Each crew adopted the method devised by Beanpole, and the first order of business was to clean the slime off the sleeves, which took the rest of the morning.

That evening, Eloise and I exited the city after a long afternoon of tentacle practice (and believe me, tentacle practice is not a phrase I had ever expected to apply to my life). As we stepped out of the gate and back into normal gravity, we saw a dark-haired woman in a red gown standing nearby. Of itself, this was not remarkable, as the number of revived women in Freetown was growing daily. I believe they were now reviving four or five a day.

What was remarkable, however, was that she seemed to be waiting for someone in particular, and with the way she was eyeing us, I got the feeling we were the ones she wanted to see. She respectfully waited until we washed our hands, then approached.

"Are you Eloise de Ricordeau?" she asked in French.

Eloise smiled. "I am."

The woman smiled back. "I was revived from that dreadful stasis two days ago, and I have learned that 75 years have passed since I entered the city."

"My deepest condolences," Eloise said. "But I am glad you are safe and well."

"My name is Marie de Ricordeau," the woman said. "I wanted to meet you the moment I learned your name."

"Oh my goodness!" Eloise exclaimed.

"My older brother and his wife had just had young boy when I was brought here," Marie said. "That boy's name was Philippe."

Eloise thought for a moment, then shouted, "I am Philippe's great-granddaughter! You are my great-great-aunt!"

The women squealed and hugged excitedly.

After jabbering and hopping up and down for a few moments, Eloise introduced me. I shook Marie's hand and made a small bow.

The three of us ate together, then I left the ladies alone to catch up on family. I was asleep before Eloise even got to bed.

 

Eloise was cheerful as we headed for the city the next morning. Halfway there, she casually said, "Some of the other women from the Pyramid of Beauty joined me and Marie last night, after you left." A few seconds passed. "Helga was one."

"Were things better?"

She shrugged. "I suppose. It was pleasant. But so much of life is unspoken."

I thought about this for a second, then said, "Perhaps too much."

She grasped my hand and said with a mischievous grin, "I agree, Guillaume." And she playfully swung our arms as we walked. Somehow, I got the strangest feeling that she was hinting at something more than what she just said, but I had no idea what.

We stepped into the city, and took a couple steps further before we realized what was wrong.

Or rather...what was finally right!

We turned to each other and smiled. Eloise's already-wonderful mood soared, and she jumped up and down.

For that was the point. She could jump up and down.

I saw Beanpole arriving behind us. I grinned at him. "You switched off the Masters' gravity machine!"

He smiled, but it wasn't as big a smile as I would have expected. "Yes. The scientists in Asia figured it out and sent us a message."

"Well, congratulations to them, and to the cooperation of humanity!" Eloise said.

Beanpole looked at me, and his face was odd, a mixture of somberness and melancholy. "Will, we also discovered something else. Some of the others were wondering if we should tell you, but I see no reason not to."

"What is it?" I asked.

"It would be easier just to show you."

"And Eloise?" I asked. "Or is this some bizarre secret?"

"No, Eloise, you can come, too, if you wish," Beanpole said to her. "But what you will see mainly concerns Will, and me."

Now my curiosity was truly piqued.

"We'll have to clear it with Jan," I said. "We're expected to report to duty."

"That won't be a problem," Beanpole said, and looked over his shoulder. "Today's already an unusual day."

I followed Beanpole's gaze.

Julius limped slowly toward the gate.

Andre, Francois, and Abner were with him, but they let Julius lead, and walked as slowly as he did.

It suddenly struck me what a monumental development this was for Julius. His efforts, more than all others, had brought us this far, yet he had never once set foot inside his conquered city, prohibited by his injury and the stronger gravity. But now, now he could finally see with his own eyes all that everyone had been describing to him.

Beanpole, Eloise, and I respectfully moved out of the way.

Julius paused at the edge, then deliberately took a single step forward.

He smiled, his eyes wet with tears. He continued into the city.

"Come with us," Beanpole said to me and Eloise. "I'll send someone to tell Jan."

