"I met the Traveller before she went. Did I ever tell you that?" asked the Master. "It was disconcerting that the youngest and least experienced was to be given the most hazardous position, the position of honour. The least I can do is stay until the probability drops below one percent and all hope is lost."
"I fear we have another failed mission," said the engineer. "I doubt the Elders will countenance another try. It would have been satisfying to know our origins."
"Our origins are surely described in the holy words of the Sacred Truth," said the Master.
"Of course," said the Engineer. "But confirmation and added detail would have been stimulating."
"Such thoughts are best not broadcast," said the Master. "An ungenerous person might detect evidence of heresy. Such a conclusion would lose a person his position."
The Engineer signalled permission to withdraw and the Master waved him away. The spread of heresy amongst the technical classes was frightening. It had become far worse recently. Privately, the Master considered the Elders mad to have permitted this mission. It had stoked up and spread heresy, not curtailed it.
A soft glow emanated from the construct and an alarm sounded. "Arrival imminent, arrival imminent, arrival imminent . . ."
"Turn that wretched subroutine off before I erase it," said the Master, irritably. "Obviously an arrival is imminent. What idiot fitted that device?"
The Engineers clamped down on their thoughts, as it was the Master himself who had insisted that alarms be installed.
"Let's see what we have," said the Master. "A capsule is approaching fast through the Shadows. This is going to be very tricky."
"Probability of successful recovery is five point seven percent," said an Engineer helpfully.
The Master glared at him. "Your model omits to properly include a variable for my enhanced skill so your calculation is invalid," he said, taking personal control of the recovery systems.
The recovery was indeed tricky. Several times the capsule almost broke through only to be lost back into the Shadow Worlds. Each time, interdimensional forces buffeted the capsule to the point of destruction but each time the Master caught it and eased it back. The vortex spun angrily between the five black holes.
"Gently, gently," said the Master, manipulating the controls. "Got you."
The capsule popped back into real space and was ejected out of the construct. Gravitational fields caught it and caressed it into a gravitonic matrix.
"It's too small," said the Engineer. "The Traveller can't be inside."
"It has the right codes," said the Master.
The force field around the capsule collapsed and data came pouring out. Lobes captured the data into the construct but the system was inefficient and vast streams were accidentally copied into the universal data stream.
The Master cherry-picked strands as information flowed past him—a universe of light, biochemical beings, matter technology, heresy, heresy, heresy. A last note from the traveller caught his eye.
"The precise origin of the People is still not clear to me. Our information functions show clear resemblances to the human's electronic information technology machines. On the other hand some of our core structures are duplicates of Lucy Dennys' central nervous system. Whether the humans transferred themselves into their machines, and so become us, or whether we are simply the descendents of the machines is unclear. I hope it is the former, as I would like to think something of Lucy lives on in us. Whichever is true, it is irrefutable that humans came first and were the creators of The People."
The Master groaned at that point. This was heresy so deep that his whole being vibrated in shock. He read on.
"I propose to stay with my good friend Lucy and learn more about these wonderful, vibrant, doomed creatures. I will send more data back when I can."
"Is there any chance of suppressing this?" asked the Master.
"None whatsoever," said the Engineer. "It is already too late. We were not expecting a data dump, so much of it has already been distributed as it overflowed our buffers. The radicals are claiming victory and have already split into two separate factions who have declared war on each other."
"The radicals are already fighting each other?" asked the Master, shocked.
"The monotheists are claiming Lucy is the source of all life while the polytheists claim she is but one of many sources."
"What are the Elders doing about it?" asked the Master.
"They appear to have committed ritual dissolution," said the Engineer, showing the modulation of extreme shock.
The Master watched news reports flooding across the universal net. Nothing would ever be the same again.
