Alien Exit
Copyright © 2020 Geoff Nelder

Alien Exit

By Geoff Nelder

Note: Alien Exit was first released as Exit, Pursued by a Bee

Teaser:

Alien Exit is driven by an Arizona-bred heroine-astronaut, involves a Palaeolithic mongrel called Kur, Glastonbury Festival chaos, steamy sex in space, a loose-cannon journalist and an out-of-control general. They are all involved in the attempt to overcome time-quake calamities created when alien artefacts depart from Earth, oblivious to the chaos they leave behind. This book smashes our assumptions about time in astonishing ways.

Alien Exit smashes the accepted wisdom that time passes smoothly. Perhaps Earth time is kept continuous by something that absorbs time decoherences - not for much longer. The Earth orbits the sun at 18 miles per second. If the mountain in front of you is thrown back a second, it slips 18 miles. Imagine such time-quakes happening all over the world.

As time-quakes cause chaos, a Mars mission is diverted to chase the departing time absorbing spheres. Arguing against hawkish military generals on Earth, the man and woman crew discover a means to communicate with the spheres, but will they listen and return to Earth?

Geoff Nelder, having been a teacher, is now a UK-based freelance editor, writer, and judge of fiction competitions.

Traveller's Notes:

I wrote Alien Exit in 2006 but the ideas arrived decades earlier. When as a kid I walked up Glastonbury hill, I would imagine the tower on the summit to be a spaceship taking off. The hill is compact, a large tor form. It wasn't difficult for my whacky brain to imagine a giant sphere being hidden inside and that one day it would emerge, lifting up that tower as it rose, slowly, into the sky. A real place spurring imagination. Once that scene was in place, I saw other iconic and near-spiritual landmarks in the same way. Uluru (Ayer's Rock in the hot desert of Australia) is an example of a natural formation of spiritual meaning to the Maori but in mind there resided a sphere within. El Capitan, in the Yosemite National Park, California is yet another. I used to be a geography teacher, hence all the places in this book are real. You could follow it with an atlas, but hopefully you won't find your favourite hills rising up in the air beneath you.

Acknowledgments:

My wife and children are not in this book but their patience and ideas helped to form it. By 2006 I was a member of many writers groups such as BeWrite, Ideas4Writers, and The Write Idea.

Deron Douglas at the former Double Dragon Publishing who took a chance on me and exit and asked J Jacobs to edit it. "Geoff, I have been doing this sort of work (writing, editing, proofreading and copywriting) for fifty-two years plus a couple of months and I have seldom encountered cleaner manuscripts than yours."

Encouragement I've had in spades from writers such as Jon Courtney Grimwood, Mark Iles, Gladys Hobson, Magdalena Ball (who interviewed me on blogradio here https://www.blogtalkradio.com/compulsivereader/2008/12/08/Interview-with-Geoff-Nelder ), Ian Clarke and Marilyn Peake.

Strange here but I have to thank a criminal too. Christopher Hill was a sham agent of Hill & Hill Literary Agency, Edinburgh. He persuaded hundreds of writers to accept him as their agent. He took a token fee but then pretended to submit our books to genuine publishing houses. He was outed but before he went into hiding, he'd advised me to have more than my Left Luggage novel under my belt when submitting to publishers. So I wrote Alien Exit on a crim's advice!

Prologue

Kallandra ran through tall grass and yanked back the five-bar gate. Five more steps and her legs rebelled. Her body trapped in a trance as her brain tried to make sense of the bizarre sight. Muscles screamed: run away. Her curiosity pleaded: stay.

After adrenaline-stretched moments that seemed like hours, with the others similarly confounded behind her, she found words.

“It’s impossible.”

Chapter One

June 23rd Lunchtime on the mystical hill of Glastonbury. The famous festival music could just be heard.

“Oh my God, I can't believe it,
I've never been this far away from home,
And, oh my God, I can't believe it,
I've never been this far away from home.”

* * *

Lying on her dampening back, feeling the grass tickling, Kallandra added her Phoenix accent to the Kaiser Chiefs’ chorus wafting across wheat fields from the Glastonbury rock festival. Fair-weather clouds in the blue sky, faded away as it seemed swallows ate them. The aroma of strawberries escaped from their picnic basket adding to spilt brown ale. As her left hand scrabbled in daisies and stones, her right played with Derek’s perspiring fingers, transmitting worry. Only a week left on Earth for both of them, and then off on the first manned Mars mission. Both were as lucky as they were skilful to be selected; she as NASA’s youngest trainee astronaut, and he as aeronautical engineer for Eurospace. She knew Derek worried so she didn’t have to.

“Relax, Derek, honey, and flow with the music. Remember when we canoodled here as students, enraptured by Coldplay? Now they’re here again, reformed. So apt, eh? As are Kaiser Chiefs’ lyrics...

“...a million miles from here,” she sang to him, but he seemed disturbed. She persisted. “You know, our space mission?” She sat up to rest on her elbows, straining to listen to the umpteenth repeat of the popular song. Mega-sized amplifiers, reinforced by fifty thousand drunk, high and happy voices, blasted the sounds, but from almost five kilometres away. By the time they reached Glastonbury Tor, only the bass and occasional higher frequencies made it. Her hazelnut-brown hair would have hindered hearing, but for the mission she’d had it styled short so now her ears were unimpeded.

She picked up the lyrics—

“It don't matter to me
'Cos all I wanted to be
Is a million miles from here
Somewhere more familiar
Oh my God, I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home....”

She lay back and saw a shape flutter on top of the ruins of St Michael’s tower.

The blackbird must have given up competing, and watched them while perched in silhouette. She stopped singing and tried to whistle a friendly greeting. Derek laughed—finally, she thought. So that’s what it took: his woman attempting to whistle.

The bird took off, probably in fright.

“This is so bliss,” she said.

“Make the most of it. It’ll take a few thousand years to terraform Mars sufficiently to lie in the open on a grassy hill and sing along to rock bands while scaring away wildlife.”

“Hey,” called Blake, Derek’s teenage nephew, “are we going down to the festival proper? Reheated Coldplay are due on.”

Kallandra evil-eyed him. She’d agreed, but didn’t really want the chubby youth with them, no matter how hilarious she found his attempts to dance. She swore she could feel the worms making a run for it as he thumped.

“We are coming back, Derek,” she said, devouring an escapee strawberry.

“What?” said Blake, taking off his glasses and rubbing them on his T-shirt for the millionth time, “to this weird hill and its spooky ley-lined, King Arthur’s tower?”

“I know the plan is for the expedition to be a return trip, but did you read the small print?”

“Sure.”

“No, the tiny print in between the lines of the small print.”

Her green eyes looked at his, as they did three years before. Sometimes she felt he was such an idiot, not with his work, but as a man. But in romantic situations like this, she knew they were an item.

“Derek, I test space vehicles. Every day might be my last. Every day I wake up thinking whoopee, I survived another day.”

“I know, and your dad never tires of telling me how, as a kid, you’d leap off the barn roof in homemade gliders so often, the ER called you bird girl.”

“That’s me. I was brought up on cornflakes and adrenalin. I continue to need both, so get used to it.”

“I have, nearly,” Derek said. “Blake, stop leaping around, you’ll start an earthquake. Watch out, Kal—ants crawling up your arm.”

She leapt up, brushing the insects off her tanned arm. “Good God, look at them!”

The ants marched haphazardly across their picnic cloth, swarming over the basket.

“They’re after the crumbs. Blake, tell them we’ve eaten the food.”

“Why me?”

“You’re nearer to having a meeting of minds,” she said, grinning at Derek, who winked back.

The bass throbbing from the rock festival continued, but she looked up as her blackbird squawked its distinctive warning to its family.

“They’re after the ants,” Derek said, clipping up the basket while Kallandra waved the tablecloth in the air. “Telling us to go away so they can picnic on the little blighters.”

“And the worms,” said Blake, “millipedes, beetles and earwigs—they’re all coming out. Ugh, there’s a load of flying gnats. Let’s get out of here.”

A golden Labrador pawed the straggly grass and then growled. Minutes ago it had rushed over to sniff Derek’s crotch, and quietly collected a Frisbee for a family a hundred metres away. Now it barked. Not playful-excitedly but in panic, as Kal recognised from her farmyard youth.

Defeated by wildlife and Blake’s need to have his ears pounded by the world’s largest speakers, they gathered their luncheon remains and headed downhill. But Kallandra skidded to a halt as an urge forced her to grab one last, lingering look at the tower. She’d fallen in love with Derek here and, by association, the place, but with additional mystique. The pragmatist within her had tried to analyse the hair-tingling feeling she experienced last time. She laughed, remembering the tarot-wielding hippies, and alternative-reality culture that ‘knew’ Glastonbury was the magical centre of the world. If the locale harboured extraordinary and sacred evanescence, it might have to do with the extraordinary people traipsing through the Field of Avalon, the Tipi Field, and the riotous craziness at The Lost Vagueness, culminating in exuberance at the Avalon stone circle. For all that, she derived more inexplicable emotion from this tower on the extraordinary tor.

Several odd things happened at once. Either her vision blurred, or the top of the tower developed fuzziness. Maybe it had become bored with its sharp lines after eight hundred years. Her legs became blurry too, as if the footpath couldn’t wait for her and decided to slither downhill and make its own way home. Staggering, Kallandra put her hand on a large boulder to prevent herself falling; a temporary respite as the rock vibrated. The tiny pink flowers of a miniature thyme plant clung to the top of the boulder. The dark green petite leaves trembled, exposing a timorous millipede that scuttled across the top.

“Go for it, beastie. Escape while you can.”

In spite of a deep rumbling, she heard Derek call from lower down the hill.

“Look out, Kal! The tower.”

Fighting the hill’s attempt to send her sprawling, she watched in horror as the old stone tower demolished itself from the top down. Eight centuries after proud masons on wooden scaffolds shared broad smiles and raised mugs of celebratory cider, the tower was disintegrating in front of her. But the stones didn’t rest where they fell. Kallandra’s chest tightened with fear as the trembling hill encouraged the dismantling tower to hurtle down towards her.

“Run, Kal,” shouted Derek, but the difference between a spaceship designer and her survival skills was the use of her brain. So she scrambled laterally towards brambles that had sheltered in the lee of exposed bedrock, making a natural wall. She threw herself into the prickly Blackthorn just as a small avalanche of limestone blocks rumbled down the path she’d vacated. Sore from the scratches but intact, she crawled through the scrub and over the shaking hillside, zig-zagging until she met up with Derek and Blake behind a field wall near the base.

The ground vibrated less here but, in addition to the crashing of tumbling masonry, shrieks from scared humans, and a cacophony of terrified animals, a deep rumble worried their ears.

Derek shouted: “Are you all right?”

“I’ve been pricked before.”

“Is it an earthquake? You’ve been in them before in the States.”

She sniffed the air. It carried the familiar disturbed earthy odours but not the sulphurous emissions she’d experienced during some quakes in California.

“I doubt it,” she yelled. “I thought you only got tremors in Britain.”

“It’s a volcano,” shouted Blake. “Look at all the smoke.”

Kallandra shook her head but she didn’t want to shout a speech. She pointed downhill to the car park. With arms out like tightrope walkers, they rushed down the lower slopes.

“Seatbelts on, where shall we go?” Derek said, starting the engine.

“Nowhere,” Kallandra said. “I only came back for my other digivideocam. The batteries are gone in the one in my bag.”

“You’re not intending to go back up there?” Derek’s eyebrows disappeared into his blond hair, making Kallandra smile.

“You can take Blake back to town if you want. Although, if it’s an earthquake, you should stay in the open.”

“But it’s dangerous on the tor, love. Come with us.”

“Most of the tower has fallen, so the worst of the danger is over. Derek, this is too fascinating. I gotta be here, don’t you see that? Anyway, no time for a debate.”

She waved and started back up the vibrating hill.

She’d already told herself this was no ordinary earthquake. She’d experienced a few first hand in California, and they didn’t rumble on for ages like this. They came in short bursts, only seconds long. Yet the hill shook so much she had difficulty keeping her feet. She reached the piece of sandy-coloured limestone bedrock against which she’d first steadied herself, and aimed the digital videocam east, at the distant Glastonbury Festival. She’d expected to see emptying fields as the crowd escaped, but she could see on the distant giant screens, a rock group leaping and twisting as they belted out another musical gem. The crowd vibrated to the resonance of the beat rather than this hill. Swinging the cam around to the west the bulk of the tor hid the small town, but she could see the M5 motorway carrying traffic as normal.

She loved this kind of mystery. She looked at her feet imagining the tectonic event hidden beneath, yet it was so local that life continued blissfully ignorant several fields away. She granted that crescendos at the festival would mask the loud rumblings beneath her, and the drivers probably couldn’t hear either. Her cellphone tinkled.

“Are you OK, Kal?”

“Sure. What’s the situation in Glastonbury town?”

“Chaos. The hill slopes right into the back gardens on this side. You can feel continuous tremors. It’s as if they’re ants that have lost their queen. But no one is leaving. I’ve put Blake in a taxi to take him to the guesthouse in Weston. Cost a bomb, but I had an urge to come back to you.”

“Aw, sweet. It’s not so loud now up here, but the vibration seems to be worsening. I’m spitting out flying insects. There are swarms of them. Derek—can you hear me above this racket?”

“Just about. You’ve swapped sandwiches for live insects?”

“Close enough. Bring a shovel with you? In fact buy two.”

“Good grief, Kal. That’s lunacy—oh, all right. And you mean spades.”

The vibration seemed to calm for a moment so she ventured away from the large rock up towards the pile of stones that was Saint Michael’s Tower. Felled like the tower of Babel. Maybe the Kaiser Chiefs overdid the loudness earlier and triggered a fault beneath the tor? Not a chance.

She could just detect the bass of Reheated Coldplay’s new piece, Random Order, and, although she wouldn’t make room for it on her own MP3 player, hummed to the chorus. A fragment of normality in this craziness. Randomness could have described the drumming beneath her feet, as if it had a beat controlled by stochastic monkeys.

She spotted Derek using the two spades as walking sticks to steady himself up the quivering hill. Fifty metres from her, he staggered as a thunderous roar preceded a violent shudder sending them both sprawling. She lay on her back as she was an hour before, only now the cumulus clouds angrily gathered. Kallandra felt the ground crumbling and digging into her back, forcing her to struggle to her feet. The rock she had leaned on rose from the surface by a metre or so before cracking and falling, accompanied by increasing roaring as rock strata ground against each other. The roaring sounds were matched by the tremors in her stomach as she thought she might not survive. This premonition was reinforced as a large crack appeared between her and Derek. The slope she slowly traversed seemed to rise at a steeper angle.

As she reached the crevice, she saw that so much loose earth and rocks had fallen into it she could scramble across, noting it was less than a metre deep. Derek grabbed her in a bear hug.

“Yes, Derek, but you’re hurting me.” She saw his face was wet, but she was uncertain whether he’d feared for her, himself, or both. Maybe she was being unkind, but for all the dangerous upheaval, she was more excited than afraid. So when Derek pulled at her to go back down to the car—the only one left in the car park—she resisted.

Unable to yell coherently with the roaring around them, she pulled away and grabbed a spade he’d discarded. She didn’t need to hear Derek trying to shout rebukes over the growling terrain. His admonition telepathed across the disturbed air clear enough.

Reaching the shallow fissure, she plunged the spade in. Why did she have an urge to dig? Defying logic she dug more in the mix of soil, turf and limestone. Another minor upheaval, releasing earthy smells into the air, sent her onto her back. She saw Derek thrown to the ground too as he tried to reach her. Back on her feet, her ears aching from the roaring noise, she raised the shiny new spade and stabbed again at the chasm, which had opened a little more. Again it merely struck limestone rubble, jarring her arm. An urge compelled her to see if anything just beneath the thin soil was responsible for this phenomenon. Was it a result of logical analysis that this event couldn’t be related to seismic disturbance nor volcanic? No. Her logic circuits partly worked that out but a more ethereal need drove her on. A feeling, intuition; a culmination of the esprit of Avalon, her scientific and engineering training, along with bloody-minded curiosity forced her to lift the spade again.

“Come back down, Kal. For God’s sake,” yelled Derek, his voice wailing across the thundering noises.

Clang. The spade hit another rock sending sparks where quartzite and steel met. Her nostrils pinched with a smell of burnt sulphur bringing memories of when, as a child, she smashed a lump of white and grey quartzite laced with yellow sulphur. She dropped the spade, which slithered further into the crack out of reach. She rested her enviably flat stomach on the ground, feeling small stones through her shirt. Stretching, she grabbed the handle. A strange tingling sensation travelled up her arm to her head.

Totally, unlike anything she’d experienced, and she’d been through throb hell: stinging nettles on this hill, purple-striped jellyfish at Long Beach, and the literal hair-raising moment when a shuttle simulator became a stimulator with an accidentally electrified hull. But none of these buzzed her brain. Not that her grey matter was frying, but it had tingled. She had the prescience and presence of mind to consider that her arm was slipping in and out of phase, but it could’ve been the increased vibration.

“Kallandra. Good God, woman, come back down before you turn into a firework.”

“I will. Just let me get this spade.”

Although the shaking ground made upward travel more like a fairground ride, Derek managed to reach her. “Bugger the spade. You should’ve seen yourself.”

“I nearly didn’t. What did you see?”

“Your hair stood up like a luminous porcupine.”

“That’ll be my blue highlights. I knew they’d set off my brown hair.”

“How can you be so calm? We’re in the middle of Armageddon.”

“That’s why I’m a pilot and you’re an engineer.”

“And spaceship designer. Your life support system would soon fizzle out—”

“Without your cunning design. I don’t underrate your genius, Derek, but you do panic unnecessarily. Now can you reach the spade handle? It’s slipped further down.”

“Leave it. I’ll buy you a dozen.”

“I want that one. Something’s happened to it. There, you have it.”

They both stared at the shiny business end. At least two inches were missing as if it had been dipped into the sun.

“That’s it,” Derek said, his voice trembling with fear in addition to the physical quivering. “It must be a volcano and we’re on top of it!”

“It can’t be. Feel the cut end, it’s cool.”

“For Heaven’s sake, Kal, you could’ve burnt yourself.”

“Life is one big chance event, Derek. Anyway, you win. Let’s go before these clouds of gnats remember we’re food.”

Aided by increasing ground tremors they scramble-slithered to the Volvo estate car waiting in the car park. She gasped not only at the exhilaration but also at the sight at the base of the hill. Luckily, Derek had parked at the far end, near the gate. The rest of the tarmac was buried under detritus. Rocks and turf hid the wheels nearest the hill.

Realising they’d be fortunate to move the car, they opened the door furthest from the landslide and at his insistence, Derek took the wheel. With impressive control he didn’t rev the three-litre-engine but nudged it in four-wheel-drive until out of the gate. The lane, too, sported a mass of fissures and debris but the sturdy vehicle successfully saw them to the main road, where they surprised a policeman erecting a barrier.

Chapter Two

Sixteen kilometres from Glastonbury languished the sleepy seaside resort of Weston-Super-Mare, where Kallandra and Derek had booked a spacious guesthouse room for their week’s break from the Johnson Space Centre, Houston. Weston had been a popular resort for the British in Victorian times until the lure of cheap flights to the Mediterranean won the tourist battle. An extensive beach overlaid with trucked-in sand entertained few since the 1970s such that the thinning sand each season supported the unkind epitaph of Weston-Super-Mud. But its lack of crassness and heaving multitudes drew Kallandra and Derek. A perfect respite for over-stretched astronauts.

Kallandra bubble-bathed her wounds. Those wicked blackthorn barbs had drawn blood. But the sandalwood and cinnamon candles helped her to relax while the Tea Tree oil in the water worked its magic on scratches and midge bites.

Through mountainous foam her green eyes inspected her reflection in the mirror tiles. Symmetrical at worst, a beauty at best, she thought as she turned her tanned face one way, then the other. A slightly turned-up nose, large eyes and ruddy cheeks from the day’s excitement. Her hazelnut-brown hair, calmed now wet, didn’t reach her shoulders. She smiled at the blue highlights, then again at the scolding at them from her mother in Phoenix. She enjoyed the electrifying look they presented to surprised friends. Maybe her raspberry nipples were a little too long but with a wave of her hand the foam hid them, so that was fine.

Exhaling she looked around the bathroom. A cobweb in a ceiling corner helped to control the fly population. They’d need a telescopic feather duster to reach that one above the four-metres-tall apple-white walls. Derek came in, saw her and backed out again.

“It’s OK, Derek, come and join me. This bath’s huge enough for us to have a swimming race.”

“Maybe later,” he said, as he returned with his iPaq, tuned to the BBC News.

“Oo, any news of Glastonbury? Funny that only sixteen kilometres away we can’t feel a thing. Perhaps the tremors have stopped.”

“Can I get a word in? The local news mentions it. The village has been evacuated, the hill is cordoned off, and worst of all…”

“What? It’s made the beer flat in Weston?”

“The Festival organisers have been told to send everyone home. There’ll be thousands of annoyed youngsters coming here.” He stared at a lump of earwax he’d unscrewed from his left ear with the nail on his little finger.

“Really? Do they expect the hill to explode? Maybe they think it is a volcano after all. Derek, you are not going to put that into your mouth.”

“I don’t know who your ‘theys’ are. As far as I can tell the army has been summoned, and no doubt scientists are packing bags to get here, but only local police are there so far.”

Kallandra stood, sending waves over the side of the bath and a foam glider gave Derek a face wash. “Sorry, love, but we gotta get back there to see what’s happening.”

“No we don’t, Kal. We’re safer here. Look, it’s seven. It’ll be dark soon.”

“You revolting man. How many times do I tell you not to eat your ear excretions?

Anyway, back to the Tor. At the moment we are the experts. This is awesome stuff.

Don’t you feel it?”

His long face told her he didn’t, at least not as much as she did. Although it could be the face he always presented after tasting the bitter earwax.

She rapidly towelled dry, grateful her hair had been chopped. “You stay here then. Hey, call Claude, our pet geophysicist will love this one. Why didn’t I think of him before? He’ll be at his Winnipeg home with his girlfriend.”

“You call him from the car, while I’m driving. Make sure you bring your NASA I.D.—I’ve brought mine; I believe it’ll get us past any cordon.”

“You are a genius and I love you,” she said, followed by a big hug and a slobbery kiss. “Use the country lanes. Hopefully the Festival goers will use the main road to the motorway.”

* * *

Five kilometres out, they stopped. Not for the exodus, although the lane pulsated with a mix of motorbikes and students’ barely legal vehicles heading at them, but because the sight of the tor made Derek’s foot slam on the brake.

They expected the tower to be rubble, unseen from afar, but they couldn’t have expected the new Glastonbury vision.

“I can’t see it clearly, wash the windscreen, Derek.”

“It’s not the glass.”

“Of course, the hill is quivering, but after all this time? Seven hours? The top is like a fuzz-ball.” She blathered on, but noticed he’d lapsed into silent mode. She continued the commentary for both of them. Verbalising her thoughts helped clarification for her, whereas Derek brewed his deliberations until the fermentation process reached perfection. And if it didn’t, he remained broody. “Keep on driving.

There’s something else different about that hill. Does it seem taller to you?”

“No.”

“That’s because you’re concentrating on collision avoidance. Wise man, but I’m telling you there is more than a crumpled tower and rising clouds from agitated dust.”

“We’ll be there in a minute, Kal. Ah, we need to turn right, but there’s a policeman single-handedly preventing miscreants going to Glastonbury Tor.”

“No problem, we have NASA I.D. cards and if all else fails I’ll whip my jeans off and wow him with my tanned legs.”

“British policemen are immune to sex.”

Kallandra nodded, thinking it applied to some spaceship designers too. The police officer didn’t want to argue, he merely insisted they drive away.

“Officer,” she said in her Texan drawl. “We’re not the press, or hippy groupies, are we?”

“I suppose not. But it is dangerous back there.”

“Look again at my pass.” Not a pass, but he wouldn’t know. “On behalf of NASA, it entitles me to access the phenomenon occurring behind you. It will be too late if we have to go all the way round to the other side. Do you want us to contact your superiors to inform them of your obstructing the course of our enquiries?”

He waved them through, muttering incomprehensibles.Around the last corner leading to the car park, they had to stop again. The avalanche that had spilled onto their Volvo a few hours ago had grown to block the lane completely.

“The policeman was right. Let’s go back,” Derek said.

“I’d rather investigate what we can from this side. We know what the hill looked like.” She opened her door and, armed with her shoulder bag crammed with still and video cameras as well as binoculars and sample boxes, she clambered up the scree of loose rocks before Derek could stop her. Luckily, her astronaut training enabled her to make excellent progress. Nevertheless, she skidded around on the moving rocks, often slipping back a metre.

Concentrating so much on not falling, she reached three-quarters of the height of the hill before she stumbled onto a wall. The rest of the hill in front of her was above a five-foot high, vertical, vibrating wall. She fell on her back, luckily on relatively level ground. The noise resembled a jet engine test, so she couldn’t call to Derek, nor appeal for his presence on her cellphone. Even so, she snapped a shot and sent it to him.

A hand patted her shoulder, making her heart neglect a beat. Derek had climbed up behind her. He drew out a handkerchief to dab at a graze on her forehead, but she waved it away, pointing at the section of hill in front. Through the roar she mouthed: ‘It’s rising.’

‘Volcano?’ he mouthed back.

‘Can’t be. No heat.’

‘Pre-eruption? Plug rising?’

She hadn’t thought of that. But it wouldn’t make sense for Glastonbury Tor.

Made of limestone and clays it was geologically wrong to have been a volcano. But she was at a loss for an alternative hypothesis.

‘I doubt it,’ she mouthed back. Up close to the rising mass she peered into the moving gloom. The sun was setting on the other side of the hill. In the dark, an irregular cascade of rock and turf dissuaded her from reaching in with her outstretched hand. She remembered her bag and brought out a small torch. The beam appeared to be swallowed by the blackness in the wall, which maybe wasn’t a wall, just a vertical something between the lower and upper slope. As if the top of the hill was being pushed up. She needed a brighter light, and turned her digital camera to flash. After selecting the night image and anti-shake setting, she pressed the button.

Although the camera sends a single burst, there seemed to be a double flash. In spite of being shaken by the vibrating ground, she examined the image. Inside the darkness a bright glare obscured the picture. She took more pictures though some were of the sky as the vibration appeared to be worsening. She’d have liked to traverse the hill to see if the wall-like blackness surrounded the top, but knew Derek was keen to have them out of danger. The rain of debris precipitated around them, sometimes hitting them, but not with worrying impact speed.

Once in the car, Derek used the sat-nav road planner to find a route to circumnavigate the tor. The roaring sound of rocks grinding and falling diminished rapidly. She photographed and took video shots, but with little hope of seeing the detail that eluded them close up. From a kilometre away, the tor was a haze of vibrations.

She had no doubt the top of the hill was lifting. After sending the images and mpeg files to Claude in Canada, it seemed too dangerous to stay.

By the time they reached their guesthouse room, Kallandra’s cellphone trilled her with a received message alert from Claude.

‘You are not the only ones…’

Chapter Three

Kallandra switched from her cellphone to view her larger laptop computer screen.

Claude had directed her to CNN broadcasts of mountain shaking in other countries.

“Derek, come and look at this.”

He turned from the kitchenette, holding an empty mug. “You said you wanted hot chocolate so that’s what— What the hell? Is that Sugar Loaf Mountain?”

“It sure is. In Rio. Apparently Rob put him on to it.”

“Our Rob? The Aussi shrink at NASA? Don’t tell me he was having a picnic on top of Sugar Loaf?”

“No, but he’s addicted to news reports.”

“So, is Sugar Loaf lifting like Glastonbury?”

“Difficult to say. The images are too indistinct—like our problem with the shaking ground.”

“Isn’t that giant statue of Jesus on top? There’ll be panic if that’s fallen.”

“No, Christ’s on top of Corcovado Mountain. On Sugar Loaf the two cable cars have broken.”

The kettle called Derek to the kitchenette. “You do realise that Sugar Loaf could be a real volcano about to blow?”

“That’s what the authorities believe. They’re evacuating millions—my God, where are they all going to go?”

Kallandra hungered for more information and clicked from CNN to Reuters, the BBC, and Earthquake Watch in an endless cycle until something new happened.

“Ayers Rock seems to be splitting in two!”

“Ah, you mean Uluru,” he said, pleased to score a minor one-up, but then her announcement reached a consequences brain cell. “That’s got all the aborigines buggered. And they’ll blame the whites. Hey, that can’t be volcanic surely?”

“Not sure, hang on, I’ve asked Claude. He said he’ll be right back. Where’s that hot chocolate?”

He pulled up a chair so they slurped and watched the screen together. Kallandra found a live webcam for Sugar Loaf Mountain but it appeared as blurred as their Glastonbury. Ayers Rock would be at night so she didn’t try searching for a webcam.

Claude sent her laptop a link to the geology of Ayers Rock.

“Hey, Uluru is like the tip of an iceberg. Only it has a sandstone root six kilometres deep.”

“There’s an interesting bit,” Derek said. “The aborigines believed there was a sacred hollow inside the rock below ground.”

“Maybe their ancient folklore knew something after all. Now what? CNN is reporting quake activity in the Yosemite Valley. But…” She switched to the Earthquake Watch site. “It’s not being picked up by live seismic centres—oh, yes it is, but not deep.

No epicentre as such so not a fault movement. More a local disturbance, like when an avalanche occurs.”

“I didn’t realise you knew so much about interpreting P and S waves,” Derek said, rubbing his ear.

“I’ve always had an interest.”

“Um, especially since we met Claude.”

“You know we have to have more than one or two high level interests on the astronaut training course. Besides piloting I dabble in Artificial Intelligence and—”

“Language, especially bad language, so why geology except that the dashing Claude…”

“Linguistics, true, but that’s kinda part of the AI work I do. Anyway geology would be useful on Mars. Except it shouldn’t really be called geology there—that’s the study of the Earth’s structure. It’s called Areography, from the Greek God of Mars.” She glanced at Derek to see if she’d sufficiently diverted his attention from Claude. “It’s El Capitan in Yosemite. It’s cracking up. Whoa, and there’s a big landslide from Tabletop mountain in South Africa. There is a pattern here.”

Derek sipped his drink, and then said, “They’re all monuments, important to people?”

“Well, they are and possibly all sacred to ancients, maybe ‘cos they’re individual lumps that are different from their surroundings.”

“If the Earth is shaking up for some tectonic reason, maybe those more isolated features would be the first to crumble. Something you could have sweet words with Claude about.”

“You could ask him yourself,” she said, wishing he’d give his jealousy a rest.

Claude, who once came second in a Denzel Washington look-alike contest, came onto women and they back to him like butterflies to a Buddleia. But at the letting-our-hair-down party last fall, a vodka too many allowed Derek to spy her and Claude in a smoochy close body-contact dance. She’d explained how it was the fault of alcohol, and that she’d no romantic intentions a thousand times to the nth power, but…

A knock at the door brought Blake shuffling into the room. “Have you heard?”

Derek nodded. “We know about the other mountains if that’s what you mean.”

“What other mountains? No, I meant the Festival has been relocated to Bath.

Will you take me tonight?”

Derek looked at him with his mouth open but nothing came out. He walked over to the window and cleaned his glasses with the curtain.

“No, is the word he’s struggling for,” Kallandra said. “We’re tired. Try again at breakfast.”

“But it’ll be a blast—bound to go on all night.” He was fondling a walnut-sized metal ball, and then threw it in the air. Derek snatched it.

“No it won’t,” Derek said. “It’ll take them all night to set everything up. What’s this, a Chinese stress ball? I didn’t know you were into Tai Chi.”

“Then I’ll help them. Oh, please uncle Derek. I’ll tell everyone what a great uncle you are—”

Blake had to stop to answer his cellphone. Derek grabbed it, giving back the ball.

“Ah, so that’s the hidden agenda. Who’s Amanda?”

Kallandra smiled and stroked Blake’s arm. “Aren’t stress balls supposed to tinkle, and come in pairs? Where did you find it? So, you have some totty lusting after you in a tent. Derek, you remember those days?”

“On the tor, it was rolling down. You two in a tent? Ugh, I’m glad you aren’t my parents.” Blake grabbed his phone and stomped out.

In a rare moment of dry wit, Derek called after him: “So are we!”

* * *

The lumps in Kallandra’s half of the bed didn’t stop her weary body lapsing into grateful unconsciousness, but her active brain woke her moments before the dawn made a spectacle of itself.

While Derek snored she showered with the bathroom door open to glimpse breakfast news. Sadly, for her, a prince had allegedly had an affair, so most of the airtime on British TV gave it undue importance. She switched on her iPaq while checking her cellphone messages. One from Claude referred her Ayers Rock enquiries to Rob Summers, the NASA psychiatrist, who’d returned on vacation to his Australian homeland.

“E-mail: to Claude Lapointe

CC: Kallandra Harvard

Hello, Claude. Having a barbeque fest here since I arrived. Ayers Rock—hey buddy, we call it Uluru these days. I’ve not been there for years. Your alert made me look at some news, and it does seem like something weird is happening—the bloody thing’s split—allegedly. My guess is that some existing cracks have opened up. The strata are vertical so it’s not so far-fetched. However, what you see isn’t what you get.

LOL. There’s over five more kilometres of upended strata buried. I can’t see the crack going all the way.

I wonder if it’s the same kind of thing that’s happening to Huashan Mountain in China?

I’d go and investigate Uluru myself but I promised Rosie I’d spend this leave with her, and I’m due back at JSC with you guys in a few days.

Kal, sorry to hear Glastonbury Fest has been interrupted. Brings back memories—can’t remember the music tho.

Maybe the planet’s having a wobble, Vic?

Cya both next week.

Rob.”

Useless man, Kallandra thought, but replied with thanks and pleas to go to Uluru to check it personally. The Huashan Mountain news interested her. A scrambled whiz around the web found nothing except tourist information about the mountain being a Buddhist and Taoist sacred place with shrines strategically placed to assist the faithful.

Maybe the authorities have their scientists all over it but have hushed it up.

Could be there’d been developments at El Capitan and Tabletop on CNN.

Before she could click, a rap at the door startled her.

“Good grief, Blake,” she called as she tightened her dressing gown. “It’s only six in the morning. Derek, get your ass out of bed, your nephew wants his lift.”

But the door opened to two uniforms. One policewoman, late thirties, stern, a couple of shoulder silver studs meant she’d worked her way up the ranks. The other was undoubtedly male, khaki army uniform with impressive and thus high ranking moustache, which twitched as he spoke.

“Major Harvard?”

Before she could deny the fact on the grounds she didn’t reveal such intimacies to strange men, he continued. “We need you and Mr Stone on a matter of urgent National Security.”

“Really? You know we’re on leave?” she said, then yelled: “Derek!”

“Indeed, but NASA has permitted us to request your assistance.” Bizarrely, a steward wheeled a breakfast trolley into the room from behind the Colonel. “But how did NASA know where we were staying?”

Derek coughed as he emerged from the bathroom. “Let them in, Kal.”

“You told JSC where we were. Traitor. I’d told them we were in London.”

“I had to, they might have needed us in an emergency—and it seems I was right.”

Frowning at being thwarted she waved in their visitors. “What’s all this about?

Have you been parking illegally, Derek…again?”

The policewoman shook her head, but remained unamused. “I’m Inspector Scrivens, and this is Colonel Dean. One of my officers reported that a couple bearing NASA credentials—”

“Glastonbury? Why, what’s happened overnight? I haven’t felt any earthquakes.”

“You need to make your own observations.”

“Oh, come on,” Derek said, offering a cup of coffee to Kallandra. “Has the tor sunk again, or split apart like Uluru?”

The Colonel looked puzzled.

“Ayers Rock,” Derek said, as if scoring a point.

“I know it’s called Uluru, but didn’t know it had anything to do with Glastonbury Tor.”

“And,” said the Inspector, “we’d rather you see for yourself. We have pictures but…”

“I completely understand,” Kallandra said. “We’ll be there as soon as we’ve dressed and breakfasted.”

“We’ll give you fifteen minutes and take you in my helicopter,” said the Colonel.

“The roads are pretty much impassable this side of the cordon.”

“Really?” Kallandra said, “have the Festival people returned…” Her left eyebrow lifted to emphasise the question, but the visitors had left. “I bet they have guards on the fire escape in case we make a break for it.”

“I thought you wanted to investigate the damn Tor.”

“I do, but I don’t like being ordered about. Especially by foreign authorities.”

“Hey, you’re the foreigner here,” Derek said, then he unwisely head-butted a jam-loaded croissant she threw at him.

* * *

As soon as they rose above the roofs of Weston-Super-Mare they could see the M5 motorway had become a linear car park.

“I’ve known it to be like that on Bank Holiday weekends,” Derek said.

The inspector cleared her throat, something she shouldn’t do into a headset, resulting in pained expressions from the others. “Oh, sorry. The traffic thins once past the Glastonbury turn off. It seems they’re mostly rubbernecks, and added to by New Earth neo-paganists.”

“No festival goers returning?” Kallandra said.

“Oh my God, I’ve forgotten about Blake,” Derek said. “He must still be in bed.”

His left finger rose towards his ear. Kallandra intercepted it and held his hand in hers.

“Let him stay there,” Kallandra said, “the rest will do him good. Inspector, I’ve been trying to find information and images on what’s been happening and failing. How did all these people know that the Tor is disintegrating?”

The Colonel laughed. “Not the Internet, nor television, my dear. Eddie Wear on Radio Weird. He broadcasted from Glastonbury Festival for the New Age folk, and then got wind of the strange happenings. His Campervan turned over when it was struck by a landslide. He called every hippy and music lover in the country to pay homage to the Glastonbury Devil that must have caused it.”

“Derek, make a note—we’ll have to a create a list of causation hypotheses—oh, my, there it is. What the hell’s happening to it?”

The top half of the tor appeared to float. Rubble was all that remained of St Michael’s Tower. Soil—mostly clay and turf—clung on, but Kallandra swore she could see sunlight glinting off the rock beneath.

The Colonel talked into his headset to them. “It was three metres clear of the ground at six o’clock.”

Her earlier photographs had disappointed her with insufficient detail, but now there was daylight beneath, easily seen as the helicopter sought ground level to land.

All the passengers were so intent gawping at the bizarre view of a hill suspended in the air, that unlike the pilot, they hadn’t noticed a tractor pulling a muck-spreader into their landing spot. The helicopter lurched upward, tilting violently to the right.

“Sorry. But we have a suicidal farmer trying to stop me landing. Where are your troops, Sir? I thought they secured this field.”

“So did I. Land in the next field before that madman gets there—I’ll radio my people.”

Cattle scattered as the chopper landed.

Embarrassed soldiers with feeble excuses reached them moments before the red-faced farmer drove up in his spluttering tractor. “What right have you to land on my land? And look at what you military people have done to it.” The man was in tears, while waving his brown hairy arm at the tor.

“It’s got nothing to do with the military, Sir,” said the Colonel, bristling at the accusation of making the world’s slowest ballistic missile out of a national heritage.

“Who else could do it? This land has been my family’s since William the Conqueror. Why did you have to ruin it all?”

“We are here to investigate this phenomenon,” said the policewoman. “Kindly let us get on with our job. I’ll have you arrested if you obstruct us.”

“That’s a bit harsh,” Kallandra said. She walked over to console the farmer, but took a step back when his border collie growled. “Sir, I know it must be hard, but something strange is going on and we—”

“Ah, the Yanks. I might have guessed your lot would be behind it. Doing experiments you wouldn’t dare in America. Anyway, I’ve sent for my solicitor. I’ll be suing the army, the government, America. Anyone responsible.” Two men were running from the farm buildings shouting. A woman walked rapidly behind them. The farmer’s family were on their way to stop him having a heart attack.

“Derek,” Kallandra whispered, “add military experiments to the list of hypotheses.” He looked at her as if to think she was joking, and then wrote it anyway.

The Colonel waved his men to secure the helicopter landing area before leading them through a gate in the tree-lined hedge to the tor.

Chapter Four

From the air, she couldn’t accept what she’d seen. On foot, the obscuring trees conspired in her denial. Eager to observe once again the most stomach-curdling, astonishing sight, she ran through tall grass and yanked back the five-bar gate. Five more steps and her legs rebelled. Her body trapped in a catatonic trance, her brain tried in vain to make sense of the bizarre sight. Muscles screamed: run away, but her curiosity pleaded: stay.

After adrenaline-stretched moments that seemed like hours, with the others similarly confounded behind her, Kallandra found words. “It’s impossible.”

“Ridiculous,” Derek said. “It must be an illusion. That hill must weigh millions of tons.”

“Eighty million,” said the Colonel.

Derek squinted at the hill, which continued to drip rocks and lumps of earth.

“Yes, that’s a good estimate. How did you calculate it? Volume times the density of limestone I suppose.”

“My engineer did.”

“Listen to them,” Kallandra said to Inspector Scrivens. “My bewilderment is in complete awe, while they nerd like trainspotters.”

The policewoman nodded, a smile, perceptible for a second. “They are sublimating their helplessness by playing with numbers. It would be just as inconceivable with one million tons.”

After a thick silence from the four, although the sound of the random cascade of rocks formed background percussion, Kallandra contributed observations of her own.

“It’s still rising. The air seems to be quivering above it. See how the clouds behind are distorted, and the whole thing vibrates, making it appear unclear like yesterday. Has someone measured how fast it’s rising?”

“A foot an hour, approximately,” said the Colonel, “according to my surveyor.

Hello, who’s this?”

“He’s the policeman who let us through the cordon yesterday,” Derek said, as the overweight police officer puffed up the rock-strewn meadow to them.

“Morning, Ma’am,” he said to his superior, and with lesser salutes to the rest. “I thought you boffins ought to know.”

“We’re boffins now?” Kallandra said. “Is that bad?”

“It’s ancient British for scientists,” Derek said. “What should we know, officer?”

“Some of us local police have a theory about this floating mountain.”

Kallandra looked at him in an effort to find evidence of awe in him. None.

Anyone would think floating mountains happened all the time. Maybe he had a Japanese print of Fujiyama at home. For a moment she wondered if it wasn’t just the frequent mist that made the mountains there appear to float. Could this have happened before?

“We think it’s them hippies. We’ve had trouble with them in the past…”

“Constable,” said his inspector, “pilfering from local shops, setting fire to haystacks and poaching fish is one thing. Stealing an eighty-million-ton mountain is quite another.”

“No, no. Excuse me, Ma’am. There’s caves in these rocks all around here.”

“You mean like at Cheddar,” said the Colonel.

“Exactly, there’s potholes around Glastonbury and some locals reckon there’s a sacred cave inside the Tor.”

His superior interrupted him. “I don’t see how that could possibly have anything to do with this phenomena.”

“It’s Wild Murray. He’s a nutter who lives in Shepton. He’s always had a crowd of followers at the Festival and each year has done some crazy gimmick. He’s made giant straw men to set afire; giant kites—and he’s a potholer.”

“So, where’s the relevance here?” The inspector was clearly agitating herself into a rage.

“It’s obvious to us, with respect, Ma’am, that Wild Murray has found a way into the cave. He’s taken a big balloon in there and filled it with hydrogen to create a big scene again.”

“I don’t think a Zeppelin inside the hill would make it lift the hill,” she said. For the first time, Kallandra saw a glimmer of a smile grow into a dismissive smirk.

“What do you think, Colonel?” Kallandra said. “Is it just possible that weak fault lines in the limestone could allow a very large hydrogen-filled balloon to do this?”

“I would say it is very unlikely, but not completely impossible. Of course it would mean our estimate of the weight of the hill is way over that of a cave.” His moustache increased twitching as he warmed to the idea. “Just suppose there was a tall cave and the roof was made of very thin strata, riddled with cracks. After all, limestone gorges, like Cheddar Gorge, are made from collapsed cave roofs. The additional buoyancy of a hydrogen-filled balloon might just lift it. And the weight of the surface soil and few rocks could keep it from rising too fast. Well done, Constable.” His mouth paralleled his moustache in a grin, enabling the constable to smile too.

“Absolute poppycock,” said the Inspector.

“Nevertheless, it is a hypothesis to be tested,” Kallandra said. “Make a note, Derek.”

“Already done,” he said, “but it’s nonsense.”

“I know. It’s quite feasible for the Tor to have a cave within—legendary, I believe.

But unless Wild Murray has an international following, it doesn’t explain the geophysical disturbances in other continents. Have you sent pictures of this floating mountain to Claude?”

“It’s sleep-time in Canada, Kal. Hey, where are you going? It’s dangerous too close.”

Risking the occasional rock fall, Kallandra grabbed a hard hat from a soldier, and ventured to within twenty-five metres of the apparition. She gasped as she raised her camera to capture the view beneath the slowly rising hill. As soon as she aimed her camera, she was grabbed by two soldiers, who carried her, screaming obscenities, back to the others.

The Colonel wagged a finger at her. “You’d be no use to us, Major Harvard, if you were crushed under an avalanche.”

As her mouth re-opened to hurl abuse at him, a thunderous crash shook the ground as the remains of St Michael’s Tower fell off the Tor.

“We have remote cameras that we don’t mind being dented,” he said, and waved to a lieutenant manning a mini-car sized tank with a turret bristling with cameras, aerials, sensors and a gun barrel.

“Are you going to shoot it down?”

“Not straight away, Miss.”

“You mean you are really considering it?”

“Miss, we have to consider the possibility that whatever is holding that rock up might let it go over the town. If the constable’s theory is correct—”

“It can’t be. Can we have some images from robo-tank, please?”

* * *

A large police incident van had displaced the few cattle remaining in the angry farmer’s east field. Army field units mushroomed around it, reproducing by the hour. It was as if the Ministry of Defence training grounds on Salisbury Plain had lunged out to swallow Glastonbury. Kallandra spotted a Bristol University minibus. She wondered when local scientists would get here. The Tor continued rising at the rate of a foot per hour.

Inside a large operations tent, Kallandra stood at the shoulder of the robot-camera operator. She pointed at the image of the base of the rock.

“See, there is something there. Although the trailing turf and falling bits mess it up, there is a smooth dark curved surface.”

“It might only appear dark because of the absence of light on it,” suggested Derek. “Can we illuminate it?”

The Colonel took a deep breath. “We could, in several ways. That robot vehicle has laser, infrared and visible light projectors. It also has radar emitters and receivers.

But using any of these could be considered offensive to an enemy.”

“The floating hill is an enemy?”

“Can you assure me it isn’t, Major Harvard? No, you can’t because we remain in observational mode. I have to decide whether to illuminate the base or not after I have more firepower at my disposal.”

“I’ve already used a flash camera on it yesterday. It didn’t blow me away.”

“That’s positive information, even if you have a reckless disregard for your safety, and for everyone else’s. How did you know the presence of sudden bright light where it had detected none before, wouldn’t trigger an explosion? You didn’t. What sort of military training have you had, Major? No offence meant.”

Kallandra’s face could have heated a house. She knew he was right. She had been trained to fly untested aircraft, and make gutsy on-the-spot decisions, not to pussyfoot around potential enemies. She must have bunked that course.

The Colonel studied the faces around him. “We’re going to light up the arse of the floating mountain.”

Everyone grinned.

If anyone expected to see alien rockets in the base they were disappointed. The light reflected off a smooth metallic curve, like the lower third of a sphere, seventy-nine metres in diameter.

Inspector Scrivens bent forward to examine the image. “Good Lord, it looks like the constable’s theory might have some validity. That could be the underneath of a balloon.”

“No it couldn’t,” Derek said. “There must be thousands of tons of rock remaining on the top of whatever that is. And initially, at least a million tons. Then there are the others.”

“Ah, the others,” said the Colonel, with a smirk barely concealed beneath his moustache. “Yes, we’ve made contact with the military in the States, Australia, Brazil and South Africa. Maybe it’s early days, but they’ve all reported geophysical or tectonic disturbances at a local level. None of them report a complete hilltop flying off. It could be coincidence, there are hundreds of earth tremors everyday around the planet.”

“What about China—Huashan Mountain?” Kallandra said.

“No contact. Just how do you know about that one? Again, there are many seismic disturbances from tectonic plate movement there, so we have access to seismograph readings, but there’s been no official reporting of anything unusual. On the other hand, although entente has been more cordial lately, they remain tight-lipped about most things.”

“So do all countries if there’s something to be embarrassed about,” she said.

“Like flying mountains.”

“Quite so. Lieutenant, for our own rocky UFO, do an infrared scan, followed by micro-radar, then other short wave radio scans. Report directly to me.”

Kallandra pulled Derek outside, made him carry two camp chairs, grabbed them a coffee each and settled to a ringside view of the hill.

She was about to speak, but surrendered when a Chinook thundered overhead.

It seemed the air was alive with helicopters, slow flying airplanes and an army drone spy plane. She focussed purloined army field glasses just above the apex of the tor, to confirm the shimmering of the air. “Either the top is very hot, or something else is distorting the air above the tor,” she yelled. The Chinook landed in the nearby developing airfield.

Derek nodded agreement. “Now we know the base is like the lower half of a sphere. The disintegrating hill could be sitting on a giant ball.”

Once she removed the field glasses to see the whole hill, she had to agree. “It really is shaping up to be like a spherical balloon, shaking off a mantle of soil. So, what is it?”

“OK, I think we can rule out a natural phenomenon. I know it’s not possible for metallic ore to have a bulbous appearance…”

“Such as pure haematite?”

“Exactly, but not that size.”

“On the other hand, maybe we are witnessing the first natural metallic shell with lighter-than-air interior.”

“Kal, just say balloon. But are there natural metallic balloons?”

“Some ejecta from volcanic eruptions have hot gases inside. And we do not possess a complete inventory of every natural phenomenon possible.”

“True. So we add to the list of hypotheses, possible natural but unknown phenomenon. An ore, inside a limestone cave that experienced massive expansion, possibly from hydrogen. Nope.

“Hello, a Bentley has arrived with a military police escort. Should we go and introduce ourselves?”

“No, Derek, if they’re sufficiently important they’ll come to us. If that sphere is not natural, then it must be artificial. Let’s rule out little green men for now.”

“Which means, man-made,” he said. “Wild Murray might be responsible after all.

It’s about time Claude woke up, let’s send him a copy of that image and ask what’s happening to El Capitan.”

“It’s only four in the morning there, oh, go on then,” she said, partly because he’d have to go to the lieutenant to copy the file or have it transferred to their iPaq. Also, the stranger seemed to be shouting in there, and she’d like to know why. She didn’t believe in auras yet an ominous feeling accompanied that car, oozed across the field and hovered in front of her. She watched Derek enter the tent, followed shortly by shouting.

He returned.

“We have to leave,” he said, with a mix of anger and apology, although both of them knew it wasn’t his fault.

“My guts had an ominous feeling about him. Who is he, MI6?”

“Maybe. He said he was Commander Berringer, Ministry of Defence liaison bigwig. He said we had no business here and to clear off or be escorted to the cordon.”

“But they brought us here. It’s that typical cock-up where the left hand doesn’t know what all the other hands are doing. We’ll see about that,” she said, putting on her stern face.

“I agreed to go.”

“More fool you. Go then. I’ve work to do here, and I thought you had.”

Derek tagged along, lagging behind a couple of metres. Before she reached the tent, she turned. “Did you get the images copied to your iPaq? If not, do it while I distract Berringer.”

She marched into the tent, but was taken aback at the diminutive size of the new arrival. She took a deep breath, having learnt the hard way that small people often punched an intellectual wallop, and decided to defend herself by an attack strategy.

“Berringer, are you in the pay of the Chinese?”

If he was surprised, or annoyed, he didn’t show it.

“Miss Harvard?”

“Major Harvard.”

“No matter, I am a Commander and so senior to you. Now get out.”

She could play status semantics but she also knew she should control her maverick tendencies, which jarred with the usual clean-cut NASA astronauts. No matter how good her flying and lateral thinking abilities were, one more embarrassment could see her off the Mars flight.

“You must have been invited here by error, Harvard. In any case you are a foreigner.”

“But Derek is British, we are together as a NASA investigative team. Are you prepared to push this into an incident, Commander, or agree to international cooperation that gets results and makes us both look good?” She embellished her conciliation with her most winning smile.

“Very well, Harvard, you may stay, but all information gathered here is to stay with me and the British Government unless I say so. Understood? Or do I have to make you sign the Official Secrets Act?”

She glanced over to Derek and noticed from his grin to the lieutenant that he’d already copied the images. She nodded compliance to Berringer. “You might be surprised at how useful I can be.”

“In that case, Major, now we are friends, you can inform me what you know about the Chinese situation in Huashan? And Uluru, Sugarloaf, El Capitan and Table Top.

Do you know more?”

She winced as she realised he knew as much as she did. “I have contacts.”

