The Woman Who Died a Lot

  “Is that why she often reacts to stuff ten seconds late?”

  “Exactly. But what’s more interesting for the Wingco is that we can pick up the buffered information on a wireless. The annoying static you get between Swindon-KZXY and Rant-AM is actually buffered dodo thoughts.”

  “And this helps the Wingco and his Dark Reading Matter project . . . how?”

  “Isn’t it obvious?”

  “Not even the tiniest bit.”

  “Watch.”

  Tuesday carefully tuned in the Encephalovision through a standard wireless set, but this time without its being connected to Pickwick via the Avian Encephalograph.

  “There’s nothing there,” I said, which was true, as only random static danced across the screen.

  “Patience, Mum. We have to overstimulate her first.” It was surprisingly easy. While Tuesday showed Pickwick several marshmallows, the Wingco juggled some oranges, and then I, so as not to be simply a casual observer, recited the opening soliloquy to Richard III. Pickwick looked at all of us in turn, blinked twice and then stood stock-still.

  “Ah!” said Tuesday. “She’s buffering. Wait for it.” We looked at the screen, and sure enough after about ten seconds there was a fuzzy interpretation of what Pickwick had seen. Juggling, a giant marshmallow and me, walking up and down. There was also more Dukes of Hazzard and her water dish. But then, after ten seconds, it faded. The buffering had ended.

  “An ingenious discovery,” I murmured slowly, “but I still can’t see how this fits into the Dark Reading Matter.”

  “We think a dodo’s buffered thoughts might be able to transit the Dark Barrier,” said the Wingco, “so all I need to find is an Imaginary Childhood Friend who is about to pass into the DRM with the death of its host and get the ICF to take a dodo with it. The dodo gets overstimulated by what it sees, and we read those buffered thoughts on the Encephalovision back home. It’s really very straightforward.”

  “Is it?” I asked, not unreasonably, and both Tuesday and the Wingco went into a complex explanation of how a thing might be possible, which seemed to revolve around the fact that the ICF and the dodo would fuse into a transient state of semifictionalization that would permeate—at least temporarily—the Dark Barrier in two directions.

  “I’m a fool not to have seen it myself,” I said, still not understanding it fully, then added, mildly suspicious, “Which dodo?”

  “Don’t worry, we won’t use Pickwick,” said Tuesday. “There are plenty of other dodos around, and so long as we get one that is pre-V4 with the old-style brain, we’ll be laughing.”

  “Okay, then,” I said as the security gate’s buzzer sounded. “Keep me posted.”

  It was Stig outside the gate, so I let him in. He had a cup of tea and talked obsessively about the weather for ten minutes, something that, along with tea and kicking balls about, was very neanderthal, leading some paleontologists to speculate that neanderthal behavior might have somehow crossed over to the English in the distant past.

  Millon and Landen came in to listen too, and the reason for Stig’s visit was not long in coming.

  “That Synthetic Thursday we retired,” he said. “We made . . . discoveries.”

  “Such as?”

  “She low-budget, no-frills model. Nothing designed to last— skeleton, musculature, endocrine system—low-quality engineering. All internal organs not required removed and body cavity stuffed with slow-release glucose compound that looks and smells like nougat. She burn brightly twenty-four hours, then downhill. Within three days she poisoned by own waste products.”

  “Unpleasant.”

  “They designed to be euthanized after only twenty-four.”

  “Okay, what else?”

  “Disposable models like these called Day Players. They used internally at Goliath when extra staff needed daily basis. If lot of extra photocopying needed, chit for a Day Player made to stationery store—extra pair of hands. Makes much more financial sense than a temping agency, and no security issues.”

  “It’s the reason they can’t regulate body heat that well,” added Millon. “Within an office environment, they never needed to.”

  “Are they not illegal?” asked Landen. “Synthetics were banned almost as soon as they were invented.”

  “There’s a loophole,” said Millon. “So long as they never leave the island of Goliathopolis, they’re quite legal.”

  “Why would they have Day Players look like me?”