The story ended. Alice was just Alice again and Lucy and her world were simply a picture in the crystal ball. It had been so real, as if Alice was Lucy. Her own life poured back into her head like rebooting a computer program but it took a moment to remember that she was Alice Harding, a London University history lecturer and a nobody. She was not an aristocrat who hobnobbed with society and who had a secret life as a demon killer.
'God, full-sensory movies,' thought Alice. 'How do you do that?'
'We aim to please,' thought Lilith. 'Makes DVDs look like a What the Butler Saw Machine, doesn't it? But to answer you question, I can get in your head, Alice. You see what I project on your brain. I could probably explain it to you if you had studied a science rather than one of the humanities.'
'I get enough of the superiority of geeks lecture from Hammond, thank you,' thought Alice.
She studied the crystal. Lucy was still freeze-framed in it, head bent over her sea captain's face. Her auburn hair hung statically in the freeze frame. 'She's very pretty, for a ginga,' thought Alice, 'The Commission like to hang portraits of their chairman on the walls of their boardroom. When they run out of space, they remove the oldest picture to a basement. They had me catalogue the basement store once and that was where I found an old painting. I recognised the likeness of Walsingham at once, of course. We know what Walsingham looked like from his court portraits, but I couldn't work out whom the girl was. She looked twenty years younger than him. I wondered whether she was some sort of trophy mistress who had been cleansed from the official records. The Commission seems to have forgotten Lucy Dennys.'
'Lucy was his closest living relative and the delight of his heart. She was also his most lethal agent,' thought Lilith.
'You stopped the story too early. What happened to Lucy? Did she marry her dashing sea captain?' asked Alice.
'Lucy had a wonderful life, with many adventures and many children, who were the biggest adventure of all. Her children and their children went out and founded a great empire. Lucy was my first and greatest friend but in the end she left me, as you all must do.'
Lilith's tone was flat but Alice had the feeling of infinite sadness. Then Lilith's thoughts lifted. 'But Lucy's daughters always come back to me. Each generation you come back to London to find me and you carry Lucy within you.'
Alice looked back at the freeze-framed picture of Lucy and her mouth went dry. Lucy's hair swirled in the wind, framing an infectious smile. Diamonds sparkled in her eyes. The sense of life in her was overwhelming.
'It's funny,' thought Alice. 'Somehow you would expect your great-grandmother fifteen times removed to look rather older than a cheeky teenager.'
'I wonder how Hammond is reacting to all this?'
"Here you go, Alice." Hammond lifted a fried egg out of the pan and plonked it on a heaped plate. "Two eggs, just the way you like them."
Alice sat at the table gazing at some old piece of tat she had found in the box.
"What is that thing?" Hammond said. "It looks like a crystal ball. You can't pick up the winner of the three-fifty at Ascot on it can you?" She didn't reply. "Nah, thought not. All you can do with those things is put old ladies in touch with their cats that have crossed over. Are ye no there Tiddles? Knock once for yes and twice for no."
He knocked twice on the kitchen table and laug
hed. Then he swept the crystal ball aside and plonked the plate down. "Forget the diet and get your laughing gear around that. I always reckon that a decent breakfast sets you up for the day."
The radio switched back to the music show and The Clash pumped "London's Burning" out into the kitchen.
"What's this?" asked Hammond. He picked up the conjuring knife. "Wow, it's really wicked. You could do some serious damage to someone with this."
Alice sat at the table staring at where the crystal ball had been. She hadn't touched her breakfast.
"Alice, are you all right?" Hammond put his hand on her shoulder. She was stiff and didn't react so he shook her gently. The stiffness disappeared and she fell off the chair. Luckily she fell towards him so he could catch her. He lowered her gently to the floor and checked the pulse at her throat. He was reassured to feel her heart beat strongly. Her chest moved as she breathed.
"Alice," he said again. "Alice." Hammond tapped her cheek gently and she stirred a little but then subsided. She appeared to be in a deep sleep. He picked her up in his arms, carried her to the bedroom, and put her to bed.
