Down at the bottom of Bunche Hall in the home timeline, there was a bust of the diplomat, and his name, and the dates of his birth and death: 1904-1971. Everything here was the same… except the date of Ralph Bunche 's death was missing. He was still alive when the war started, and after that nobody cared. The 1904- that remained seemed asymmetrical. The artisan who put it up had figured it would look fine once Bunche died. In the home timeline, he was right.

Liz wondered whether Ralph Bunche ever saw the building named for him. If he did, what did he think of the way that nameless artisan had laid things out? Wouldn't it have seemed as if the man was just waiting for him to keel over? It felt that way to Liz, anyhow.

Her goal lay beyond Bunche Hall and to the left as she came up from the south. In the home timeline, it was the Young Research Library-the YRL-named after a twentieth-century administrator. Here, it was the University Research Library, or URL. They hadn't got around to naming it for the otherwise forgotten Young before the missiles started flying.

Five stories' worth of books and periodicals… What better place to try to figure out why things went wrong in this alternate? The Westsiders had an almost superstitious respect for what they called Old Time knowledge. They took care of what the URL held as best they could. Most of it was still intact.

A guard outside the door nodded to Liz -she'd been here before. He had an Old Time.45 on his hip-that was how important the Westsiders thought the L'RL was. Liz had sometimes wondered if computer URLs got their name from the University Research Library. That turned out not to be true- only an interesting coincidence.

Once upon a time, the plate-glass door by the guard station had been automatic. No more. No infrared beam to cut. No electricity to power the door even if there were a beam. Nothing but muscle power and fading memories. Liz pulled the door open and went in.