by Ruth Morgan
‘Well, I still have all that data to analyse from before I left…’ He rested his chin on his knuckles, his eyes still fixed on the celephet. He hadn’t looked at me, his trained monkey, once.
‘Mmmm,’ I nodded. ‘That’s good.’
I wondered if he was really buying my story.
‘Why was your message function turned off, Bree? I was trying to contact you for days.’
‘I’m sorry but I always keep “call” turned off when I’m writing.’
‘You’re not writing poems all the time!’ he almost yelled, just reining it in at the last moment. ‘You should have contacted me straight away, as soon as this happened.’
‘I know. I was worried.’
I really felt like yelling back at him but knew I couldn’t. Even after everything that had happened since I’d last seen Carter, even though I was so thrilled I’d made contact with Jonah, I couldn’t forget the way the Doctor had lied to me and I resented him for thinking me so stupid, especially now. If only he knew that I was the one who had made contact with a spirit from the past and not just made contact either but was actually communicating with an ancient human. It wasn’t his precious invention doing this, it was me.
But he couldn’t know. I had to keep it to myself if I was going to protect Jonah.
‘That’s quite a nasty scar you have but it will heal,’ he said. ‘In a few weeks we can try again.’
‘You think you can mend the celephet?’ I faltered. ‘It looks pretty wrecked.’
‘I brought some replacement components and there are facilities I can use in the lab downstairs. It’ll be tricky but I think I can manage it.’
With sudden exasperation, he slammed his fist on the table. I jumped.
‘Damn it, we’re this close, this close.’ He held up his thumb and forefinger, indicating a tiny gap. ‘We have to try again. If the data we’ve collected already doesn’t give us the answer, we must.’
‘Doc Carter,’ I knew I was risking being shouted at but had to say it anyway, ‘I don’t know if the celephet was doing any good.’
He goggled at me. The look on his face said it all: how dare this stupid girl doubt my invention?
‘What I mean is,’ I went on, hastily, swallowing my own temper, ‘all the energy ever did was shout and scream at the celephet to go away.’
‘That’s all you heard, Bree,’ he snapped. ‘The celephet may have picked up more.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘But all it seemed to do was torture this poor energy.’
‘It got results.’
‘But through torture? Is that really the best way?’
‘Bree, anyone would think this energy has feelings. It is just a residual energy in the atmosphere, nothing more. It’s something from the distant past that the celephet has been clever enough to tune into. You can’t torture energy.’
So: stupid Bree, clever celephet.
‘It felt like torture. You weren’t there,’ I protested.
‘Yes, well, when we try the experiment again … and I mean when Bree, not if, I’ll be keeping a much, much closer eye on you. Remember why we’re doing this. Remember it’s to further our Great Quest and Purpose.’
More like your own quest and purpose, I thought. Your own fame and fortune, Doc Carter. He swung round on his stool and I took it as my signal to leave. Despite his annoyance, I’d expected something far worse and guessed that he’d gone easy on me because he’d obviously need my help with his revolting experiment once the celephet was fixed. I wasn’t about to refuse to ever wear it again, that would have been very dangerous. I assumed from what he’d said that it would take weeks to mend the nasty thing and that left me time enough to come up with a plan.
Facing Carter was bad enough but I’d been dreading seeing Halley again. We ran into each other in the corridor, near the window where we’d viewed the moon together the night we first arrived. He greeted me with a huge smile plastered across his face. He was so wrapped up in what he wanted to tell me that he didn’t notice how forced my own smile was. He put his arm through mine, keeping in step with me. We carried on up the stairs to the fourth-floor common room.
‘You will not believe what I have to tell you,’ he began.
‘Whatever it is, you look pretty pleased with yourself,’ I said. ‘How was India?’
‘Oh!’ He let go of my arm and did a funny little jig of a dance as though words alone couldn’t express his delight. He rounded it off with one word, ‘Grrreat!’