  “A company in-joke most likely,” suggested Millon. “My sources tell me that Day Players have transferable skill adaptations, so you don’t have to teach them everyone’s name again and where the photocopier paper is stored. The technology might have advanced since then to a full Cognitive Transfer System.”

  “Say that again?”

  He did, and we pondered over the possibility of what a Cognitive Transfer System might potentially mean. At its most complex, eternal life in a series of hosts, and at its least complex a way to carry out potentially fatal repairs inside nuclear reactors.

  “Krantz,” said Landen softly, “was probably a Day Player himself. It would explain why he’s down here alive and not up in Goliathopolis dead.”

  “When precisely did he die?” I asked.

  “Sunday morning.”

  I looked at Krantz’s Gravitube ticket, the one I’d found in the Formby Suite.

  I thought it over for a moment.

  “Okay, how about this: He activates his own Day Player at least an hour before he dies of an aneurysm, so he achieves full consciousness and memory download, then the Day Player catches the midday Gravitube to Clary-Lamarr with five unactivated Synthetics in Tupperware sarcophagi on his baggage manifest. He checks in to the hotel and then activates the first Thursday this morning.”

  “How did he know he was going to have a brain aneurysm?” said Millon. “It’s not something you can predict, is it?”

  “You have something there.”

  “And why is he on holiday in Swindon with five—now four— ersatz Thursdays fresh-packed in Tupperware?”

  “You have something there, too,” I conceded. “But what we do know is that somewhere in the city is a Day Player who’s been going for two and a half days out of a maximum three. He’ll probably be in pain and a bit panicky and will certainly be dead by midnight—but he’ll have the answers.”

  We all exchanged glances.

  “Here’s the plan,” said Landen. “I’ll search hotels, Stig can check out boardinghouses, and Millon can put his ear to the ground. No one could move that amount of Tupperware around the city without arousing suspicions.”

  “I don’t know,” said Millon. “This is Swindon, remember.”

  “Agreed,” replied Landen, “but ask around nonetheless.”

  “And me?” I asked.

  “You’re accompanying Friday to his Destiny Aware Support group meeting.”

  20.

  Tuesday: The Destiny Aware

  After many years of employing operatives from within only a couple of hundred years around the end of the twentieth century, the ChronoGuard was forced by increased lobbying from the thirtieth and fortieth centuries to broaden its employment criteria. After threats of withdrawing transit rights through their time periods, the thirtieth and fortieth centuries successfully had the ChronoGuard implement an Equal Temporal Employment Policy. The success of this was short-lived, as the service was disbanded a few years later.

  Norman Scrunge, Time Industry Historian

  Shazza and Jimmy-G had just finished setting out about a hundred chairs when we turned up, and I wondered just how many ex–potential employees might be coming. Although we knew that the ChronoGuard had employed about three thousand, it wasn’t known how many came from which era, and indeed the covering letter attached to the summaries indicated that the Letters of Destiny were only for the Swindon branch of the timeworkers union.

  “This is Friday,” I said, introducing Friday to them both. “Jimmy-G, you would have
worked together, and Shazza, you and Friday would have—”

  “We know what we would have been. Thank you, Mum.”

  They shook hands and looked at one another shyly. In another timeline they would have been lovers and inseparable, but in this one their future was considerably bleaker. Shazza marries a clot named Biff, and Friday spends his life in the slammer. It wasn’t the sort of circumstances in which romance could blossom, really—unless found in the pages of a Farquitt novel, in which case all would doubtless turn out well.

  “We would have worked together closely,” said Jimmy-G, giving Friday a warm embrace, “on many exhilarating adventures, apparently.”

  “Any idea what?” asked Friday.

  “Nothing too specific,” said Jimmy-G, “just that we would.”

  “Mine says the same.”

