Chapter 21

Escape

An indeterminate time later: dim awareness of warmth and comfort.

Gradually, other senses returned.

I opened my eyes.

Then immediately closed them. What I’d seen I did not want to see.

Reluctantly, hoping I’d been mistaken, I again opened my eyes. The same sight greeted me: a hospital room, my right leg in plaster suspended from a hoist, a bed beneath me.

I closed my eyes. How had I gotten here? What had happened? For a few moments, I could not remember anything earlier than Yvette knocking at Ernest’s front door. Then more recent events flooded back, including a final memory of feeling tired while driving back to Ernest’s.

There must have been an accident. And yet I could I feel no pain. Perhaps I was dosed up on painkillers.

I opened my eyes again. Bandages covered many parts of my body. Tubes and wires ran from me in profusion—I resembled an impotent pincushion.

To my right, bright light streamed through a window—the dawn of another day.

From my left, a female voice: “Awake at last.”

I turned to see, sitting on a chair, a magazine open on her lap: Yvette. Not the Yvette with whom I’d spent the previous evening. My wife, Yvette!

I gasped with shock and relief… Home again. I’d woken up, finally! I must have had an accident that put me in hospital, and I’d dreamt everything while unconscious. Or during surgery, for all I knew.

I had to be certain. “What year is it?” I said, with urgency.

“You haven’t been out that long,” said Yvette, mock-serious.

“Just tell me,” I replied. “Please. What year is it?”

She closed the magazine and shrugged her shoulders. “2070.”

“But…” I could not believe my ears. I looked at her welcome face and saw confusion creep across it. My own bewilderment was quickly replaced by a sudden thought. “O no,” I cried. “Has Wilbur snared you too?!”

Yvette smiled, stood, leaned close, kissed me passionately on the mouth. “Who’s Wilbur?” she said, straightening. Her smile widened, and her face blurred. Then her whole shape became a vague smudge that shifted to become that of Wilbur.

“Is that supposed to be funny?” I said, angrily.

“How would I know?” said Wilbur, with one eyebrow raised. “It’s your dream.”

He and the entire hospital room vanished, replaced in an instant by Ernest’s bedroom. I was sitting bolt upright in his bed, my leg no longer in plaster, my body free of bandages, tubes and wires.

Some moments of dazed disorientation ended with me hurriedly checking myself for injuries. There were none, other than my still bruised toes. I noticed I was lying on top of the bed not in it, with a blanket over me, still in the clothes I wore the night before. Closed curtains were aglow from broad daylight behind.

Confusion again. How did I get here? Or was I still dreaming? (Dreaming within the dream?) Or still in the car, asleep? Or trapped, after an accident?

Or had the time viewer fouled up again?

I did not waste time trying to choose. I rushed from the bed, found Ernest’s Babel where I had last left it in a shirt pocket, and called Wilbur.

“Awake at last,” he said.

“What?! You know something about this? How did I get here? The last thing I remember was driving home, feeling tired.”

“Yes, tired enough to fall asleep, and activate the car’s failsafe.”

“The what?”

Wilbur explained about a mandatory car device, fixed unseen in the roof above the driver’s seat. Its purpose: to detect brain wave patterns, and upon recognising those indicative of the driver falling asleep, to slow the car to a stop, switch on the hazard lights, and alert the local police. Wilbur was listed on my Babel—or Ernest’s at least—as an ‘emergency contact’, so the police who found me left a message with him explaining they’d been unable to rouse me, then they had driven me home and put me to bed.

Embarrassed and somewhat incredulous, I wondered how this might affect Ernest’s reputation. “Will Ernest be charged over this?” I said guiltily.

“No,” said Wilbur. “It’ll go on his record. And repeated offences will risk a suspended license. But everyone’s allowed the odd mistake. The important thing is there were no injuries or damage. That’s what the failsafe is for, after all.”

There was a quiet pause, as I reflected on how lucky I’d been.

“I was a little surprised,” said Wilbur, “to hear you’d driven a car.”

“I was with Yvette. We had a night out. I’ll tell you about it later if you’re interested. But what can you tell me? Have you tracked Ernest to the right time yet?”

“Nearly. With any luck, I’ll need little more than an hour.”

Having moved to the kitchen, I noticed its clock read shortly after noon. “More than enough time for me to freshen up and join you. See you soon.”

I quickly showered and lunched, less quickly rummaged through Ernest’s collection for a new shirt to wear (in the end opting out of desperation and shocked sensibilities to re-use one I’d worn a few days before), then walked to Wilbur’s as fast as I could. I was keen to return home, in fact could barely wait for it.