He waited until we entered the common room before telling me more. This was the most comfortable room in the building with super-squashy sofas facing a panoramic view of Cardiff, but it was usually empty in the daytime when everyone was busy at work. I’d just wanted a quiet place where I could get my head together following my interview with Doc Carter, but now here I was with Halley.
‘Ah, good, we can be alone,’ he said, stressing the word ‘alone’ in comical fashion.
Fantastic, I thought.
He threw himself onto one sofa and I sat on the edge of a different one.
‘Go on, then,’ I said.
‘Where shall I begin?’ I felt like slapping the sappy grin off his face but sat patiently, waiting for whatever he was itching to say. ‘All right. I didn’t know I was going until half an hour before, so sorry to start with,’ he said. ‘I did try calling you in Mumbai but your “call” signal was switched off?’
I shrugged. I didn’t see why I should explain this again and to him of all people. He must have thought I was annoyed at him for leaving without saying goodbye.
‘Anyway,’ he continued, ‘if I could have persuaded Doc Carter to take you along, I would have done, but of course he wanted you to stay here, didn’t he?’
‘I guess so.’
‘Bree…’ He sat on the edge of his seat, leaning towards me and waving his hands to emphasise what he was saying. ‘I have seen such amazing things. I’ve walked on golden sandy beaches. I’ve explored tropical forests. I’ve been out in nature. It’s like our canals but much, much more. It’s so different from here.’
‘What about the dragomansk?’
‘Oh, they’re there like they’re everywhere. I got to see some amazing metamansk, so big they filled the sky. We had to take the usual precautions. The heat is so much worse, we had to wear these special suits with cool air circulating inside or our enzymes would have started breaking down. It’s even less habitable than here.’ He tried to reach out and take my hand but I flinched and withdrew it. ‘Bree, I know you’re mad at me for going without you but I couldn’t help that. Please let me tell you what I saw there, it was unbelievable.’
My dislike of him was deepening. He was so different from the last time we’d met, when he’d seemed so distraught. Doc Carter had bought him off with this amazing trip and now he’d do anything Carter asked of him, I just knew it. Including spying on me again.
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘I’m waiting.’
‘There were shells on the beach, huge conch shells in all colours. They reminded me of your fossils. Best of all was the sea. It was the clearest, purest blue I have ever seen, clear as a crystal. We actually went into the sea, Bree, can you imagine that? We saw everything there is to see in the water.’
‘How? You didn’t swim? You couldn’t have.’
‘In an amphibical!’ He laughed. ‘The larger ones – the class fours – can go underwater. We were down there for hours. I saw great shoals of fish, all the colours of the rainbow. I saw sharks and eels and seahorses and … I saw a nautilus. A real nautilus, like the ammonites you like at the Museum? I saw a real live one in the sea!’
‘I’m surprised Doc Carter had time for all that,’ I cut in, stunned by the horrible coincidence. It was almost as though he’d just butted in on one of my and Jonah’s conversations.
‘Oh, he didn’t, he was working. It was just a bit of a treat for me. I went with some of the scientists from their Base who’ve been surveying the minerals underwater. I was thinkin
g about you, Bree. I was wishing you were there with me the whole time.’ He reached across again. I stood up and folded my arms.
‘You should count yourself lucky,’ I said curtly.
‘I do. Bree, if I’d only had the chance I would have taken you with me…’
‘I would only have got in the way.’
‘No!’
‘I have to go.’ I turned for the door.
‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Listen. We’re only here on Earth for a short time. Any chance we get, we should be out there looking at it, experiencing it! It’s difficult, I know, but we should at least try! You spend all your time in that Museum amongst the old rocks and fossils, but they’re dead, Bree, and it’s dark in there and depressing. I know Doc Carter wants you there some of the time but you need to get out, into the light. I want to show you what you’ve been missing.’