“Good, so do I. We might need them. The Chinese have already broken off a trade mission. They seem to think a bomb is responsible for the massive landslides and cracking of the mountain. Huashan is one of their most sacred mountains.”

“I guess they haven’t seen inside it yet? Or noticed that it is rising?”

“It was you who was going to be helpful to me, Major? All we know about the Chinese situation is that there is too much smoke from a forest fire, possibly caused when a crushed hotel oil tank spewed burning oil into its grounds. Our surveillance photographs can’t see enough and China News is silent. We have little information on your country’s El Capitan. Apparently the whole of the Yosemite Valley is cordoned off, including a no-fly zone. I hope you can enlighten us?”

“We’re trying to wake up our contact. Don’t forget, that region is eight hours behind us. Even if the military are there, it’s dark so, unless they feel under threat, there’ll be no detailed observations. Have you been there, Commander? If only the top hundred metres are affected, they won’t see events as clearly as we can here.”

“Major, you mean because El Capitan is three times the height and in a gorge?

South Africa is in a political turmoil again, so we’ll probably not get much sense there.

Uluru’s been in daylight for hours, so why’s Australia keeping quiet?”

“Something different seems to happening there,” Kallandra said, finding herself on the defensive. If only Rob Summers had been more informative. “It seems Uluru is splitting. If there is a sphere in there, it might take longer to become visible. But all of us are in the dark, so to speak.”

“In which case, why do you think you can be helpful, Major? You seem to know less than my department.”

“A very big reason, Commander. I called NASA. If necessary I can have close-up live satellite imagery and data from their onboard sensors much quicker than you could.” She could tell by his nodding, that she was on a winner. “Plus, my training allows for more lateral thinking than yours.”

“Maybe. Speaking of imagery, I believe you noticed the shimmering in the air above the Tor. Maybe you could ask NASA to scan it for any odd emissions, and alert your contacts in the USA to fly low over theirs? I’ll ask the Australian Air Force to do the same. Major, are we singing from the same hymn sheet here?”

“You mean it’s the Air Force’s meteorological wing—so to speak—with their flying sensors? Sure I do.” They both grinned.

Derek, secreting his iPaq in his jacket pocket, came over. “The lieutenant has another theory about the floating mountains.” He saw the Commander looking serious.

“But I wouldn’t give any of the theories any credence, especially his.”

“Spit it out, Derek,” Kallandra said.

“He says it could be an elaborate illusion, such as when the entertainer David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear.”

“Thank him, will you,” said the Commander, clearly unimpressed.

“Add it to our list of hypotheses, Derek. None of them might be the answer, but the answer might be in a combination.”

The lieutenant called over from his console. “Excuse me? I saw one of the shows. A Jumbo jet vanished in front of a large audience. I know it was only an illusion but it looked very real. I’m not saying he or another entertainer is behind this, only that a similar effect could be operating.”

“That’s a fair point,” Kallandra said. She flashed her eyes at him. “I’ve noticed the air shimmering above the rising tor. I’m waiting for high-definition satellite imagery of all the sites. The infrared and gravity anomalies in particular might reveal phenomena we can’t see. It probably isn’t a master entertainer at work here, but it might be instructive to question them.”

Inspector Scrivens jotted it into her notebook. “So we shan’t arrest Copperfield on suspicion of vandalising part of our National Heritage by floating it up and away, but to help us with our enquiries?”

“Exactly,” Kallandra said. “Squeeze out of him how he would have done it, if he’d thought of it first. It could point us in some useful directions.”

Kallandra heard a sharp crack from outside.

The lieutenant cried out: “A slab of rock is sliding off the top of the tor.”

The ground shook sending everyone hurtling to the floor as a roar, like a rocket taking off, hurt their ears. As the thundering ended, the tent walls facing the tor burst in as rocks smashed into it. More thumps and equipment-smash noises followed, but ended in seconds. In-tent chaos pursued the exterior noises with tumbled shelving.

Kallandra gasped as an angle-iron shelf unit broke its fall on her ankle.

She knew it could be broken, but couldn’t reach it because the limp body of the Commander lay on top of her. She could see his face, pale, but a pulse throbbed in his neck, allowing her to assume the rest of him survived too. “Commander, can you hear me? Someone get him off me?”

Her request was met with groans from the others, as the sunlit tent exterior cast an eerie green glow on the shambles of fallen equipment and people. The main poles remained, but gashes in the canvas showed where ricocheted fragments of sharp limestone made forced entries.

A helmeted sergeant rushed into the tent. “Who’s hurt?”

“Hooray. Over here,” Kallandra said. “The Commander’s unconscious and I can’t move.”

“I’ll call for medics first, Miss, then I’ll be back.”

A long groan came from the direction of the lieutenant. She called to him, and after some minor crashing, he responded. “I’m all right, Major, but the computer isn’t.

Anyone would think the Tor didn’t want us to know too much.”

“Now that would be too spooky. Lieutenant, if you are able, can you get over to me? I can’t see my ankle, which is trapped. It only aches but I’d hate to think I’m leaking red stuff while we’re idly chatting.”

In moments he stood over her. “No bleeding, Major. Is the weight of the Commander too much? I’d rather wait for the medics to put a neck collar on him just in case.”

“OK. I’ve eaten burgers heavier than him. Can you lift the shelf-unit up enough to shift my ankle?”

“I’ll help,” Derek said. He rubbed his face as if waking from a nightmare.

* * *

Grateful that the bombardment hadn’t seriously injured anyone, Kallandra sat on a camp-bed outside, and nursed her bruised ankle with an icepack, while staring at the floating hill. Derek lay on a nearby camp-bed, head propped up by his right arm, and stared at the gravity-defying mass.

“It’s no longer a Tor,” said the lieutenant, more upset at his computer’s demise than his scratches and mild concussion.

The Colonel shouted at them. “We’re retreating to the next field. You three, come out of the line of fire.”

“You’re right, we can’t call it a hill, mountain or Tor,” Kallandra said. “That last rockfall has exposed the top so much, it looks like a bald head.”

The lieutenant laughed. “And the remaining rocks and turf looks like a monk’s fringe.”

“A silver-headed monk. But I doubt that turf will hang on for much longer. That is a sphere—no doubt any more.”

The Colonel’s shadow crept over them. “Fascinating though it might be, people, but let’s move out.”

“We’re as safe as we’re going to be, Colonel,” Kallandra said. “That last fall was the top, and when it went it took most of the rest.”

“Orders, Ma’am,” said the lieutenant. “We’ll be right along, Sir.” He winked at Kallandra, so that she nodded agreement to the Colonel, allowing him to get back to the base relocation.

They couldn’t take their eyes off the sphere.

“It’s not as shiny as new steel would be,” Kallandra said.

“Nor dull, more a silky lustre, like an aluminium sphere might be. But it’s still indistinct, as if there is a motor inside.”

“Lieutenant – just a moment, what is your damn name?”

“Lieutenant Keeler, Ma’am.”

“First name, idiot. Mine’s Kallandra.”

“Gifford, Ma’am. Maybe there is a motor inside, and a difficult-to-see ratchet railway pulling it upwards.”

“Do you feel a tingling up your neck when you look at it?”

“I know what you mean, Ma’am. It’s like looking at the Grand Canyon for the first time, or the moon through a telescope. Only this is a thousand times weirder.”

“Totally awesome. I am looking at that sphere slowly rising, yet my brain’s logic centre screams that it can’t be happening. That tingle I am experiencing in my spine is like being plugged into an electric fence.”

Minutes of wonder drifted by as the sphere imperceptibly rose. She glanced at the young Gifford, taking in his pale skin, high cheekbones, longer than military-approved blond hair and narrow nose. A classical, handsome profile, but she wondered if he knew it. No ring—probably because of his marriage to computerised robotics and sensors. She’d take him on as a challenge, if she hadn’t Derek. In any case she’d be accused of toy-boyism, but so what? She smiled at wicked thoughts but had to abort when he turned to her, and then nodded at the supine form of Derek, half-asleep, but with his left little finger mining his ear.

“It gets worse,” she said.

“You mean he eats it?”

“Revolting isn’t he?”

“My cat eats my earwax.”

“Oh my God, Gifford. Don’t you feed it fish? But earwax has a sour bitter taste.

I would’ve thought cats had more sense.”

“A friend did a research paper for his biochemistry degree. He found that cats went for the triglyceride fats and cholesterol among the other muck. It’s food… but not as we know it.”

“Hah! So Derek must be half-cat. I knew it.”

Another round of thuds alerted them to more of the sphere losing its mantle. The base of the sphere shimmered at fifteen five metres above the rest of the Tor.

“Besides thinking this floating sphere might be an illusion, what do you think is happening?” Kallandra said.

“I didn’t say it was an illusion, but that the tricks used in them might give us clues.

It’s obvious to me what it is, especially if it’s happening to other mountains.”

“Well? Wild Murray, natural gas inflating a metal ore deposit, or an unusual volcanic ejecta.”

“Aliens.”

“Maybe, but aren’t they supposed to invade, not go away?”

“They write their own rules, Ma’am.”

“It wouldn’t make sense for them to bury themselves under millions of tons of rock. Look he’s eating it now. Hisss.”

“It makes perfect sense, if they have the technology to make their way out again.

Mankind hadn’t discovered them until now, had we?”

She had to concede that point, but raised another, playing Devil’s Advocate.

“That’s another puzzle. How come millions of tons of metal can hide from us? Why haven’t they been detected with seismographs or by potholers?”

“I don’t know, Ma’am. We don’t know how deep they were. For all we know they started up years ago from several kilometres deep.”

“How did they get down there then? It would take quite an operation to bury them. Ah. You’re going to say they might have been on the surface millions of years ago and have been covered up by sedimentary rock. Interesting. I like the way you think, Gifford.”

He stopped himself laughing at her tease. “It’s only a hypothesis, Ma’am. It could be rubbish. On the other hand, none of the ones we know about are in volcanic rock, which implies they didn’t want to risk being destroyed.”

“Not necessarily the case. There might have been some in volcanic areas but have been destroyed. Others might be under the ocean. I wonder if the spheres can swim?”

“Here come the Royal Engineers,” said Gifford, as an armoured humvee equipped with telescopic poles motored slowly by. “They’ll probe the sphere and see if they can get a sample, before it rises out of reach.”

Chapter Five

20,000 years before present.
On the East bank of the Red Sea.

Angry with Hanra for allowing her mother to share their home, Oqmar had wrapped bread and goat cheese in hessian, shouldered a bladder of sour wine and stamped his bare feet as he left their hut. A track led north to the hills, and within them to a favourite cave. First he had to pass through the ramshackle baked clay dwellings that made up their village. He kept his head down, hoping not to see, or be seen, by that witch, Kardinuta, Hanra’s mother. Living with the two women had become a conflagration. Flocks of birds rose to escape the cacophony of three shrieked and bellowed shoutings, and unless he raised his fist, he’d always lose the battles.

Neither did Oqmar want to be seen by Sar Abdul, the village elder. Oqmar would be cudgelled for not subjugating his women. But Sar Abdul hadn’t had his will broken by evil black eyes boring into his head.

Luckily, the midday sun blasted down, forcing life into the shadows. He scurried through the narrow shaded gaps between rough walls, occasionally glimpsing the flashes of sun reflecting off the sea to his left. He knew every corner, palm tree, derelict and new dwelling. This was his only world. Travellers told of other settlements to the north, but neither he nor his family had been further than four days walk from Jedir.

He’d had to walk for days when the goats he tried to control wandered off. He preferred his secondary role. When he fished, he’d been scarily out of sight of the township in the palm-leaf and clay boat he built with his brother.

He’d spent a few nights out there, lit by the moon and stars. He’d lie in his craft trying to sleep in the never-ending bobbing, wondering at the moving stars—some shooting through the blackness into the horizon. Some of the pinpricks were like the reds and blues of desert flowers. Perhaps they were reflections, the sky a pattern of tiny colours, each with a god to steer them and control destinies. He enjoyed rather than endured the solitude—not that he was ever completely alone. The sea-bats clicked their greetings while hunting water insects, as did the splashing flying fish, laughing at his attempts to grab them. The netted fish would spit at him, flapping for their feeble lives, as he exchanged their spirits for the survival of his family. And, again, the gods would speak with him. At least he supposed that was the purpose of long whistles, hums and groans in the black air. Sometimes, especially when a growling storm rolled near, sending fire to light up the sea, he’d see dreams even though he was awake-scared. He’d witnessed flying shiny pots, great fire, floating moons and sensed the silent screams of the not-yet-living.

His brother wouldn’t share the boat in times of impending storms, but Oqmar had faith in the boat, and thus his survival. But mainly it was because his visions of the screamed dances of the gods were so vivid.

Looking ahead he saw he was past the thorn stockade, where goats scampered away as they saw him. He’d been herded in there, as a child, with the others for lessons on milking, telling the truth, efficient slaughter, avoiding trouble, skinning and tanning, when lies were necessary, which berries and leaves helped life, and which would gripe him to death. He’d also had to learn the ancient stories.

The old people, who’d seen thirty wet seasons, and the young were shepherded into the stockade when it was too late to run for the reed beds in times of the Klar attacks. They’d taken anything and anybody they wanted years ago, but now the village had grown. Strength in numbers.

His shadow-self hid under his bare feet. The overhead sun hammered down, but his self-incriminating anger drove him on. He waved his goat-herding crook at the sun, but it ignored his threats.

In his cave it would be cooler and calmer. No one should be travelling in this baking midday, but he withstood it. His twenty wet seasons body was sufficiently strong, and his mind determined. Sweat could be replaced. If he didn’t seek solace in the womb of his cave, he’d kill Hanra, and that would be a shame.

A scuffled sound in the gravel behind made him turn. A brown deformed dog looked at him with tilted head. A twisted leg made it a reject by all but Oqmar. It earned its scraps by keeping small predators off the goats and herding them.

“Here, Kur. Take the chance of being kicked. We’re both cursed, but have each other, eh?” The dog shambled up and licked Oqmar ’s hand, no doubt finding remaining smears of cheese to savour.

“You have no women trouble, Kur. Shag the bitches and scamper away. No mothers come after you waving dead snakes, and hurling stones and spells.”

The old dog threw him a sympathetic look as if the witch had tried to feed it hemlock too.

“Kur, we’re going to the cave. I’m glad you’re here; you make a good vermin chaser.” Oqmar looked over at the glowing orange sandstone of neighbouring hills.

When he stood on the summit he could see a horizon of purple mountains.

The hour walk stretched as the scorching heat slowed both man and beast.

Perspiration stung Oqmar ’s eyes and his tongue felt swollen. With a dry voice he croaked to Kur. “I wish I’d brought fruit to wet our throats, friend, instead of wine, but at least it’ll help us forget our troubles.” It might bring him insight, he thought. It had once before when baffled in the morning over how to keep his fishing net from drifting too much in the current, his inebriated evening mind told him to tie stones on the ends.

As they staggered up the steep track, Oqmar, slipping on loose red stones, saw the narrow cave entrance. Kur saw it too and ran ahead, remembering the game where he played bite the rats.

Oqmar sat on a shaded rock, listening to yaps and the scrabbling of paws and claws. He didn’t want to be in full view of the cave entrance or the rats might head back in. He had no urge to catch them: their flesh too stringy and bitter to enjoy. He fell off the rock when he saw the scared animal emerging wasn’t a rat, nor Kur, but a wild cat.

He laughed as he brushed off the sandy dust from his long grey shirt. Now he knew there was no vermin in the cave. Nevertheless he waited for Kur to poke his nose into the sunlight.

“Good dog. Your cheese reward is on its way.”

The cave usually smelt musty with a combination of bat and rodent droppings, but Oqmar breathed in air that seemed fresh, with a tangy taste. Maybe the cat had been here a few weeks and driven away the smellier guests.

A feed-me whine brought another smile to Oqmar. He squeezed into a narrow gap a few strides into the darker recesses. Kur waited for him to get through before scrabbling after. A narrow zigzag passage with an uneven floor led them to an open space sufficiently expansive for several dwellings. White rays of sunlight allowed in through overhead fissures illuminated the mysteriously level sand floor. No animal droppings ever fouled the air in this section—another mystery.

He was in error; he’d spoiled in his cave. Not with his waste, only foxes tainted their own nest, but with gnawed bones, fish tails, and bread so green even Kur wouldn’t devour it.

He settled on a rough blanket and straw pillow he’d brought up several new moons before. The air in the cave was not only clean but remained consistently cool— an exhilarating respite from the daytime heat and night chills outside. No one moved out of their sordid dwellings at high sun, yet here he was in paradise, a flask of sour wine, loaf and ripe cheese. He laughed. Kur whined.

Oqmar laughed again, took a swig of the wine, and broke some cheese for the dog, which it took it to a dark corner, wolfed it down and settled. He couldn’t have tasted it. What a waste. The air that was so sweetly clean now carried the sour taste of goat cheese, dog’s breath, and acidic fermented grape juice. He broke off a lump of the gritty grey bread and let it dissolve in his mouth, being careful not to let any stones break more of his teeth.

How could this be bettered? He was away from the nags at home, a real friend snoring in a corner, and half a skin of wine to go.

Without knowing why, he awoke mid-dream. In that otherworld state he was adrift, midnight, in his boat, his net over the side playing with the fish, while he took in the stars. The memory of the dream was fading already, moments after waking, but was it the shooting stars or Kur? For the hound was howling, and in that cave each sound amplified beyond endurance.

“Enough, animal.” He threw a handful of sand in its direction. The howling diminuendoed to whimper, but Kur’s discomfort persisted. “Well, what is it?”

Instead of barking an intelligible response, Kur fled some invisible spirit, keeping to the cave wall, and with tail between its legs, scrambled through the fissure.

“You go then, back to looking out for the goats. I’ve a dream to catch. You always get spooked by nothing.” Oqmar looked around the cave, knowing that if Kur was frightened there would be a real cause, even if he couldn’t see it. Satisfied that Kur was being silly, he reclaimed his place and laid back, folding his arms behind his head.

Moments later he realised sleep wasn’t an option. The cave had lost its calm aura. Kur had detected it first, and tried to tell him, but Oqmar didn’t want to believe his sojourn was over. He raised himself to a sitting position, gathering the energy and will to walk back to Jedir. His neck tingled, and the hairs on his brown arms stood quivering as if he was cold. It couldn’t be fear. A hard life had inured him against the dread of death although the terrors of life, as embodied by Hanra’s tongue and her mother’s witchcraft, vexed him.

A column of loose sand rose from the floor a stride from his foot, and twisted like a dust devil. He’d seen many over the desert on hot days, and much bigger, but never in his cool cave. He leaned back on his elbows to stretch his foot into the sand vortex.

His foot was slowly but forcibly pushed upwards. It also tingled as if many feathers had made gentle contact. He laughed and yanked his foot back before the rest of him left the floor. Standing, he saw the vortex had reached the ceiling a man’s height above him, and the sand spiralled outwards. He kept at arm’s length, not wanting to have his eyeballs sandblasted, but he could see that the sand was dissipating as the cave floor gave up its carpet revealing a smooth circular area.

He thought the hill had been created by Ptah from squeezing the red sands all around. Yet the cleared circle was like the round base of a shiny grey pot. So it wasn’t part of the rock. Grains of sand vibrated off the top of the upside down pot, which appeared blurred. Oqmar rubbed his eyes but it remained indistinct. The air immediately over the apparition seemed to be quivering like boiling water. Yet no heat reached him, so, squatting, he ventured his hand into the turbulence.

Immediately, his hand lifted—gently but forcibly. He withdrew it, finding his black hairs rising up his forearm inside his shirt. A shiver ran through him, up his spine, making the hair on the back of his neck rise.

Oqmar looked at the pot. “Are you trying to scare me? Should I be worried, like Kur?” He walked around the quivering pot, deciding what to do.

“You must have a foxhole beneath, and the animal is trying to push up. That must be it. I’ll help it.” On his knees he dug his hands in the sand at the base of the pot and revealed more. The pot continued vibrating and lifted a little as if to help him.

He snatched his hands away and sat back on the sandy floor.

“Ah, what have we here? The gods try to burn my fingers!” To his amazement the shape was not the upside down pot he assumed. Enough was free of sand to show it had no broad lip below, and it was too shiny for the clay pots he’d seen. It glistened like the moon.

In spite of the unpleasant sensation when he brushed too close to the ‘pot’ he dived at the sand, shovelling it away with his strong hands. Moments later he’d discovered the spherical shape of the object, and sat back in amazement. Hovering a hand’s width above the base of the shallow crater he’d dug in the sand, the sphere shimmered as it continued to slowly rise.

“This is the witch’s doing.” A mixture of fear and disbelief gripped him. He’d seen Hanra’s strange mother perform magic with fire, making objects move, and concocting potions that either made ill people well or healthy people die—usually the latter. He liked the cave because it was his sanctuary, and he relished its cool atmosphere, but perspiration poured off him.

Gradually, he’d formed the opinion that it couldn’t have been the witch. He’d only seen her move small objects like bowls and knives, never something as big as his head.

And the sphere was the size of a bigger head than his. Nor had he known her to magic anything out of her sight, except her curses and potions.

His tentative dismissal of her involvement allowed his curiosity to gain over trepidation. He tossed some leaves at it. They fell off. He tried offering it a few last droplets of wine, but the air turbulence over the top of the sphere prevented him holding the bladder above it. He tried to examine it more carefully by shuffling on his knees all around it, putting his face as close as he could without it repelling him with its unpleasant sensation similar to when lightning strikes near. The surface was not only smooth but showed his reflection like in a bowl of water, but distorted. The sphere appeared to be inhabited. He realised that the surface reflected his own image, but not immediately. Disturbed at his own image, he felt and prodded his nose that seemed huge in the reflection. He remembered where he’d seen shiny rocks similar to the sphere. A traveller had small stones made of a grey-white substance that had been found in streambeds. He said it softened with fire, and we could make better beads and spear points. The matriarch was interested until the traveller wanted four of the children for two handfuls of the silver rocks. We threw ordinary stones at him as he ran away.

Standing, Oqmar poked at the sphere with a stick. He expected it to knock it away or set it afire. To his astonishment, the end of the stick disappeared. But when he threw a stick it bounced off. The sphere chose how to defend itself. The revelation that the sphere might be animal weakened his knees, forcing him to sit once more. It couldn’t be animal. The only eyes, mouth and limbs were his reflection. Was it using his reflection to embody itself? He’d heard of stranger things with gods and evil spirits.

Was the spirit within evil or benign? Apprehension obliged Oqmar to edge to the wall. Leaning back, he felt the coolness through his shirt, reminding him how hot he felt through anxiety. He stared in wonder and awe at the levitating ball. At a size a little larger than his head, there were few objects he’d met with a similar shape. The sun and moon looked round. Children played with baked clay balls, and he’d eaten the round eggs of turtles and fish.

To lay a silver egg larger than his head, this hill would have to have been the largest turtle in the land. A mother goddess of a beast. He squeezed himself back into the wall as if he could melt into it. Had he disturbed a god? He stared at the levitating enigma wondering what he should do. If the sphere had special powers it could be useful to him and the village. The others would regard him as a benefactor, and so bestow privileges on him such as the choice food. There was the possibility he could undo his ties with Hanra and thus her wretched mother. He could have the pick of the young women.

Four of his children had died of wasting illness or pox. The village Elder had traded little Wrok and fat Zeira with a boy and girl from another village, and one was growing up with the matriarch. Maybe they’d let him have his son back if he brought home this sphere—as long as it held richness or good magic for them. He’d have to capture it first without it killing him.

Or maybe he should keep it to himself. See what happens. If some of the magic rubbed off onto him, he could be the most powerful person in the village—be the Elder, and start giving orders instead of taking them.

“Hey, sphere, have you something for me? No? Perhaps it is just as well I am not in possession of too much power. I prefer the quiet life. But it would help the village if you could rid us of the savages up in the north. The witch says we might be overwhelmed by the next wet season—our village and existence gone without trace. Is that why you’re here? Are you our salvation or a witness? You’re not going to tell me, are you? I am unworthy.”

A faint luminescence in the sphere lit the cave. It reminded Oqmar of a ball of lightning of which he’d been scared witless, in his boat, a long time past when a fierce, noisy storm blew at him. The waves fought back, but overturned him, making him swallow the brine as he righted the boat and clambered aboard. The fiery miniature conflagration swooped on him then flew across the waters into the black horizon.

Maybe this one buried itself in the sand hills, and only now found its way out.

For all his posturing and pleas, Oqmar had the feeling the sphere ignored him.

He was just another grain of sand in the cave.

An enquiring yelp from Kur brought Oqmar out of his brain-hurting thinking mode.

"Come in, Kur, and tell me what you make of it."

The dog offered a short bark as it scrambled through the narrow entrance, and then bristled as, with a freshly-licked nose, it sniffed the air. Kur lowered his head while fixing the sphere in his best goat-herding stare. With ears twitching like a leaf in a breeze, Kur, emitted a low growl. If the sphere heard the menacing sound, it failed to show any reaction.

“Kur, I don’t think you should atta—” Too late, with lips curled back revealing cruel yellow teeth, the dog leapt at the sphere. Oqmar reached out in a vain attempt to grab him, but all he achieved was to stroke the animal as it flew past and onto the sphere. Horrified, Oqmar expected his dog to be eaten, swallowed whole. But, yelping in shock and pain, Kur slithered over the top and down to the sandy floor on the other side. The sphere hadn’t deviated a jot. The dog lay shaking, but alive.

Oqmar lifted it, cradling it like a baby. “There, you’ll be all right. My hand brushed against it earlier, and I too felt the demon sting, prickly, at me; like being stroked by thorns. We are not permitted to touch the moon’s daughter.” He talked comfortingly to the dog as if he knew what he was talking about. With his back to the cave wall, again, he stroked the whimpering Kur.

Convinced the sphere was not going to attack them, they both fell into exhausted sleep.

* * *

Oqmar awoke in fear, but it was Kur’s rough tongue salt-licking his face. The incoming sunlight had dwindled, but the sphere’s luminescence gave a blue candlelit hue to the cave. His dry mouth fell open when he noticed the sphere had risen to waist height. He had to leave before nightfall, not trusting Kur’s skills to fend off night creatures such as jackals while he picked his way home by starlight.

“Come, Kur, we’ll return at dawn. If it won’t let us touch it, maybe we can trap the devil. I’m a fisherman, and my shirt will be my net!” He pulled off his long shirt and stood thin and naked, considering his next step. The sphere should fit nicely inside the garment, but he had to stop it escaping. While he shivered in the cooling air, he knotted the sleeves at the top. Now the shirt resembled one of his nets—the gap at the neck too small for the sphere to seek its freedom.

With a hoarse laugh, Oqmar gripped the hem in both hands and approached the sphere. It hovered in its eerie blue glow—mocking him.

“We’ll see who’s the master now.” He held the hem with bent elbows at his chest, and then yanked it over the sphere. For a moment the glow shone dully through the shirt. Anxiously, he pulled his side of the hem towards him as if netting a large fish.

For another excited moment he’d thought victory was his. Kur barked encouragement.

Then he fell back clutching the shirt, but the sphere remained, implacable, imperceptibly floating upwards.

“What cursed magic have you worked?” Oqmar said, examining his ruined shirt.

The knotted collar area had disappeared leaving a neat elliptical hole. He fingered the smooth edge. He’d never seen a cut so precise with no raggedness. Neither was it burnt, it was as if the sphere had swallowed the part of the garment with which he’d tried to net it.

“Look at this, Kur. What will she say? I’ll be sleeping with you again tonight.” He slipped the remains of the shirt over his head but only a fragment of cloth kept it on his shoulder. He held it there with the cord from the wine-bladder, and grabbed his shortened goatherd stick.

“Let’s head for home, Kur. I’ll bring my net tomorrow. We’re not beaten yet.”

* * *

Oqmar ate his breakfast eggs faster than the time taken by the water hen to have laid them. But in vain, for Hanra had heard him creep back into the house clattering around to add bread to his breakfast. Kur too had given him away with exuberant yelps.

“Look at your shirt. No, the one you wore yesterday. If you’d torn it, why not bring both bits home? It’s going to take a boatful of fish to replace the missing cloth. I don’t see why I should bake a week’s worth of bread to barter for it. You’re the most useless mate in the village. Well?”

“I’ll catch fish today.”

“Our neighbour’s warthog would be of more use than you. And a better lover.”

Oqmar stuffed bread and cheese into his only other long shirt, but stopped short of taking the sour wine when Hanra stood in front of it.

“I’ll take a bladder of spring water today.”

“You can drink your piss for all I care. And Kur’s.”

“It will taste sweet when I think of you, my dear,” he said, relishing the amazement on her face at his apparent acquiescence. Once he had the sphere with its magic, he’d have the pick of the young women. It’d be Hanra drinking her own tears then. He fought the smile from betraying him.

Outside, with Kur trying to make sense of the negativity emanating from the troubled home, Oqmar shouldered his strongest fishing net, and said to Hanra: “See? I am going fishing.” And then, whispered to Kur: “But we’re going to catch a richer prize.

Yes?”

Kur barked agreement, but was clearly confused whether to take the track to the hills, or to the shore, where they always walked when with a net.

“Come, Kur.” Oqmar led the way towards the shore, knowing Hanra would know if he didn’t. A short time paddling would take him round to a bay where they could disembark for the day’s true purpose.

* * *

Laughing, Oqmar caught up with Kur after a race up a low dune. At mid-morning their shadows sought refuge in shallow depressions to their left. Although proud of his strength, Oqmar sat on the warm sand to let his lungs catch up. He smelt the tar in a blackened patch where Kur pawed at it.

“It’s not food. Here, boy.” He threw him some cheese, which gave off a stronger odour than the tar, though not as much as the dog. No doubt he gave off stink signals to the wildlife too.

Kur lifted his head to expedite sensory reception beyond the tar and already gobbled cheese.

“What is it, Kur? Yes, that’s where our cave is.”

Kur barked.

Oqmar squinted at the red sandstone hills a short distance away, in front of the misty-lilac coloured mountains on the horizon. He looked for telltale dust rising, indicating animal or human movement. Nothing. The stupid dog was barking at flies.

He brought the hog’s bladder of water to his lips. As he swallowed a glint low in the sky caught his eye.

With his right hand shielding his vision from the sun’s glare, he realised he was looking at the area immediately above his cave. The sphere had escaped.

He stood, and then ran with long loping strides towards his cave. Stopping before he reached the entrance, he glared at the sphere. Four men’s height above the hill, it had the look of an extra moon.

With Kur whimpering in trepidation behind him, he angrily climbed the low hill to its highest point immediately above the cave and below the sphere. He threw small stones that bounced harmlessly. He knew it was out of reach of his net. Walking carefully around the sandstone rock summit, he found the neat hole. The sphere had cut a chimney.

He stomped over to a fig tree and sat in its shade, staring at the sphere. He threw an overripe fig at Kur, who nosed and licked it distastefully, and then sneaked off preferring to find a tastier rodent.

The sphere obviously floated upwards so slowly he couldn’t detect the movement. “You beat me. Come back and allow me to snare you in my net. You are condemning me to a miserable existence with the woman from hell and her worse mother. Curses.” He gnawed a fig, including the tiny ants who’d thought it would make a fine feast.

As the sun rose overhead, the sphere inexorably climbed too. An earlier thought surfaced in Oqmar—the sphere had not been aware of him nor his dog in the cave. The magic sphere ignored everything except itself. It performed whatever task it needed no matter what was thrown at it. No yelling back. And yet it had two admirers, followers, who risked ridicule and humiliation to believe it was something they could have. Maybe he should follow its example. Play life like the sphere. Instead of reacting with sarcasm, screeched shouts or violence with Hanra, he’d remain aloof, follow his own path, and she’d come after him—eventually. He’d display the same patience as the sphere did. Perhaps their attitudes to each other would improve in time.

The sphere headed for the stars, but it had left its impression, and Oqmar, with Kur, still possessed their cave, albeit with added ventilation.

He waved goodbye to it, then had the urge to make his own impression on the adventure. He gathered some sharp stones, sticks, figs and berries. In his head lived an image of the sphere’s coming and going, but for others after him to ponder, he’d recreate it on the wall in his cave.

Chapter Six

Five days since the spheres emerged.

With headsets to enable the occupants to communicate above the mind-numbing reverberations of the helicopter, Kallandra urged the pilot to infringe National Park regulations and fly directly into the Yosemite Valley.

“I’m sorry Ma’am,” said the pilot, obviously in awe at flying two astronauts, but insisting on doing his job properly.

Kallandra turned to her French Canadian colleague. She fell in love with his accent and a little with the man, every time he spoke. “Claude, I told you I’d rather fly this bird myself. We’d be there now.”

“It’s better to maintain a modicum of protocol. It’s not a NASA chopper, and we are cashing in favours more than giving them out.” He ran a moist finger over his newly grown black moustache. Kallandra spotted his preening, and smiled.

“You’re a poser, Claude. Already dashingly handsome, yet you continue to add embellishments. Show me that weird tattoo on your shoulder.”

“Two pythons entwined in battle is not weird. And I’m not undressing for you, again. Derek will hear of it. Look, there’s the mighty El Capitan in front. It looks white with the morning sun.”

“You’re looking at Cathedral Rocks. Pilot, another kilometre, please. Oh, what’s your name? I’ve forgotten, and I can’t read your name badge.”

“Lieutenant Lester Cobden, Major.”

“Hey, that’s a great name,” Claude said.

“What?” Kallandra said, “Do you know a Lester? But Cobden is a great name, Lieutenant. Richard Cobden was a Victorian British politician making a real effort for international peace. Are you related?”

“I am, distantly, to one of his daughters, Major, but I know little about him.”

“Well, Lester, his genes are guiding you through life. You won’t be disappointed if you find out more about him.”

Claude quietly laughed. “Listen to you. I didn’t know you majored in British history.”

“I didn’t, but we had high school history projects. I stuck a pin in a list and pricked him.”

“Lucky Cobden. Hey, Lester where’re we going?” Claude said, as the helicopter veered sharply to the right.

“Excuse me, Sirs, I am receiving orders to turn back. This is a no-fly zone.”

Kallandra took a tired intake of breath, and then said, “Lester, tell them these two NASA astronauts have full access rights. We have the permits. Tell them to check it out with Colonel Dwight Disraeli at the Pentagon.” She winked at Claude. They knew that Disraeli would back them, if he could be found. He’d been briefed on the spheres the previous night, and was throwing a crisis meeting together. Five days since the spheres showed themselves, and Kallandra was eager to see any changes. She knew the Chinese had been investigating theirs, but weren’t releasing their findings. The Australians had cordoned theirs, as had the others but the Aboriginals had raised objections to their Uluru being violated, so hardly any investigation had been accomplished. Locals had shot at the South African sphere to no effect.

Claude manifested his concern by pulling at his moustache, again. “We’re going to miss the meeting at Johnson this afternoon. I know your Derek will be there, but to be frank…”

“He’s a brilliant designer, and engineer. OK, so his backbone’s somewhere in a left luggage locker, but so far no one has been close up to two of these spheres to check similarities.

“Lester, you see El Capitan, now, and oh my God.”

El Capitan had a proud right-angled cliff-top appearance, which had disintegrated. Floating above it was a twin sphere to the one at Glastonbury. The sun glinted off the silvery chrome ball that had no turf or earth clinging, but then maybe the other one didn’t by now.

Only the pilot seemed unmoved, but Kallandra knew he’d be worrying about being chased away or worse.

“Lester, operate the cameras and range-finding computer, I have a feeling this beast is larger than the Glastonbury sphere.”

“It could be perspective,” Claude said. “This one is higher. Voila, If you still want to get an up close and personal, there’s a clearing at two o’clock, but too rock-strewn to land.”

The increasingly panicky pilot hovered at jumping off height, and after his passengers leapt, flew to a safe distance out of the no-fly zone to await their pickup signal.

Kallandra had an eerie sense of déjà vu as she stood five hundred metres from the sphere hovering thirty metres above the ground. The landscape, too, looked familiar. The grey limestone rocks had clearly been subjected to upheaval with large fissures running from the crater. Trees further down the slope had either been uprooted by ground movement or smashed down by avalanches. A mass exodus of insects and other fauna had emptied the immediate area of wildlife. She couldn’t see any birds.

Once the helicopter left, the only sounds she could hear were of streams—the remnant of the Horsetail Falls that used to cascade down the face of the monumental rock. She picked her way through the rock-field. She knew Claude would have urged caution, but also that he’d know she’d know, so he didn’t. So much cleverer than Derek, in so many ways.

Without admonition, she approached the edge of the sphere’s exit void. The limestone looked as if the sphere had polished the vertical circular wall on its way up.

Although the sky darkened with increasing cloud cover, she could see down tens of metres, but it seemed endless. The air was cool and thick with silence. She knew it was illogical to have bottomless pits, and supposed a team would soon be sending a remote camera down. Knowing which strata from where the sphere originated would give them its age. She had the urge to abseil, but had no rope.

“If you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you,” said Claude, having picked his way through the rocks to her side.

“You’ve been reading Nietzsche again.”

“Nevertheless, mademoiselle, do you feel the void working on your mind to draw you in?”

“No, Claude. I’ve seen holes before, but what’s creeping me out is being this close to that levitating sphere.”

“I keep ducking, even though it’s higher than a five storey block. And is that static I feel?”

“I felt tingling sensations when close to the Glastonbury sphere, too.”

She held up a hand for silence. Claude obeyed but the streams and occasional rock cascade ignored her. “I can’t hear any buzzing, or engine noise,” she said.

“Could you at Glastonbury? I don’t recall you mentioning it in your reports.”

“No, but…”

“But you thought you might’ve missed it. Did you set up wide-frequency ranging sound recording gear to pick up the sounds humans can’t hear?”

“Sure, but it picked up too much background noise. I left a Lieutenant Gifford there, requisitioning more directional mikes. It’s true to say that dogs ran off, going berserk. As did Derek, but at least he came back for me.”

“Of course he did, Kallandra.” He gave her a hug, and she gently pushed him off.

He continued, “Maybe the sphere is emitting keep away noises, but we can’t hear them. Did the Glastonbury sphere look out of focus, like this one?”

“It might be because it’s vibrating. I can imagine that would help it through the rock, but not through the atmosphere. I wonder what’s making it rise?”

“That fuzziness could be from infrasound. It could be vibrating at less than twenty-five Hertz—you know, like movie frames?”

“I’ll send Gifford a message—it’ll be midnight over there now. Oh, a reply—darn it, auto response. Claude, I think you’re on the button with the blurred affect. It’s known that infrasound can make many people feel uneasy, even nauseous.”

“Ah, you mean the brown note? Seven Hertz? I thought that was an urban myth, but maybe no one has tested it with a weird giant sphere as the source.”

“Hey, good man Gifford is awake and busy,” Kallandra said, dabbing at her iPaq.

“There you go. There are a variety of frequencies coming from the sphere including infrasound at eleven Hertz and a bunch of high ones we can’t hear.”

“Maybe they’re communicating with whales—scrub that thought. But, Kal, it’s ironic that humans might be one of the few species of animals that cannot hear the very low and very high sounds being sung by the spheres.”

She cupped her ears, but it made no difference. “I wouldn’t assume that the sounds are anything but noises from its internal machines or the effect of the vibrations.

It would be like you trying to understand what a bicycle is saying when all it’s doing is recklessly negotiating a steep bend.”

They laughed, took photographs, and then ventured a little closer. Kallandra would have liked to stand underneath the sphere but for the deep hole. “Because the other one was at ground level I was very close. Probes cold-melted when pressed into the surface, yet stones bounced off. I had a definite feeling it was animate, or something sentient was inside. I can’t explain it, but maybe it was the infrasound interfering with my insides. I can’t see any markings, can you?”

“Were there some at Glastonbury?”

“It had too much debris on it. This one’s much cleaner. It’s remarkably smooth.

I can see the landscape, including us in it, but like in a fairground hall of mirrors.”

“Kal, why isn’t the military pointing their best artillery at this apparition? I expected to have to flash our permits at bayonets every few metres.”

“I reckon our chopper flew over roadblocks and dug-in troops in the trees. And you know that there will be missiles aimed at our sphere from over the horizon.”

“It’s our sphere now? Has it captured your heart, Kallandra, mon cherie?” His moustache, along with his mouth, danced with mirth.

“Don’t be soft. Apart from re-sculpturing a few landmarks they haven’t done any harm have they?”

“They’re not just rocky outcrops, they all seem to have been heritage sites, mostly of a spiritual significance to indigenous peoples. I did a bit of web-based archaeology and the Shoshone have been here for thousands of years. They’ll consider destroying their centrepiece a sacrilegious act.”

“Or, they might believe their gods have reached a stage where the sphere has to be released.”

“And do you believe that, Kal?”

“Behave yourself—you and I know this must be an alien artefact. The interesting point is whether they chose to insert, or grow them in sites of spiritualinterest, or…”

“Whether their presence created emanations such as infrasound that made early people believe those sites were sacred.”

“Exactly. But, Claude, there’s more. Why are the spheres only in these areas of relatively minor beliefs, and not in the crucible of Judaism, Muslim and Christianity?”

“Buddhism is major, and a sphere has emerged from one of their sacred mountains in China.”

“True, Huashan Mountain, but was it a spiritual site before Buddha?”

“If spheres were below ground in the Middle East then they would have been damaged by the tectonic upheaval with earthquakes and all the mountain ranges there are volcanic. Kallandra, we are mere observers. Maybe whoever designed them might have thousands of spheres boring their way up through the Earth’s crust as we speak.”

“That’s a bizarre, and scary, image. But let’s stick with the little facts we know.

For example, the spheres seem to create tectonic disturbances on a local scale—mini-earthquakes, and avalanches, yet the holes they make are smoothly cut.”

“Without all the seismic and geochemistry data, we are only hypothesising, but my guess is that pressure release underground can cause all sorts of reactions in the rocks.” He looked at the sky. “Kal, that cumulus cloud is getting bigger and ominously darker.”

“If you mean we’re going to get wet, why can’t you just say so?” She poked him in the ribs, then realized the ground was too fissured, and rocky to play catch me. He grabbed her arms to prevent more teasing. Laughing, she caught a whiff of his Armani men’s fragrance.

Derek would have rather died than wear men’s perfume, with the exception of manly sports deodorant. But Claude’s French half enjoyed splashing out in an extravaganza of continental aromas. She’d discounted the rumoured efficacy of pheromones and perfume, but had to admit to being stirred in the right places when in his proximity. She risked a glance at his brown eyes just as he put a warm arm around her.

“Oops, I thought you were falling,” he said, but he didn’t let go. Her cheek brushed his chest making her knees weaken. Resistance was needed, but she’d put it on hold, wondering fleetingly how Derek would react if she confessed that their lacklustre but steady relationship was history. She shook her head, to clear hormonal cobwebs. What was she thinking? Maybe the awesome situation with the sphere had affected her biological judgement.

“Hey, that cloud is leaking. We’d better call Lester for our lift.”

Claude reached into his camera pouch and retrieved a zoom lens for the camera.

Kallandra realised his intention.

“Excellent. I wonder how the sphere will react to rain. Will the drops be absorbed or be repelled?”

“I think it will act like any other metallic sphere but, since it can absorb objects, anything goes until we know better. It’d be useful to see the angle raindrops bounce off the sphere.”

“Hey, there’s a curtain of rain cascading off the sphere’s equator. And my hair’s getting wet—damn, my curls will straighten.”

“Oh dear, you’d better tell Lester to hurry. You don’t want Derek pulling a face at your blue highlights shining through your gorgeous hazelnut tresses,” he said, and then after looking at her, “or your wet T-shirt.”

Unused to such flamboyant flattery she reddened, willing the helicopter to fly faster than light.

Like the seventh cavalry to her rescue, the reverberating noise of the helicopter drowned the sound of the rain bouncing off the sphere. She looked but couldn’t see it.

“Hey, Claude,” she yelled, “where the hell is it?”

“It’s coming out of the sun in the south.”

“I hope he goes around the sphere and not over it. No. No! He is going to fly over it.

“Major Harvard to Lester Cobden—do NOT fly directly over the sphere! Do you copy?”

“Too late,” Claude said, “he couldn’t have been briefed, and we were too exhilarated to tell him.”

They watched in horror as the pilot struggled to control the helicopter a hundred metres above the sphere.

“Can’t… ca… get lift. Unstable…”

Kallandra had flown helicopters and although she was more used to handling out-of-control jets, tried to help. “Lester, engage your turbo and veer starboard.”

“Control panel… dead.”

The turbulence over the sphere turned the helicopter vertical, nose upwards.

Claude pulled Kallandra’s arm to move further away. Their ears throbbed in pain at the noise of the screaming engine and the blades fighting to do their job.

Slowly, but accelerating, the helicopter fell.

“If that was an alien spaceship,” yelled Kallandra, “then surely it would fly out of the way?”

“Or engage a force field?” Claude said.

Kallandra knew a ship-sized force field didn’t exist in human technology. Ideas of magnetic repulsion flashed through her brain as the tail plunged onto the top surface of the sphere, out of their direct line of sight.

“Has it gone into the sphere?” Kallandra said, though she knew Claude wouldn’t know either.

“No, here comes the debris. Get down behind a boulder, tout suite!”

The helicopter’s rear struts crumpled, followed within a second by the sound of the engine and fuel tank exploding, bringing the awful noise to a crescendo.

Jets of yellow and red flames, black smoke and metal flew out from above the sphere. Like ejecta from a volcano, flaming incendiary bombs fell around them. Daring to look up no longer, Kallandra held her shoulder bag over her head while crouched between two large boulders. Instead of a diminuendo in the noise level it increased as further explosions—maybe the helicopter carried small munitions—and a minor apocalyptic hell plummeted onto the rocks. Sharp fragments: a painful mixture of metal and plastic shrapnel and rock shards ricocheted into her bomb shelter. She heard Claude’s yelps of pain through the percussion, chorusing her own.

Moments later the crashing had ended, replaced by hissing as rain cooled hot fragments. Distant thunder added to the drama. The two astronauts looked up from their sanctuaries and stood, surrounded by helicopter debris, although the larger pieces had landed on the other side of the sphere’s circular chasm.

With no need for speech, Kallandra exchanged anguished looks with Claude as they searched for Lester, or what was left of him. She glanced up at the sphere.

Hovering above the carnage, it was impassive. Nothing seemed to faze it, but then it was probably a machine whose task was to rise, repelling or melting any obstacle. If it could cold-vaporize solid rock, what chance had a helicopter?

Kallandra said: “Have you noticed a difference between that monster and a manmade metallic object when rain hits it?”

“Do you mean it isn’t wet? Yes, but the underside wouldn’t be, and from this close we can’t see the top.”

“But some water would dribble down under, wouldn’t it? Not every drop would fall off leaving it instantly bone dry. Even a Teflon ball would have a trickle around to the base.”

“I know you are employing distraction therapy, Kal, but let’s keep looking for Lester. I can’t see where his part of the cockpit hit the ground.”

Kallandra knew he was right. She was blocking poor Lester’s fate. She tripped on a loose rock and fell among tangled struts from the helicopter’s tail boom.

Claude rushed to her. “Kal, ah, you have quite a gash on your forehead, don’t get up.”

“I’d already had that, and the bleeding has worsened, but I’ve twisted my ankle, damn it.”

He helped her up just as the sun signalled the end of rain, and illuminated the sphere. Reflected light stung her tears.

“Damn you, sphere. You’ve gone from being a fascinating curiosity to a fucking, murdering liability. Let the army do their worst.” She sat on a boulder and let loose her own rain, her shoulders shaking. Claude had a comforting arm around her, and let her work through a few minutes of shock. He rummaged for his water flask and insisted she took a sip.

Through sobs she managed to speak. “Thanks, Claude. At least I’m still alive, unlike poor Lester. I’ve limped before. Give me your arm, you can be a crutch. Let’s find his body.”

“At least the rain’s given up. I don’t understand it; only half the chopper seems to be here. I’ve known of aircraft being partly vaporized when its fuel detonates from a huge impact but even exploded fuel tanks shouldn’t have disappeared the cockpit.”

“Which means…?” She looked up.

“That,” he pointed at the sphere, “has eaten it.”

“I’m not sure I can be surprised by what it does any more. But I still feel we have to look for Lester in case he was flung clear and is lying battered, but breathing.”

They circumnavigated the hole, and widened their search area. Claude sent a message to the San Diego airbase to inform them of the accident and was told it would be a couple of hours before another suicide mission was sent to them.

While supporting her, Claude looked at aluminium fragments, shiny alternating with soot-blackened. “I’ve been on grisly post-operation fuck-ups and there’s always bloodstained aircraft fragments, and lumps of people’s innards.”

“Me too, but there’s nothing of him here. We’ll have to extend the search. Just a minute, something’s different with that sphere.”

They stopped to look more carefully. The blurring of the sphere persisted but near the base was a small dark bulge.

“You don’t think the helicopter engine has fallen through the sphere?” Kallandra said.

“Merde, it is not the engine. Look, it’s a foot!”

Gripped with astonishment, Kallandra agreed that a naked foot was emerging from the sphere. There was no opening. The foot, then a leg. The other leg came out as if sliding from an instantly healing membrane. Before his torso emerged, Lester’s head appeared as if he was bent double.

Kallandra gasped. “He’s alive. Oh my God, Lester’s alive.”

“To think what he’s experienced; what he’s seen, but no doubt too traumatised to speak. The poor man. I cannot see him too clearly. Was he bald before?”

“I was thinking that, but many men are these days and I didn’t see him without his helmet. Ah, Claude, he’s falling out!” With a mixture of concern and disbelief, she watched as Lester drew out his arm and shoulder. It seemed only his back was holding him in the sphere. He opened and shut his mouth, but they couldn’t hear any words.

The instinct to aid overrode that of escaping the horror so they moved to the edge of the hole.

“Lester, can you hear me?” Kallandra shouted.

Only then did the pilot look in their direction.

“Help me! Oh, fuck, fuck…”

“Claude, do something. Quick, he’s about to fall.”

“What can I do?” He looked around, desperately hoping there’d be a rope or planking, but there was nothing but limestone rocks and broken helicopter pieces.

“For fuck’s sake, Major, help me.”

“Don’t worry, Lester,” Kallandra said, having had optimism drive her success in life, so far.

To their consternation and dismay, the pilot exited completely from the sphere.

The naked man appeared to hover just beneath the sphere, giving them all a modicum of cruel hope, before gravity took over. With flailing limbs, and his eyes and mouth wide open in a scream, he fell past them. He gave Claude a last accusing stare before plunging into the abyss.

They couldn’t watch. Kallandra buried her head in Claude’s chest, but they couldn’t shut out his long wavering wail. There was no sudden end: their ears merely couldn’t or wouldn’t hear after thirty seconds.

Kallandra had done many skydives and knew he would have dropped at least three kilometres into the hole. Maybe he’d fall forever. As a test pilot she’d cheated death more times than she’d want to forget, but she’d remembered each stomach griping moment, and in many ways, relished them. The adrenalin buzz was better than sex, better than the best meal, with no exceptions. She reflected that all lives were short, too damn short, and that kept her alive in dangerous situations. It sharpened her reactions, honed by an intellect that zoomed as high as her test flights. She’d argued that by working dangerously, she’d live longer because of her heightened reflexes and mental alertness, and no one dared to contradict her.

But the death of their duty pilot bothered her, especially one she’d engaged with in friendly banter, and then in the face of catastrophe, told him not to worry.

For long minutes they stood at the edge. She wanted to hit Claude for not whipping together an instant rescue construction, but then why hadn’t she conjured one up either? Some missions really were impossible.

“It seems that the sphere wants to absorb some of our artefacts, and our hair,”

Claude said.

“There’s no evidence to support any such thing. The electrostatic or magnetic and other turbulence above the sphere made the chopper lose stability and crash. Just because some of the machinery appears to have been absorbed is coincidence.

Otherwise you’re saying the sphere deliberately brought about the crash, when I suspect the turbulence relates to its motion. For instance it could be a gravity push pull engine of some kind, or an Alcubierre effect where space is being shrunk above the sphere while space is expanded below. I don’t know, that’s why I hoped scientists and engineers would be here investigating it. But I doubt it deliberately added some bits of helicopter to itself. And for all we know, Lester was hairless before.”

“Fair enough, but all this only started a couple of days or so ago, and the universities are on vacation. They and the government investigators will take a few days to get their butts out here.

“And, Kallandra, he might have been bald when he entered the sphere, but he definitely wore clothes and was strapped into a helicopter. Yet he emerged—forget the hair—minus the helicopter he was attached to. It seems that the sphere absorbed or accepted metals and other materials, but rejected live organic matter.”

