Norby

13. Useful Time Trouble

"I'm sorry, Cadet," said Yobo as Jeff sat down in Fargo's chair in the control room. "I was perhaps a bit undiplomatic in the matter of Norby, and I've alienated Mentor First needlessly."

"I would like to trust you, Admiral," said Jeff.

"I would rather you understood me, Cadet. My first duty is to the Terran solar system. I want the secret of hyperdrive and I must have it before anyone else gets it; in particular, before the Inventors Union does. The Union was founded for praiseworthy purposes, I suppose, but it has been increasingly taken over by militant radicals, who want to use their inventions for the establishment of power."

"Do you suppose they plan a revolution and to take over the Federation?"

"It's my job as head of Space Command to see to it that they don't. And if I'm to do that properly, Norby's talents can't be viewed as amusing toys anymore. They have become vital. We must have his secrets."

"You'll be killing the goose that lays the golden egg, sir. Norby, intact, would be far more useful to the Federation than any of his parts would be."

They both looked at Norby, who was plugged into the Hopeful's computer.

"Ready to go back to the Terran solar system, Admiral?" asked Norby.

"Yes. Take me to Space Command Spome."

"Do you need my help in visualizing it?" asked Jeff.

"No," said Norby.

"Admiral," Jeff said, "please watch the monitor viewscreen closely so that you can tell us exactly where to go to drop you off."

Once the admiral was occupied in that fashion, Jeff leaned forward and touched Norby.

— You haven't taught me long-distance telepathy, so I've had to distract the admiral to keep him from watching us touch. I'm sorry that we can't trust him any more than we can trust Mentor First.

— My father is trustworthy!

— They both are, under ordinary conditions, Norby, but they both want something desperately, and that's you. They want to use your talents, find out your secrets, because for each of them, a world is at stake.

— That's true, Jeff. Mentor First wants hyperdrive before Terrans have it, because he is afraid of Terrans. I made the mistake of giving him a short telepathic course in human history. He was particularly appalled at my personal experience with the lions in the Roman Coliseum. I tried to explain that human beings have improved in behavior since then, but the fight with the pirates convinced him that you are all dangerous.

— That was thoughtless of you, Norby. What you told him of us made him suspicious and defensive, which encouraged Yobo to grow suspicious and defensive, and I just wonder if anyone will ever be friendly again.

— You won't have to be mad at me for long, Jeff. I'll take you home and then bring Fargo back, and then I'll go to Jamya where I'll be safe.

Jeff let go of Norby and put his hand over his eyes. I've messed things up even worse, he thought.

He was suddenly aware of something on his forearm. He looked down at it and discovered that the gold collar Zi had thrown to him circled it. He had put it on absently and promptly forgotten it.

"Admiral!" he said, awed. "See here. You won't have to use Norby! This collar is a powerful antigrav device. Take it to your scientists and let them use it to work out the mechanism for mini-antigrav. And from that they might get hyperdrive without trouble."

Yobo grunted and took the collar. "How does it work?"

Jeff said, "Imagine yourself moving up."

Yobo did, and his head hit the ceiling with an audible thump. He yelled and must have visualized dropping again, for he hit the floor with a considerably louder thump. He sat there, looking pained. "I accept the mini-antigrav part, but what makes you think that will lead us to hyperspatial travel?"

"Fargo thinks it will."

"Fargo is not a theoretical physicist, but an overgrown adolescent. I still must have Norby. My duty to the Federation…"

"Ready?" asked Norby. "I can't keep my mind properly adjusted forever. "

"Just a minute," said Jeff, thinking furiously. "I know you said you could hyperjump back to any solar system yourself, but I don't want you to. If you have to be taken over by the scientists of the Fleet or leave Earth for good, I must, either way, learn the technique of hyperspatial travel to the point where I can do it without you in a ship like this, adjusted for it."

Quickly, before Yobo or Norby could say anything, Jeff tuned into the controls of the computer and reached out to touch minds with Norby.

— You're up to something, Jeff.

— You bet I am, Norby. Take us into hyperspace, and then out of it to Earth, like this. Jeff visualized it for Norby, who chuckled.

As the Hopeful leaped out of the space-time of Jamya, Jeff felt the usual odd sensation inside himself. It was much worse than usual, almost as though something had turned over in his abdomen, but that might only have been because he was nervous about what he was doing.

The admiral said, "Very good, we're in the solar system. but where's Space Command? I don't see any spomes anywhere."

"Perhaps," said Jeff, "we missed the solar system. We may be in the planetary system of another star."

"Nonsense," said Yobo, "that's the moon over there. It's quite as usual. And directly ahead is Earth. Those are Terran cloud formations. I've studied them for decades. And if there's any question…Can this visiscreen be adjusted for microwave emission and reception? Yes, I see it can."

He made the necessary adjustments. "We can look through the cloud cover and see the continents. Although clouds can be mistaken, continents ca

Even as he spoke, the swirls of white clouds that hid the blueness of Earth's atmosphere thi

Yobo's breath came out in a large whoosh, as though he had been bashed in the abdomen. It was a minute or so before he could say in a strangled way, "There's no Atlantic Ocean. There's one big continent. If that's Earth-and it must be because the moon is still unmistakable-we're 250 million years ago."

Jeff stared at the viewscreen. "Interesting."

"Interesting?" Yobo didn't quite gnash his teeth, but if he had had fangs, he might have shown them. "You and that idiot robot of yours haven't just moved the Hopeful across hyperspace-you've moved it in time as well."

Jeff said, "I'm afraid that's part of Norby's mixed-upness, Admiral. Sometimes he takes you right where you want to go and sometimes…"

"Sometimes he doesn't! That is horribly obvious, Cadet. Since when have you known that Norby gets mixed up in time as well?"

"Well, he was reading history…"

The admiral waved Jeff to silence and shook his finger at Norby, whose back eyes were staring at Yobo with equal i

"No, sir." The domed hat slid down until only the tops of Norby's eyes were peering out at the admiral in his wrath. "I think that McGillicuddy did something that caused this talent of mine."

"Talent? It's a liability!"

"It's Norby's other secret," said Jeff. "The only trouble is that he can't seem to go to any time period when he existed-at least not easily-and he can't go into the future."

"You mean we can't get back to our own time?"

"Oh, no, sir. I mean he can't go into the future from our present-the present we used to be in. I mean…"

"I know what you mean, Cadet. Don't confuse me. Is this-talent-controllable?"

"Not exactly, sir. Time traveling keeps getting mixed up with space traveling, and we hardly ever go directly where we want to."