I turned back to face him. ‘You think you know about the Museum, but you don’t. I’m happy there. Look!’ I spun around and showed him the back of my neck. ‘This happened while you were away. The celephet fell off. I’m not allowed back there until it’s repaired and that could take weeks. The Museum’s the only place on Earth I want to be, Halley. The only place.’
It wasn’t exactly true. What he’d described sounded amazing and part of me longed to see it for myself, but I didn’t want to go anywhere in Halley’s company ever again. In any case, I really was having the best time of my life at the Museum with Jonah.
‘Oh please, listen to yourself!’ He threw back his head, exasperated.
‘When I should listen to you, I suppose?’ I cried. I hadn’t intended having a full-blown row with Halley but now I’d started, I couldn’t stop, much as I tried keeping my voice down. ‘Why can’t I make up my own mind? Why can’t I decide what I want to do? If I want to sit in the dark and write poems, that’s up to me, surely?’
‘That really is what you came all the way to Earth to do?’
‘Yes, it is!’
‘I’ve never heard anything so stupid.’
‘Oh.’ My breath was short now. ‘Is that what you think of me then? Stupid? Making all these stupid decisions for myself? Who the hell do I think I am, making my own choices? How ridiculous. Why don’t I just listen to the intelligent ones on board this mission?’
‘I didn’t say you’re stupid. I don’t think that. Bree, will you just shut up a minute? Shut up!’
Now we were talking across each other, our voices raised, and I was past the point of caring whether anyone heard us. Still, I wasn’t about to reveal to Halley how I’d overheard him and Doc Carter arguing the night before they left, otherwise he’d just scamper back to Carter like a faithful little pet and tell him everything.
‘Bree.’ He put out his hand but I moved so the sofa was between us. ‘What’s happened? You and me, we came all the way here dreaming of what we were going to see and do together. I thought we were friends? I thought of you as my best friend.’
I couldn’t say anything. I was shaking with anger.
‘What’s happened?’ he asked again. ‘This isn’t about me going to Mumbai without you, is it? Please tell me what I’ve done wrong.’
‘Nothing.’ On the verge of tears, I bolted from the room.
Of the four of us, Nisien had really steamed ahead with his project and it was impossible not to be impressed with what he’d achieved so far.
The technology on board the existing vehicles to clear obstructions was old-fashioned and didn’t always perform well, as we’d seen on the day we landed. The huge demands upon the small team of mechanics on board a mission meant that this was the kind of issue which never really got properly sorted. The current way to deal with obstructions on the road was to seal, freeze and shatter them and the vehicles were very good at this, but the larger remains still had to be cleared away manually which took time. Nisien’s idea was simple but effective. He’d worked out a way of flattening the seal during the freezing process and putting pressure on the midpoint, so that when the seal ruptured, the shattered remains got blasted out on either side, leaving the path in front of the craft relatively clear.
Having replaced the wires he’d disabled accidentally when Robeen had been helping him, Nisien had already modified the equipment on a decommissioned amphibical, a hulking class four brute at least thirty years old, and although it didn’t work perfectly yet – the debris often got blown back at the vehicle itself – he was getting there. When he gave us a demonstration one afternoon on the back road from the workshop to the main service road, the craft froze and dispersed a huge pile of wood that had been dragged up from the marshes. Safe in the amphibical’s cabin, we watched as the frozen fragments exploded in great arcs to either side of us, leaving the road fairly clear. It was a near perfect demonstration and we gave Nisien a round of applause. Robeen, to her own surprise and ours, planted a kiss on his cheek. Nisien was delighted and of course, we’d also filmed the momentous event to send back to school.
Our weekly broadcasts to Pioneer School were basically all about Nisien’s project. To me, the broadcasts were just a chore to be got through and since learning the truth about why I’d been chosen for the mission, I felt so thoroughly betrayed by Core Panel I couldn’t work up any enthusiasm for them. Since I couldn’t report what I’d really been up to at the Museum, it was a relief to let Nisien enjoy centre stage. Robeen explained her musical instrument discoveries and once he’d returned from Mumbai, it was impossible to shut Halley up about what he’d seen on his trip. When I absolutely had to say something, I talked about the weather, but they weren’t expecting that much of me, so what did it matter?