“I suppose so. Claude, I’m thinking…” she said, dabbing a reddened handkerchief at her head wound, “that the blow to my brainbox is making me feel faint.”

“I only have cuts and grazes, but my head has discovered tinnitus. It’s probably all the trauma with Lester’s death-plunge, noise and minor injuries. Kal, sit down on that flat slab. We have to wait for the replacement chopper. It’s a pity we didn’t bring a flask of coffee.”

“You’d better rest too, Claude, and we should move further from the sphere. The Glastonbury sphere had emanations from its low frequency vibrations that affected us, so it’s a good guess they all do.”

“You’re right. Come on, let’s move away at least a hundred metres. Oh, my head—what?”

“You blacking out, too?”

* * *

“Hey, there’s a curtain of rain cascading off the sphere’s equator. And my hair’s getting wet – damn, my curls will straighten.”

“Oh dear, you’d better tell Lester to hurry. You don’t want Derek pulling a face at your blue highlights shining through your gorgeous hazelnut tresses,” he said, and then after looking at her, “or your wet T-shirt.”

She blushed, hoping the helicopter would appear.

A roar announced the arrival of their lift, but peering around in the sky she couldn’t spot it.

“Hey, Claude,” she yelled, “where the hell is that chopper?”

“It’s coming out of the sun in the south.”

“I hope he goes around the sphere and not over it. No. No! He is going to fly over it.

“Major Harvard to Lester Cobden—do NOT fly directly over the sphere! Do you copy?” As she uttered the warning she experienced a feeling of nausea, and a stage-fright unease as if she’d rehearsed those words for a college play and about to perform on stage. Then a disturbing flash image of Lester, naked and hairless, falling through the air made her squeeze shut her eyes.

“Copy. I’ll fly around the sphere. Major, I’ve spotted a good landing spot five hundred metres to the south if you don’t mind a hike.”

“No problem,” said Kallandra. She looked over at Claude, who was rubbing his forehead. Their gaze met.

He spluttered a nervous laugh. “You too? I feel as if I’m having premonitions.”

The helicopter flew overhead and landed in one piece, although it was difficult to see clearly as the rotors flung the rain in all directions. As they picked their way through the rocks, Kallandra slipped, but Claude had already put an arm out to support her.

They halted and looked at each other with puzzled expressions.

“How did I know you’d forgotten how to keep upright?”

“Beats me, too, Claude. That sphere is screwing up our minds. How far from it do we have to get to be…out of its sphere of influence? Hah!”

Claude joined in the relief of hilarity with the poor pun, and they continued their hike.

As the rotors whirred, the pilot emerged, feet first, from the cockpit. Standing, he removed his helmet, and then scratched his shining bald head.

“Hey, he is an embodiment of the sphere,” Claude said.

“Shush, he’ll hear. And stop laughing.”

“Hi, Lester. How are you? Oh, my, you are shaking.”

“Sorry, Major, I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I was all right until I came around this mountain and landed. I feel…I don’t know how I feel…dithery and like I’m coming down with the flu.”

“Lester,” Claude said, with touching concern, “have you always been bald—you have no eyebrows?” He fingered his own moustache in an act of self-affirmation.

“It’s the sphere,” Kallandra said. “Maybe you flew too close. Come on, let’s get out of here, and leave this beast for bio-hazard suits to deal with.”

Chapter Seven

Kallandra read the update note on her iPaq as she and Claude reached the pale green door leading to the Special Mission Meeting at the Johnson Space Centre, a day late.

“Mars Mission on indefinite hold.

Imperative you attend crisis-control meeting in Rm 426 at 10:00

Barringer”

“Good, we’re in time for this,” Kallandra said, while she made unnecessary adjustments to her hair.

“And only a day late for yesterday’s inaugural crisis meeting,” Claude said.

“What did Derek say about our Yosemite excursion?”

“Let’s say he wasn’t happy—I’d kinda only let him know we’d gone by text message. He was fine with it after I got home last night. What was your fiancée’s reaction when she found out you rushed off for the day with me?”

“She doesn’t know you were with me. Mon dieu, I value my delicate parts too much. Hah.”

Kallandra raised her hand to knock on the door, and then put her ear to it. “I can’t hear any talking. We must be the first here.”

She opened the door and walked in. The room was full of her astronaut colleagues from the delayed Mars Mission. They were quiet because apart from Colonel Dwight Disraeli, they were ploughing through hefty files of information. She could see pictures of spheres, maps, and pages of statements. Then she caught the Colonel’s baleful eye, and his beckoning finger. Like a naughty schoolgirl dragging her feet to the front of the class, she and Claude drew up chairs to sit at the desk opposite the Colonel.

“I have reports on you two, and they aren’t pretty.”

Kallandra attacked in her own defence. “What’s our visit to Yosemite have to do with the Mars Mission hold? NASA got a case of cold feet again, and looking for excuses?”

“Don’t butt in, Major. Obviously the Mars Mission is suspended while we have these damn spheres to fuss over. We were hoping to keep a dignified, scientific and level-headed corporate front over this, but you two have brought NASA into disrepute.”

“Excuse me?” Kallandra said. “How is being very early in the investigation of the spheres the wrong thing? Unless you’re referring to our overnight report and recommendation that bio-hazard suits should be worn by any investigators near to the spheres?”

The Colonel glared at her, then Claude, before flicking through a file. He then spoke quietly but increasing in volume until the whole room stopped to listen. “Not only did you commandeer a USAF helicopter without authority, you used my name to break no-fly zones, and most tragic of all, your lack of appropriate risk-assessment led to the destruction of a machine and the death of its pilot. Not only are you two grounded, but you could be on a court martial, possibly manslaughter by negligence.”

Kallandra and Claude looked aghast and confused. Kallandra blushed with indignation.

“You’ve been misinformed, Colonel. Lieutenant Lester Cobden was alive and well when he brought us back to San Diego last night. His UH sixty was functioning perfectly. What’s all this about, Sir?”

“It’s partly based on a call you made to San Diego requesting a second helicopter because, you said, the first had crashed, killing the pilot.”

The colonel, flustered, turned to his aide. “Check with USAF in San Diego. I want to get to the bottom of this.”

“Can we have a copy of the briefing notes, Colonel,” Claude said. “Not just to see what was written about us, but to catch up on what the spheres are doing.”

“And on the status of the Mars Mission training program,” Kallandra said, hoping she still had a place if and when it lifted off.

“Training is proceeding as scheduled—your leave, like everyone’s here, is cancelled. Pending the outcome of your statement being correct, you are still in the program along with the others. But the flight crew has not been chosen. And the go date is anyone’s guess now.”

“Sir, I hope my involvement, nor Claude’s and Derek’s, in the sphere investigation has jeopardized our inclusion in the Mars Mission.”

“Harvard, there are others here who did as they were instructed for this period of leave. Do you recall those instructions—the crucial element of them?”

Kallandra reddened, but didn’t waver. “It was imperative to relax without getting involved in anything that might bring NASA into disrepute. But—”

“No buts, Major, only your butts on the line for infringement.”

Claude tugged at her elbow in a vain effort to quieten her. She snatched it away, piqued at being remonstrated with when she felt they’d done nothing wrong.

“With respect, Sir, if a sphere lifted you up off your ass and threw you to the floor, and then down a hill, I bet you’d feel compelled to see what the hell was going on!”

Apart from a groan duet from Derek, sitting at a nearby desk, and Claude, the quiet room fell deeper into shocked silence. Before the Colonel could form a response, Claude spoke up for her.

“What our mademoiselle means, Sir.” he held a hand up to Kallandra, who knew that he’d launched himself over a line by referring to her in such a sexist way, though he’d meant it to placate the Colonel, “Is that your training procedures here work so well.”

Everyone looked quizzically at him.

“We are taught to be scientists, not just spaceship jockeys. To investigate rationally that which puzzles, and not walk away pretending not to notice. Sir, who better to consider the astronomical aspects of the spheres phenomenon than an astronaut on the spot—and one who’d actually touched a sphere?”

A gasp waved around the room, followed by flicking papers as evidence of his statement was searched for. Kallandra leaned to Claude—catching a whiff of spearmint, and whispered: “I haven’t actually touched it except with a spade—possibly.”

“Roll with me, Kal.”

The Colonel grumbled to his aide, then to Kallandra. “I’ll let your impudence go for the moment, Major. You might have a point with your valuable experience.

Laponte, to answer your question, the best people to investigate the spheres are properly equipped investigative engineers, and not expensive astronauts. Agreed?”

Claude stiffened while returning a, “Yes, Sir.”

The Colonel pointed them at the Mission schedule officer for continued training duties before he changed his mind. Kallandra swore with her allocation of yet more repetitive manual landing practice, while Claude laughed at his beloved Mars geological studies. Derek had duties with the engineering design team making modifications to the Apoidea.

“Derek,” Kallandra said, “You’ll have to go on the mission because someone would have to be onboard to continue designing it en route.”

He smiled at her assumption of his automatic inclusion on the crew, but then she spoiled it.

“After all, when the stabilisers start falling off, it’ll be your fault.” She laughed at his pained face, and then felt guilty. “I’m sorry, Derek, I’m only fishing for excuses to keep you on board with me.”

“I forgive you. I forgot, Claude said to be sure to meet him at coffee break.

Haven’t you two spent enough time together?”

“We are all in the same team, Derek. Honestly, there’s no cause to be jealous.”

“Me? Should I be envious of Claude? Just because he talks American with a French accent, is devilishly handsome in a weird kind of way, chases every piece of skirt—and catches them.”

“My God, you are as green-eyed as that Californian Senator whose wife tongued you at the New Year’s Party. You have nothing to worry about, honestly.”

“Her tongue, not mine. Anyway, that’s not the impression Claude gave me. But never mind, we have work to do. See you later.” He stomped off down the shiny corridor to scrum down with the other designers. Kallandra was convinced they had no serious designing work left to do, but in desperation to be on the mission, created work for themselves. She didn’t blame them. She pulled an involuntary pained face as she watched his left hand take a recreational break to his ear.

Moments later he called back to her. He approached with a cellphone clutched to his recently gouged ear. “Kal, we’re in really deep trouble. Blake didn’t arrive home.

He’s three days overdue.”

“Oh, and your sister’s blaming us. Tell her he’s probably shacked up with a Goth. Oh, make it a bunch of them, she might feel happier. And I suppose it would be good to know when he arrives.”

* * *

As soon as Derek was out of sight she called Claude on her cellphone.

“What the hell have you been telling Derek about us?”

“Ah, dear Kallandra, you are gorgeous, but you know I do not harbour longings for you. Derek simply misunderstood our brief conversation. But we need to discuss the report back from the Colonel’s aide on the strange message about the helicopter crashing.”

“What did it say?”

“Later. I’m overdue for my training session, as are you, and we need privacy to talk. Coffee time is in two hours, meet in the refectory, and we’ll walk and talk.”

* * *

Relief grew on Kallandra’s face as she and Claude took their coffee onto the sunny refectory patio. The atmosphere inside blistered with so many lines of accusing sight. It was as if the other trainees thought Kallandra was responsible for the enigmatic appearance of the spheres and the subsequent grounding of the Mars Mission. Derek, spared the condemnation because he hadn’t shared the Yosemite oddity with the crashed yet not-crashed event, sipped his coffee in the engineering designers’ clique corner.

“Go on,” she said, “tell me the report confirms we killed Lester even though he is walking around.”

“Kinda. It’s weird, Kal, there’s a voice recording at the San Diego USAF air base of me reporting Lester’s UH-60 crashing, and us needing another chopper being sent to us. I said it crashed onto the sphere and that Lester must have died.”

“We have no recollection of either that event nor of you making the call—right?”

“Correct, and yet it did happen—so…”

“It happened and yet it didn’t. But the only evidence that it did is the voice recording?”

“Not quite. Kal, we have no memory of Lester crashing, and the USAF confirm that the helicopter is in perfect condition. But Lester isn’t well. He has nightmares—the screaming abdabs.”

“About the alleged crash, I suppose.”

“Do you have nightmares since then?”

“Not as bad as Lester, apparently, but they have been weird. Up close to the sphere, and as if it’s calling me in.”

“I’ve had some, too, Kal. A persistent one has me reaching out to catch Lester falling, naked, out of the base of the sphere. I said it before, but you know what this means?”

“It happened. So, it was undone. Now we know nothing could reassemble a helicopter and pilot smashed to smithereens. So that leaves us with it happening at time X, that day. Only somehow time was rewound to X-30 minutes, or whatever. Then rerun as if the first reel never happened. Only it worked reasonably well for us, but not for Lester. Poor kid.”

“I agree. And that the likely outcome is Lester becoming a long-term patient in a Gulf-War syndrome wing of an armed services hospital.”

“And so will we, Claude, if we open up about this.”

“I can be the epitome of discretion ma petite fleur, but you have a tendency to burst your indignant righteousness on the world. Like when you attacked the Colonel this morning.”

Her eyes widened and her cheeks reddened. “We’ve done nothing wrong.” But then she laughed. “Oh, he can take it. You know Maureen, his secretary? She told me he loves the flirty S&M banter I assail him with.”

“Don’t we all, but I doubt he appreciates it so much in front of all the rest. Try to be discreet with the time and place of your vampire blood-letting in the future.”

“Agreed,” she said, opening her mouth and pretending to bite his upper arm, just as Derek came round the corner. “Oh, God, he’ll think we’ve been love-making again.”

“Pardon?”

“Derek, he thinks you and I are…you know?”

“Hello Derek, your gorgeous fiancée has been telling me how brave you were at Glastonbury when the boulders avalanched.”

“Ummph. Kallandra, they’re waiting for you at the prototype Apoidea hangar for another test flight.”

* * *

That night, Kallandra lay awake. Her lavender-scented pillow absorbed the overheating of her head obliging her to keep turning it. Derek softly snored beside her; a noise that comforted her with its repetitive predictability, and normally helped her active brain to settle. But the weird timequake and the inscrutable spheres kept her synapses busy.

She always slept with the curtains open, taking pleasure in the sight of the stars, planets and the moon. She’d flown the prototype Apoidea into space last month. At least she, and the rest of the test crew, took it above a hundred kilometres. The stars didn’t twinkle that far above the atmosphere, and the ochre-coloured Mars beckoned her. Supply and accommodation modules were already there, robotically assembled and in full working order, waiting for them.

She couldn’t vodka herself to sleep because she had to fly again the next day.

She lay on the rapidly warming pillow, stared at the stars and plotted a route to knit them all together. After the tenth star she fell asleep.

* * *

“Kallandra, bring me your intellect and spirited personality.
I am within many of your beloved planets.
In time take time while time lasts.
Your curiosity draws you to me.
You will be forever changed.
Blink and it’s too late.
Abyss dwellers shine.
Come here now.
Alight.”
“No!”

I am yelling at the poor pilot not to fly over the top of the El Capitan sphere.

There it shines in the bright Californian sunlight.

Is it rotating? And, if so, in which direction and about what axis? Another helicopter flies at us. It’s horribly distorted. Hey, it’s our reflection on the sphere. But why is it projected up in the air like a holographic display? It isn’t. And look it’s blurry, like the sphere. Proximity to the sphere doesn’t distort the image, but it does my mind.

The biggest problem remains: how am I to lower myself on top of the sphere without the turbulence over the sphere throwing the helicopter away, with me dangling on a line hurtling to the distance like a mad angler’s desperate last cast?

The minor problem of persuading a pilot to take me perilously close to the sphere depends on him being convinced I’ll survive sufficiently intact to be jumped on. I seriously doubt my survivability of this event so I feel simultaneous relief and guilt.

Maybe, if the helicopter flies far above the sphere, the electrostatic, magnetic or gravity waves won’t affect it. But there’s no need. I didn’t realise that the sphere’s invitation includes a free pass. Consequently, one moment I’m in the helicopter, a hundred metres from the sphere, the next I’m floating down—face up—onto its north pole.

I should be more than stomach-wrenchingly terrified, but I might as well be in a massage parlour anticipating a languorous experience. In full flight gear I sink slowly into the sphere, as if it’s made of a silver gel. My eyes shut as total immersion occurs.

A panic nerve jangles for a moment, but my eyes continue their refusal to cooperate: they remain shut—or there’s nothing to see, just as there’s nothing to hear.

What bizarre urge makes me do this? How could my famous self-will be so easily manipulated by this metal orb? Maybe I can swim out, but to where? Hell, I might as well benefit from this rare experience.

Soundless and visionless, I can feel the soft gel-like medium surrounding me, soothing me at a comfortable body temperature. There’s a sensation of falling through the sphere, but only slowly. Surely it cannot be composed entirely of a gel? There’s a slight metallic odour somehow detected through my mouth and nose even though breathing doesn’t seem necessary.

Should I be listening—reacting—is the sphere trying to communicate? I attempt speech, but my hello blubs incoherently. Ah, now I hear something, a low-level vibration. I’m probably receiving it from whatever’s making the sphere quiver. No, this is silly. I should be on the outside looking in, not within the very problem.

But there is a different sound. In between my increasing angst moments I hear a wavering high-pitch harmonic that sometimes meets the low sounds we think comes from the vibration. If only Pythagoras were in here, he’d know whether the musical ratios were right for perfect harmony—the music of the spheres.

I try to swim in the goo—backstroke—but without being able to see or feel movement, it’s like being in a sensory deprivation tank. But, no it isn’t. Something nudges me in the small of my back. Maybe I’ve bumped into a piece of this sphere’s inner workings, although I’m beginning to feel it has none. I try to move my hand to feel what’s there in my back but now I can’t move a muscle. It’s a kind of paralysis—it’s weird. I’m in suspended animation in a gel with my limbs moving slowly but to the internal pressures of the sphere rather than my own muscles. Ah, my back is all right now. But what’s this? Someone is touching the ends of my fingers. Who’s in here with me? Now my toes are being fingered at the same time—two others in with me?

Just a moment; how can my toes be touched? I entered the sphere wearing full flight gear; a green one-piece suit. I can’t tell if I’m wearing it now. My senses won’t tell me if my skin is touching this gel-stuff or my suit’s undergarments. This is so weird and yet I’m not as freaked out as I should be.

No! Whoever is feeling my extremities is exploring up my arms and legs. My stomach tightens with increasing worry as I try to wriggle any muscle. Come on you sinews, obey your brain. My developing panic must be causing perspiration to pour out of my forehead, but I can’t feel it. The fingers gradually creep up to my armpits, while others are on my thighs. It’s nothing like a massage, more an exploratory discovery.

The fingers that have now reached around my armpits and heading for my breasts feel like they belong to someone beneath me, while the upper thighs fingers ‘person’ is above me. I’m in a sandwich yet feeling their presence without any physical pressure.

Maybe it’s an illusion created by a robotic sensory device rather than humanoid creatures in this globular gel. Ah, the armpit explorer has found my breasts. That feels more like a human would: following the contours then an inward spiral gentle pressure until each nipple is simultaneously tweaked. They linger, continuing the erotic yet strange fondle. I’m both scared and aroused, but that wasn’t unusual with pre-Derek lovers. There’s nothing usual in here.

Now the fingers, and I hope it’s not another part of a male anatomy are creeping up my inner thighs and converge. Ah, something is inside me, and probing around.

Luckily the gel is like being immersed in moisturizer, but I don’t like this. I’m being violated. I seriously want out. I try to scream ‘abort’ but nothing happens. Another probe has just inserted itself in my butt! Has the pilot come in here with me? Lester is that you? Of course it isn’t. Lester is in the chopper. It’s not human is it? Good grief, I’m being raped, buggered and groped by alien jelly.

Struggling only results in the probes penetrating deeper. Squeezing anti-rape muscles doesn’t evict them either. This is fucking awful. Somebody stop them! They are hurting me now. My breasts feel they are being wrenched off, and the pain in my butt is excruciating. I think I might be bleeding—vagina and anus. Aaarrggghhh! Stop it!

I’m using every inch of my hazard training. After all physical means to extract myself, I block the pain. Damn, it’s not working. They’re pushing into me harder still.

Why can’t the bastards leave me alone? My face is as wet with tears as my ass must be from blood. At least that’s what I feel is happening. Sweat mixes with tears. I can hardly struggle now; all my energy has drained. When will I come out of this torture chamber? Stop it you fuckers!

* * *

“Kallandra, come on, wake up. You’re having a terrible nightmare. You’ve been restless all night. I’m going to sleep in the other bed tomorrow night—my pyjamas are soaked with your sweat.”

Her eyelids cranked open to see Derek’s disgusted look. She raised herself up on her elbows and looked around. A moment ago she was inside the El Capitan sphere, so how did she become transported to their NASA apartment at Johnson? It felt too real to be a dream, but Derek said she was here all night. But why would her desire brain cells want to be inside the sphere? Did her subconscious harbour ridiculous fantasies?

Her own pyjamas were drenched, but at least it was with perspiration. She had a quick feel under the satin, resulting in a smile that she was in as healthy a condition as she ever was.

Chapter Eight

Tabitha Wish heard the dinner bubbling and hissing in the kitchen, forcing her to abandon her tenacious viewing of the CNN channel. Her family, exasperated by her fixation on the spheres, must have conspired to be out of their tract-house to get her to vacate her chair.

“I know what you’re doing,” she shouted at no one, but possibly everyone outside the door of the newly bought home in Pearl, Mississippi. Her recent promotion didn’t pay well, but it upgraded them from an awful downtown apartment.

Before she left the living room, her nose involuntarily twitched at the aroma of roast chicken, and overdone steamed vegetables.

In the steam-filled kitchen she met three saucepans whose lids danced with uninhibited rage at being abandoned for so long. Peering into the condensation she discovered sweet potatoes gurgling at her in one pan, turnips boiling down to pot liquor in another, and a mysterious mishmash including Yellow Crookneck Squash and tomatoes plotting to escape.

“I’m turning it all off,” she yelled to her supposed conspirators. The first in the family to gain a degree, and still she was expected to be momma in everything about the home. The twins were only a week from being teens so they shouldn’t need their noses being wiped. Nor should her pop, who had taken on man-of-the-house duties since her rat-husband deserted after his Iraq duty. Not deserted from the army—that’d be understandable, but after he’d de-mobilised back in the States. Last seen in a New Orleans topless bar, she’d top him if he came near Jackson. No child support in money or any other kind. She might’ve understood if the medical report rabbited on about Gulf War syndrome, but she could visualize the testosterone-over-achiever making hay until money, health or suckers gave up on him.

Pulling a face at the lace-curtained window, in case any of the three playing hooky were peeping in, she sat back in her computer chair and logged onto SpheresWatch.com.

She clicked through the newly placed five webcams: Glastonbury, Uluru, Table Top, Huashan, and El Capitan. All floated thirty metres above their exit holes. Military presence surrounded them, too. From missile launchers to tanks, fire brigades with hoses at the ready in case the spheres or the landscape turned incendiary. Scaffolding was climbing towards them at Huashan and Glastonbury. She rapid read the scrolled text where scant details informed her of the need to probe the spheres, test their structures.

The El Capitan webcam had a friend; another variable camera that zoomed to the hole, and showed heavy-duty army vehicles. A third camera showed the progress of a remote camera and grabber descending into the chasm. The three kilometres deep shaft swallowed the clumsy, boxlike apparatus, but the floodlit image stayed constant.

Occasional streaks proved it was descending but the polished rock showed the same grey scene for forty minutes before the rough base was revealed. Sample drill bits telescoped out of the robot and started their work, while more photographs were snapped and X-ray and other emissions were sought.

With bloodshot eyes from zooming too close to the screen, Tabitha hardly dared blink. Her fascination would have bordered on insanity, but she was gathering data, too. Although plenty of front pages had blurted the unusual phenomenon to the populace, she, as a newly qualified journalist, searched for an angle. To make her breakthrough at The Clarion Ledger, and beyond, she needed to be the first to make a connection and get it out there. She strained to catch a slipped-out piece of information seemingly insignificant at one of the sphere sites, but paralleled at the others.

“Hey, Mom,” shouted Roma, “You’ve let the dinner go cold.”

“Sorry, daughter, you know how important it is for me to show those men at the office how we women are better than them?” She swivelled the chair and grabbed her daughter for a hug.

“It’s KFC again tonight then?”

Roma laughed as Tabitha tickled her. “No, it looked just about done. I’ll heat it up again in the microwave while I butter the bread. Ah, I see Charlie’s beaten me to it.”

“Sure I have,” said Roma’s twin, with his mouth full of peanut-jellied bread.

A walking stick came in horizontally through the front doorway, signalling the entry of Tabitha’s father.

“Hey, Pop, sorry to have left you with them, but—”

“I know, I know. Matters nothing to me. You get on with your studies, maybe you’ll pass them exams this time.”

“I’ve already passed them, Pop, it’s…oh, never mind.” She stood to belatedly sort the dinner when a Reuter’s tickertape item, scrolling across the task bar caught her eye, and then her breath.

“...Vatican spokesperson says the spheres are a warning to non-believers...”

Amazing, considering the Vatican works in centuries not in days. She hit her journalist’s link to Vatican statements, but that report wasn’t there yet. Good, that meant others wouldn’t find it either, increasing her chances of a scoop. She used her Press ID password to get into the innards of Reuters and found the source of the item.

She was curious how the Vatican would’ve thought the spheres favoured Catholics or Christians.

“Item # 3421DYS-39-Rome,Italy: 0910: 06:28: Sergio Califano, the Pope’s spokesperson, issued the following statement:

The phenomenon, known as the spheres, is a manifestation from God. They came from his Earth and symbolise a calling for non-believers to pay heed to the Church’s teachings. We must all pray for salvation. They are also a reminder to the faithful of His omnipotence. Earlier manifestations of the spheres occur in the bible as angels and balls of fire—this isn’t new. Nor are they aliens from outer space. We observe that all the spheres destroyed sites of heretical fringe religions, mostly from the ignorant past. No Christian site was violated giving us surety in the hand of God. They are the Light and Good.”

Tabitha saved the statement, but knew she had to find quotes from other religions before rushing off an article. This could be big, but also explosive if not handled appropriately. Her family weren’t Catholic like that Sergio Califano, but they were Baptist and she wouldn’t be at all surprised if they agreed with him. On the other hand, many Baptists she knew liked to believe in UFOs and aliens. But because this raises too many difficult questions with their religion, they conveniently don’t bring the two issues together.

“Whaddya think, Pop? Could aliens have the same God as us?”

“Damn Mexicans say they do.”

“No, outer space aliens.” Tabitha stifled a laugh.

“Sure, though they’d have to have descended from Adam and Eve.”

“So, any aliens out there, or here, according to the bible, must have originated from humans.”

Her father shuffled in his seat, looking for a forbidden cigarette. “Or they might be angels or demons, unless God made other Earths besides this one. I reckon not ‘cos it doesn’t say so in the good book.”

“It doesn’t say He didn’t, either. I wonder what the Koran says about it. I’ll go and get my copy.”

“Hey, girl, you saying you got a copy of the Koran in my house?” He mocked shock—Tabitha knew he was only a Baptist by tradition.

Part of her journalism course was on multicultural and multi-religion familiarisation. She couldn’t absorb it all, but she excelled at taking notes. She found a list of contacts, and sent an E-mail to a PA of the Grand Ayatollah in Saudi Arabia.

The trouble with E-mails was that they took seconds to reach their destination but hours or days for people to consider them. She started the article; left it to wash pots from the partly consumed dinner; did research into aliens in other religions; badgered the kids into baths and bed; and then bit fingernails waiting for a reply. Only then did she realise Saudi Arabia would have been past midnight and asleep.

Tutting to herself, she knocked off a so-so article on how the spheres were panicking people—using a riot in Alice Springs where thousands of aborigines wailed at the despoliation of Uluru. She leant towards the ‘fear of the unknown’ angle but, like many journalists, presented problems rather than solutions. Another riot had erupted in China but, although it was sightseers fighting to get a good look at the Huashan sphere, she supposed they did so to convince themselves of its existence, and therefore something tangible to panic about.

She couldn’t find any evidence of rioting or panic crowds at El Capitan. The army had sealed off Yosemite, just as the British had at Glastonbury. The latter had what appeared to be hedonistic rock festivals instead of woeful mass prayers. She dug up a few worried forum threads on the Web, but maybe because no one had died, general disbelief, and the holiday season on people’s minds, there was too little meat to feed her article. It seemed over-cooked with unnecessary gnashing of teeth. Her finger hovered over the Send button, feeling guilty for writing such nonsense, although most of it was kinda true. A light pinged on in her good-idea brain cell.

“Hello Minister? Sorry to trouble you late evening.”

“Who is it?” said the Baptist minister, sounding like this call was one too many.

“Sorry, I’m Tabitha Wish, my family has just moved to Pearl, but we did come the last two Sundays.”

“I remember, twins and your father. Do you have a problem that can’t wait, Mrs.

Wish?”

Tabitha had to think quickly. She was going to ask if he’d heard of people being worried about the spheres; people hoarding food and candles; more praying than usual.

But he sounded like he’d fob her off crying tiredness. She needed a problem not a mere journalist’s interview question.

“I’m really worried, Minister. I can’t sleep over it, and I’m afraid God is punishing us, which means my kids will suffer.”

He sounded tired. “What’s upsetting you, Tabitha?”

Once again, guilt gnawed at her conscience, which helped to make her voice quiver.

“It’s those spheres. I heard that they are a manifestation from God to remind us of our sins. But, worse than that, I’m scared to death I’m the only one that’s worried about them.”

“Nonsense, woman, many people are worried about them—well, concerned might be a better word.”

“Really? So others are panicking more than me?”

“You are not alone, Tabitha. But there’s no need to feel afraid. I’m sure the Lord is looking out for us. Come round tomorrow if you want to talk.”

“Minister, how many people have phoned you about them?”

“Why would you want to know that, Tabitha? What is this really all about?”

She’d detected a hint of suspicion in his voice. Surely he’d not know she was a journalist, although a few pieces in the Ledger had her name in the by-line.

“It’s me being silly. Thanks for your comforting words, Minister. I’ll let you go.

Bye.” She amended her article to include: “Panic grows as congregations flock to seek salvation from the spheres.”

Once again her right index finger lightly dusted the Send button, but a musical ping announced an incoming E-mail.

“To: Tabitha Wish of the Washington Post”

To:TabithaWishoftheWashingtonPost

She blushed at her audacity.

“Your request for an Islamic view of the spheres prompted the Grand Ayatollah Idries Taqizi to issue the following statement to the news agencies. He will use this statement on a TV broadcast to all believers in Allah.

With no doubt whatsoever the spheres are Jinn. Allah’s Garden of Bliss is filled with Angels and Jinn. In the Qur’an, the Prophet (salAllahu alayhi wasalam) has confirmed ‘The Angels were created from light and the Jinn from smokeless fire’. But, although Jinn are normally not visible to mortals, there are circumstances when evil has to be driven out. We note that all the spheres have emerged from non-Muslim countries and so conclude it is the evil in them that has driven the Jinn away. Their visibility indicates Allah’s displeasure, and his demands that those countries follow the true faith.

End of statement.”

Tabitha clapped her hands. She had two contradictory views, just what the tutors at university urged them to have in all good articles. In one, the Christians have the spheres as manifestations of goodness, and destroyed heretic sites. The Islam view is that they are the evil spirits in Jinn, and appeared in Christian and other non-Muslim countries. She knew this wasn’t quite an accurate representation of the two statements but that way made better copy.

This time she pressed Send.

* * *

Tabitha walked into the busy office of The Clarion Ledger the next afternoon expecting applause. Her report hit the front page of the paper, and by lunchtime had been broadcast nationwide, then globally. Having started her job there only three weeks before, she had yet to bond with the staff, but the hostile looks were totally unexpected. Were they envious of her coup? Never mind, she was destined to go on to greater things than their parochial existence.

An uncanny silence filled the room. Even the aircon forgot to emit its headache racket. The editor’s door opened. Roger de Griffe, a sweaty, middle-aged white man with extraordinary thick grey hair glared at her.

“Wish, in here, now.”

She sat on a padded chair facing his polished mahogany desk; an anachronism in that otherwise glass and aluminium office. Stale tobacco haunted the room from pre-no-smoking days. Or was he a secret cigar man? She wanted to pre-empt his attack by pointing out the success of her article spreading around the networks, but decided to let him bluster first.

“How dare you display such unprofessionalism in our name?”

“I thought you’d be pleased. What did I do wrong?”

“First, you hadn’t checked your sources. Second you distributed the article under our banner to CNN. Third, we do not engage in hysterical hype.”

Tabitha’s stomach tightened as she battled with responses. “I used the sources—well, my interpretation of them.”

“You should’ve passed your sources to me. I assumed you got it right, but the Vatican is now denying their spokesperson said anything like you wrote.”

“It’s substantially what he said—the spheres are a sign from God.”

“Yes, and the Grand Ayatollah said remarkably much the same thing, except you chose to emphasise the differences. Instead of promoting harmony, and inducing calmness, you’ve created panic where there was very little before.”

He pointed a remote control at a huge flat TV. CNN showed the waving hands of the president urging people to not panic. He said the spheres had not demonstrated any harm, his best experts were on the case, and they were most likely to be a hitherto unseen natural phenomenon. Further shots showed supermarkets whose shelves were emptying as fast as panic-buyers wheel loaded trolleys out. He switched it off. Tabitha felt nauseous as her crime sank in.

“Mrs. Wish. You have children, don’t you?”

“Sure, Mr. de Griffe, Roger. Twins.”

“D’you want them to grow up in a world like that?” He pointed at the now lifeless screen. “Where people are convinced the spheres are evil and about to kill us all.

Where emptying stores is just the beginning. People will stop going to work, wanting to spend their last moments with family and friends. No work means no power, no fresh water, no medics—need I go on?”

“You can’t lay all that on me. There was already some panic, my minister told me.”

“Oh, you mean your Baptist Minister, Mr. Michael Davis? He tells me he in no way recognises your reporting of his ‘phone conversation with you. Oh sure, some people were worried about the spheres. They are one weird sack of potatoes, but only a handful saw them as evil devils ready to strike. You put it about that if you were a Christian you’d better become a Muslim and vice versa. A neat trick!”

“Aren’t you blowing this out of proportion, Sir? Somebody was going to use the Vatican statement and the Ayatollah’s, sooner than later. I beat them to it. I don’t think I exaggerated by as much as you said.”

“What do I hear? D’ya think I’m making a scapegoat outta you? Well maybe you’re right and panic was on its way. But the chairman of the board found out you said you were from the Washington Post to get that Islam statement. Another time he’d give you a raise for your initiative, but in this case, he’s letting you go. In fact he said to tell you go get a job at the Washington Post.”

Tears filled her eyes. She tried to will them back but couldn’t. Sacked so soon.

Her father would be mortified. Perhaps she’d gone too far, but wasn’t that what go-getting journalists were supposed to do? Her frustration boiled over. She half-remembered a rumour about the chairman having several affairs.

“You can tell the chairman he wouldn’t know a good journalist from a lap dancer, or would that be below the belt?”

“In his case you could kick him below the belt and he wouldn’t notice. Listen Tabitha, I’m supposed to sack you, but take a week off instead. If this debacle blows over, come back. If it worsens, I don’t know, I might still want you back.”

Surprised, Tabitha finally accepted a paper tissue from his outstretched hand, and mopped up tears. “Why so generous?”

“Luckily, most of the intelligentsia ignored your comments, and the extremes of the Muslim and Christian statements. Others are in dissent or denial, because they’re convinced the spheres are alien artefacts. Sadly, it leaves the masses in disarray, but many seem to like it that way. Your stupidity and boldness reminds me of me when I was wet. Keep an eye on the spheres for anything others haven’t spotted, but let me know first, yes?”

Chapter Nine

“Claude, I have an urge to walk on the sphere—stop me.”

A break in training at Johnson gave Kallandra the opportunity to catch up with her Canadian friend. “I had a nightmare about being absorbed by the sphere and falling through it. It was weird, terrible, but so fantastic I can’t get it out of my head until—”

“Until you are purged by actually doing it? Mon Dieu, no Kallandra. What does Derek say, assuming you told him?”

“I had to, he was being thrashed by my flailing arms when he shook me out of the dream. Strange, because I was paralysed while in the dream–sphere.”

“Not strange at all. Your muscles are locked when in REM sleep, but as you awoke you probably lashed out. So, what did your fiancé say about your desire to enact your crazy dream?”

“I’m not sure. He just says it’s stupid, and I’d be killed, either from something weird, or by falling off it. But we could string a safety net beneath, couldn’t we?”

“We? Very amusing, but this isn’t a circus act. Derek is right. Kallandra, if you weren’t an antivivisectionist, we could throw a live rabbit at it to see if it’s injured.”

“Yeah, then interrogate it to assess its experiences if it survives. No thanks. And what mild electric or electrostatic charge might kill a rabbit mightn’t affect protection-suited me.”

“Well, I will stop you, you mad bitch.” They both laughed. “Did you hear that Lester has gone deranged? He’s in a psychiatric unit rambling on about having been absorbed by the sphere.”

“I’d heard. It’s also strange he’s lost all his body hair. There’s more going on here than we’ll ever find out. Oops, look at the time—we’re always late for briefings, and it’s about the hole findings.”

* * *

“Two billion years? That must be an error,” said Derek, when Colin Feubacher, a NASA geologist, gave an assessment of the age of the spheres. Derek’s outburst in the otherwise silenced briefing room met with nods of agreement. Kallandra, sandwiched between Claude and Derek, couldn’t get her head around the concept.

“Excuse me,” she said to the worried-looking man, whose skinny appearance made him a blur when he shook with embarrassment. “To clarify, two billion is the age of the rock strata at the base of the hole? But we have no way of measuring the age of the spheres.”

“I agree. It is an assumption that if a sphere cut its way out of a hard layer, then it must have been there before that stratum was formed.”

“Unless it cut its way down too,” she said, although she could think of no reason why the sphere might do that.

“That doesn’t seem likely, Miss, sorry, Major. The base of the hole is rougher than we’d expect if the same polishing effect on the sides were applied above and below.”

Derek stood to ask a question. “What sort of rocks have you found down there and how did you date them?”

“The oldest, at the base, are conglomerates—like a concrete mix of ancient sedimentary rocks and granites. We used radiometry and lead isotope ratio dating, which gave us two billion, plus or minus ten percent.”

Claude, smiling, also stood and turned to the group who knew he specialised in geophysics. “Two billion might seem a lot, but I’m surprised it wasn’t older at that depth.

There are four-billion-year-old granites in the Jack Hills of Western Australia. However, tectonic upheavals in the Sierra Nevada means that new and old rocks have played around with each other in the past, so they look like folded blankets now. So the age of the base rock isn’t a sure thing for the age of the sphere.”

Fran Hope, a young electronic wizard, stayed in her chair when she made a statement. “These methods of dating are not foolproof. They depend, for example, on statistical assumptions such as that radioactive decay continues in the distant past to the same regressive equations as laboratory short-term measurements. Contamination could interfere with the collected data, not just since sampling, but in the hole as the sphere rose, if it rose.”

The frail Mr. Feubacher stared at Fran for a few but long seconds. “Yes, Miss.

We are aware of the objections to those techniques by Young Earth Creationists, and others. We don’t say their ideas are wrong, but that we have presented our best conjecture to fit the data. Our highest probability view, given possible errors.” He threw her the partial smile that said: “I don’t want to upset you, but you’re wrong and that’s it.”

Before Fran could retaliate, Feubacher wisely rushed on. “Data from the Glastonbury and Uluru holes concur with the El Capitan findings. All three spheres seem to have originated below rocks around two billion years old.” He glanced at Fran.

“With the usual assumptions and caveats. We await data from Table Top and Huashan.”

An awkward silence followed as Feubacher shuffled his notes. Kallandra wondered whether he was waiting for Fran to object again, or had something even more startling to say. Muttering replaced silence as the notion of the spheres being in the crust for half the Earth’s life span sunk in to the astronauts and support teams. She turned to Derek.

“What do you think of the spheres being that ancient?”

“Preposterous. They’re almost certainly alien artefacts so that implies an advanced engineering race, either living on this planet or travelling across space, when the only life on Earth was bacterial.”

“Amazing concept, isn’t it?” said Claude, leaning across Kallandra to join in. “The moon then would’ve been so close to Earth, the tides would be over three-hundred metres high. There would have been hurricane winds every day, and—”

The Colonel clapped his hands. “Our expert here has more to add. Buckle your seatbelts. All yours, Feubacher.”

“I was going to emphasise that the two billion years is give or take ten percent. If we take the oldest possibility, that is two point two billion years ago, that puts the time frame to correspond with a particularly exciting event on the planet.” His papers shuddered in tune with his mounting exuberance.

“The moon being broken off the Earth?” shouted an impatient exobiologist.

“No, no—the formation of abundant free oxygen on the planet.”

Claude muttered: “That’s what I was going to say.”

“Ummph,” said Derek, as his hand on its way to his left ear was intercepted by Kallandra.

Feubacher was on a roll. “As you know, oxygen was the greatest polluter this planet has known. Anaerobic life forms died in their millions when this highly corrosive, and dangerous gas became important. Fossil records show that oxygen became sufficient to allow aerobic processes in the atmosphere just over two billion years ago.

This begs the question—”

“The spheres came to bring oxygen to Earth? Never,” said Derek.

“More precisely,” said Claude, “to engineer conditions to create oxygen.”

“It could just be a coincidence,” said Kallandra.

“You still believe in coincidences?” asked Claude.

“It’s just that I have a feeling. That’s all,” she said, not sure what she felt, and certainly not willing or able to broadcast her inner soul.

Feubacher hadn’t finished. “Oh, and the holes taper in the lowest kilometre to three centimetres.”

Gasps followed by murmuring rippled around the room at that news until the front table was banged.

The colonel wound the meeting up with another thought for the group. “It would be ironic indeed for the planet who had plans to terraform Mars, find itself terraformed.”

A laugh rippled through the room.

Before that ripple had completed its resonant ricochets, Kallandra’s vision blurred for a second. Her seat shuffled a few millimetres making her instinctively put her hands down to grab the sides. It was as if a micro-tremor had hit the room. She realised it wasn’t confined to her as many others had grabbed their seats. A premonition made her look at the clock over the exit, but it told her nothing. A crepuscular ray of sunlight sneaking in through Venetian blinds lit up motes, dancing more vigorously than she’d seen before.

“That had nothing to do with oxygen,” she said to Claude, loud enough for anyone else to hear, if they were sufficiently calm to listen.

“I’ve experienced and studied earth tremors,” said Claude. “And that wasn’t one.”

“I know you’re right,” she said, “but I only have a suspicion about what it was.”

“Spheres?”

“Of course, but what exactly, I don’t want to say at present.”

Chapter Ten

Face down, yet paradoxically with the wind in her face, Kallandra knew her night was about to be disturbed by another sphere dream. Determined to make her muscles work this time, she used all her willpower to lash out. More awake than asleep she raised herself on elbows to see that Derek had already sought sanctuary elsewhere.

Deciding a camomile tea would help dispel nightmares, she persuaded her petulant leg muscles to walk to the kitchen.

Instead of snoozing in the spare bedroom, she found Derek at the computer desk. The screen displayed a rotating Earth, with the spheres dotted. But even with a brassy-coloured image doing its best to please, Derek ignored it as he crafted in paper, scissors, and glue. Paper polyhedra hung from the ceiling by threads. A miniature solar system. Kallandra put up her hand to rotate an octahedron, an icosahedron, and batted a tetrahedron. Each represented approximations to the Earth with pencilled outlines of the continents. Each had six matchsticks glued at the points from where the spheres were departing.

“Is this playschool?” she said, giving the octahedron a playful tap so that it swung.

Derek laughed. With all the paraphernalia, he looked like a boy in a toyshop.

“That’s the one.”

“Right, let me guess,” she said in response to his enigmatic statement. “The Earth is really made of eight triangles, which in time have eroded to the present-day globe.”

“You must have noticed something odd about the geographical location of the spheres?”

“If you mean there’s only one per continent, we’ve all spotted that.”

Derek smirked and steepled his fingers. “Actually, there is a continent that is minus a sphere, but there’s more to their distribution than that. They are remarkably equidistant from each other. You’re not listening, are you?”

“Sorry, I was wondering what you’d stuck on the ends of the matchsticks. It’s not….” She thought earwax, but realised it was the amber glow reflection from the nearby screen onto the silver-painted match heads.

“Concentrate can’t you? Look, it’s too much of a coincidence for distribution to be equidistant. Especially, when we consider plate tectonics have shifted the crust such that all the present sphere locations were in vastly different places two billion years ago.

Whoever planted them had to calculate predicted crust drifting—”

“Not necessarily. We’ve seen how the spheres can slice through tough rock.

Suppose they’ve been stationary while the rocks flow through them since they were planted all that time ago.”

“Then, sweet Kallandra, we’d see tunnels going sideways like drift mines—oh, they would’ve melted and deformed since then, but it implies the spheres can withstand high temperatures.”

“That wouldn’t surprise me. I wonder what they’re for? They’re not big enough to be gathering minerals unless there’s a very rare one.”

“Perhaps they were adding something to the planet, not removing it. After all, Feubacher mentioned the origin of atmospheric free oxygen coincides with them arriving.”

“Yeah, Claude told me it coincides with the start of plate tectonics too. Was that a good thing: to bring us volcanoes and earthquakes?”

“Volcanoes added water to the planet’s surface, as well as gases. Anyway, I thought you had a completely different theory to the geological effects.” He picked up an octahedron ready as a visual aid for his next sentence.

“I do, but it’s simmering, not ready for consumption. Go on, where are the missing spheres?”

Derek looked disappointed. “What makes you think two are missing?”

“It’s an eight sided figure you have there, pretending to be the Earth. You have dots where the six spheres are, therefore—”

“I could have made a six-sided polyhedron.”

“Why can’t you say ‘cube’? But you wouldn’t because you’re fiddling the geometry statistics.” She laughed. “Go on, why not?”

He picked up a couple of paper cubes with continental outlines. “I couldn’t find a configuration for a cube where the spheres are near the centres of the faces. But for an eight-sided polyhedron the six spheres are more or less central. See?” He was excited at his discovery. “And the crucial point is that it shows where two more spheres might be found.” He turned the octahedron to show her a blank triangular face.

“South Pacific, and where else? Ah, Western Atlantic—hang on, no, nearer the Caribbean. You know what that area is known as?”

He nodded. “Bermuda Triangle. So you think a sphere down there has been sucking down ships and making planes vanish?”

“Derek, there are many theories attempting to explain the Bermuda Triangle.

We’ve just added one more. Interesting because the religious furore is partly because the spheres have desecrated ancient sites. We think the sites became sacred or special because of some influence of the buried spheres. That kinda fits with the Bermuda Triangle—special even if not religious. What South Pacific island has ancient religious significance?”

“Easter Island,” he said. “I haven’t checked the Web for one of the moai rising up into the sky sitting on top of a sphere. That would be a sight.”

“Ha! Floating giant stone heads. But if these two are coming out, why haven’t we seen them?”

“After two billion years they might have malfunctioned or couldn’t cope with particularly active earthquakes, or plate subduction zones.”

“Possibly. Derek, you have no sphere coming out of the Antarctic, ah, the sphere-less continent, or the north pole. Have you been fiddling the polyhedra to fit the facts, you naughty mathematician?”

“I’m a designer. OK, I do engineering mathematics, which means I look at the results and see how real life gives me those solutions. The only shape that fits the data well is an octahedron orientated with the known six spheres approximately in their face centres. I don’t know why they weren’t arranged so that none are flying out of the poles.

Do you?”

“I think I do. They are flying machines—assuming they are machines and not living entities. Without doing the mathematics, they probably need some spin of the Earth to take off. That’s why our spaceships don’t leave at the poles.”

“But their vertical speed is only eight metres a day. Surely the latitude isn’t going to make any difference.”

“Maybe not, but we’re travelling east at eleven hundred kilometres per hour while standing here playing with models. At the poles the speed reduces to nothing. But who knows, perhaps they don’t like the cold.”

Derek’s finger made it into his left ear before she could stop him. “Kal. we should alert NASA to scan the Caribbean and Easter Island areas. Perhaps the spheres are out of sight, under water.”

“You do that, Derek, I’m going back to bed before it’s time to rise. I’m off back to Yosemite to laugh as Claude, army engineers and UCLA Geophysics people pit their might against the sphere.”

Derek pulled a pained face. “I thought the Colonel said you were to go back to the training program?”

“Of course, though you could say off course. I am flying there.”

“Not in the prototype Apoidea? It’s not designed for prolonged Earth Atmosphere flight.”

“Cool it, Derek. The co-pilot, navigator and I are testing a modification to the flying suits. So you can knock another rivet in the Apoidea tomorrow. I’m off.”

Chapter Eleven

Shouting instructions to avoid the hole, Oqmar sent the eager Kur back into the cave. No wildcat screeched out of the entrance this time. He, too, felt uneasy last night when Hanra’s crone of a mother muttered incomprehensible incantations over a simmering pot smelling of rotting fish, while throwing him malevolent glares.

Now he looked above the hill and could just make out the spot of light ever moving upwards. The shiny orb that should have been his, its power—transferred to him—making him leader. His face twisted while ruefully imagining wild nights with the girls he could’ve had. That Emzeena, who had no sores, and Groch with those deep sultry eyes….

Kur barked a come-in call, so Oqmar followed his spear inside. The uneasiness remained, but tinged with expectation. Ah, that was probably it: he was picking up tomorrow. It often happened in advance of a storm; the hairs stood up on his neck.

Even the curled black hair on his head made an effort to point up at the sky. Flashes of weird images would enter his head—white monkeys playing with sticks on fire; silver bulls charged around at a terrifying speed, their legs rushing so fast they were a blur.

Sometimes it wasn’t some impossible vision. He’d see the northern savages coming down into the village, so they’d be ready for them. If only he could see the mad schemes of Hanra and her mother.

The cool of the cave welcomed him. But the inner sanctum was all wrong. The ceiling had a circular vent lined up with the bottomless pit beneath. Oqmar’s vision blurred for a second, making him stagger. He held out his arms for balance, being acutely aware to keep away from the well.

Kur yelped once, preferring to lie by the wall, watching the hole, then up to the ceiling, for any further spherical apparitions.

“There’ll be no more, Kur. That magic orb was our chance and it has flown away.” Rubbing his face to calm himself, he sat in his favourite corner, rummaged in his robe, and threw a chunk of cheese to Kur. It was particularly ripe, and with the sour wine, consciousness soon went for a walk for both man and beast.

* * *

Oqmar awoke in a cold sweat. Before he opened his eyes he detected a presence, other than the ever-faithful Kur, whose snoring he could hear. As could the stranger no doubt. His heart doubled its drumming in spite of silent instructions to be still. Faking sleep he surreptitiously felt for his goat-crook and closed his hand around the comforting olivewood. Slowly he eased his eyelids open. No one there. He felt foolish, yet his instincts rarely disowned him.

His nervous system told him that something else shared the cave. More, he’d felt this presence before, or rather the aura disturbance that accompanied it.

Slowly he stood. “Kur, wake up you useless lump of shit.” A worried canine eye opened, followed by a nose in the air, sniffing for demons, and finding one. With a whine, Kur slunk off.

“That’s it, no more treats for you today. Don’t you know anything about loyalty?”

As Oqmar watched the shamed dog’s tail dragging the floor a tremor blurred his vision. He abruptly sat in the cave’s gritty sand, and held his head while squeezing his eyes shut. This was no ordinary tremor. Outside, he’d seen the sand grains dance waist high while he hung on to the nearest tree. His head hurt, but he heard Kur growl.

Opening his eyes, Oqmar knew why he’d had a premonition.

A stranger lay asleep on the floor on the other side of the sphere’s hole. He’d not seen a human with padded out flesh, and it was white. The stranger had an odd attachment on his face. His face was pale, like the belly of the snake Oqmar cooked last night. The man’s robes were strangely coloured. An elaborate shirt-like green garment covered his upper body. Oqmar’s eyes widened when he noticed the stranger’s legs were wrapped in a blue cloth. His hands were white, and not just his palms. Maybe he’d been in a white clay bath like the hogs by the oasis. Oqmar was too afraid to get close in case this ghostly monster awoke.

Oqmar should run. But, by the gods, it was his cave. And hadn’t the sphere chosen his cave? It was the stranger who should leave.

His hair seemed to be made out of fine straw.

Oqmar, quivering, with his stomach yet again in a knot, moved around the hole while pointing his crook at the hair—perhaps it was a strange hat. By the gods, the stranger had extraordinary coverings on his feet. Were they goatskin? They were whiter than his face.

Kur, behind Oqmar, growled again just as his master made the stick reach the stranger’s head. He flicked his crook with the intention of seeing if the straw was really hair. The stranger awoke, screaming.

