Time Bomb and Zahndry Others

TIME BOMB.

AND ZAHNDRY OTHERS.

Timothy Zahn.

Contents ERNIE.

RAISON D'ETRE.




THE PRICE OF SURVIVAL.

BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HIGH PLACE.

HOUSEGUEST.

TIME BOMB.

THE PRESIDENT'S DOLL.

BANSHEE.

Acknowledgements.

Ernie

The first time I ever saw Ernie Lambert was on that sweltering August day when he showed up at my tiny office in the Athlete's Club and asked if he could join my boxing team.

"Sure," I told him. "It's not really a team, you know, just a bunch of kids who like to box. You ever box before?"

He nodded. "Yes, sir, I used to fight all the time in St. Louis, before we moved down here." His voice was the careful English of a kid trying to break free of a ghetto accent. "I was hoping you could teach me enough in the next few months so I can get in the Golden Gloves tournament."

"Well, we'll see what we can do. I suppose I ought to tell you, though, that I'm not a real boxing coach. I teach gym at the high school and I haven't boxed in compet.i.tion since college."

"That's okay. My last coach wasn't a pro, either."

"Fine. Just thought you should know." I glanced at the clock and continued, "Some of the other guys will be in pretty soon to do some practice sparring. If you want to suit up, you'd be welcome to join us."

"Yes, sir, thank you."

Eight other guys eventually came in. I told them to do their own warm-up exercises, partly because that'seasier on me and partly because I wanted to watch Ernie. No doubt about it, he had had some good coaching in the past. He knew all the standard exercises and a couple I'd never seen but which made sense once I stopped to think about them. He seemed in pretty good shape, too, and it looked to me like he was eager to get into the ring. That was starting to worry me a little. It wasn't because he was black; three of my twelve fighters were black and that never caused any problem. But Ernie was the smallest guy here today, outweighed by ten to fifty pounds, and I didn't want him to get run over on his first day. I hoped he would see that and have the sense to stay off the canvas.

He either didn't notice, which is bad, or didn't care, which is worse, because after Ray and Hal had finished their bout Ernie asked to have a turn in the ring. I wished I could say no, but I'd already sort of told him he could and I couldn't go back on my word. The only guy even close to Ernie's size was Chuck, who still had ten pounds and an inch or two on him. But there was no help for it, so the two of them put on the head protectors and oversized practice gloves and got in the ring together. Holding my breath, I tapped the bell.

Ernie demolished him. I mean, completely.

It was the strangest fight I'd ever seen. Ernie didn't seem to be particularly fast, but halfway through each punch there was this weird little jerk of some kind, and suddenly that hand was behind Chuck's guard and was bouncing off his head. At least three out of five of those jabs were landing, which was ridiculous for someone as good as Chuck. And on top of that, Chuck's own punches weren't connecting with anything except air, because that jerk of Ernie's was as good for getting his head back as it was for getting his fist forward.

The whole thing began to get to Chuck in the middle of the second round and he started throwing everything he could find, so I had to stop the fight. But I'd seen enough. I had a real Golden Gloves contender on my hands in Ernie.

It took the other guys awhile to see it, and awhile after that to see what it might mean in prestige for the whole town, but they eventually figured it out and from then on Ernie was one of the gang. At the end of the session Chuck announced that everyone was chipping in to buy Ernie a soda at the drugstore, and they all trooped off together. Me, I went home and startled my wife by telling her we were going out to dinner.

The next few weeks went by quickly, kind of surprising when I looked back at all the work I'd done. My gym cla.s.ses at the high school took up a lot of my time, except for the two weeks between summer school and the fall quarter. Ernie was kept pretty busy with studies himself, and so we didn't work out as much as we had before. But every minute that I could get Ernie and at least one other guy together I spent at the Club. For a while I worried that I was neglecting the other guys in my work with Ernie, but Ray told me that they were getting more from my coaching, now that I was really fired up, than they ever had before. Ever since that day back in college when I broke my wrist and had to drop out of the boxing team, I'd really wanted to get a shot at working with real champion material. I guess my excitement was just boiling over.

And gradually, I got to know Ernie.

