Langue[dot]doc 1305 Read online

  Langue[dot]doc 1305

  Gillian Polack

  Satalyte Publishing

  Victoria, Australia

  First published in Australia in 2014

  This edition published in 2014

  Langue[dot]doc 1305

  Gillian Polack

  Copyright © Gillian Polack 2014

  By Satalyte Publishing at Smashwords

  ABN 50 145 650 577

  satalyte.com.au

  ISBN: 978-0-9925580-0-0 (Paperback)

  978-0-9925580-1-7 (eBook)

  Cover photos Copyright © Gillian Polack and M.J. Ormsby 2014

  Cover design Copyright © M. J. Ormsby 2014

  Quote Copyright © Laurence Sterne: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, 1759-1767

  The right of Gillian Polack to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.

  This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  6 Reserve Street, Foster VIC 3960, Australia

  Dedication

  This novel is dedicated to those Medievalist friends and teachers and colleagues who tolerate my tendency to write fiction and make bad jokes at inappropriate moments.

  Acknowledgments

  First and foremost, thanks to Van Ikin for mentoring me (and my novel) during a rather difficult few years. Thanks also to Stephen and Marieke, for the obvious (championing the book) and the not-so-obvious (sometimes my ideas are a bit unusual...). Thanks also to the University of Western Australia for its financial support and to ArtsACT for a 2011 grant.

  Sometimes it takes a village: this novel was research intensive and covered many disciplines. All real errors are my own, though some apparent errors belong to my characters and are quite intentional. Thank you to all those who gave me help and advice on this project: Lara Eakins created my skies and checked my astronomy and explained the importance of delta T; Guy Micklethwait introduced me to methods of time-travel; Samantha Faulkner checked Geoff Murray’s background for me; Mark gave me explosives advice and Pixie help with the blacksmithery.

  Of the fine scientists of CSIRO and the writers of CSfG special thanks to Cris Kennedy, Linda Karssies, Wendy Welsh, Barbara Robson, Stuart Barrow, Elizabeth Fitzgerald and Simon Petrie. Of my wider world of historians and writers, thanks to Kathleen Neal, Kari Maund, Jonathan Jarrett, Katrin Kania, Brian Ditcham, Amy Brown and Elizabeth Chadwick.

  I owe a very particular debt of gratitude to all the friends who pushed me towards this project I swore I would never undertake, but particularly to Lucy Sussex and to Ian Nichols.

  Thank to Sean Sidkey, for naming Ben Konig as part of fundraising to help people inundated by the Queensland floods.

  Contents

  Chapter One: Arithmetic

  Chapter Two: Solving Problems

  Chapter Three: Assembling the Team

  Chapter Four: New Residents in the Languedoc, March 1305

  Chapter Five: Where Nobody Talks

  Chapter Six: The Month of Small Things

  Chapter Seven: Memories

  Chapter Eight: Shifting Views

  Chapter Nine: Sylvia

  Chapter Ten: Children all

  Chapter Eleven: The Traps of Responsibility

  Chapter Twelve: “I need a friend”

