"While walking there alone with my contemplations, I recalled something I had forgotten. I mentioned the word craterbrought back memories. I have now managed to remember it."
"Go on."
"Chron-jumps."
"What the?.."
Doc looked around to make sure the others were not within hearing distance. "The gateways. You know they're mat-trans ports. You get in and instantly you're carried somewhere else."
"Yeah. Look, I'm fuckin' freezin' to the bone out here, Doc. Can't we?.."
"It won't take much longer, sir. I said that there had been some dreadful accidents. I didn't tell you because I couldn't remember it, but the gateways have also been used for other experiments. Chron-jumps. Time travel. It does work."
"Never. Come on, Doc. You know you get confused sometimes."
"Most of the time, my dear Mr. Cawdor. But here is a moment of crystal clarity. I know that time travel is a reality — I know better than any living soul, believe me. But they tried other times. Once, and once only it nearly worked."
Either Doc Tanner had completely lost all his creds, or he was telling the truth. Ryan shook his head, resisting the temptation to slap himself to see if he was dreaming all this.
"It is passing strange how I can fail to know even my right hand from my left and still recall some fragments of the past in such clarity. It was the sixth day of August in the year 1930. Seventy-one years before Armageddon. A man of great distinction got into a cab in what was called Manhattan, in old New York. He waved to a friend and disappeared forever."
"What's this got to do with talkin' about volcanoes and craters?"
"Wait. The men who ran the Gateway and the Cerberus projects were evil. Oh, such wickedness and misery! My dear, dear Emily! They were trawling and they picked up this man. I was there when he came through, or when what was left of him came through."
Ryan had enough sense not to interrupt Doc to ask who Emily was. That might have been enough to throw his memory off the subject forever.
"It nearly, so nearly proved a success. A justice of the supreme court. It would have... I can still see what came."
"Go on, Doc." Behind Ryan, the rest of the group had boarded the ice buggies and were watching curiously from the ob slits.
"A shirt with a high collar. I remember the shoes were very sharply pointed, which was the fashion of the time, and were polished like twin mirrors. The suit was double-breasted, a brown pinstripe. That was the expression, pinstripe. That torn suit — with the label of the tailor still neatly sewn within it."
Doc's voice was becoming quieter. The early sun had long gone and the day was turning colder and bleaker. Gray clouds streaked with a dull purple were gathering over the giant mountain behind them, and already the first flakes of threatening snow were blowing.
"Those clothes. And... most of his trousers were missing. All but the lower jaw of the head was gone. That row of white teeth, everything sliced clean as a razor, and very little blood. The right hand was there, perfect, the fingers still curling, but the left was hewn away by some unknown and unimagined power. The voice mewed like a kitten. I think that was the worst of it — that little, little mewing voice. Lord forgive us for what was done in the name of science and progress! Progress! That poor relic of a man, plucked from the past to end... who knows where? Or when?"
"But what's this got to do with craters, Doc? I don't see the connection."
Doc's veiled eyes turned to him, unblinking. "The name of..."
J.B.'s shout interrupted them. "It's droppin' fast, Ryan. If we're goin', we should move. Goin' to be bad weather soon."
"Sure, sure. Go on, Doc."
"For... what? Go on? Ah, I comprehend you, Mr. Cawdor, indeed I do. Go on and get into those infernal internal combustion machines. Of course."
It had gone. The call from the Armorer had been enough to tip Doc's mind back over the edge, from sanity into utter confusion. But even the few coherent sentences that Doc had managed gave Ryan plenty to think about. Time travel! Maybe the gateways could be used for time travel. That was something else.
The small barometer in the cab of Buggy One told its own tale. The pointer moved down and down as they drove, roughly maintaining a heading that would take them toward Fairbanks. But the land had undergone massive upheavals and distortions. Also, they were driving in one of the worst blizzards that Ryan had ever seen: worse than anything he'd ever experienced in the Deathlands. Visibility was falling toward zero, and winds rocked the heavy vehicles.
In the end there was nothing to do but halt. In Buggy Two, J.B. was having problems with the ignition system, which was coughing and cutting out. With a wind-chill factor that lowered the temperature outside to around minus one hundred and thirty, there was no hope of getting out to do repairs.
During a brief lull in the blizzard, Ryan saw a geodesic dome to the left, with buildings and an old radar dish scattered around it. "Part of what they called the DEW line," he said to Krysty, pointing it out. "Early defense system."
"Did 'em a lot of good, lover."
"Yeah. And it looks like a dam up at the head of that valley." But the storm came screaming back again and visibility fell to zero.
In midafternoon the storm began to ease, with the wind fading away to a mere fifty miles an hour, and the snow stopping altogether. The barometer rose from the depths and the watery sun peeked through the chem clouds.
"Buggy One to Two and Three. You read?"
Both came back affirmative.
"Map shows steep valley a few miles ahead. We'll go on and check it out. Keep in contact. If you can't fix the ignition, J.B., then call us, and we'll return, or you can all pack into Buggy Three. Is there room?"
"Sure, Ryan. No sweat. We'll meet up in the opening to that canyon. Keep in touch."
As he was about to press the gas pedal, Ryan had a second thought and switched the radio back on. "Mebbe better if you come with us, J.B. Henn's the engine expert, and he's got Finn to help him out. Six in one of these babies could be too much. You come with us."
"How about taking Lori?"
"No. If we meet trouble ahead, I'd rather have you along, providin' you don't smoke one of your bastard cheroots in here."
So the transfer was made, and the ailing buggy was left in the charge of Henn and Finnegan, who were both now recovered from the effects of the drugged punch. Despite intermittent snow flurries, visibility was generally fair.
"We should be near that valley," said J.B., holding a handgrip to steady himself against the rocking and lurching of the buggy.
"How far'll we go?" asked Krysty.
"Far as it takes. Looks like what's left up here is a big round zero," said Ryan. "Mebbe go back to the redoubt in a day or so and try movin' to warmer places. That the way you figure it, J.B.?"
"Sure."
The bazooka shell exploded near enough to the vehicle that it stopped dead, tipping up and over. The concussion was shocking, sending the three occupants toppling into instant darkness.
Ryan Cawdor was first to recover. He blinked and opened his eye, aware of a shattering ache in his head. He could feel blood crusted around his ears from the force of the shell.
Someone was looming over him; a man, well built. He wore some sort of silver band around his forehead, with a large red stone at its center. And his eyes were a peculiar golden color.
"Has the agony somewhat abated?" asked Uchitel, pronouncing the words carefully.