By Aladdin and Christopher Leeson

Chapter 3

The Dark Shoppe

A young fig tree its form lifts high
Within a beauteous garden;
And see, a goat is sitting by,
As if he were its warden.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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"Thanks for clearing that up," I said sarcastically. "But you still haven't told me what you had to do with those crazy things that happened to me today."

Gabriel sighed and nodded. "All that will take a bit of telling."

"Then start talking, or get out of my life!" I said.

"I'll try to explain, but listen carefully. The concepts will sound very unfamiliar to you."

"Telling me that I'm ignorant is not going to win you many Brownie points."

He pursed his lips. "To say it simply, by an assiduous exploration of minus time, one discovers causation."

"Minus time?"

"Yes. Minus-time is the time that has already passed by in a timeline. There is also Plus-time, which is the future that results from the accumulation of events in the past. Plus-time allows us to anticipate probable outcomes. Because of the looming catastrophe, we must move swiftly to scout out Plus-time to discover the future hazards that will beset us. When I recruited you to be a scout, I learned a great deal."

"I didn't volunteer for anything! Why don't you do your own scouting and leave innocent people in peace?"

"Because utilizing a time agent is not a one-man or one-woman job. The active agent needs a support team, and no one else was available to support you while you were in alternate time. I had to remain behind in natural time and monitor you so I could anticipate the dangers you were facing. That way, I could help you avoid them."

"You did a lousy job. Danger socked me in the jaw about a hundred times when I was in that messed up world!" I stated.

He shook his head. "Those were mere inconveniences which you were able to handle very effectively on your own. My eyes were set on much graver matters.

"I wish you to understand that your life – the life you're living here and now -- was never at risk. You were never more than a virtual participant in that other world. I used my nanites to digitalize a copy of your conscientiousness and place it into host bodies living in that other time-reality. While you were in that realm, I gathered a great deal of information, while you simultaneously getting an education in the subtleties of alternate time.

"Everything that happened to me seemed damned real!"

"You only believed you had traveled to a strange place and time. In reality, the three Mantras whose memories you now share were never you; your real body remained at the restaurant where I found you."

"If that was so, why are these memories so damned vivid?" I asked.

"That is because the nanites allowed me to record all their thoughts and memories. I took the new memories they acquired and downloaded them into your mind through the interface of the nanites you carry. Their memories became your memories. Do you understand?"

I balled my fists. "Why pick on me? Why not use an AI probe that you could sacrifice without causing grief to a stranger?"

"Because I needed to introduce a living scout into a situation to gain information where an AI probe could not go."

"What happened to those three Mantras after I left them?"

"Alas, they ceased to exist only seconds after I downloaded their memories into my VIGOPS."

"Died? How?" I asked. "I didn't see that they were in any danger when I left! What was the danger?"

"Those realities they were in were unnatural universes that the Tree of Eternity created by its frequent reboots. A reboot reestablishes a new universe that is very like the old, but there will be imperfections that make the two worlds somewhat different. For example, a reboot may cause certain people to vanish from existence. And some new people will be created that the history of the new world remembers, even though they never existed before.

"So, a person could vanish like Contrary did, and appear out of nothing like Thorn Boy?"

"Exactly," the little man affirmed.

"What else did your high tech do to me? Was I brainwashed so I'd become your enthusiastic lackey?"

"Not at all, my dear fel – Mantra. I want to keep you just the way you are – with clarity of thought, lightning reflexes, and battle readiness."

"Are all Timekeepers like you? Do you all take incredible liberties with other people's lives?"

"Regrettably, sometimes one has to be cruel to achieve beneficial ends. Think of a doctor. His scalpel is a wicked instrument, but it is a necessary tool for achieving a healing treatment. "

"Maybe you're so alien you can't understand simple right and wrong. I'd be crazy to get involved with a person like you."

"I can understand your point of view, but I have a way to persuade you of the importance of my mission. Would you be willing to take a journey with me?"

