After she’d tugged the frost-covered bag out of Tropic-2, she switched the vehicle’s power cells off. They’d been on standby since last night. Given the high temperature they operated at, restarting them in subzero conditions would probably shatter them. Elston hadn’t wanted to risk that. The lights on the dashboard went out. For the first time in eighteen days she didn’t have the whiny buzz of machinery in her ears.
Eighteen days?
She found herself trembling. The convoy’s journey was too intense, too visceral to be a mere eighteen days. Even the joy of being reunited with Rebka could not compensate for the enormity of everything she’d endured.
Angela backed out of the Tropic, seeing the Barclay-avatar waiting on the frozen river as Ken, Sakur, and Tamisha carried Botin’s stretcher to the waiting spaceship. The non-human thing was as impassive as it ever was, standing perfectly still as fat strands of the aurora caressed it as though it communed with the lightstorm. In her mind she saw into the humanoid shell it wore, saw through it, saw how it could be the spirit living in the plants, a fabulously complex life force swathed around a planet as a corona clung to a star. Immense, immortal, the triumph of an evolution billions of years beyond anything terrestrial biology could aspire to. Rich with abilities that humans couldn’t even imagine for their gods. She was standing on it, amid it. Irrelevant, infinitesimal, her time fleeting.
The perspective was draining. Really … what was the point to a life so small as hers in a galaxy that held St. Libra and the Zanth?
The sound of sobbing broke her miserable reverie. Lulu MacNamara was leaning on the side of Tropic-3, crying her little heart out as she clutched her cheap copy designer bag, not caring the tears froze on her cracked, scabbed cheeks.
Angela walked over. “What’s up, sweets? We’re saved. We’re out of here.”
“I know,” Lulu whimpered. “But the gateway’s gone, like. I heard the monster say it. I’ll never get home now, I’ll never see me nan again. She’ll be so worried.”
“There’s no such thing as never,” Angela told her. “Look at me, it took twenty years, but I found Rebka again. Your nan, she’ll be there waiting for you when you get home.”
“How?” the girl pleaded.
“I’ve no idea,” Angela said breezily. “That’s the thing about the future: You just take a running jump at it and see what you can find there. Isn’t that kind of wonderful? You want to go home, back to Newcastle—then when we get back to Abellia, stand up and shout out the question loud as you can: Who else wants to come with me? If there’s enough of you, then you build that gateway for yourselves.”
“Aye, like I can do that. I’m just a waitress.”
“Lulu, you’ve come through something that not one of us had any real expectation of surviving. It’s been the most remarkable, terrifying, brutal time of my life, and trust me I’ve been places and done things you wouldn’t believe. That makes you one of the greats, Lulu. Just living is a victory in this universe. Now we’re all going to get on the spaceship, and fly back to a city that’s going to thaw out nicely. After that, we’ll decide where we’re going next. Okay? And nobody will decide that for us.”
“Aye, I suppose.”
Angela put an arm around the girl’s shoulder and gave a quick squeeze. “Come on. I’ve never been in a spaceship before. I want to know what its like. For one thing, it’s going to be warm. Who knows, there might even be a shower.”
The interior didn’t seem anything special. The air lock opened into a simple circular compartment with a slightly concave ceiling. Curving couches were arranged in a circle, their gray tough-foam substance blending seamlessly with the floor. The convoy personnel were stripping off their parkas and thick trousers, dripping a small stream of foul slushy ice onto the floor. Advanced spaceship it might be, but the life support was struggling with the smell of so many unwashed people.
“I have a question,” Angela said to the Barclay-avatar.
“Yes?”
“Have you killed the MTJ mutineers?”
“No, Angela. They didn’t stand between me and the weapon.”
“Can you feel where they are?”
“Yes. They were hit quite badly by the blizzard. They’re still digging themselves out.”
Angela turned to Raul. “We know the route they took. Let’s go get them.”
“They don’t deserve it,” Antrinell grunted sourly.
Angela gave him an evil smile. “I know. But enough people have died on St. Libra, so now let’s show this planet what being human really means, shall we? Let’s go collect them, and give them a hot meal, and take them back to Abellia where they’ll be safe and warm, just like us.”