  “And mine,” said Shazza, “but I like the idea of being known as the ‘Scourge of the Upper Triassic.’ ”

  “Is this the ChronoGuard thing?” came a voice from the door. I turned and saw a moody-looking teenager with oily hair and a black eye. He looked as though he had just lost an argument about something and was plotting payback. More significantly, he was the one who had paid fifty p to see Tuesday’s boobs and more recently offered her a fiver for sex. He was also due to be murdered on Friday. It was Gavin Watkins. I didn’t want to be judgmental, despite his offer earlier to Tuesday, so instead I used that mildly condescending voice you reserve for acquaintances of your children. “You’re a friend of Tuesday’s aren’t you?”

  “Not really friends,” he replied. “Our relationship is based more on a . . . business footing.”

  I narrowed my eyes at his impertinence, my patience rapidly vanishing. “Is it, now? Listen, Gavin, I’m not so sure offering cash for sex is really appropriate behavior.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s disrespectful, insulting, and . . . she’s not that kind of girl.”

  “This is what happened,” he said. “I asked her if theoretically speaking she would sleep with me for four point three million pounds, and she said she theoretically would, so then I asked her if she’d accept a fiver. So she is definitely that kind of girl. All we’re doing is discussing the price.”

  I stared at him.

  “Oh, c’mon,” he added with a sneer, “are you really going to stand there and tell me you haven’t sold yourself at least once? If not for cash, then certainly for influence.”

  “You’re a nasty piece of work, aren’t you?” I said, although privately admitting that he was right. A long time ago, but he was right.

  “Apologize, Gavin,” said Friday, who had heard enough. “You just crossed the line.”

  “I wasn’t the one who drew the line,” he said in a low, controlled voice, “but I’m only telling the truth. Both your mother and sister are—”

  “Don’t say it! I swear to God I’ll—”

  “You’ll what?” said Gavin, taking a step closer so they were almost nose to nose. “Kill me?”

  Friday took a step back, firmly rattled. He was going to kill Gavin, but not over name-calling. I hoped.

  “Lost your appetite for a fight?” sneered Gavin.

  “Okay, okay,” I said, before this got any more out of hand.

  “Time out. Friday, cool it. And, Gavin, there’s tea and coffee and Kool-Aid on the side and some biscuits. You can help yourself.”

  “Nothing stronger?” he asked.

  “You could always not dilute the Kool-Aid, big guy.” He grunted and moved off.

  “I kill him because he insulted my mother and sister?” said Friday as soon as Gavin was out of earshot. “No, that’s just crazy.”

  “You don’t kill him until Friday,” I said. “A lot of time for stuff to happen—or not.”

  “Everything all right?” asked Shazza as she walked up.

  “Just Gavin.”

  “He lives down our street,” said Shazza. “The corner shop won’t let him in because of all the stealing, and I know for a fact that he gets beaten up at school at least once a day simply for being Gavin.”

  “Figures.” I looked at the kids who were entering in ones and twos. All of them were in their late teens. “Any idea of attendance numbers?”

  “It’s not packed, I must confess,” said Shazza, regarding the small group, “but I’m willing to bet he’ll take careful note.” She indicated a middle-aged man in a turban who was standing by the door.

  “And he is?”

  “Mr. Akal Chowdry. He’s Swindon’s rep for the Asteroid Strike Likelihood Committee.”

  “Oh.”

  The ASLC relied heavily upon statisticians like Chowdry to compute an Ultimate Risk Factor for HR-6984.

  “Any significant data from a meeting of ex-timeworkers,” added Jimmy-G, “might allow the ASLC to update the Ultimate Risk Factor.”

  We were currently at 34 percent likelihood, and this figure was derived from many sources—astronomical observation, computer modeling, level of divine concern, guesswork and archaeology—future archaeology. Artifacts from the future had been found, but dating was contentious, as it is difficult to say when something was to be invented or built. Of course, something with a date on it beyond 2041 would be conclusive, but the fossil record—both forward and back—is sketchy at best, and so far nothing like that had turned up.

  Three other members walked in. They were all clutching their Letters of Destiny and didn’t look too happy. We waited another five minutes, but when no one else turned up, Jimmy-G called the meeting to order.

  “I was hoping for more than fifteen,” he said, scanning the small group. “Perhaps we’ll see more as the weeks go past.” He cleared his throat and began.

