As the cliff advanced, things began pushing through the undergrowth all around. Not far from the amphibian, slimy lungfish were hauled from their shallow pool by snakelike extrusions of the same cliff—only these snakes were without eyes, possessing only mouths that were vertical slits lined with incurving teeth. One such snake was squirming along the forest floor towards the small amphibian, and in response, the acanthostega arched its back, more prominently to display its bright poisonous coloration. The slit mouth rose above it and opened, then abruptly snapped shut. Then the snake things withdrew from the forest and the devastation immediately ceased. The earth still shaking, the cliff began to withdraw. Now the amphibian, sensing that the danger had passed, moved downwards along the log and began lunching on the termites.
Eventually the acanthostega returned to its little swamp but there found only a muddy cavity. Its vision was not sufficient to see the utterly denuded landscape beyond, and its mind was not sufficiently sophisticated to comprehend such concepts as ‘luck’. It could not comprehend what vast beast had come to feed in its world, or how that feeding must necessarily be limited. That the beast had to cease before being forced back down an incomprehensible slope as a result of its destruction of this history.
‘I’m not so sure I’m glad to see you well.’
That came from Polly, the girl he had tried to add to his list of victims millions of years in the future. So she had not been a hallucination earlier and he was glad she was alive. Though all those others before her were most definitely dead. He had killed them. Made mute by what he was suddenly feeling, he moved on past her to one of the arched windows and gazed out into darkness, trying to blink the strange after-images there from his eyes. In a moment he realized these were no after-images; he really was seeing shimmering hints of nightmarish shapes, as of open mouths and snakelike bodies, beyond the rain-beaded window.
‘What is that out there?’ he eventually asked, his voice dead.
‘Something you caused.’
Tack surveyed the occupants of this strange room. That familiar voice had not come from the Roman soldier, the Chinese man, or the boy, for they were all over on the other side of him — the first two working on something inside the back of the boy’s head. Tack tried to take sights like that in his stride: the boy with the back of his head open like a hatch, and two men who should have no conception of such work, probing inside with various finely polished tools, discussing in low voices what they were doing. Perhaps the boy was an android or something. Nor did the voice issue from the Neanderthal, who was sitting carving circuit patterns into a club fashioned from the rib of a large animal. Tack’s attention then strayed to the wasp robot squatting beside the sofa Polly occupied.
The robot spoke again, ‘It is the incursion overspill from the torbeast—that always happens when Cowl summons it up from the bottom of the slope and establishes a communication link, but not normally intruding to this extent. Perhaps, Mr U-gov facilitator, you can explain exactly what fuck-up you have caused.’
Polly, sitting with arms crossed, flicked her gaze to Wasp, then brought it back to Tack. ‘You have to understand that Nandru may be even less glad to see you than I am.’
Tack stared at the robot, then looked at Polly, who pointed to the Muse 184 at her throat.
‘Nandru?’ he said, even more confused.
Polly just stared at him silently, a hint of a smile twisting her mouth.
‘The dead soldier uploaded to the device Polly wears—and which now speaks to you through Wasp,’ explained Aconite as she entered the room. ‘But however he speaks, his questions are still pertinent.’
Tack was not even sure he cared, for moment by moment he could still feel elements of his mind knitting together. All those missions for U-gov, all that facilitation … even the Heliothane reprogramming had not brought him to this level of consciousness.
‘So what have you caused here? Why is my brother reacting in this way?’ Aconite asked.
Tack swallowed dryly and tried to shove his mangled history away from himself. He considered not telling Aconite anything, but decided he did not owe his silence to those who had sent him to this time. No matter how he felt about Saphothere, the traveller had sent Tack on a suicide mission. Tack managed to admit, ‘Inside my mind… Cowl found a way to attack Sauros.’
‘Sauros?’ Aconite asked mildly, unsurprised.
Tack concentrated on the now, and found that by doing so he could control the horror growing between his ears. While the other three in the small group moved over, Tack told of Goron’s project, of the city and the wormhole, how it fed energy for accurate mantisal jumping, and how the Heliothane were pushing backwards in time finally to get to Cowl. He then repeated, verbatim, those particular segments of conversation that had been of such interest to Cowl, and had now caused this reaction. He did not tell them what Thote had said, however, or of his own thoughts about distance weapons and sacrificial goats. That was for himself.
After a long silence, Aconite said, ‘This Sauros is what you saw, Polly.’ She turned back to Tack. ‘I somehow doubt that either Goron or Saphothere would be so negligent, but it appears to me that this Palleque might not have been entirely in their employ.’ She looked thoughtful and bowed her head, supporting her chin on her heavier hand. Musingly she continued, ‘I can think of only two possibilities: if the information Cowl extracted from you is true, then Sauros will become vulnerable when it shifts, and the torbeast my brother is now summoning will kill everyone in it. Thereafter, it being impossible to shut down the wormhole without catastrophe, the beast will then push through to New London and to the Heliothane Dominion.’
‘They’ll be able to deal with it there, won’t they?’ asked Polly.
‘That I very much doubt,’ said Aconite. ‘It will kill billions and destroy New London, thus causing that catastrophic shutdown. Most likely resulting vacuum will then kill it, but it is tough and, should it survive to somehow reach Earth or the solar colonies, billions more will die.’
‘Option one don’t sound so good,’ said Nandru. ‘You got anything better?’
‘Maybe this is a trap. Perhaps, having lured the beast out fully, the Heliothane will use some sort of nuclear conflagration to destroy it. Even so, I don’t see how the destruction of Sauros can be avoided, followed by the consequent collapse of the tunnel, which in turn would result in the destruction of New London — so achieving the same result. This leads me to think that maybe option one is the only one—no Heliothane plot, just my brother winning this battle at least.’
To Tack the second option seemed the more likely, and he wondered why Aconite was so dismissive of it.
‘Why would that happen? Why would New London be destroyed?’ Polly asked.
Tack knew the answer to that one. Keeping under rigid self-control he said, ‘Remember I mentioned how interested Cowl was in what Saphothere said: “if the wormhole was independently collapsed, the energy surge would vaporize New London.” Sun tap and wormhole are inextricably linked, and the hole is drawing in so much energy that if it collapsed, that energy would have to go somewhere else. The life of New London, in such a case, would be numbered in seconds.’
‘Then what should we do?’ Polly asked.
‘Nothing,’ said Aconite, turning away. ‘It is not our concern.’
Watching her go, Tack could not fathom the hint of amusement in her expression, but he knew how absolutely she was wrong. What he hadn’t told her confirmed this for him, but he had no wish to tell her now. He hoped that the Heliothane succeeded in whatever plan they were pursuing, if only it resulted in the death of this damned Cowl. That would be repayment for what the being had done to Tack himself, would end the slaughter of the torbearers, and maybe even end the war. His silence, now, best served that purpose, and anyway he had no trust of any sibling-on-sibling conflict—getting involved on any side of that was the way to find yourself branded the enemy, and have them both at your throat.