There was no attempt to explain his behaviour, and Deira suspected none would be forthcoming even if she pressed the matter. She gazed at the Founder with interest. There was something about him that jarred, as if his personality wasn’t at home in this body. But then, of course, this was an alien occupying a temporary human body to facilitate communication. Of course, he wouldn’t feel entirely comfortable.
She tore her gaze away and thought about what she’d been asked. She hadn’t given any consideration to what she was going to do on arrival in sub-quantal space. Simply getting here and familiarising herself with it seemed to be of over-riding importance. She was completely focused on being able to help with the evacuation.
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted, feeling a little foolish. ‘I’m here for familiarisation. I’ll take your advice on how best to accomplish that.’
‘Then, shall we adjourn to our little hideaway for a while? Then you can see what’s possible down here if you know what to do.’
Barth led her away, down what had suddenly become a path through a wood. Deira hadn’t even noticed the change occurring, it was almost as if it had always been like this. It was remarkable. She knew what she was seeing was all photonic construct, but she could have sworn she was back on Earth walking through a broad-leaved wood, the trees swaying overhead and her hands brushing bushes alongside the path. She could even feel the breeze on her cheeks and see the sun flitting between the trees. It all felt so natural.
After a few minutes, they came to a spot where the path gave way to a clearing, and sitting in the clearing, like something from the American hill country, was a log cabin, complete with stoop and rocking chair. She noticed Barth’s look of pride in his construct and could understand why. The level of detail was impressive, though she couldn’t help wondering where he got his model from. For an alien species to render a human environment so perfectly said much about their level of development.
They walked up the couple of steps leading to the door and Barth opened it and held it for her to enter. Inside, was a roaring fire which, despite the warmth of the day outside, didn’t appear to overheat the place. In front of the fire were three comfortable-looking chairs, and Deira could see one of them was already occupied. It was obviously another photonic construct, male again, but it wasn’t until he turned and looked over the back of the chair at her that she recognised him. It was Adam, and his photonic body mirrored his original body from twenty years ago so perfectly it made her gasp.
‘Deira!’ He stood and held out his arms.
Deira accepted the offered hug and kissed his cheek, suspecting this meeting had been Barth’s plan all along.
‘Nice to see you again Adam – especially in your own body.’
‘Yeah, it’s nice to be in a male body again, especially when it looks just like my old one.’ He offered her a chair. ‘Please.’
She sat, noticing that Barth had taken the other chair and was watching them intently. He looked a little guilty, and she wondered what this had to do with familiarisation. Perhaps nothing. It might all be just a well-intentioned reunion with an old friend
‘You’re looking well, Adam.’ She realised as soon as she said it how stupid this was, given the situation, and tried to retrieve it. ‘What I mean is, you seem to have settled in here quite well.’
Adam produced that certain smile he’d always had, and she almost felt she was back twenty years in the past. ‘It’s just so different to the last time. I spent twenty years in the photon stream, watching the alternate universes and never realising I could have this.’
‘You can actually watch them.’ Juliette had mentioned the presence of the multiverse in sub-quantal space but Deira had never actually considered a physical reality that you could watch.
‘Oh yes, and I can tell you it gets pretty traumatic when you see what might have been – both good and bad.’
‘I can imagine.’ Deira frowned and glanced at Barth before giving her attention to Adam again. ‘Adam, what’s this meeting about?’
‘Just a chance for two old friends to catch up. Barth thought it might be a good way to introduce you to the possibilities that exist down here. To show you that you can live a perfectly normal life here.’
‘A constructed life. Not normal by any measure.’
She regretted it as soon as it came out. This was one of only two options open to Adam – the other being to forever occupy a dark corner of someone else’s brain – so it was natural he’d be enthusiastic, or at least try to be. He turned away and gazed forlornly at the fire, watching the flickering flames as if they were truly the result of combusting wood. There was something more going on here, she was sure about it, but Adam seemed in no mood to elucidate.