  “A fortnight ago the future was the undiscovered country. None of us knew what we would do or how we would do it. As part of the Union of Federated Timeworkers severance package, we now have a clear idea of what might have happened and what will. If anyone in here is in any doubt over the truth of these summarizations, I bring your attention to Gerald Speke, who received his papers three days ago. They predicted he would lose an arm to a gorilla in Swindon Zoo, and within six hours he had.”

  There was some murmuring at this.

  “His name was Bongo,” said Gerald, who was sitting at the back with a large bandage wrapped around his upper body. “But if I hadn’t received the Letter of Destiny, I never would have gone to the zoo to see if there was a gorilla.”

  “That’s how it works,” said Jimmy-G. “the Letters of Destiny and the effect they have on you are now included in your Letter of Destiny. But we’re sorry for your loss nonetheless. I suggest we begin with introductions.”

  He looked out over the gathering. No one moved. “I’ll start,” said Friday, standing up to face the group. “I would have been the sixth director general of the ChronoGuard. My first major feat was in the Armageddon Avoidance division, where I ensured our survival of HR-6984, but I have no idea how. After a long and apparently eventful career, I retire at eighty-two the most decorated ChronoGuard operative ever. Now it’s a bit different. I spend thirty-seven years in prison for murder. Three days after release, on the third of February, 2041, I’m beaten to death by persons unknown with a baseball bat up in the Old Town.”

  There was a pause, and everyone clapped. Presumably not because they liked what they’d heard but for his honesty. I was just relieved he hadn’t mentioned that Gavin was his victim.

  “My name’s Sharon deWitt,” said Shazza. “I would have had a dazzling career in the timestream. I’d be pioneering transPaleozoic jumps by age thirty and a full colonel by forty-two. I’d have retired third in command at the ChronoGuard with four citations for bravery and be Flux magazine’s Woman for all Time, then comfortably retired in fourteenth-century Florence at age eighty. The way things stand at the moment, I’m a receptionist for twenty years, marry a guy I don’t much like, have two kids who turn out so-so and then get hit by a Vauxhall KP-13 at age fifty-five, late one rainy night near t
he library. They never find the driver.”

  There was more applause, and she sat down. There was a longer pause, so Jimmy-G stood up again.

  “My name is Jimmy-G, and I would have worked alongside both Shazza and Friday. I would have been time-engine policy director from 2014 until 2032, when a gravity surge in the auxiliary Time Room dumped me in the forty-fifth century. I was stuck there for sixteen years and upon my return ran the enloopment facilities. These days I work in retail and have a happy if unexciting life with a good wife and a fine son. I don’t see him graduate, though, since I die in mysterious circumstances in 2040.”

  He sat down again, and, heartened by his contribution, the remainder of the ex–potential timeworkers joined in. There was someone who would have worked as part of the Retrosnatch Squad who was unhappily not going to see his sixtieth year due to a car accident, and a youthful Bendix Scintilla, whose future self we had met a few years back when he was giving a ChronoGuard recruitment talk. He was eighteen and would now work in engineering until vanishing without trace in Kettering not long before his fifty-fifth birthday. Braxton’s son Gordon was also here, to give a much-needed positive take on the proceedings. He was slated to suffer a fatal time aggregation when his gravity suit leaked, first day at cadet school. Now he gets to be fifty-six. He wasn’t the only one. A girl named Lauren would have been fed alive to pterosaur infants next April during an assignment in the Cretaceous that went badly wrong, but now she succumbs to gruppling bongitiasis at age forty-four.

  “Go, me!” she announced happily at the end of it. “I would have suffered a fatal time aggregation,” said another attendee, “twenty-two years from now. Now I die falling from the roof while attempting to adjust the TV aerial—on exactly the same day. Whoop-de-do.”

  “What was the program you would be wanting to watch?” The attendee looked at his summary. “Er . . . a repeat of, The Very Best of ‘The Adrian Lush Show Repeats Again,’ Part 7. Serious bummer.”