"Peter, let's not be hasty," said Joe, as he approached the group. "I think you and I and John should leave in the probe. The kid's on to something. He may be right. Probably is."
"I have business to finish first," replied Green.
"You don't want to shoot your partner's daughter. Leave her here."
"I only want him."
Con flung her arms back, grasping Rick around the waist.
"For God's sake, Pete," said Greighton. "Put the gun away." Green slowly lowered his gun. "He's lucky I'm a for-giving man. John, as a precaution, I think we should go."
Sara clutched Greighton. "Don't leave me, John!"
"He won't be gone long," assured Joe. "Remember, this is time travel. He'll return only seconds after he leaves."
Greighton took his cue from Joe. "I'd never abandon you, Sara. I promise."
"That's bull!" said Rick hotly.
"You don't know shit!" said Joe. "Don't scare the lady. You've made enough trouble already. Come on, Peter. Come on, John. There's no point in drawing this out."
John kissed Sara, then pushed himself away from her arms. "Good-bye, Sara. I'll be back soon. Good-bye, Constance."
"Good-bye, Daddy."
Joe led the two men into the storage room in Green's quarters. Pulling the dresser aside, he kicked in the plas-ter wall to reveal a passageway. All three men disap-peared into it.
"Would you please tell me what's happening?" said James in an exasperated voice.
"A giant meteor will hit the Earth this morning," said Rick. "If you believe Joe, we'll be long gone when it happens. I believe we're going to die."
"Rick's right," said Con flatly.
"How can you doubt your father?" said Sara angrily. "He promised to come back."
"He abandoned my mother. He abandoned me. What makes you different?"
"You've never appreciated him! Never understood him!"
"I understand him, all right! He's leaving you to die!"
"He is not!" screamed Sara. She strode up to Con and slapped her across the face. "You spoiled, ungrateful brat!"
Con burst into angry tears as James separated Sara from her. "Ladies, ladies," he said, "you must remain calm."
Sara turned her back to Con and stared expectantly at the door. Con pointedly ignored her. Assured there would be no more fighting, James turned to Rick. "Okay, Rick," he said, "I'll assume you're right and we're here when this thing happens. What can we expect?"
"The meteor will hit the ocean about twelve hundred miles to the south. At the impact site, the temperature will be hundreds of thousands degrees. Everything will be vaporized and rise in a plume miles above the earth. That's what we'll see first. Debris will fall back and burn as it hits the atmosphere to form an expanding ring of fire. To the south, everything will burst into flame. Up here, huge fires will burn too. The Earth's crust will rip-ple like the surface of a pond. If we survive that, a tsu-nami will arrive in a couple of hours. It will tower over the island."
"There's nothing to be done?"
"Can you fly the plane?"
"No," said James, "only Joe can."
"Then we're stuck."
"How much time do we have left?"
"There's a clock counting down the minutes in Con's quarters. It works on a decimal system, but I can figure it out."
Rick walked over to the pulsating red symbols on Con's wall. James and Con followed. The row of zeroes had advanced:
"If there are ten hours in their day," said Rick, "and a hundred minutes in their hour, then, they have a thousand minutes in their day instead of our 1440. One of their minutes is approximately 1.4 of ours. Ninety-one times 1.4 equals 127. About two hours."
"Two hours and seven minutes," said Con.
"Not much time," said James.
Rick turned to Con. "The world's going to change for-ever this morning."
"Then let's not stay in here," she said. "I want to see it one last time." As they walked back outdoors, they saw the time probe sparkle in the sunlight as it rose into the sky. 18
CON FELT ALMOST NUMB AS SHE WALKED, AS IF THE
things around her were happening to someone else. That per-son was going to die, not she. She dispassionately observed Sara glaring at her. She noticed Pandit speaking to Sara. His voice seemed to come from far away. "Everything will be fine," he said, as one might soothe a child. "Just you see." She saw James join them. He, too, said soothing words, but his sad eyes betrayed his true feelings. Con did not want to see them.
Rick reached out and gently grasped her hand. "Thank you," he said softly. "Thank you for saving my life."
Con stared at the hand holding hers. It looked strong de-spite its long, almost delicate, fingers—a hand used to work, already a little worn by living. It pulled her from the void of unfeeling.
"I guess I did," she said, as a glimmer of animation re-turned to her face. But not for long, she thought darkly.
"I've never met anyone so brave," he said, squeezing her hand a little tighter.
"I just did it without thinking. I'd hardly call it brave."
"I would," said Rick.
Con met Rick's eyes. He gazed at her as if she were the entirety of his world, as if nothing else mattered. No one had ever looked at her that way and despite their approaching doom—or perhaps because of it—Rick's gaze met a desper-ate need within her. She saw in his eyes the adoring look she had always dreamed of and longed for. It filled her with joy mingled with almost unbearable sorrow. Why only now?
she lamented.
"I can't believe this is happening," she said.
"I wish I was wrong, but I can't see how," said Rick. "Everything fits together so neatly. Now, it all makes sense."
"This makes sense?" said Con bitterly.
"I should've figured it out earlier," said Rick. "In all Earth's history, this is the most spectacular event. The only one you could pinpoint precisely. Of course they'd build an observatory here. How could I be so stupid!"
"Don't blame yourself; everyone lied to us."
"That's true. Joe had me going up to the last minute," said Rick.
"He talked Green out of shooting us."
"Only to save his own skin."
"I don't want to talk about Joe," said Con, "or Daddy or anyone else. Let's go to where we had our picnic."
They walked to the beach, then slowly strolled along the shore, as the wind and the surf roared in their ears. Con paused to pick up a shell. She held it for Rick to see. "The pink ones are my favorites," she said.
"It's beautiful."
"I want to see as many lovely things as I can." Tears were glistening in her eyes. "I want every moment to count." Still holding the shell, she wrapped her arms around Rick and kissed him on the lips. For a moment, his expression was one of surprise. Con murmured to him, "Aren't you going to kiss me back?"
"Con," said Rick, his voice filled with wonder and ten-derness. He lovingly brushed a tear from her cheek, then embraced her as their lips touched, and the wind called their names. The wind had Joe's voice. "Rick! Con!" They turned and were startled to see Joe running down the beach. "Thank God, I found you! We've got to go."
Rick stared at Joe in disbelief. "Why the change of heart? Green kick you out?"
"Of course," Joe replied. "But I had to convince him that I thought I was going. Otherwise, he never would have got into the probe."
"Where's Daddy?" asked Con.
"Left with Green," replied Joe. "He's who Green wanted. Soon as I entered the coordinates, I was surplus."
"Did Daddy get Sara?"