Yet, while walking, the memory of my most recent dream prompted a disturbing thought. What if I had it all back to front? What if the seemingly most unlikely reality was the true one, and the most plausible one not real at all? What if the episode in the hospital with a shape-shifting Yvette was not a dream but real? Perhaps the same was true for the earlier alleged dream where I woke up beside Yvette only to find her wearing a demon’s face? Was it possible one or both of these were the only real events of the last few days? Was what I thought of as my real life truly nothing more than a false memory? Or a dream within a dream? And if Yvette was a shape-shifter, did that make me one too? Might we both be on Orlanos? Engaged in a psychological experiment? Or a test procedure gone wrong to prepare us for a stint on Earth as observers? Or perhaps as invaders?

All disconcerting possibilities I did not want to even think about—yet I found myself unable to completely reject them, no matter how hard I tried. They stayed in my thoughts all the way to Wilbur’s. Once there, however, they could not compete with everything else demanding my attention.

Wilbur took me immediately to the room with the time viewer. On the screen, freeze-framed, was Ernest, asleep under an overhang of rock and dirt, a small stream not far below him, screening greenery on all sides. At his feet: a loaf of sliced bread in a plastic bag, a small wad of cheese, a few apples and bananas. The light was dim but not as dark as the night scene I’d viewed previously. Twilight, I decided.

“After his escape from the bull,” explained Wilbur, “Ernest walked for a while before exhaustion overcame him. Then he just sat down against a tree in an empty paddock, and fell asleep. The next morning, he stumbled onto a farmhouse but veered away from it into thick bush behind it, eventually finding this secluded spot. He’s stayed there almost the whole time, except for two forays to the farmhouse to steal food. He was seen once by the wife as she hung out washing, but managed to elude her. He’s spent most of his time asleep—which is lucky, since it’s relatively easy to fast-track him when he’s still.”

“He’s sleepy too, eh?”

“Even so, he seems to be aware that he’s travelled to your time. I think he’s deliberately trying to avoid contact so as not to change the future—his past.”

Wilbur tapped a touch-key on the viewer’s front panel, and motion returned to its screen. Bird song filled the air, accompanied by the stream’s calm babble.

“He knows?” I said. “How?”

“He is, after all, an historian,” said Wilbur, tapping another touch-key. The screen’s activities sped up: the trees and bushes fluttered rapidly, the stream blurred and its babble turned to soft white noise, and the bird-song accelerated almost to supersonic frequencies. Ernest, though, remained mostly still, apart from an occasional fast-motion twitch or toss and turn in his sleep. “But,” continued Wilbur, “even without his training, he could never mistake the farm equipment for those of his own time.”

On the screen, twilight faded quickly to night, prompting Wilbur to switch to night-vision. “Are you sure he knows?” I asked.

“Yes, the secluded location of this spot, and many of his actions, have suggested it. But he’s also said a few words which I think prove it.”

“O?”

“Quote. Damn. This is 2030. Or some time near it. Unquote. I consider that a likely indication he knows when he is.” Wilbur’s expression was completely deadpan.

“Are you sure Orlanis have no sense of humour?”

He did not reply, but was clearly surprised—until we were both suddenly distracted when the viewer’s screen was momentarily obliterated by a flash of light, quickly followed by an abrupt sound resembling a thump on a drum.

“What happened?” I said.

Wilbur did not answer, but slowed the motion to real-time. Another brighter flash erupted, followed by the unmistakable sound of a sharp crack of thunder, with which Ernest jolted awake.

“Another storm!” I said.

Wilbur briefly widened and redirected the shot to verify the approach of a thunderstorm, before zooming in again on Ernest. Then he hit a button that put two sets of characters, both in what must have been Orlani text, into a corner of the screen, one beneath the other. At first, I had no idea what they were, even when I noticed the characters on the right of each set were changing rapidly, while those on the left were fixed.

“Only about half an hour from catching up,” said Wilbur, resuming the fast-forward. The speed of change of the top set of Orlani characters increased proportionately. An Orlani clock, I realised.

Much less than half an hour later, indeed barely two minutes, Wilbur slowed the motion and announced, “We’re almost in synch. Just a few little nudges.” He pressed more buttons that sped up Ernest in short bursts. He was by then leaning against the cutting behind, munching on bread. Light rain fell in front of him, but the overhang kept him dry. Lightning still flashed but less frequently.

“There,” said Wilbur, eyes on the screen, “Ernest has now been in your time for very nearly five days—as long as you’ve been here.” Belatedly, I realised the two Orlani clocks were identical.