"No journeys," I said. "I've got sleeping kids! I have to watch over them."

"What if I help you find a babysitter?"

"I'd rather pick a babysitter I can personally trust."

"Tonight I arrived here in the company of a person with excellent credentials in childcare. She is waiting outside at this moment." He looked over his shoulder at the front door.

"She's there now?" I asked.

He nodded.

"I'm pretty sure that whatever loonie you've got lined up won't be acceptable to me."

"Oh, I believe the person I found will meet your standards very acceptably."

No sooner had he said that than the doorbell rang.

I used my mystic scene and confirmed that there was a life-form standing outside on the welcome mat. "You let her in," I told Gabriel. "I don't want to get into a crossfire between a pair of Godwheel scoundrels."

Gabriel obligingly rose and went to the door. When it opened, I saw a woman standing there. It was Eden Blake.

Eden Blake?

My doppelganger stepped past the Timekeeper and fixed an unhappy glance on me.

"It's like looking into a mirror," my double remarked to Gabriel.

The little man stepped between us. "Lukasz -- this is, ah, Lukasz. She's a temporal clone of yours originating in a future timeline."

"She's from the future?" I muttered. My double was dressed in "suburban casual" and seemed my age. I glowered at the Timekeeper. "I don't like the idea that you've had a copy of me riding in your hip pocket all this time!"

"Is that a bad thing?" he asked.

"It's a bad thing if you plan to deep-six me and put a ringer in my place."

"I have no such plan. I recruited Mrs. Blake just today -- as your people reckon calendar dates. For a long while, the two of you were living a single life. But at one point, the Main Bough timeline bifurcated and she began a separate existence of her own."

"If you already have a pet Mantra, why do you need me?"

"Because the coming disaster is aimed at this Main Bough and it can be most effectively defended by one who is a natural resident of this universe. I'm of this time and universe, and so are you."

The other Lukasz shook her head and said, "Look, bro, the little guy is weird, but he's made me a believer. I only wish I could do the job he wants you to do since my life is a wreck, and I don't have a whole lot to lose."

"What does she mean her life's a wreck?" I asked Gabriel.

"Don't talk over my head as if I'm not here!" my double growled. "My kids -- my own Evie and Gus -- are dead. There! You made me say it. Are you happy?"

That set me back on my heels. "Dead? How?"

"Rune!" she said with a bitter grate. "He wanted the Sword of Fangs and took Gus and Evie hostage to coerce me into making a trade. I didn't trust his word, so I gathered a gang of ultras to help me take him on. But he saw us coming and killed the children before we could lower the boom."

I knew about Rune – an alien creature with incredible power and vampiric habits. I'd met him more than once and had barely survived the encounters.

"I'm sorry," I said. "But you have to realize that Rune would have killed the kids no matter what you did. He relishes killing."

She looked away. "I know that's true. I've been telling myself the same thing every day since the murders happened."

I knew how she felt. I'd seen a Time-clone version of my son Gus die right before my eyes. That, too, happened because I had made a wrong choice.

"When does Rune strike?" I asked through a tight throat.

"For me, it was October 17, next month," she said. "But I've already lived two years since then. It happened because of a stupid mistake I'd made on the Godwheel. I called Eden Blake by her own name in front of some 'friends.' But one of them was Rune in disguise. That bit of information allowed him to track down the Blake family in my universe and take me surprise."

A shiver ran through me. I had made that exact same mistake. But in my reality, Rune had flown through a gate into another universe – to hopefully never return.

I clenched my fists. "Well, I'm going to make sure that it won't happen in this world's future. One way or another, I'm going to kill that blood-sucking bastard if he shows up in this universe again!"

"I hope you can do that," the other Lukasz said. "But Gabriel tells me that you're going to die tomorrow. If you want to save yourself and your family, I suggest you take seriously what the gentleman is trying to tell you."

This was too absurd! Now I was being browbeaten by myself! This conversation was giving me a headache.