"Now what do I do, girl?" he said. "I should phone for an ambulance but you will kill me if it turns out that you have only fainted. The last thing you ever want is officialdom involved in your bloody dubious activities."
He went back to the kitchen and brewed up. When he returned to the bedroom she was still out of it, so he drank the tea himself.
"I will give you an hour. If you haven't woken up by then you are going to casualty my girl. You will find breakfasts in Wimbledon General Hospital not to be a patch on mine." He looked at her. "Please wake up, Alice."
He washed up. Every five minutes, he checked up on her. Alice's pulse remained strong and she breathed normally. Occasionally, she made small snoring noises. After an hour had passed, he decided to give it two before he panicked officially, and after two hours, he decided to give it three. After four hours he was seriously worried. He shook her one more time, "Please, Alice, wake up."
There was no reaction. Hammond slipped his mobile out of the leather wallet on his belt and slid open the lid. Blue light lit up his face. He dialled nine-nine-nine and waited interminably for an operator.
"Emergency services. What number are you calling from?" asked a cool female voice.
"02771 490 1324," said Hammond
"What service please?"
"Ambulance."
"It's okay, Hammond. Put the phone down, please," said Alice.
"I'm sorry operator, I was too quick. The emergency is over," said Hammond, flipping closed his phone. "How are you feeling?"
"I feel wonderful. I feel so rested and alive." She held her arms out, "Come to bed, Hammond."
"What the bloody hell was the matter with you? You scared me witless this time." He was shouting, relief and anger equally proportioned in his voice.
"Nothing, Hammond, I was just exhausted. Come to me."
He knew he should let her rest. He knew he should persuade her to see a doctor, he knew this was a bad idea, he knew so much. But he took his clothes off anyway and slid into the bed and into her.
They made love, not sex but made love. It was slow and caring and wonderful. Afterwards, he left the bed and walked to the window. He looked out, not really seeing anything. A dark blue BMW was parked across the road behind his Ford. There were two men inside the cabin, wearing identical black leather jackets.
"What are you thinking?" she asked.
He was not ready to tell her. He knew what he had to do but he was barely ready to admit it to himself. "Are you hungry?" he asked.
"Hmm, starving," she replied.
"I'll make you something." He left the bedroom without a word and went to the kitchen. When, he reappeared with a tray, she was dozing. She ate as if she had never seen a decent hot meal before, pausing only to sink a mug of dark English tea. Afterwards, she chatted to him about inconsequentials. His answers where monosyllabic and she eventually ran down. He walked back to the window; the BMW was still there.
"What is it, Hammond?"
"Alice . . ." Hammond said.
"Hmmm," she purred. He could not look at her. He knew she would be stretching like a cat and he would be lost if he looked at her.
"I am leaving you, Alice." There he had said it.
"What?"
"Let me go, Alice."
"And for old time's sake, you decided to have me one more time before dumping me?" There was a flash of anger in her voice and something else, hurt. He did not want to hurt her. He had never loved anyone as strongly.
"What we just did finally made my mind up. I've thought about leaving you before but never had the nerve to go through with it. This on-off relationship is tearing me apart. Let me go, Alice. You don't want me enough to commit to me."
"I need you, Hammond. You are the one anchor in my life." She sounded as if she meant every word. As if the thought of losing him forever, of not being able to just drop in when she needed reassurance, was terrifying.
Now it was his turn to get angry. "I am tired of being an anchor, tired of being here for you when it suits you. Tired of ringing you in hotel rooms all over the world and hearing another man's voice in the room. How about me? How about what I need?"
"I'm a selfish cow, Hammond, I always have been. You knew that before you bedded me. But I can change. Please don't leave me." She cried softly.
"You'll never change, Alice," he said. What can one do with a crying lover? But this time she would not talk him round. He was resolved to stand his ground. "Let me go, Alice, if you feel anything for me."