The last of five children, he grew up in the St. Louis ghetto area. His father didn't earn too much money, but Mister Lambert must have put a lot of time into raising his kids, because Ernie seemed better adjusted than a lot of richer kids I've known. He was about average height and build and sort of plain-looking, and he wore his hair short instead of in one of those Afros. He was soft-spoken and polite, and though I finally broke him of the habit of calling me "sir," he never called me "Ron" like some of the others did. It was always "Coach" or "Coach Morrissey."He was smart, too, especially in the math and business cla.s.ses he was taking. His teachers told me they thought he would get straight A's in those courses if he didn't spend so much time at the Club. That bothered me a little, but I decided it was my duty to develop the boy's talent. That's what I told myself, anyway.

About a month and a half after Ernie's arrival in town we got a real nice break. One of the local banks closed its lobby for remodeling, and I managed to talk them into loaning me one of their videotape cameras for a few days. I set it up at the Club and announced to the guys that they were going to get to watch their own fights, just like the pros do.

Everybody seemed pretty enthusiastic about the idea. Everybody, that is, except Ernie. He was sort of nervous, and kept looking at the camera while the others were sparring. And once in the ring, he got clobbered, the first time I'd seen that happen. His timing was shot to pieces, that whiplash jerk gone completely. I had to stop the fight after two rounds. Ernie wouldn't say anything about it except that the camera must have made him nervous.

The camera went back after four days and Ernie became dynamite in the ring again. But it bugged the heck out of me. Ernie was good, sure, but he still had flaws and I just knew it would help him to be able to watch himself in action on film. In real action, I mean; not the b.u.m show he had given before for the camera.

It finally bugged me to the point where I did something about it. The videotape camera was back at the bank, but I had an old movie camera of my own. Taking it to the Club, I set it up where it wouldn't be seen or heard from the ring. I figured that what Ernie didn't know about couldn't make him nervous.

Sure enough, the next day Ernie did his usual good job in the ring. After everyone had left I took the film out of the camera and hurried home with it. Wolfing down my dinner*Diane complained about that*I went down to the bas.e.m.e.nt and set to work developing the film.

It came out beautifully. The camera had been close enough to the ring that the fighters sometimes stepped out of its range, but there were some really clear shots, too. Ernie's whiplash punch was there in all its glory; so were a couple of his fast ducks and side-steps. My projector was an expensive model, a gift from the in-laws, and it had three speeds and even a single-frame viewer. So after I watched Ernie go through his paces a couple of times, I backed the film up and watched one of his whiplash punches in slow motion.

It didn't look much different. That weird little jerk halfway through the punch was still there, just as impossible to see as at regular speed. Using the slowest speed didn't help any more.

That was strange.

Now my curiosity was aroused. Moving the reels by hand, I got the film set to the frame just before the jerk. I took a good look at where Ernie's fist was in relation to the background and then moved the film one more frame.

No doubt about it, that fist had moved. But, then, it moved in every frame. Naturally. So what was the jerk I kept seeing? I puzzled over those two frames for several minutes before it finally hit me.

Ernie's whole body had moved forward a little. His whole body, even his feet, which looked to be solidly planted in the canvas.

Now that struck me as a little strange, because you can't just move forward without leaving your feet on the ground to push with. I figured I must be missing something, so I took a look at the other shots I'd gotof Ernie punching or ducking. Every one of them, the same way. He'd be here in one picture and there in the next. Not much, maybe a couple of inches or less each time, but enough to see if you were looking for it.

I puzzled over it for the rest of the evening, but couldn't come up with a good answer. Maybe Ernie could give me one.

"What did you want to see me about, Coach?"

"Sit down, Ernie. The rest of the guys gone?"

He nodded, sweat still trickling down his face from the workout I'd just put them through. Pulling the single guest chair in the office close to my desk, he sank into it.

"Ernie," I said, "I have a small confession to make. Remember how you didn't like the videotape camera we used a couple of weeks ago? Well, I figured it was just some kind of stage fright that was bothering you. So yesterday I hooked up my movie camera without telling anybody and got some film of you sparring with Jess."

Ernie had quit breathing. After a little while he seemed to notice that and took a careful breath. His face*well, scared didn't really fit it. Maybe wary did.

I went on, "I'm a little puzzled by something on that film. That little whiplash jerk in your punches looks sort of strange. I thought you might explain it to me."

"Gee, Coach, I jist swing an' m' body does the rest." He seemed to realize his English was slipping and stopped for a second. "I guess I don't really think about what I'm doing," he finished.

I shook my head. "Sorry, Ernie, but that won't wash. Whatever it is you do, you know about it, or else you wouldn't have stopped doing it when the other camera was on you."