*
As soon as the spaceships appeared, Sid and Jacinta had driven to the school to collect the kids, putting the Toyota Dayon on manual and using Sid’s police authority to demand priority in the city’s road metamesh. They’d pulled up outside with the siren blaring and strobes flashing, much to Will and Zara’s delight. Both children were disappointed when Sid switched them off for the trip back to Jesmond.
“Why?” Will grumped.
“Because I don’t think the spaceships are hostile,” Sid explained. He was only half concentrating on the road, which was dangerous when so many people were driving so badly, racing home or to collect loved ones just like him. The streets were rivers of green taillights, with nobody obeying the metamesh. His attention was mainly on the images playing in his iris smartcell grid. The imposing shoal of spaceships were holding station above and around the gateway, the only objects that were static in the whole area. Their unnerving cybernetic spawn were seething over and inside the massive gateway generator. Sunlight flashed and flickered off the chrome tool mandibles as they writhed incessantly, clawing at the mechanism’s seams, prising it apart like mechanical carrion.
“Why, Dad?”
“Because they come from Jupiter. I think.”
“How do you know that, Dad?”
“Because I once met someone who flew in one.”
“Dad!” Zara squawked excitedly. “When was that?” she asked breathlessly.
“The night Uncle Ian died, okay.”
“Were they part of the D-bomb plot?” Will asked.
“Aye, come on you two, give your father a break,” Jacinta said sternly.
“But Mum—”
“It’s all right,” Sid said. “No, the spaceships didn’t have anything to do with the plot. They belong to Constantine North. But I’ve no idea why they’re dismantling the gateway, okay.”
Just like always, we never get to find out what’s really going on.
The sound of jet turbines rolled along the streets. Both kids spent the rest of the journey trying to spot the fighters circling the shoal, vigilantly guarding Newcastle citizens from the invaders blatantly looting their city’s greatest asset. Fast, dark delta shapes would flash through the gaps between the rooftops, and they’d point and whoop eagerly.
Back home safely, the Hurst family settled down in the lounge, watching the big wall pane. Media helicopters were venturing ever closer to the floating spaceships in a quasi-lethal game of dare. Down on Last Mile’s streets, a similar charade was being acted out, with reporters attempting to dodge past the nervous agency constables who were trying to close down access roads leading to the gateway. HDA personnel carriers were rumbling along the Kingsway, bringing squads of troopers, with officers not sure what they were supposed to be doing in the absence of definite orders from their command.
Sid’s e-i reported a lot of high-priority calls stacking up in his transnet interface. The whole of Market Street’s sixth floor were trying to get in touch. He didn’t care, he’d run about meekly at the bidding of the rich and powerful for years, playing the game for their benefit, because as any smart man knew, that was how the world worked.
But on this day he was going to be with his family, because that was what a man should do. Defiance felt good, too.
Northumberland Interstellar made an official statement seventy minutes into the crisis. An amazingly calm Alanzo 2North stood up in front of a media scrum at the company’s marketing headquarters in the city center and announced that the gateway was being dismantled to prevent a humanitarian disaster. That native sentient life had been discovered on St. Libra, and an orderly evacuation of the Independencies was being planned.
He wanted to emphasize that the spaceships were North-owned, and not a threat to anyone. Yes, they had come from Jupiter. No, he couldn’t comment if one of them had been at the Mountain High building the night Ian Lanagin died.
“Is that true, Dad? Have they found aliens?” Will asked.
“Yes. I saw one.”
“Really?”
“Yes. It killed Uncle Ian.”
Jacinta gave him a sharp glance as her elbow nudged him.
“Are they dangerous?”
“Very.”
“Sid!” Jacinta hissed.
He shrugged.
A couple of news company helicopters had found the spaceship parked outside Augustine North’s truncated pyramid mansion beyond Alnwick. Armed security helicopters were buzzing them, but their meshes and lenses were sending back high-resolution images. Several Norths were milling around the base of the craft. Automated trolleys were trundling out of the mansion, laden with crates and pods.
The news switched back to the gateway shoal. Another of the smaller teardrop spaceships was drifting upward. News copters played chicken with the squadron of HDA’s VTOL gunships following it as it began to fly north, a couple of hundred meters above the city.
“It’s come over the river,” Will said. “That’s central station, look.”
“What’s it doing, Daddy?” Zara asked.