‘Adam and I have had long discussions about his future,’ Barth interrupted. ‘He knows there’s no way for him to gain access to his recently-constructed body and, on balance, feels that remaining here would be the least bad option for him. If that’s possible, of course.’
‘I understand,’ Deira said, ‘and I apologise for my lack of tact. I seem to have left my empathy at home. ‘Adam, I agree with you. It’s plain, even on my short visit, that you could have a reasonable life here. Certainly, it would be far better than the alternative.’
‘You can even have … relations.’
Adam’s gaze left the fire and switched to Deira. She did a double-take, this was so unexpected.
‘You mean … sex?’
‘Yes. With a hard photon body, you can do anything you can with a real one.’
‘That’s very interesting.’ Deira was perplexed. What was all this about? Then, in a flash, it became crystal clear. ‘You want me to stay with you.’ A statement, not a question.
‘Deira, you must know I’ve always loved you. And when all the Founders have left, I’ll be all on my own. I just thought …’
‘You thought?’ Deira could hardly contain her anger at being manipulated so crudely. ‘It doesn’t strike me you’ve thought much at all. Adam, I think the world of you – always have – but I’ve got Sol. I …’ She stopped as she saw the look of horror he was exchanging with Barth. ‘You didn’t know, did you? Neither of you knew. You didn’t know Sol had come back.’
‘When I was in normal space in Tao’s body, we all thought Sol had died,’ Adam mumbled. ‘Then, when Tao came back, I was stuck in her brain and couldn’t access the outside world. I had no idea about Sol.’
‘Neither had I,’ put in Barth. ‘I would never have agreed to this meeting if I had.’
‘Well, I suppose I understand to an extent. But Adam, I must be honest, I don’t think I’d have stayed with you even if Sol had gone. I’ve a life to live, things to do, grandchildren to see. I’m sorry. I know I’m being cruel, but there’s no point in letting you continue with this fantasy.’ She stood and walked to the door. ‘Barth, it’s time I went home.’
Barth hurried to catch up with her while Adam remained sitting, gazing steadily into the fire.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I thought … never mind what I thought. I won’t see you again, Deira.’
Deira glanced back at him. He hadn’t even turned to say goodbye, such was the depth of his hurt. She felt so sorry for him, sorrier than she’d felt for anyone in her life, except for Josh 2, but that didn’t translate into love, and there would have been no way she would strand herself in this godforsaken place to be with him, even if she’d been alone without Sol. It was at that moment she realised how hard she had become. Where was the caring young agent of twenty years ago now? Worn out by years of fighting, that’s where. Whatever! She was who she was.
She walked briskly along the path with Barth, who maintained a discrete silence all the way to the “jump-out point”. He was frowning and obviously confused.
‘I’m truly sorry… Deira,’ he said, clearly struggling with his own emotions. The short pause before he said her name wasn’t lost on Deira. ‘I don’t know how that could have happened. I miscalculated badly.’
Deira stared at him, still mad but beginning to calm down.
‘Are you alright? You’ve been giving me strange looks ever since I arrived and now you say you miscalculated? What’s the problem?’
‘It’s … nothing. Nothing I want to talk about, in any case.’ He pulled himself together with difficulty. ‘Will I be seeing you again?’
‘Well, since I’ll be helping with the evacuation, I think it’s highly likely, don’t you?’ Deira knew she was being tetchy but couldn’t help herself. However old this entity was, he’d overstepped the mark, and she was damned sure she was going to make him suffer for it. ‘I’ll see you later.’
She initiated the “return protocol” and seemed to jump into her own infra-low. From there it was a straightforward process with her new abilities to rise into delta-normal and then back into the real world.
Tao was waiting for her, sitting on the sofa, drinking a cup of jasmine tea.
‘All well?’ she enquired. ‘What do you think of sub-quantal space now?’
‘It’s as fascinating as you made it out to be.’ Deira was still angry but trying to conceal it from Tao. She didn’t want to discuss Adam’s proposal and, in fact, wanted nothing more than to put it out of her mind completely. ‘I think I’ll be fine with the evacuation procedure now, though I’ll need a little help from you with the attachment protocol for a Founder’s energy body.’
