The last place anyone would expect us to turn up. At the core. But only for a moment. In and out again. Let them see us, then not see us. Nathan's mental voice was cold, grim now, reminding Trask very much of his father. I want Turkur Tzonov to know who he's been dealing with. After what he's done to Siggi Dam, and what he would have done to me and Zek, I want him to worry.
But why? You won't be here.
He doesn't know that. Anyway, I'm Szgany and I owe him.
But Perchorsk!
In and out, that's all, Nathan replied, determined. Sufficient that they see us. It can't do you any harm, either. Turkur will think twice before he tries any more fast ones on you or E-Branch.
Do you know the . .. the way there?
Oh, yes. I was there, remember? But on the way, there's something else I would like you to see.
Trask was calmer now, but found difficulty in not being able - in not requiring - to breathe. Really? And what would that be?
The past, Nathan answered. And the future! For I've discovered Harry's time-doors, but I haven't crossed a threshold yet. And don't worry - I'm not going to. Not yet. I fust want to see it again. And Ben, just think what lan would give to be your shoes right now.
Not a lot, Trask answered, sensing movement. Ion Goodly doesn't much like the future. It's just something that happens to him. Come to think of it, it's something that happens to all of us. It's inevitable as dying. Maybe that's what he doesn't like about it. He'd much prefer to take his chances not knowing . ..
They moved rapidly towards a point of light that expanded in a moment into a shimmering door. And Nathan brought them to a halt close to the threshold. Light sprang forth from beyond the time-door, a pulsing blue light which was yet warm and in no way artificial. The light of life! Trask would have known the truth of it, of course, without being told. But standing or being at the threshold with Nathan, both of them silhouetted in the warm blue glow, he asked anyway:
The future? Our future? Man's future? And the blue threads?
After a short pause Nathan answered, and his whisper was no less awed than Trask's. The threads ... are men! he said. They are the lives of men . .. And, drawing Trask closer to the threshold - indeed, onto the very threshold -he added, See! That's you, Ben, the blue thread of your future life!
Beyond the future-time-door, all was a chaos of millions of filaments of blue light, and Trask saw that one of them had its origin in his own being, streaming out from him like some weird ectoplasmic extension and dwindling to a bright blue thread as it hurtled into the future - his future. Another sped out from Nathan, out and away into the ever-widening haze of tomorrow ...
For some time they gazed upon the panoply of the future; a minute or an aeon? .. . Trask couldn't say. But eventually: