. Even Miyo, with no experience of men, knew a single day of hardship could not cast such a deep shadow over one so strong.

“Where did you come from?” In spite of herself, Miyo felt a growing interest in this man. “What happened to you? You seem so…gaunt.”

“Do I look that bad?” The Messenger seemed slightly surprised, but then he smiled. “Don’t worry about me. You’re the one who should be resting. Walking that far without rest is hard for a woman. You must be tired.”

“Not at all. This day was easy compared to rituals at the palace.”

“But you’ve had nothing all day except swamp water. At least get something to eat.”

The Messenger’s repeated urgings made Miyo suspect he was trying to change the subject. Perhaps he didn’t care to have others nosing about in his affairs. But she was about to entrust her fate and that of her people to this man. She could not remain in the dark about him.

Suddenly the sword spoke quietly. “O, heads up.”

In one movement he was standing, sword in hand, but after peering into the darkness he just as quickly relaxed. Miyo turned to see something atop a rock. Nearby, an old woman was sliding backward across the ground in an attitude of reverence. It was Kan’s grandmother.

Miyo went to look. There was a tray with hot rice porridge and dried cakes, enough for two.

“Sustenance. Now we can talk a bit longer.” Miyo brought the tray over. She watched the Messenger as she set out the plates. The cakes were made from dried dates, carefully set aside last autumn. Miyo tasted one. An inexpressibly delicious sweetness melted across her tongue.

The Messenger stared at the porridge a long time before taking a bowl in both hands and inhaling half the contents in one go. He sighed deeply. “My first food in twelve centuries.”

Miyo paused. She returned the cake she’d been eating to its dish and silently passed him the entire tray. It was as she thought. This man had traveled here from some far country.

“Where did you come from?”

“Before this? I was on ops in the New Kingdom, in Egypt…no, I’d better start at the beginning.” With no further hesitation, he began devouring the food. Then he glanced at Miyo. “You’d best keep this to yourself.”

“I intend to.”

“I come from a world 2,300 years in the future. But not your future. My journey spans many timestreams that are doomed to disappear.”

Miyo held her breath and settled back to listen.

T
RITON A.D
. 2598

“Wake up.”

“—acknowledged. I am, awake. Initiating self-diagnostic sequence. Confirming self-recognition. I am Messenger Unit Eight Six Niner Niner Eight One, subunit of the Sandrocottos AI. I serve that the human species may survive.”

“Permission to load functions. Select your work name from the knowledge base.”

“My work name is selected. It is Orville.”

“Orville, we assign you this body. Innervate and set Second Law to self-preservation.”

“I understand.”

Orville opened his eyes. He extended his awareness into the hardware that comprised his body and began taking inventory.

Implementation: cyborg, compound organic/synthetic. Length: 180 centimeters. Weight: 75 kilograms Terra Normal. Format: Homo, standard. Reproductive function: disabled. Growth function: disabled. Endurance/reflexes/strength:hyperenhanced. Extranet links: enabled. Health status: optimal.

Readiness: 100 percent.

Orville locked his initial awareness values to Euthymic, calibrating his Self accordingly. Then he rose from his bed and inspected his environment.

A hospital room in soothing colors. Two white-uniformed operators were studying him intently. Orville sensed there was something significant about his being initialized in this environment instead of on a fabroom worktable. Not that they’d treat him as human, of course. But at least he’d experience far better handling than a nonsentient robot.

One of the walls was switched to view mode. Neptune loomed enormous, suspended in the blackness. Orville walked to the wall and looked down. The city below him was lit, not by the distant Sun, but by many intense luminosity sources suspended several hundred meters above the surface. Roads curved gently through thick forest cover. Tall, strongly built residences and buildings were visible among the trees. Automated vehicles ferried commuters in a smooth, unending stream. Humans in civilian clothes strolled here and there. In a large square, some sort of ball game was in progress.

The city seemed to have been designed for comfortable living. It looked neither like a metropolis with an exploding population nor like a bristling military base. But of course it was both.

“Welcome to Triton, Orville.”

Orville turned. One of his youthful operators was smiling. With a blank, professional expression, the other operator brought Orville a robe and placed it on his naked body.

“How are you feeling? Any discomfort? Any nonspecific anxiety or hostility? Feelings of panic?”

“My condition is excellent. I am happy to be awake. I wish to fulfill my purpose.”

“That’s splendid,” said the operator. “But we’re in no hurry. We want you Messengers to get thoroughly acclimated to Triton. First, would you like to try eating? Of course, you don’t require nutrients, but I’d like you to put your food privileges to good use.”

“An excellent idea. I’m born, now for my first meal. Wait—it’s not breast milk, is it?”

With a look of amusement, the young man gestured toward the exit. “You seem quite easy to communicate with. I’d like to join you. Order anything you wish—but I can’t offer you breast milk.”

And Orville’s life began. Many other Messengers were awakened at the same time, and spent their first days being initiated into the mysteries of daily life. The expert AIs assigned to look after them were masters at socializing newly awakened cyborgs. Some Messengers, unable to tolerate being treated like children, soon transferred out of the facility. But Orville doggedly stuck with his operators. He sensed it might indeed be a problem if he put his clothes on backward or greeted someone from a distance of thirty meters, or for that matter three centimeters. So he learned to dress himself and to greet others from a distance of three meters; in the process he encountered his own levelheaded yet irrepressible nature. Before long he was ready to enter the world outside, the world of people.

He was assigned a place to live and personal property every bit as good as the average citizen. Triton was built for comfort—as much as its distance from the Sun allowed—and Orville fell in love with it. But the existence of this pleasant city was itself based on something far from pleasant. The decision to build on Triton was made in the shadow of extinction.

Sixty-two years ago, human life on Earth was annihilated.