‘And I used the plus and equals signs to make it clearer,’ Madvedant added. ‘We don’t use those symbols for those functions. And we count in base six, not base ten.’
Cygnus frowned. ‘Why?’
‘Historically, when people counted on their fingers, they used one hand for the numerals and one for the sixes. It lets you count to thirty on two hands.’
‘Hardly the most unusual form of counting,’ Ultimate said. He turned back to Bianca. ‘However, I believe you can see the issue. You, I’m sure, know how to write down an integral, but it is highly unlikely that you would recognise the same thing written down by an ashar.’
‘Yeah,’ Bianca replied. ‘I get it. So, we keep doing what we’re doing for now, and get together some teams to go up to Mars. They’ll need some training anyway, I guess.’
‘Probably,’ Madvedant said. ‘We can construct habitats for them which would mimic Earth’s atmosphere, but they will need to be prepared to work in respirators outside those areas. And we are busy working on our own requirements at the moment. It will be… at least several Earth weeks, probably more like months, before we can begin an exchange programme.’
‘Well, I think I’ve got a handle on the antigravity system anyway,’ Elaine said. ‘It’s a bigger, more efficient version of the flight systems on Ultramech. I think it’s the other technology and science we could learn which is going to be important. We could be looking at some serious advancement in human technology over the next decade.’
Bianca grimaced. ‘Great for the company bottom line, but I can’t help but think that’s not going to be as good as it sounds.’
‘No,’ Ultimate said sadly. ‘I should imagine that decade and the one or two after will be quite turbulent. But that’s the thing about knowledge. It’s a two-edged sword and once it’s out of the scabbard, it’s very difficult to put it back in.’
Earth Orbit, 29th March.
‘Do you think this was a success?’ Cygnus asked. She was engaged in the task of making sure the warp conduit she was about to generate came out in the right part of space, i.e. near Mars, but she could still talk.
‘I think…’ Madvedant paused, her lips pursed. ‘Yes, I think it went well. I even enjoyed myself. At times. Next time, I’d like to visit privately and go out into your city. I’d like to see normal citizens doing what they do.’
‘You’ll need to be able to shapeshift, at least cosmetically.’
‘I can do that. I already worked that one out. Which reminds me, I’d like to spend some time with you, learning more of what you have done with your power.’
‘We can do that, sure. It might be better if I came out to Mars for some things. I’ve had to learn a lot of ways to destroy things, and Mars has the advantage of providing almost no possibility of collateral damage.’
Madvedant giggled. ‘Yes. That is a valid point. Tell me, do you think this visit has been a success?’
‘Currently, yes. However, I reserve the right to change my mind when I’ve seen what the media makes of it all. If there are problems, I’ll come out and let you know. I’m not expecting any, but humans can just be… contrary.’
‘We need a method of communicating without all this travel.’
‘Yeah… I’ll ask Hugh what we know about long-distance telepathy. If I can figure it out, we can add it to the list of things I’ll teach you.’
‘It’s getting to be a long list.’
‘Sure is.’ Cygnus stretched out a hand and space convulsed, twisting and shrinking until part of it was trying to be in two places at once. ‘There you go.’
‘Thank you. I think I’ll be able to do that myself next time. Farewell, Cygnus. I hope your life is not going to be too interesting for comfort.’
Cygnus grinned. ‘Farewell, Madvedant. I’m sure something will turn up to keep me busy soon enough.’
Kansas City, MO, 4th April.
The sound of a loud bang, maybe more of a crack, had everyone at the bus depot looking up and wondering what had happened. Then Miss Liberty rocketed down at a pace which suggested that she had arrived very quickly indeed and was probably the source of the sound. She was a new enough phenomenon in the country for people to start toward her as she landed beside the depot, looking around urgently. Phones were produced. People began to video what was happening.
‘Everyone, get away from the depot,’ she called out. ‘Run! There’s going to be an explosion.’ At first no one moved and, exasperated, she yelled louder. ‘Run!’ Then she headed for the waiting room behind the glass. Whether it was the shouting or the intense look on her face, the crowd began to hurry away. In a few seconds, they were running.