Oqmar fell back, and tripped over Kur, who yelped before running off. “Come back you coward.” Kur refused, but at least the stranger had stopped screaming.

Struggling back onto his feet, Oqmar shouted in self-defence, “I was only checking your wrong hair!” He patted his own head and, keeping the hole between them, pointed at the stranger’s hair. A thought hit Oqmar like a bolt of lightning. The stranger must be a Jinn! Out of the orb’s hole had arisen an evil spirit. Suppose it was here to stop the orb escaping, but too late, and now he’d be angry. He tore his attention from the Jinn to his only escape route. Fear tightened all his running-away muscles, although a working synapse told him escape would be futile. The fear won and he leapt for the cave’s entrance chamber, but Kur had returned and blocked the gap.

“Damn it, Kur,” he said, then turned when he heard a very human gasp. The stranger clutched at his arm. Only then did Oqmar notice a dark patch in the green cloth. The Jinn was hurt, therefore he was no Jinn.

Oqmar peered at the stranger’s face. He needed to see into his eyes, to read the person within. But the…the decoration he had wedged on his nose with what looked like round clear crystals made seeing his eyes difficult. But what he did see was a greater fear than his own. Eyes behind the contraption darted about; and he watched beads of sweat emerging out of terrified skin. Oqmar’s confidence grew in proportion to the stranger’s discomfort.

He pulled himself upright as tall as he could, even though he was much shorter than this giant. Gripping his crook tighter, he strode around the hole to the feet of the weirdly dressed man. He’d not seen anyone with surplus body, nor with such odd robes. He must be from one of the southern tribes. He’d heard the rumour of white peoples in the mountains but hadn’t believed them.

“Are you from the mountains?”

The fleshy man frowned, but looked straight at Oqmar, and opened his mouth, revealing perfect white teeth. He uttered sounds, probably words but beyond Oqmar’s recognition.

Gibberish, thought Oqmar. He knew far away villages had strange dialects but this one must have chewed too much dream root. The stranger rolled up the sleeve on his left arm. A cut oozed blood, proving his reality. Oqmar dug in his own robe pockets for the healing-plant leaves he always carried. In among the green furry cheese, he unfurled a browned leaf. He sucked up spittle in his mouth, spat on the leaf, and then held it out to the stranger, who shrank back.

“Good leaf. It will stop the bleeding,” said Oqmar, persisting. It was then he noticed the stranger’s fingers were not only whiter but also extraordinarily clean, and his fingernails had been bitten so neatly. He looked at his own brown fingers—part his skin colour, part dirt. His broken yellow nails hardly compared either. Nevertheless, this clean man was bleeding, and if it wasn’t stopped the buzz-flies would be a nuisance.

The stranger shook his head as if in disgust. Oqmar then knew this childlike man would have to be treated like a child, for his own good.

Oqmar called out, “Kur, tell me where you are?”

In the adjoining cave Kur barked making the stranger look over his right shoulder.

Oqmar leaned over and pressed the leaf on the bloody cut.

The stranger shouted, making no sense to Oqmar, who’d held the leaf firmly in place, in spite of the ensuing struggle. Oqmar smiled to himself. In spite of his disadvantage in size, his strength was superior.

After a few moments he withdrew his hand, and to the stranger’s obvious disgust, spat again on the leaf and found a home for it in his robe. The young man examined the wound with one of his very clean fingers, but he didn’t seem pleased about it.

Perhaps he remained worried about being lost.

Oqmar stood and then coughed for attention. He pointed at his own chest and said, “Oqmar, Oqmar.” Then he pointed at the stranger with one hand and held his hand to his ear.”

The stranger must have played this game before, because he nodded, and said,

“Blake.”

Oqmar offered him a lump of his grey bread and a piece of cheese, but it was declined even when Oqmar gnawed off the worst of the fur. He squatted and made ready to nibble some himself.

Blake rummaged in his clothes and produced what looked like a stick wrapped in a leaf, but too neat. He peeled it to reveal a shiny thinner leaf, and offered Oqmar a thin pink stick. Without hesitation Oqmar took it and after seeing Blake do the same, he put it in his mouth.

“Gum,” Blake said, pulling it out and back in. Oqmar realised Blake was showing how gum was to be chewed and not swallowed.

Oqmar couldn’t believe how sweet it was. He’d eaten honey and sweet berries but they were sour in comparison. With his fingers he pulled at a corner and stretched it out of his mouth. He’d eaten entrails that he could pull but not like that. He sniffed at it, but didn’t recognise the odour. He chewed again; much of his food wasn’t easy to eat.

Snake was chewy; birds often bony, and some insects wouldn’t stop wriggling even after swallowing. He again, took out the gum thinking it reminded him of the entrails of boiled white snake.

He looked at the grinning Blake who had both thumbs stuck in the air. Now the boy had shared food, perhaps he’d exchange weapons. Oqmar found his old knife in his corner. The sharp flint had dulled but the boy might not notice. He passed it to him.

Blake looked puzzled, but placed it in his clothing. Then Blake’s face contorted with worry and he clutched at his right hip. His hands clutched at his garments but he snatched them away with the speed of scared bats. Through the blue cloth emerged a small shiny ball—a tiny version of the one that escaped Oqmar from this very cave.

As both Oqmar and Blake stared in shock and fear, the sphere hovered for a moment, and then shot up through the hole in the ceiling. Intuitively, Oqmar knew it was chasing the other sphere. On his back he lay on the floor with his head and shoulders overhanging the hole, and then looked up. Through the dark hole in the cave roof, he could see the sun glinting off both spheres making them look like stars. Then they were one.

It blinked.

Winked.

Gone.

Oqmar rubbed his eyes, but only blue sky remained to mock him. Two magic orbs he’d had within his grasp, and he’d lost both. A low growl from Kur, entering the main cave at last, made Oqmar glance over at Blake. Like the first sphere, the man’s edges appeared blurred as if he was moving too rapidly for eyes to see clearly.

“Blake?”

“Aaaaaaargh!” Blake’s voice came through the air, but also shaky. Oqmar tentatively poked him with his crook proving there remained some substance there.

Then after an increase in frenzied blurring, Blake vanished.

Kur barked once.

Oqmar and Kur raised their noses as they detected lingering whiffs of that metallic tang they’ve associated with thunderstorms when lightning strikes rocks.

“He must have been Jinn after all. They come and go, but usually in the Elders’ late night gatherings after a few potions. He’s not here now, Kur, if he ever was.

Come.” He held out his fingers, which Kur sniffed at and curled his lip.

“Ah, you smell Blake’s food on my fingers.” Oqmar snorted a laugh, but Kur didn’t seem pleased. He sniffed the air and then, with nose to the sand, snuffled around to where Blake last existed.

Oqmar looked at the image on the wall that he’d scratched and coloured, with burnt sticks and berries, of the sphere rising through the cave and out. He picked a sharp stone and added a stick figure of Blake. He added a large stomach while he laughed at the memory of the only plump person he’d seen. He added big feet and then a tiny circle for the baby sphere.

Another bark.

“What have you found? Ah, his unused sticks of gum. Look, Kur, at the patterned wrappings. I’ve never seen any leaves like this. Do you think Hanra would want it?” Kur snarled.

“Nor me. Should I hide it in Kardinuta’s supper? I suppose not. Let the wild cats find it.” He threw the gum packet onto the sand for the future.

Chapter Twelve

El Capitan, USA

“No, Major, you are not passing this barrier, even if you are who you say you are,” said the army sergeant. He gripped his XM8 rifle, as did the five soldiers behind him.

“Sergeant, I was at the sphere a couple of days ago.” Kallandra sighed at yet another obstruction, but the officious guard was good at his job.

“Major, I have strict orders to allow no one, even if they could prove they were the president. In fact, especially if they were the president. It could be dangerous.”

“I could go over your head, Sergeant.”

“Yes, we heard about a chopper that got into trouble. Was that you, Major?”

Raised eyebrows indicated he was impressed, but his intelligent, steady eyes showed he wasn’t going to let her through. In spite of his obstinacy, or because of it, she liked him.

“OK, I understand. But soldier, two more astronauts are following me here.

That’s three from the Mars mission. Don’t you think you’d better ask your superior about us? We’ll be happy to be escorted to the site.” Not a sure thing but he nodded and spoke into his radio. She’d had to shoulder her way through a large crowd to get to this barrier. Her loaned airport jeep had to be parked among hundreds of vehicles in what looked like the Glastonbury Festival a couple of weeks before that seemed like years ago. Family picnics, religious groups on their knees sending missives to the Almighty for salvation, and New Age believers crowded the valley.

“Hey, Kallandra,” shouted a short black woman with vermilion hair. There was something familiar…. TV? Journalist?

“I’m not in the mood for interviews, Miss—?” Kallandra looked for cameras: she hated being on TV.

“Honey, don’t fret. I’m with newspapers not TV.” She held out a red-finger-nailed hand, which Kallandra shook briefly. “Tabitha Wish, The Clarion Ledger, nothing to stir you up. But I hoped to hear your view on the religious angle.”

Kallandra, looked past her for Claude, who was supposed to be following her.

She turned to the reporter, whose unnatural red hair grabbed her attention.

“I’m sorry, what religious view?” As a representative of NASA, she knew how to be guarded.

“The spheres. Do they represent Good, a symbol of God’s beneficence?”

“Um, how?” Kallandra was too scientific for such loaded questions, but had an inkling how to answer them. “Maybe.”

“Or, are they Evil being driven out of the Earth by God, to save us?”

While she floundered for an answer she saw salvation shouldering his way through the throng. “Claude, over here!”

They hugged and Claude overdid the greetings embrace with kisses. Tabitha ogled and then rapid-spoke into her Dictaphone. Kallandra dug Claude in the ribs to draw the journalist to his attention, and whispered, “Press.”

He picked up her signal and held out his hand. “Hello, I’m Derek, Kallandra’s old man.”

While Kallandra’s eyes widened, Tabitha shook his hand, and looked disappointed. She hadn’t a juicy affair story to break. Then she clearly noticed Claude’s name badge and pursed her lips in a knowing oh.

Before Kallandra could re-arrange the charade, the Sergeant rescued her.

“Major, your party is allowed in under escort.”

* * *

Five jeeped kilometres later they saw the sphere above the remains of El Capitan, again.

“It’s as high as a sky scraper now, why didn’t the engineering and physics people do their tests when it was easier to reach?” Kallandra said.

“When we were here, Kal,” Claude said, “they were preparing equipment. Whoa, there’s the heavy-duty boys.”

The army driver slowed at another barrier while speaking into his headset.

Tanks and missile launchers circled the exit hole, all pointed at the sphere.

“It must be scared to death,” Tabitha said, sitting in the back of the jeep.

“Hey, who said you could come?” Kallandra said, turning from her front passenger seat.

“No one said I couldn’t.” She smiled, but not at Kallandra. And Claude winked back.

Shrugging, Kallandra scanned the faces of the dozen engineers and scientists, both army and civilian. She recognized none. She turned to Claude.

“Why are there no NASA people here?”

“There should be.” He walked over to an army Captain, nattered, and returned.

“It’s OK, they’re over in that blue tent, preparing to launch the sensor-missile.”

“Right. What? They are not going to fire a missile at our sphere?”

“Sorry, to inform you, Kallandra, but it isn’t our sphere. It isn’t anyone’s.”

Tabitha thrust her Dictaphone closer to Claude. “Could the sphere explode?”

“I doubt it.”

“Anything is possible,” said Kallandra. “We have no idea what it is. Oh, right, we know it isn’t life as we know it, and not made by humans. They should be pointing all the other sensors at it, like at Glastonbury.”

The captain had overheard Kallandra’s overheated reaction, and came over. He saw her flying suit insignia. “Major, we’ve tried everything else. The sphere’s vibration varies between seven and eleven Hertz, just like the others, making us feel a bit queasy and accounts for the blurred look. Its surface temperature is usually three above ambient, and with negligible short wave radiation. No long wave emissions either beyond light—not a single radio transmission.”

“Maybe they use TV,” Tabitha said to the stares of the others. “What’s wrong with that?”

Claude smiled. “TV is just another set of frequencies in the same electromagnetic spectrum as radio and light.”

“So it is,” she said. “So, how do the spheres talk to each other? Semaphore?”

“Good question,” Claude said, “we’ll let you know when we find out.” He turned to the Captain. “It’s a par excellence question, bien sûr.”

The Captain agreed, and looked up at the sphere. “We can only test the range of emissions for which our science knows about. The spheres are non-magnetic, but we haven’t been able to sample one to test its composition.”

“How about the temperature differences,” Kallandra said, trying to seek ways to prevent them firing a missile. “Is it possible their variations are used to signal to an orbiting alien satellite? No, scrub that. There might be undetected satellites but the temperature variation would be too small and interfered with too much in the atmosphere.”

“Even so,” the captain said, “everything else about this phenomenon is unearthly too. How is it rising? What’s it made of? How did it get down there two billion years ago? So what’s a few degrees for it to detect? But I agree it seems too prone to error.”

“Could it be the way it’s vibrating?” Tabitha said.

“The vibrations make infrasound we cannot hear, but we can detect with instruments. It’s what’s making us all feel queasy. It’s called—”

“The brown note,” Kallandra said, remembering the British engineer saying the same thing.

Tabitha held up a hand, like in school. “Like whales? They can sure as candy talk over huge distances.”

“You might be right,” the Captain said, “but only on Earth—sea or air. Sound doesn’t travel through space.”

“We don’t know they need to communicate in space,” Kallandra said, “or if they did, they could switch to radio.”

Claude shook his head. “If they did, we’d be able to pick it up. They’re obviously advanced. If they want to keep their communications secret, they’d never use something simple like radio. But something has to be done by sphere A to be detected by sphere B.”

“But for all we know, they only exist here on Earth,” Tabitha said. “Lord, they might be one of God’s creatures we’d not heard about.”

Everyone laughed…except Tabitha, who slowly smiled so as not to look out of phase.

Kallandra’s cellphone chimed, obliging her to walk away from the noisy discussion. She saw it was Derek, back at Johnson. “Hi, Derek,honey, is our spaceship still in one piece?”

“Hello, Kal. I’ve news about those two locations I told our bosses to search. They think they know where a sphere might be in the South Pacific near Tahiti.”

Before he could give Kallandra details, a warning klaxon sounded followed by the start up whine of a rocket motor making her put a finger in her ear. Then she realised the implication. She shouted: “No!” into her phone before closing it, and ran back to Claude, who in the collision threw himself on top of her in the grass.

“For Christ’s sake, Claude, it’s not going to explode.”

She wriggled free in time to see the flash of the rocket as it shot into the sphere.

Although she didn’t expect any pyrotechnics, there remained the unexpected. Her stomach tightened and her mouth hadn’t felt so dry since she nearly failed to pull out of a dive a month before at White Sands. Holding her breath, she listened intently for any change in sound. The silvery surface continued its blurred image but the entry point of the rocket looked no different. It had healed itself. Her eyes looked at the wisps of remaining rocket exhaust drifting down before flicking to the sky on the other side of the sphere in case it had made it through.

Kallandra felt the ground quivering, bringing back memories of Glastonbury. But it lasted only a few seconds, sending a few puffs of dust into the air and a leaves spiralled down from worried trees. She noticed her fellow Americans had hardly blinked through it, their quake muscles already familiarised having reacted to the high frequency of tremors in California.

Elbowing Claude to allow her to stand, she heard whoops from a couple of soldiers. Thinking the sensors on the rocket had told them something new she rushed over to the command tent. The screen snowed.

“Nothing? Then why the cheers?” She looked first at the officers who stood looking foolish, and then at a corporal, who pointed in the direction of the sphere.

“We thought it would explode, or kill us. But It just took it in without so much as an oops.”

“Something did happen,” said the captain. Tabitha held up her Dictaphone, but he waved it away and wagged a finger.

Claude pointedly tapped at his watch, while lifting his eyebrows at the captain.

“Yes, Sir. Our computer went a bit haywire while I was monitoring the rocket launch. The screen blanked momentarily, but when it came back, everything seemed normal. However, when we ran the rocket sensor data through again, there’s a two- second gap, leading up to impact. Though a disappearing trick hardly counts as an impact. Consequently there is no data.”

Tabitha, annoyed at her Dictaphone having to be turned off, said, “You mean you lost two seconds’ worth of information. So what?”

“No, Ma’am,” said the captain. “We all lost two seconds. That computer, all the computers and time-related equipment show a leap forward, so to speak.” He stopped for a while to let the time factor sink in, but Claude and Kallandra already had a notion from Johnson.

Claude said, “We experienced time irregularities yesterday in Houston. Do you know if the time jump was local or general?”

“Well, that’s the odd thing isn’t it?” said the captain. “How could only us time travel forward? Surely observers at the edge of the time-field, or whatever you call it, would notice if we vanished for two seconds?”

“But we mightn’t vanish to them,” said Kallandra. “They might experience a peripheral disturbance decreasing in distance from us; a blurred vision type event. Hey, maybe that’s why the sphere is blurred. I wonder if it’s shifting time in increments but just on its fringes?”

“I don’t see how that would help the sphere move upwards,” said Claude.

“It might if it is skipping time while the Earth moves,” said Kallandra. “But I’m only floundering here, not making a reasoned hypothesis.” She noticed the captain had turned away to talk on his cellphone.

“What did Derek say?” Claude asked Kallandra.

“He said they’ve found another sphere. Or they think they have. I don’t know details. I’ll ring him back now.”

The captain beamed at them when he finished his call.

“Good news, we have a ‘go’ to use explosives.”

Chapter Thirteen

“Yellow Fin Tuna?” yelled the red-faced tourist, his riotous-red Hawaiian shirt bursting over his belly. “We hired this boat to catch shark.”

Charles Cakobao, the Fijian skipper and owner of the Crazy Motion stood his ground, which was literally difficult in the South Pacific swell greeting them that dawn.

His frown related more to his recollection of the calm sea forecast than to the American’s tirade. He took a slow intake of air, as if it was a long cool drink. Looking past the rich man and into the fair-weather cumulus skidding over the smudged horizon shape of Fiji he watched dark dots pinpointing other game fishing boats. No doubt their skippers faced the same tirade. Ready or not, he gave his speech.

“Mr. Addison, there is a moratorium on Shark fishing this season as part of the Global wildlife inventory. But we can still go after Tuna. They take just as much skill.”

“Ah, I get it,” said Addison, tapping his nose. “You want more money.”

“No.”

“Cash. Stewart, pay him another thousand.” A sea-sickly youth, wearing a blue and white striped jerkin that brought a smile to Cakobao, unzipped his money belt.

“No, Mr. Addison, I’d lose my licence. These boats carry electronic tags, and so do many sharks.”

“Then I’ll buy the fucking boat. Stewart…”

“It’s not mine to sell,” Cakobao lied. “Do you want to go back ashore, or shall we go catch fish?”

A disgruntled shrug from Addison allowed Cakobao to head his boat southeast away from the island. He needed the cash from these damnable tourists, legally, or he’d go straight back.

An hour later, Cakobao scratched his head in consternation. They hadn’t yet reached the spot where he could always guarantee lively fishing, but the sonar revealed a worrying phenomenon. He gestured to his engineer-also-waiter to come into the wheelhouse, without alerting the passengers.

“Jack, look at the screen. I’ve never seen activity like this.” They peered at blips moving to the west. Thousands of sea-creatures swam beneath them away from where the Crazy Motion was headed.

“You’re registered with Fishwatch, aren’t you?” Jack said. “Call them to see what’s happening. Or are we gonna try catching them here?”

“No point. If they’re on the run, they’re scared, not hungry.”

Cakobao used his Web connection to send his sonar data to Fishwatch. In return they fed data from other boats and satellites back to him, and added a warning.

Cakobao looked at Jack with a here-we-go face and went to the aft deck, where the four large tourists inebriated themselves on the complimentary beer.

“I’m sorry, folks, we have to turn back after all. We’ve been informed that there might have been a seaquake up ahead, so there’s a strong possibility of a tsunami.”

Addison’s face turned a deeper shade of crimson. “Hang on there, buddy. I’ve paid good money to be on this bucket.”

“Mr. Addison, money can’t control a tsunami.”

“It’s all balls anyway, Cakobao,” he said, looking past the Fijian at the horizon as if a dark wet wall was speeding towards them. “There’s no sign of any tidal wave.

You’re pissed off with me, and your pride is getting in the way.”

Addison’s young assistant called him from where he’d been sick over the side.

“There’s millions of fish, Sir.”

“So there is. Cakobao, why can’t we stop here and catch some of these?”

“Come with me, Mr. Addison, and look at the data sent to us from Fishwatch.

Look, there are fish and whales leaving the area. We’re only a hundred kilometres off the centre of the area they appear to be evacuating. What does that tell you?”

“You’re right. Something’s spooked them. And you reckon it might be a quake.

But that ain’t right either is it?”

He had to concede. “No. We’d have seen and felt a tsunami by now—even a small one.”

“Even so, aren’t you the least curious, Cakobao, about what’s alarmed these critters? I’m the hell am. OK, let’s forget the fishing and go see. Ah, I see you find something to agree with me at last.”

* * *

Derek called Kallandra back as she left with Claude to return to the Johnson Space Centre.

“Fish. Radar—did you know the spheres are invisible to radar? Sonar has tracked aquatic life leaving the area. Extrapolating backwards has given them a point of origin. A remotely controlled sub is being airlifted there.”

“Maybe that wet sphere had further to go. How about the one in the Bermuda area?” She was impressed that Derek’s impromptu globe and sticks model produced the right result.

“Too much background noise.”

“Or it isn’t there. Destroyed? After all, two billion years is a hell of a warranty period.”

Chapter Fourteen

On tiptoe.

Then a man, a Jackson newspaper editor called Roger de Griffe, was launched into the air.

A few more bits of debris tumbled after him and although freezing, he was shocked to see a woman in her seat accompanying him a couple of metres away. Her eyes were shut. Probably dead, he judged, by her blue pallor. He started to feel if he was sitting in his seat, but the pressure of the cold air wouldn’t let him move his arms from being folded. He remembered that he’d been walking back from the toilet.

A Barbie doll drifted close—its fixed smile helloed while a hand reached out.

Synapses roughly calculated he had three minutes falling ten kilometres, more if he flapped. Pushing panic away on the grounds it had no survival features, he wondered whether to hold his jacket open like a sail. But he must already have reached the 200 kilometres per hour terminal velocity so it would have ripped apart. Fighting wind resistance and numbed fingers, he reached into his pocket and switched on his phone. Were three minutes sufficient to say sorry and how much he loved her—or would it be too cruel? He texted: LUV U. But there was no service.

The debris drifted apart. Roger involuntary revolved and saw that he was about to overtake thousands of glass slivers. They brushed his face, a soft caress. It must have been cargo.

The sea looked no closer. The hurricane in his ears blocked out screaming and any explosions. Frozen numbness disallowed the pain of sucking in air. Surreal. He let his phone have its own trajectory; maybe it’d find a signal en route. Damn that Tabitha.

Looks like she was onto something after all...

Chapter Fifteen

Back at Johnson, sixty people had been arguing. A quarter of them sported military uniforms, a few wore their NASA apparel with equal pride. The shouting had died after Colonel Dwight Disraeli demanded they employ cogent argument, or he’d clear the room and ask the cleaners in to make the strategic decisions. Of course they knew it was a bluff, but one that brought their bickering into perspective. Even so, the Army Chief of Staff, Gibbon, made the point that the increasing time shifts would probably end if the spheres didn’t exist.

Kallandra was losing faith in her presumed superiority in arguments. The bullish military had made a powerful case for destroying the spheres, but all she had were gut feelings to hold back.

Derek, sitting next to her in the awkwardly hushed meeting room, leaned to whisper in her right ear. “Aren’t you going to protest?”

She stood and waved her agenda at the Colonel, who nodded at her.

“I take your point,” she said, “that these time decoherences have only occurred since the phenomenon of the spheres, but it might be like saying let’s put out a fire by destroying a box of matches—or the person holding the matches, even though they might also have a hidden fire extinguisher.” She saw blank faces and some leaning to each other, no doubt whispering ‘mad woman’.

She continued. “I see I made no sense to some of you. OK, suppose the spheres have something to do with the timequakes. How do we know they can’t put it right? Maybe we were going to have them anyway, and they are here to correct the situation.”

“You are in cloud cuckoo-clock land, Major,” said Gibbon.

“Fair enough, they probably aren’t,” she admitted. “But my point is, nothing is known for certain about the function of the spheres. If time was running along continuously when the spheres were inside the Earth, maybe that was what they were doing—perhaps inadvertently. Now they are leaving, the Earth-Space–Time discontinuities are returning to a pre-sphere situation? We just don’t know. I cannot see how, by destroying the spheres, we resolve our situation. We might be making matters worse.”

“Major,” said Gibbon, “how could it be worse than, say, if a timequake happens at a nuclear power plant, or a nuke missile finds itself in the air without its plane over LA?”

“OK, that would be disastrous, but it hasn’t happened to that degree, yet. The presence of the spheres so close to Earth might be preventing Time from becoming completely chaotic.”

“Absolute rot,” said Gibbon, to murmured agreement around the room.

“We do have a physicist among us,” said Disraeli, looking at a woman in a mulberry red trouser suit in a corner. She had her head down thumbing her iPaq. To Kallandra she seemed oblivious to the turned faces. Many of those faces had wider eyes, probably wondering why they hadn’t noticed the Sophia Loren—in her younger days—look-alike.

“Doctor Gabriella Avana is a physicist from Milan University, currently on a sabbatical, working for NASA.”

Kallandra smiled at her in a vain effort to ease the poor woman’s discomfort as, on hearing her name, she looked up at the sea of faces.

Realising she hadn’t heard much of the debate, Colonel Disraeli said, “Doctor Avana, what is your take on the time dislocations, slippages or decoherences we’ve been experiencing? Are they caused by or minimised by the spheres?”

Smoothing down her jacket, the physicist stood. Her Italian accent embellished her impeccable English. “The wave function collapses we’ve experienced may have been caused by quantum decoherence, or it could be that leakage into the environment has occurred. Such leakage from the total superposition of the wave function obviously—”

“Excuse me, Doctor,” said Gibbon, “can you put this into English?”

“I’ll try. Basically, the decoherences you mention are theoretical occurrences that could happen, for example when the system’s wave function becomes entangled with the measuring device. Oh, sorry. In the scale of normal experiences on Earth we shouldn’t experience the kind of time distortions we are familiar with for objects near the event horizon of a black hole or the changing relative time associated with very fast space travel. The fact that some extraordinary decoherences are occurring is not inexplicable in theory. It’s just a matter of selecting which aspect of which quantum theory you want to choose.”

“So, are the spheres responsible?” said Gibbon.

“I doubt anyone can be sure, unless you go and ask them,” she said.

Gibbon laughed while Kallandra shouted, “Yes.”

“Doctor,” said Disraeli, “the spheres seem to be not only ignoring us but don’t appear to recognise we exist. But is it possible that the presence of the spheres stabilised time until they started leaving Earth.”

“I suppose if, in some way, the spheres absorbed time decoherences while in the Earth such that time seemed linear and continuous to us until they left…” Her voice drifted off while she tapped on her iPaq. But shook her head. “I can’t say. The spheres, if artificial, are far in advance of us. Who knows what they know—and can do?”

“It is possible, then, for these time problems to get worse?” asked Disraeli.

“I’m surprised it hasn’t been already, if their leaving is creating some disruptions in time on Earth,” she said. “For example, the Earth is orbiting the Sun at…um—”

“Thirty kilometres per second,” said Claude, to murmured agreement.

“Prego—I should have known this audience would know,” she said and looked pleased for the first time. “Imagine then if the time displaced affected the whole planet and instantly pushed time forward for a minute. Instead of merely shifting a few metres onto your lawn when you were attempting to put a key in your front door, you found yourself a hundred and seventy three kilometres above the ground, or into it.

“Luckily, the affected time decoherence regions seem to be very small, say the size of a person or half an airplane. But suppose the Earth’s core was displaced. We could suddenly see it as a fiery ball a thousand kilometres away.”

“So, we need time to be back on track as it always has been,” said Gibbon. “And I think blasting those darn spheres might well do that.”

All whispering stopped while everyone looked at Dr Avana and she looked steadily at him.

“Mi scusi. Suppose, Sir, time was chaotic on Earth before the spheres arrived, and they somehow absorbed the decoherences? Destroying would be catastrophic.”

“Hear hear,” called Kallandra, but Gibbon, as the army Chief of Staff persisted.

“Why would an alien race come to this little old planet and do us a favour by keeping time in order? What’s in it for them?”

“Sir, I am a theoretical physicist, not a treaty strategist, but I assume whatever they were doing was for their benefit with no thought of any future life forms on Earth. I would further assume that merely absorbing time decoherences to make time linear and continuous here wouldn’t be their aim.”

“Are you trying to tell us those spheres were collecting our time? Why would they do that? And now that they’re leaving, they are taking our time bits and pieces with them?”

“I can think of another reason why they might have had an interest in keeping time normal here,” said Claude. “Who and what needs time to be orderly? Life does.

So maybe the spheres have or, sadly, had a need to keep life, started billions of years ago, ticking.”

“You’re not saying they are God, or Angels, are you?” said Fran Hope, the New Earth Creationist.

“I’m not, but you might,” Claude said. “It’s just a hypothesis. After all, it is beginning to appear that, without the spheres, life would have not been sustainable on a planet with time zipping about everywhere or everywhen. Instead of thinking of the spheres as being God, we might consider what you’ve assumed was the Creator, was really the spheres all along.”

As Fran stormed out, muttering: “Heresy”, Colonel Disraeli addressed the gathering again.

“People, we need decisions, not religious arguments or theories about what quantum physics might be.”

“The decision can only be to continue attempting to communicate with the spheres without trying to destroy them,” said Kallandra.

“On the contrary,” said Gibbon, whose aide whispered in his ear as soon as sufficient quiet enabled him to be heard. “The decision can only be to take them out so our planet can return to normality. And if those bastards have stolen our time decoherences, or whatever they are, we’ll have them back,”

“This is ridiculous,” muttered Kallandra. “There must be a protocol for dealing with communications with aliens; first contact and all that. Did you come across any in training?”

Claude shook his head. “There probably isn’t a protocol or, if there is, it was thought up in the sixties and long forgotten.”

“I suggest a compromise,” said Gibbon to the Colonel. “Instead of destroying all the spheres, which, if they really were being used to stop time being fucked up, leaves the others to do that job. Destroying one will show them we mean business.”

“Or drive them away without ever looking back,” said Claude. “And if we weren’t at El Capitan yesterday, one might have been destroyed then. Let’s keep aggression out of it s’il vous plait.”

The Colonel held up a hand. “It’s a possible compromise. I’ll have to put it to my strategic panel and clear it with the Pentagon.”

Derek leant towards Kallandra. “Do you think the President will say no to a strike? You know people who know him.”

“He’s not my country’s President,” said Claude, “but Edsel Cabot will agree to whatever Gibbon says. A function of him being too young. I like him, clever, and our first black President, but overawed—or so I’ve been told.”

“I agree,” said Kallandra, “but at forty two he’s only a year younger than Kennedy was. Cabot was elected as a rejection of Bush, although there are clever people at the White House who’d—hello, what’s going on?”

Disraeli had rushed back into the noisy room clutching his iPaq. His normal ruddy complexion had paled.

“Quiet everyone. Apparently there’s been a pre-emptive strike on the Fiji sphere.”

A moment of shocked silence was chased by Claude shouting out, “Who by? Or need we ask?” he said, looking at Gibbon—as did everyone else.

“Hey,” said the Army Chief of Staff, hardly concealing his delight. “How was I to know some maverick commander decided to take direct action?”

“Gibbon,” said Colonel Disraeli, “I’m in charge of the Spheres Coordinating Group. If I find you had ordered a strike, there’ll be trouble.”

Kallandra stood. “Never mind the posturing, what happened exactly? Has the sphere been destroyed, damaged and—”

“Available for our engineers to investigate?” said Disraeli. “All I know is that three aircraft launched six missiles, resulting in a mix of EMP, fragment and nuclear detonations. After which, the sphere appeared to be vaporized. I have an image of the fireball.”

Kallandra whispered to Derek, “I don’t believe it’s gone. Let’s fetch up a live satellite image of the spot—they’re all being monitored. Can you send it to the big screen behind Disraeli?”

Claude leaned towards Kallandra. “I know we’ve seen spheres survive and, Mon Dieu, ignore being prodded by sticks and sensor rockets, but do you think they’d endure nukes?”

“Claude. I reckon they’re above anything we could do to them.”

While Derek left to play with the relevant buttons, Gibbon continued crowing about the strike, which was clearly at his instigation. “I hate to rub it in to those who wanted to leave those time-stealing bastards alone, but that will show them we have the balls to take them on.”

No one had the energy or words to combat him until the satellite image flickered on, bringing more gasps. The date and time were current and yet the sphere was clearly shining, in place and intact.

Gibbon, in shock, stuttered: “I don’t understand—”

“Nor do I,” said Disraeli. “I apologise if I’ve misled this meeting. Can we replay the last thirty minutes?”

Awkward moments ticked by until his hand went to his earpiece. “There seems to be a technical problem. No, there it is.” The screen showed fighters approaching the sphere, but then they reversed—the time signatures showing nonsense as the picture disintegrated into pixels.

“Colonel,” said Gibbon. “I’ve had a message from…I’ll give you exact details later, but the pilots now report they never took off, but all are unwell—headaches. The jets still have their ordnance, unused. I can’t explain it.”

“It’s obvious,” said Kallandra, glancing at Dr. Avano, who shrank into her seat at the back as if hoping her corner location would protect her.

“Quantum time decoherence has only been detected in the laboratory and at atomic scale. It now seems as if a maxi time decoherence has occurred, especially if we have evidence of the planes being synchronously in the air and on the ground.”

Kallandra addressed her and the meeting, “Dr. Avano, I know you’ll not be able to answer this comprehensively, but before our military antagonise the spheres further, would you say repeated bombardments of, say, all the spheres simultaneously, would only make things worse?”

“We’re not letting inexperienced joy-pilots like you dictate our strategy,” said Gibbon to Kallandra, and waving an arm around the meeting as if appealing for support, but getting little.

“Gabrielle?” said Kallandra, feeling a small victory, but worried at what might happen if Gibbon went for all-out-attack on the spheres.

The physicist stood but fidgeted with her iPaq, and then looked at her audience.

“If the spheres can control wave-functions to affect time—I mean, if what we’ve witnessed isn’t a coincidence brought about by the nature of their existence as opposed to deliberate action—then I feel we should be very cautious indeed.”

Kallandra was fed up with the young woman’s hesitancy. “Doctor, you mean it might be possible for them to change the scale of the time decoherence from a few seconds to take us back centuries?”

A gasp from the others in the room enabled Kallandra to note with satisfaction that more attacks on the spheres would be impossible if that thought simmered.

“I doubt it—the energy required—”

“But not impossible?” Disraeli asked her.

“Very little is impossible in theoretical physics, especially quantum mechanics.

We could all slip into another universe equivalent to a million years ago, or the future.

And then we could—”

“Thank you, Doctor Avano,” said Disraeli. “Gibbon, you’d better attend a meeting with me in twenty minutes. I want details.”

Chapter Sixteen

A month later, near Alice Springs, Australia.

Rob Summers accepted the cigarette from his friend, Mandu, although he’d told the NASA doctors he’d given up in plenty of time for the Mars Mission. But that was on hold, and, in any case, the urge for the intake of nicotine was secondary to the need for a social bonding with the aboriginal leader of the Anangu clan that owned Uluru.

“It’s a bloody bummer, Rob,” said Mandu, as they swung on his shack’s porch seat looking at the rubble of Uluru in the distant sunset.

Rob agreed. “I used to enjoy coming to the hotel here—always paid the extra dollars to grab a view of Uluru and watch its glory shimmer from red to blue with all the shades between.”

“That was the Tjukurpa energy of the dreamtime. Our ancestors’ spirits were looked after by Tjukurpa, until….” Tears filled his brown eyes.

“Where have the ancestral spirits gone, Mandu?” said Rob, his psychiatric skills on auto, keeping his friend talking to work through the disaster. It wasn’t as if the abos could blame the White Man this time. They could point at and blame metallic spheres for the destruction of one of their most sacred places, but they knew any retribution moment had passed.

“The spirits have gone on walkabout, Rob. I tell you what, our ancients were right about Uluru being hollow, right?”

“Too right. Do the Anangu clan leaders consider the ancient spirit—this Tjukurpa—may be related to the sphere? Hah. By that I mean—”

“Don’t worry yourself. You mean the sphere must have been down there dancing its rhythms so that we could feel it. The sphere was our hidden soul?”

“Metaphorically, perhaps. Am I going to be allowed access to the hole tomorrow? I’ve been patient, Mandu.”

“Why ask? Them buggers didn’t.” He waved a fist at the Australian Army encampment that supported the engineers and scientists who’d examined the sphere while it was near ground level. The sphere had now reached three hundred and fifty metres and the human investigators had given up. The army remained, pointing their weapons and a residual science team listened with their sensors, but from afar since the Fiji time event, which remained worrying.

“I’m a different kind of bugger. You coming with me?”

“As long as all we’re doing is to take a gander.”

* * *

Although Rob wasn’t a geologist he’d understood that the spheres somehow cut their way vertically through any rock strata they found themselves beneath. He’d seen photographs of smooth sides, including those at Uluru. But the ancient red rock was friable. The structure had become so unstable the hallowed tourist attraction had become a rubble heap.

It took them two hours to reach what used to be the plateau. They’d gained very little height but the scramble over the newly crumbled Uluru with large friable sandstone blocks exhausted them. Curiosity drove Rob’s perseverance, and Mandu found amusing his friend’s need to know what happened to the hole.

“Are you sure your leaders won’t mind me climbing this sacred heap?” said Rob, stopping below the last steep slope for a breather.

“The spirits have left. Probably gone to Kata Tjuta. So Uluru might as well be trampled over.”

“Ah, they’re the rocks bigger than Uluru. Where abouts are they?”

As he stood to conclude their hike, Mandu waved his arm in a general easterly direction. Rob was a psychiatrist for NASA, not a geologist, but he was expecting a neat hole at the top, not the ragged crater they found.

“I don’t get it, Mandu, why should this rock disintegrate so much when, by the images I’ve seen of the other sphere exit holes, it should be relatively intact?”

“The spirit put up a damn good fight, Rob.”

“Of course, silly of me.” Rob tried not to be too flippant. He had a lot of respect for the ancient religions. In his professional capacity he’d witnessed Caribbean witchdoctory, and although the aboriginals here were more discreet, he knew of the power of autosuggestion with people getting better, or worse, merely on a spiritual leader’s say so.

While Mandu set off walking around the rim, Rob laid on a warm slab of ochre rock so he could look safely down the pit. He leaned over sufficiently to feel the seemingly polished wall. It felt like glass, but to his amazement he could see the bottom of the hole. Many small and some large rocks had filled it to within thirty metres of the rim. The vibrations must have opened up all the faults and cracks in the stone. He saw a cascade of gravel slither down the opposite rim eighty metres away. He felt connected with the earthy aroma, but he always did when lying on bare ground.

“Hey, Mandu, be careful.”

“Yeah, I noticed. It’s the bloody sphere making those noises. It’s disturbing the Earth.”

Rob looked up at the sphere directly above the hole. A perfect metallic globe over three hundred metres up. How could Mandu hear the low frequency noise that it emitted? When the spheres weren’t so high many people felt nauseous from the vibration but not when they were so high. It looked like a hydrogen balloon except it didn’t drift in the wind, just slowly rose. He aimed his camera and took both movie and stills at different settings. With the zoom he could see the warped reflection of the ochre rocks he lay on. Did the sphere know the ructions it caused? It would be ironic if it had no notion, no concept of humans or life on Earth.

One aspect of the reflected image of the rubble remains of Uluru made him gasp.

The exit hole had the look of a crater. Inexpert as he was, he’d seen hundreds of images of Lunar and Martian craters. This one had a deeper and more rough base than most but the similarity sent a shiver playing xylophones on his spine. The shiver tingled again as he tripped through a series of concepts resulting in the realization of the uniqueness of the images. Of course satellite images were available of the spheres, but not of the ground, including the holes, directly beneath. Oblique aerial photographs from airplanes lost the circular nature of the holes, and so his opportunist upward-yet-down-reflections of Uluru was special. No doubt others had photographed the spheres from beneath but maybe they needed the height to have the reflected crater view appreciated.

Of course the other exit holes on Earth were much deeper—the spirits hadn’t fought as hard, or maybe the rock was harder but, in time, they would fill. All the exit holes would look like craters, even if temporary.

He sent the image with an accompanying text message to Colonel Disraeli’s data-coordinator, Matt Stevens, and to the others most interested including Kallandra and Claude.

* * *

Tabitha Wish woke to her cellphone appealing for attention. Her budget was stretched to the limit but one of her backhanders had sent her some interesting pictures.

No doubt Matt Stevens blundered in his decision that crater-like photographs along with written observations from Australia were not a problem to National Security and so worth a few bucks. But they were gold in her hands.

She lay in bed with a silly grin, composing a breakthrough story that would rock the planet more than her religious-conflict report that led to trouble last time. But this was different. She’d gone freelance to rid herself of being dominated by do-this-that editors.

Deciding to make an early start, she threw back the bedcover only to find Roma curled up in the bed with her. A late night thunderstorm had driven the thirteen-year-old into her mother’s bed. Not that Tabitha minded. In fact it was great. Always on the go, leaving childrearing to her poppa, her guilt was assuaged only by the large but irregular checks for her exposes and audacious reports. What she lacked in accuracy she made up for in exuberance. She noted that Charlie, Roma’s twin’s street cred, had made him stay in his own bunk although he too was more scared of thunder.

Successfully deserting her daughter, after stroking her sleek hair, Tabitha fired up her laptop, copied the message and image from her cellphone and started research.

By the time she turned the laptop around because the morning sun made it unreadable, she’d hit the Send button.

* * *

It missed the first two editions, but by mid-morning The NY Times splashed the front page with:

“Spheres have been on Moon!

World Exclusive by Tabitha Wish

NASA scientists, studying the cavities left behind by the enigmatic spheres, have determined they are the same as craters on the surface of the Moon, and probably, the other heavenly bodies in our Solar System.

Dr. Rob Summers took the photographs on this page, showing the reflected image of the Uluru (Ayers Rock). Instead of the gaping deep hole he expected to find, the sides had crumbled in to fill it so it became a crater.

Measurements checked by NASA found hundreds of similar-sized craters on the moon. It would seem our spherical friends, who so far have only succeeded in desecrating the special religious sites on Earth, had already been to the moon. Why?

Perhaps they couldn’t find what they sought there, and came to our planet and found time. At least that’s the theory going around NASA at the moment. Can you believe it?

Nor me. Maybe though, they found essential stuff in the ground that now they’ve taken it, is affecting time.

I tested my theories by interviewing Claude Lapointe, 30, a NASA geophysicist and astronaut. He confirmed that sphere craters exist not only on the moon but on Mars and other planets in our Solar System. He should know, he was on the scratched Mars Mission. It makes me wonder if someone at Johnson knew all along about the spheres, maybe on Mars, and created a hidden agenda to go investigate them there before we were surprised by their appearance on Earth.

All attempts to communicate with these aliens have failed—they are not listening or we don’t know their wavelength. Trigger-happy chancers apparently tried to nuke the South Pacific sphere but that didn’t bother them either.

So, we civilians are subjected to timequakes. Mostly they are only inconvenient—even bizarrely cute, such as when we arrive at a bus stop before we set off from home. Annoying when the bus has already gone beforehand, but hey, the death rate is nothing compared to our soldiers continuing to fight ghosts in the Middle East. But when will NASA do something to stop these spheres before we are zapped so far back or forward in time that the Earth is a million kilometres away? No one hears you scream in space.”

* * *

Tabitha’s sigh stretched across the lunch table to her father, who gnawed an unlit cigarillo and growled at the copy of the Times thrust at him ten minutes before.

“Tabitha, this is crap.”

“Sure, Poppa, but it might be true, and it definitely evened up my bank balance.”

She leaned over and eased the paper away from him, before spittle dampened any more. She reread her article, smiling at her own mischievous words, which she knew would incinerate those more sensitive minds that hung on to the notion Earth was prime, and the spheres an aberration yet to be explained. There was bound to be trouble, but investigative journalists revelled in controversy—enriching themselves in the process.

Her cellphone jangled the keys in her purse.

“Tabitha, we’re in deep shit,” said Matt Stevens, Colonel Disraeli’s data-coordinator.

“Correction, Matt, it’s you who is in trouble, I only used information you passed on to me.”

“Information you bribed me for and that makes you an accomplice. There’s a big stink about who leaked the photographs to you and then there’s all your claptrap analysis. I bet you didn’t know there’s an item about you in Astronomy Now, wondering how you knew more than they did? I don’t recall sending you all that crap about the spheres having been on the Moon and Mars.”

Tabitha dropped her cellphone; partly because of her inability to grasp it while elated that she’d made the big-time. She’d become not only the writer of the headline story but the subject of the headline. What a hoot!

She gnawed at a knuckle to stem her hilarity and said, “You didn’t, Matt, but it needs a creative mind to take the dry NASA data for a run and see where it takes us.”

“Laugh at this then, Miss Wish, they want you for an investigative hearing on the leak.”

“Really? It’s a bit late for that—unless they want to give me more information.”

She heard coughing at the other end followed by Stevens, who said: “Doesn’t it occur to you that you might be prosecuted for illegally obtaining security data?”

“No, I’m totally covered—hey, I’m a professional journalist, ya know. I don’t have to reveal my sources.”

“Maybe not, but I’d be careful if I were you, Tabitha. Some, let us say, difficult people have had to take very early retirement, if you know what I mean?”

“Matt, are you suggesting I shouldn’t be fixin’ to come to Johnson for this enquiry?”

“That’s up to you, but if you decide to come, maybe you should be escorted at all times. Perhaps at other times, too.”

“Not my style. Send me the details for this meeting, and I assume they’re making flight arrangements for me from Jackson-Pearl international?” She waited for his response but heard only crackles.

“Matt, are you there? Come on you bastard, stop fucking me about.”

“…escorted at all times. Perhaps at other times too.”

“Just a minute, Matt, you said that word for word five minutes ago.” She waited again, but only heard more crackles and possibly shouting, crashing in the background.

Having experienced some micro time decoherences, or timequakes as she liked to call them, she guessed Johnson was experiencing one. Tabitha felt torn between concern for fellow humans, some of whom she’d met, and grateful she’d switched her call to record. If something really bad had gone down at Johnson, her cellphone evidence could be another headline. The dilemma of using tragedy to advance herself lingered for a moment as she rubbed her chin. It meant food for her kids; at least that was how she justified her journalistic intrusion. Besides, the old cliché, if she didn’t do it, someone else would, came partly to her lips before she chided the awful ethics it implied.

“Hi, Tabitha, you still hanging on there?”

“Hey, Matt, I thought you were all gone up there. Was that one of those time decoherences, or had you dropped your cellphone in the shredder?”

“Time messing us up again, but it’s back and forward this time. Whoa! We seem to be a having tremors too. I have to go.”

* * *

Tabitha played with the computer mouse with one hand while using the other to phone other personnel she guessed were at Johnson. Her stomach tightened when the Earthquake Watch website sprung onto her screen. The last time she pointed her cursor there, the red spots of daily seismic activity followed the usual Pacific Ring of Fire, and other tectonic plate boundaries with a few hotspots here and there. Nothing unusual there, as compared with Roma’s school Earth Science textbooks. Now it was as if the screen had contracted measles. Every continent and ocean bed seemed to have a rash of earth tremors randomly distributed. She adjusted the scale so only those with Richter Magnitude five were displayed, the level at which minor damage was noticed, but no loss of life. The red spots reverted to the normal pattern with a few odd spots, including one at Houston in the last ten minutes.

The phrase timequakes revisited her from science fiction movies, but they were not the same. They referred to aberrations in time travel rather than the physical shuddering and displacement of parts of the Earth as a result of one bit suddenly moving forward or backwards in time. She was sure NASA and others would know about this. A mere Mississippi journalist couldn’t come up with technical explanations, surely? She found references in the logs of NASA meetings Matt had sent her. If part of the Earth had stood still for a second, the rest would’ve been thirty kilometres further in its orbit around the sun. Clearly that hadn’t happened, yet. But something akin appeared to be affecting some parts.

Happy that she had sufficient pseudoscience to throw together another article under the heading: Are we in for more timequakes? she knocked off a few words while fresh. Her cellphone interrupted her, again.

She didn’t recognise the incoming number, but risked allowing the call. The house phone had been targeted by a few crank calls since she’d started her revelations on the spheres. Strangers from New World Religions would regale her with their views of what was really happening with the spheres, as would High School science teachers and local politicians. Others assumed she had inside information and really knew what the spheres were. She’d had a phone call from a toy manufacturer prepared to pay her for the rights to how the spheres levitated. The call she really wanted never came—a mission statement from the spheres.

“Hello?” She never gave away her name until she knew who called.

“Mizz Wish? Ted Williamson here, a commissioning editor for the New York Times. We want you to cover the latest events at El Capitan. My sec has e-mailed you a contract, and details where to pick up flight and travel arrangements.”

“Hey, hang on there, Ted Williamson, I’ve to be in Johnson…” She hesitated as two thoughts zipped through. What new events were happening with the sphere? And this was a paid job while appearing in front of an investigation at Johnson wasn’t, although it would keep her in the loop. She didn’t believe she was in danger or in trouble with NASA; Matt merely tried to frighten her off so she couldn’t point a ‘that’s him’ finger in his direction. But she only needed to be up-to-date in order to earn the bucks. Maybe she could do both.

“Sorry about that, Ted, the front door hollered at me. Any chance of you letting me arrive there the day after tomorrow?”

“No way. Something unusual is happening, as you should know, and so you need to be in Yosemite for us, immediately—no options.”

“In that case I’ll have to disappoint folk more important than you, but what the hell? Twice the usual fee, then, or you’ll have to find someone else.”

“We could easily do so, Tabitha, but your inimitable style has caught the public’s imagination. Agreed on double the fee in the contract, but I want it good and fast.”

Tabitha rocked in her chair, laughing to herself. From barely scraping one assignment a week on the local rag, to The New York Times demanding she work for them. A warm satisfied feeling grew in her stomach; a justification of the hard evenings of studying had blossomed. Her nose wrinkled as a sickly sweet odour, like synthetic raspberry, assailed her nostrils. A tug on her blue cardigan sleeve tore her attention from her searches for what had excited the editor over the spheres. The webcams seemed to be stuck on yesterday’s images.

“Momma.”

“Hi Roma, sweetness, careful with that lolly on my cardigan, darling. Did grandpop get that for you? Yeah?”

“Momma, take me to the pool today?” Eyes as big and brown as her rabbit’s.

Her coffee-coloured face had been recently scrubbed and shone; probably to increase her chances of a successful plea.

“I can’t, honey, Momma has to work to buy your clothes. I’ll get grandpop to take you and Charlie.”

“But you promised.” Tears leaked from practised yet genuinely pathetic eyes. At least, Tabitha assumed they were genuine; the girl had learnt to be a superior actor over the last couple of years. They hugged.

The embrace continued longer than usual as Tabitha tried to impart love through their clothes and skin. She had an urge to promise a trip at the weekend, maybe to Disney World, but her pledges had fractured so often lately she dared not set herself up for another fall.

A raucous coughing from the kitchen heralded her father bringing out their cordless phone. “There’s some God man here wanting you. Probably after rescuing the rest of your soul before you sell another portion of it to the devil.”

“Newspapers are not the devil’s work, Poppa, maybe money is.” She took the white phone off him, but held her hand over the speaker for a moment wondering who it was, like she did with the mail—playing detective with the postmark and handwritten address before tearing open the envelope.

Perhaps it’d be that Denzel Washington look-alike who’d winked at her at the El Capitan site. That Kallandra Harvard bitch kept touching his arm. What was his name?

Claude. She’d given him her business card; twice. She felt heat rising in her face in anticipation of his French Canadian accent. A rasping Irish male voice dampened her passion.

“Are you there, Miss Wish?”

“Yes, who is this?” Who was her letdown? It’d better be damn good.

“Kearney, Religious Affairs editor at the Washington Post. We want you to cover a crucial multi-faith conference on the significance and response to the spheres.”

“Really? When?” She could hardly believe her luck, but surely another plane ticket didn’t bear her name at the airport?

“Tomorrow, here in Washington.”

Damn. Everybody seemed to be offering her work but simultaneously. The religious angle was very interesting especially if disparate faiths were, at last, putting aside differences in the face of a common foe. On the other hand, they wouldn’t be paying as much as the Times or as important for connections as NASA. Anyway, her Baptist upbringing hardly qualified her to weed out the angles. They only wanted her there because she’d made a name for herself with her scoops. This could be the job too many that would undo her.