He looked like a cornered animal. "You wouldn't understand," he muttered. "You'd think I was a*a freak."

"Try me. Look, if I'm going to coach you properly, I have to know all about you. If you want, I'll give you my word I won't tell anybody else."

For a long time he just sat there, looking down at his hands folded tightly in his lap. "All right," he said at last. "Coach, have you ever heard of teleportation?" When I shook my head, he went on, "You read about it sometimes in those science fiction books. It's when you go from one place to another, like, in no time at all."

"All kinds of crazy stuff in those books. So?"

"Well, that's what I do. I can 'port about an inch at a time, and I do it when I'm hitting or ducking a punch. It's just enough distance to throw off the other guy's timing, usually."

I just sat there, wondering if he was putting me on. He must have seen that in my face somehow, because his eyes started looking wary again. "You don't believe me," he muttered.

"How about giving me a demonstration?" I suggested. "How fast did you say you could... teleport?""I can move an inch at a time, but I can do it five or six times a second if I need to." He stood up, pushed the chair against the wall, and faced me across the table. "What direction do you want me to go? Front, back, or sideways?"

I stood up, too, so I could watch his feet. "How about going a couple of feet to the left and then a foot backwards? Any more and you might wind up going through a wall."

"Can't. If there's anything solid in my way I can't 'port in that direction. I can't go up, either, and going down makes me real hot." He took a deep breath. "Here goes."

It was the d.a.m.nedest thing I'd ever seen. You know those cartoons on TV that they make by taking a picture of something, moving it a little, and taking another picture? Well, it was just like watching one of them. Ernie sort of jolted his way around the room without ever moving his feet*in the usual way, I mean. It was really weird to watch him doing it.

When he was finished he pulled the chair over again and sat down, looking suddenly very tired. I sat down, too. My legs felt just a little weak. "How did you ever learn how to do that?" I asked.

"I don't know, Coach," he shrugged. "One day when I was thirteen I just... did it, I guess, and from then on it was easy."

"So you've been doing this for, what, three years now? Does your family or anyone else know about it?"

"No. At first I was just... I was just too scared to tell anyone. It took me months to find out the name for it, even, and when I found out that people thought it was a make-believe sort of thing, I figured I'd better keep my mouth shut about it. I did try to tell my brother once, but he wouldn't listen. I don't know, maybe my family knows but just won't talk about it."

That I could understand. "I'm a little surprised you're willing to risk boxing," I said. "I mean, this teleporting thing has got to be in your brain somewhere. You get hit too hard in the head and you might lose it."

"Coach, I wouldn't be boxing at all if I couldn't 'port. I figure I might be able to get to be a pro now."

That startled me. I had had no idea he was that serious about the sport. "Ernie, pro boxing isn't for you.

It's a hard way to earn a living, and there are a lot of crooks to watch out for. Besides, with your brains and that wild talent of yours you shouldn't have any trouble making it in life."

" 'Wild talent,' huh?" Suddenly Ernie looked bitter. "Coach, what do you think I can do with my 'porting that'll make me any money?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean this is the most useless 'talent' that anybody's ever seen. There's just nothing I can do with it.

Except fight."

"Aw, come on. There must be hundreds of things..." My voice trailed off as I tried to think of somewhere 'porting would come in handy. "Well, look, just because I can't think of something off the top of my head doesn't mean there isn't anything."

He shook his head. "I've been thinking about it for three years, Coach. It's really useless."

"Okay, suppose that's true. There's still no reason you should have to fight for a living. I know you're good in math and some of your business cla.s.ses. Accounting, or something, would be a good job for aguy like you. Pays pretty good, too."

"No," Ernie sat up a little straighter in his chair. There was a glint in his eye. "I don't want to be some*some cog in a big company somewhere. I want to be somebody." He leaned across my desk, half defiant, half pleading, his usual polite reserve gone. "Coach, I've been n.o.body all my life. I've been pushed around and looked down on and treated like garbage, and I'm tired of it. I'm gonna make a name for myself. People are gonna call me 'sir,' not 'boy,' and they're gonna treat me with respect. I'm gonna be somebody!"

He was almost shouting, and must have suddenly realized it, because he quit talking and settled back in his chair.

"The only kind of respect that's worth having is the kind you have to earn," I said. "And as for being somebody, Ernie, it's not the name that counts but the guy who wears it. There are a lot of guys on a.s.sembly lines who are better men than any pro boxer that ever lived."

