I refused to believe it. My brain ignored the obvious fact in front of me. I just couldn't process what I had seen. Susan, my dearest friend, was lying in the gravel courtyard, knife lodged in her spine, and dead. Simply dead. A sudden and total loss of potential, an immediate cessation of all possible future experience. She had been my greatest source of strength since the invasion. She trusted me implicitly, she had faith in me the likes of which I'd never known before. And I had failed to keep her safe. First Tony, now Susan. How many more would have to die before we just gave in?
I felt tears welling up inside me, a sadness beyond countenance, but I fought to keep them at bay. I was afraid that if I started to cry, I'd never stop. Despite my efforts, a single tear ran down my cheek and dropped onto the dusty gravel below, causing the stone to darken. As if by some miraculous fairytale wish, as my tear fell, Susan stirred on the ground. I was too stunned to react, so I watched passively as she pushed herself up with her arms. As her back arched, the knife simply tumbled away. Or rather, the handle did. Only a few millimeters of the base of the blade remained. By some miracle, the spinning blade must have entered the transmat field handle first, so only that portion travelled with us. The blade must have remained aboard the Vakarian cruiser, embedded in the wall panel most likely.
Susan got to her feet, bemused at the attention which had gathered around her.
"Pull yourself together Arven, you hardly knew Osgood. And why are you lot standing around? Now that we're back the Vakarians will follow shortly. We need to prepare."
Sue was met with mostly stunned silence mixed with the occasional mutter of approval. The crowd began to disperse again, so I huddled with my companions to discuss what had happened in space.
"Let's just recap for a moment. The Vakarian forces sent three scout ships to Earth."
"Why three?" asked Dave, with a raised eyebrow.
"Because there were three areas of importance on their invasion map. We saw the Peruvian area turn red when that ship was destroyed."
"So what about the other areas?" Dave asked.
"One is still active, here. The Tokyo marker was already red."
"That could mean anything."
"It means another scout ship was destroyed. Whether it was by humans, poor landing or navigational errors, doesn't matter."
"Right, but even if this is correct, how are they important? What's the purpose of these scouts?" added Susan. "Surely the Vakarians overreacted if it's just for simple intel gathering."
"I have a theory about that. But it's a bit flimsy." I said, cautiously. I still wasn't sure if I believed it myself. I sighed before continuing.
"The Warchief mentioned that they travelled via paradox engines. As in, some kind of machine that harvests potential energy from chronologically impossible events."
"What?!" Dave exclaimed.
"Right, think of it this way. We stand at opposite ends of a hallway. I call you, and you hear my call once the soundwaves reach you, at which point you come running to me. You reach me after some time has passed."
"OK..."
"Now, imagine the same scenario, but you start running before I call you, because you are forewarned that I'll call. This time you arrive as I call. That's a paradox. Effect came before cause as it were. But it's self contained. I called and you came, just in a messed up order. A closed loop is a stable loop."
"Think I'm still with you..."
"Now, the same scenario again, only this time you arrive before I ever call. Now I don't bother to shout out, so you never have reason to have travelled. It's effect without cause. The loop remains open, chaos and anarchy, which time doesn't like."
"OK, so there are types of paradox. What does that mean for the Vakarians?" Asked Susan this time, as Dave was struggling to comprehend temporal physics.
"Well, the Science lady, Osgood, mentioned that the scout ships were generating a tachyon field. Think of them as the caller in the previous scenario. Sending a signal to draw in the mothership. Thanks to the paradox engines, the mothership arrives before the signal has been sent. This closed time loop powers the engines."
"But why? If these scouts can travel the galaxy at warp speeds, why bother messing with paradoxes and temporal energies?"
"My best guess? Their warp technology only scales to small craft, not warships, and are too expensive to mass produce. So someone came up with a needlessly complicated solution to a problem. The Shining Gods, I assume. Whoever they are."
"So the reason the scout ships are so vital..." mused Susan, thinking aloud. "... is because if they are destroyed, the signal can't be sent?"
"Open paradox baby, like a stack overflow in the RAM of the Universe, time resets to the last available safe restore point. In a manner of speaking."
"Or the Universe implodes."
"It's a possibility. But really, Earth is so insignificant on the grand scale of Time. Resetting time for a few days on one backwater planet is far less disruptive than utter annihilation. Like gravity, electricity or any physical force, time prefers the simplest, most direct, efficient route."
"You hope."
"Well, that's what I learnt from the Doctor. I'd be inclined to trust a Time Lord on such matters."
Susan and Dave seemed mostly baffled. I understood completely, the baffling intersection of of science and science fiction is difficult at the best of times, let alone creatures who experience time in a linear fashion. At least I had some experience of time travel. Being in the TARDIS can help you think fourth dimensionally.
"So, even if what you say makes sense, not that I'm saying it does..." said Dave, struggling not to confuse himself with his own question... "How do we know there's still time? If all they have to do is send a signal, why don't they just do it? Paradox resolved, thanks for playing. Goodnight Vienna."
"Well, we know there's still time. Why else would they have been so distraught over losing the Peruvian scout? As for the why... I think they have to wait. The longer they wait to send a signal, the greater the paradox of the invasion. The energy needed to move the mothership across space is dependant on distance travelled. So the further the mothership is transported, the more energy is required, the longer they must wait before sending the signal."
Susan summed it up pretty well. "So, they could activate the scout ship here at any time, we don't know when, and that legitimizes the invasion. But if we can destroy the scout in time, the paradox opens and time resets."
"Well, it sounds crazy when you put it like that, but yeah." I replied.
"Still better than fighting until the human race is extinct. I'd risk losing a crappy future for a chance at returning to our own."
"You two seem to understand this nonsense. So I'll trust you both with it." Said Dave.
So it was that we three students had decided on a course of action that would hopefully alter the flow of time. Or destroy the Universe as we knew it. We were running out of time, had no idea how long was even left, nor the location of the scout ship itself. But, it was a start, and we finally had a chance at victory!
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