As I’d told Halley, with the celephet broken, I wasn’t spending time at the Museum any more, not legitimately anyway. Until it was mended, Robeen and I were back helping the archaeologists. One afternoon, Lana took Robeen to the Museum in one of the larger amphibicals and they brought a lot of the musical instruments back to Base so Robeen could carry on with her project and, best of all, practise on the real cello.
So the days went by. The new archaeological site was on the headland just below Cardiff, where caves had been carved into the sides of the cliffs. They were believed to have been hideouts in the last days. No one knew exactly how long these ‘last days’ had lasted but they’d been long enough for humans to tunnel their way right into the cliffs and establish communities. Most of the caves had collapsed long ago but it was still possible to enter one or two which had been declared safe, via the steep steps carved into the cliffsides. There were no human remains in the caves but plenty of artefacts, furniture and cooking utensils. Some of the rooms looked as though the inhabitants had left only minutes before, which was eerie.
You could imagine these caves as the perfect place to hide from giant monstrous insects: the entrances were small but once you’d made it through the first tunnel, the rooms opened out so you could stand up in them. The structures were re-enforced with metal cages so they were safe from collapse or from the gigantic, tunnelling worms. It seemed strange that humans had ended up living in dwellings like large replicas of a beetle’s burrow and when I shared the thought with Pico, he agreed with me. He told me he’d seen the drawings at the Museum and had found them terrible. When I’d first heard we were going to these caves, I’d been afraid that we might find more apocalyptic scenes on the walls, similar to those at the Museum. The drawings we actually found, and there were many, drawn with varying degrees of skill, portrayed a more idyllic world – peaceful landscapes where smiling adults and children worked and played. Perhaps the people who’d drawn them had clung to the hope that the Earth could be like that again someday.
People sometimes commented on how tired I looked, how I couldn’t stop yawning, but on the whole they were too busy to take much notice. I was tired. I was still spending hours each night writing poems with Jonah at the Museum. His vast store cupboard of knowledge about the Earth and memories of places he’d travelled to before the War was an endless source of inspiration. The
poems we wrote were wonderful, if I say so myself, and of course, I’m entitled to because they weren’t mine alone. Jonah was a true poet; he could open my eyes, help me feel that I’d seen things I’d never physically seen and give me exactly the words to describe them.
My fellow poet remained hidden, a blurred shape within the crinoid circle, a warm, mellifluous voice which came and went, a humorous voice full of humanity, so real and so near, yet so far away. I felt so close to him, so happy I had someone to talk to, but I found myself shying away from some things. I didn’t understand where he was, for a start, or rather where his consciousness was stored. Somehow, he had latched on to my brain patterns, my ability to empathise and possibly my deep feelings for Earth, although in a way it was easier to believe this was some ancient magic and that the crinoid circle had charmed him back into existence. Each time we spoke, he seemed to be carrying on from where we’d left off previously, as though when I wasn’t there, he didn’t exist.
Then there was the War for Earth and the last days; I longed to know more but I was afraid that making him tell me might shunt him into remembering his own death. I would do absolutely anything to avoid causing him any more pain. In all the excitement, it was easy to forget that the brief candle flame of his consciousness wasn’t going to last forever. Doc Carter had explained it to me; a stored consciousness had a limited lifespan, if you could call it that, and one day soon Jonah would have used up his existence.
Quite unexpectedly one night, he began talking about the War without my asking him. It had been a hard day on site and I’d really been looking forward to spending time with Jonah, but he seemed unable to tune in his voice and it swooped over my head and circled in the air over and over again. I was alarmed and kept talking and encouraging him but as soon as his voice settled, I noticed how different he looked. The shapes I thought of as his head and shoulders were sort of slumped.
