'That's all - probably less. I can feel it coming closer to this continuum all the time, but it's difficult to keep a fix on it always. It takes most of my energy.'
They entered the wide, high-roofed public hall of the Salvation Inn. Asquiol looked around him, seeking someone in the crowd, but was disappointed. The huge windows, which stretched up one high wall lighted several tiered galleries and looked out on to the bright black and white carbon desert of the planet.
They pushed through the crowd of men and women of many types. There were richly clad men; ragged men; men who drank heavily and men who sipped at a single drink; vociferous men and quiet men. Here, as in the rest of the town, there was an air of tired, tense expectancy - an atmosphere, which had lasted, this era, for thirty-seven years. All the residents glanced often at the big scanner screens suspended in the middle of the hall.
The screens would come to life only on particular occasions - when what they awaited entered the area of space on which they were always focused. When that happened - if it happened - there would be a rush for the spaceport and Migaa would be deserted again. Some people had been waiting in Migaa for over thirty years; others had died before their chance came.
The three climbed a narrow, winding stair until they reached a gallery occupied by a table and three chairs. They sat down.
'I had this reserved,' Asquiol said as he craned his neck to look down into the public hall.
Renark looked at him quizzically. 'I'm having the ship checked and re-checked,' he said. 'It's got to be ready very soon. The Snifter could materialise well before the maximum thirty-six hours I mentioned. Though it shouldn't be here for another twelve hours - judging by the rate it's been moving towards us since I contacted it twenty days ago.'
Renark paused, staring out across the terrible desert, screwing his eyes against the glare, which penetrated even the polaroid windows.
'We've got to be ready,' he said. 'I can't tell how long it will remain in this continuum. There's also the possibility that it will go through the continuum at speed and we won't have a chance to get there before it travels on.'
'So we could have come to Migaa for nothing,' Talfryn shrugged. 'Well, my tune's my own.'
'Mine isn't,' Renark said - but he didn't expand on that remark.
He was the only man in the entire galaxy capable of knowing when the Shifter System would materialise. Others who came to Migaa took the chance that the bizarre, continuum-travelling system would appear in the space-time during their own life, but it was a gamble. This was the only reason Migaa existed, built on the nearest halfway, habitable planet to where the Shifter would materialise. So the outlawed and the damned, the searching and the hunted came to Migaa when there was nowhere else to go. And they waited.
Renark knew he did not need to wait, for he was a Guide Senser with a peculiar instinct, developed to the level of a science. He could locate, given only the vaguest direction and description, anything in the galaxy, whether it was a planet or a lost penny.
Needing no maps or co-ordinates, he could lead a person anywhere they wanted to go. He was a human directionfinder, and because of this he knew the Shifter was coming closer, for he had trained himself to see past his own space and out into other dimensions lying beyond, where there seemed to be hazy ghosts of planets - and suns almost, but not quite - like his own.
He had trained himself to see them, to prove a theory concerning the nature of the weird Shifter System which had been known to materialise - just suddenly appear in space and then vanish again without trace - only five times since mankind had reached the rim.
Little else was generally known about it.
The few explorers and scientists who had managed to reach the Shifter before it vanished again had not returned. It was impossible to say how long it would stay at any one time. The mystery system seemed to have a wildly erratic orbit, and Renark's theory that it moved on a course different from the rest of the universe - a kind of sideways movement - had been postulated years before when, as Warden of the Rim Worlds, he had been given the responsibility of sensing it - as he sensed the world and suns within his own continuum.
The time of the Shifter's stay varied between a few hours and a few days. It was never certain when it would appear or disappear. The desperate men who came to Migaa were optimists, hoping against hope that they would have the luck to be there when the Shifter arrived.
Though the Shifter received its title from Renark's own theory, it had several other names - Ghost System was a popular one - and certain religious-minded people ascribed some more dramatic significance to the system, declaiming that it had been cast from the universe for some sin its inhabitants had committed. These fanatics also had a name for the system - the Sundered Worlds.
And so a whole framework of myth had developed around the system, but very few dared investigate it for fear of being stranded. For the most part only criminals were willing to take the risk.
Renark stared down at the seething public hall. The Galactic Union's government machinery was near perfect, its institutions difficult to abuse. This meant they could allow a greater degree of personal freedom for their citizens. But, because the government worked so well, criminals were hard put to escape the Union's laws. Migaa was their only hope. From Migaa they had the chance of escaping right out of the universe - unless the Galactic Police - the Geepees - made one of their sudden swoops on the town. For the most part the Geepees were content to leave well alone, but sometimes they hunted a criminal when he possessed some particular item or piece of information which they wanted. Then, if he eluded them long enough, they would come to Migaa looking for him.
Renark knew the Gee-lords sought him, that Lord Mordan, Captain in Chief of the Galactic Police, had his men scouring the galaxy for him. He wondered how long it would be before Mordan thought of Migaa.
Asquiol put his head in his hands and stared at Renark.
'Isn't it time we had your reasons for this trip, Renark?' He turned his head and searched among the crowd below. 'What made you quit your position as Rim Warden? Why wouldn't you tell the Gee-lords what you learned from that strange spaceship which landed on Golund three years ago? And why the passion to visit the Shifter?'
'I don't want to answer yet,' Renark told him. 'In fairness I should, but if I did it would give rise to further questions I can't possibly answer yet. All I can tell you right now is what you've guessed - I've been waiting three years to get to the Shifter, ever since I learned something of great importance from the crew of that spaceship on Golund. What they told me indirectly caused me to resign as Warden. As for the answers I don't have - I hope the Shifter will give me them.'
'We're your friends, Renark.' Talryn said, 'and we're willing to go with you for that reason alone. But if you don't find the answers you want out there, will you answer the original questions?'
'There'll be nothing to lose if I do,' Renark agreed. 'But if you decide you don't want to come, then say so now. It's dangerous, we know that much. We might perish before we even reach the Shifter, and once there we may never be able to return.'
Both men moved uncomfortably but said nothing.
Renark continued: 'I owe you both debts of friendship. You, Paul, helped me in my research on variable time flows and were responsible for finally crystallizing my theory. Asquiol saved me from the attentions of that police patrol on Pompeii, sheltered me for six months and, when the Gee-lords found out, was forced, under the terms of his agreement, to give up his birthright. You have both made big sacrifices on my behalf.'
'I'm curious enough, anyway, to explore the Ghost System,' smiled Talfryn, 'and Asquiol has nothing to keep him here unless it's his new-found attraction for Willow Kovacs.'