‘Clear the building!’ Miss Liberty yelled as she walked in through the doors. ‘There’s about to be an explosion. I am not kidding, people. Get out or you could be badly hurt. Move!’
The vision she had had was quite graphic and it had come with an awareness of the location she was seeing, but the exact details of the explosion had not been clear. She knew that this bus depot was the location of the next bomb, but she had no idea where in the depot the detonation would happen. She was starting down toward the far end of the building when the walls shook and the glass around her exploded.
~~~
Another sonic boom broke over the site of what had been a bus depot. This time, the results were a lot more ducking and a lot less looking upward, but Cygnus appeared over the site barely a second later and everyone relaxed. Astraea was with her and spotted Miss Liberty first. The national hero was starting to shift debris at one end of the building which now looked like a badly designed flat-pack furniture package.
‘Talk to me,’ Cygnus said as she dropped in beside Miss Liberty, shifting her powers to let her search for survivors.
‘I got here about five minutes before the bomb went off,’ Miss Liberty replied. ‘I didn’t get enough information to know exactly where it was. I cleared people away from one side of the building, and I went inside to look. It went off before I could get to it.’
‘That’s probably lucky. Are you sure you could survive being close to one of these things when it goes off? I’m pretty sure I’d be dead.’
‘I… hadn’t thought of that. I was in that end when the explosion happened.’ Miss Liberty waved toward the other end of the building which was still standing, if damaged and missing all its windows. ‘There was a wall between me and the bomb. The doors blew out, but I barely felt the actual explosion. Well, there was a lot of heat. Flames blew through the doorway.’
Cygnus nodded. ‘It really does sound like a thermobaric bomb, but… Are you sure it was a bomb?’
‘No, but something exploded.’
Looking around at the flattened, broken building, Cygnus nodded. ‘It certainly did. Leave that bit, there’s nothing under it. We’ll find the bodies further toward the centre.’
‘Just bodies?’
‘No one’s moving, but we might get lucky.’
‘Have some faith. We will.’
Cygnus flashed a bleak smile. ‘Faith isn’t something I have a lot of.’
~~~
‘Who’s the guy in the suit?’ Cygnus asked. She had stopped to take a break from shifting debris and gone to see how Astraea was doing with the victims. Against the odds, they had pulled a couple of live ones out of the wreckage and Astraea had managed to get all of them to the state of walking wounded.
Astraea glanced around to where a man in a three-piece, slate-grey suit was wandering between the less-injured victims, handing out bottles of water. ‘His name’s Jonas Harrison. He’s some sort of preacher. He seems to have some talent for healing since I’ve seen him heal a few cuts and bruises.’
‘Well, that’s good, I guess.’
‘Maybe. I asked if he could help some of the more serious cases and he told me, and I quote, “I do not work with the spawn of Satan. These people will wish they had never accepted succour from a demon in human form.”’
‘Oh really?’
&
nbsp; ‘Yeah. He prays a lot. And spouts biblical quotations. It’s all sincere too. He really believes what he’s saying.’
Cygnus raised an eyebrow. ‘He believes you’re a demon?’
‘Or possessed by one. There was a lot of stuff about “casting out.” I stopped listening and went back to work, so he said I couldn’t stand being in the presence of “the truth of God.”’
‘Huh. Nothing much we can do about it.’
‘Except get on with our jobs.’
‘Too true,’ Cygnus replied, rising into the air. ‘Let’s do that.’
New Millennium City, MD, 5th April.
‘I believe I have spotted a pattern in the explosions,’ Denny announced. The big screen lit up with a map of the USA. It had four little stylised explosion symbols on it, one for each of the detonations so far. Aside from a general movement to the east and north, there did not appear to be any visible pattern.
‘I’m not seeing it,’ Penny said. She was a little grumpy that the television footage from the previous night had featured a lot of video of Jonas Harrison spouting nonsense.
