“Camera obscura?” I suggested. “Da Vinci?”
Frank Oda shook his head. “That merely redirected light in action, it did not collapse the wave function, it did not embed any given moment in time.”
“Daguerreotypes,” said Erszebet, with distaste. “I remember those becoming so popular so quickly. Like this social media obsession just after the turn of the millennium, or automobiles a hundred years ago.”
“But what led to daguerreotypes?” asked Oda-sensei. True to form, despite the urgency of the moment, he was enjoying this as an academic exercise.
“Photosensitive paper,” I said. “That’s silver nitrate, right? Lenses. Mirrors, maybe?”
He nodded. “These are the things she will undo. If you kill Louis Daguerre, you trigger Diachronic Shear, but if you undermine the development of lens-grinding technology and you do it on enough Strands, then Louis Daguerre will turn his innovative brilliance in some other direction. The same with photosensitive chemicals.”
“Now that you say that, it does sound familiar,” said Erszebet—Gráinne’s erstwhile deputy.
“But the technology behind grinding lenses applies to more than just the development of photography,” said Tristan. “The development of optical technology has influenced the course of human history—it’s given us telescopes and microscopes and spectacles—”
“Well, if she is successful, now it won’t,” said Oda—still as if this was nothing more than a most interesting theoretical problem set. “So if she is successful, human history will retroactively alter.”
“And silver nitrate,” said Tristan, looking a little spooked. “That was discovered by Albertus Magnus in the thirteenth century.”
Oda nodded. “She can’t kill him off, but she would have to interfere with his accomplishments and discoveries. And he was one of the greatest thinkers of his age, so that, too, would alter what we believe to be our heritage and destiny.”
“Undoing photography from the roots up essentially undoes the development of science in general,” Esme said.
“Well, I’m not going to stand by and let that happen,” said Mortimer drily. “That would totally mess with my undergraduate curriculum.”
No one laughed. There was a pause. A long pause. Outside, I heard someone knocking on a nearby door.
“If we really think she’s going to do this, we have to stop her,” I said.
“Of course she is going to do this,” said Erszebet. “I would do it, in her position.”
“Would you really?” I asked. “It’s pretty evil.”
She gave me her signature cutting side-eye. “Why? History evolves one way or another, history itself is not evil, even if there are evil people in it. I know what you are about to say,” she said, as I held up a protesting hand. “You are going to say, just to name one example, slavery is evil, and to that I say, perhaps it is, but we would not have this world without it.”
“That doesn’t make it acceptable,” I said.
“If I could rewrite the world so there was never any slavery, I would do that, yes, absolutely, but then human history would be unrecognizable to us, and you would not like what replaced what you already know, because everyone wants familiar things. You want to stop Gráinne, not because she is trying to do something evil, but because she is trying to make things unfamiliar to you. And that is inconvenient for your view of how life is to be lived, with Walmarts and cotton underwear and things for which you need this so-called rare earth. You want to have always had those things. That’s all. Gráinne’s plans are inconvenient to your lifestyle. You have no valid complaint beyond that.”
“If she interferes with the development of science,” said Tristan, “we have a very valid complaint.”
“No,” said Erszebet stubbornly. “Humanity existed without making much of science for a very long time. This is true regardless of what magic ever did or did not do. Science has brought good and evil to the table, in equal measure. I have watched that happen. To have the world without scientific developments is not to have a better world or a worse world—just a different world from the one we know.”
“That’s such bullshit,” said Tristan harshly. “Come on, Erszebet, you’re being . . . academic. Obviously science and technology has improved the existence of humanity.”
“Tell that to the people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” she said. “Tell that to the atmosphere that is choking on carbon emissions.”
“I’ll tell it to the hundreds of millions of people who would be dead without basic antibiotics,” he retorted impatiently. “This is a ridiculous conversation.” He got up from his seat and paced in the small triangular space described by the table, the hearth, and the kitchen door.
Then the doorbell rang. Everyone looked surprised except for Tristan, who invited the rest of us to remain seated while he took care of it. Through the windows we could see a FedEx truck idling in the street. A little surprising, on a holiday, but we had been receiving deliveries at the strangest times as rush orders came in for the ODEC project, and so we all assumed it was another shipment of exotic superconductors.
“Erszebet,” said Rebecca, speaking for the first time. “Are you arguing against fighting Gráinne?” She asked it in a very neutral tone, simply a request for information, all judgment reserved.
“No,” said Erszebet. “I am happy to fight her. She is too powerful. Every witch is enthralled with Gráinne, except Julie and you, who are still learning how to do good magic. I myself was in thrall to Gráinne, and I almost did her urging, even though I knew it was evil. Luckily for you, I am too good a person and too loyal a colleague to kill you off.”
Tristan came back in carrying a small package that he had received from the FedEx man. He carried it into the kitchen, set it on the counter, and carefully slit it open with his pocketknife.
“Give me an ODEC,” Erszebet was continuing, “and I will help you to preserve the world as you know it, which you seem to think is the best world.”
“Even though you don’t agree,” I said.
“I do not think there is any ‘best’ world. I am not judgmental that way.” But there was a hint of a smile in one corner of her mouth, as if she understood, and enjoyed, how maddening she was.
“With all respect, it seems to me,” said Mortimer, “that the operative part of this conversation is: give Erszebet and Julie and Rebecca an ODEC and they’ll help us stymie Gráinne. We have the ODEC. We have the three weird sisters. No offense.”
“None taken,” Julie said. “I like being weird.”
“Am I right? And then if you guys want to get into philosophical bickering, you can do it on your coffee break or something.”
Erszebet’s face suddenly fell. “Only we do not have a Chronotron.”