‘No problem. I’ll give it you now, then you’ll be good to go. I must say, Deira, I’m really impressed at what you’ve achieved.’
‘Yeah.’ Deira sighed. ‘It brings other baggage with it, though, doesn’t it?’
Tao gazed at her as if she knew something had occurred that Deira didn’t want to discuss.
‘Sure does. And you don’t know the half of it yet.’
Chapter 45
Six weeks later, the Founders evacuation programme was still struggling along. Two more agents, Pyotr Kuznetzov and Chloe Burns, had successfully achieved the time fold and been inducted into the programme, but the rate of retrieval of energy-bodies remained stubbornly stuck in single figures. Josh and Tao were routinely managing to free five each per day now, while the rest of the agents couldn’t get past four. Deira had been doing her best but was stuck on three. The total liberated was one-thousand three-hundred and thirty-two. That would take them to about five thousand by eighteen weeks.
Sol had spent the time doing nothing very much. He watched tri-vids, chatted with Chard, and drank one hell of a lot of beer and bourbon. He’d taken to visiting Juliette quite regularly and had taken her out to dinner on a couple of occasions. That was where he was now. He stood by her terminal gazing round the lab, waiting while she fussed around and closed things down for the day.
‘You know, this lab isn’t that different to Markus’s,’ he said. ‘Just bigger, is all.’ He sounded rather mournful and Juliette looked at him with concern. He’d tried very hard to stay upbeat during his visits with her, not wanting to inflict his own woes on his only daughter. Unfortunately, despite his best efforts, his mood was seeping out tonight.
‘You alright, Dad? You sound a bit down.’
‘Don’t you worry about me, Jules. I’m fine. I was just thinking back to our little adventure in Markus’s lab, you thinking you’d found Adam when all the time it was Tao.’
‘I suppose it was quite funny, looking back. It was the amount of energy she needed to escape that was staggering – yet now she can go in and out of sub-quantal space at will.’
‘She’s come on a long way, that’s for sure.’ Sol suddenly looked startled.
‘What Dad?’
‘Shit!’ Sol slapped himself on the forehead. ‘How stupid can we get?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Jules, they’ve all been struggling for weeks to drag those Founders out of sub-quantal space, and it’s beginning to look hopeless. Neither Chayka nor Barth has come up with anything that might help speed things up, and unless they can speed things up, we’re all done for.’
‘I know, Dad. It’s very frustrating. But everyone’s doing what they can.’
Sol took her by the arm and gazed earnestly at her. ‘Is Chayka still here?’
‘I think so. Why?’
‘I need to see him urgently.’
Now Juliette was truly worried. She had never seen Sol want to go anywhere near Chayka if he could avoid it, but he was already striding off in the direction of Chayka’s office. She hurried after him, worried about what he might say, and caught up with him just as he gave a brief knock on Chayka’s office door and went inside. She followed him in.
Chayka looked up at the intrusion and his face briefly contorted into a grimace before he forced it back into its usual state of impassivity.
‘Well, well, Agent Smith – no, sorry, Agent MacMahon. We seem to have a surfeit of agent MacMahon’s, don’t we? What can I do for you?’
Without waiting for an invitation, Sol sat and slung one leg over the chair arm, eliciting another look of distaste from Chayka. Juliette wished the earth would open-up and swallow her, but she sat next to Sol all the same.
‘I know you’ve been looking for solutions to the problem of the Founders evacuation,’ Sol said. ‘Had any joy yet?’
‘Unfortunately not.’ Chayka regarded him as if he were some sort of imbecile. ‘Even the energy body of our friendly Founder, Evara, hasn’t helped elucidate the problem.’
‘Well I was thinking.’
‘Really?’ Chayka sounded like he didn’t think Sol was capable of such a thing.
‘Yes, really. Some time ago, we helped Tao Chen escape from sub-quantal space.’
‘I know. I have all the data.’