 

We joined the procession as Julius beheld the city of the Masters for the first time. He spent a little while on the ledge looking over the city, where we were joined by a few more people. Julius knew he wouldn't be able to see everything in a single day, but he solemnly declared that today he wanted to see three things.

We escorted him to see the three things. One could argue that we didn't have time to do this, that every second was precious. One would have to be heartless, though. We were human; to deny this moment, this somber celebration, was unthinkable.

Julius climbed into a car, and marveled at its wondrous mechanism as Andre drove him to the Pyramid of Beauty. We followed, about a dozen in all. I drove the last car, and all of us who had driven them before instantly noticed that they handled a bit differently now that they were lighter.

The others in this group were scientists and high-ranking members of the resistance. Eloise and I felt out of place, so we stayed quiet and out of the way. But no one begrudged our presence. Some of the scientists even seemed to understand why we were there, which made my curiosity about what Beanpole wanted to show me burn that much brighter.

Julius wandered through the room of women in suspended animation, pain and wonder on his face. A couple of medics, along with Helga, Juanita, and a few other women, had already arrived to begin their day's work. They respectfully stood to one side, and Julius spoke with them for a few moments. I was pleased to see that one of the women in that group was the one in the green gown whose scratches on the inside of her case had so effectively caught Beanpole's attention that fateful day.

I knew this situation was a little awkward for Eloise. She literally stood apart from the other women who had been revived.

But the moment passed, as they always do, and we moved on to the second thing Julius most wanted to see: the Place of Happy Release.

Our group became more somber as we stepped into the small building. Inside was a simple affair: a dais on which the willing victim stood; a rod in the ceiling pointing at the dais; a button on the wall, presumably to activate the rod; and a conveyer belt to take the body away.

Julius wept, his face twisted with rage and pain. There was no way to know how many people had gladly stepped to their deaths in this evil place, but after a century of slavery, the number must have been staggering.

Julius laid a hand on the dais, as if he could somehow touch all those lost souls who had passed through here. He grasped the rod of death pointing at the dais, and almost looked like he wanted to wrench it out.

He turned to Andre, and said, "I want this abomination reduced to rubble by this time tomorrow."

Andre nodded. "It shall be done."

The third thing Julius wanted to see was the control center.

I hadn't been here since we'd carried Mario away, and it had certainly changed. A crude deck had been constructed along the perimeter so the scientists could operate controls which had been built for Masters' height. There were blankets and pillows scattered around. Many tables and chairs had been brought in, and more chairs stood before the consoles. The tables held food, water, dishes, cutlery, books, magnifying glasses, microscopes, journals, and disassembled machinery.

None of this really surprised me. I knew Gregory and the scientists had practically been living here.

Eloise looked around, her eyes wide. It suddenly struck me that, aside from the Pyramid of Beauty, she had never been further into the city than the Hall. I wondered if I should give her a full tour some time, or if that would be too macabre.

As Andre began to escort Julius into the central pyramid so he could see the pool of fire, Eloise asked, "May I see it, also? Since I'm already here."

Andre nodded. Eloise glanced at me, but I shook my head, indicating I wasn't interested. She followed them into the pyramid.

While they were in there, I asked Beanpole, "So what did you want to show me?"

"A little while longer, Will," was all he said.

Julius, Andre, and Eloise returned after about five minutes. Julius was as calm as ever, but Eloise's face was filled with wonder.

"What'd you think?" I asked as she rejoined me and Beanpole.

"Exactly as you described, yet like nothing I could ever have imagined. Its moving firelight is hypnotic and captivating. I'm sure I could stare at it for hours and never see the same pattern. I felt like...like I was looking into a mystery of the universe made real." To Beanpole, she asked, "What is it?"

"We still do not know," he said. "And the great irony is that we have no time to investigate it. Unlocking the city's secrets which impact us directly is far more urgent."

The scientists showed Julius various things about the control center for a long while, and I was actually almost getting bored, when Gregory asked Julius to sit in front of a particular console with screens. That's when Beanpole motioned for me and Eloise to join them.