Dates appeared next to the icons. ‘That is because the pattern is not spatial, but temporal. With a variance of plus or minus one hour, the explosions occur at an interval of twenty-two point five days.’
‘That’s weirdly precise for a bomber,’ Andrea said.
‘It is,’ Denny agreed. ‘There is an obvious trend toward the north and east. It would suggest that the cause of these explosions is heading this way. I have no data to predict a specific destination. It could be this city or Andrews Field, or another city in the immediate area. Or the spatial pattern may be entirely erroneous. I can say that the next detonation is likely to occur between ten a.m. and midday on the twenty-seventh of April, but not where it will occur.’
‘It’s more than we had,’ Penny said.
‘If it were going to be night, maybe I could spread some imps out and we could get the news faster,’ Andrea said. ‘That time of the morning, they’re more or less useless.’
‘The explosion after this next one is likely to be at night, Andrea,’ Denny replied.
‘We were sort of hoping to avoid that one, but beggars can’t be choosers, I guess.’
Kansas City, MO, 6th April.
Jonas Harrison stood to the right of stage, preparing himself for an unusual meeting. He had done the same sort of thing for several years, but the crowd waiting for him this morning was not his usual crowd. Generally, the folks in the seats were Christians waiting to hear his inspirational words. They wanted to hear about faith, the glory and power of God, and the salvation which could only be received through the blessing of Jesus Christ Our Saviour. They wanted to see miracles worked in the name of God and for five years Jonas had given them that. It had been a con. The blind men who Jonas had given sight to had been shills. The old women who suddenly regained their health had been reacting to a placebo. Faith could be a wonderful way to get people to believe they had seen something they had not and thereby extract money from them.
And then it had changed. At a Sunday afternoon prayer meeting, he had really cured a young girl’s asthma. He had riled the crowd into their usual fervour, but this time he had felt the power of God roaring through him. He had touched the girl’s head and her breathing had eased in an instant. He had known that the power was real. Three months later, in Paducah, Kentucky, another girl had been brought to him because she was hearing voices in her head. He had known what was wrong as soon as he had laid eyes upon her: Jolene Beck was possessed and he, Jonas Harrison, could drive out her demon. He had done it too. Her parents had been ecstatic, but Jonas was even happier than they were because he knew what his mission in life was. God had chosen him for a specific task, and now he was going to go out in front of the assembled press people to explain that task to the world.
He walked out onto the podium, to the waiting lectern, and cameras flashed madly. At the back of the room there were video cameras from several news channels, all the major networks. It was a good turnout. He was pleased, and he knew he looked good on camera. He was a reasonably tall man, not exceptionally, but above average, with a well-proportioned body and an attractive face. His ash-blonde hair was well groomed and his blue eyes shone in the lights. He always wore immaculate suits to events such as this: the crowd liked the authoritative statement that made. It made him look a little like a politician, which worked for him because his task would eventually lead him to depose the current president.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began when the flashes were dying away. ‘Brothers and sisters in God. My name is Jonas David Harrison and I have come before you all today to reveal to you the mission God in his infinite wisdom has placed upon me.’ Slight pause for dramatic effect. Jonas knew his voice had sounded better since God had granted him the power to do what had to be done. Even in that short introduction, he could tell that the reporters had begun to hang on his words. ‘There is a cancer in our society. Evil walks our streets. That evil presents itself as good, but I see through that veil of misdirection. The Prince of Lies works in plain sight in our cities and towns. His agents are everywhere, and we have come to believe that they are helping us. They are not helping us, brothers and sisters. They worm their way into our hearts and make us believe that wrong is right. We call them Ultrahumans, but I see them for what they are: they are possessed by Satan’s demons and I have been chosen to cast them out.’
There was a rumble from the crowd. Part of it was disbelief, and there were some hints of disgust. A greater part was positive; hardened journalists were wondering whether he was telling the truth and suspecting he might be.
