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Back The Arrows of Time Save as PDF
Chapters (42)
  1. THE ARROWS OF TIME
  2. Note to Readers
  3. Contents
  4. 1
  5. 2
  6. 3
  7. 4
  8. 5
  9. 6
  10. 7
  11. 8
  12. 9
  13. 10
  14. 11
  15. 12
  16. 13
  17. 14
  18. 15
  19. 16
  20. 17
  21. 18
  22. 19
  23. 20
  24. 21
  25. 22
  26. 23
  27. 24
  28. 25
  29. 26
  30. 27
  31. 28
  32. 29
  33. 30
  34. 31
  35. 32
  36. 33
  37. 34
  38. Appendix 1:
  39. Appendix 2:
  40. Afterword
  41. Also by Greg Egan from Gollancz
  42. Copyright

Ramiro said, ‘I think they had prototypes working before the bombing.’

Tarquinia shifted uncomfortably in her seat, then made a decision. ‘Since everyone knows the situation, I’m not going to treat you like fools.’ An inset opened on Ramiro’s console showing him a patch of sky lit up with stars. Not the home cluster’s long trails; these images were brief stabs of colour, some of them piling the whole spectrum together into a white smudge. He glanced to his left and saw that Agata and Azelio were being sent the same feed.

‘Behold the orthogonal stars, lighting the way into the future.’ Agata sounded bitter, and Ramiro couldn’t blame her: this was proof that even from the killers’ point of view her friend’s murder had been futile.

‘This is Esilio’s sun.’ Tarquinia drew a red circle around a bright speck near the centre of the view.

‘Greta’s spyware will tell her that you’ve broken your agreement,’ Ramiro predicted. He hadn’t been allowed near the Surveyor’s automation while it was in development, but he was sure that the Peerless would be receiving a constant flow of data from the expedition, far beyond the communications they volunteered.

‘I don’t care,’ Tarquinia replied. ‘What’s she going to do about it now?’

‘Blow us up?’ Azelio joked.

Agata said, ‘Not if we keep going. They’ll only kill us if we start to look threatening – if we turn around and start heading back.’

18

Agata woke in a state of joyful anticipation, but then she spent a lapse or two lying motionless, wondering if she had the day right. She could see the diurnal clock on her console’s panel, but she’d made a deliberate choice to omit the date from the default display. She’d fooled herself in the past, waking with all kinds of wildly optimistic notions about the phase the mission had reached, but it was important that she settle the matter by consulting her memory, with no other aids.

Since the link with the Peerless had crackled its last transmission and the flow of messages from Serena and Lila had ceased, time had become a desert out of the sagas: a featureless wasteland of shimmering heat haze and treacherous mirages. But Agata was sure that she’d just passed a full day with a justified belief that the long-awaited event was imminent. If she was wrong about that then she wasn’t just disoriented, she was completely delusional.