Gregory explained what this console was for. "The Masters not only have the ability to use a camera to show images on a screen, they can record them. But they somehow store the recording directly in their machines; they don't need film. The moving image, or video, can be played back and watched as if it were live. And it turns out, they often recorded events: cappings, hunts, any time they felt like swamping a boat just for the fun of it, and anything else unusual."

Gregory pressed a few buttons. Rows of alien text, partially split into columns, appeared on one screen.

"Each line of text refers to a video," Gregory said. "I discovered this collection a few days ago, and it's been really helpful in my studies because of the words the Masters used to refer to the videos. Each video has a group of words associated with it. For instance, if you want to filter the list of videos to see only the ones which show a boat swamping, you would do this." He entered some alien characters on a keypad, and the list shortened to lines which contained that word in one of the columns.

"These videos guide my studies, because I can view them and match their subject matter to the word they have in common. And I found one word in particular which is of interest to us."

He typed another word, and the list changed.

"This word roughly translates to resistance, or hostile action. These videos directly relate to us, so you need to see them, Julius."

Gregory looked at me. "And they relate to you, Will. Jean-Paul has seen what I'm about to show you. We knew you would want to see this, too."

Eloise and I stood next to Julius, with Beanpole nearby. Gregory turned a dial to move a rectangle on the screen up and down. As the rectangle moved, it surrounded each line in turn. When the rectangle surrounded a line near the bottom of the screen, Gregory pressed another button.

A larger screen next to the first began showing a moving picture, with sound. It took me a moment to understand what I was seeing.

It was the ground as seen from the height of a Tripod. It was twilight, with just enough light to see detail, and the ground was covered with low, thick bushes. A tentacle whistled through the air, ripped up a clump of bushes, and tossed them aside. Then it did it again. And again.

It looked familiar.

"No," I whispered, realization dawning.

Suddenly, there we were: me, Henry, and Beanpole, five years younger. We looked so small! With nothing to lose, we rose from our hiding place in the bushes. Henry and Beanpole hurled grenades at the Tripod's foot, while I gripped my injury and faltered.

Henry and Beanpole ran while the tentacle plucked me up, the grenade still in my hand. I twisted and shoved, turned to look at the Tripod, then reached back and hurled that grenade.

A muffled boom, and the image jarred abruptly. The tentacle slackened, and I fell. I grabbed at it.

The three boys on the screen gathered again and looked up in amazement, hardly daring to believe they had killed a Tripod. Then they ran, disappearing from the camera's view.

Gregory stopped the video, and the screen went blank. "It continues for a long time after, but shows nothing more."

I leaned forward, gasping. To actually see it! To live it again...

Julius patted my arm. "A moment of terror turned to triumph. You needn't worry, Will. It's in the past. And you did very well that day."

"Was that you, when you killed the Tripod?" Eloise asked, awestruck.

I nodded. "That was me. Little thirteen-year-old me." I straightened and let out a deep breath, then turned to Beanpole. "Odd that I asked you about this just a couple days ago."

"The coincidence of your question is more bizarre than you know," he said, and nodded to Gregory.

"There's more," Gregory said. "We've discovered at least one reason they installed cameras inside Tripod control rooms: to make a video log of important events, almost certainly to aid them in any investigation." He moved the rectangle on the first screen to the next line. "This next video shows the same sequence of events, but from a different point of view. I'll mute the sound on this one, as it's unpleasant." He turned another dial which I presumed was a volume control, then played the video.

The larger screen showed a Tripod control room, seen from the camera high on the wall. Three Masters were driving while a fourth rested in a bath. The Master operating the right console walked to the cabinet while the Master operating the pedals leaned over to speak into the radio. The one at the cabinet put on an atmosphere suit, then activated the control to open the airlock. Just after he stepped through and was about to close the door, there was a boom and the view shook. The Master in the airlock fell backward, his suit ripped, and they all panicked as the green air rushed out the airlock door. They scrambled for a safety they would never find. In moments, they lay still.

"The fact that their atmosphere left the room so quickly tells us they kept that room under a higher pressure," Beanpole said, clinically detached from what we had just seen. "A natural desire, given the higher gravity of their home planet."