“I’m sorry, I have other commitments. I could try and find someone else to be there?”

“That’s OK Miss Wish, there’ll be other journalists there, and we’d provide briefing notes. You would just have been back up. Goodbye.”

Chapter Seventeen

Near El Capitan

In spite of abusing friendships that should have unearthed the answer, and an Internet search, Tabitha failed to discover what had excited Ted at the New York Times.

She’d sent a text to Claude who’d responded with some techie stuff about a change in the Hertz from the sphere.

A few moments more of tapping her manicured red fingernail on her cellphone, allowed her to decide that NASA’s investigation of how she obtained covert information would fizzle away in any drama at El Capitan. So the decision was made and she’d enjoyed her NYT-paid-for flight and helicopter to Yosemite.

Tabitha’s stomach felt the warmth of contentment as the escort led her to the military encampment at El Capitan. For the first time, she hadn’t had to blag her way to where the officials didn’t want her. She also felt the resistance crumbling with those two astronauts, Major Kallandra and that dreamboat Claude. Or did she? The Major was difficult to fathom. Those beautiful emerald eyes threw back Tabitha’s reflection rather than allowing her entry into her soul. She appeared so much stronger-minded than the nightclub scene blue-tinged brown hair implied.

To her immense delight, while queuing for a coffee, Claude had crept up behind and wrapped his arms around her. “Who’s my favourite media babe?”

“Tell me her name and I’ll claw her eyes out.”

“Mon Dieu, how I’m drawn to feisty women.”

“Is that why you are always with Kallandra?”

“Tabitha, do I sense a green-eyed monster? Kal and I are colleagues, and she is engaged to Derek, the ship’s chief designer.”

Tabitha couldn’t help smiling. She’d observed the signs in the two astronauts’ body language the last time she was in Yosemite. Either they are officially in denial for public consumption or hopeless techie-people who wouldn’t know a romantic magnetic pull when they encountered it. But hey, all the better an opportunity for her.

“Hello, what are you two getting too close about?” Kallandra’s clear Arizona accent cut across the room. Tabitha coughed and spilled her coffee on Claude’s blue shirt.

Claude pinched to lift the hot cotton from his chest while Tabitha, in a fluster, reached for a paper napkin, but was beaten by a flying Kallandra who tugged at his shirt.

“Hey,” said Claude, laughing, “this isn’t the Blue Zone Club. Leave my clothes alone.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t get so close to the press,” Kallandra said, giving Tabitha the evil eye.

Tabitha, in excoriating mood, was about to rejoin with a witty comment on being pressed when a manly shout came from the entrance.

“Evacuation! Sergeant, hit the emergency claxon!”

Tabitha’s eyes widened in shock, then narrowed in cunning. Emergencies were made for journalists. So, while the cafeteria emptied through a rear door, she readied her videocam and would have headed for the entrance nearest the sphere, but halted when she noticed the two astronauts wavering. She assumed all the service personnel would obey without question, as part of their rigorous military training, but of course those two had to be different; their superior intellect with egos the size of Jupiter would consider an evacuation order as a mere option.

Squabbles forgotten, they rushed outside and towards the sphere. They headed against the running people stream, being knocked around as if in a pinball machine.

Claude, spearheading, slowed holding out his arms to halt the two women.

Still a hundred metres from the sphere’s exit hole, they stared up with pained expressions at the blue sky and silver sphere. The buzzing hurt her ears. The sound waves rippled through, creating a nauseating up-welling of the mouthful of coffee followed by remnants of wrapped taco beans she’d gulped down while airborne.

With one finger in her left ear, Kallandra turned to both Claude and Tabitha. She mouthed look and her right hand pointed above the sphere. Against the cerulean sky a red pencil line projected vertically up. As Tabitha watched, the colours phased through the colours of the rainbow in the mnemonic order she learnt at school: Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain. It stayed for a few moments as a thin violet line, and then became paler until it whitened.

The fear that the sphere might be preparing to detonate, and dismissed by Tabitha in her need for a scoop, revisited her as the buzzing ear-pierced so much that she had to abandon her camera and squeeze both hands to her ears. As did the others. In Tabitha’s case, her hands were far from puny, nevertheless, the sound travelled through them with ease. With a crumpled face she gazed up at the sphere, waiting for it to burst into a million pieces, putting her to death but at least the noise pain would be over.

Abruptly the noise stopped. Silence hit her like a slap in the face. Not being sure if her ears had malfunctioned in some ghastly reaction in her eardrum, Tabitha took her hands away. Nothing.

She reached across and patted Claude’s arm.

“Hey, Claude, can you hear me?”

Her voice echoed around her own head as if she was dreaming. Claude turned to her and mouthed: “I’m deaf.”

Kallandra turned to them both while silently talking.

Equally suddenly, a high-pitched whistle penetrated Tabitha’s skull. Fingers in ears she looked up at the sphere only to see it smoothly shoot up at high speed and disappear. The whistling stopped and her hearing slowly returned to normal; although not as quickly as her mouth took to close.

Chapter Eighteen

On the way back to the Johnson Space Centre Kallandra was not surprised to learn that all the spheres had left simultaneously. But her eyebrows rose when Derek, back at Johnson, told her on the radio that after they’d reached fifteen-hundred kilometres directly above their takeoff points, they veered to park in a geosynchronous orbit 42,000 kilometres above the equator.

“That’s where most of the communications and geostationary satellites are, isn’t it, honey?” She had the Learjet on auto while speaking into her headset. Claude caught up on sleep on the bed in the passenger section.

“Yes. Full marks,” Derek said. “How about getting NOAA to steer some so as to keep a camera eye on them.”

“Not easy, they are designed to grab weather images of Earth, not snoop on enigmatic travellers in the same orbit. Maybe the military have—”

“Hang on, Kal, more data…. I’ll get back to you.”

“Derek? Keep the line open, oh, he’s gone.” Cursing, she wondered whether to wake Claude. He required more sleep than the five hours she enjoyed most nights, but even so, he’d want to know, and she needed to share thoughts.

She double-checked the auto and then pinched Claude’s toes sticking out from under the blanket. The thought he’d wake from the leg upwards tickled her.

“Merde!”

“Oops, sorry Claude, I must have squeezed too hard. Anyway, you need to be awake. The spheres have gone into a geosynchronous orbit.”

He rubbed his eyes, and pointed at the galley while he yawned something unintelligible. Kallandra poured herself a coffee, too, and took them back, swaying as turbulence rocked the plane.

“Should we take these into the cockpit?” said Claude, glancing at the dark spots of coffee on the red carpet.

Her inclination was to let the plane look after itself but knew Claude would rather be in the driving seat when there was the slightest trouble. She needed to talk about the spheres latest gymnastics without him being distracted, so she followed him in while licking spilt coffee from her hand.

Claude played with the controls for a minute before sipping the bitter Columbian coffee. “Maybe they’re grouping before departing.”

“It must be strange for them to be saying ‘hi’ to each other after two billion years.”

“Do not make the error of assigning human attributes to these machines, Kal.”

She felt piqued that he’d believe she would be so naïve, but played along. “Many animals seem pleased enough to find each other. Of course, the spheres are robotic.”

The plane lurched again, falling several metres. Kallandra thanked the previous CAT event or she and Claude might not have been strapped in their seats, even though the remains of their coffee found ways to decorate the cabin.

“Shit, just look at the altimeter,” said Kallandra.

“Have we lost much height?” he said, tapping his duplicate co-pilot’s instrument.

“Yes, but I meant the coffee splatters. Just as well, I take it without sugar. Hey, Claude, you don’t suppose the turbulence is not from turbulence, do you?”

“I was thinking the same. Now the spheres are further away maybe the decoherences will worsen, and—”

Kallandra interrupted. “We have a message coming in from Elaine Stringer, relaying data from NORAD.”

“I don’t know her, do I?”

“You’re joking. Blonde, an inch shorter than me, but packed with sex appeal.”

“Like you?” Claude winked at her.

“Maybe—ask Derek. Elaine’s hair is shoulder-length, while mine has been savaged in readiness for our aborted Mars mission. Apparently over ten gallons of water and a hundred kilowatts of heat energy would have been saved by my having short hair. Elaine is my usual link comms person at Mission Control on my shuttle flights.”

“I am far too overwhelmed with the sea of unknown faces when I go through the Mission Control room. I can’t say I remember this mademoiselle. Anyway, Kal, I think the Mars Mission should have gone ahead.”

“It was the top brass at NASA who pulled the mission after the appearance of the spheres created so much uncertainty. I was gutted too. And we might need another home if these time fractures don’t settle down.”

“Kal, suppose there are decoherences on Mars. Mon Dieu, maybe they are the norm throughout the universe except where the spheres have evened time out.”

“Possibly, let’s consider that for all human history we’ve been used to a continuous linear timeline, so of course it was normal for us. If it is usual for time to be more jerky, perhaps we would have got used to it. Just a minute….”

Kallandra listened to Elaine’s message, then reached for her iPaq to check the data sent through.

“I’m copying to your iPaq, Claude. Oh my God. Apparently there’s an asteroid on a collision course with Earth. No images for another hour, but NORAD’s radar asteroid detection net reckons its mass is sufficient to take out a Houston-size city. There’s no impact-destination co-ordinates yet. As if we haven’t enough problems.”

Chapter Nineteen

Gathering painful consciousness, Blake assumed he’d fallen back into the cave.

But, no. He registered, not Oqmar’s cave, but from within, a van, much like the Student Union’s Ford Transit. Night time, judging by the two rectangles of pale yellow light that struggled in through the rear doors. Looked like the inside handle was broken.

Had he drunkenly climbed into the van to sleep off a boozy night and dreamt about Oqmar and his crazy dog, Kur? Again, no. The burn on his right thigh and the hole in his jeans testified to the weird experience he had in that cave. He sniffed. The scorched fabric agitated his nostrils, but another odour brought a taste of bile fighting its way up to his mouth. It was not just the smell-memory of Oqmar but evidence in that strange man’s spittle on the cut on his left arm. His Parka displayed a rip through to the blackened blood. He couldn’t remember how it’d happened. One minute he was walking home in Bristol, all limbs intact. Then a fall, but waking in that cave with a few minor abrasions as added extras. And, after that, the tiny ball he’d found rolling on Glastonbury Hill during the sphere’s dramatic exit, burnt its way out of his pocket.

As he struggled to his knees, the rear door screeched open.

Good, he thought, now I can get home, shower, proper sleep.

The amber street-light invaded the van, blinding Blake.

A male voice, mid-twenties, West-Country drawl, said, “Hey, there’s a fat fucker in our van,”

A deeper voice worried Blake with, “He must be nicking it.” But voicing a denial came out as a stutter as panic sent phlegm up into his throat.

“N-no.”

“Get him out of there.”

“I w-was not s-stealing your—” His voice gave up as he was hauled out. He crumpled on the wet road. Immediately he doubled up as a boot rammed into his stomach. In spite of the extra fat layers, the pain nearly blacked him out again.

Although Blake couldn’t remember when he had his most recent meal, its acidic remains, now agitated, regurgitated into his mouth and he had no choice but to throw up onto the road. He heard raucous laughter, but he dared not look up in case he faced accusations of ‘looking at them’ with increased painful consequences.

He remained curled up, face down, urging his muscles to do their best to squeeze his bulk into a ball.

Another kick to his right side hurt, and he thought a rib might have cracked.

Should he cry out his agony, or would that encourage them? He grunted.

After a minute or so of relative quiet he lifted his head to assess his status. A mistake. At the last-moment he saw a boot head for his face. The impact smashed his spectacles into his nose, which immediately filled with blood. The excruciating pain brought an involuntary scream and a deluge of stinging tears.

Curled up once more, he tasted a mix of snot, blood and salty tears. What had he done to deserve such an ignominious end? His ears malfunctioned as he could only hear their words as mumbles and guffaws. Eventually, they seemed to move away. He heard two vehicle-door slams, and then the engine started, forcing the exhaust to splutter water and diesel residue over his bloodied face. He rolled further into the gutter as the van rattled down the road. Through tears, Blake saw that he was in the grimy back streets of industrial warehousing, a kilometre from his home.

Blake winced, and yet was grateful to his mother for dabbing the abrasion on his face with cotton wool made sodden with clear water, which whitened with the phenol, then reddened with blood.

She’d not believed him, but once he’d uttered about the tiny sphere, she’d called his uncle Derek in Houston, and under penalty otherwise of a supper abstinence, he had to oblige.

“Yes, the ball I found on Glastonbury.”

“That could have been a miniature version of the spheres. It must have emerged from the Glastonbury one. Good God, Blake, that was a vital clue; evidence. Why didn’t you give it to us?”

“I did. You played with it and gave it back.” Typical adult to have not appreciated the importance of little things. Blake, found he could afford a wry smile at that thought, even though he hurt and he hardly knew what day it was.

“Good grief. So where did it take you, exactly?”

“I dunno. Some cave.” His nerves made him shake as he recalled the strangeness of the last few hours but he needed to tell it to Derek. He’d probably believe it, unlike his mother.

“Like at Cheddar Gorge?”

“Yeah, no, it was too hot.”

“There was a fire? Or the weather was hot? A desert? Help me out here, Blake.”

“I never saw the outside—I was being attacked by a mad caveman and his pet wolf.” Was he remembering it right?

“Did he do anything to you?”

“He didn’t bugger me.”

“I’m glad to hear it, but did he touch you or give you something you still have?”

“He put some gunge on the cut on my arm. I must have fallen.” His mother, antiseptic-reeking cotton wool in hand, grabbed his left arm. “Mum, not that arm.”

“Blake, is your mother trying to clean that gunge off your arm? Stop her. I want you to take it to a lab—I’ll give you the addr—”

“Too late, it’s in the dish with the antiseptic now.”

“I was hoping to get it dated. Anything else he gave you, that hasn’t been wiped out?”

“He tried to feed me, but I refused it. I gave him gum.” An automatic grin came with that thought.

“I thought you said he attacked you.”

“Yeah, well. Do you wanna know the rest?”

“Yes. What happened to the miniature sphere?”

“It burnt a hole in my jeans and disappeared up a smooth hole in the cave roof and joined with a bigger one in the sky.”

“Then what happened? Was the caveman surprised—or did he behave as if spheres were normal for him?”

“Oqmar.”

“What’s Oqmar?”

“The caveman’s name. I remember it, and Kur, his dog.”

“Excellent memory. What happened next?”

“I passed out and woke up in a van in Bristol.”

“Blake, I’d like you to write all this down before details fade away. Please keep all your clothes—don’t let your mum wash them. Sorry to hear you were mugged when you returned. I hope you feel better soon.”

“Thanks, Uncle Derek.”

“Bye,

Blake.”

“Don’t you wanna know about the knife Oqmar gave me?”

Chapter Twenty

Kallandra lifted an eyebrow in disbelief. “Blake’s been back twenty thousand years?”

“Give or take a couple of thousand. We used carbon fourteen dating on the knife’s bone handle. He was in a cave in the desert. Probably Middle East. Sand grains and other debris in his clothing and trainers might narrow down the area.”

“And you believe him? Assuming you don’t find the sand was from Weston-Super-Mare, it means there were eight spheres. Messes up your math, Derek.”

“Not necessarily. There might have been dozens of spheres. Now, eight with the one in the Caribbean and the South Pacific. And the Middle-East one was small.

Blake describes the hole in the cave floor and roof as fitting a beach ball, not seventy nine metres, like these.”

She fought back the urge to criticize Blake’s observational abilities. “So, that fits the tapered exit holes, and the theory they’ve been gathering something—exotic particles, time dechorences.”

“How big would something have to be to collect time? And you could fit millions of exotic particles in a matchbox.”

She put on her hurt look. “Hey, there’s enough theory bashers knocking me down, thanks.”

They sat in the communications lab, watching the screen for a NORAD update on the incoming asteroid. The time was due for the first image to be transmitted from a close-encounter orbiting telescope.

“Derek, is that scrolling data from the incoming object or the outgoing spheres?”

“The spheres are manoeuvring, it seems, to converge in a geostationary orbit at seventy-three degrees East.”

“I presume, like all geostationary satellites, that’s over the equator. So what’s beneath them on the ground?”

“The southern tip of the Maldive Islands is the closest. There’s only the Indian Ocean directly beneath them so it’s probably insignificant.”

“Unless they need to communicate with something down there, or need rapid access, bearing in mind they can sure travel fast when they choose to.”

Derek pointed at a newspaper on the console desk. “Have you seen this garbage?”

“Sadly, yes. I’m gonna have words with that Tabitha Wish. It’s a deliberate incitement to riot.”

“She’s only doing her job, which is to sensationalise everything.”

Kallandra admired the journalist for her pulling in all directions adding to unknowns in a story. She’d explored the possibilities that the spheres were leaving not because they’d finished their mission on Earth but escaping because they knew a killer asteroid was on its way. Risking panic in the streets like that was quite reprehensible, yet cunning in a way. Ms. Wish must have known, even when she wrote it, that the incoming rock was too small to do serious damage to the planet as a whole, but she’d claimed that it was merely a forerunner of others. Of course there would always be more asteroids, but probably not just following this one.

“Just journalistic hype. Ignore her. I don’t hear any riots, do you?”

“Derek, to say that Rome is likely to be obliterated tomorrow is irresponsible.

There were riots there. Where did she get her data—I mean the course projection coordinates? The leaker should be strung up.”

“It wasn’t you, then?” Derek said, his finger heading for left-ear gouge until she stopped him.

“I’m hurt that you’d think it was. Probably a man, Wish has a way of weedling information out of you weaklings.”

Derek returned his screen to a course analysis and simulator. “You know if that incoming object maintains its course vectors, and if those spheres converge where we predict…”

“I’m ahead of you. So no coincidence then. We have some checking to do. But, Derek, NORAD should know this by now, so why aren’t they telling us?”

Chapter Twenty-One

Tapping at her shiny new laptop on the kitchen table in Jackson, Tabitha couldn’t believe her luck, nor how her bank account bulged.

“Mom,” Roma said, “do we have to move? I just got used to Five Oaks Junior.”

“You hated it last week.” Tabitha took no nonsense from her twins, even if she felt guilty for the time she left them with Poppa while she abandoned them to fly away on assignments. “And Charlie is keen to move to Ridgeland. We can now afford a bigger house. You’ll have whatever clothes you want.”

“Can I have my new friends over?” Roma snuggled up, nuzzling like a puppy on Tabitha’s right arm.

Knowing this ploy but playing along with it, Tabitha said, “Run along now, hon, while I make us some more dough.”

She smiled again, couldn’t stop herself if she tried. After her piece on the spheres leaving to escape the incoming asteroid catastrophe syndicated globally, along came another Godsend. So the spheres have aligned themselves to intercept said asteroid. A shield. A wonderful alien saviour to Earth’s inhabitants. Maybe they’re gonna sacrifice themselves for our unworthy souls. She hardly had to put effort into the new copy for the NYT. They’d won her auction after she’d faxed around that she’d had new news from a NASA insider.

She stopped smiling for a moment as she looked again at the e-mail from the Johnson Space Center. Her usual contact didn’t write like this one. No siggie, a scrambled sender’s data. The IP address originated from the NASA network. Unsigned but she’d stretch validation for the sake of a great story.

Whatever. The spheres had gone from wreckers and deserters to white knights within thirty six hours. Way to go. Perfect.

* * *

Kallandra sucked air in between her teeth. “Hey, we have an image. Jeez….”

The asteroid heading for planet Earth was a perfect sphere, shiny metal, and a perfect match to the others.

“Yes,” Derek said, “they’re going to meet up.”

In some ways Kallandra wasn’t too surprised. “So, no obliteration of Rome. All that woe to Catholics and terrifying the population. Followed by the spheres being a shield. Good grief, the nerve of the woman. You don’t have Miss Wish’s phone number by any chance?”

“You wouldn’t let me find it a week ago, remember? Rob Summers has been communicating with her. And Claude probably has the number of every woman on Earth in his address book.”

Kallandra put an arm around his shoulders. “Envy doesn’t suit you, Derek.

Anyway, Disraeli has just released a statement about what the incoming sphere appears to be. See?” She pointed at a document window on her screen.

“Interesting. He likes to keep cards up both sleeves. He must have felt pressured to release a keep-calm notice. He says the incoming sphere seems to be meeting up with the others. Of course it could collide with them and they’d scatter like skittles.”

“Yeah, it’ll help Rome, but the rest of the world will still wonder what the hell is going on.”

Kallandra’s and Derek’s bleepers harmonised with others in the comms lab. A call to another meeting with the worriers at the top.

“You’d better reveal Blake’s trip back in time.”

“I’ve already sent a note to Disraeli about it.”

Kallandra pulled a long face. “I thought I was the first in the know. What did he say?”

“He thought it was nonsense. But I’ve been thinking since that if Blake did see the tiny sphere go up to where another larger sphere was rising, then perhaps we are seeing that same sphere up on that screen.”

“You are making a leap there. A present-day big sphere, releases a tiny one—”

“Perhaps a communication module with data.”

“Maybe. It needed to go back twenty millennia to link with a medium-sized sphere that is leaving the planet—”

“To go back to mother, perhaps a planet light years away or one of their space stations, or—”

“And then comes back twenty thousand years later. To do what? Bring news of home?”

“Possibly, and to coordinate whatever they need to do before all going back together.”

“Seems to fit—in a way—although rather convoluted.”

“All right, Kal, you tell me how you would communicate with your home planet thousands of light years away in only a few hours. If it works then why have another method? But was Blake an accidental passenger or a necessary carrier?”

“Not being funny about your family, Derek, but—”

“Say no more.”

“Are we going to this meeting? It’s only going to be a let’s-wait-and-see, isn’t it?”

“Unless some brass hat wants to lob a few nukes at the spheres again, now they’re out of the atmosphere. Coming?”

* * *

“I’m sorry but this meeting is cancelled,” said a worried-looking, grey-suited man Kallandra hadn’t seen before.

“A mixed blessing,” Claude muttered. He sat, as usual, on Kallandra’s left, with Derek on her right.

The man turned to go.

“Hang on,” Kallandra shouted.

“Here we go,” said Claude to Derek, who raised his eyebrows in return.

The suit turned to face her, along with the other dozen in the hastily convened and now abandoned meeting.

“Where is Colonel Disraeli?” She glanced around the room. “And any of the military personnel? Are they in another meeting?”

The poor man trembled, and his handheld papers shook with him. “I am not at liberty to say, Major.”

Claude called out. “What are you at liberty to say, Mister…?”

“Only that this meeting is cancelled, Mister Lapointe.”

“Can you, at least, tell us if we will be informed when this meeting is reconvened?” Derek said. “There are developments in space, and—”

At last the suit asserted himself, standing straighter. “You have access to the NORAD, JPL and NASA data as much as anyone here, Mister Stone. As for if you will be informed, that is not my remit.”

“Aide moi,” Claude muttered, “he’s remarkably well-informed as to our identities considering we’ve not seen him before.”

“Let’s go,” Kallandra said. “Getting information out of Mister Happy is like milking a chair.”

“I’m afraid it’s obvious what’s going on,” Derek said.

“Sure it is,” Kallandra said, walking briskly down the corridor to the comms lab.

“Those brass-studded bastards want to shoot the spheres out of orbit.”

“Stop!” Derek yelled.

To her surprise, Kallandra did stop, mainly because it was so out of character for Derek to issue commands. He pulled the other two into an empty side room, and closed the door. He leaned on a conference table rather than take a chair.

“We’d be making a mistake to rush in guns blazing.”

“Do you have a better plan?” Kallandra said. She grabbed a chair and sat, her chin supported by her hands as she elbowed the table. She glanced at Claude who seemed bemused at the unusual situation.

“The military are used to this kind of situation,” Derek said. “We mustn’t treat them as clichéd military types. Remember, they not only play wargames in peacetime, they use game theory in wartime.”

“So you’re saying we use game theory against them?” she said. “But I only know paperback outlines.”

“Maybe,” Claude said, fingering his moustache. “On the other hand, I bet we know a man who knows a lot about game theory, don’t we, Derek?”

With a raised eyebrow, Kallandra looked at her fiancée, who’d cast his eyes downwards while shuffling his feet. “I know a bit.”

This was crazy, she told herself. Her heart bounded against her ribcage, more than when she performed dangerous flying manoeuvres. How could a trivial matter like not knowing an aspect of your fiancée’s life and personality be so upsetting? A nervous smile betrayed her feelings.

“But, Derek, I’ve not seen you playing wargames, neither on your computer nor in clubs where—”

“Not wargames, as such. There are many ways in which game theory can be employed.”

Claude touched Kallandra’s arm. “You didn’t expect him to be moving Napoleon’s forces around at virtual Waterloo, did you?”

“Maybe I did, but then I suppose I haven’t been in his company lately.”

“Does anyone want to know how I use game theory in my recreation?” Derek said, looking hurt, presumably because the other two had been nattering during his exposition.

“Go for it, Derek,” Kallandra said.

“In London there’s a club I’ve been going to since uni days. Every third Thursday in the month we set up an ancient battle scenario—one that really happened. We then apply various game theory strategies to see if they would have changed the outcome.”

“I thought you were going to some secret Gentleman’s Club, to put it politely. But what’s the point?”

“Pure intellectual satisfaction, although it might come in handy now. No, not that Julius Caesar had to confront alien spheres, but he had to persuade his officers to undertake apparent daft actions, which often won the day. We also apply Games Theory to economic models and business strategies. Then we—”

“Our immediate battle,” Kallandra said, “is with the military all set to fling our most powerful nukes at the spheres.” She looked from Derek to Claude and back, wondering if they felt the spheres should be taken out. Was the nod from Claude a perfunctory solace? Had she become too involved with the spheres? Perhaps that first contact in Glastonbury and the falling into the one at El Capitan…. No, that was a dream— probably.

She worried that her emotional ties with the spheres clouded her judgement, but her pilot training drove a sure wedge between passion and harsh reality. It made no sense to destroy objects that were leaving. Worse, their departure appeared to be causing chaos on Earth. She had to entertain the idea played around in the physics web-chat-groups that the spheres somehow absorbed time decoherences and that the linear smoothness they’d experienced with time before this year was not going to be the norm in the future.

Again she scrutinised Claude’s face. She searched for telltale half-winks, quivered eyebrows, the nearly imperceptible grin. Anything that might give away a clue that he felt as she did, or not.

Derek’s face looked like a weasel’s. A physiognomy narrowed, it seemed, into a nose-led cone of concentration as he tapped on his iPaq before announcing the results of his game theory analysis. She worried that he might conclude with solutions she wouldn’t like. Maybe he’d find that the military would have an edge by displaying huge force. Even if they didn’t destroy the spheres, they might reveal humans as a significant entity.

Derek disrupted her ruminations. “Let’s consider one event at a time. First being, stopping the military from nuking the spheres. Second, if we get there, is to persuade the spheres to communicate with us or in some other way give us our normal time back. Is that right?”

Kallandra nodded, though her gut reaction worked against the spheres talking to them. If they’d had the urge to natter, then why hadn’t they up till now?

Derek continued. “Game theory places scores on the consequences of various actions of, say, the military and us—or the military and the spheres. The simplest situation is called a Zero-Sum game in which no player gains except at the expense of the other player.”

“This isn’t a game with players, Derek.”

“I know that, Kallandra but, for the sake of the theory, lets proceed as if it is. For years theorists couldn’t apply game theory beyond simple situations but then the Nash Equilibrium was dreamed up where sets of optimal strategies are considered in non-cooperative games such as in our situation. We apply scores in a matrix and let the computation choose the best strategy.”

“But—”

“I know what you’re going to say. OK, so the colonels and us are not machines.

But drama theory has been added to game theory recently to take opinions, emotions and the theatre of both sides into account.”

Claude brightened as if a light had been switched on in his brain. “You mean the cold matrices of game theory have a touchy-feely component now?”

“Exactly. Anyway, let’s consider what is in it for the military to go for a pre-emptive strike against the spheres.”

“If the nukes work, then, voila, the spheres don’t exist any more,” Claude said.

“No problem for the military, and we all go home.”

“Except that time—”

Derek interrupted her, holding a hand up. “Let’s be systematic here and only consider positive aspects first.”

“Oops, sorry,” she said, looking up at the ceiling as if help was up there. “How about it demonstrates we are dangerous and so, if they survive the blast, they know to go away and not return.”

“A moment,” Claude said. “The Pacific sphere already took a nuke and ignored it. Ah, but it was low yield. Presumably, the colonels have duct-taped several together.”

“Don’t miss the main point,” Derek said. “It’s possible the spheres haven’t noticed us at all, let alone as an intelligent species.”

“I’ve been thinking that,” Kallandra said. “In spite of our prodding and throwing our sharpest toys at them, it could be their auto-defence systems have reacted, rather than any higher order intelligence. Interacting with us isn’t programmed into their systems so they take no notice of us.”

“But they must have some threshold programmed in,” Derek said, “to prevent them being destroyed. Ah, they do…the timequakes that apparently allow them to cut through solid granite and survive tectonic upheavals.”

“They must have a very rapid reaction to an event in order to skip out of ambient time,” Kallandra said. “So maybe, no matter what the military does, they’ll not be aware it was humans.”

Claude nodded. “But we suspect some spheres haven’t made it to the surface, and the Caribbean one was delayed, it seems. Perhaps they aren’t infallible although surviving two billion years is impressive.”

Derek looked up from his iPaq on which he was entering data. “My guess is that, if they were placed here by an intelligence, there would be contingencies to both protect their long term investment—the spheres—and to react if another intelligence—us— threatens their existence.”

“Maybe we wouldn’t be considered intelligent compared to them,” Kallandra said.

“And nothing we do can really threaten them.”

“I agree with the first part,” Claude said, “but it would be risky to assume the second. What do you think, Derek?”

“From a game point of view, the second carries a retaliation threat. Worse for us, they might be able to sense a nuke heading for them, nip back in time a second or so and disrupt time on Earth in some disastrous fashion.”

“Like one half of the planet stop in time while the other half goes forward,”

Kallandra said. “Or shift the space-time of the nukes so they detonate on Earth instead of in space.”

“Interesting, but we’ve wandered away from my request for positive angles for the military to fire first.”

Claude grinned and held up a finger as if it were an antenna gathering inspiration. “Does game theory allow morale as a parameter? A strike by Earth at the nasty aliens who messed up our time, could help people feel better.”

“Only if it worked,” snapped Kallandra, who didn’t feel the spheres were enemies as much as unaware artefacts, and so technically innocent. “If the attack failed or backfired; such as contaminating parts of Earth with radiation fallout—”

“Yes, but game theory handles consequences in a separated, but linked, cell in the matrix.” Derek tapped his stylus again on his iPaq. “Now, why would it be better for the military to take no action?”

“Because there’s no way of knowing the outcome of blasting the spheres,”

Kallandra said.

“Any positive reasons?” Derek sounded tired.

Claude said, “It would leave open the option of a surprise aggressive action later.”

“And it wouldn’t aggravate the spheres.”

“If that’s the best you can do, it looks like the military first strike option is optimal.”

Derek’s eyebrows twitched, in a show of looking pained yet confident of his conclusion.

“You see, if we apply Zermelo’s Algorithm: where we use a backward induction from the result you want, that is, no action, then the spheres might continue to leave and the Earth continues to have time decoherences until normal life becomes impossible.”

“I smell a rat with conspiracy disease,” Kallandra said. “You must have assigned a higher negative score to the time problem than I would have, and you believe the colonels when they say destroying the spheres ends our problems.”

“To be frank, I think it would too,” Claude said.

Kallandra’s mouth opened in silent disbelief. She’d suspected Derek would be a sycophant and side with the military. He’d always choose the path of least revolt although he could often be persuaded by logic to travel in her maverick directions. But she’d formed the impression Claude was a natural freethinker. Had she missed the point here? He seemed to be avoiding her glare, but he pre-empted her scold.

“I don’t think, Kal, you’ve taken into account the possibility that, yes, the spheres might have been absorbing our planet’s time decoherences and so we’ve assumed time naturally travels smoothly. But we’ve absolutely no idea how they’ve done that, nor what they intend to do. There’s a chance, n’est pas, that if they were destroyed, the aspect of their existence that absorbed time decoherences will fall back to Earth and—”

“Our time continues uninterrupted as before? Are you crazy?” She felt her cheeks reaching meltdown. “Won’t whoever owns the spheres come whizzing back and investigate? Do you think the potshot technology we have will defend us against a system that had technology far beyond our comprehension two billion years ago? Ye gods.”

Claude shrugged and fingered his moustache before he said, “OK. So many unknowns.”

“I agree,” Derek said, “which is why a methodical decision making process, such as game theory can help.”

“For all we know, the spheres have done our planet a good service. Time displacements might be the norm, resulting in chaos and possibly no evolutionary or life development as it timequaked back and forward.”

“Or,” Claude said, “evolution would have occurred quite differently to our experience. And two billion years ago, maybe some of the ingredients of proto-life, such as eukaryotic cells, were planted here by the spheres, or whoever built them.”

“So why blow up our parents,” Kallandra said, and then, arms folded in frustration, walked away.

* * *

She threw herself face down on her bed. Exhaustion had overtaken her adrenalin-fuelled energy. In pilot and astronaut training she’d felt in control of every situation. Indeed, she’d manipulated her superiors and had shamelessly exploited her intelligence and looks, knowing both put men on the defensive. The last few days had seen enormous setbacks for her, upsetting her confidence and making her distrustful.

She wriggled with irritation at the knowledge, whispered to her by Claude that some of the other women considered her to be a spoilt brat. It was probably the envy monster at work. It didn’t used to get to her—she’d never felt she had to justify her natural tomboyish childhood skills. If pressed she could’ve lectured them on how her dad was as grubby-finger-nailed a rancher as any, and the sacrifices both parents and grandparents went through to help her with extra tuition, flight school, and college fees.

She rolled onto her back and studied the faint cracks in the white ceiling paint.

They formed straight lines like the once-believed Martian canals.

Back to Earth. It felt as if she was the only one on the planet who felt they shouldn’t try and blast those spheres. Maybe her gut reaction was the fabled woman’s intuition, and she’d got it wrong. Damn. It was times like this she wished she still smoked. With closed eyes, she imagined a good long pull on a King Size, ignored the inclination to cough, and exhaled slowly.

“That felt better,” she said out loud. “Come on, Kallandra, dear. Stop feeling sorry for yourself and do something constructive.” There was the option to go and see Colonel Dwight Disraeli. He had the President’s ear, not that he would bend it on her behalf. Damn, she needed strength. That comes from public pressure on politicians and who influences the public but the press—Tabitha Wish.

Kallandra reached for her cellphone, but was interrupted by a knock at the door.

“Go away.”

The door sneaked open and Derek crept in carrying a carton of steaming coffee.

“Apologies for disturbing you, Kallandra, but I thought you’d like to know.”

“The spheres have been obliterated, and we now wait for their creators to enslave us?”

“Not yet, and possibly. But a researcher at the Jet Propulsion Lab has been investigating historical records in a cooperative project with Chinese and Brazilian historians.”

“And I should be interested, because? Oh, sorry, Derek. It’s funny we three work so well together with occasional input from Rob Summers. I forget that hundreds at NASA and the JPL along with thousands all round the planet are also working flat out on the spheres.”

“Sadly, in spite of the combined mass of global brain-power, and a range of weird international technology, no one has managed to learn more than we have about what the spheres are made of, or why.”

“At least other countries aren’t sending annihilation greetings to the spheres. Are they?”

Derek sat on the corner of the bed while studying his iPaq. “Some interesting coincidences have led to an alternative view of the time decoherences.”

“Are you telling me other countries, consortiums, whatever, also plan to attack the spheres?” She knelt on the bed shaking with anger, the more so as her rage was directed at herself for not seeing it coming.

“Actually, I’m talking about the time decoherences—they may have been with us for some years—possibly always.”

She looked at him through narrowed eyes, as if he was more alien than the spheres. How could he ramble on about theoretical niceties while she writhed in angst?

But then maybe it’d lead somewhere if she played along.

“You mean like the Bermuda Triangle? Old news.”

He lowered his iPaq and looked at her with a half-smile, in what she interpreted as a pitying mode. She curled fingers around the corner of a pillow ready to hurl at him.

“They—the researchers—have catalogued hundreds of unexplained disasters.

Not that smaller accidents wouldn’t count but they aren’t documented so well. Airplane crashes like that one the other day. Did you know that Tabitha had a call from the wife of her editor, Roger de Griffe? He’d sent a text message from that plane disaster.”

“Yes,” she said. “Weird wasn’t it? He was on that plane that we think split when the front displaced in time from the back? Would you think to send me a goodbye love message, Derek?” She said, instantly regretting it because of course he would. But she wouldn’t have done because she’d be fighting death all the way down.

“Anyway,” he continued. “There’ve been many accidents that could be explained that way, from the beginning of aviation history.”

“So now we have a convenient scapegoat for human error?”

Derek gave her a short laugh. “Fair enough, but we now have an alternative explanation for some unexplained accidents. For instance…” He consulted his iPaq.

“KLM Flight six-oh-seven. August fourteenth, nineteen fifty eight. Unexplained crash two-hundred-and-eight kilometres west of Ireland. No survivors, Ninety nine died.”

“I hope you’re not going to read me an uber long list of disasters that might be the result of time decoherences.”

“I won’t. But listen, there was always doubt about the North Sea Piper Alpha oil rig explosion in nineteen eighty eight. Gas leaked into a compression chamber and led to an explosion with a hundred-and-sixty-six deaths.”

“And you’re saying a timequake ruptured a gas pipe?”

“Possibly….”

“Evidence, Derek. Come on, you should know better than this speculative hearsay. Have you become Tabitha Wish?”

“Recovered monitoring equipment indicates discrepancies in times recorded for the accident. And men the previous few hours reported feeling weird—headaches and nausea, which could be a feature of time decoherence, couldn’t it?”

Kallandra closed her eyes. “Maybe, dear Derek, they were breathing in leaked gas.” She lay back on the bed and stared again at the ceiling. “Is there a useful point to this list?”

Derek followed her gaze up to the ceiling. Kallandra released a smile, even though her upward gaze wasn’t meant as a trick, the play tickled her. He returned his eyes to hers.

“It seems to me, not only me, that if mankind knew about time decoherences in the past, we wouldn’t get so upset about them now. It could help your appeal to leave the spheres alone.”

She sat up, eyes now wide open. “Really? Ah, I suppose if their leaving makes time just more erratic rather than being a completely new problem, people mightn’t think they’re so bad.”

Derek stuck out his bottom lip. “Well, maybe….”

“And that would be especially so if most of those unexplained disasters were in areas far from where the known spheres were buried.”

“Ah, now we’re getting somewhere,” he said. “Putting aside, for the moment, the notion that unexplained means a phenomenon about which we have insufficient facts.”

“Or insufficient belief in the few facts we have.”

“Agreed. Let me tell you about a particularly accident-prone region in Canada, between Nova Scotia on the East coast to Ontario. On a disaster-map of the world, that region is splattered with red dots when larger areas elsewhere have none or only one.”

“And these unhappy red dots are?”

“The weirdest is a DC-4 that crashed heavily near Quebec in nineteen fifty seven.

It hit the ground so hard one of its engines was buried twenty-six metres. The seventy-nine people were virtually unidentifiable.”

“What caused the crash—engine or human failure, a storm? What makes it weird? There must have been sufficient parts, and the black box, for the investigators to work it out?”

“Black boxes were in production by then but not in general use. There was a storm—”

“Well, there you go, Derek. I need more convincing. Next one.”

“There was a survivor. A baby was found sitting in the pilot’s seat. It was over a hundred metres from where the rest of the passenger bodies were found.”

“A baby—alive. It must have got lucky. Even so, I agree that is rather Twilight Zone.”

“Hardly anybody’s watches had the same time as each other.”

“If they’re within a minute or five that would be the case in this building. In fact, Derek, it’d be more impressive if everyone’s watches told the exact same time.”

“Fair enough. Next is a massive explosion in nineteen seventeen, in Halifax Harbour, and no, it wasn’t the Germans. A Belgian ship, the Imo, collided with the munitions ship Mont Blanc. Eight million tons of TNT detonated, killing up to seven thousand sailors, dockworkers and even over five hundred local children in their schools.”

“OK, so a munitions ship explodes—it happens.”

“A survivor on the Imo says his ship seemed to suddenly be further forward and so avoiding the collision was impossible.”

“Um, and I suppose his testimony wasn’t taken seriously then whereas it would now. What’s next?”

“Right, a liner went down in a storm in eighteen seventy three. It was built to withstand worse storms and there were conflicting reports. Similarly, two boats collided with over five hundred deaths in eighteen ninety eight and another two boats with over a thousand deaths in nineteen fourteen. Remember these are all in north-eastern Canada.”

“There could be many reasons why that area is prone to accidents. The Newfoundland fogs, and North Atlantic storms and freezing winters all contribute to accidents queuing up to happen.”

“I’ve only mentioned some of the worst accidents. Comparing stats for other areas with fogs, stormy weather and shipping business, that area gets more than it should—far more. Of course you’re right to be cautious, Kallandra, but open your mind to some of this.”

“Cautious? I sure am. You can prove anything with statistics and imagination.”

“That region had no known sphere.”

“Ah, so time decoherences weren’t being collected over the years and so more accidents happened there.”

“I thought you’d like it.”

“I do, but what about the most accident-prone area on the planet?”

“I know, I know. The Bermuda Triangle does have a sphere—or did. But then it seemed something wasn’t right with it. Delayed compared with the other six. So, perhaps it was malfunctioning.”

Kallandra walked over to the open window and breathed in the heady aroma from the wallflowers below.

“Don’t forget the eighth one in the Pacific. That was slow too. But then no one lives there so time decoherences could come and go and we’d never know.”

Derek stood alongside and put an arm around her waist. “We have to accept that there are many incidents that could’ve been triggered by even a small timequake.

Or could equally be something else—unexplained. For example in nineteen ninety-two, sewers in Guadalajara seemed to zigzag underground. Manhole covers shot into the air and streets split like earthquakes. Two hundred died.”

“Maybe it was an earthquake?”

“Not according to the Mexico Seismology Institute. If we assume the Bermuda sphere was faulty, then it’s interesting that Guadalajara is halfway between the spheres at El Capitan and Sugarloaf in Rio.”

She banged her hand on the windowsill. “Why are we pratting about discussing these accidents? If time jerked Earth around in the past, we have plenty of circumstantial evidence all around us. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, avalanches, landslides and freak weather could all be blamed on one spot suddenly moving forward or backwards in time. It was right under our noses all along.”

“You’re not saying the spheres made no difference?”

“No, Derek. I’m saying that it seems they were absorbing time decoherences but not equally around the globe and that maybe some of the accidents and disasters over the years could have been influenced by time-quaking. We know it’s gotten worse since the spheres started leaving. We need those spheres to return or do something to stabilise our planet.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

The military executives, including General Haskell Gibbon, from a newly combined grouping involving NATO, ANZUS, China and Japan rushed through a military solution to deal with the spheres. Gibbon knew that NATO or just the USA component could have acted unilaterally, but the President decided to draw on the unique situation where the whole planet was under threat from outside. Although many military top brass were also political, they tended not to be the more cautious personalities of the purely civilian leaders.

As the USA Chief of Staff, General Gibbon rubbed his hands at the thought of so much power, sans politicians. Of course he was answerable to the President, but in this emergency he only had to inform President Edsel Cabot, who was overwhelmed with new presidential duties, and Gibbon had ensured he’d placed his own people in the President’s advisory committees.

That masterstroke twinkled his eyes. He’d easily persuaded the joint action committees to approve a massive pre-emptive strike. Not at the spheres. That was too obvious, and that bitch, Major Harvard, would’ve tried to spike it. But the incoming object was a threat, especially after he’d arranged for its parameters, in his published scenario, to change so that it seemed to be larger and coming in faster.

The Chinese general was no fool, and while shaking Gibbon’s uncertain hand when they first met, kept his smile to utilitarian minimalism and nodded in a way Gibbon associated with the Japanese. The Chinese general spoke yesterday as if Gibbon had prepared his speech.

“Though the data you provide falls outside of the range our experts predict, we recognize the incoming object as a threat and approve interception as soon as possible.”

Gibbon had expected to argue his case for action against the spheres along the lines of their taking these time displacements away was causing Earth’s problems. An earthquake larger than the 1976 Tangshan disaster sent a blame-the-spheres ripple around the globe along with the seismic waves.

He recalled the morning’s TV story. An Italian journalist had jabbered too fast for anyone to follow, but her narration wasn’t necessary. A helicopter view over the reawakened Mount Vesuvius showed the famous crater filling with bubbling, angry red lava. The pilot’s face bathed in sweat, he’d swung the chopper to the right, away from the caldera just in time as lava bombs projected up at him. The white, then red-hot ejecta arced through the air before one landed on a packed tourist minibus. The molten rock punched through the roof. The vehicle lurched to the edge of the mountain road and toppled over, then down the steep ash slope. Luckily, the noise of the helicopter drowned the screams, but the TV allowed Gibbon to hear those of the journalist.

* * *

With the collective firepower to obliterate life on Earth, the international consortium watched the monitors as over a dozen US and Russian Federation rockets blasted off with a combined nuclear warhead yield of sixty megatons to meet the single incoming sphere. It was too late to use the latest space-based kinetic energy weapons or organise the redirection of a meteoroid to intercept the sphere. They’d know in ten hours if the mission was successful. The projected interception was just over 160,000 kilometres from the other combined spheres remaining in orbit.

But this wasn’t Mission Control in Houston, nor The Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Russia, but the Vandenberg USAF Base in California. The martial gathering, in pressed uniforms of olive-green, greys and navy-blue, mingled in a white room where one wall comprised of screens showing duplicate displays from the real control centre a few corridors distant. Vertical beige blinds rejected the glaring Californian sun. Most of the group left for refreshments.

* * *

Two hours to detonation, Gibbon looked over the top of his clipboard at the incongruous gathering. In spite of the nostril-widening aroma from a cup of hot coffee, the air felt thick, but it could be the tension. He leant towards his aide and whispered:

“Ray, is it my ears being clogged, or is there a deathly silence in here.”

“Some have second thoughts. Haven’t you, Sir?”

With as much surreptitious skill as he remembered, Gibbon attempted to predict which of the military gathering were the traitors. “Good Lord, no. It’s just as well we programmed in a proximity detonation as the failsafe. I don’t want to risk a mission failure just because some of these piss-artists are dithering.”

Of course he’d put to the back of his mind the niggling doubts planted by that Kallandra woman. After the failure of the low-yield tactical nuclear missile on the Pacific sphere, she’d said that anything they threw at the things would be skipped out of the way with a time slippery manoeuvre. Well maybe not with such a big detonation as he’d planned and he had an ace up his sleeve, both sleeves.

Radar and radio jamming would confuse the sphere’s sensors moments before detonation. The lead rocket would detonate with a low yield a full minute before the others, which would blast it to another universe. Hah! Time-quaking wouldn’t help that fucker this time. And, hopefully, the spheres would think the bunch of grapes above the Indian Ocean was the target anyway. Then they’d realise Earth meant business. How dare they ignore us? Stealing our time like that had a price.

“Sir, suppose the Russians built in a failsafe too?”

“What?” Gibbon said, too loudly, drawing faces to him. He turned his back to them, while tugging Ray Wolfe’s arm. “How the hell could they?”

His aide shrugged. “You taught me to anticipate anything, Sir. Suppose they rigged their missiles so they can independently trigger them? I know we agreed on an electronic-systems protocol with them for this mission, but we paid off their inspector, so—”

“I need to lean on them to make sure they don’t use their own abort button.” He felt his face heat, probably reddening, as he sought the Russian general heading their group.

This is ridiculous, Gibbon thought. I can feel my pulse accelerating and yet all I’m gonna do is to talk horse-sense to that yellow-livered Ruski.

Gibbon had led a gunship assault at that commie island, Grenada, in ’83. Not much to worry about there, but anything could happen in warfare, even so he’d hardly a spot of sweat then. Cool, calm and collected. He looked at his palms swimming in perspiration. He fished out a large handkerchief from his right trouser pocket and towelled his hands.

The Russian general wasn’t difficult to spot: tall, a mass of thick grey hair creating a shadow across the light grey uniforms of his two podgy aides. He was too damned good-looking. Gibbons faltered in his walk towards the General not only because he’d forgotten his name; he’d seen for the first time, the Russian’s epaulet: three stars, not four. So, he was not their main man, just a Colonel General. Gibbon slowly about-turned and strolled back to Ray Wolfe.

He ensured his voice travelled only to his aide. “What’s that damned Ruski’s name again?”

“Ivan Federov. He’s a Colonel General, equivalent to our—”

“General, I know. So he’s inferior to me as Chief of Staff.”

“With respect, Sir, it makes little difference. He’s their superior officer.”

“Yes, yes, I know that too. He speaks better English than I can get by in Russian, I suppose? I remember him saying hello and how are you, but could he manage a debate?”

Wolfe tapped at his iPaq. “He did a training course at Grantown-on-Spey in Scotland, so he may have a bit of a Russian-cum-Scottish accent.”

Grumbling, Gibbon walked cautiously over to the trio, who watched the lines of missile tracks on the wall-screen.

“Say, Colonel Federov, may I have a word?” Damn, he realised he should have added in ‘General’.

“Certainly, General Gibbon, this is a momentous occasion,” he said in impeccable English with no trace of an accent.

“It will be if it goes to plan.” Gibbon needed to test the Russian, although the chances of him giving away intelligence of any unilateral failsafe device was as unlikely as finding a budget-happy Republican.

“As you know, General,” Federov said, “we went along with it because the worst that could happen is nothing, unless the spheres decide we need to be eliminated.”

“That was a factor in the games theory matrix.”

“Indeed it was. But I’m not as convinced as you that in destroying this sphere, the other spheres will take notice of us.”

Gibbon imagined tugging at his collar and wished he could undo his tie. “How could they fail to notice, or not realise they’ve created havoc down here?”

“It’s no good trying to get inside their heads. For one thing, they are probably robotic. Granted they might be sentient robots—”

“Now you’re worrying me, General Federov, have you been working on sixth generation AI machines?”

The Russian grinned. “As your Seattle people have. Don’t you think it comical that in these times of détente we still keep so many secrets?”

Gibbon agreed, though he didn’t vocalise the ‘more than you know’ thought, since maybe it was less than the Russian knew. There were far more ex-pat Russians and former Eastern Bloc nationals working in Microsoft and Silicon Valley than Americans in the whole of Eurasia. And yet the Japanese were probably ahead of everyone. However, they weren’t in that room with itchy fingers on a comms device in their pocket.

“Listen Federov, we need this mission to be successful. Sure we have more missiles, hundreds ready to go, thousands could be later. I know you have too, and other countries if pushed. But this is our first real big shot at stopping them bastards from messing us up.”

The Russian’s smile evaporated. “Your people tried to destroy the Fiji sphere unsuccessfully. But perhaps it was too small to affect the sphere.”

“Exactly. We don’t want anything fouling up this time.”

“I could interpret your tone, General Gibbon, as one suggesting we might abort, even though our technicians have arranged it so we cannot.”

“Come off it, Federov. If you wanted to abort I’m sure you could.” Gibbon abruptly realised he’d walked into his own trap.

“You mean your side could abort. You have overridden our agreed protocol?

Yes?”

Gibbon chose to be silent, as now was the rest of the room. He felt foolish and yet chimerical because he knew the Russians must have an abort or blow-to-hell-on-command ability secretly built in, as he had. Surely? He felt a sour taste in his mouth as if his acid reflux problem was being triggered by stress.

A shout by one of the Russian aides rescued Gibbon.

“The sphere is changing course.”

Gibbon knew that in the control centre down the corridor, computer operators’ fingers would be a blur as they accessed scenarios triggered by the new trajectory data.

Federov leant towards Gibbon. “It’s not a problem; the missiles will home in on it.”

“I know that,” he blurted. Gibbon hated not being in control, but immediately regretted his hasty response while the Russian was so calm. “They can even cope with the loss of forward sensory contact for several seconds at a time.”

“Yes, that was clever programming.”

Gibbon couldn’t recall whose side did the programming. Sure enough, the lead missile changed course too. On target. He grinned, at last.

A solid black rectangle on the large wall of screens flickered to life. Gibbon’s eyes eagerly switched from the tracking screen to the newly energised one. It was a live feed from a nose cam on the lead missile showing…nothing, mostly. Eyes narrowed, he leaned forward as if that helped. Then, a techie must have twirled a focus knob; he saw the non-twinkling pinpricks of stars. Even though the missile zipped through space at over 40,000 kilometres per hour, the stars didn’t seem to move.

