“Yeah, that’s right! The Age of Trilobites. So, what, you’re out here pitching the story of your life to producers?”
“No, I’m just visiting my brother. He’s the screenwriter in the family.” That information did not seem to impress Rubis particularly, so Ivan added, “He was just up for a Best Screenplay Oscar. Donald Kelly.”
Rubis brightened. “My own fifteen minutes of fame are long past, and they really didn’t amount to all that much.”
“Mm. Any face minutes?”
“I’m sorry?”
“You know, your face on the TV screen. Media interviews. Face minutes.”
“Ah. I turn up in some old documentaries. Everybody made documentaries for a while, until all six people who were remotely interested were sick of them.”
Rubis rolled his eyes. “Documentaries! Even I watched part of one. No offense, but it was like watching grass grow. The most exciting thing you found was a trilobite, and it’s basically just some kind of big water bug, isn’t it?”
“Yes, basically.”
“There’ve been bigger bugs in movies already. Like in-like inThem and I. AndThe Thief of Baghdad.
Seen it?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact. I thought the Indonesian settings were interesting.”
“Our first idea was to actually shoot it in Baghdad. But not much of Baghdad’s standing anymore.
So-besides, Indonesia, Baghdad”-Rubis made a gesture expressive of some point that was not altogether clear to Ivan-“eh!”
“Once upon a time,” Ivan said, “if you wanted to make a movie about Baghdad, you built sets on soundstages here in Hollywood, right?”
“Aah, nobody makes movies in Hollywood anymore. Too expensive. Lousy unions. But this is still the place to be, the place to make deals. Anyway, like I was saying, about time-travel-I’ve always thought it’s a sensational thing. When you think about it, it really is just the biggest thing since the early days of space travel. I wish it could be used for something more interesting than studying bugs and slime a million years ago, but don’t get me wrong. I think it’s a real shame the time-travelers never caught on with the public like those first guys who went to the moon-Armstrong, Altman. Now those guys were celebrities.”
“It’s not like we could do a live broadcast from the Paleozoic. The view wouldn’t have commended itself to most people anyway. The Silurian Period looks like a cross between a gravel pit and a stagnant pond.
And we didn’t plant a flag or say anything heroic. In fact-” Ivan hesitated for a moment, considering.
“Still, it was all tremendously exciting. It was the most exciting thing in the world.”
The wall opposite the door had pivoted away. The metal platform had begun to move on rails toward a ripple in the air. Everything had turned to white light and pain. Ivan, blinded, felt as though someone had taken careful aim with a two-by-four and struck him across his solar plexus. There was a terrifying, eternal moment when he could not suck in air. Then he drew a breath and started to exhale, and his stomach turned over. The convulsion put him on his hands and knees. Too excited to eat breakfast that morning, he had only drunk a cup of coffee. Now burning acid rose in his throat. He felt cramps in his calf muscles. His earphones throbbed with the sound of-what was it, crying, groaning…?
Retching. His vision cleared, and he saw Dilks nearby, lying on his side, feebly moving his arms. For some reason, part of Dilks’s visor was obscured. Ivan threw his weight in that direction and half rolled, half crawled to the man’s side. Now he could see Dilks’ face through the yellow-filmed visor. Dilks had lost his breakfast inside his helmet. Ivan spoke his name, but it was quickly established that, though Dilks’ helmetphone worked, his microphone was fouled and useless. There was nothing to be done for it now: they could not simply remove Dilks’ helmet and clean out the mess; they were under strictest orders not to contaminate the Paleozoic.
Nearby, the air around the anomaly rippled like a gossamer veil. Ivan looked around at the Paleozoic world. He and Dilks were on the shingle just above the high-tide line and just below a crumbling line of cliffs. The sun stood at zenith in the cloudless sky. The sea was blue-green, brilliant, beautiful.
Ivan bent over Dilks again and said, “You’re in bad shape. We’ve got to get you back. Come on, I’ll help you.”
