Key Out of Time quotes

The lazy swells of the ocean held the same soft color, darkened with crimson veins where spirals of weed drifted.

A rose world bathed in soft sunlight, knowing only gentle winds, peace, and⁠—sloth.

Ross Murdock leaned forward over the edge of the rock ledge to peer down at a beach of fine sand, pale pink sand with here and there a glitter of a crystalline “shell”—or were those delicate, fluted ovals shells? Even the waves came in languidly.

Hawaika—named for the old Polynesian paradise—a world seemingly without flaw except the subtle one of being too perfect, too welcoming, too wooing.

Its long, uneventful, unchanging days enticed forgetfulness, offered a life without effort.

Except for the mystery. …

And now the gill-pack which separated the needed oxygen from the water made even that lighter burden of tanks obsolete. But there remained depths into which man could not descend, whose secrets were closed to him.

There the dolphins operated, in a partnership of minds, equal minds⁠—though that last fact had been difficult for man to accept.

Ross’s irritation, unjustified as he knew it to be, did not rest on Tino-rau or Taua. He enjoyed the hours when he buckled on gill-pack and took to the sea with those two ten-foot, black-and-silver escorts sharing the action.

If and when he or Ashe—or Karara and her dolphins—discovered the proper site, the two Agents could set up their own equipment. Both Ross and Ashe had had enough drill in the process.

All they needed was the brick of discovery; then they could build their wall.

But they must find some remainder of the past, the smallest trace of ancient ruin upon which to center their peep-probe. And since landing here the long days had flowed into weeks with no such discovery made.

Ross resented her half question, whether it was addressed to him or mere thinking aloud on her part.

Rule One: Conserve native life to the fullest extent. Humanoid form may not be the only evidence of intelligence.

There were the dolphins to prove that point right on Terra. But did Rule One mean that you had to let a monster nibble at you because it might just be a high type of alien intelligence?

“Men have asked that question all their thinking lives, Karara. There have been those who have said no, who have turned aside and tried to halt the growth of knowledge here or there, attempted to make men stand still on one tread of a stairway.

Only there is that in us which will not stop, ill-fitted as we may be for the climbing.

Perhaps we shall be safe and untroubled here on Hawaika if I do not go out to that reef tonight. By that action I may bring real danger down on all of us. Yet I can not hold back for that. Could you?”

“

We are here because we are of those who must know⁠—volunteers. And being of that temperament, it is in us always to take the next step.

”

Ross grunted and stretched out to follow Ashe’s example. But behind his closed eyes his brain was busy, and he did not cultivate the patience he needed. Peep-probes were all right, but Karara had a point.

You wanted more than a small window into a mystery, you wanted a part in solving it.

The setting of the sun deepened rose to red, made a dripping wine-hued banner of most of the sky, so that under it they moved in a crimson sea, looked back at an island where shadows were embers instead of ashes.

But behind his closed eyes his brain was busy, and he did not cultivate the patience he needed. Peep-probes were all right, but Karara had a point. You wanted more than a small window into a mystery, you wanted a part in solving it.

The setting of the sun deepened rose to red, made a dripping wine-hued banner of most of the sky, so that under it they moved in a crimson sea, looked back at an island where shadows were embers instead of ashes.

Three humans, two dolphins, and a machine mounted on a reef which might not even have existed in the time they sought.

There it was again, the old thorn which prodded them into risks and recklessness. Danger ahead on both paths. Don’t risk trying to learn galactic secrets, but don’t risk your enemy’s learning them either.

You held a white-hot iron in both hands in this business.

And Ashe was right, they had stumbled on something here which hinted that a whole world had been altered to suit some plan. Suppose the secret of that alteration was discovered by their enemies?

Because her question was just. With the gate gone the Terrans were committed to this time, just as they had earlier been committed to Hawaika when on their home world they had entered the spaceship for the takeoff.

There was no escape from the past, which had become their present.