  Chapter Thirteen: Dead Saints and Their Amazing Adventures

  Chapter Fourteen: Colonising

  Chapter Fifteen: Data

  Chapter Sixteen: The Look of Things

  Chapter Seventeen: Interpretations

  Chapter Eighteen: Ethics

  Chapter Nineteen: Plain Sight

  Chapter Twenty: Introducing Zombie Ancestry

  Chapter Twenty-One: Communications of a Kind

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Badass and Baggage

  Chapter Twenty-Three: In Case of Trouble

  Chapter Twenty-Four: The Noise of the Middle Ages

  Chapter Twenty-Five: A Dialogue of Silence

  Chapter Twenty-Six: Soul Sorting

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: Lure of the Fair Folk

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: The System is Dynamic

  Chapter Twenty-Nine: Affiliations

  Chapter Thirty: Places in Time

  Chapter Thirty-One: Very Big Children

  Chapter Thirty-Two: They Had Buildings in the Middle Ages

  Chapter Thirty-Three: Wild Harvesting

  Chapter Thirty-Four: Cues

  Chapter Thirty-Five: Explosions and Desolations

  Chapter Thirty-Six: Hearing the Music of the Spheres

  Chapter Thirty-Seven: A Dream of Travel and Time

  Chapter Thirty-Eight: Family Matters

  Chapter Thirty-Nine: Companionship

  Chapter Forty: Relationships

  Chapter Forty-One: Bitter Truths

  Chapter Forty-Two: Being Debonnaire

  Chapter Forty-Three: The Hunt

  Chapter Forty-Four: Judgements

  Chapter Forty-Five: In Town

  Chapter Forty-Six: Consequences

  Chapter Forty-Seven: Catharsis

  Chapter Forty-Eight: Webs

  Chapter Forty-Nine: Waiting

  Chapter Fifty: Endgame

  This is the year when human horizons will grow again. We’ve looked outward. We’ve looked inward. Now, for the first time, we’re about to look at our past with new eyes and new technology. For the first time, we will understand who we are and how we came here.

  Theodore Lucas Mann

  Chapter One

  Arithmetic

  “You have to say something.” Harvey had said this to Luke six times before and he would say it six times more if he had to. He relaxed back in his ostentatious black chair and explained patiently, “We need a ceremony to mark the moment. We also require words for the great unwashed. If you don’t want the floor, just say so: I’ll cobble something together.” Behind him, the Melbourne skyline stretched towards the bay.

  Luke grunted and fidgeted. He wanted to leave the ceremony behind and get on with changing the world.

  “Something that we can translate into a press statement,” Harvey continued, gently and implacably. “That Timebot is new. That Timebot is part exotic matter, part mechanical and part computer. That Timebot will set up a platform so we can travel into the Middle Ages. That there are many questions that Timebot will answer, but one is very dangerous: is Timebot reliable?”

  “Oh God, that’ll make everyone happy, won’t it?” Luke interrupted, his voice gruff with frustration. “More doom and gloom. I’ll do the talking. You can stay behind the scenes. Pay the bills, or flutter some paper.”

  “I’ll be glad when you’re gone, you know,” Harvey said, leaning forward and posing his elbows on his oak desk, confidentially. His posture reminded Luke that every time Harvey won Luke ended up doing something he hated.

  * * *

  “No chance of another contract?”

  “None,” the Chair was polite but firm. “You’re good, but we simply don’t have the money. It’s not just the Department of History - the whole university has been hit by these budget cuts. No three-year teaching contracts. Not even a one-year one.” Artemisia found her eyes had crept over the Chair’s shoulder, to the bridge beyond. The coathanger shape of the bridge dragged her mind ahead of her body.

  “Back to Australia, then.” Artemisia stood up, ready to leave at once.

  “There’s no hurry. Your visa gives you a bit of time.”

  “I have that research booked in France.” Artemisia was almost apol
ogetic. “If I’m to go back to Melbourne straight from there, I’ll need to rearrange.” She moved towards the door, determinedly dragging leaden feet.

  “We could fix something… help you get research contracts, see if the London group are taking editors… it will only take a few weeks.”

  “I wish I could take you up on that,” Artemisia turned fully back and smiled, her face brittle.

  “Damn it, woman, sit down!” Artemisia’s obedient feet lost their lead, and she returned and sat. “Now tell me what’s changed. Two weeks ago you would have turned this into a career opportunity.”

  “It’s my sister.”

  The Chair nodded. “She needs you?”

  “She needs money. Her cancer’s returned and all that the experts can promise is that they’ll spend a great deal of money.”

  “And?”

  “Lucia says she’ll cope. She says she’ll never forgive me if I don’t finish my research project. I’m so nearly done, and I’ve a grant to cover it.”