A green arrow appeared on screen as if Sagittarius, the archer, was targeting the star in the centre. The image zoomed in to reveal the approaching metallic sphere.

Scrolling data indicated that their combined collision speed was a hundred and ninety kilometres per minute. Detonation in twelve seconds.

Twelve seconds, he thought, making sure the failsafe procedure was only a finger press away in his right jacket pocket. He internalised his own commentary to the countdown.

Eleven.... Federov had his hand in his pocket too. Left—trousers.

Ten.... Strange that the sphere, very tiny on screen even at maximum zoom, didn’t seem to get any larger.

Nine.... That last one seemed longer than a second.

Eight.... Throat drier than Arizona but no time for a glass of water.

Seven.... The room seemed to sway.

Six.... The sphere vanished.

“Is it my eyes, Ray, or has it gone?” Gibbon needn’t have asked. The room pulsated with gasps. Silly because it was anticipated. The spheres were becoming predictable when faced with attacks, but Gibbon hoped that the heavy-duty walloping would damage it this time.

The screen blanked. Silence again as all eyes turned to the tracking screen. A red spot grew to a disk where the lead missile detonated. Simultaneously, the tracking lines showed the other missiles spreading so that when they detonated the chances of hitting the sphere increased, if and when it appeared in the next second or minute.

Seconds later a predetermined pattern of detonations erupted from the outer missiles to the centre.

Gibbon allowed a grin, however nervous, as he thought of the sphere being caught like a salmon in a net. It should have been smashed this time.

He started shaking. Ridiculous after his wartime experiences and yet, somehow, the threat was worse for being undefined. He was unlikely to die in this conflict although he hadn’t enjoyed the implications of that physicist when she pointed out that if part of the Earth stood still the rest would move on at thirty kilometres per second. So there was a chance all this could go fatally wrong if the spheres had such a defence mechanism. Suddenly, his knees gave way and his chair creaked as he promptly landed on it. Frowning, he couldn’t remember standing. He put his hand on his stomach as if that would calm the cauldron effervescing in there.

His eyes flicked to the other screens one at a time, seeking evidence of destruction or survival. Weather satellites, and others, had their sensors re-aligned especially. Infrared was washed out for a while yet, as was visible light. Radar was a mass of speckles. Not from missile fragments: they would have vaporized. Plasma pockets and maybe sphere shrapnel?

“Is...is that all of them, Ray?” Gibbon’s eyes couldn’t focus properly on the status screen.

“Yes Sir. The second wave are being prepared at Vandenberg and Plesetsk.

Aimed at the cluster in orbit. Are you OK, Sir?”

“Not really, but let’s get through this nightmare.”

“Not a nightmare, Sir. I think we managed to destroy that sphere, even though….”

Gibbon saw that his aide was sneaking a glance over at Federov. So, the Russians tried to sabotage the mission after all. He stood, too abruptly and felt light-headed. Swaying for a second he put out a hand on Ray’s shoulder for support. While revving up his energy for a blast at Federov, he could feel his pulse throbbing in his thick neck.

“Sir,” said Ray, “you may have misinterpreted what I meant—”

“No I didn’t. You stop here.” Gibbon had wound himself up, and marched across the marble floor to the group of Russians, who remained watching the screens.

“Federov, you set off your missiles too early, didn’t you? Jeopardising the whole mission like that is totally irresponsible.” He couldn’t stop his forehead perspiring but didn’t want to fish out a handkerchief; it would look bad—a weakness. But he felt hot too; his face must be glowing red. The damn Russian hardly looked round at him.

“You shouldn’t jump to conclusions, General.”

“So you don’t deny it? Don’t bother, I wouldn’t believe you anyway.”

To Gibbon’s astonishment, the Russian, looking calm and collected, smiled as if he was so superior nothing could touch him. Feeling his anger bursting up through him like an awakening volcano, Gibbon wrenched off his jacket, dropped it over a chair and threw himself at the Russian. His last-moment raised arm failed to prevent an ignominious scrum down to the floor. Chairs scattered chairs and shocked colleagues shouted.

Through the Russian’s shirt, Gibbon could feel iron stomach muscles as he scrambled, trying to protect his eyes from a two-fingered jab. He wondered why he was on his back while Federov enjoyed the space and superiority of being over him. Gibbon rolled to the left, but the Russian knelt on his chest. Not only could Gibbon not move, he could feel his ribs cracking and his sternum shot hot pains straight to his heart. Maybe this was it! A heart attack from the physical and emotional stress. He thrashed his arms trying to smite the Russian, whose face had lost its control and twisted like a gargoyle drooling vehemence and spittle over Gibbon.

Incongruously, Gibbon felt his elbow getting colder. He twisted his head sufficient to see broken glass on the floor. They’d knocked iced water off the tables.

His sleeve must be wet.

In the midst of the fracas where it seemed the Russian didn’t really want to hurt him, and Gibbon’s initial vehemence had sublimated to embarrassment, arms dragged them apart.

Gasping, Gibbon couldn’t look his aide in the face. “Damned Russians.”

Before the expected agreement came from his aide, a sharp female voice cut through the room.

“It’s back.”

Grumbling that it demonstrated his correct interpretation, even though the Russians denied detonating their missiles too early, Gibbon looked at the screens. He didn’t know which one indicated the sphere had popped back into their time.

“The group of spheres, Sir,” said Ray. “There’s nine there now. There were only eight this morning. They’re running an image-tagging algorithm to—”

“Since when?” Gibbon looked at a smudge of blood on his handkerchief after using it to dab the back of his sore head.

“Since the start of your…erm…fight, Sir.”

Gibbon groaned. His explosion at the Russian might have been justifiable, at least to him, but he knew it would be seen as unprofessional and bad form with regard to the recent relationship with the former Soviets. He’d risen to his position by always being right but also in making positive decisions, aggressively when appropriate.

“General, you were wrong this time,” Federov said. “And so were we. Sixty megatons made no difference to them. For all we know, the sphere was going to flip out of time and zip across to the others all along.”

Gibbon sat more upright. “Then we blast them with ten times as much in the second wave.”

The Russian sat opposite Gibbon, who bristled at the sight of the man looking suavely no different than before the scuffle.

“Our game theorists don’t agree, General. Now this negative event is factored in, there’s no advantage to us in taking a second aggressive action.”

“He’s right, Sir.” Ray wrung his hands in apology.

Gibbon sniffed at the strong but now cold coffee he’d originally brought into the room. A scum of milk glared accusingly at him. Maybe if he’d drunk it all earlier, his brain would’ve sorted this problem out without needing the Russians or blasted game theory.

Dolefully he looked up at Federov and was about to suggest another tactic when another woman’s voice sliced through the awkward air.

“The spheres are moving off. Slowly, so far. At normal to the ecliptic and now parabolic. Too early to estimate direction.”

Gibbon slumped in his chair. Exhausted and sore, in several places and meanings, he resigned himself to the inevitable; the Earth had its chance and blew it.

Time decoherences were going to get worse until the planet split apart. A flash of insight told him that it might have happened to other planets in the Solar System, creating the asteroid belt.

Chapter Twenty-Three

At last she’d piloted a spacecraft way beyond the Earth. The exhilaration pushed away the doubts. In between checking the near-fully-automatic ship controls, Kallandra stared through the viewscreen at steady stars. It buzzed her so much and yet the only word she could drag up to describe it was inexpressible. She laughed but checked herself before accusations of hysteria could be hurled at her.

A long inhale brought whiffs of new plastic and fresh rubber seals. Something, Kallandra appreciated, most people only experienced when they bought a new car.

She twisted in her pilot’s seat to find Claude triple-checking navigation and engineering modules in the spacecraft’s cramped forward cabin. She knew he felt guilty, and so did she. She tried to forget the arguments and so concentrate on the mission, but emotional fragments snagged her.

“I’m the chief designer of this craft, and the modifications aren’t fully tested.”

Derek’s pleas to Disraeli should have worked, but the General had thought it through.

“If this was the Mars mission, we might have kicked off a biologist to make way for an engineer—after all, Mars is a machine-hostile environment. But this is flight only.

Instead of a crew of six, we’ve booted off flesh to make way for fuel and resources so two can follow them fuckers for as long as possible. Maybe a one-way trip.”

Kallandra didn’t need reminding that the mission was more important than the crew.

“Even so, General,” Derek said, “The Apoidea’s modification in the switch from Mars to pursuing the spheres has been hastily, too hastily done.”

“Are you saying it’s too dangerous to fly?”

“Well, not really, although all space-vehicles can be improved on—”

“Yeah, forever. If it was up to you guys, the first space rocket would still be sitting on the launch pad.” He chuckled at his own joke in spite of the seriousness of the situation, or perhaps because of it. He pointed at Claude, who was fingering his moustache; like his hair, close cut for the flight. “Lapointe there, like Major Harvey, is a top NASA pilot, and it’s those skills we need more than yours. He’s an engineer, so is the Major, and both can follow any emergency directions. You’ve only flown sub-orbital,

Derek.”

Refusing to go away, Derek tried one last time. “The ion drive has only been tried on much lighter unmanned vehicles, and the auto-drive-interface is revolutionary— my design.”

“And we’re damned grateful, Derek. Who better to be manning the duplicate and simulator at mission control in case it needs tweaking?”

“But once they leave the Solar System there might not be time for radio messages to bat to and fro in an emergency.”

“The decision’s been made, Derek. Excuse me, we’ve both a heck of a schedule.”

* * *

Kallandra ran a hand over her brown hair, trimmed to within an inch of her scalp.

She could just make out the sun-reflected white spot of the spheres eighty thousand kilometres in front. They’d caught up after five days and kept their distance at the amazingly slow speed of just over sixteen hundred kilometres per hour, expecting a speed surge or time displacement disappearance any second. NASA programmers told them the sensor software would track the spheres even with slight temporal displacements and large acceleration.

“Claude, do you think they’ll speed up any moment? Surely they can’t be thinking of spending another billion years to reach their home system?”

“You don’t have to make small talk, Kal. The General was right to only let two come on this mission.”

She turned to see if he was smiling. “I know the General had a dossier on me and Derek.”

“Don’t look at me, I had no hand in it.”

“Allegedly it said me and Derek could be unstable.”

“And how dare they? God knows how these shrinks operate.” He wasn’t smiling but she guessed he might be on the inside. He pointed at the spheres on the zoom field screen. “Whoa there they go.”

Kallandra waved her finger at the sensor to turn off the alarm, triggered by the sudden change in the spheres’ velocity to nearly sixteen thousand kilometres per hour.

Their own ship had engaged its ion drive days before, but now it needed rocket engines to catch their quarry.

After the computer’s feminine voice nagged them with safety checks and re-checks, Kallandra tried to focus on readouts as their engines blasted. It was easier to close her eyes as her face distorted, but the boost didn’t last long.

“If they go ten times faster again,” Claude said, “we might as well turn around and head for drinks at La Carotti’s Bar.”

“Don’t wish for it. Look at that news bulletin.” Kallandra pointed at a CNN programme live feed.

Claude rubbed his neck after the acceleration had pulled his muscles. “What’s happened to the Golden Gate Bridge?”

The screen showed that only the north side remained.

“Probably timequaked into the Pacific,” Kallandra said, “along with the hapless people driving along it. Apparently a mini tsunami hit Frisco shortly after, so a mass of sea must have been displaced, too.”

“If the displaced mass of ocean was thrown into the Pacific, then more displacements would have happened there, too. I’m contacting NASA to see if more tsunamis hit Japan.”

“We haven’t time, Claude. Let’s make sure the Apoidea has its nose pointing after the spheres.” Something nagged at her.

“Ma soeur is studying at the Tokyo Language Institute.”

Kallandra nodded. Now she knew it was his sister, Marie, that tugged her memory. “Sorry, Claude.” She left him to dig around the news channels while she interrogated the nav computer for an update on the spheres.

Ten minutes later she smelt coffee. It only took a pressed button but she smiled knowing Claude had forgiven her.

“Maybe I should’ve asked earlier, Claude, but how do you feel about being Derek’s replacement?”

“Excusez-moi, I have replaced Derek in your heart? Ah, don’t worry. I jest. I don’t consider I have replaced Derek up here. I am needed and there is no room for him. C’est la vie.”

“Yes but...oh well.”

“Kal, I stopped worrying about my promotions affecting friends’ career prospects from day one—I had to.”

She nodded, and then turned to find their nav systems had fixed on the new position of the spheres. She checked the auto systems.

She glanced at their Apoidea badge emblem: a bee whizzing off from Earth into space. “Do you think the spheres will actually notice this little bee chasing them?”

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

“Trouble is—”

“Oui, they’ll either ignore us or blast us into another universe.”

“Hopefully, they’ll realise we’re not non-sentient insects and damn well want to do something about having left us with a rapidly uninhabitable home.” She sniffed at a liquorice stick after sucking at it, while thinking others would have sworn at the spheres.

“Claude, why can I call people bastards, but not badmouth the spheres? It’s as if they did something to me with that first Glastonbury encounter. Not many folk have actually touched a sphere.”

“They sprinkled magic-dust on you.”

She threw him a glance and caught his smirk. His moustache looked so ridiculously like Errol Flynn in They Died With Their Boots On. “You might as well shave off that cookie-duster.” She couldn’t help laughing as he twitched it into a dance, while he mocked looking hurt.

“I will if you will,” he said.

“What?” She threw an iPod earpiece, which he batted back. As she turned to place it in a drawer she felt his warm arms around her, and his moustache nuzzling her neck.

“Claude, you’re freaking me out.” But she didn’t fight him off. A sensible synapse urged caution; remember Derek. Wasn’t she betrothed to him? Yes, but that scent…. “Are you wearing perfume?”

His voice deepened as the words slowed. “You are aware of regulation one-five-nine-twelve forbidding the introduction of extraneous contaminants such as deodorants and aromatic aerosols? This is all me, madam.”

“Yeah right, and a roll-on pheromone boost with added musk.”

“Are you enamoured with me or my alleged fragrance?”

“Don’t push it, buster.”

“But you want me to push it, ma cherie, don’t you?”

“Not right now, Claude, we have stage one of this mission to see through.” My God, she thought, she’d not said no, but sidestepped into the job. He unwrapped his arms but his smirk left its ghost. She looked away to the console, looking for work, which wasn’t difficult: they were always behind schedule on double and triple routine checks.

Kallandra needed thinking time along with a rest. “Claude, I’m taking my sleep time now. Wake me if there’s any change?”

* * *

Damn, she couldn’t get off to sleep. The ship sang to her through its aluminium alloys, struts vibrating their concertos and syncopating with gurgling fluids, and the symphony conducted by occasional engine thrusts. But it wasn’t those noises that kept sleep at arm’s length.

She’d known of Claude’s bad-boy reputation over the previous two years. He’d nearly cooked his future flight chances with an opportunist fumble with Disraeli’s teenage daughter at a launch party. He’d kept quiet but the excitable Fiona’s face had glowed on return to the bar and couldn’t help blurting to her friends how they’d had their own take-off in the deserted upper observation room.

Kallandra sat bolt upright at another revelation. She’d dismissed a suggestion from Tabitha Wish that she’d dug up dirt on Claude about an affair with Gibbon’s wife, a former pageant queen. If he’d hit on married women, why had he treated herself as a mere flying colleague up till now? She’d assumed they would always be no more than buddies. Surely he wasn’t afraid of Derek? Maybe he wasn’t a sufficiently aggressive challenge compared to the boss’s wife and a general’s daughter. She knew there was little point in such a bedtime analysis with insufficient data, and so tried to sleep.

Unconsciousness resisted her appeals. Although she’d successfully driven thoughts of Claude away for another day, issues about the mission prevented sleep.

She’d pressed for the mission on the grounds that the spheres would notice, after their exit, their bee in pursuit, and so maybe they‘d want to rectify the time mess they’d left.

Actually, that maybe had crept in after her impassioned speech to Disraeli where she’d asserted undue positivism to that hope. Her other argument, agreed by everyone, was that they’d nothing to lose, and possibly something to gain if the spheres returned and, somehow, rectified the increasing time chaos.

Gibbon said that it was possible the spheres would notice their Bee following them, and rather than be stung or having their lair discovered, would swat the Apoidea, and then the Earth; as an exterminator would do to a barn wasp nest. While this possibility remained, the environmental scientists and physicists agreed that normal life couldn’t be sustained with the time decoherences.

She turned over, the tucked-in single sheet preventing her drifting in the near zero gravity. Sleep usually galloped up on her once her head hit the pillow. It’d better arrive soon or her six-hour sleep-slot would be over….

* * *

Moments later she smacked the back of her neck, but then opened her eyes when she realised there shouldn’t be a mosquito within a hundred thousand kilometres.

“Claude, what are you doing? Get back to monitoring the console.” He’d removed his hand from stroking her neck after her hand caught his finger. She shivered from the sensation, although it was not unpleasant. Thankful—maybe—the bunks weren’t wide enough for two, she glanced at her watch as she turned and realised she’d had a welcome four hours sleep.

“There’s a news bulletin you should see.”

“Can’t you just tell me?” she asked, but to his retreating back as he loped-drifted back up front.

Still in NASA underwear, Kallandra grabbed an instant coffee and sleepily collapsed in the swivel chair next to Claude. He waited for her first sip and then clicked to replay the web news item. The headline said it all: Spheres leave from Mars, and Venus.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Hurtling through space at right-angles to the ecliptic plane left the solar system behind her worryingly fast. The stretched communications with Earth made conversations more of a planned chore with minutes for her to say good morning to Derek and to receive a meaningless weather’s fine here back.

She’d gone through the medical instructions again for a three-months drug-induced hibernation. It’d worked fine with prison volunteers but not tried in space. A necessary evil to extend their life support resources, and maybe their lifespan. Failure to elicit a response from the spheres made an extended flight plan necessary. She paused to reflect on their argument a few days before.

Claude had said: “It seems bizarre that the spheres still travel at only eighty thousand kph, give or take a click.”

“Maybe they need to go slow for all the others to catch up,” said Kallandra.

“You think there might be more sneaking up behind us? They’ll say Enchante, pardon moi as they pass. Don’t they have enough time decoherences, or whatever else they’ve harvested?”

“NASA hasn’t spotted any from planets beyond Jupiter.”

“And so they’re taking longer to catch up? Possible. If that’s the case—”

She threw her hand into the air like a rocket. “Then zoom. I bet they’ll pop out of our time frame or accelerate to near light speed, and—”

“And we turn back, unless we can make them notice us first. Let’s try again.”

“Claude, we’re already sending stop-and-talk-to-us messages on every wavelength and frequency.”

“Like every tourist says in Quebec, parlez lentement s’il vous plait. ”

“Just because it’s taken them two billion years to gather time doesn’t mean they communicate at a snail’s pace. But, OK, let’s send a very slow version of ‘Hoi, what about us?’” Something else tugged. How did the spheres communicate? She’d set up the recordings of four of the sets of spheres their own telescopes and sensors could measure, and ran multi-dimensional pattern recognition routines.

“Got it! Claude come see.” She could feel her face glow with the excitement as the display revealed a simple but repeated phenomenon. “Remember that we’ve noticed the light from the spheres sometimes flickers?”

“Oui, possibly from when they rotate or somehow change their albedo.”

“When a comparison algorithm is run on the timing of those flickers in conjunction with the other sets of spheres, we get something interesting.” She tapped the computer trackpad to show a set of graphs that scrolled but resolved finally to one.

“You are right. Every time one lot flickers, there is a flicker from the one we think came from Earth—fifty-eight seconds later. Do you agree?”

“Sure, and when the Earth sphere flickers without ‘answering’ one of the others, they all flicker simultaneously exactly fifty-eight seconds after.”

“So why doesn’t it respond to us when we blast it with all the lights we have?”

“Remember you mentioned earlier about our radio signals might be on a different timescale to theirs? Suppose our blast of light is too long, and so they didn’t figure on our light as being relevant to them.”

“Good thinking, Kal, let’s blast them with an identical light signal the spheres sent to their "vaisseau amiral”

“I get you. The mother-ship? OK, I’m onto it.” She copied the pattern of the answering flickering from the spheres into the transmitting circuit. She looked at Claude, who gave her a ‘GO’ look, and so she did.

An hour later there’d been no change. They’d lit up their section of the universe, strobing like a supernova at a disco, with and without radio, and all available electromagnetic radiation output, but nothing came back.

“They don’t want to play, Cherie, we might as well go to bed.”

While Claude wrote up and sent back to Earth an updated report, she flipped open the medical cabinet and retrieved the hypnagogic drug instructions. She’d hoped they’d have made contact before going into a three months hibernation state, particularly as no one she knew personally had tried it. The procedure involved intravenous feeding and hydration, and their waste, although much reduced, had to deal with nightmarish contraptions.

“Hey, Kallandra, you are hiding something from me.”

She glanced at him, picking up facial clues. Was he joking, as usual? His eyebrows reached for his nose—not a good sign. “What are you jabbering on about?”

He grabbed her arm and tugged. “Over at the comms console.”

She considered waving him off, but what the heck…. “OK, but this had better be good.”

“I’ve had a few suspicions about why you’re on this mission,” he said. “I know you’ve been on national security missions. And Tabitha said—”

“Hang on, there, Buddy. What are you on about? Why me on this mission? The more relevant one is why you are?” She stopped herself launching into a greater tirade when it occurred to her that the stress of this probable one-way journey was getting to him. Surely his logic circuits knew they were both in the same boat—literally. How could one of them have a hidden agenda, and linked to the secret services. Sure, she’d been on training courses with the FBI, CIA, and all sorts over the years. Hadn’t all NASA pilots?

Claude pulled her over to the screens. She noticed that unread message flags waved at them. “You’ve made a pact with them, haven’t you?”

“Who—the spheres or NASA? And the answer is no to either. And why should I? See sense, Claude. You know we have to clear these messages, send a see-you-later and prepare for hibernation.”

“You’ve been besotted by the spheres since you hugged one at Glastonbury.

You probably feel you have an affinity with them, and that they couldn’t possibly hurt you in particular. But they don’t know we are here, you stupid bitch.”

“Claude?” A wave of maternal emotion washed over her towards him, in spite of his invective. Or maybe because of it. “Sure I feel a connection with them. It’s one of those ephemeral reasons I was sent on this mission. But I want to go home as much as you do.”

“Non, you have arranged a failsafe solution if we can’t make ourselves heard. A massive detonation with our death would do that.”

“I doubt it would. Anyway, we’ve missiles that could do that without destroying ourselves.” She tried to fathom what had really upset him.

With a look that told her he was about to reveal a trump hand, he leaned to the side of the main comms console and opened one of the large aluminium lockers. A matt black box filled most of it. No labels, handles or buttons. It looked heavy, threatening and yet she knew that was an illogical reaction.

Claude pointed at the black box and said, “What’s that called—or is it classified?”

Kallandra put her hand out to the unknown black surface but stopped short at touching it. “That’s truly weird. Before launch I’d been over every inch of this vessel—”

“As have I.”

“Sure, Claude, we both have, though resources were being shoe-horned in, right up to the last hours. And equipment relevant to a larger crew, such as the extra suits, were being extricated. Hey, let’s see what the manifest says.”

“I have already checked. Spare batteries and comms parts.”

“Yes, that’s right. A regular warehouse for Radio Shack. That’s what I remember seeing there during the week before we took off. You were with me, Claude.”

He spoke slowly, in low tones. “Ah, oui. So what is this?” Claude put on his best hangdog face, while his arms invited a hug.

She stepped back. “I’m annoyed with you. How dare you think I’d conspire against you.”

He advanced. She put her hands on her hips, and then realised she was still in her underwear. Not able to be both defiant and improperly dressed her face rebelled and broke into a smile. His embrace charged her whole body. In particular, skin on skin produced a tingle as if they were human batteries. Maybe the stress of the flight and the not knowing, had melted her resistance. She stroked the back of his shirt while feeling his warm breath on her neck.

“Claude, what are you thinking now?”

“Isn’t that obvious?”

“I guess so, but where shall we—?”

“I don’t know what you have in mind, but I know we have to break into that box.”

And so her flight of fancy crashes to Earth, or rather the deck. “Of course. Have you actually checked for a touch panel?”

“Yes. No reaction. But we have cutting tools. I could make a hand sized circle in minutes, and then—”

“Claude, wouldn’t it be better to ask Houston what it is? It’s been there for weeks, we can wait another hour.”

He pulled back from her and prodded his forehead with an elegant forefinger.

“I’ve thought of that, but suppose it is a device to create a huge ‘notice me’ explosion?”

“Then they might do a pre-emptive remote detonation. OK, what else can we do?”

“We can jettison it. As long as they didn’t weld it or use superglue we can lever it out and attach a propellant canister so it moves away from us.”

“That might be a bit drastic if all it contained were our spare pants. Let’s put it outside but on our longest tether.”

“And then ask them what it is? The four-k tether wouldn’t protect us from a nuclear blast even if behind us.”

“Granted but our rear has good blast protection. Better than it going off in here, and I’m reluctant to completely abandon what might be essential resources.”

Claude waved his arms in exasperation. “But obviously we’ve not needed it. We know our food and water will keep us going for months. We have sufficient nuke energy to outlive us. What else, besides chocolate, are you going to need?”

“OK, a compromise. We dump it here with enough hydrazine in a strapped-on nozzle to slow it, say, to a thousand mph, and with a radio beacon.”

“So we can find it on our way back, if we found it was something essential.”

“Yeah,” she said, “like a strawberry gateau.”

* * *

Contemplating hibernation sent her the shivers. A hundred-percent survival rate with prisoners was small comfort. Suppose the ship forgot to wake them? Any change in the spheres’ behaviour should trigger a first stage preparation to wake them, then, if the change didn’t return to the previous status, the next stage would follow—their being awakened. But she knew the criterion for what constituted a sufficient change in the position vectors or appearance of the spheres changed with whoever joined the group discussing it at JPL. She and Claude were allowed a say but not a final decision.

Mankind was too important. The mission outweighed their lives. She had to accept that one scenario had to include their demise. Life support depletion or meteorite encounters could see the end of their involvement but, if not destroyed, the Apoidea would continue, robotically pursuing the spheres and sending back mission reports.

The automated relays and subroutines were good, the best, but they didn’t have the gut reactions, that insight and serendipity giving humans an edge. Or, so she argued, to be allowed on board.

“It’s good that we’re only test driving this hibernation lark for three months, and not three thousand years,” she said, but Claude merely nodded.

Blasting another set of flashing lights and radio signals at the spheres brought a further zero response so, after a series of injections and the insertion of ignominious surgical appliances, they both lay in waterbed-like pods, waiting for drug-induced sleep.

For precious minutes Kallandra’s brain fought and lost consciousness in several bouts. Something tugged at her, preventing sleep. Her eyes opened wide when she realised what they’d missed. All she could see was nothing—no need for light while they were asleep. No, a faint green LED led her eyes to an emergency stop button.

Did she want to hammer it now, or wait? Now, but it was too much effort to reach….

Chapter Twenty-Five

A flu virus, Kallandra thought, as her chilled blood struggled to accelerate. Her stomach although empty, agitated and she felt nauseous. None of these concerned her as much as her head, which banged with the mother of all headaches. She tried to feel if it was perspiration or a leaking pipe that soaked her brow but her arm refused to lift.

She tried to call Claude, but her voice rasped like a leaky bellows.

In moments that seemed like hours she remembered the hibernation. Either the three months had elapsed or an emergency was fast-tracking her awakening. Her headache was precipitated by an alarm siren! Again she attempted movement but knew she had to be patient. Gradually, she could twiddle fingers and toes….

* * *

“False alarm.” Claude slumped in a too-comfortable padded seat, and strapped in just in case he was wrong.

Kallandra’s head throbbed from a cocktail of headache, recalling procedures— although that mainly consisted of checking the computer routines—and a niggling something half-remembered feeling. Cradling a coffee, she leant against the cream-coloured bulkhead preferring verticality after being horizontal for so long; a contrast to Claude’s caution.

“How long?” she asked.

“Eighty eight days. After such a sleep we should be bouncing with energy.”

“Claude, you look as dormant as I feel. Should we EVA to check? I don’t fancy losing our air supply while we return to hibernation, if we do.”

“A sensor alerted the computer of a coolant leak in a module over an hour ago but it’s been green since. There’d be nothing to see from outside unless there really is a leak and the outside cam doesn’t show anything.”

“I thought we could independently check fluid leaks?”

“Kal, I’m beginning to feel hungry. What delicacy do we have for petit dejeuner?”

“I suppose that was before they bolted on these extra modules.”

“On the other hand I may not be able to keep any food down, I still feel nauseous. Do you have a headache that feels like a carpenter is working on the inside of your skull?”

“Claude, there are some tasks we’ve overlooked because of this premature awakening. Like I send a signal back to say we survived…. Oh, they’ll know that. Hey we haven’t done the post-hibernation medical.”

He threw up his hands in mock horror. “We survived. Ergo it worked, but I feel so terrible.”

“Me too.”

Claude unbuckled to drift over and embrace her.

She hugged back. “Mind my coffee. I don’t want to repeat this hell of a hangover, and with no booze for hair of a dog.”

He pulled back so they could look into each other’s eyes. “So, you are saying no more hibernation?”

“Claude, if only you could see the yellow of the whites of your eyes.”

He smiled, and placed her coffee carton into a desk holder before another hug.

“You Americans have such a flair for romantic small talk.”

She felt warm in his arms. Comforted, but duty overcame desire. “Let’s plug ourselves into the body checks and see what those drugs have done to us.”

“The basics must be within the expected range or they would have woken us.”

“I suppose so, but they don’t take blood samples—oh, heck with it. Let’s check on the spheres, though I guess they must still be there too.”

Their relative location to the spheres revealed their situation—except distance from Earth—virtually unchanged since the two months before they went into hibernation. A shower, caffeine and glucose later saw her nausea diminish. At the comms console she fell quiet as a memory played catch with her sub-consciousness.

“Got it! Claude, I know why the spheres flicker.”

He turned from a viewscreen to look at her. “Startle me—come on.”

She couldn’t help smiling, both at his words and her unuttered revelation.

“They were nipping in and out of time—our time.”

She expected his face to light up, but he shrugged.

“Could be, but at the speeds we were all doing, and, by the way, we are now at a hundred and thirty three thousand kilometres per hour, they’d have reappeared in a different place.”

“No they wouldn’t, they could move back and forward in time so that…ah, you’re teasing me, aren’t you? Bastard.” Her hand reached behind her for something to hurl at him. Shame it was her coffee carton. Flying in near zero-gravity didn’t mean slow motion, although only a few spots escaped the drinking tube as it rotated. The potential for short-circuit damage led to Kallandra holding her breath.

Laughing, he caught the cup. “So, to communicate with the spheres, who are now grouped together, all we have to do is invent our own time-machine.”

She pulled some paper wipe from a dispenser to catch remaining coffee blobs.

“There may be another way. Remember that quantum mechanics briefing we had from Miss Avano? What was her first name? Gabby? It doesn’t matter, but—”

“Gabriella with the beautiful deep brown eyes,” Claude said, his eyes drifting upwards.

“That’s her. Trust you to remember. Anyway, she said that when objects are moving, time changes too. And that when objects change speed rapidly, time changes more so.”

Claude slowly shook his head. “I see where you’re going but she also said those time decoherences were only known to occur at quantum levels, and in a probabilistic way.”

Undeterred, she continued. “And near black holes, large masses, tiny masses, close to speed of light travelling and varying in between. After all, time is bound up with mass and energy.”

Claude turned to check more console data screens. “I know. Different forms of each other, but how can we make use of such theoretical nuances?”

“I’m just thinking out loud, but if we program ourthrust rockets to max forward and retro in—”

“Not in time to the sphere’s flickerings? I don’t think the engines can react fast enough. If they could, Mon Dieu, the Apoidea would be torn apart.”

“We’ll try it as fast as the system says it’s safe and then increment the speed. I know it would be more like a traffic light changing but maybe the fact that we change velocity vectors to their pattern, although slower, would alert them to our existence.”

“Especially if we light ourselves up again. Aren’t you the clever one ma fleur?”

Claude looked into her eyes. She felt a tingling up her neck, and could sense her heart hammering too fast for a levelheaded pilot.

He reached for her and held her left hand. “This won’t work, Kallandra.”

“Maybe not…but nothing ventured….” She lifted her other hand to his arm.

“What would Derek say?”

She hadn’t expected him to refer to her fiancé just as they were, possibly, about to…. “I imagine he’s written me off. I didn’t think you’d care what he thinks.”

“No, I meant…. Never mind.”

It was her turn to look at him quizzically, but she knew then that he wasn’t talking about being playful.

“Claude, when we tell Derek our stop start plan for the Apoidea he will be as pleased as a poked grizzly bear.” She wondered whether to withdraw her hands from his.

“Then we’d better not tell him.”

Kallandra smiled. “Mission Control has feeds; they’ll know what our engines do, eventually.”

Kallandra felt the ship’s ever-present vibrations, like the busy bee Apoidea was named after. But now she experienced a new buzz. An emotional resonance she hadn’t felt in Claude’s presence before, and shouldn’t now. Human magnetism seemed to throw rules out of the viewscreens in extreme situations. He spoke and yet she had to concentrate to absorb his words.

“…which engines do you refer to?”

He must have felt it too. Oh God. She brushed her lips against his chin.

“You need to get closer to your razor, Claude.”

“Not now though, eh?” They hugged, and their movement caused them to drift in the near-zero gravity. She felt his warm body through his thin pertex T-shirt, and breathed in his smuggled deodorant—a blend of Cedarwood and musk. Was he deliberately tugging at her senses? His hands roamed over her back and into her shorts, and she didn’t resist. This was wrong, yet right; inappropriate for professional pilots on a mission, yet inevitable; inexcusable, yet…wonderful.

* * *

Glowing from shame, exertion and a too-hot post-coital shower, Kallandra considered the latest message from Mission Control. Because they were over a 160 million kilometres from Earth, radio signals took over ten minutes to travel, so at least she was spared having to make instant feedback. To reduce signal loss at this distance the communication from Houston was radio only.

Capcom’s voice belonged to Elaine Stringer. An obsession with dark chocolate had contributed to her plumpness, but for intelligent calmness she was unbeatable.

Kallandra had spent many silly hours in bars with Elaine.

“As you know, Major Harvard, we have monitors on the Apoidea sending us feedback from your ship’s vital stats, and more than just the forward views of the spheres.”

She wondered where the internal viewcams were in relation to their X-rated activity. Ah….

“NASA has a live feed from some of your cams onto their website and several TV shows….”

“No, no! Claude, come here.”

“…there seems to be a glitch and we’d like you to run a diagnostics…”

She sighed with relief as he shouted, “Not now, ma cherie.”

“You turned the cams off?” She found the button and touched it on again. Then, as she started to laugh, she remembered their medical sensors. Implants sent vital signs via the onboard health monitor computer to Houston.

“…we registered heightened levels of biological stress symptoms…concerned you guys might have an emergency…”

She did have an emergency of sorts, and now she felt guilty. Sure she could rationalise her actions—as Claude did. They probably wouldn’t make it back so why not experience some pleasure while they could? It was ingenuous for Claude to disable all the cams, but Derek was going to guess what happened. He wasn’t stupid.

“Major Harvard and Captain Lapointe,” Capcom said.

“Oh dear, Elaine has gone all serious on us, Claude.”

“They know then?”

Elaine continued: “Before the break in the cam link we overheard your intended risky engine procedure.”

Kallandra paused the recording. “I’d rather them have heard our screams and grunts than know too early of us teaching the engines to do the rumba.”

“That’s your maverick test pilot persona speaking, mon cherie. I wouldn’t be surprised if The Flight Dynamics Officer came up with better ideas. Let’s ask him.”

She mumbled, “I suppose so,” before playing the rest of Capcom Elaine’s message.

“The Flight D.O. is sending you a file. We know that you could override any remote stops we put on your manoeuvres, but please listen to his comments. Over.”

“See,” Claude said, “he is sending us advice.”

“I don’t believe it. Knowing the Flight Officer, he’s sent us a long list of don’ts or…hey, I wonder if you’re right? Maybe he has ideas of using the lateral thrusts, which can turn on and off rapidly.”

A couple of minutes later Claude shook his head and unplugged his earpiece.

“No, just a reminder of engine tolerance factors, the likelihood of us breaking up if we exceed them, and why not set up a drone.”

“I guess we kiss goodbye to the warranty on this little rocket ship then, because we are going to emulate the spheres flickering. A drone would be too small for them to notice and it wouldn’t have the engine power.”

Claude shrugged. “All right, even if it’ll be the slowest flickering they’ve seen.

Actually, Kal, I’m not convinced we should—”

Not wanting to hear his doubts, she interrupted. “Without trying we’ll never know if they might have seen us. Just tagging along isn’t working. Hello, another urgent message from Capcom.” Grateful for the distraction, she let Claude listen to the new message while she prepared the rocket programming. Did Elaine and Disraeli think she was a kamikaze pilot? A smile grew as she realized they’d probably remembered those white-knuckle test flights she did while in the USAF not so long ago.

“They want us to download new programming code for the navigation computer and for us to go to hibernation for as long as it takes.” Claude gave her a combination grin and quizzical look telling her he didn’t think she’d go along with them.

“They can want. I felt ill waking up from the short version, and I don’t relish being asleep for ever, probably decaying while the spheres continue without knowing of us.”

“Then, there’s that box we ejected. Mon Dieu, Houston must know what we did with the cams and sensors we overlooked. Why didn’t they say anything, if it was innocuous?”

“Exactly. Erm, Claude, are they listening to us now? Or in ten minutes when the signals reach them?”

“No. I’ve allowed digicams but with no sound except for when we want it. But unless we sever the incoming telemetry I don’t think we can stop them taking control of the Apoidea if they wish.”

She guessed that would be Disraeli’s intention with the new programming code.

But if he really wanted a totally compliant crew he wouldn’t have picked her. She guessed Claude would do as he was told by Houston. His middle-class Quebec upbringing conditioned him more than her rapscallion childhood on the outskirts of Phoenix.

“OK, Claude, I suppose we’d better download their new code, but not into the nav computer until I’ve had a chance to run it through a computer simulator. God, there’s so much to do. The spheres doing anything different?”

“Not a thing. Perhaps they, too, are hibernating.”

“Maybe. Well, we’re gonna damn well wake the bastards up.” Her impatience, tempered with self-preservation urges, saw the engines re-programmed and all set for their attempt to communicate with the spheres. Probably for the last time, she thought, if they disintegrate, but she had faith in the integrity of the Apoidea, after all, her Derek built it.

An hour later, strapped in and counting down the last ten seconds, Kallandra felt nervous but at peace. They’d transmitted details of their programming back to Earth along with her promise to use Mission Control’s program codes if their micro-time experiment with the engines was unsuccessful but they’d survived. What could be more fair?

Chapter Twenty-Six

Tabitha laughed at the knowledge her stories bulged her bank account through syndicated World rights and translations. Who’d have thought it? Certainly not her poppa, who recklessly accompanied Roma and Charlie on the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad roller coaster. He’d been moaning about the heat wave—a hundred and climbing, but said the rushing air from the hurtling carriage would cool him.

“Careful, Poppa, make sure they’re belted in.” She had to yell from below them.

A cellphone call from The Washington Post prevented her from climbing aboard. The twins grinned their cotton-candy-coated mouths, and waved.

Blue sky, the heady aroma of wallflowers—she’d bent to check they weren’t plastic with artificial perfume puffers nearby—and the background chorus of other parents’ happyclappy children both irritated and pleased her. The pleasure derived from seeing her family laughing at last.

They were happy now, but she’d panicked on the flight from Jackson to Florida that morning. Although the increase in timequakes hit the headlines with airplanes splitting, towns buried in avalanches and more tsunamis, most folk weren’t directly affected. It was like shootings and multiple car crashes; they happened to other people.

The jet had bucked in clear air turbulence and she’d gripped Roma’s hand with each bump.

“Ma, you’re hurting me.”

“Hang on tight, Roma.”

“I don’t need to with you strangling my hand.”

The lights blinked out followed by a chorus of gasps and a short scream as a flight attendant fell in the aisle.

Now, here they were, panic over, no timequake. As well as buying the new house, she needed to give her kids and poppa a treat. Magic Kingdom was their choice, not hers. Guilt obligated her compliance this time. She’d been fixin’ to be there for her kids more—not that they complained when she skedaddled for days at a time.

Since Apoidea had set off in hot pursuit, she’d found new angles. She needed to keep the dollars rolling in. She’d squeezed the religious groups, but they wouldn’t bite.

Most reckoned God had driven the spheres away and the timequakes would settle down. Bah.

The cam blackout on the spaceship sent her imagination into overdrive. She checked her new gold watch; Cartier radio-controlled movements allegedly bypassed the timequakes. A smile flitted, moderated by worries for her twins. She looked up again at the slowly accelerating train, and she waved. Their image shimmered in the heat. Already she’d forgotten the time displayed on the watch, and re-checked. Forty-five minutes before she had to leave on another flight; an interview with Derek Stone.

She had a story on Kallandra and Claude. It was dirty, lucrative, and possibly true.

This ride was going to take ages, especially if the twins tricked poppa to stay on.

It was so damned hot. She looked around for a drink stall; a thirst for freshly squeezed orange.

With closed eyes she enjoyed the tangy flavour while her lips exuberated in the crushed ice.

Screams disrupted her trance. Was that Roma’s cry in among the rest? Her legs gave way as the ground shifted. Earthquake or timequake? No way of knowing, and the question lost its relevance as she scrambled back to her feet. Her hand, now cold and wet, crushed the orange drink carton. In spite of the trauma—her children occupying her need—she cursed the wasted dollar.

The air shimmered as if it suddenly became much hotter. Metallic grinding and squealing from the roller coaster drowned the human screaming for long moments.

“Roma! Charlie! Poppa!” Tabitha attempted to stand but collapsed to her knees as if she was grabbed and shaken by an invisible giant. A more unnerving feeling overcame her like losing a sense of direction even though she was looking straight ahead at the disintegrating fairground. Wailing, she held out quivering hands to where her children should have been.

Through the cacophony she heard Roma: “Momma!”

Struggling with momentous effort to stand and move closer to the dust cloud surrounding the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, accompanied by continued clanging, crashes and screams, Tabitha spotted their carriage. It wasn’t so high. Maybe they could climb down the support struts built to appear like a rickety mountain bridge.

Although swaying and vibrating, the mock railway carriages were stationary on the track. Poppa had stood in the shimmering air to talk with waving arms to the attendants below. Tabitha’s kids’ faces portrayed a mix of fear and excitement. Her stomach churned with acid, hurting more with the thought she should’ve been with them.

Although the roller coaster wasn’t rolling, reaching her children didn’t seem an option. If only it’d kept rolling another few seconds. As she contemplated climbing the trestle framework she felt nauseous. The thought that another timequake was upon them occurred but the need to rescue her family overcame the feeling she was about to throw up.

Her immediate problem was a wire mesh fence with no footholds. No choice then but to run to the entrance. That took her out of sight of the kids. She hesitated…a stabbing pain and high-pitch buzzing penetrated her head. She couldn’t stop crying, further blurring her vision. Rubbing her eyes, she peered up. From this angle the sun’s glare blinded her. But was it the sun? Turning her head she found whiteness impinging, intruding into her eye sockets. She rummaged in her bag for sunglasses.

Increased screams from Roma accelerated her scrabbling, while yelling:

“Momma’s here, baby. Hang on in there.”

Just as she rammed the shades onto her nose the whiteout ended but her panic hadn’t. She should be making for open ground but mostly-suppressed motherly instinct drove her upwards.

Adrenalin beat her fear, but she was not a physical person. Her days were spent tapping at keyboards and haggling for higher fees, not negotiating obstacle courses.

Her heart pounded and uncertainty grew.

Her right foot found a shoe-width wooden ledge. She paused and looked up.

Immediately she felt dizzy and put her head down. Maybe it was the pungent creosote that coated the lower struts and now found a new home on her clothes and hands.

Wrinkling her nose, she looked up again.

“Momma, over here,” Roma called from Tabitha’s right.

Relief at seeing Roma’s happy white teeth so close was marred by her vision losing focus. That heat haze and shimmering had returned.

“Poppa, is that you standing? Be careful. You knew you shouldn’t be…. Poppa, sit down!”

He looked as if he might obey but increased shaking refused to make any such obvious caution an easy option. He staggered and Tabitha wailed while she clung tightly to the struts.

A knot started in her stomach and travelled up to her head. She gripped and yet her right hand felt nothing. As if she’d been dipped in water, she seemed to lose buoyancy. Her feet lifted from their shelf but worse was the hammered glass image she had of her father. Through the increased buzzing of a million mosquitoes, she heard him call: “Tabby, my Tabby.”

Her hands waving towards him while her feet tiptoed on the shelf, she watched in horror as her poppa seemed to stretch sideways. His left side pulled slowly away from his right. He seemed to fight the tug-of-war between invisible foes as if he was made of elastic. Her vision seriously impaired, all she could see was out of focus. She felt her bladder lose control as she saw his body pull apart, but not like on a rack. His left arm and half his chest pulled into nothing, as if he was tugged into an invisible doorway.

She knew he was in a timequake. His left side was thrown back, or forward, into time. Back; or he’d catch up again. She struggled to reach him, not thinking of wisdom or rationality but she wasn’t going to lose her poppa to the darned spheres.

She glanced up again and saw half a face, only a right eye to stare back at her.

His mouth was bloody, mangled and drooping. No left side. With his brain starting to fall out of the remaining half of his skull, he collapsed out of her sight but in full sight of her children. Their screams now stifled, they stayed frozen until she reached them moments later. As she climbed into their mountain railway carriage she had to step into the bloody carnage on the floor. Foul vapours from internal organs wafted up with the stench of bile and blood. Gagging, she turned her back on her pa’s remains and hugged her children, squeezing them hoping to control their shaking, and her own.

Her eyebrows lowered, she cursed the spheres, but they’ve escaped, along with their conniving bitch, Kallandra. But someone was left behind—for her revenge.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The engines played a fast tune. A mazurka shuddering Kallandra’s body back and to in a vicious fairground ride in hell. Hibernation seemed a good idea after all.

She heard an aria of expletives and groans from Claude in syncopation with her own howls. More worrying was the metallic screaming and clanging from Apoidea. What was she thinking? No way could they match the speed of the spheres’ flickering, so the chances of their gut-wrenching yet comparatively slow velocity changes being observed as time-altering communication was negligible. A second of calm allowed her to consider that the chance was maybe worth it, but then she was hurled against her seat restraints harder than ever.

“I’m gonna have a helluva lot of bruises.” Her voice burst out in rasps, her chest heaving and sometimes failing to suck in sufficient air for speech. He’d likely not hear her anyway, as she wouldn’t from him. Her ears filled with Apoidea’s complaints, so she gave up.

Moments later she saw floating star-motes as she rushed towards blacking out.

* * *

Consciousness drifted in. Why had she been asleep? Did Houston force a hibernation? Messing with their air supply? A low-frequency siren warbled, and then stopped. Her eyes remaining closed, she tried to remember the code for that alarm. It repeated. Maybe Claude was letting her lie in and he was fixing whatever it meant; seemed familiar—on a sim. Next time the wail quietened to allow the computer voice output. “Warning. Malfunction transmitter array.” Nothing serious then, she thought, as she undid her restraints. She pulled a face at the caked blood on her legs and stomach from biting belts.

“You there, Claude? I’m covered with blood. Kick that racket into touch, will ya?”

No response. She had to sit up, fighting painful bruises, maybe a cracked rib or three. She could make out Claude’s sleeping form, strapped in his reclined seat. She stumbled to the control panel and hit the alarm. No thinking made sense with that din scrambling brain cells.

A glance at Claude revealed a pallid face.

“God, Claude, don’t die on me, man.” She threw herself on his chest; instantly regretting the self-inflicted pain. Claude released a groan, she a sigh.

“Merde,” he said, not opening his eyes.

“Agreed, but you might as well wake up. We’ve a bit of an emergency.”

“How long?”

“I don’t…hang on.” She checked her watch. “Thirty hours. No wonder I need a pee.”

Like the cripple she felt she was, she headed for the shower and first aid, while Claude made for the console.

* * *

She met him again as he replaced her in the shower. She raised an eyebrow at him shaking his head.

“A genius configured the alarms to allow a minor fault to override a more critical one. No, I’m not saying it must have been Derek. Even I know thousands of people helped design this bird, insect, whatever. Yes, there is a fault in the Ship-to-Earth transmitter array, but while we could survive without those postcards, the cause could be catastrophic.”

He rapped the bulkhead with his knuckles, and his usual jovial face looked strained. “Ice seems to be damaging the array, which could be fixed, but the ice is coming from a leak in a nearby coolant conduit.”

“We can shut those off.” She saw a deep red weal in his forearm, and found similar in both of hers. Damned restraints.

“Not that one. It leads to several others. The engines would overheat.”

“We shut it off now. The engines are on idle so we shut that off, too, and then think of a long-term solution. Why the leak?”

He rubbed his stubble, “Kal, we’re lucky this bee is alive at all with the hammering we gave it.”

“Sure. I guess increased pressure in the coolant system breached tolerances.”

“The status computer will tell us. If we’re lucky the auto-repair would’ve fixed most of them. That coolant leak is a worry. It might require an EVA fix.”

“Too dangerous, Claude. Any idea how fast we’re going? And if we’re unstable—”

“Speed is irrelevant. It’s the rate of change that would be dangerous. We’d better run through some tests and re-routing scenarios.”

* * *

Two hours later she knew one of them had to go outside.

Claude showed her a task sheet generated by a procedures program. A panel to be unsealed, lifted, and the pressure-rupture fixed.

He laughed, and then said, “It’s not rocket science.”

“True enough, but it could be hazardous. We should attempt it with the Repair-robot first.”

“It’d be much quicker for me to suit up…ah, you’re only saying that in case you lose me. How sweet, mon cherie, come here.”

“Not now, Claude,” she said, and wagged a finger. “And who says it’s to be you if an EVA is necessary?”

“Try and stop me.”

Kallandra admitted a dislike of wearing the EVA pressure suits. She often developed a rash in delicate places so didn’t fuss. She helped him suit and tool up.

She urged him to take care but with hugs and digs in the already bruised ribs rather than a speech.

The cabin felt strange. She’d often been awake while Claude was asleep, but this was different; a stomach muscle-tightening gripe. At least she could follow his movements on the monitors and hear his commentary. She held back from comfort chatting, enabling Claude to focus on the task.

She watched the signal feedback return to eighty percent normal just by his knocking away frozen coolant and realigning the aerial array—mainly a parabolic dish pointing back at the pinprick that was Earth.

Keeping an eye on Claude’s progress, Kallandra expected to hear a tirade from Mission Control. Sixty minutes had passed since the link worked. She smiled at the psychological scenarios they must have tortured themselves over and then to arrive at the softly softly approach she received.

Capcom Elaine Stringer’s calm voice merely asked: “Good to receive your telemetry, Apoidea. Now, do you have voice?”

“Roger that, Cap. As you’ll see, we have a problem but Claude is outside fixing it. Sending you the data. Over.” She pulled back from the console, knowing it would be at least an hour for the response. She swivelled to concentrate on Claude’s progress.

His helmet cam showed his hands working inside the troubled conduit housing.

Blue bubbles escaped from an ice-crusted pipe and jetted while freezing past Claude’s face.

“Why is there pressure in those pipes, Claude?”

“There must be residual coolant. Can you check the console and turn it all off?”

He sounded calm, considering there was a possibility of a blow out.

“Checking now.” Kallandra’s face heated as she saw that section’s coolant pump-light flickering green.

“Claude, get out of there while we re-think this. The indicator’s flickering. Maybe the actuator’s damaged and the pump won’t switch off.”

“I’ll be all right, peut-être. Turn off the master switch, and then turn the switch for this section on and off again a few times.”

The now steady green light glowed at Kallandra, daring her to play. Its colour had become not only irrelevant but dangerous. She should not have let Claude bamboozle her out of using a remote robot with its grabbers. Her stomach quivered all the way, such that her normally cool head exuded a tear.

“Abort the attempt, Claude. I can’t tell if this switch is on or off. The master switch might be affected by rogue feedback.”

“The leak appears to have stopped. I’m going to slap on a patch and squirt QuickCem over it.”

“No! Back off from it. Come back.”

“Ten seconds. Twenty tops.”

Although she was technically in command on this mission, she knew there was no point asserting authority in a two-man crew. No effective reprimand was available on return because they weren’t expecting to make it back. Maybe she could use a carrot instead of a stick.

“You’ll not get your birthday treat tonight if you don’t obey me.”