“The Foanna,” she continued, “these Wreckers, the sea people—all at odds with one another. Do we join any, then their quarrels must also become ours.”

“I do not know. Only the magic has made Zahur a part of Glicmas, and Glicmas is now perhaps a part of that which spoke from the mountain.

It is not well to accept gifts which tie one man to another unless there is from the first a saying of how deep that bond may run.

”

Dark eyes surveyed Ross with interest. The light from the deck focused directly across the raider’s shoulder to catch the Terran in its full glare, and Ross fought the need for squinting. But he tried to give back stare for stare, confidence for self-confidence.

On Terra in the past more than one adventurer’s life had been saved simply because he had the will and nerve enough to face his captors without any display of anxiety.

Such bravado might not hold here and now, but it was the only weapon Ross had to hand and he used it.

This was going it blind with a vengeance, but Ross took the next leap in the dark.

He had the feeling, which often came to him in tight quarters, that he was being supplied from some hard core of endurance and determination far within him with the right words, the fortunate guess.

“On which one of you?” He drew his lips tight, displaying those same teeth, wondering for one startled moment if he should take the Rover’s query literally.

Torgul smiled grimly. “You are the sea, you yourself said that.

The sea is wide, but it is all one.

Through it you must have your own paths. Take any you choose. But I do not risk my ship again into what lies in wait before the gates of the Foanna.”

There had been other ships, leaner, hardier.

Those had plunged into the unknown, touching lands beyond the sea mists, sailed and oared by men plagued by the need to learn what lay beyond the horizon.

And here was such a ship, taut, well kept, larger than the Viking longboats Ross had watched on the tapes of the Project’s collection, yet most like those far-faring Terran craft.

“They have lived their lives on the sea; for it they must have a vast respect.

Perhaps they know, as did my people, that the ocean has many secrets, some of which are never revealed except to the forms of life which claim their homes there.

But, even if you discover this Baldy sub, what will the Rovers be able to do about it?”

“Have you then another hand to give to the fire as your defense?” That was Vistur. “

But no man has the right to order another’s battle challenge.

”

Ashe’s grasp fell on Ross’s arm once more, and his whisper reached the younger man thinly. “They are mistresses of illusion.

Be prepared not to believe all that you see.

”

The response to his unspoken wonder came clear and determined. “We may be but three; however, our power remains.

And sometimes power distilled by time becomes the stronger.

Now it would seem that time is no longer our servant but perhaps among our enemies. So tell us this tale of yours as to why the Rovers would make one with the Foanna—tell us all, younger brother!”

There has been enough death here already. And those who are our servants shall no longer be asked to face battle to keep an empty shell inviolate. We would see with our own eyes these invaders, probe what they would do.

There is ever change in life, and if a pattern grows too set, then the race caught in it may wither and die.

Maybe our pattern has been too long in its old design. We shall make no decision until we see in whose hands the future may rest.”

“Yes, Sea Maid.

There are weapons of many sorts, and not all of them fit into a warrior’s hand or can be swung with the force of a man’s arm and shoulder.

Yes, this venture is yours, also, sister.”

“Ahhhh—” Karara’s sobs gave way to a whisper which was half moan. “

This is a way of gods, old gods, gods who never dealt with men! It is not well to walk the road of the gods!

”

“Not our gods!” Ross put his stubborn defiance into words, more as a shield against his own wavering. “

No power where there is no belief!

” From what half-forgotten bit of reading had he dredged that knowledge? “No being without belief!” he repeated.

As yet this shadow of the Shadow is a small one. But it will spread, for that is the nature of those who have spawned it. They have chanced upon and corrupted a thing we know.

Such power feeds upon the will to power.

Having turned it to their bidding, they will not be able to resist using it, for it is so easy to do and the results exult the nature of those who employ it.

He opened his eyes and saw above him a patch of clouded sky. Shakily he levered himself up on his elbows.

There were no complete walls any more, just jagged points of masonry, broken teeth set in a skull’s jawbone.

Open sky, dark clouds spattering rain.