I wasn't clinically detached, I was flabbergasted. "Was that the grenade I threw?"

"That is what I said," Gregory answered a little testily. "Here is the video from the other chamber."

Leaving the sound off, he played a third video. This time, the screen showed a human room. It was empty and its outer hatch was open. Suddenly a grenade hit the edge of the hatch, ricocheted directly at the airlock door, and detonated. The screen cracked! No, I realized moments later, not the screen, but the camera. It had cracked, so of course, the crack became part of the image. The airlock door was off its hinges. Green air streamed through the door and swirled around the human room, very little of it actually reaching the outer hatch.

Gregory stopped the video.

"Now we know the answer to your question, Will," Beanpole said. "Your grenade detonated near the hinges of the outer airlock door, at exactly the moment it needed to."

I gasped, still staring at the blank screen. My knees felt weak.

Beanpole continued. "If you had thrown it any earlier or later, both doors would have been closed and the control room would not have been compromised. If the grenade had detonated further from the door, it might not have taken it off its hinges. If the Master entering the airlock had been a couple of feet further back, his suit might not have ripped, and he would have captured us. But that grenade detonated at exactly the right point, at exactly the right moment, to save our lives that day. The control room airlock door was open; the grenade detonated next to the other door's hinges; and the Master with the atmosphere suit was fully inside the airlock and his suit ripped. Everything aligned perfectly."

"Pure luck!" I said.

"Pure luck," Beanpole agreed. "And on top of that, the bizarre coincidence of you asking me about this mere days before we discovered the answer." Beanpole shook his head. "It almost makes one wonder..."

"About what?" Julius asked. "Providence, Jean-Paul?"

"No," Beanpole said, and there was the slightest tinge of steel in his answer. "Providence would never allow so much death and destruction in the first place. But bizarre coincidences and miraculous outcomes are...frustrating."

"How boring the world would be if everything always lined up with statistical probability," Francois said with a grin.

Julius simply smiled. "Maybe some things aren't meant to be understood, Jean-Paul."

Beanpole scowled slightly, but didn't take that bait.

"Something else to show you," Gregory said. "The Masters' written language has three systems: one logographic, one syllabic, and one phonetic. Their phonetic writing is the most rare; they use it only to write alien words which can't be written any other way, including people's names." He pointed at the first screen. "Will, this is your name."

I was too amazed to speak.

"The Masters attached your name, as a key word, to the videos we just saw," Gregory said. "And the reason they knew your name was because you told it to them."

Gregory entered my name in the alien language. This shortened the list to four lines. I recognized the second, third, and fourth lines as the videos we had just watched. Gregory put the rectangle around the top line, turned the volume back up, and pressed the button.

The larger screen showed a human room with its outer hatch open. A Master stood near the inner wall in an atmosphere suit, holding some kind of device. Seconds later, a metallic tentacle shoved a struggling, screaming person through the hatch.

That person was me. I recognized the clothes I wore from the morning I left the Chateau de la Tour Rouge to catch up with Henry and Beanpole. I had just been plucked off Aristide.

Little thirteen-year-old me screamed in terror at the sight of the Master, who effortlessly wrapped his tentacle around me, pinning my arms. The metallic tentacle withdrew. As the hatch closed, the Master raised his device to my face and pressed a button. Instantly, my struggling ceased, and my face became calm and blank. The Master let go.

I looked carefully at the screen, at the Master standing in front of the younger me. I recognized the Master as the same one who died in the airlock in the other video.

"What is your name, boy?" the Master asked in French.

My younger self's face and voice were devoid of any real life. "Will Parker."

"Where are you going in such secrecy?"

"To catch up with two friends I am traveling with."

"Do you and your friends wander aimlessly?"

"No."

"What is your destination?"

"The White Mountains."

"Why do you go there?"

"To live free of the Tripods."

"Why?"

"Because we are scared of them. We don't want to be capped."

"Do uncapped adult humans live there?"

"Yes."

"How many?"

"I don't know."

"What are their names?"

"I don't know."

"Tell me the exact location of your destination."

I was silent for a moment, then said, "It's in the mountains." Apparently that was the only way I knew to answer.