I tossed a frown to Gabriel. "What, exactly, is this journey you were talking about?" I demanded.

Suddenly, the world spun.

#

Out of blankness, a scene quickly rematerialized around me. When I could see again, I wasn't in Canoga Park anymore.

I was in a medieval-style alehouse built from sturdy timber and stone. The tart smoke filling the air was already laden with the bouquet of fermented beverages and other repulsive odors reminiscent of the Middle Ages. My daze now wearing off, I noticed that the people filling the tavern stools were wearing costumes unfashionable since the Tenth Century.

Incredible! I knew this wasn't just any alehouse; I recognized it as an establishment I knew. It was the Dark Shoppe! Centuries ago, that fabled place had served as a clearing house for arcane information. In those days, it had been run by a prophetess.

What had been her name? Diana.

Just then, a raucous male voice sounded off:

"'God's Blood, wench! From whence hast thou appeared in the wink of an eye? If I did not know this place, I would be damning myself for a drunken sot. But the Dark Shoppe e'er hath been a place of miracles. Tell me, lass, hail ye from Faery, or art thou of mortal kind?"

I turned to behold a large knight seated at a table and clutching a tankard in his oversized fist.

"Your name, sir knight?" I asked cautiously, addressing him in the same dialect of Old French that he'd used.

"Sir Lukasz at thy service," he said cheerily. Nudging the youth seated next to him, he added, "And this callow good-for-nothing is my squire, Thanasi."

I was staggered. Yet, why should it surprise me to be confronting Lukasz and Thanasi centuries in the past? Hadn't I just come from interviewing Eden Blake about a babysitting job?

"Cry mercy! What costume be'eth that, milady?" my mail-clad alter-ego inquired. "Art thou pursued by villains and compelled to travel in male attire? Faith, madam! Not e'en the most cracked-brained varlet couldst e'er mistake thee for a boy."

When I looked away, he persisted: "Fair one, tarriest a while. I would fain know thee better."

I was seriously thinking about speaking to him. By pretending to be a prophet friend of Diana, I could alert my counterpart to bad things coming down the chute. I could even have warned him about Thanasi.

But should I do such a thing? Wasn't it dangerous to meddle with history? By trying to help Lukasz, I might get him killed before his time. After all, when I intervened to help a time-clone of my babysitter, Lauren Sherwood, she was attacked and slain. On the other hand, if I let the knight go his own way, I could count on him surviving for another thousand years.

As I vacillated, Gabriel took me by the arm. "Come," he whispered.

"Lady!" the knight called after us -- but I didn't look back. The Lukasz of this era had concerns of his own. Those concerns meant little to me now that I was neck deep in the issues of the Twenty-first century.

"Gabriel," I said to the little man, "this is nuts. Why did you bring me here? I'm impressed, but all this has to be an illusion. Take me home – now!"

"Not yet. You are here to gain vital information. The person whom I most wish you to meet in the Dark Shoppe is not Sir Lukasz. You remember Diana the Mystic, I presume?"

"Of course. Is Diana here?"

I glanced from side to side. Through the smoky air, I saw the raven-haired Mystic standing by a plank table watching us.

As we approached the Mystic, she addressed Gabriel. "I had no alert that you were coming. Who's your attractive friend?"

"You should soon be getting a VIGOPS download; that will explain everything."

She sighed. "I can't wait. But the bull-in-the-china-shop way that you've come barging into my timeline tells me I've just been cloned again."

The little man smiled. "It's all for a good cause, Diana. Creating a new copy of you will start to make up for the casualties that two of your clones have unfortunately suffered."

She blinked with surprise. "I hope they didn't suffer too much, at least not like some of the others have."

I looked askance. How could she be so cold as not to show more reaction to learning of the deaths of persons who were, essentially, her identical sisters?

The Timekeeper clicked his tongue commiseratively. "Their attacker was a possessed demigoddess. Such power! Their suffering must have lasted less than a second. On the other hand, your original self is still well and thriving."