“It’s not my birth—ah. Trust me, I can see what to do. Hey, there’s an oxy pipe leaking too, but I can turn it off. Done. We might not have made it much further if I hadn’t seen it.”

“Good one, Claude. Hey, you’ve not only saved the mission but our lives! You deserve a Congressional medal, and a UN one, if it exists.”

She should be seeing the view change from the patch on the pipe to the stars as he made his way back, but his arm blocked the view.

Once again she scanned the schematics to see if there was an alternative and safer way to shut off all coolant movement in that section or in the whole ship.

“Kal?”

A wave of relief washed over her as a combination of switches occurred to her.

“Just a minute, I think I can shut it all off.”

As she reached to turn off a control button she was jerked away and drifted across the cabin as a vibration rattled through the ship. Trying to keep calm she glanced at Claude’s live bio-signs panel while calling him.

“You OK, Claude?” She propelled herself to the panel but could see his vital signs were green, and so within a normal range. But his helmet cam was blurred. He must be jerking his head around too much or coolant from the blowout had frozen over the lens, she thought. While her own heartbeat rose, she twisted to look at a fixed exterior camera—cam four. It too showed a fog.

“Speak to me, Claude.”

Unlike helmet cams, cam four had more controls. Fighting growing apprehension she touched a button that discarded one of its transparent covers. If debris had smudged the lens, that would dispose of it. Her mouth had gone dry but she had to wait for the autofocus.

Cam four had looked at the troublesome panel area and it still did. The panel remained hinged open, the jagged ends of a pipe peeped out at her, but there was no sign of Claude.

“Claude!” Screaming at him could help wake him up although logic told her the volume was automatically adjusted in his helmet. Another glance at his vital signs showed he lived, but where? With sweaty hands she grabbed the joystick operating cam four and twisted it. Too far. Now all she saw was the black universe. Taking a deep breath and telling herself to keep calm, she manipulated the cam to Claude’s last tether anchor point. From there she followed the straight-line twenty metres into the void, and there he was; arms and legs motionless, his face obscured by his visor.

“I see you, Claude. Move an arm, or leg, if you hear me.” Nothing. She took a more careful look at the screen showing his vital signs. BP 95/65 and falling. Pulse, 40 and falling. Respiration, 15. Body temperature normal. She hit a diagnosis button.

Possible causes: haemorrhaging; trauma, dehydration, orthostatic hypotension , vasovagal syncope, overdose of dyazide,….

“For Christ’s sake, I don’t know half of this crap, though it’s probably trauma. Are you listening, Claude? No, of course you’re not. You never listen.”

She stopped the scrolling illnesses and hit the prognosis button. Remain unconscious; coma or death in minutes.

She gasped. Shocked, her face flushed so hot she felt a headache coming on.

She had to get him back in the Apoidea real fast. She found the remote controls for the tether anchor point and programmed it to reel in. While it whirred, she initiated the remote grabber in preparation to push Claude into the airlock. Such activity sublimated her twin fears—Claude’s possible death and the grim prospect of being alone.

Ten metres to go. Kallandra frantically operated the remote grabber, while jabbing at a panel to turn cam four to bring the airlock into view. She needed to pee but had no time. Damn, she’d sweat it out anyhow. A change from the beeping to an urgent continuous wailing startled her.

“No, no. Fight in there, Claude!” The vital signs had all flat-lined. With the coolant sensors playing havoc, maybe the medical transmitters or receivers had malfunctioned. She bought a spot of comfort from the minimal probability store.

Although desperate, she couldn’t reel him in any faster in case his suit was breached when he hit. On the other hand, what’s a few bruises or broken ribs compared to death? She upped the retrieve speed to maximum.

She’d hardly had time to find the airlock entry with cam four when she felt the thwack reverberate through the ship. Damn. Too hard, and she wasn’t ready! The high pitch flat-line wailing continued—no time to find the right button to shut the darn thing off. At last she could see him via Cam four splayed across the tether anchor, mercifully close to the airlock.

“Houston, when you get these transmissions bear in mind how useful it would’ve been to have a tether point inside the damned airlock.”

No doubt, some smartass, probably Derek, will come up with a logical reason why such an idea was preposterous. Bah.

Frantic button punching and joystick waggling resulted in Claude being pushed into the airlock, and with a sigh, Kallandra hit the emergency hatch shut and re-pressurized the airlock. Precious seconds later, training overcame emotion as she unclipped his helmet and slapped a forced-oxygen mask to his face—his cyanotic lips and alabaster skin.

She was too late. Maybe it was too late ten minutes before when she couldn’t persuade him not to go out. It was her fault. She’d yet to give up. After stripping his suit, she pounced on him with aggressive CPR. If he hadn’t any broken ribs from his battering outside, he had now. After a few exhausting minutes and in desperation, she shocked him. He might have a pulse, but she didn’t want to find he hadn’t or there wouldn’t have been any logic to using the defibrillator, which she’d turned up to 360

Joules before abandoning the effort.

Only then, kneeling beside the forlorn body, did the dam burst. Through her wet wailing, she heard Elaine coming through.

“No one must go EVA until we’ve run a sim test here. I hope that instruction is redundant if you’ve followed procedures.”

Too upset to respond, she lay on her side next to Claude, gently massaging his chest, still sticky with defib-gel. She kissed his pallid face. Whatever fragment of remaining soul lingered in him would know she loved him. Not like Derek, but she didn’t want to go there just now, and wiped the incipient argument. Minutes of quivering sobs later, she rose to obey her bladder’s demands.

With a cold-washed face, her red eyes stared back from the unwelcome mirror.

Was Claude’s death real? She returned to the suiting-up bay and saw the prone form.

Adding to her despair, she seemed already emotionally distant from Claude’s body. It was bad enough missing him, now she was afraid she might miss missing him.

She heard Capcom’s voice again. “Kallandra and Claude, it is imperative you do not, repeat not, attempt a repair from outside at this time.”

“You’re too late, Elaine,” she called back from her kneeling position while cradling Claude’s head, and stroking his short hair. The microphone might not pick her voice up, but it’s academic with the time lag. Houston would know what happened soon enough.

And then what? They’d insist on activating the protocol for disposing of a demised person—set him adrift. She couldn’t face that, not yet, if ever. There was a clause in the protocol for storing a body in the cargo bay: if the mission was on a home leg, and if the cause of death was uncertain. The last criterion held. NASA medical experts would have had Claude’s biometrics automatically packaged and transmitted, as they would hers. The data of one stopped heart, and of one confused heart.

Surely NASA would want to investigate the cause of Claude’s death? He’d been traumatized by a blowout and so jerked back to the end of the tether, but unless he got real unlucky and ruptured an internal organ…. Then what was on that diagnostic list?

Overdose of dyazide? As far as she knew, neither of them were taking any prescribed medication. She tapped at the console for his medical file. Tylenol for the first few days for headaches. Trivial, though it disturbed her a little because she hadn’t known. What else had he kept from her?

Zupiklone, a sleeping tablet. She checked further and found it was a barbiturate with possible internal haemorrhaging if taken with paracetamol and alcohol. Surely they had no alcohol on board? And she thought she knew everything about him.

Through sore eyes she looked at his face and stroked his moustache. “What went wrong out there, Claude? This cocktail give you an ulcer that burst while you were EVA? I finished you off by slamming you up against the ship with a too-fast-tether-retraction, didn’t I? You’re not supposed to die, dammit. How am I going to get my kicks with our arguing now?”

The ship rocked a little, more like a sway that for a fleeting moment Kallandra put down to the escape of Claude’s spirit rather than more coolant leaking as a lateral jet.

Was his body more than the sum of his parts now?

She hit his chest with her fist, and then lay on her stomach with her head on his chest. She smelt the antiseptic in the defib-gel, glistening on his skin. She closed her eyes, and reminisced of their adventures: in training at White Sands, shouting at superiors at the JPL, and the weirdness with the El Capitan sphere. A memory of something there made her catch her breath, but before the notion could form definition, an incoming call beeped.

“Kal…” Elaine Stringer’s voice conveyed concern across the void. They must know by now; seen the images of Claude working, then…. Elaine lost her husband two years last fall, and Kallandra was there.

* * *

Two years before, Toulouse, France

“Hey, Kal, are you on this shindig too?” Elaine asked at the bar. Not any bar, but the long curved one at the European Aerospace factory lounge.

They hugged and kissed on both cheeks as they’d experienced with their French hosts.

Kallandra tapped her nose. “There was a vacancy for a six-weeks test-pilot exchange program. So, je suis ici! But why are you here? Is there a Euro-US meeting of minds and protocol?”

“Isn’t there always? No, Jasper’s here on an engine components compatibility test; across the road as we speak. I’m here for shopping and sight-seeing. Did Paris at the weekend, and off to Lyon tomorrow. Hey, you coming with me?”

“Love to, but although I’ll be there, it’ll be eight kilometres up.” Kallandra pointed up as she spoke, then her eyes followed her own arm and stayed looking up at the ceiling, noticing for the first time the suspended models of spaceships and airplanes.

“Go on,” Elaine said, lifting her white wine upwards, “which have you flown?”

“Umm, none. They’re mostly European, and Russian. Hey, there’s one; a Stealth F35b. Good grief.”

“What? They’ve got it wrong?”

They walked across the half-empty bar area to be directly beneath the metre-long model jet.

“On the contrary, it’s worryingly perfect, and top secret. Lockheed would go ape.”

“My God. What’s such a good model doing here then?”

A dark-suited man looked round at them from his window table. The lounge lights played in the large plate-glass window so it looked as if there were two of him.

However, he was alone and playing cards—solitaire, and now seemed to have his interest piqued by the two American women. His large black brown eyes twinkled at them from his amused face. He sported a deep tan right into his plentiful laughter wrinkles.

“Excuse me,

Mademoiselles, but how else can our fighters learn to shoot the planes your country sells to our enemies?”

Elaine stifled a snort. Just as well, Kallandra thought as she detected his manner for the tease it was.

“You mean the enemies that use French Exocet missiles against us?”

“Touché. May I get you a drink?”

Kallandra was about to tell the smarmy tormentor which hell to go to when the window alongside him smashed, sending shards lacerating his shirt and head.

Before the screams started, Kallandra had thrown herself backwards, pulling Elaine with her. They fell to the floor away from the glass but, while others looked at the imploded window and the screaming Frenchman, Kallandra looked at the bar.

Something very fast must have entered from outside, so where was it? Satisfied that this wasn’t an attack or an ongoing accident she stood, then crunched glass, over to the wooden bar. Embedded near the top was a smoking piece of twisted metal.

A barman had already spotted it and aimed a soda siphon. Kallandra let the sizzling die down before peering closely. “It’s from a jet engine rotor blade. There must have been an accident in a test rig—” She turned to stare at Elaine. Her Jasper was working late at the factory, but surely not….

Elaine beat her to the door. When Kallandra caught up they could see a fire in a hangar across the road and silhouettes of people running around.

“He’s already dead, Kal, I feel it.”

“Nonsense. Your brain knows a bad accident has happened but Jaspar might have been hundreds of metres away.” Nevertheless, she knew Elaine was sensitive to upsetting events when they happened to people emotionally close.

The serenade of grief from sirens came at them from up the road as fire-engines and ambulances broke speed limits.

Sadly, Elaine hadn’t erred with her premonition. Jasper was one of two engineers killed outright.

* * *

Kallandra shook her head to escape the disturbing reverie. How long had she spent daydreaming? It didn’t matter. She felt like abandoning the radio transmissions and going to bed. Maybe take the hibernation procedure again and wake up in a year or two to find the nightmare was over.

No, she couldn’t bury her head in sleep no matter how welcome, and it wouldn’t have been what Claude would’ve wanted. She hit the button to replay Elaine’s latest message.

“Kal… we know what’s happened. It’s awful, I’m so sorry. You’ll be grieving even though Claude isn’t…wasn’t the love of your life. Kal, I know you’ll just want to hide away, listen to music, read a silly book, anything to immerse yourself in nostalgia or into nothing at all. But, I’m afraid we need you to focus your energies to some emergency work on the ship…”

Kallandra paused the message and listened to Apoidea. She heard the usual creaks, and hisses from the ship’s infrastructure, whines and whirring from computers, actuators and other machinery, distant pumps and, ah, there was no sound of coolant pumps working. She’d turned them off along with the master for audio alerts. She covered one ear, and pressed audio-on. Immediately the air filled with the sound of sirens and warning voices. She turned it off again.

At the status console she enlarged the screen showing a triaged list of urgent tasks. The first was to re-engage the coolant pumps. The failure-to-comply box told of the engines overheating if engaged, and since they augmented the power plant’s coolant….

She knew she couldn’t just switch on the coolant pumps; she’d lose it through the ruptured pipe. How important was the coolant for the power plant? It had a self-contained coolant system. Surely, by throwing the master switch, that hadn’t shut down too?

After checking what she already knew, the small nuclear power plant device needed nothing from the damaged coolant system except as emergency backup.

Phew! The main problem, as she saw it, was the lack of coolant protecting the ship from hot externals such lateral jets, re-entry heating, or being close to the sun. The latter was unlikely and the former wouldn’t apply until the ship changed course again.

Ready to argue that nothing was urgent, she resumed the message from Elaine.

“… You probably think the engine coolant isn’t urgent while you are merely using your inertia to chase the spheres but, when we checked an hour ago, your navigation computer lock was still connected up with the correction module and so…”

Of course, fuck, bugger and re-fuck, the auto-correction would re-engage the smaller jets to keep her pointed at the spheres. The coolant pumps would adjust, but not if they were switched off. Not that a lot of heat would be produced for minor corrections, but the lack of coolant pumps could mean the jets would refuse to fire and so the spheres could have disappeared out of sight.

She rushed to the nav console. No problem, the spheres were still in range.

Another beep sounded from the radio, followed by Derek’s voice.

“Kallandra, I need you to listen.” It seemed strange hearing Derek’s voice. He wouldn’t normally be on comms duty, but these were unusual times. Damn, she hadn’t finished listening to the earlier message from Elaine. It was probably just about the coolant engines. Maybe with a solution.

She wished Derek and her could chat live with only the normal five seconds delay—half a second for her, and four and half for him. She smiled at her joke. She did love him, even though he had the charisma of custard. Actually, he was custard with hidden flavoured depths, whereas Claude was a flambéed crêpes with rum and lime.

She allowed another tear to escape, and tried harder to listen.

“…so it’s imperative to effect a repair. I emphasise, Kallandra, that you do not need to go EVA to do this, but to use the repair robot. It’s designed exactly for this type of job, though the setup and programming will take an hour. I could attempt to do all that from here, but the chances of success are greater and quicker if you operate the robot from the ship. I’ve sent you an assessment and suggested program routine.”

Oh God, she didn’t want to have to focus on anything difficult. It was interesting neither he nor Elaine had mentioned disposing of Claude’s body. No doubt they were prioritizing for her.

“Kallandra,” Derek continued, “I love you. Always.”

Arrgh! She wanted the immediacy of human contact to hug the man, kiss him, apologise, explain and tell him she loved him too. Did he know about the intimacy between Claude and her on the flight? He must, so he pretended it didn’t matter. Had Capcom or the director told him not to have a go at her? It didn’t really matter, and yet it was going to bug her.

“Love you, too, Derek,” she blurted into the mike. “I’ll look over your upload, and report back when ready to activate the external repair robot.”

As she checked Derek’s procedures, an odd thought occurred. Why was she still on course for the spheres? All that coolant leakage must have pushed her off course at least a few degrees, unless the backup hydrazine jets spurted out to keep the spheres on target. That must have happened unless…. Another possibility flitted in and out of her ideas box, but nothing realistic settled.

She activated the repair task equipment. It was robotic in that once programmed and switched on, it could move without her and make some decisions. The most important of those was when to halt and ask for help.

There was little for her to do for another forty minutes while it collected items from storage and manoeuvred into position over the ruptured pipe. Feeling a few niggling hunger pangs, she swivelled in her chair before rising to head for the galley.

Claude was in the way. Prone, drifting a few inches off the deck. Now what?

Nausea replaced hunger as she missed the stupid, lovable lug, and faced decisions. A flash of inspiration sent her to the computer and she pulled up Claude’s private file.

She’d been too busy both prior and during the trip to consider nosing around in his personal data. They’d decided months ago it would be churlish to have passwords, but the system insisted so they’d agreed hers would be queenbee and his hornet.

Both were advised to make out a will while on Earth, so maybe a copy sat in his personal files. Sure, there it was. Umm, nothing for her, and who was Amanda Belton?

The proceeds of the sale of his Quebec property goes to her, along with all his personal files—strange. Ah, he wanted to be buried at sea or in space. Fair enough.

“Elaine, just to let you know Claude’s will says he wanted to be buried in space, so I’m activating the procedure now. The repair to the coolant pipes is progressing as per Derek’s coding.”

The message was matter of fact, her emotions put on hold for as long as necessary to function. She’d a niggling feeling she was being kept sweet by Derek, even though she’d kinda betrayed him. Maybe he’d been told to go easy on her in view of the mission. And he’d devoted years of his life into this ship. OK it wasn’t on its way to Mars, but its unknown destination added that mystery-tour element; an added frisson.

It was inevitable she’d develop paranoia. Hopefully it was mild and its awareness would avoid side effects.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Screwing up, but not throwing away a sheet of paper, Derek paced the bright office he shared with other designers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He glanced at the crumpled printout, frowned, then stared out of the triple-glazed window at the Pasadena urban landscape. Flat-topped homes, boxes in which people scurried about attempting normality. Many of them worked at JPL, seeking solutions to Apoidea issues and the increasing time decoherences. Some worked up there on Mount Wilson. He looked northeast to the grey jagged outline. Smoke drifted up at random places kilometres apart. Maybe they were from truck-farms clearing debris, or illegal garden bonfires, but one or more could be that bit of planet Earth slipping as a result of the timequakes; striking anywhere anytime. It was like living in a war zone.

He couldn’t see the observatory up near the summit, but he knew colleagues working up there. They supplemented the Hubble telescope data in tracking the A poidea’s and spheres’ journey, but once out of sight the telescopes looked for evidence of timequakes on other planets.

The mountain shimmered in the afternoon heat, or was it a timequake? He shivered as he recalled the drive last week when Rob Summers took him to Santa Barbara in his Porsche Cabriolet with the top down.

* * *

“So, Rob, why am I coming with you away from my Apoidea simulator? Have you re-created the Australian Outback in your apartment and you need someone not to laugh at it?”

Rob tapped the overlarge steering wheel to the beat of a Green Day song while cruising Highway 101.

“Your boss thought you needed a break from overworking, Derek. Chill, and all that. Relax for a couple of hours. I’ve some genuine German beer warming up and there’s a real British chippy round the corner.”

Derek found his hand tapping to Boulevard of Broken Dreams, an involuntary action until he remembered last listening to it with Kallandra. He stopped, then restarted tapping as if she was there too.

“Are they better than Oasis, Derek?”

“Remarkably similar, but does it matter?”

“Heck, don’t go philosophical on me just because your girl is millions of kilometres away.”

“And getting further away,” Derek grumbled and, thinking of distances, he wondered when this highway winding around a steep slope was going to end.

“What the—”

With tyres squealing, a Pepsi truck careered around the bend and headed straight for them on their side of the road.

As Rob pumped the brake and steered for the left side of the highway, Derek gripped his seatbelt. He wanted to shout but his voice dried up. He felt helpless as the oncoming truck seemed to shudder. Earthquake or timequake, Derek thought with the only non-panicking brain cell still working. Bugger, he’d wet himself. Then, with a sickening screech, the truck slid off to their right and into a ditch. A cloud of dust obscured the vehicle and the smell of burnt rubber made him pinch his nose. He heard a rumbling noise drowning out the honks from vehicles behind them. Although stationary, Rob’s cabriolet trembled. Derek couldn’t tell how much was physical vibration of the road, vehicle, or just his nerves. He felt the uncertainties in his life could easily amplify his inner tremors to a full-scale earthquake. From rectum to Richter—a glimmer of a smile played his lips.

Looking over his shoulder, he saw a UPS van had successfully stopped, but the rolling thunder-like noise increased. Clouds of grit seemed to be getting thicker.

Rubbing his aching neck he twisted back to look at the road in front. Through the dust he could see the surface bubbling like black porridge. The steep earth slope on the left bulged and seemed to creep onto the road.

“Earthquake, or…?” yelled Rob, “And should we U-turn?”

During a quieter moment Derek was about to urge their return when a discordant fanfare of motor horns made him look back again. A gaily-painted VW Beetle was overtaking the line of vehicles.

“The idiot!” Derek shouted, but the young driver and three passengers, all laughing, shot past. Moments later the collapsing cliff of earth and stones engulfed them, accompanied by a noise like an Apollo rocket taking off.

* * *

Derek shivered with the memory. His left hand rose towards his ear, but then stopped. It was as if Kallandra had put a spell on his hand. He couldn’t take advantage of her heroic absence, and so examined his hand instead.

His right hand squeezed the crumpled paper. The feel of the sharp corners in his palm reminded him of its contents, and a stirring of anger rose within him. He crossed to a desk and smoothed out the e-mail printout. It was received by his secure e-mail and so didn’t get thrown into the void as were most of the spam e-missives he was bombarded with daily. They were mostly quasi-religious curses blaming him as part of the scientific establishment for driving the spheres away.

“To: d.stone77@nnass.gov

From: icu_revenge@yahoo.com

Subject: Tick oops tock

Worried, Stone? You should be.

You are not going to die imminently but you’re sure gonna suffer first, boy.

You’re responsible for that bitch. You encouraged her to kowtow to the spheres of evil.

And now she’s killed him.

Don’t go to sleep tonight, Derek, or any night…

A.B.

Derek pondered on the identity of the sender but also of the ‘him’ in ‘And now she’s killed him.’? Should he assume it was a reference to Claude who’d just died? He peered at the date the e-mail was sent. Yes, Claude had died but only just and it still wasn’t broadcast in the media until the mission’s PR people decided how to break the news. They were afraid that the increasing public disturbance at the timequakes would reach panic levels if they thought the Apoidea, representing hope, was in trouble. In his opinion, it was a futile and a potential disaster to keep such news quiet. NASA staff already knew, and the diffusion of that knowledge to friends and family would reach the media via dollars or misguidance sooner than later.

The AB signature must surely be a bluff. The first two alphabet letters, or was that too obvious? He couldn’t recall any woman or man with those initials in his small circle of associates, but that circle had become global with the Apoidea publicity.

He could have the computer experts here backtrack the message via the computers that handled it—like tracing a phone call. He wasn’t sure he wanted too many people knowing about it. Rob was better at hacking than he was, so Derek sat at a spare console and pulled up the e-mail, then forwarded it to Rob with a request to perform a confidential backtrack.

Damn, he should have asked how he was. Rob’s superb apartment, overlooking Santa Barbara and the ocean, was swept away by the mudslide. That was the official explanation. Rob pointed out that there was no mud. Sure enough, the region was prone to mudslides, and one occurred on that highway a few years ago, but after persistent rain that doubled the weight of soil. They’d had a drought this spring and Derek could hardly fail to notice the dryness of the moving earth: he’d choked enough and still had sore eyes. Earth tremors also proliferated in the region, but it seemed to Derek that a timequake was the likely cause of anything disruptive.

His ruminations lasted as long as it took a carton of tea to be fetched from the machine and apparently for Rob to finish his analysis. Derek’s cellphone jingled.

“Hi Derek. Naples—the one in Florida, not Italy. But it was sent from an Internet café and with an e-mail account created in Yahoo that morning at the same computer.”

“Thanks, Rob. I suppose that means we’ve no way of finding who actually sent it?”

“That’s why I’ve called. Some Internet cafés have CCTV. I could call them to send us the relevant clip, but I needed to know how confidential you needed this inquiry.”

Derek thought while risking burning his lips with the hot tea. “What do you think, Rob? A crackpot, obviously. Shall I just ignore it like the similar spam I get through on my public e-mail?”

“Mate, it is a cranky message, but they know your secure e-mail address, and are making threats.”

“So you think I should let you grab that footage? All right go ahead.”

“How about recruiting more help, Derek? I know a cop, and how about our friendly media whiz-woman?”

Derek felt a hot flush and it wasn’t his tea. “No, thanks. You mean Tabitha Wish? Well, maybe, but not yet, and perhaps not ever. Goodness, it’s only the one crank message from a drunk.” He wished he hadn’t asked Rob for help. He should’ve remembered the schoolboy project mentality he had. He’d gnaw at the mystery, like a red-neck with a T-bone until there was nothing left.

“Right you are, Derek, but think about what else he or she might be doing— yeah? And forward me any more as soon as they arrive. See ya.”

Derek folded his cellphone but felt nothing like closure on this problem. Rob said to think about what else he or she might be doing? What did he mean?

He knew for certain that he wasn’t going to tell Kallandra. On her own in that big tin can, his ship. Oh shut up, Derek, how could he harbour such arrogance? Although he was the senior engineering designer, it would have remained on the ground if it weren’t for those other thousands of workers. Nevertheless, he felt as if Apoidea was his child. Even here at JPL, his hands felt vibrations in the simulator and duplicate sections. He imagined being transported to the real Apoidea, and so he would vicariously share experiences with Kallandra.

Derek composed another love-you note, attached it to a technical document, and sent it to Elaine to upload to Kallandra. Then he returned to the huge hangar-laboratory where the ground-based version of Apoidea was housed. Its technical name was A-tp-IIc but some wag had stuck the word Nectar on the nose section. No doubt in the hope that the bee would return for nourishment. He liked it.

* * *

After three hours of triple checking that the fractured pipe repair by the robot wouldn’t lead to further problems, Derek noted rain slanting in through the open hangar doorway and wetting the lacquered floor. He picked a JPL umbrella from a collection near the entrance and stepped out into the evening. The adrenalin of work had kept weariness away but now Derek felt beat. He lowered the umbrella and let the cool rain wash his face.

A screech of brakes made him re-open his eyes. Rob’s Porsche, this time with its roof in place.

“Get in, Derek, before you grow fins.”

He lowered himself in and apologised for wetting the suede seat.

“Don’t fret, mate. This downpour is unseasonable, but never mind. Let’s go to a club downtown.”

Derek was not a clubber, at least not without Kallandra and then he was, at best, hiding in her penumbra. Her exuberance carried them both, as it did in most things. He felt so drained, from work, concern over the Earth’s future, his own with regard to the poison e-mail, and most of all from his acute anxiety for Kallandra’s safety. His request to go on the flight, apart from the engineering arguments, was selfish. He’d admit that, to himself. Keeping his sanity together while she was so far out of reach would be too much for him to bear. The fact that he’d not had a breakdown was a remarkable achievement, a feat in part, engineered by Rob, and apparently, at the request of Kallandra. Argh, he’d argued himself into a corner: if he’d obeyed his instincts and went to his apartment, he’d be going against his fiancée’s wishes. Damn.

“Does this club have a quiet snug?”

“A snug? Crikey, Derek, it isn’t a London backstreet pub.” He laughed, too raucously for Derek’s liking.

* * *

As soon as they’d had their car parked for them, Derek knew he’d made a mistake. He appreciated that most entertainment venues were adorned with garish neon signs, but should he, as an engaged Englishman, enter a club that had an advertisement featuring the outline of a giant naked woman? No.

Twenty minutes and two beers later, Derek started to relax. Not by much, but the corner he insisted they occupy was far enough from the pole-dancers for him not to feel too unfaithful. Besides the beers, he could swear there were so many alcoholic liquids and other substances in the club that the air he breathed reeked with mind-altering microscopic droplets.

When a topless dancer meandered over to him with a suggestive finger half in her mouth, Derek assumed that Rob was her target. He looked to his left. To his astonishment, his chaperone wasn’t there. Perhaps he’d slipped away to the men’s room when Derek had his eyes closed in an effort to deny the erotic visions.

“It’s cosy and private in this corner, isn’t it, sir?” She didn’t speak so much as allowed words to escape from luscious fuchsia lips, float across and caress his ears.

Close up he admonished the trowelled makeup, and speculated on whether her luxuriant red hair and enticing emerald eyes were fake. He struggled to avoid glancing at her despicably beautiful raspberry nipples. Averting his eyes from those annoyingly amazing breasts hovering too close to his face, he shifted in his seat, unsure whether to cross his legs to hide a growing prominence. Unfortunately, the young woman mistook his manoeuvrings as an invitation to sit on his lap, her fishnetted legs astride his.

“I thought contact wasn’t allowed?” How did his voice raise an octave?

She stroked his hair. “In this club, anything goes, honey.”

He didn’t know what to do with his hands. She seemed to be slipping and the gentlemanly thing would surely have been to support her, so he held her wanton supple waist with both perspiring hands. My God, her skin felt so smooth. Her aroma—citrus, possibly with bergamot—added to his intoxication.

Part of him wished she’d keep still: the gyration was agitating parts that he’d rather remain inconspicuous, but this woman was in imminent danger of being catapulted across the room!

Oh no, she must have read his thoughts and one of her hands attempted to gain entry into his trousers. He fidgeted, which only extracted low moaning noises from her.

“Madam, I believe we should stop.”

“Relax, sugar, it’s all paid for.” Her other hand unbuttoned his shirt and played with his chest hairs.

What? Paid for by whom? Alarm pierced through the fog in his brain. This was taking friendly support too far, damn you, Rob. He was about to insist she remove herself from his lap when her left nipple plugged his mouth like a baby’s dummy. He was wrong: strawberry not raspberry. It must have been a flavoured rouge she’d applied. He involuntarily sucked and felt her nipple harden. No! He pulled his head back but she leant into him.

He felt ridiculous and blamed Rob, and himself. Certainly he’d felt something of a cuckold when he discovered, along with the rest of mission control, that Kallandra had fallen into temptation, but he’d overcome that shock. There was no need for this charade, taking advantage of his vulnerability with alcohol and inexperience.

His struggles increased and then a light caught his eye. Not photographs.

Please, dear God, no publicity. How could Rob allow this compromising situation to develop and worsen?

“Please, madam, I insist you desist. I am going to stand. If you fall, it will be your wish.”

“OK, buster, d’you think I’m enjoying this?” She unsaddled and strode off, leaving Derek to readjust his clothing, mostly under the table. He threw furtive looks around but failed to spot a photographer. Perhaps he’d caught the stray flash from a random camera phone.

“Hey, Derek, want another drink?” Rob said, appearing from a flight of stairs to the left.

“Take me home, you bastard.”

Rob’s smile lingered. “I know this isn’t really your scene, but try to relax.”

Derek stood. “If you won’t take me home, I’ll call a cab. In fact I’ll do just—”

Both his and Rob’s cellphones called. A picture of the dancer sitting astride Derek with her breast in his face appeared on both phones. Derek slumped back onto his chair and stared in dismay at the image.

“Wow, mate. You hit gold there. Ah, knowing you, I bet you wished for a timequake to come to your rescue. That looks like Angelina you’ve hooked.”

“Hooker, is probably more appropriate. How much did you pay her?”

Rob sat beside him, put the phone on the table and with no hint now of mirth, looked Derek straight in the eye. “Derek, I didn’t arrange for this woman to come to you. I wouldn’t do that to you. I respect you and Kallandra too much.”

A flush of guilt heated Derek’s face as he realized Rob told the truth. He put out his hand to shake Rob’s, who took it in both of his.

Derek picked up his phone again. “Which means someone else did.”

Rob used his iPaq to connect to Internet news podcasts, and then frowned. “And who else have they sent this image to?”

* * *

Derek needn’t have lost sleep over the photograph. He’d discovered it was distributed to news agencies and they might have run with it if he was a presidential candidate. No one at NASA displayed interest the next day except himself and Rob, and their concern was more on the identity of the perpetrator.

“Maybe we could ask Kallandra who AB might be,” Rob suggested, in the JPL refectory, while dipping a hard breakfast biscuit in his tea.

“I don’t think we should bother her with it,” Derek said. “She has enough to concern herself with, and I don’t want her worrying over prank letters I’m getting.”

“Fair enough, but I think we should keep Elaine up to speed with the content of the e-mails. After all, she is the Capcom link for Kallandra and filters messages from anybody up to her.”

“Any luck with that CCTV in the Internet Café?”

“They didn’t have it switched on that day. Bugger them. Anyway, now the perpetrators tried and failed to create a problem for you at the nightclub, maybe they’ll drop it.”

Derek looked at his closed cellphone, not wanting to be reminded of the image within. “I doubt it. They must have been following me to know I was there. Damn. If I wasn’t so busy, I’d quiz that Angelina over who paid her.”

“It’d be a dead end. Try and forget the whole thing, Derek. Let’s concentrate on what really matters. Kallandra, out there pursuing the spheres.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Kallandra awoke but refused to open her eyes. She’d set the wakeup call at an arbitrary time so she’d have a lie in. A few minutes later she niggled herself into rising.

Before sleep she’d added a few tasks to the list she’d been working through.

She needed to quiz Elaine about the mystery locker that they’d jettisoned. She had suspicions, too, over the large sealed section near the rear. The inventory indicated food, emergency coolant, and other supplies that were only accessible robotically. It was impossible for her to manually verify, but she’d thought of a way to attach a cam to the machine that would fetch stores—a robotic quartermaster, as long as she could figure how to override its controls.

Her stomach protested at the prolonged fast by rumbling louder than Apoidea’s background gurgles and whinings so Kallandra re-hydrated scrambled egg and wolfed down a granola bar, washed down with Hawaii Kona coffee, black.

With her hunger abated she drifted to the bow for a languorous stare out of the window and played join the dots with the stars. She frowned as the constellations didn’t figure as they should, even taking into account the distance from Earth. Idly, she checked that distance, which should now be around 240 million kilometres. Her frown reversed with raised eyebrows when the distance showed 232 million. Had she remembered it incorrectly? After all, her head had been orbiting her heart in the last forty-eight hours. More out of curiosity than concern, she initiated a star identification head-up display over the window. It confused her more. None of the constellations she recalled seeing before her sleep were showing. A tingling sensation raised her neck hairs as she realised a significant course change had occurred. She shivered and then held her breath as she illogically leaned towards the window to get a clearer view. A green dot in the middle.

The star identification computer kept track of Earth’s position at all times and there it showed—the green light for home, which shouldn’t be visible. A thought tugged about the navigation homing system. If, during hibernation, the ship lost the spheres there was a routine to do an acceleration to the most likely direction and search. If unsuccessful the ship would then head back to Earth. However, the search was to take a week or more, not a few hours. Had she slept too long after all? She couldn’t have gone into a partial hibernation, surely?

If Apoidea had about-turned while Kallandra slept, then the spheres could be more than a quarter of a million kilometres away. Damn. A glitch in the system seemed to have aborted the mission. She’d much rather be in control of a search than let the ship automatically do it without her input. A strong urge to turn the ship around grew.

Should she ask Mission Control first? No, she’d tell them. Enough pussy-footing around with fucking protocols when the last chance to save Earth was disappearing behind her. As she checked the electronic manual for overriding the homing controls another thought occurred to her. This time a nagging feeling gave her stomach butterflies another chance to agitate.

She visited the console for using the rear navigation telescope and punched keys. She gasped as the spheres showed up sixteen-hundred kilometres behind her. A few more jabs revealed they matched her speed and direction. From consternation and near despair moments before she abruptly laughed aloud. The first human noise for days, other than crying. That thought also added to her laughter for at least three minutes.

“Claude,” she shouted to his imagined spirit. “They must have noticed our message after all. They’re on their way back to Earth!” The elation was tinged with a battery of new questions but they could wait while she celebrated. Then she calmed, gathering her thoughts.

The repeated realization she’d succeeded made her lose control again and she clapped her hands and spun around in glee. Oops she shouldn’t have done weightless pirouettes straight after breakfast. Luckily, she rarely suffered motion sickness, nevertheless, to avoid the horrendous possibility of scrambled egg ejecta decorating the cabin, she grabbed the side of the comms console and braked.

“Hi Houston, reporting in after my breakfast. Well, you guys pulled one on me while I slept didn’t you? Turning me one-eighty like that. Good to see I’m on my way home though and that the spheres must have noticed our feeble attempts at timequake communication.

“After running through a systems check, I’m gonna work through the more conventional comms with them. Now that they’ve recognised my existence, maybe they’re ready to open up. Out.”

She checked for messages and was surprised to find none since Derek’s attempted morale boosting note sent with a less romantic update on coolant reroutes.

Elaine had already uploaded a hundred more good luck and Claude-condolence messages. She must have held onto hundreds more, filtering out crank notes, thank God.

Sucking up more of her coffee, and making herself comfortable in the swivel chair, she tripped through the systems check. Everything had green lights, but something was missing. The readouts for fuel and hydrazine didn’t indicate any usage while she was asleep. How could Mission Control turn her around without using any fuel? A cartoon image of a Space Monkey flying alongside with a giant magnet brought a smile, but it disappeared when the puzzle persisted. She checked for radioed data packages that must have been received to activate programs running navigation and the manoeuvring controls. Nothing.

The dawn of truth hit her, making her let go her coffee tube. Not that it drifted far, but a small blob of coffee floated in front of her eyes. She partially stood and like a fish opening its mouth, leaned forward, caught and gobbled the miniature sphere. As she swallowed, the metaphor wasn’t lost on her. But was it the other way around? She looked at the screen showing the spheres now following Apoidea, a reversal of roles.

If the spheres had turned her around, what was their motive? OK, she knew Earth needed them to return and normalise the time problems, but did the spheres have the same motives? Strange, because it was her who argued for this mission until she had no voice left, but now that it might be nearing achievement the doubts others threw at her began to nag.

Running diagnostic routines revealed the Apoidea achieved an about turn an hour before she awoke. One moment she headed away from Earth, the next she was pointed at it. Impossible if she hadn’t known the spheres’ ability to use time in unusual ways. If the ship had suddenly rotated, without time effects, she along with everything else not strapped down, would have been thrown against the bulkhead. An hour ago, so Mission Control would have detected the course change any time….

Sure enough, the radio beeped.

“Apoidea, Dwight Disraeli here as temporary Capcom. Elaine is off duty, but wanted to ensure I wished you a happy birthday.”

Kallandra hit the pause. Birthday? She didn’t know what day of the week it was, let alone the date. Fancy having a birthday sneak up on her like that! She laughed, wondered if they’d left a present, and resumed the message.

“I’m confirming what you must know. Your biometrics indicate you were asleep when the Apoidea reversed its course. We need you to attempt a communication with the spheres, find out their intentions, otherwise—”

A cold chill rippled down her spine.

“…we can’t let them get too close to Earth. You know why. We’ve learnt from the previous mistakes, but don’t ask—It’s better you aren’t privy to all our options.

“We have comms and linguistic experts on twenty-four-hour standby to assist you, and as much computing power as necessary to figure a way to talk to the aliens and insist they rectify our problems, which they caused. The next communication will be in an hour. Out.”

He must be joking, thought Kallandra. All she’d done is copy a pattern of flickering via quasi time-decoherences, and that by a considerable slowed-down factor.

She’d no idea what the flickering meant. It could’ve been anything from a ‘here we are’ to ‘where are we?’. Damn, she’d thought too humanlike again. If the alien spheres were machines then the only comms they’d need would be in alien machine code—they were saying: 00110101 or more likely: #..-|||. No translation would be relevant. Disraeli would know from her records that her secondary majors were in Linguistics and AI, and so expected her to come up with the equivalent of the Klingon-English dictionary. If only it were that easy!

She sent a cautionary reply to him, then, before opening a dialogue with the ‘experts’ on how the hell they’d set about mission impossible, she reflected on his other loaded comments. He said: ‘We can’t let them get too close to Earth…’ Obviously, NASA wanted them to go back into Earth to once again absorb the time anomalies, and make time smoothly linear. He was saying that unless she could get confirmation from them that it was the reason for turning back, then Earth would assume they were returning to eliminate humans or their technology so they couldn’t follow the spheres again. Surely Disraeli didn’t really believe the Apoidea would be able to follow the spheres to their home planet, base or whatever? Her assumption, along with others, was that the spheres were travelling so slowly in order to meet up with other spheres or maybe to check if they were being followed. Of course, that implied that they cared they were being chased, would do something about it, and damn it, think like humans. Once under steam, she’d no illusions that the spheres could either zip to their base at just under light speed or use their time manipulation to get home faster; assuming they had a home.

Part of her strategy was to chase the spheres until it was impossible. To alert them to human existence because, apart from a few time-side-stepping of missiles and a handful of other interactions, they hadn’t shown any indication they’d noticed Earth was populated. They behaved robotically where their programming had not taken Earthlings into account.

At least it seemed the Apoidea’s efforts to simulate timequakes had attracted the spheres’ attention.

Now Disraeli was saying, unless the spheres indicated friendly intention, they’d be what? Destroyed, and how? He said that they’d learnt from mistakes, which could mean they’d try and blow them up, presumably with missiles and nukes sent from Earth, but the spheres dodged them before using timequakes. Perhaps a battery of multiple missiles timed to detonate seconds apart, but how would the detonation of one not destroy any nearby unexploded missiles?

“Apoidea calling Mission Control. First, with respect, Sir, the chances of engaging in any meaningful dialogue is as likely as me winning an Olympic medal pole-vaulting with a pencil. This doesn’t rule out me giving it my best shot. Second, and, speaking of shots, if I don’t succeed in acquiring a benign intent from the spheres, it doesn’t mean they’re returning to eliminate us. They know where Earth is and could already have wiped out the Apoidea, so that indicates non-hostility, doesn’t it?” She turned off the mike.

The spheres might not have eliminated her for several reasons, only one being friendly. If they’d only just noticed the existence of an Earth-based sentient species because of Apoidea following them, then maybe they were still gathering data. It was possible they were using her as a human shield…. She couldn’t imagine her one life and the billion dollar Apoidea preventing a missile being launched in her direction.

Before she left Earth, she’d discussed possible communication strategies with her linguistics professor.

Ah, her rumination on how to initiate a dialogue was interrupted by a thought image. She’d just pictured missiles leaving Earth—how ridiculous. They’d take far too long. Instead, the bastards must have primed Apoidea as a super bomb—the sealed cargo area wasn’t food and resources. Disraeli was using her as bait and it was working. Surely Earth needed the Spheres? She found it hard to accept her own logic that they’d go to so much trouble to destroy the only means to save the planet.

She postponed her communication attempts in order to test her suspicions. With her heart thumping, she stood at a console and tapped in instructions for a robotic inventory of the extra storage facility.

:NOT POSSIBLE AT THIS TIME:

That’s ridiculous, she had administrative rights to all the computer facilities. She typed in a query.

“When will it be possible to undertake an inventory?”

:UNKNOWN:

Undeterred by such blocking manoeuvres, Kallandra tried a direct question after checking the label on the suspect storage hold.

“What is in storage number 3 aft?”

:INTENDED STORAGE FOR EMERGENCY OXYGEN, FOOD STORES,

EMERGENCY WATER, FUEL CELLS, MISCELLANEOUS:

“List the miscellaneous.”

:NOT POSSIBLE AT THIS TIME:

“Show me the most recent inventory of number 3 aft.”

:NOT ACCESSIBLE:

“Has there been such an inventory?”

:THERE IS NONE LISTED:

“Switch on the number 3 aft cam and display on this screen.”

:CAM INOPERATIVE:

“I instruct you to perform an inventory now of number 3 aft now.”

:NOT POSSIBLE AT THIS TIME:

Known for her patience with machines, Kallandra didn’t blame the computer as so many home PC owners would’ve done. It had either been programmed to refuse access or it really couldn’t access the storage hold. If she was going to try and access it manually—the next logical step—it would be useful to check a few facts such as:

“Is life support operating in number 3 aft?” In some ways it would be illogical to waste heat and air in an emergency storage facility but neither would it make sense to damage food and other supplies. Some electronics and liquids don’t like being frozen.

:AIR PRESSURE 800MB. TEMP 5 CELSIUS:

“Is the access hatch from the external bay doors unlocked?” If so, she could open the cargo bay doors and EVA in.

:UNKNOWN:

“Nonsense, you know the status of all hatches with locks.”

No answer because she’d not asked a question. This meant the hatch was locked and the computer didn’t know the access code. Worse, it’d been programmed not to be aware of it. If she broke into the storage hold, she’d not be able to re-seal it without a lot of work. If only Doctor Who’s Sonic screwdriver wasn’t fictional.

Maybe she should get back to working on communication attempts with the spheres. Punching up the flicker pattern she’d used previously, she wondered if she dared use Apoidea to do a repeat stop start pattern and risk not only the ship falling apart but her insides being turned to raspberry jam. No. Now that the spheres were closer and presumably watching for signals maybe lights alone would work, or perhaps she could program a tethered engine to perform the dancing instead of Apoidea.

In the meantime she should set up a rear cam to specifically record flickering from the spheres. Damn, she should have done that hours ago. She immediately took a long look at the following spheres. It looked like a closely packed bunch of silver grapes. The bunch from Earth had been added to those from Mars and Venus, and Houston had told her there were twenty five a few days after she’d left Earth.

She uploaded the cam image into a graphics package and counted. She could see fourteen. She smiled a welcome relief when she recalled a mathematics lecture on sphere-packing problems and their associated kissing numbers. For three dimensions, which she had to assume she was working with, the kissing number, or the most efficient number to pack perfect spheres around a central one is twelve. She ran a programming routine on the image. It told her there were thirty-one spheres in that group.

She peered again at the live cam image. There didn’t seem to be any flickering.

She punched in the instructions for her rear lights to simulate the previous set of flicker patterns. The lights were so bright the cam blanked, but she let it repeat for five minutes.

While she waited for any response, she wondered again whether the spheres were artefacts or aliens. Suppose they had already evolved beyond their original form and the spheres were their current state? Metal for skin, patience for a heart, time for ambition. How should she communicate with such beings? OK, she knew the physical how—at least she thought they’d noticed the attempts at time-quaking, but it could’ve been coincidence.

Her concern was what she should attempt to say. The debates about how to convince aliens that Earth housed intelligent species was to transmit mathematical concepts such as PI, prime numbers or the Fibonacci series. The last seemed a nonsense to her. Fibonacci occurred in nature, so transmitting that wouldn’t necessarily imply intelligence. A sequence of prime numbers might, but it was irrelevant since the existence of the Apoidea must imply at least a minimal level of competence.

She recalled her notes on what great minds had said about first contact conversations. Professor Kopal said if the cosmic phone rings don’t answer it; we shouldn’t attract attention. Too late. Rather similar to Martin Ryle, the former British Astronomer Royal, who’d warned that aliens might consider humans to be their next lunch. The only nearly useful advice she remembered was from Douglas Vakoch at SETI, who advised the first approach to aliens should be to indicate our altruism.

Further, he thought the very sending of a message or reply to an alien contact conveys intent of mutual benefit. Well, too late and not relevant. If the spheres had any inkling of the plight of humans they’d know in an instant that her mission wasn’t one of mutual benefit unless the spheres considered giving to beggars would help in their own spiritual salvation. She couldn’t see that either.

A beeping from the spheres-watching cam software shook her. She seemed to be easily shaken now that she was on her own. The spheres had flickered. Yeay! She ran the pattern through the computer. The pattern was different, and repeated six times. Wow, maybe they were asking her what help she needed! Her excitement stopped her fingers pressing the right keys. She had to stop, step back and breathe slowly or she’d find she’d sent last week’s garbage at the spheres instead of a “Hi”.

Exhilaration was exhausting and fearing she’d make mistakes she forced herself to think about having a short rest. First she ensured all the data from the spheres continued to be transmitted to Houston. She had to think about how to interpret and reply to the spheres. Forcing herself away from the console she laid in her sleep couch and hit the random music player. Claude’s favourite flooded the cabin:

“Well, I never felt more like singin’ the blues

‘cause I never thought that I’d ever lose

Your love dear, why’d you do me this way?”

Tears cascaded down her cheeks. A few minutes later she thought, OK, what would Claude have wanted? He made up his own lyrics. She pictured him with a pretend morose face looking at his watch and reaching the end of the song with:

‘Singin’ the decoherence blues.’

Hah, that felt much better. It should be a hit. Claude! Hey, that would be her first real question if she ever mastered enough language of the spheres: “Please use time decoherence to bring back my Claude.”

She wondered where his body drifted—she must have already passed it on the return journey.

After a short rest, she sent a copy of their flickerings back at them; seven instead of six repeats, just in case they thought she was a simple mirror. Life was going to be easier if they’d accept a light signal instead of physical agitation. Her excitement rose again as she thought about how she was going to try and learn rudimentary elements of an alien language.

She made some tea and returned to the cam screen to wait for the next response. Five minutes, ten, thirty. Maybe they were having a meeting and, after trawling the Earth’s Internet, were getting ready to use Morse code. If only.

With more time to kill, Kallandra remembered she had another problem. There must be a way the captain of a NASA spaceship can get into a storage space. She had her own code for accessing those hatches. Claude had his code too. It was possible that she could suit up, EVA to the external access for the cargo bay and use her’s or Claude’s code to get into that elusive store. But if Disraeli didn’t want her to get in there, then it would be waste of time and effort—the codes would be inoperable. What she needed was an engineer’s backdoor code. Um, but messages to Derek would be filtered—Elaine would pass them on—but, hey, was that why she was replaced?

Disraeli trusted only himself.

Nevertheless, she prepared a message for Derek. They’d discussed the possibility of needing their own encryption.

“Derek, love,

Again on my own up here now, except for the spheres. Fortunately, I’ve help from linguistics for messages to them but I wondered if there was more I could do.

Talking of messages, remember we hatched a plan about opening chatlines? 3rd June wasn’t it? I’m sure you can come up with a code or something that will open their minds for me?

Back soon, love K XXxx X x”

She hit Send. It would take about thirty minutes to reach Capcom, whoever it would be by then, be read by Dizzy or one of his censors and passed on to Derek. He’d recognise their agreed kiss-code meaning covert message—first letters and hopefully he’d notice the important words—aft 3, hatch open and code? Sure he would.

Suppose he didn’t receive the message? Then an EVA armed with cutting tools might have to be in order, but was it really necessary? She attempted an analysis about what type of munitions Disraeli would have planted.

She ruled out missiles. Using the Apoidea as a launch platform would’ve been difficult to engineer covertly with Derek as senior design engineer. It wouldn’t be difficult to release mines, and she supposed they’d be triggered with proximity sensors. She couldn’t imagine how engineers working in secret on Earth would know how to ensure the right target had been selected.

Even with the relative ease of releasing mines, she knew they’d be unlikely to be powerful or wide ranging temporarily and spatially to do significant damage to the spheres. The only possibility left sickened her. Store number 3 aft was probably a nuclear bomb. Disraeli had said they’d learnt from their mistakes, which meant their solution was to go bigger. So the Apoidea was a Trojan Horse, luring the spheres in to take a close look then boom. Unless she could disarm it or jettison it like the mysterious locker.

Maybe the locker had lost some of its mystery. It was located next to a comms unit. No doubt a wifi link to the electronics in the locker was part of the identify and detonation plan. She and Claude hadn’t turned off the internal cams then, but Mission Control hadn’t referred to their sabotage. Either they had a backup plan or the locker was merely a red herring.

She studied the rear cam and readouts, but sadly the spheres had not flickered in response to hers. The previous occasion must have been coincidence; they remain blind to her lights or not seeing them as communication.

Blast. And that might be the operative word if Disraeli believes there was no communication going on. So, what was she going to do to make Houston think a dialogue was happening, when it wasn’t?

Chapter Thirty

At last Blake had snared a girlfriend. True, she was even larger than him: in girth, income, intelligence and humour, but there tingled mutual attraction and he’d long ago cared nothing for the opinions of his peers.

On Severn Beach, seven kilometres to the northwest of Bristol, Blake and Amelia laughed at each others’ red lips; a consequence of the punnet of fresh strawberries sitting between them. Crumbs cascaded from his juiced lips, onto his tartan travel rug, as he indulged in crunching chocolate biscuits.

He’d been out with girls from his school but, thanks to Internet dating, Amelia was his first real hugging, kissing, friend and his love life had elevated to new levels.

He was convinced, by feeling his neck pulse, that his heartbeat now averaged a hundred per minute, possibly caused by the permanent hard on he’d experienced.

Amelia had told him he didn’t need Viagra, but once he’d found them in Uncle Derek’s bathroom cabinet, he couldn’t resist trying one and then another the following day.

He grinned at Amelia, and she returned a pink-toothed crumby smile as if she knew and desired the same post-picnic activity, even though she’d told him sand made her sore last time.

“I love this spot,” Amelia said, waving her chubby arm at the distant Welsh shore.