"Have you ever been there?"

"No."

"Then how do you know where it is?"

"I follow a map."

"Show me this map."

"I don't have it."

"Where is the map?"

"My friends have it."

The Master seemed to think for a moment.

I stared at the screen, dumbfounded for multiple reasons. It's shattering to see yourself doing something you have no memory of, like the universe itself has turned inside out. But on top of that, I was shattered again at seeing myself give such crucial information to the enemy. Not that I blamed myself, but the implications were staggering!

The Master disappeared back through the airlock. My younger self just stood there, staring sightlessly at the wall. I was relieved to see him at least blink every few moments.

A wall panel swung down to form a long table. Younger me didn't react.

The Master returned with several more objects and said, "Remove your shirt and lie on the table." I did as instructed, and the Master stood beside me for another minute. The Master's body blocked us from seeing what he was doing, but we all knew: he was attaching a tracking device to my armpit.

He stepped away. "Get up and replace your shirt." I did so, and the table swung back up to merge seamlessly with the wall. The hatch opened and the metallic tentacle re-entered, curling around me.

The Master adjusted a setting on the device he had used before, held it in front of my face, and pressed a button. My eyes closed and I went limp. The tentacle pulled me back through the hatch, and the Master turned to the airlock.

Gregory stopped the video.

I stared at the screen in shock and horror, my hands covering my nose and mouth. Eloise gripped my shoulder.

"I know that was hard to see, Will," Beanpole said. "Like I said, some of us felt you were better off not seeing it. But I knew you would want to see it, and you have a right to."

I let out a deep breath I had been holding I don't know how long. "You're right. Thank you." I swallowed hard, then asked bitterly, "If they knew about the White Mountains all along, why did they never investigate or attack us?"

"A full-scale search wasn't worth their time," Andre said. "They didn't see us as a threat, even after losing a single Tripod, which they knew was a fluke. A handful of humans holed up in a cave, living in terror? I'm sure they were interested to learn that, but they had no reason to send a fleet of Tripods to scour an entire mountain range, which would be almost impossible for them to walk on, anyway."

"Especially with their ship just five years away," Julius said. "And remember, even Ruki felt we had no chance of winning, even after showing ourselves capable of capturing him."

"Still, just..." I felt lost. "If they had ever known exactly where we were, they would have come for us immediately!"

"That is absolutely correct," Beanpole said. "But we got tremendously lucky, Will. We found the grenades in Paris, Henry and I had the map, we found the tracking device, you destroyed the Tripod, we got away."

"A sequence of events more miraculous every time I think about it," Julius said. "Now, even more so."

Beanpole took a deep breath and let it out. "These videos confirm what I always suspected, that they knew you were heading to a community of uncapped people. Due to its tiny size, the tracker must not have had much range, which is another part of the miracle: the fact that the Tripod had to catch up with us each day, and its constant presence, is what alerted us to the danger.

"Also, the Master who interrogated you came so very close to learning where the resistance was in another way. You had the map memorized, but he assumed you didn't. All he had to do was order you to draw the map, and that would have been the end of everything. But it didn't occur to him."

We were all quiet for a moment, each person thinking their own private thoughts about our astonishing brush with disaster. The Masters could have tracked me straight to the railway tunnel, or ordered me to draw the map, then easily rounded up everyone. By the alignment of a number of miracles, that had not happened.

With a flash of horror, I suddenly realized how they would have attacked us. They couldn't have entered the railway tunnel in their Tripods, so they would have instructed all the Capped in the valleys to grab their pitchforks and scythes...

My mind whirled. What an awful, horrible, sickening day that would have been! In my heart, I felt again all my hatred for our monstrous oppressors, for their utter heartlessness and cruelty. And I felt once again the need to do everything in our power to destroy them!

And I felt disgust, and the first tinge of weariness, that we had to fight them at all, that such cruelty even existed.

"You say they recorded cappings?" Eloise asked, very quietly. "Do you...do you have the video of me being capped?"

"Would you really want to see it?" Julius asked gently.