‘I know you do. What I don’t know is why you haven’t seen the obvious solution to our problem. To be honest, I don’t know why we haven’t seen it either.’ Chayka looked blank and stayed silent, so Sol went on. ‘We had to supply Tao with an enormous amount of energy for her to escape. I suspect we need to supply the Founders with a similar amount of energy. Any thoughts?’
Chayka’s face changed in an instant. If anything, he looked shocked. Sol didn’t think he did shock.
‘Of course. The energy gradient. We were all thinking that the evacuation problem had to do with sub-quantal mathematics when it was all down to the energy gradient.’
He quickly opened a file on his terminal and began rapidly inputting data. Sol recognised the signs – he was lost to them now. Would be for some time probably. He looked at Juliette. She also seemed shocked, though whether at the apparent simplicity of the solution or the fact that it was him who’d thought of it, he couldn’t tell.
‘Is that all it is?’ she said. ‘We just need to send an energy pulse to each Founder?’
‘I think so. I’m sure old Chayka here will eventually come up with the maths to describe it, but we shouldn’t wait for that. How’d you fancy a little hop to see our old friend John Kendrick?’
Juliette checked the time. Almost 19.00 Cambridge time would make it 11.00 in California. He’d probably be in his office.
‘What if he’s with somebody?’
‘Can you think of anything – absolutely anything – more important than this?’ Sol said. ‘No? Neither can I. Come on.’
Taking Juliette’s hand, he formed a portal straight to Kendrick’s office and they stepped through. Kendrick was sitting at his desk and was so engrossed in something on his terminal that he didn’t notice their arrival.
‘Hi John.’
Kendrick shot out of his chair, momentarily disorientated, and fumbled around on his desk for something. Sol gave a wry smile. Whatever was on that terminal must really be something else if he’d been that taken up with it. He looked up and saw them.
‘God damn it! It had to be you, didn’t it? You persist in …’ He suddenly realised who he was looking at. ‘But I thought you were …’
‘Dead?’ Sol thought he’d help Kendrick out since he seemed reluctant to use the word. ‘Afra
id not, John.’
Kendrick came around his desk. ‘But that’s fantastic.’ He enveloped Sol in a bear hug and patted his back. ‘I’ve never been happier in my life. How did Deira take it?’
‘How do you think? I don’t think she’s over it yet. Anyway John, I’m afraid I’ve come looking for favours again.’
‘I’d expect nothing less. What are we up against this time? Another existential threat to Earth?’
‘Try the possible destruction of the entire universe.’
Kendrick went white and returned to his seat, taking a mouthful of water from a tumbler on his desk. He didn’t question statements like this any longer, not when they came from Deira or Sol at any rate.
‘Can you tell me?’
‘I think you deserve that and more,’ Sol indicated Juliette. ‘You know my daughter, don’t you?’
‘Yes of course. I think everyone on the planet knows her after her efforts on Mars.’
‘Okay, so shall we get down to it then?’
Sol sat and did his usual leg-over-the-chair-arm thing. Juliette sat and tried to look somewhere else. Then Sol went through the whole story. At the end of it, Kendrick looked ashen.
‘So, you’re some way off freeing these Founders?’
‘Way off, John. Way we’re going we’ll get maybe a third of them.
‘What do you want from me, then?’
‘You remember that CFR spark generator you very helpfully obtained for me once?’
‘How could I forget? It … oh, you want it again?’
‘Think you could get it?’
‘I’d think so. When do you want it?’
‘Now would be good.’
‘Give me a minute.’ He contacted Margaret, his secretary, and asked her to put in a call for him to a certain general at the Pentagon. It wasn’t long before he was into full haggling mode. Sol waited patiently until it was obvious he’d got what he wanted, then stood.
‘I heard you mention the coordinates,’ he said. ‘That was a particularly effective bit of communication, John. I’m in your debt again.’ He opened a portal and stepped through. A moment later, another portal opened, and the spark generator appeared, followed closely by Sol. ‘Pass on my thanks to the General. You coming, Jules?’
Gods of Titan- The Cosmic Constants Page 38