The Nest Is History

Poul Anderson, "The Nest" IN Anderson, Past Times (New York, 1984), pp.71-111.

There is an excellent slave revolt with many a war cry:

"'Kill the Yankees!'"
"'...smite the Papists...'"
"'Allah akbar!'"
"'Vive le Republique!'"
"'Ho La Odin!'"
"'St. George for merrie England!'"
"'Ave, Caesar!'"(p. 103)

- the cry of the centuries!

Another that could have been used is: "Morte alla Francia Italia anela!" ("Death to the French is the cry of Italy!) (Mafia.)

Now we return to time travel issues. Trebuen and his friends capture the Rover, a hundred foot long cylindrical time machine. The Normans who, having stolen the Rover from its owners, had used it only to plunder through history from their base in the American Oligocene, had never checked their future. Superstition had prevented them from really using the Rover as a time machine. They had never doubled back on their own past, never tried to change the past and always let a day elapse at their base, the "Nest," for every day spent in another era. The intricacies of time travel were to be avoided as far as possible.

Trebuen moves the Rover forward one thousand years and looks out, whether through a window or by opening the door is not clear. The chamber of the Rover is dark, still and full of dust and has become the lair of an animal. Eerie - imagine being able to do that with the room you are sitting in now. Trebuen either deduces or checks that the Norman castle is now empty. He knows that a million years of rain, wind and glaciers will destroy it utterly so the secret of time travel to the Oligocene is safe.

Next he does play a trick with the time machine but, because it is nearly time for meditation group, that will have to wait till the next post.