Marooned in Realtime

answering. Where to? 'Are: we certified free of eavesdroppers?' Lu nodded. 'Okay. We start from Peacer Lake.'

The flier boosted across the Inland Sea. But Della was no satisfied with the directions. 'You don't know the cairn's coordinates?'

'I know what I'm looking for. We'll follow a search pattern.'

'But searches could be done faster from orbit.'

'Surely there are some sensors that need low, slow platforms?'

'Yes, but '

'And surely we'd want to be with such sensors to pick up the find immediately?'

'Ah!' She was smiling again, and did not ask him to point out the equipment he referred to.

They flew in silence for several minutes. Wil tried to see evidence of their escort. There was a flier ahead of them. To the right and left of their path, he saw two more. There was an occasional glint from beyond these, as from objects flying distant formation. It wasn't very impressive-until he wondered how far the formation extended.

'Really, Wil. No one else can listen; I'm not even recording. You can 'fess up.'

Brierson looked at her questioningly, and Della continued 'It's obvious you saw something in the diary that — for all OUR deep analysis, and all Yelen's years with Marta-we did not She was trying to tell us that the murderer was stalking her, and that the Korolev system had been deeply penetrated.... But this story about a fifth cairn' — she raised an eyebrow, her expression mischievous — 'is ridiculous.'

Wil pretended great interest in the ground. 'NA Why 'ridiculous'?'

'In the first place, it's unlikely the killer lived every second of those forty years in realtime. But if he was so interested that Marta felt his presence, and felt the need to write with hidden meanings — then I think it's reasonable he had sensors watching all the time. How could Marta sneak away from her camp, build another cairn, and get back — all without tipping him off?

'In the second place, even if she succeeded in fooling the killer, we're still talking about something that happened fifty thousand years ago. Do you have any conception how long that is? All recorded history wasn't much over six thousand years. And most of that's been lost. Only an' incredible accident could preserve a written record across such a span.'

'Yes, Yelen raised the same objection. But —'

'Right. You told her Marta had taken all that into account. I'll give you this, Wil. When you feel like it, you're one of the most convincing people I've ever seen — and I've seen some experts.... By the way, I backed you on this. I think Yelen is convinced; she believes Marta was all but superhuman, anyway. I wouldn't be surprised if the killer does, too.

'My point is, I'm on to you,' Lu continued. Wil put on an expression of polite surprise. 'You saw something in the diary that we didn't. But you don't know much more than what you've said — and you have no clues. Hence this wild-goose chase.' She waved at the lands beyond the flier. 'You hope you've convinced the killer that you will soon know his identity. You've posted us as targets, to flush him out.' It was a prospect she appeared to enjoy.

And her theory was uncomfortably close to the truth. He had tried to create a situation where the enemy would be forced to attack him. What he couldn't understand was the activity around the low-techs. How could hurting them hide the killer?

Wil shrugged; he hoped, that none of this turmoil showed on his face.

Della watched him for a second, her head cocked to one side. 'No response? So I'm still on the suspect list. If you die and I survive, then the others will be on to me-and together, they outgun me. You're trickier than I thought; maybe gutsier, too.'

The morning passed, slow and tense. Della paid no attention to the view. She was rational enough-and perhaps even brighter than usual. But there was a cockiness in her manner, as if she held reality at a distance, thought it all an immensely interesting game. She was full of theories. It was no surprise that her number one suspect was Juan Chanson. 'I know he fired on me. Juan is playing the role of racial protector. He reminds me of the centaur. I think our killer must be like that centaur, Wil. The creature was so trapped by his notion of racial duty that he killed the last survivors. We're seeing the same thing here: murders and preparations for more murders.''

Wil's 'search pattern' took them slowly outwards from Peacer Lake. Fifty thousand years before, this had been vitrified wasteland. The jacaranda forests had won it back thousands of years since. Though this forest had not existed in Marta's time, it was much like the ones she had traveled. Wil was seeing the heaven side of the world Marta had described. To the northeast, a grayish band stretched along the border of the forest domain. That must be the kudzu web, killing the jungle and preventing invasion. On the jac side, there were occasional silver splotches, web attacks on non-jacs that had sprouted beyond the barrier. The jacarandas themselves were an endless green sea, tinged with a bluish foam of flowers. He knew there were vast webs there, too, but they were below the leaf canopy, where the spiders' domesticated caterpillars could take advantage of the leaves without shading them out.

Here and there bright puffs of cloud floated above it all, trailing shadow.

Marta had walked many kilometers before finding a display

web. From this altitude, they could see several at once. None was less than thirty meters