She didn't reply. He gazed back down in the street to keep his eyes away from her. The sun was setting over the building opposite. The BMW still sat parked below. The man in the passenger seat saw him looking from the window and carefully looked away.
"Alice. Why are two men watching your flat?"
"Oh Christ, it's the Commission. We have to get out of here. Get dressed."
Hammond hopped on one foot trying to get his trousers up. "Why do I always get caught with my pants down around you?"
"Probably because you are so keen to get mine down." She grinned at him archly, pulling her clothes on. "You will miss all this if you leave me."
There was no answer to that. He was not sure whether she was talking about the situation or her body or just the whole experience. She had done it to him again. They were supposed to be splitting up. Instead, he was helping her flee into the night with stolen artefacts.
"I meant what I said." He tried desperately to get a grip on the situation.
" 'Course you did, love," said Alice. She grabbed him and kissed him passionately. Alice looked deep into his eyes, "I love you, geek, don't leave me, please don't leave me. I will treat you better."
She had never ever said that before—said she loved him, that is; she had often called him a geek.
"Hurry up," she said. "They'll have an enforcement team here soon. Put the knife and crystal back in the box. You carry it; I'll drive. They may not realise that I have a car in the basement garage. We'll take the service lift."
The service lift was designed for rubbish bins, not people. It had no door and creaked horribly all the way down. The basement car park was empty of people. Her prized Mini Cooper, with the Union Jack painted on the roof, was over in a corner. The cars were crammed tightly together to maximise capacity. Hammond waited in the aisle for her to wriggle in the driver's side and back the motor out. Something niggled at his consciousness. He took a moment to isolate what was bothering him. A car engine was idling somewhere nearby.
Alice gingerly backed the Mini out of the space, taking care not to catch her mirrors on the cars parked each side. An engine roared and a black Jaguar Sports shot across the line of parked cars. The driver hit the brakes at the last moment. They shrieked as he stopped, boxing in the Mini.
Hammond tried to see inside but the windows were heavily blacked out. The passenger door alongside him opened and a
woman slid gracefully out of the Jag. She was petite and slim with jet-black straight hair. Matrix-style sunglasses hid her eyes.
"Ours, I think," she said, taking the box out of his unresisting hands and opening it.
A man appeared out of the driver's side of the Jag and opened the boot. "Come on, Alice, get out of your car. We are taking you to see some friends. They want to talk to you about loyalty and punishment. As this is only a two-seater, you and lover boy will be travelling in the boot. Not much of a boot on this model, so you will be cramped. Never mind, that will give you the chance to snuggle close and whisper sweet nothings."
Alice climbed out of the Mini. "Let my friend go, Jameson. He's a civilian."
"Love, he stopped being a civilian when you chose to involve him," Jameson said.
"Let me introduce you to two of the Commission's top torpedoes, Hammond," said Alice. "The man is Major Jameson, late of Her Majesty's Guards, and the woman is Karla, better known as the Dark Lady. Back away from her; she's very dangerous."
Karla removed the sunglasses to reveal iridescent, metallic green eyes. She looked at Hammond and licked her lips. He backed off. For some reason, the woman scared him silly.
"The box is mine, Jameson," said Alice. "It has been in my family longer than the Commission has existed."
"Bollocks," said Jameson, succinctly.
'Lucy's movement patterns are laid down in your hindbrain; power up, defensive field on, you have control, Alice,' thought Lilith. 'Oh this feels good. I've missed human company.'
"Okay, Jameson, you've asked for it," Alice said.
Alice walked around her car towards Karla. Hammond was astonished. Alice was always slightly gawky and uncoordinated. It was part of her charm, but now she moved like Kate Moss on the catwalk. Her skin seemed to glow with vitality but what really worried him were her eyes. Diamond sparkles lit up her eyes to match the iridescent green of Karla's.
"Lucy Hawkins?" Karla said. "It can't be you, Lucy. You've been dead these four hundred years. I saw you die."
Lucy's Blade Page 40