Ernie shook his head slowly. "I wish you could understand, Coach. But I'm going to be a pro anyway. If you don't want to help me, I... guess I just have to do it on my own."

"If it means that much to you, I'll keep working with you," I said after a minute of hard thought. "But I want you to keep an open mind about other possibilities, okay?"

He hesitated, then nodded. "Okay. And... please don't tell anyone about my 'porting, all right?"

"I promise. See you tomorrow?"

"Sure thing. Good night. Coach. And thanks for listening."

I thought about it all the way home and for most of that evening. Ernie was right: I couldn't come up with a single solitary job where 'porting something an inch at a time would be worth doing. It was slower than walking and no good for going through walls or working in tight places. I didn't know how much other stuff he could move with him when he 'ported*he told me later he could move practically anything as long as he was touching it*but even that didn't help any. It would be faster to jack up a ton of steel or whatever and roll it on wheels instead of 'porting it around. Especially since he couldn't 'port things upwards.

I didn't get to sleep until after two, and when I woke up the next morning I felt almost hung over, I was so tired. Diane told me I had muttered in my sleep all night and had rolled around so much I'd almost pushed her out of bed. She wanted to know what was wrong, but of course I couldn't tell her. She didn't like that much.

Most of the rest of the day was pretty hazy, but I managed to get through my cla.s.ses somehow. I woke up enough to spend a good hour in the Club with Ernie and the other guys.

Now that I knew how much Ernie wanted to be a pro boxer, I could see the quiet sort of determination he took into the ring with him, and that grit paid off in the next month or so as he moved towards becoming a really top-notch fighter. His speed and strength increased, and his reflexes got so good that he almost didn't have to 'port anymore. Which was just as well, since the other guys were learning how to handle his whiplash punch, even though they didn't know how he did it. Actually, Ernie's style was even deadlier now that he didn't have to 'port because you could never tell whether that extra inch would show up or not. It raised h.e.l.l with your timing.All the other guys were getting better, too, which didn't surprise me any, because if they could handle Ernie they could handle anybody. At least one of them was good enough already to go to the Golden Gloves and give a good account of himself, and the others weren't very far behind. As their coach, I should have been happy. But I wasn't.

That talk I'd had with Ernie all those weeks ago was still bugging me. The more I got to know him, the more I liked the kid and the less I liked the idea of him going pro. Sure, he was good, but at a hundred thirty-five pounds he was only a lightweight, and he would never be more than a middleweight unless he did a lot of growing in the next few years. A good middleweight could make money, all right, but it was the big heavyweight champs that got most of the publicity that Ernie seemed to want so badly. He stood a far better chance of winding up disillusioned than famous, it seemed to me. And I hated to see him go through something like that. He was too smart, too polite*h.e.l.l, he was just too nice for that.

And, as I watched Ernie getting better, my conscience started bothering me in the other direction, too.

Namely: was it fair of me to turn Ernie loose on boxers who didn't know what they were up against? Just because the official rules didn't forbid 'porting*big surprise*that didn't mean it was ethical.

It gave Ernie an unfair advantage, really, because I was pretty sure a boxer could watch Ernie's whiplash punch for a month from ringside without figuring out how to stop it. You had to actually get into the ring with him, and by then it was too late. Did I have a duty to the rest of the boxing world?

The really maddening thing was that there was a clear way out of this mess. All I had to do was find some other way for Ernie to become successful and respected by using his 'porting talent. That's all. But I couldn't come up with one to save my life. Nothing in industry worked, and the professional-type jobs were even worse. I tried to find another sport that Ernie might go into, but he was too small for football or basketball and I couldn't see how 'porting would help any in baseball. All I could possibly come up with was the idea of letting some scientists study him to try and learn how he 'ported, and I knew Ernie wouldn't go for that.

I finally gave up the effort. Ernie had at least twenty IQ points on me, and if he hadn't been able to find anything else to do with that 'porting trick in three years I figured I was probably wasting my time.

Something had to give here, though. Much as I wanted to see one of my students become a real champ, I couldn't keep coaching Ernie if I didn't think it was good for him. It wasn't fair to him, and it wasn't good for my stomach, either. I made up my mind to nave another talk with him as soon as I got a good chance.

A day or two later I got my opening. Driving away from the school after cla.s.ses on the way to do some errands, I saw Ernie walking along the road. Pulling alongside him, I called, "Where you heading, Ernie?"