searchware, the Archivists could analyze moments in the past.
“Analyze moments at a level of detail unknown to historians before,” Chiron said, standing and pacing, his hands clenched behind his back. “The Archivists began to realize that the closer they examined any given moment, the less they knew about the complete reality. About people’s inner lives, what they heard and smelled and tasted. What they remembered. What they felt.”
The Archivists also discovered that certain moments contained historical ambiguities. They found gaps in the data, gaps they call dim spots.
“Theory and practice and philosophy intertwined.” Chiron sat uneasily back down in his chair. “We cosmicists believe in a cocreatorship between humanity and the Cosmic Mind, the force of Universal Intelligence. We’ve always wondered how you could travel to a past that already exists, but the cosmicist answer is consistent with the time paradox. If you’ve traveled to the past, you have already done so. Quite simply, you must do so.
“Please understand, Zhu,” he added, “we cosmicists are conservationists. We believe in the mandate of nonintervention. Nonaction is as vital as action. We scorn the aggressive, exploitative pursuit of oppressive new technologies that so typified the technopolistic plutocracy three hundred years ago. We approached t-porting cautiously, mindful of its dangers. We formulated the Tenets of the Grandmother Principle for the proper conduct of t-port projects.”
He pulled out a page of hardcopy, handed it to Zhu. “We want you to learn the Tenets backwards and forwards before you go. You must make every effort to observe them. There are seven, plus the Closed Time Loop Peril. Trust me, you do not want to create a new probability.”
“Okay,” Zhu said, taking the paper page, turning it around curiously in her hands. And sighed. Now she had to, like, study? “Because if I do create a new probability, that could unravel all of spacetime as we know it. Right? Am I getting this right?”
He gave her a sharp look. “Exactly right.”
“Then,” Zhu said, “you’re really serious? I’ve already lived in 1895? Before I was born?”
Chiron’s sapphire eyes bored into her.
“But how can that be?” she wailed. “I don’t remember!”
“Of course you don’t. You don’t remember because you haven’t yet experienced it in your personal timeline. Time is a forward-moving experience for us, Zhu. Till you experience your life in 1895, you haven’t experienced it in your consciousness yet. Not till you t-port there. Understand?”
She shifted on the divan, clutching her prison uniform. She wasn’t sure she understood. “But why me?”
He nodded, expecting the question. “We’ve got evidence that you—or someone like you—were there.”
“Really! What evidence?”
“Well, first off. . . .you’re a Chinese woman.”
Zhu laughed out loud. Was he racist and sexist, after all, this sophisticated cosmicist with his Cosmic Mind rap? “Well, yeah. Just me and several billion other Chinese women.”
“And you’ve got a neckjack. Primitive as it is, yours is better than several billion other Chinese women.” He licked his lips nervously. “We’ll be installing a monitor in your neckjack that will carry an Archive of relevant files, including Zhu.doc, as I mentioned. The monitor will make sure you get to where you’re supposed to go, keep you informed, stuff like that. Muse will have full holoid capability, if you ever need to view a file. Much more advanced equipment than the knuckletop I took on my Summer of Love Project.” He gives her another sharp look. “Okay. So prepare yourself, Zhu. The shuttle will be ready in two days.”
“Two days?”
“Yes. Because of the unfortunate incident at Changchi”--he was choosing his words carefully, now, which instantly raised her hackles again--“the monitor will also ensure that you’re fulfilling the object of the project.”
“Oh, I see. You’re really installing the monitor because you don’t trust me. Because I’m an accused criminal.”
“Oh, you’ve got other qualities,” he said as if she’d made a joke. “You’re educated. Decent gene-tweaking. Nice eyes, by the way. And no family responsibilities.”
“I’m a Daughter of Compassion, sir. And a skipchild.”
“I’m a skipchild, too.”
“Yeah, but you’re Chiron Cat’s Eye in Draco. My skipparents got tired of playing mommy and daddy with me. They abandoned me to the State when I was fifteen.”
“I know. The Generation-Skipping Law can be harsh.” Chiron was fumbling for the right words, a condition that looked odd on him. “Listen, Zhu. We’ve researched the project. And we’ve chosen you. I’ve chosen you.” He plunged on. “There’s isn’t much data on Chinese women in San Francisco, 1895. Mostly they were smuggled into the city as slaves. Immigration authorities never knew who