“I’ve no idea.” Sit watched uneasily as the spaceship slid smoothly over the Civic Center. That route would bring it very close to—
“Is it following the metro line?” Jacinta asked.
“Looks like it,” Sid admitted.
Will scrambled to his feet. “We’ll be able to see it!” he yelped.
“No!” Sid said, and lunged, trying to grab his son’s arm as the boy charged past with youthful exuberance. “Come back.”
Sid set off after Will. Jacinta and Zara were on his heels. Will got the front door open and ran out into the small front garden. Sid was a couple of paces behind him, and finally managed to grab hold of the boy’s shoulder. It didn’t matter, Will had stopped anyway.
The spaceship with its hornet-swarm of terrestrial aircraft in cautious pursuit was over St. George’s Terrace and descending. Sid’s neighbors were also outside, staring in quiet awe as the spaceship approached.
“Dad!” Will said in scared delight. “It’s coming
here
.”
Sid’s arm went around the amazed boy, his other arm around his wife and daughter. Twenty meters in front of him, in the middle of a quiet suburban street, a spaceship from Jupiter silently touched down. A circle near the base darkened and dissolved. A North stepped out, wearing a green shirt open at the neck and blue jeans; he grinned at Sid as the news copters and VTOL gunships circled overhead.
Zara pressed into Sid’s side, moving slowly behind him as the North walked up to their front gate.
“Hello, Sid,” the North said.
“I’ve no idea who you are.” Sid told him. “Not unless you tell me.”
“I understand. I’m Clayton. No subterfuge this time, boss, I owe you that much. That’s why I’m here. I know you need answers, and you deserve them.”
“Aye, appreciate that; so what was that thing?”
“An avatar sent by St. Libra’s dominant life.”
“Did it kill the North?”
“Yes.”
“Who was he; who did we pull out of the Tyne?”
“Abner. The avatar took on his identity.”
Sid nodded weakly, giddy with the thought that he’d worked right alongside the alien imposter for months, talked to it, sat in cafés with it, accepted its reassurances about his future. And now he knew, he wished it made a difference. Right now he didn’t see one. “Why?”
Clayton pulled a face. “That’s a long answer, and we’re leaving as soon as the gateway is dismantled. I can send the file for you. Some of it’s quite fascinating, though there’s a lot of history involved.”
“Where are you going?” Sid blurted. He couldn’t take his eyes from the spaceship. That same sleek machine had been in his dreams for a week, shooting up to the stars, leaving him Earthbound and envious. Envious because it wasn’t his life.
“The Sirius system,” Clayton said. “We’re going to start a new world, Sid; build a fresh civilization from scratch. Among other things.”
“But you’ve shut down the gateway. How will you get there?”
“The long way around, I’m afraid.” He gestured at the spaceship with a smile. “Fortunately they’re fast, and it’s only eight and a half light-years away.”
Sid felt his heart leap. Part of him ached with longing at the prospect. He looked at Jacinta, reading the fascination in her expression. “Take us with you,” he said.
*
The Camilo Village school hall had quickly become their community center once the snow and ice arrived. It allowed them all to cook big shared meals when the blizzards allowed; there were still classes for the kids, planning sessions for the adults, people coming together to solve problems, organize work parties. If Saul didn’t know the farms were buried under meters of snow, that no more food could be grown, he might almost have enjoyed the winter. But as the weeks progressed and they settled into a routine scavenging between storms, snippy rumors started to infiltrate their cozy world, about hoarders, about hidden stashes, about some people not pulling their weight.
Those petty squabbles had instantly become irrelevant when the news came through the remnants of Abellia’s net that morning, telling them the Highcastle gateway had shut down. The last images from Newcastle were bewildering. Hundreds of spaceships falling from the sky, then nothing—
Was Earth being invaded?
Camilo Villagers didn’t care about that. They had all trudged into the school hall without even being summoned. It was a town-council-style meeting, and a lot of fear was being vented in angry exchanges. Everybody in the village agreed they could keep going as they were for another couple of months, though the scavenger parties were now having to venture farther each day—and they weren’t the only people stripping the unoccupied houses of their food. So far encounters with other groups had been peaceful, even collaborative on occasion. But they admitted that had just ended. They’d have to mark out their territory.