Eloise was silent. She seemed to be drawn in upon herself, small and vulnerable, her gaze a million miles away. Finally, she whispered, "No. No, I don't suppose it would do any good."

I put my arm around her, and she gratefully leaned into me.

"Is there a video of us capturing Ruki?" Julius asked.

"There are several," Gregory said. "Including one of a certain young man in green paint riding a green horse." He grinned at me.

I could only give him a small, polite smile in return. He either didn't know or didn't remember how much I loved Crest.

"What about videos of our ancestors fighting the Tripods?" Julius asked.

"That's more difficult," Gregory said. "I see indications that such videos exist, but they have problems. The video names look different, and when I press the button to show them, the machine displays what I think is an error message."

"Those videos would be invaluable," Julius said. "Whatever mistakes our ancestors made, we must not repeat."

 

It was clear that Julius and the others would stay a while longer in the control center. It was also clear that Eloise and I, having seen what we were brought here to see, were expected to get back to work.

I drove us to the city entrance. We were silent, each still absorbing all we had seen. Eloise stared into the distance, away from me, watching the pyramids slide past. I was about to ask if she wanted me to show her around the city some day, when she abruptly said, "Life is short, Guillaume."

I waited to see if she had any follow-up, but she apparently did not. I didn't know what to say other than, "Yes. Yes, it is."

"It's too short to have petty squabbles." She still stared into the distance. "And every time we have differences among ourselves we cannot resolve, no matter how small or trivial, the Masters laugh at us. For why achieve freedom only to tear ourselves down?"

I stayed silent, waiting for a clue as to what brought this on.

She turned to me. "I need to speak to Helga."

"You want to resume helping in the Pyramid of Beauty?" I asked. There was no reproach in my voice; she and I both knew I fully supported anything she wanted to do.

"What? No. No, I want to stay in Crew 3. I will choose my own path, unless they directly assign me another duty. But life is too short for a stupid, childish, petty grudge to spoil something wonderful. We are not giggling girls in an embroidery class, gossiping and developing jealousies over which knight will woo which girl. We are women participating in an endeavor on which hangs the fate of humanity, of our entire world! Pah!" She scowled. "To be so petty."

A certain turn was approaching. I slowed.

"So...is this something you want to do now, or tonight?" I asked. We were expected to report straight to our stations on Tripod 3. Any self-indulgent detour would be frowned upon...yet no one would know if we did.

"Now."

I swerved onto another ramp.

"How do you find your way around this maze?"

"It took a while."

I stopped outside the Pyramid of Beauty. "You want me to wait here?" I asked.

She started to say something, thought for a moment, and said, "Yes, probably for the best. I will do all I can not to be long."

Feeling a little self-conscious, I laid on the ramp, taking the opportunity to rest. A trick one learned while hiding, fighting, and spying: rest whenever you could.

Of course, I couldn't help but think of the videos.

Me, a captive, controlled and violated by the Masters.

Me, in the clutches of the Tripod, throwing the grenade.

I was suddenly weary of it all. I wanted this entire conflict over with, so I could enjoy my life doing something other than fighting for it. So I could enjoy my life...with Eloise.

"Life is short, Guillaume."

She playfully swung my hand and agreed that too much of life is unspoken...but she said it mischievously.

"All our days are precious, Guillaume. This is what we have, and all that we have. All the precious days."

I lay there, thinking. And my slow brain finally started to catch on.

I stood when she returned.

"We are all friends again!" she said with a smile. "I told her what I am doing and why, and that I am happy to be working with you by my side. And she admitted she was being petty by being upset that I chose to do something else. So all is well!"

I got down on one knee. "Eloise, will you marry me?"

She stared at me, dumbstruck.

Then she looked around in exasperation. "Here?! Of all places, you choose here to propose to me?!"

"Yes. Because life is short."

She stared at me a moment longer, then her face split into the biggest grin ever. "Guillaume Parker, you are amazing! I thought it would take you another week to get the hint, but look at you! So much faster than I thought."

"Is that a yes?"

"Come here. Stand up."

I stood. She put her arms around me, stood on tip-toe, and kissed me.

"There," she said. "That is a yes."