Wilbur turned to me. “We can attempt the transfer as and when you wish.”

So—the time had come. I was about to go home. The dream was really about to end. Yet to my surprise, I found myself in no hurry. “This won’t hurt, will it?” I said, though without real concern.

“It didn’t hurt the first time, did it?”

“No.” I looked long and hard at Wilbur, and sighed. He’d been patient and understanding and helpful from the moment I’d arrived, despite my frequent hostility. “Perhaps I’ll let you take part in another of my dreams, after all,” I said. I put my hand out to shake. “Thanks. For everything.”

Wilbur took my hand and shook it firmly. “You’re welcome. Especially since if anyone is to blame for you being here, it’s me.”

“No one’s to blame. It was just an unanticipated accident, like you said. And it’s all a dream anyway.”

He smiled, and seemed ready to comment but stopped himself.

The handshake ended, and I decided there was no point stalling. “So what do I have to do?”

“Touch the screen when you’re ready and… away you go. It’s been a pleasure knowing you, Steven. And deeply instructive.”

I was touched. “Likewise,” I said, nodding. “Likewise.” I swallowed hard. “Well… as the saying goes, there’s no time like the present.”

I put out a hand towards the screen, and gradually inched it forward.

“Bon voyage,” said Wilbur.

My hand touched the screen…

Nothing happened.

I was still in the room with Wilbur, the only change being the mood of disbelief and doubt into which I suddenly plunged.

I removed my hand from the screen, then touched it again with more force.

Still, nothing happened.

I repeated the movements, with ever more force, each attempt equally unsuccessful. I touched both hands to the screen. Nothing. I rubbed an arm against it. Still nothing. I bent and rested my forehead against it. Zilch. I was on the verge of heaving a shoulder against the viewer’s screen, probably more forcefully than was safe, when Wilbur put a placating hand on my other shoulder and shot me a warning look.

“No, no, no,” I said, anger rising with each repetition. “This can’t be. What am I supposed to do now? Click my heels and chant ‘there’s no place like home’?” I faced Wilbur, for all I knew with steam rising out of my ears. “Why isn't it working?”

Wilbur’s poker face briefly betrayed puzzlement. He started double-checking the time viewer’s counters and settings. “I don’t know. We’re definitely synchronised with Ernest’s time coordinates.” He stopped his motions abruptly. “And with his spatial coordinates.” He turned to me and smiled. “Which is rather impractical, since as I explained yesterday, we’re meant to be viewing a spot halfway between his and your locations.” His smile grew embarrassed. “My mistake. Sorry.”

My anger and doubt faded rapidly. I breathed a sigh of relief. “Apology accepted. Only don’t let it happen again. Please.”

He typed away at the keyboard, and the view jumped suddenly from Ernest to a non-descript paddock full of seedlings in long rows. “That should do it. Whenever you’re ready.”

Full of nervous anticipation, I hesitated briefly. A hard swallow. “Well, nothing personal, but here’s hoping I never see you again.” I stretched out my arm, and this time more quickly touched the screen.

Again, nothing happened.

“O no,” I groaned, this time keeping my hand on the screen, pressing it harder, staring blankly at it. “Are you sure we’re looking at the right spot?”

“Yes,” said Wilbur, double-checking nevertheless.

The screen suddenly brightened with another lightning flash, just before I was blinded by a more pervasive burst of light that seemed to come from the room itself. I covered my eyes with my hands, but to no avail—I could see nothing but a wash of intense whiteness.

My mind grappled in turmoil. Had it finally worked? Would my vision clear, and then I’d find myself at home? With Yvette? In our time? Or had some malfunction blinded me for good? Was I still in the room with Wilbur after all?

It seemed to take forever, but my vision gradually returned. I strained to make sense of the dim blurs coalescing in front of me.

Eventually, I could see enough to be sure—and to be depressed: I was still in the room with Wilbur. He was blinking and widening his eyes as if having trouble focussing. In front of him, the time viewer’s screen was now blank, and thin wisps of dark smoke were rising from its interior.

“What happened?”

That took the words out of my mouth, until I realised it was not Wilbur who’d spoken. It had been my voice. And yet I was sure I hadn’t said anything!

“Is that you, Wilbur?” said my voice again, as if from near the floor and behind me.

I turned and saw him: sitting on the floor, rubbing his head, looking in Wilbur’s direction with wide blinking eyes—my doppelganger.

“Well,” said Wilbur, sheepishly, “at least we got you back to your right time. Welcome home, Ernest.”