Diana shook her head. "Wonderful! A few minutes ago, I was the original, and now I've gotten a downgrade. I sometimes wonder why I agreed to live like this!" Then, with a grim smile, she looked at me and asked, "Can I offer you two a platter with a tankard?"

I demurred. "I don't think my Twentieth Century body could survive the microbes that swarm all over the Tenth Century. Anyway, I just ate at the mall."

"You'd probably be safe. I've trained my cook staff to prepare food according to Twentieth Century standards."

I suddenly had to wonder whether Diana had been originally a medieval or a Twenty-First-Century human. Of course! Her accent, which I had always found so unplaceable, was actually Old French spoken with the cadence of American English.

Before I could ask her to verify that, the Mystic froze, her glance fixed and staring through me. I looked bemusedly toward Gabriel.

"She's fine," said the man. "Diana is merely receiving the VIGOPS update I mentioned. I arranged for it just before bringing us here. All Timekeeper agents need to be kept well informed concerning unfolding events."

"This is as strange as hell," I told him, "but so far nothing here makes me believe in gods and doomsdays."

The scientist shook his head. "I think you will change your mind. Maybe Diana can help convince you."

"It wasn't like the two of us used to be close or anything," I said.

He grinned slightly. "My information tells me that the two of you were closer than you may have supposed, especially on her side."

Admittedly, I'd always thought that Diana was a looker. Also, I liked her personality. But my wife Marinna had been murdered on a sacrificial altar before my eyes, and my memory of her had always prevented me from getting serious about any other woman.

I changed the subject. "You said before that there's a god in this woodpile," I replied. "Why do you think I can handle him alone? Why not bring in another hundred ultras to improve the odds?"

"I assure you, if we had a hundred gods who were the equals of Loki and Thor, they could not prevail against such an adversary as Nemesis."

I threw up my hands. "Are you kidding? The horned god by himself was strong enough to have me for supper. And I don't think Thor would have been any pushover either."

The Timekeeper grimaced. "Do not underestimate yourself, Eden. You have vital skills; an army traveling with you would only get in your way."

"Whew!" Diana suddenly spoke up. "The download I just got was certainly informative! As if I didn't have enough problems, I've found out the Multiverse is about to end."

Then she glanced my way. "Is it true that you are, in spirit at least, the same person as that knight who's presently sitting across the room?"

I looked back at Sir Lukasz. He was still staring at me. I wondered if I could cool his ardor for my body by reminding him of his deceased wife Marinna.

"Yeah, that's me. Don't ask me to explain," I said.

She shook her head resignedly. "I've been living with time paradoxes for so long that I don't find much that can still surprise me. I've learned that you've become an ultra and have a family. How are you holding up?"

"It's not so great being an ultra." In that alternate world that Gabriel sent me to, I discovered that the only thing worse than being an ultra is not being one.

"How is it being a mother?"

"If you play your cards right, you can find out for yourself," I said.

"I've always let my professional life get in the way of my personal life. I think you've been living in that trap for a long time, too."

"Di, there's something I always wondered," I said. "You always seem the same age every time I've met you over the centuries. How does that work?"

She shrugged. "Advanced science. I receive age-retardant treatments, though I still age very slowly. When age becomes a problem, there's a technology to rejuvenate me, cell by cell. If you decide to work with the Timekeepers, you can receive the same perk." Then she added with a smirk. "With a body like yours, you really should preserve it!"

"I hope that's not necessary. My old master Archimage never aged as long as I knew him, and he told me that my magic would keep me young, too. But my question right now is whether I can believe what Gabriel is telling me. What do you say about that?"

"I could give you an opinion, but the question has many ramifications. It's hard to decide where to begin."

"A person seldom goes wrong if he starts at the beginning," I advised her.

"When you're a time traveler," Diana said, "it's hard to tell the end from the beginning."

TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 4