“So it’ll be like old times for the two of you,” said Ram Odin, more than a little snidely.
It dawned on Noxon that Ram Odin was jealous. Here came Noxon out of nowhere with a far superior claim to intimacy with Ram Odin’s companion of the past seven years.
Even though he did not say this aloud, Ram Odin reacted as if he had. “I am not jealous of you!” Then he drummed on the console in front of him. “All right, I’m human. I couldn’t help bonding with this asinine machine and so yes, I was briefly and irrationally annoyed, but I’m over it.”
Everything about his tone and expression said that he was definitely not over it.
“You’re welcome to stay awake with us,” said Noxon.
“Seven years of aging,” said Ram Odin. “It’s not just the mind-numbing boredom.”
“I can promise that you age very well,” said Noxon.
“So if you won’t go into stasis and turn the ship over to the computers, why not try what your sister does? Slicing forward in time?”
“I sliced time when I first got here, hiding from the ship. But now I’m in the open. If I bring you with me, I risk bringing the ship as well. That would take us out of sync with the original ship.”
“But you already saw that the paths travel with the ship. So you won’t take the ship with us.”
“But if I can’t take the ship with us, we’re going to stay in this backward timeflow forever.”
“That’s a different kind of timeshaping, and it’s in the future,” said Ram Odin. “When we’re closer to Earth. Right? So by then, maybe Earth’s gravity will make it so you can take the ship with you.”
Noxon put his face in his hands. “I’m scared to try it.”
“You’d be insane not to be scared,” said Ram Odin.
“He’d be insane to try it,” said the expendable, “when there’s no recourse if your guess is wrong.”
“There’s no recourse no matter what we do,” said Ram Odin. “We’re cut off from the whole universe, and you’re worried that something might go wrong?” He turned to Noxon. “Just slice time for a little bit. Take my hand—that’s how you take me with you, right? And take us a second into the future.”
“A second or an hour,” said Noxon, “if we get out of sync with the original ship, it might get ugly.”
“Just do it,” said Ram Odin. “I believe that whatever you do, it won’t destroy you, because you’re the causer. Right?”
“Terrible things can happen to us,” said Noxon. “Being the causer only means that we can’t accidentally wink ourselves out of existence by changing our own past.”
“Take my hand,” said Ram Odin. “Slice time. See if it destroys us.”
Noxon took his hand and, with only a moment’s hesitation, sliced forward for only a second of perceived time.
But because he and Param had practiced slicing forward at a very fast pace, his “second” was more than an hour.
Nothing blew up. They were both there. And the expendable was exactly where they had left him.
“Well,” said Noxon. “I guess now we know that we can do that.”
“Please don’t do it again,” said the expendable.
“Missed us?” asked Ram Odin.
“No,” said the expendable. “The moment you disappeared, the mice started attacking the ship’s computers, trying to take control. They’re very good at it and very quick. They ignored my commands to stop. So I had the life support system drop oxygen levels so low that they all fainted. Then I found them all, put them in that box, restored the oxygen levels, and came back here to wait for you.”
Ram Odin gave a little bark of laughter. He thought it was funny, apparently, but that’s because he didn’t know the mice.
Noxon walked to the box, sat beside it, and leaned his head against it so he would be able to hear their tiny high voices, if they should feel inclined to try to explain themselves. “Well,” said Noxon, “you violated our agreement the moment you thought you could get away with it. I think you know what that means.”
There was begging and pleading, all the voices at once. And then one emerged stronger than the others. “You don’t tell us your plans, we don’t tell you ours.”
And another mouse voice: “We didn’t try to attack you. We could have.”
“Not twenty of you,” said Noxon. “And you know I slice much more finely than Param did back when you killed her.”
“And I would have removed any metal they placed in your space,” said the expendable. “They knew that, of course.”
“I assume you’re talking to the mice,” said Ram Odin.
“Human ears can’t hear their conversation,” said Noxon.
“But your facemask—”
“Loaf’s ability to hear the mice and keep track of them was one of the reasons I knew I needed to have a facemask of my own. For this voyage.”
“Kill them,” said Ram Odin. “I know they’re not ordinary mice, but this was treason.”
“I’m not king,” said Noxon. “Well, technically I suppose I am, in Aressa Sessamo, but that’s a dangerous thing to be. I’m not going to kill them. I might need them.”
“For what?” asked Ram Odin. “You can’t trust them.”
“I can trust them to do what they think is in their own interest,” said Noxon.
“In the interest of the world of Garden,” said a mouse.
“In the interest of the mice of Garden,” Noxon corrected him.
There was no argument from the mice.
“But now I’m sure that I will slice time with you,” said Noxon to Ram Odin. “Only we’ll bring the mice with us. The less time they have to figure out ways to fiddle with the ship, the better off we’ll be.” Then Noxon turned to the expendable. “Thank you for your quick action.”
“It was the obvious thing to do,” said the expendable. “Remember that I have a complete record of all the things the mice have done. Including the attempt to send a devastating plague to Earth, and the murder of Param. I have been watching the mice continuously since you appeared here. I recognized them as soon as the memory transfer was complete.”
“Thank you for taking the obvious action, then,” said Noxon.
The expendable nodded graciously.
“Give me your hand,” said Noxon to Ram Odin. Noxon scooped up the box of mice, tucking it against his body. “By the way,” Noxon asked the expendable, “why did you happen to have an empty box lying around?”
“This is a colony ship,” said the expendable. “We have hundreds of containers of various sizes for the use of the colonists.”
“They can’t chew through this, can they?” asked Noxon.
“It would break their little teeth,” said the expendable.
“Then by all means,” said Noxon to the mice, “go ahead and give it a try.”
“I’ve seen people talk to their pets before,” said Ram Odin, “but you’re the first person who actually got answers.”
“Not this time,” said Noxon. “I think they’re pouting.”
“They had a near-death experience,” said Ram Odin. “I think I know just how low our friend here took the oxygen level. They were desperate for air.”
“As we will be,” said Noxon, “if I can’t take the ship with us back to regular time.”
“Cheer up,” said Ram Odin. “You probably won’t be able to find regular time, so it’s a moot question. But let’s get close to Earth and see.”
Noxon turned to the expendable. “We’ll be moving very quickly. What should I look at to know when we’re nearing the gravity well of Earth, but are still outside it?”
“Gravity goes on forever,” said the expendable. “The Earth is already exerting a faint but noticeable tug on this ship. What threshold am I looking for?”
“I don’t know,” said Noxon.
“When we come within the average orbital distance of Pluto,” said Ram Odin.
“I didn’t even think about the outer planets,” said Noxon. “What if one of them captures our timeflow?”