“Yeah, especially the bridge. It’s so elegant, five kilometres long, you know,”

Blake said, nodding to his right at the Severn Bridge, the source of the ever-present muffled roar of motorway traffic. Actually, the picnic site wasn’t his favourite, there were more stones than sand and often the stench of rotting seaweed assaulted his nose, but not today. He lifted his face and sniffed. He found a metallic odour like an over-scrubbed metal saucepan. Then cheap rose-petal perfume wafted from Amelia and he smiled.

He brought her here last time—and it thus became their place—because it was the closest railway-accessed beach to Bristol. He should’ve paid more to go further.

On the other hand, it possessed the generic beach features: the hypnotic rhythmic ebb and flo of the small waves, and the beached flock of waders and seagulls, mostly black-headed and herring gulls. They seemed to be having ripples of arguments. No wonder they were called a squabble. He amassed collective nouns as other teenagers collected names for spliffs.

“Isn’t that a hot-air balloon on the other side of the bridge?” she said, “Or is this cider making spots appear in my eyes?”

“Yes to both. Hey you can see the burner flame—I can’t hear it though. Tell those lorries to stop for a minute.”

Amelia lay back, her head resting on Blake’s stomach. “This is bliss, lover. I could spend all weekend here.”

“Yeah,” Blake replied, but didn’t share exactly the same desire. He once missed the last train back to Bristol and spent a long hour shivering in the sea mists, midges and menacing local kids while a taxi took its time to come out to him. In fact, looking at the power station to their left, he’d rather spend time at Bristol Zoo, but Amelia had a fear of crowds and apes.

“Blake, can you see that cloud forming on the opposite shore?”

His stomach lurched as he moved her head and he rose up onto his elbows to grab a better view. Across the blue-grey estuary, the Welsh shore was never very clear. He removed and polished his spectacles with his shirt. The shore remained fuzzy. Then he saw Amelia’s clouds, puffs of darker grey mushroomed at random. He heard a low rumble, similar to the bridge traffic but deeper. On Blake’s left, the flock of seagulls, all facing the same way downstream, took off in a noisy crash of wings, obscuring the sky and his view of the estuary.

Amelia struggled to her knees, and Blake thought about standing as a worrying thought sent shivers through him. As the sky gradually cleared, the opposite bank looked fuzzier and the rumbling noise grew.

“This looks bad, Am,” he said.

“Is it an earthquake? Where should we go?”

“That’s the problem, there won’t be a train for ages. If it’s a quake they say we should be out in the open, and we are.”

“It’s a time decoherence thingy, isn’t it?”

“If it is, it could be over already, but even so there’s nothing we can do.”

“We could pray,” she said.

Blake didn’t know she was religious and there she was on her knees, her lips silently supplicating. Hopes of the event subsiding grew as the rumbling diminished such that the bridge traffic noise once more gained prominence. Then the far end of the bridge lifted to double its height, along with its piles and the nearby ground.

Blake opened his mouth to both gasp and tell Amelia to look up from her praying but words refused to come out. He felt the beach vibrating, forcing him to fall, landing in a sitting position, crushing the remainder of their strawberries and biscuits. The rumbling roared in a painful crescendo as he saw the opposite bank impossibly rise as a black cliff. He thought he heard a penetrating scream from Amelia, but his ears had stopped working and his brain rattled, giving him the worst headache.

“The sea!” he yelled, but no one heard. His eyes remained functioning, giving him image stabilization as the rocking beach rattled his body. He wanted to call out to Derek, the only family member who gave a stuff about him. With remarkable presence he whipped out his picture phone, snapped the opposite bank and sent it to Derek’s number.

The estuary water should be going out to sea, like before a tsunami, but he couldn’t tell if the normal flow was exceeded. The noise from the earth movements opposite hurt not just his head but he could feel his lungs begin to vibrate. He remembered his geography teacher telling the class that if people were around during some the big quakes millions of years ago, they’d have been killed by the noise rupturing their lungs. He folded his arms as if that would help. He found he couldn’t breathe out properly, like during his asthma attacks. Panic setting in, and yet more under control after his other weird experiences, he wondered if he’d put his puffer in the knapsack that morning. Never mind, he thought as his eyes registered the black cliff opposite rise further and the sea now definitely coming towards him; a wave ten or more metres high. This was it, the end. He rolled on the shaking ground to hug Amelia, amazed at grains of sand leaping up and bouncing. He wanted to say something momentous but his headache overwhelmed him. He felt hot, like flu; pins and needles in his fingers—he tried to look at them but as he felt Amelia’s arms hugging him he blacked out.

* * *

The return of consciousness jabbed at his brain and tormented his body. He couldn’t open his eyes so this could be death. He had no control over any of his muscles and yet he felt as if the black wave that had ploughed into him was throwing him around. Perhaps his eyes were already open but he was too deep underwater to see light. Although he couldn’t control his muscles they fought against the forces that gyrated him as if he was trapped in a giant washing machine. With supreme effort he extended his left arm and cried out: “Amelia.”

No reply. No Amelia; she must be out of reach or in her own demented whirlpool. Just a moment, if he was underwater all this time how come he could breathe? The question didn’t apply—he wasn’t breathing. Maybe he should attempt it.

Ah, he was blacking out once more….

* * *

There, he heard his own wheezing, so although he felt exhausted and hadn’t tried putting any muscles to work, he guessed life remained a possibility. With his eyes shut, his ears registered animal scuffling noises that developed into approaching sniffing. He must have been washed up on the beach—his hand beneath him could feel sandy grit. He felt no fear; it had all been beaten out of him and so didn’t register the need to wake up properly. The disaster teams would arrive sooner or later. In any case he should stay immobile to prevent exacerbating medical problems. Nevertheless, the approaching animal, probably a dog, meant he might need to employ defence or avoiding action.

He couldn’t feel any sun on his face, but to avoid possible danger of blindness he rolled onto his stomach, and opened reluctant eyelids. Inches from his face glistened a black nose. Before Blake had time to yell or pull back, the dog licked his face.

“Kur, stop that,” he said, but the dog’s excitement or more likely, enjoyment of tasting twenty-first century sea-salt continued its greeting.

Blake found that in spite of agonizing pulled muscles, he could manipulate his body into a sitting position. It was Oqmar’s cave.

He found himself hugging the dog before his eyes detected the fleas and lice, or his nose smelled unmentionable crud in Kur’s coat. Past caring for his own safety and astonished to be alive, if indeed he was, he continued the mutual embrace.

Blake pondered his situation. Uncle Derek told him that when he was in this cave last time, he’d gone back twenty thousand years. He didn’t know what to believe.

After all, how could he know what it would feel like to travel back in time? The cave, Kur, and Oqmar could easily have been around in the twenty-first century, but carbon fourteen and other dating evidence was too compelling, apparently.

“Kur, why am I back here? I’ve no mini-sphere this time.”

The dog, presumably saline satiated, had curled up in Blake’s lap, an eye looking up at the long lost friend of its master.

“Perhaps my previous journey here created a path, like lightning that repeat-travels along its initial ionized path.”

Blake shooed Kur so he could heft himself to his feet to check out the place, finding he’d landed, if that was the right image, in the larger cave. If he’d arrived another metre to his left he might have fallen down the sphere’s hole. Instinctively he looked up, painfully—rubbing his neck; everything seared him with pain—to see blue sky through the exit hole.

So, he’d arrived back in time but after the mini-sphere had left, possibly many years later.

“Are you Kur, or Son of Kur?”

It must be the original dog or he’d have been more aggressive.

“Let’s go find Oqmar.” At the sound of his master’s name, Kur released a short woof, turned and trotted through to the smaller chamber. The brighter light illuminated sketches on the walls. Blake smiled at the illustration of the sphere, and what must be him with his spectacles and exaggerated jacket and jeans. He looked down—different jeans, trainers and jacket.

Kur waited for him at the bright entrance.

“Hang on a minute, Kur.” Blake wanted to reflect on his extraordinary experience. Pity Amelia hadn’t come through with him. She might have freaked out at all this. but he would have enjoyed comforting her and travelling through this new stage in his inverted existence.

What sort of life was he facing? Assuming Oqmar and his village helped him out, he was likely to starve with no big Macs and no hospitals to keep him alive beyond one score years and ten. Hey, he could invent ice-cream! Excellent.

He felt in his pocket and fished out his mobile phone. Wet, it probably didn’t work, but he tried anyway. No signal. He tapped in a text message to Amelia and a last one to Uncle Derek.

“Back 20k yrs. Put me down as inventor of wheel. Blake.” He hit Send. Maybe an orbiting sphere will pass the message on.

The phone slipped out of his fingers onto the sand. Retrieving it he found the packet of gum he’d left last time. It looked like insects had tried to nibble at the foil but given up. Laughing at the irony of not expecting to return and wondering if that linked him to here, he unwrapped a stick and popped half in his mouth. Kur sniffed back but refused the half Blake offered.

“Very wise, Kur, you shouldn’t get into bad habits. Now, take me to your master.”

Chapter Thirty-One

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California

Not only had Derek deciphered Kallandra’s message successfully, he was livid at the implications. He banged the table at the JPL hangar where he and a trusted engineer confirmed that number 3 aft should have contained straight-forward reserve stores, mostly for life-support in case the two humans needed to travel for at least three years.

He’d only the message relayed from Apoidea that indicated this wasn’t the case.

“The trouble, Derek,” said Tomas, scratching his untidy grey beard, “is that so many folk were involved in loading Apoidea.”

“Come off it, Tom, you can’t sneak a high-powered nuke on a spaceship in a few moments. It’d take planning, especially constructed rigs to house it securely, staff to do the actual loading, electrics, and all under our noses.”

Tomas shook his head and waved his tortoise-shell spectacles at Derek.

“It’s not that hard. The design and rig construction was probably done at one of many Defence Department workshops. It would’ve been cobbled together into a self-contained module that was flown in and placed in the Apoidea in minutes. The electrics are hundred percent wireless so no electricians needed. Meanwhile, some nerd in stores has fiddled the inventory data, put a non-access code lock on number 3 aft and routed the intended LSS gear elsewhere.”

“And sold it on e-bay. I know, but it’s worth a bit of covert checking on those stores, if you will, Tom.”

“Sure, but don’t forget that we’ve no proof.” Tom’s eyes lit up. “Hey, there was twenty-four-seven surveillance on Apoidea all through her build to launch. I’ll get onto it.”

“Cheers, Tom. But I’m sure they’d have known that. And the radiation monitoring would be confused with the small nuclear-power modules on board. Damn.

It might mean the only way to confirm our suspicions is for Kallandra to cut her way into number 3 aft from an EVA. Or is it?”

A big grin, revealing a bright white central incisor tooth among the natural ivory coloured. “You mean we kidnap Dizzy and make him talk.”

Derek grinned his more expensive dentistry. “I was more considering sending her my hack code.” He paused while an image of a trussed and gagged Disraeli played in his imagination. “Also a hack routine to force the robotic quartermaster to go into number 3 aft and check it out.”

“Well, that’s less fun, but why haven’t you already done that from down here?”

“Yes, I could do it remotely, but with the time delays and the possibility that the hatch is obstructed from the inside—possibly booby-trapped. I’ve a good mind to come straight out with my suspicions to Disraeli. Publicly, of course. I don’t want to be disappeared.”

Tom’s grey eyebrows raised in shock. “They wouldn’t dare! Anyhow, that only happens in films. Tell ‘em you’ve made a recording and it’ll be released to the media if anything happens to you—hey, and to me.”

“I suspect that kind of bluff only works in films too. Damn, I wish I could chat privately to Kal about this.”

“Not all the radio frequencies allocated for Apoidea comms are used,” Tom said.

“Why not encrypt one channel?”

“Because it would be detected—it’s not just NASA who tune in so, if radio transmissions are detected batting to and fro outside the declared times and channels, there’d be an investig—”

Tom tapped his nose and showed his odd tooth again. “Not if the frequency is tucked inside the radio data streams. They’re—”

“Of course, there’s a constant data stream to and from the Apoidea. I’d have to tap into the transmission uploads—excellent idea, Tom.”

“I have my uses,” he said, patting Derek’s back. “Now give them bastards hell.”

* * *

Derek simmered with increasing anger on the airplane from Pasadena to Houston. No more Mister Nice Guy, he thought, as his mind travelled through strong words to tell the inner circle at Mission Control, Disraeli and the flight controllers, who must know that powerful explosives occupied number 3 aft. Elaine, although she was the primary Capcom, seemed to be unaware of the secret, although he could only assume her innocence, knowing how she and Kallandra were good friends. It was best he made no assumptions like that. Also, it would be foolhardy for him to blast away with his one gun against their barrage.

He needed backup, but who could he trust who had clout? Rob Summers, himself, maybe Elaine, a handful of others. However, the strongest potential ally was the media—or was it? Some Governments seem to willingly persist in unpopular wars so why would the governments involved take any notice of him or the media, assuming they would take his side?

As he walked off the plane he realized he’d embarked as an angry agitator eager for a fight, and disembarked a livid man believing no fight is possible. Nevertheless, he was determined to use his supposed indispensable position as senior design engineer to lean on Disraeli.

The interior of the Houston Yellow Cab reeked of furniture polish, making it difficult to rehearse his indignation tirade.

The hot Texas sunshine burnt into his blond hair as he clambered out of the aircon-cooled cab. The cab driver stayed in the driver’s seat and released the trunk-lock so Derek could grab his black leather overnight bag. No tip for you, thought Derek, piling on the meanness attitude he needed to develop for Disraeli. Argh, the damned cab driver had dropped him off at Building 3, the restaurant, instead of 30S, the Mission Control complex.

Too late, the cab squealed away as Derek faced the walk through the Zero-G

Diner and Blast-off Bistro. He hated crowds and there were not only tourists to elbow him but Disneyland-type space creatures and comic astronauts in oversized costumes that would pat him on the head and try to force a Jupiter-lollipop into his mouth. At least the buildings were air-conditioned, unlike the alternative outside walk around to building 30S.

With his heavy overnight bag in his right hand and his briefcase in the left, Derek hunched his shoulders and marched towards the smoked-glass entrance doors. Before he’d completed two strides he felt a whack to the back of his head. He dropped his bag and promptly tripped over it. The hexagonal sandstone paving rushed towards him and, although he rolled, his head smacked the stones. Dazed and shocked he lay on his back for a few seconds. His first thoughts were not wondering if his assailant might finish him off, but how he was going to maintain credibility in his arguments with the top staff at NASA when he had the looks of a barroom bruiser. As sensibility returned he looked up at the silhouette of his female attacker eclipsing the sun.

“You bastard, you killed him!” She kicked his legs and swung her shoulder bag at his bleeding head. Derek thought that he recognised that southern accent. Then, why hadn’t the door security rushed to his rescue?

He called up: “Is that you, Tabitha? It’s me, Derek Stone. Remember—”

“I sure remember you all right.” Her bag swung at his head but caught his protecting arm. He snatched at the strap and held onto it.

He heard running footsteps. At last the security guards must have stopped laughing. One grey-uniformed guard grabbed Tabitha while the other helped Derek to his feet. Tabitha persisted in aiming a kick at the puzzled Derek.

“Madam,” said the guard holding her. “Did this man assault you?”

“Hey,” Derek shouted. “It’s the other way around.”

“He killed…he killed my—”

Now it was Derek’s turn to be grabbed by a security guard, while Derek’s battered head whirred through half-remembered information.

“Tabitha, I’m sorry about what happened to your father. Really I am, but I can’t be held responsible for the timequakes, or for the spheres.”

Instead of calming down, her agitation increased with added incoherent yelling.

Meanwhile the guard holding Derek looked at him carefully and saw his pendant identity card.

“Say, you’re that Mr. Stone, the Mars Mission ship designer? Sorry, Sir.” He released Derek and pointed at the angry Tabitha. “What d’ya want us to do with her?”

“I’m not a HER!” And she emphasised her denial with flailing arms, but the guards were well-trained and the only outcome was her bag hurling to the paving, scattering the contents, keys skidding into the grass verge.

Instinctively, although wounded, Derek stooped to gather her belongings. Dark red drops dripped from his forehead onto her iPaq. He wiped his blood off with his thumb. She didn’t display any remorse, her mouth set rigid. He found a paper handkerchief in his trouser pocket and dabbed his head.

“Tabitha, come inside and we’ll have a talk over some breakfast. I’ve been meaning to talk to you about something important anyway.”

“Get this goon offa me.” Her shaking shoulders subsided as tears replaced vehemence. Derek waved at the security men to leave her alone. He noticed her keys still in the verge and picked them up. The fob sported fancy gilt lettering: A.B.

* * *

In the café, they avoided the space-orientated foods and opted for double espressos and donuts. Derek shooed away a grey Junction Jack rabbit-costumed tourist annoyer, and tried to pacify Tabitha while priming for his own attack on Disraeli.

Before he could open with any no-need-to-apologise niceties, as becomes a British gentleman having been attacked by a lady, she pre-empted the discussion:

“It wasn’t the death of my pa I was on about.”

“Come on then, Tabitha, who’s death are you referring to?”

She played with the wooden sugar stirrer, making whirlpools in her coffee. “You should know.”

“Thousands are dying daily from quakes, mudslides, floods, avalanches and accidents caused by the time decoherences.” He had a struggle keeping his patience.

She didn’t seem to want to look into his eyes. He’d not been this close to her for longer than a few minutes. He found himself staring at her red highlights in auburn hair.

Was that unusual in black women? He was so out of touch with fashion, the more so with what was expected of upwardly mobile journalists.

She had beautiful deep brown eyes, though tired looking and red in the white sclera from crying. She seemed to be aiming them at the space pictures on the wall rather than have eye contact with him.

“Somebody, other than your father, who was very close to you…not your boy?”

Her eyes flared as if someone had just electrocuted her. “Leave my family out of this!”

“Good grief, Tabitha, I’m not telepathic. Who?”

“S-someone you wanted dead.”

Derek didn’t know whether to laugh in derision or be shocked. “I’ve never wished death on anyone.” He waited for her to respond; to give him the name of the person he allegedly wanted dead and who was close to Tabitha, but nothing came from her after seconds…a minute.

She’d turned from gazing at the pictures and used the kids’ crayons on the tables to doodle on a paper napkin. He used his napkin to mop up more of his blood. His temple throbbed.

“You sent those hate e-mails and hey, how did you manage to be in Pasadena to take my photo and be here waiting for me. Were you on my plane and guessed I was coming straight here? No one else knew—well Rob did, but he wouldn’t…” Perhaps he would for a laugh if he thought it was a harmless prank. He’d probably arranged for the lap-dancer, at Tabitha’s request, and he was too embarrassed to confess there and then, not thinking it would go to the media.

He tried again. “Who is the AB on your key fob?”

She waved her hands as if it was utterly unimportant. She said, “Do you have a key fob, or have you had one with a name? If so…”

“Your name doesn’t begin with A. Is it the initials of this other person?”

He glanced at her doodles and noticed she’d written her first name and crossed out the T. Her fingernails were polished with a silky fuchsia, immaculately manicured.

Glancing up at her concentrated face he saw Tabitha for the first time as a desirable woman. He’d never made love to a black woman and wondered if her skin was as sensuously smooth as it looked. Stop it, Derek. Good grief, concentrate on the problems he already had.

She looked at him at last, but without a smile.

“I need a pseudonym sometimes for my journalism.” She circled the AB. “OK, now what did you want my help for, Mr Stone.”

So, she wasn’t going to tell him who had died—later, perhaps. At least, if he could read her face accurately, he seems to have been found not guilty of actual murder and only of complicity in some way.

He leant towards her and in a low voice said, “I’m not sure how to handle this suspicion bordering on certainty that some of us have about what has been secretly stored on the Apoidea.” He noticed she wasn’t writing anything down—good—at this stage. “The extra stores to help Kallandra and Claude survive for several years had been replaced, we think, with a powerful explosive device to use on the spheres.” He’d noticed her eyes flicker at Kallandra’s name, or was it at Claude’s?

“And the problem is?”

Derek sighed. She wasn’t going to help if she thought the destruction of the spheres was going to solve the planet’s problems, or that hurting them would be a just revenge.

“Don’t you see, Tabitha, the spheres may be on their way back to help us sort out these time problems.”

“You might be a better man than I took you for, Derek Stone, but a naïve fool if you believe the spheres love us all. They’re probably coming back to finish us off because some ferucking idiot calculated a way to send two good people after them.

One of those is dead.” Her eyes filled again, and overflowed.

Claude was then the ‘him’ he killed. He was about to tell her how much a friend Claude was to himself when his phone jangled. He opened it. “Oh, it’s only from my nephew, Blake. I’ll read it later.”

Tabitha frowned and put her hand on his. “No. It’s important. I can feel these things. Look at it now.”

She was psychic? Her eyes instructed him to open it, so he did.

“It’s not a message, just a picture—a blurred image. He probably took and sent it by mistake.”

“He didn’t. Let’s see.”

He shuffled his chair closer so they could both see it.

“You’re right, it’s too small to tell what or where it is, but I feel strong vibes here.”

“Hang on, my laptop’s in my briefcase I’ll transfer the image and enhance it.”

“I’ll go get more coffee while you set up.” She gave him a resigned look as if she’d a premonition and was never wrong.

After some tweaks with graphics software, he recognised a distorted Severn Bridge and the dark wall that could be the opposite bank or water; either were too high.

He looked up at Tabitha’s sad face. “This is a spot near Bristol in England where Blake lives. Something’s destroying the bridge and…well, I can’t tell.”

Tabitha’s cellphone played Amazing Grace. Derek threw her a quizzical raised eyebrow.

“My daughter put it in,” she said. “Anyway, it’s an alert from Earthquake Watch…”

“Why are you registered with them? Ah, you’re a journalist and—”

“I have to file copy with the press agencies as soon as a big one comes that might be related to the timequakes.”

Derek looked across at her cellphone data. “But, Tabitha, any quake might be related to the time decoherences.”

“I leave the quakes related to the historically active zones, such as the San Andreas fault, to journalists covering normal natural disasters.”

Derek shook his head, and then wished he hadn’t when the throbbing increased.

“No, Tabitha, the point is that timequakes might always have been happening to an extent, and the spheres leaving hasn’t started disasters, just increased them.”

“Do you want to know…? Well you need to know that a Richter scale of eight point six hit the British Isles in the last few minutes, epicentre in the Bristol Channel.”

“You can’t mean eight point six, that’s enormous; it would mean devastation across most of Britain and great loss of life.”

“Sorry Derek, I’d better verify and write it up. Excuse me.” She stood and re-packed her bag.

He put his hand on her arm. “Tabitha, this means Blake is likely to have died just after he sent that photograph to me.”

Her face effused pity but with a small smile. “I’ve a feeling he hasn’t actually died, Derek, but most there probably have. I’ll verify the data, use my contacts to find out as much as I can, and get back to you. Derek, are they likely to get worse than this?”

Derek was too choked to answer immediately. Blake was an oddball, too much into emo-cults and bordering on gothic, but he was family and their relationship had grown considerably since he’d taken that time-travel trip. Damn, he’d miss him.

“Y-yes, Tabitha, unless the spheres help us, it seems the planet will rip itself to pieces. I could try and explain…”

“I’ve got reams of quantum mechanics stuff, thanks Derek. All I needed to know was that time is related to space and that when it slips some lumps of the planet move faster than the rest.”

“Or slower, or shifts where it was a few seconds before. Whatever, if it continues or gets worse then the planet could disintegrate and we’d become another asteroid belt.”

“OK, Derek, so how can the media help you?”

Chapter Thirty-Two

Kallandra grinned at Derek’s cunning. Elaine must have allowed through one of his verbal messages, probably while Disraeli was out of the building and didn’t have an opportunity to hover over him with a hand on the microphone. She ensured the Apoidea’s nearby sound and cam recorders were turned off.

‘Hello Kal. I suppose it’s the afternoon there, fifteen hundred hours, give or take a minute.’

Yes it was, clever timing to use the Apoidea’s time zone, which of course was set to synchronize with Greenwich Mean Time, and aft 3 refers to the suspect hold.

‘Don’t forget it’s our fourth anniversary tomorrow since we met; don’t all those months fly?’

It’s three years and three months so what was he telling her? She was hoping for a code to hack into the hatch for number 3 aft, but forty eight could refer to an encrypted channel. Of course he was devious enough to make it forty eight minus the actual thirty nine. She’d have to try a few combinations.

“Bad news back in Britain. A severe quake. Blake sent me a picture of the Bristol Channel as it happened.”

NASA sent her news streams so she knew about the quake but at least it seemed Blake must be OK and maybe referring to channel was a clue for her to use the previous numbers for an encrypted radio channel?

“On another matter, I don’t think you should put Apoidea through those stop-start pressures again, nor yourself. Maybe we can work out a drone to do it like you’re probably thinking about. See you later, love.”

She immediately punched in channel forty eight, an unused data radio channel.

Crackles, then she heard an auto-signal retrieval tone followed by what sounded like a fax machine signal. Her system automatically recorded it. After a few minutes, she decoded and transformed the cacophony into Derek’s voice.

“Congratulations. Still no real confirmation of the contents of number 3 aft.

Earthside inventory lists LSS stores as planned. I’m convinced it might hold dangerous cargo so be careful. In this signal, further encrypted code D is a backdoor hex password for all hatches with locks for Apoidea. Disraeli and MC frontliners don’t know it. Tabitha Wish is on our side now to not destroy the spheres. I think she and Claude had something going, but she doesn’t blame us, now. Be careful up there. Kisses.’

Why so much about Tabitha Wish? Kallandra had the wink of bad feelings that Derek might have urges to expand his romantic experiences. He’d had a sheltered life, even in student days, so it would be understandable, even if not forgivable. Tabitha and Claude? Possibly, but she wasn’t the Amanda Belton in his files.

* * *

The code worked, and the internal hatch for number 3 aft unlocked so she could enter without going for an outside walk. As far as she was concerned, she hadn’t broken any rules. NASA might be hiding something nasty in there, but they hadn’t told her she couldn’t investigate, only locked the door and threw away the key. She wasn’t averse to breaking rules, however, safety protocols were important to her; they’d kept her alive as a test pilot. She sealed off the rest of the ship except for an internal airlock outside the hatch, and while letting pressure and temperature normalise in the store she donned a radiation suit.

She cracked the hatch, sent in a robot sniffer, and closed it. Her screen displayed a cam image along with radiation levels and gases. Neutron and gamma-ray emission accumulated as the robot, propelled by small compressed air jets, manoeuvred about the crowded and dark cargo hold the size of a minibus. Racks around the walls normally held containers secured by tongue and grooves for auto-retrieval, but many of them floated around presumably knocked around when Apoidea attempted to talk to the spheres. She smiled wryly at the thought that not all her additional resources had been removed.

The radioactive readings increased as the sniffer approached a dark box, the size of a padded coffin that seemed to be bolted down. She waited a few minutes for the sniffer to accumulate data and analyse the emissions. It then concluded that the box was consistent with being a plutonium bomb, probably 12 Kilograms, a tungsten tamper, with a shielding of lithium hydride.

At the nearest console she sent a coded message to Derek.

“Derek, I’m putting the readouts from a two by one by one metre box in there.

Any ideas how I check if it’s armed—and then disarm it? I have some nuke armaments training, but only to USAF Level Two handling. There are no radio emissions from the box. Ciao.”

She knew he’d not want her to take a hammer and chisel to the box. The problem was that the bastards had probably sealed the bomb by welding the edges. It could be booby trapped, but unlikely since they want it to detonate in the vicinity of the spheres, not if the crew of Apoidea got curious. Whatever priming or trigger mechanism had been wired in place, it was robust enough to survive severe rattling. Nevertheless, it was likely that an assault with a cutting tool, mechanical or laser, could be hazardous to her health, life and the mission.

While she waited for Derek to make a return call, she set about investigating the inventory for a mobile engine that could be used to simulate the spheres’ time decoherence communications.

She couldn’t find anything bigger or more powerful than the small robotic mechanisms like the sniffer. She’d have to use the main engines again on the Apoidea in spite of Derek’s misgivings. With that decision made, she set to trying again to interpret the Sphere’s signals.

She opened the latest message from the group of Artificial Intelligence and linguist experts gathered at Houston. Hopes that they’d cracked the code evaporated.

With the optimism of a one-legged tight-rope walker, she’d sent them the three sets of the spheres’ flickering. There was nothing in the patterns that could be interpreted for humans. A twig tapping a window on the breeze made more sense.

The experts had suggestions; they wouldn’t have had their bank balances enhanced otherwise. Repeating the spheres’ flickering back at them had a minority backing. Sending them her own pattern carried the majority. The message could be the expected declaration of PI or prime numbers—up to her. Sending a declaration of peace would probably be more meaningless to them than it would be to Earth’s warring factions, assuming they possessed deciphering skills. She thought she’d better stay clear of broadcasting to them NASA’s published Vision: “…we boldly expand frontiers in air and space to inspire and serve America and to benefit the quality of life on Earth.”

Nothing there about peace and goodwill to non-Earth species. If anything, Earth was saying move over, we’re on our way to expand in your territory.

PI was out of the question as far as she was concerned. Why would people think that transmitting PI to the nth decimal place would make aliens think the signal came from an advanced species? PI was the circumference of a circle divided by its diameter. There were plenty of circles and diameters in nature. So it was feasible that among the millions of radio signals emitted by a spherical celestial object, a signal like PI would be found.

Sending a sequence of primes wouldn’t mean anything more than an intelligent species sent it. The spheres already knew humans were sufficiently savvy to build space ships, so no need to send PI, primes or anything like the 1974 Arecibo message to space. She needed to exude peace and an appeal for help—an intergalactic SOS.

It was all right the linguistics experts saying send the message in hex or Morse code because the intelligent spheres will work it out—but they haven’t talked to anyone for two billion years! It was possible the spheres weren’t actually communicating with each other with their time decoherences: they could have been random movements.

Jiggling to get comfortable.

In an attempt to diversify communication methods, Kallandra initiated a holographic display system that would project still images of floods and disasters behind the Apoidea.

“What’s the point?” She’d argued with the team two days before leaving Earth.

“How would spheres recognise a disaster when they’ve spent the last two billion years blindly simmering deep underground?”

“My dear Kal,” said Rob Summers, acting in his official capacity as NASA psychologist and apparently extended to alien mind-reading, “the spheres may well have all sorts of sensors once out in space. A holograph display would be an unusual event, worthy of investigation. Granted they’d have to be relatively close to notice it, so don’t waste time and energy on projection when they’re thousands of clicks away.”

Now they were only sixteen-hundred kilometres, give or take a stone’s throw— she gave a quick loud laugh at that thought because a thrown stone out here could travel forever—she’d asked for more images of despair to project. It seemed weird to her that her situation was a bit like a backseat automobile passenger trying to attract the attention of a following police car. Holding up ‘Help Me!’ signs but the police driver didn’t understand English, or even the concept of help messages.

She recalled more arguments:

“Suppose pictures of earthquakes with falling and burning buildings, destroyed bridges and floods mean absolutely nothing to them?” she’d asked Rob.

“I agree. We should send them images of people; their distraught faces, broken people—”

“But the aliens might not have faces—the pictures could be as significant to them as finding meaning in a plate of scrambled egg for us.”

“You’re a bit negative, Kal, aren’t you?”

She opened her arms in mock apology. “Trying to think beyond the obvious, Rob.”

“Fair doos. Aborigines back home tried to communicate with early white settlers using body paint and tribal dancing. Sadly, they waved pointed sticks and got shot. If we use a mathematics number series instead of people—”

“Ah, then we could break it to show things aren’t well on Earth,” she said, realizing that a math series but disrupted could be a meaningful message.

“That wouldn’t work. For one thing, assuming base ten is in their numerical vocabulary, they might know a number series that does that, or they might assume our transmitter was faulty. Good concept though, and worth working on—I’ll get back to you.”

He hadn’t, yet. A burst of telemetry from Houston had not only sent her new images of bridge collapses and floods, but moving images and software enhancements to enable moving quasi-holograph footage to be displayed.

Following that transmission came comments from a Professor Tiptley at MIT that prickled the hairs on the back of her neck.

“Major Harvard, some observations of mine may be of technical interest to you in your predicament. The way the holograph system we’ve put together for you makes use of a Doppler frequency shift using coherent light reflecting from moving objects.

The Doppler data is manipulated by using both temporal and spatial filtering of modulated reference wave holograms, which…” the rest was too much blah blah for her to take in without more coffee, but the magic words temporal and Doppler sent her brain into a spin of its own.

She’d started to frame a set of questions to ask the professor if the modulations could be programmed to approximate to the type of sphere flickerings, and to what level could they be boosted. Did she have an alternative in the holograph drivers to using the Apoidea as a time decoherence machine? She’d already guessed it wasn’t the visual output that spheres seemed to communicate with, but the underlying time decoherences. So, if the Doppler modulations also registered with the spheres’ sensing devices rather than the actual images displayed, then just maybe a comms channel could be opened between them that didn’t involve her insides turning to jam. She sent off her questions feeling one of the worry knots undo in her stomach, and a warm satisfying glow making her reach for the kitchen area store for chocolate.

* * *

Three-hours’ sleep later, beeping announced the arrival of messages. When was she going to get a full eight hours shut-eye? She heated a coffee and tapped the comms console. Derek first.

‘Hello Kal. The bomb is enough to vaporize the ship and damage the spheres— depending on exactly how close they got and what the hell they’re made of. And, of course, whether they’d stand in the same time spot to be affected. The whole device seems to be desperate and doomed to fail. On the other hand, it might annoy the spheres so much they’d leave us to our fate. In my opinion the best course of action is to jettison the thing. I doubt it’s booby-trapped, but that’s a risk for you to consider. I’ve uploaded inside this message code for the robotics to use the jigs and open the external hatch, but you’ll have to use power tools to manually unbolt the box from the bulkhead and superglue a hydrazine gas jet to it. Good luck. Oh, I’ve also uploaded a program to probe the electronics in the box. It might do nothing or tell us what’s going on in there.

Derek xx”

The spheres would be more than annoyed if the Apoidea blew up in their faces, they’d be fucking pissed off, rush to Earth and put its core into the middle of last week, eight million kilometres away from the rest of the planet. So, now she had to suit up and work on Disraeli’s Trojan Horse surprise, and update the holograph display, as well as single-handedly housework the ship. To think she’d brought all the Bronte sisters’ novels to read in case too much spare time was going to be a problem.

A response arrived from the professor.

“Major Harvard, you obviously know less about Quantum Mechanics than your spheres do about making coffee. Ditto for the way the holograph projection system works. You obviously didn’t read past the first couple of pages of my previous memorandum. Time decoherences are several levels of relevance from the temporal modulations used in the new gadget we’ve provided for you. Nevertheless, considering these are desperate times, I’ve added the parameters for the projectors and holographic ‘engine’ to maximise their quasi decoherence emulation. Good luck. Tiptley.”

So the holographic fireworks are unlikely to be used as communication, either.

She’d give it a go anyway. Whatever happens, at least the spheres were heading back with her, whether to ensure they were not followed again or to make amends probably didn’t depend on her efforts.

She’d set the holographic display in a rush, eager to get rid of the plutonium bomb. Even so, she would have liked to see what the display looked like from the Spheres’ perspective. Her rear camera view wouldn’t reveal the working holograph.

The best she could manage was a simulation on a computer.

She felt she needed to work fast to get rid of the bomb before Disraeli sussed out what was going on. She hadn’t heard from him for more than half a day, though she turned the cams on enough to keep Houston busy, and their main interest was the location of the spheres. Her guess was that Disraeli and his cronies really did want the spheres to help Earth, but only if that intention was explicit. If no such indication arrived, then there must be a threshold distance from Earth at which the Apoidea would be used to destroy the spheres. The idiots, as if the spheres hadn’t already demonstrated their ability to dance around explosions.

Despairing at the unconnected thinking back on Earth wasn’t going to save her neck up here so she gathered equipment and turned off the aft cams. She sent a boring mission update report to Houston to keep them thinking mundane activity kept her occupied, and after refreshments and ablutions, she dressed up and entered number 3 aft.

Her first task was electronically listening to the bomb. Nothing. It could have been dead, switched off maybe by the spheres already. She could send it some test signals but nooooo….

Next she superglued two fire-extinguisher-sized tanks of hydrazine to opposite sides of the box. Radio controlled nozzle actuators gave her elementary control so that once spaceborne, the explosive coffin wouldn’t boomerang back to her. She added small transmitters to two opposite corners.

A portable electric wrench wouldn’t shift the first bolt. She glowered at the hexagonal black beast holding a welded right-angled bracket to the floor. It was no good trying the other five if that one stuck. It meant fetching the heavy-duty air-pressure wrench from a distant tool locker. “Fuck and bugger you, Dizz the…” she couldn’t think of a rhyming expletive as she opened the hatch, and set off tool fetching.

This time, with the help of the noisy air compressor, she whipped off the bolts.

After triggering the external cargo hatch the weightless box lifted slightly with the evacuating air after which it was easy with the jig to manipulate it out into space. With a remote control she switched on the jets and watched the box accelerate away at right angles to Apoidea’s trajectory. There was no need for them to jet for long. Once it started moving it would maintain velocity until something stopped it.

Unless the spheres accelerated, they wouldn’t intercept the bomb, which, although moving away from Apoidea, continued its forward momentum. Once it was two-thousand kilometres from the spheres she could activate the nozzles to send the box on another course away from Earth.

Any satisfaction she felt dampened when Disraeli shouted down the radio at her an hour later. Not that she felt threatened by men shouting at her. Her pa yelled at her often enough, his raucous voice echoing across their Arizona yard dust urging her to come on down off the roof. Even when he hit her for answering back, she stood up to him all the more until he gave up. Now, Disraeli shouted as if she was his wayward daughter and in the same room. She laughed but with nervous bravado. She had no surety that Houston hadn’t an override to Derek’s programming. They could mess up her Life Support System, induce a hibernation or worse. After all, they were prepared to sacrifice her and Claude; atomise them. And the military hawks could launch missiles against the spheres, but they’d know that was useless and counter-productive.

She felt pleased that Disraeli bellowed a give away piece of information: the bomb had indeed been disabled. However, he’d assumed she’d done it and of course it had to be with Derek’s connivance so he was detained.

She knew that Derek accepted their conspiracy might be uncovered. She had to make sure the media knew. Maybe, as Derek had said, Tabitha would help.

With her fiancé locked up, Kallandra felt more alone than ever.

She punched up a view of the trajectory of the box to ensure it didn’t need redirecting before she hit the sack for a few hours. A red line tracked its progress. A vector image created by the transmitters she’d placed showed the box wasn’t rotating, making course adjustments easier. She made the gas jets do a ten seconds burn for more acceleration, and as a test. Would the spheres notice what she’d done, and interpret it as a peaceful gesture: ridding them both of a bomb? Or as aggression, by laying a one bomb minefield? Not the latter, surely, as it must have been them that disarmed it, unless it had malfunctioned.

If the disabling of the bomb had been by the spheres, they could have just as easily annihilated Apoidea by sending it into another time. Perhaps they only took avoidance action. She couldn’t recall an instance when the spheres pre-emptively destroyed missiles. They treated humans and their artefacts with contempt or more likely didn’t recognise their existence just like humans taking notice of a dandelion asking for its rights to be respected. Nevertheless she’d found she couldn’t start Apoidea’s engines. She felt like she was being herded home like a lost sheep.

Too tired to think around more contradictions and alternatives, she retired to bed, setting a wake-up alarm for four hours time.

* * *

She awoke more tired than when she went to sleep, but was anxious to see if there’d been any developments. The fact she could open her eyes meant the military hadn’t somehow detonated their plutonium firework.

The bomb was just over eight hundred kilometres distant, she sent a signal to puff the jets for twenty seconds of acceleration. That should be enough to clear a couple of thousand clicks before she needed to go to sleep again so she could send the thing to the sun instead of the Earth.

Checking aft cameras revealed the spheres might’ve been enjoying the holoshow but weren’t applauding. Nada, and maintaining distance. The comms console told her there were messages. Probably a Disraeli rant. She’d put that off while she snacked on noodles and ginger sauce, and read the CNN news bulletins.

She couldn’t finish her snack. Southern Britain was a disaster zone. Shocks toppled buildings that have stood solid for centuries and more easily, schools, hospitals and offices built in the last fifty years. Emergency services hadn’t been able to cope with the thousands of dead and millions injured. Floods and fires followed the quake and typhoid looked like it was adding its deadly toll. Northern France and Eire couldn’t help as they too had many casualties and floods.

Tabitha had published an exposé on the Apoidea as a nuke Trojan Horse, but it was relegated to several pages down. Warring factions in Africa and the Middle East had declared ceasefires while the timequake havoc continued. More airplanes, ships and trains crashed or disappeared. Britain wasn’t the only place to have unaccustomed large quakes. The planet seemed to be gearing up for disintegration. She couldn’t read any more.

She hit the button for the radio messages. Nothing Disraeli could say would be worse than the news. Surely, even he must realise the error in trying to destroy their only chance to get back to some survivable state.

The first message was from Elaine.

“Hi Kallandra, I hope you had a restful sleep. We see you’ve successfully ejected the bomb…”

Shhhh, shut up, Elaine! But then everyone there must know from the imprisoned Derek’s saved messages, even if the bomb-box was too small and the transponders too weak for Earth to detect.

“Colonel Dwight Disraeli has been replaced on orders from President Cabot.”

She hadn’t seen that on CNN, maybe she should’ve kept on reading.

“His replacement is Colonel Maggie Fernandez, and she says to wish you the best of luck. You’ll have no problems with the Apoidea being used other than originally agreed by you.”

Kallandra had seen Fernandez at NASA social functions but not to talk to. If she was as described, then that could only be good news. Come on, Elaine, had Derek been released?

“We need to know telemetry data for the bomb, Kallandra, assuming you have them? We wouldn’t want it to come here and cause a problem on re-entry.”

Fair enough, but what about Derek?

“There’s no need now for you to keep turning cams off, especially as you seem to forget to turn them back on. At the last check, we had no aft and only one lateral visual.

Only one forward.”

Oops, Kallandra felt like she was a naughty schoolgirl being admonished. Derek, Derek.

“We’ve scheduled some tests for 1700 hours. Test firing of engines one, two and three will take place to a plan at the end of this message.”

Interesting. She’d already told them of her inability to restart engines. She’d assumed it was the spheres’ interference but maybe Houston had disabled them. That, and Elaine not mentioning Derek in the message worked on her encroaching paranoia.

There was another message from Professor Tiptley with more image data and software enhancements. For someone who’d implied she was wasting her time, he was sure working overtime on the holoshows. She upgraded the system and set it going.

The prof wanted her to boost the power output to it even though his previous notes had said it would either do nothing or break it.

While she remembered, she turned all the cams on, and checked the telemetry was transmitting all the necessary ship’s data. She might as well let Houston have it even though she didn’t trust anyone there now. Not even her friend, Elaine. Maybe she’d been got at, or had been persuaded it was her spaceborne friend who couldn’t be trusted. Well, that wouldn’t be surprising. Kallandra released a short laugh at the accumulation of all her disobediences—no wonder Houston might want to be able to control Apoidea.

The laugh remained restricted; she was in no real jovial mood even to relieve her stress. A beeping made her look back at the spheres-watching screen. They were flickering again. If it was a form of communication, she was the only one for them to chat to. She played the pattern through the computer. Again just random; like and yet different in times and pauses to the others. They could just be fine tuning, making ready for a closer look or to finish off the bomb or the Apoidea. That can’t be right. It must have been the spheres that turned her ship around, and they’d only do that for a purpose. OK, there was a possibility the ship’s nav had lost the spheres and obeyed its programming to return to Earth while she and Claude were in hibernation, but she didn’t believe it. And why would the spheres only then notice they were followed and return?

Right, she didn’t think they were bringing her back to make sure all the humans were gonna be finished off, but all doubts had now been given room to play around.

The computers on the ship were the best NASA could buy for the job. Besides those dedicated for life support, navigation, and communication, they installed the latest code-cracking software on powerful minicomputers to supplement Earthside mainframes. Although she’d a Masters in AI and linguistics, it was the software that did all the work. A bunch of cleverer folk than she had thought of everything, except the one that worked. To be fair, they didn’t know about the flickering time decoherence as a language until the flight was underway. Even so, the problem wasn’t so much in emulating time decoherence, although that wasn’t easy, but in cracking the message and formulating their own with a species that seemed to be so unhumanlike.

It wasn’t just the AI team working on the problem. According to the messages and CNN bulletins, every person with an interest sent in suggestions from music to DNA, ancient languages to machine code, resonances to snowflake variations, dolphin-speak to the periodic table, and thousands more. All had been tried. No one had been derided. From her unique situation in space, she felt she might have a closer relationship with the spheres—a connection dating back to Glastonbury.

She sometimes felt vulnerable out here on her own, but was successful in pushing negative thoughts into her nose and blowing them into a paper handkerchief.

Maybe they’ve all been trying too hard on the communication. Looking too deep. Too much intellectualism and not enough feeling. Maybe the flickers were the visual manifestation of the spheres experiencing their emotions through time decoherences.

She had no problem thinking of sophisticated machines having emotions. Weren’t emotions partly a set of responses to sensory experiences? And that assumed the spheres weren’t a species.

She considered using her medical sensor output then thought it was too much data for a communication device so filtered everything out except a skin conductivity readout from a miniscule radio transmitting patch on her upper left arm, and sent it to the holographic machine to flicker at the spheres.

“There you go spheres, see what I feel when I’m scared shitless.”

Within moments she felt a tingling followed by a warm sensation near the transmitting patch on her arm. This couldn’t be right, there shouldn’t be any feedback in the system to her medical sensors—should there? As she checked the system diagnostics, the warm spot spread from her arm to the rest of her body, instilling contentment more than she’d experienced since making love with Claude.

Was this communication from the spheres? Maybe not a meeting of minds but of feelings: a mood exchange. She had an urge to close her eyes and let the incipient exuberance surge through her. A niggling thought tucked away in her brain’s right hemisphere hinted a warning, but she was too much enjoying the moment. It was like relaxing on a warm sandy beach, listening to the call of seagulls; the swash and backwash of gentle waves; the mixed aromas of sun lotion and seaweed; the gritty sand in the folds of the towel beneath her and the warm subtle breeze stirring the hairs on her arm. Vacations were meant to be like this.

Seconds later, two alarms impinged on her reverie. Reluctantly she opened her eyes and discovered she’d leaned her chair right back to near horizontal—not that she hardly touched it. Leaning forward she flicked off the alarm telling her the spheres had accelerated. Ah, they were coming for her now they knew she was a true friend.

She had to drift over to another console to turn the other alarm off. What? Her whole body system shocked itself to fully alert when the screen told her the bomb was within a few kilometres. She punched up vectors. Damn, when she’d accelerated the box last time, one of the nozzles must have malfunctioned and she’d turned the box around. Or Houston had. Damn she’d sent the telemetry from the box onto Houston with the normal ship’s data. An alternative cause could be the spheres. A shiver down her spine contrasted with new warmth from her arm, and spread to her neck. Noooo, the spheres didn’t turn the bomb. It must have been a malfunction, the box was also too far from Earth for them to know exactly where it was or to affect the gas jets on board, surely? She wasn’t a hundred percent sure of anything. The chances of the box changing its course were high, but it seemed suspicious for it to be heading straight for her. True, both the ship and the box had the same Earthward momentum but if one of the jets malfunctioned or partially blocked there were an infinite number of directions it could have taken. Surely the gravitational attraction of the Apoidea was too small at the distances involved? Ah, maybe so, but she didn’t know what was in the box besides death. There might have been some kind of homing device that the military hoped would steer it to the spheres only it headed for her ship instead.

Had the spheres noticed the box’s return before Apoidea had, and that’s why they were closing in? For a moment she’d hoped they would read that thought and transmit warm for yes and cold for no, but she was thinking too much like a rational human instead of ‘species sensory’.

She punched in commands to the control she’d earlier set up for the box’s navigation and made it do the tricky three dimensional geometry calculations to at least stop its approach. She needed to know which jet nozzle was malfunctioning and spent ten minutes testing. Both seemed normal. She frowned. Either the problem had righted itself or there wasn’t a problem with the jets. She transmitted to the actuators on the box and watched the vector graphic turn around while still heading for Apoidea.

Then she fired both gas jets and felt a glow of satisfaction to see the box slow down, stop and accelerate away. Damn, she was looking at the projected outcome display not the real-time images!

Her signals had gone out but the feedback when fed into the display showed no change. The box hadn’t decelerated at all!

For once she started to panic, but did it matter too much? The nuclear weapon was deactivated, wasn’t it? It was just a battering ram. She should treat it like a wayward meteorite and take avoiding action, but the Apoidea’s engines wouldn’t start, or didn’t last time she checked. She propelled herself to the master console and initiated a burn sequence for engine one. Nothing. Returning, she tried sending signals again to the jets to turn the box. Was it not receiving the signals or had the hydrazine been used up by the malfunction?

Options for dealing with intercepting meteorites and small asteroids included shooting at them. She had missiles and explosive bullets. A missile could be used at the hundred-and-sixty kilometres range the box was now at. It would be foolish to have it attempt to destroy a plutonium bomb. It wouldn’t be likely to trigger a fission reaction unless the missile detonated the imploding explosives in the right way. A big risk. She set a missile to detonate alongside the box at a hundred metres distance; enough to whack it off its course.

Ten....

As she started a countdown, she wondered why she needed one, after all there was no one to get out of the way, take shelter; and then a surge of well-being came over her.

Nine....

Why? Were the spheres congratulating her on solving a tricky, potentially lethal problem? That must be it and she smiled.

Eight....

A thought nagged through—surely the spheres could have solved this problem…

Seven....

Belay that heresy. The spheres were bosom buddies. She’d always felt a rapport since she touched the Glastonbury.

Six....

Her tactile memory oozed up and she realized it had resonance with the sensations she now experienced.

Five....

On the other hand, why were the spheres getting closer? Maybe they weren’t closing in on the Apoidea, it was just that the ship was en route to Earth and wanted to pass by her.

Four....

Or, the spheres really fell for the holoshow and they wanted to get up close to it.

Another smile.

Three....

The message alert beeped. Had Derek been released? Elaine wanted to apologise for forgetting to mention Derek—that was it. And Maggie wanted to apologise on behalf of Disraeli for turning the bomb back towards the Apoidea. At least the message alert proved Earth remained intact.

Two....

She wondered how the spheres were going to put the time situation right on Earth. Probably they’d seed the planet with mini-spheres. She visualized them burrowing into the crust and down three kilometres. Would they use the same places or would new ones, in time, become sacred places too?

One....

Her finger hovered over the glow-red button. She felt at peace, there were few sensations more satisfying than pressing a red Fire button.

Zero....

Chapter Thirty-Three

June 23rd lunchtime

A strange trembling sensation swept through Kallandra as she lay on her back, sucking a grass stem. Either her vision was blurred or that single white fair-weather cloud had developed fuzziness. She could have sworn she saw a trio of birds fly into that cloud, but they didn’t emerge.

She spat out the grass blade and tried to lever herself up on her elbows as her body and the hill vibrated. Moments later Glastonbury Hill felt solid once more and the cloud looked clear, but no birds.

“Derek, did you feel that, honey?”

“Feel what?” he mumbled, through a cheese and pickle sandwich.

“I felt a vibration through the ground. Didn’t you?” She looked at him sitting upright in his workday trousers, but a Festival T-shirt Blake bought for him. She looked down at her’s and smiled. Then, as she lifted the hem to admire her tanned stomach, she frowned at bruises. She looked carefully at the webbed pattern as if they’d been made by restraints in one of her test jets during violent manoeuvres. A memory flash hit her as if she’d acquired the damage in the Mars mission spaceship, but they’d only been in the simulator at JPL so far.

“Probably the bass from the Kaiser Chiefs,” Derek said. “Listen, they’re at it again.”

She shook her head to be rid of wrong memories and found she could just make out the beat added to by fifty thousand voices, but she sang along to the lyrics she knew well, and how appropriate for both Derek and her about to embark on the first Mars mission.

“It don't matter to me
'Cos all I wanted to be
Is a million miles from here
Somewhere more familiar
Oh my God I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home…”

She lay back again but an encroaching shadow cooled her face. She stopped singing and said: “Hey Blake, how’s it going?”

“I’m all right,” the plump teenager said, while holding his spectacles up to the sky, as if looking for smears. “But you two might have a problem. The news said that the orbiting telescope around Mars has seen a metal ball coming out of a volcano.”

“I told you,” Derek said, “to keep off that funny baccy.”

“Blake,” Kallandra said, “what’s that in your right hand?” A spot on her upper left arm felt itchy and warm—a familiar sensation although she couldn’t remember where from.

“Oh, it’s one of those silver chime-balls. Found it down the slope but the chime’s broken.”

Kallandra felt her heartbeat accelerating without knowing why, and then held out her hand for the small sphere.