Infinity Read online

  “Well, after your cleansings, take three days bereavement. Or whatever it is you like to do when you lose a partner. Then I need you back here. We have a rather unusual excursion coming up. I want my best bridgers involved.”

  Infinity eyed him warily. “Coming up when?”

  “Could be as soon as August third.”

  “That’s three weeks. How in the hell am I supposed to—”

  He held up a hand. “You’ll be paid double for the upcoming excursion. Plus, you won’t be docked for bringing your tourist back tonight with eight qualifying wounds to his body and possibly a concussion.”

  Now she looked at him with outright suspicion. “What are you getting me into?”

  “Like I said, it’s a rather unusual excursion. The clients will arrive August first. You’ll train them on the second. If our first bio-probe is successful, the bridge could take place August third. But they’ve blocked out the entire month in case it requires multiple bio-probes.”

  Infinity slapped her palm on the plexiglass, smearing her own blood. “Two things about what you just said are screwed up. What do you mean, clients? I’m not taking two tourists again.” It was always difficult babysitting one tourist. She had taken two before. It was too risky, too damn chaotic.

  “No, you’re not,” he said. “You’re taking three.”

  She pressed harder against the plexiglass and the seams began to creak under the pressure. “You’re not serious.”

  Armando glanced at the seams but refused to show concern. He nodded. “They’ve got the money. In fact, they’ve pre-paid. They’re going, Infinity, and you’re taking them. You and the bridger you choose for your new partner. Next question.”

  She closed her eyes and tried to slow her breathing. She was almost afraid to ask her next question. Tourists got to choose how far back the point of divergence would be. If the destination world had diverged from ours five minutes ago, it would be virtually identical. If it had diverged a year ago, there might be noticeable differences. A lot can happen in a year. With a divergence 1,000 years ago, civilization could look quite different. At 100,000 years, humans may not even exist, as with this latest fiasco. Neanderthals or some other species could have gotten the upper hand at some point. Infinity hated bridging to worlds that had diverged much beyond 1,000 years ago. Things got too unpredictable. She could fight any human alive, because she understood how humans fought. But as she had been reminded today, it was hard to know how a nonhuman would fight.

  She opened her eyes slowly. “And why do you think the first bio-probe won’t be successful? How far back do they want the divergence?” The bio-probe was how SafeTrek found an inhabitable world, one that didn’t have toxic air, lethal temperatures, or some other instant-death deal-breaker. Worlds with divergence in the distant past were much more likely to be uninhabitable due to all the possible environmental changes that could have occurred during that time.

  Armando forced a smile. “You might want to sit down first, kiddo.”

  She pushed even harder on the clear barrier. “Just spit it out.”

  “The clients were very specific in their request, and they were willing to pay all additional fees.” He hesitated. “You’ll be escorting them to a world that diverged from ours eighty million years ago.”