  “But if you stay past that last bit of research, then you’re not earning any money to send her.”

  “Right. If I go back sooner, I can get a job as a check-out chick or something. I can help.”

  “That email address you use for friends, it’s still active?” Artemisia nodded. Every microsecond her face became tighter with tears. She just wanted to hide in the toilets until they passed. “Check it every day. Every single day. And if anything comes up, I’ll send it.”

  “There’s not much of a chance.”

  “Not much,” the Chair was fierce. “But whatever there is, whatever I can find, I’ll send it your way.”

  “Thank you,” Artemisia said, her voice still under pressure from tears, but her face was able to open up just enough to give a minute smile. She was so near the edge that talking to even the most well-intentioned person was a strain.

  She didn’t stop at her office. She didn’t stop for milk. She went straight home and locked herself in the bathroom.

  * * *

  Luke walked into the tiered lecture hall, a sheaf of papers fluttering. The pages were more for decoration than anything else, like his speckled beard and the slight narrowing of his eyes and the use of his full name. It was what he would say that was important. The tremor of the papers showed how he felt deep inside - to the world he was magnificently confident.

  Only half the seats were full. The doors were closed. Security guards slumped outside, bored.

  Luke had a flair for the dramatic. He stood and looked out and up, those slightly narrowed eyes roaming the hall, making it seem as if he were noting everyone there. It was the smile that caused the room to go quiet. It was a big smile. An intensely happy smile; a smile that suggested great things.

  “We’ve done it,” he said. “Timebot is no longer with us in our present. It’s somewhere near the end of the Medieval Warm Period, in Languedoc. It triggered the beacon exactly on schedule. The time, ladies and gentleman, is right.”

  There was a silence. The news was expected, but somehow beyond comprehension.

  “Do we know the date?” A lone voice in the wilderness. It didn’t break the silence: it confirmed its intensity.

  “All we know is that Timebot arrived safely, unpacked, and set up the beacon. We can go to that place, that time whenever we want. We have a platform. The exotic matter at the far end is stable and we can trigger wormholes. We can maintain a wormhole for almost half an hour.

  “Now,” he continued, “we’re ready for humans to travel. We want to go soon. Very soon. The set-up party and all the equipment will follow immediately; we have the power for a second trip. We’re stripping the State of Victoria and half of New South Wales of their energy. If everything continues to run smoothly, we should have four people in Medieval Languedoc by this time tomorrow night.”

  He was grandstanding. Everyone present was part of the project and knew all the details. Except that it had worked: a machine had travelled backwards in time and space. Across the world and into the past. It had unpacked itself into a platform that accepted teleportation data and had reconstructed itself perfectly, almost every time. Now anyone could travel.

  A moment later, Luke regretted having given into his desire to make that extra flourish, to present that swirl of information. It had broken the intensity of the moment. Worse, it had created a space for The Ancient Mariner. The old man was about to speak. From the front row. Luke could see it. He couldn’t stop it. The hushed silence changed from awe to the verge of laughter. The Ancient Mariner was an institution: brilliantly gifted and there, him and his long white beard, forever, at the precise moment when he should not be.

  “And then?” Everyone looked at the Ancient Mariner. He was an older man with a riveting gaze. He was the unwelcome guest at the wedding. The one that was there because the university had insisted. His voice, as ever, was querulous. He was demonstrating to the whole room that he felt, as ever, neglected. “And then?” he repeated.

  “Sir,” Luke’s voice was respectful but the way his right shoulder jutted forward just a little showed he still owned the universe. He intentionally echoed his voice, like a boombox through his rib cage. That should make it clear. This is my day. My year. My journey. “I can go through the process again, if you want.”

  “Not the process. I understand the damn process. I helped with the maths, if you’ll remember. I just want to know the order of things.”

  “If everyone else will bear with me?” A murmur of agreement from the floor.