Dilks vehemently shoved him away. He looked gray-faced inside his helmet, but he grimaced and shook his head, and though he could not say what he meant, Ivan understood him.We didn’t come all this way only to go right back. Dilks patted the front of Ivan’s suit and then motioned in the direction of the water.
Ivan nodded. He said, “I’ll be right back.” He staggered to his feet, checked the instruments attached to the platform, activated the camera mounted on his helmet, and collected soil and air samples in the vicinity of the platform. Then, with what he hoped was a reassuring wave to Dilks, he lumbered toward the water. The shingle made for treacherous footing, and yet, as he looked out upon the expanse of water, he experienced a shivery rush of pleasure so particular that he knew he had felt it only once before, during boyhood, on the occasion of his first sight of the sea off Galveston Island. He had never been mystically inclined, even as a boy, but, then as now, he had responded to something tremendous and irresistible, the sea’s summons, had rushed straight down to the water and dived in happily.
Nothing moved along the whole beach, nothing except the curling waves and the tangles of seaweed they had cast up. The beach curved away to left and right. It must curve away forever, Ivan thought.
Hundreds, thousands of miles of perfectly unspoiled beach. He knelt on the dark wet sand and collected a sample of sea-water. As he sealed the vial, he saw something emerge from the foam about two meters to his right. It was an arthropod about as big as his hand, flattened and segmented and carried along on jointed legs. The next wave licked after it, embraced it, appeared momentarily to draw it back toward the sea. The wave retreated, and the creature hesitated. Come on, Ivan thought, come on. Come on. He entertained no illusions that he had arrived on the spot just in time to greet the first Earth creature ever to come ashore. Surely, a thousand animals, a million, had already done so, and plants before them, and microorganisms before plants. Nevertheless, he had to admire the timing of this demonstration. He crouched, hands on knees, and waited. Foam rushed over the creature again. Come on, Ivan commanded it, make up your dim little mind. It’s strange out here on land, not altogether hospitable, but you’ll get used to it, or your children will, or your great-grandchildren a million times removed.
Eventually, most of the species, most of the biomass, will be out here.
The arthropod advanced beyond the reach of the waves and began nudging through the seawrack. Eat hearty, Ivan thought, taking a cautious step toward the animal. He reflected on the persistence in vertebrates of revulsion toward arthropods. He felt kindly toward this arthropod, at least. Both of us, he thought, are pioneers.
As last he reluctantly tore himself away and returned to Dilks, who had sagged to the ground by the platform. Ivan propped the stricken man up and pointed toward the ripple. “We’ve got to cut this short,” he said.
Dilks indicated disagreement, but more weakly than before.
“You’re hurt,” Ivan said, holding him up, “and we’ve got to go back.” There was a crackle of static in Ivan’s helmetphone, and he heard Dilks speak a single word.
“…failed…”
“No! We didn’t fail! We got here alive, and we’re getting back alive. Nobody can take that away from us, Dilks. We’re the first. And we’ll come again.”
They got clumsily onto the platform. Ivan made Dilks as comfortable as possible and then activated the platform. The air around the ripple began to roil and glow. Ivan gripped the railing and faced the glow.
“Do your goddamn worst.”
Rubis had offered Ivan a cigar, which he politely refused, and stuck one into his own mouth, and Larry had lurched forward to light it. Now, enveloped in smoke, Rubis said, “Trilobites just never did catch on with the public. Maybe if you’d found a reallybig trilobite. On the other hand, trilobites didn’t make for very cuddly stuffed toys, either, and that’s always an important consideration. The merchandising, I mean.”
“Candy shaped like brachiopods and sea scorpions? How about breakfast cereal? Sugar-frosted Trilobites?”
Perfectly serious, Rubis nodded. “Now, if you’d’ve set the dial in your time machine for the age of dinosaurs instead.”
“There wasn’t actually a time machine. Just the space-time anomaly, the hole. And it just happened to open up where it did.”