‘On Tuesday in Kansas City, I saw the destruction Satan has brought to our world. And I saw Satan’s minions swoop in to provide their false aid. They came from New Millennium City, the new Gomorrah, and that is where I will take my quest next. There I shall confront the minions of Satan, casting the demons from those possessed, and I shall free that blighted city from Beelzebub’s yoke!’
New Millennium City, MD.
‘He’s delusional,’ June stated flatly. ‘He believes every word he’s saying. He believes that we’re all possessed by demons.’
‘Technically not far from the truth in my case,’ Andrea pointed out.
‘You aren’t possessed by a demon.’
‘Well, not now. I embody the entity which has preyed on human fear of darkness and the unknown for longer than his religion has existed. You could say I am a demon.’
June scowled at her. ‘You’re not a demon. Anyway, his religion hasn’t been around that long. I mean, he comes over as an Evangelical Christian, but he’s not without guilt.’
‘I pretty much thought guilt was as omnipresent as God in Christians.’
‘Mostly Catholics, but not the point. His guilt is that he used to scam people before God gave him the real power to heal. He really can heal people. I saw him do it. Just minor stuff, but he was healing.’
‘The question, I think,’ Penny said, ‘is whether he can really “cast the demon” out of Ultras. I assume he means he can take their power away.’
‘His website claims he can,’ Denny supplied. ‘There are a number of examples. I can find no other documented evidence of such events, however.’
‘He could still be a con man,’ Andrea said.
‘I don’t think he’s that,’ June replied. ‘I’m not really sure what he is, but he’s left the con jobs behind. He could be a problem.’
‘If he is, I’ll look into it,’ Andrea replied. ‘After all, if he’s after anyone in this city, it’s probably me.’
~~~
‘It’s about time someone said something about them,’ Edward Woodford said to the evening news. He would do that fairly often and Brian, his son, generally ignored whatever was said. This time was different: the report was on the press conference Jonas Harrison had given.
‘We’d all be dead if it wasn’t for Cygnus,’ Brian said. He had still not told
his parents he was an Ultra. His father’s inconsistent, but generally negative, attitude was the main reason for that.
‘If it wasn’t for her, those aliens would never have come here.’
‘That’s not true. They’d have come eventually.’
Edward flashed his son a glare. ‘Sure of that, are you?’
‘Yes.’ Maybe the direct answer came as a shock or something, but Edward did not immediately answer. ‘Cygnus told everyone what they were like and why they were here. Eventually, they’d have found Earth, seen the Ultras, and attacked.’
‘She was just trying to save her own skin,’ Edward snapped.
Brian got to his feet and started for the door. ‘Everything she told the government about Naryan Tan was true. He did exactly what she said he’d do once she was aboard his ship. She’s tried her best to safeguard humans when all we do is hound her and take every opportunity to make her job harder. I’m going out.’
‘When will you be back?’ Felicity, his mother, asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Brian replied as he closed the porch door behind him.
13th April.
Brian had been back. His father had started spouting stuff he had heard from Jonas Harrison’s speeches, and Brian had packed a bag. His mother had been a little perplexed by Brian’s attitude, but explaining would have just made things worse. It was not the best way to spend your birthday.
Not the worst either. He knew Josie was indulging him some by letting him stay with her. On the other hand, she seemed to be enjoying having him around on a more permanent basis. He had been spending the odd night, occasionally whole weekends, at her place, but this time he had been there for a whole week. It was… kind of domestic. Brian had even taken a trash bag out to the dumpster at the back of the building before school on Tuesday morning.
Today, however, was Brian’s nineteenth birthday, and Josie was determined to lift the slight melancholy which had settled over her boyfriend. ‘We’re going out to dinner,’ she told him. ‘I’m paying. Don’t argue.’ She was wearing a dress. It was short, showing off her gorgeous legs, but high in the collar and long-sleeved. It was rather more sophisticated than she usually wore. She was actually wearing heels! Josie, or Fleet to many of her friends and the UID, never wore heels; being a speedster able to run at almost four times the speed of sound, she preferred running shoes.
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