  “All right, then. Timebot has gone back to the end of the Medieval Warm Period. We send the set-up team in two days. Four people and all the equipment. The first humans to travel backwards in time. A triumph for humanity. They will have three months to prepare. Three of them will come on home. Cormac Smith will remain with the rest of the team. He’ll be back-up. The handyman, if you will. The first team is almost ready, in fact, just got to sign a few more forms. The specialists also have to sign a few more forms, but they have a bit of time up their sleeve for briefing and so forth. The second team is full of knowledgemakers. Let’s see, we have an astronomer, a biologist, an atmospheric scientist, two agricultural experts, two historians, and, of course, myself. Once we get together, seven hundred years ago, we’ll have serious science.”

  “Travelling seven hundred years into the past isn’t serious science?”

  “Trust me,” Luke said, his eyes shining, “Travelling seven hundred years is just the beginning. Our research program will change the world.”

  * * *

  The Montpellier archive had closed early, so Artemisia had taken a bus to see an abbey and its town. Artemisia looked up at the twelfth century castle, her tatty twentieth century handbag ironically hiding her natty twenty-first century mobile phone. The ruins were from her kind of period, but not of her kind of place. Jagged edges at the top of the pile of rocks were all that were left giving the craggy peak a crown. Those edges loomed over the old town in its valley. Cast its old shadow. Spiked. Wary. River below, castle above and abbey dominating it all, gently, from within the town. Greens and creams and the sound of wind and water and the streets lined with the Middle Ages. She recognised the shape of some doorways and the curve of the road. Even though it wasn’t the region she knew, the buildings still had the right feel to them.

  It was a bit like coming home. Home was faded and exhausted and crumbly, but nevertheless comforting.

  * * *

  As Artemisia walked into the abbey of Gellone to pay her respects to the bones of Saint William, her path crossed with someone else’s. They didn’t see each other, for they were removed in time. Guilhem left as Artemisia arrived, however. He had already paid his respects to dead kin and was ready to make for home on the slopes of the town and do his duty to his family and to give up his dreams of Jerusalem. He wasn’t ready to let go of his anger. Not yet. It showed in the size of his stride and in the way his gaze disrespectfully refused to lower itself before his seniors.

/>   Timebot’s presence in Guilhem’s 1305 had created a synchrony between the two people.

  Chapter Two

  Solving Problems

  “We can’t do everything,” Sylvia said. “These contractors simply won’t be able to deliver on time.”

  Luke frowned. “Harvey warned us about this. If it’s money...” His office was big and full of sunshine. Whiteboards everywhere. Formulae everywhere. Papers everywhere, even on the stands of the fake tree ferns. The scent was plastic and paper, old dust and faint ammonia. It smelled as if Luke had lived in it forever, put down institutional roots. He had not. Luke had moved to Melbourne three years before, specifically for this project.

  “Not money.” Dr Sylvia Smith’s voice was firm, despite its softness. “There were problems with the orders, with follow-through when personnel dropped out. And the contractors, as I said. The ones dealing with the scientific databases. All of them. Every single library supplier was waiting for confirmation from us about one element or another. Our history people walked out. Some of our scientists walked out. Follow-up never happened. This means that the library suppliers are running late. We can prioritise and get more than we have, but not everything. Not in time. There’s no way around it. We can’t change the launch date: our expedition will be short.”

  “Not of supplies.”

  “No, the Director was wrong. Supplies are mostly local and are all clear. It’s the databanks. Everything electronic. Mostly for research and reference.”

  “How bad is it?”

  The two sat down and spent an unhappy hour trying to work out what was most important. What could be improvised. Which project relied on what sort of electronic material. How the whole thing could be made to work.

  “That’s most of it, then. Not so bad after all.” Sylvia was cheerful; her own research program was completely covered. Sylvia’s voice communicated her confidence. “If we hire a couple of students, get them to download publicly available material for the next four days, not even the library will suffer.”