NECROM

"That's okay, you did your best."

"I wouldn't worry too much. Another dimension shouldn't be so bad. A lot of them are very like our own."

" Have you ever been to another dimension?"

Windemere shook his head. "No, but…"

"So let me worry."

As soon as he'd said it, Gibson felt bad. Windemere had done his best for him and he didn't need to be on the receiving end of Gibson's panic and anger. After the near snub, Windemere turned to the streamheat to hide his resentment. "Where are you taking him?"

Smith looked at Windemere as though it was hardly any of his business. "A nearby semiparallel."

Gibson detached himself from Christobelle. "What's a semi-paiallel?"

"A dimension very like this just twelve or so points across the divides."

Gibson's face hardened. "I know it's company policy to not tell poor dumbfuck Joe Gibson anything if you can possibly help it, but since we're going to have to be traveling together, I'd suggest you start talking to me in terms that I can understand. We'll get on a whole lot better if you do."

Smith had the expression of a woman who'd been pushed far enough. "Okay, Gibson, this is the start of the first lesson. Semiparallel dimensions are those in very close tuning, ones that follow paths in the time stream that are only slightly divergent."

"How divergent?"

"Some parallels are very close, varying in only minor details. Others have undergone radical changes at some point in the past and, although they follow similar courses and share a broadly common pattern of events, the differences are major."

"And this one?"

"There are some significant differences."

"Like what?"

Klein answered this question with a grin. "Like this one never had a World War II the way that you did here."

Gibson thought about this. "It must have slowed them down some."

Smith looked puzzled. "Slowed them down?"

"Yeah, think about it. Here in this dimension, we went from the first powered flight to a landing on the moon in a little over sixty years, just one human lifetime, and a hell of a lot of the momentum for that dizzy surge of progress was World War II."

Smith nodded as though surprised that Gibson should have the brains to come up with an idea like this. "In fact you're right. The UKR in many ways resembles North America in the fifties."

"The UKR?"

"United Kamerian Republics. Our destination will be the capital city of Luxor. We have a primary installation there."

Gibson was thinking about something else. He turned to Klein. "The fifties?"

"Similar."

"Did they invent rock 'n' roll yet?"

Klein shook his head. "I really don't know."

Smith looked sourly at Gibson, clearly disapproving of this flippancy about rock 'n' roll. "There is a footnote to the lesson."

Gibson didn't like the sound of this. "Yeah? What's that?"

"You are now in my charge. The transition to Luxor can be either easy or hard. I suggest you remember that."

Gibson's gaze didn't waver. "So I've been warned, have I?"

"Indeed you have."

Gibson and Smith continued to stare each other down until Windemere stepped into the conversation. "How do you intend to make this transition?"

Smith finally turned away from Gibson. "We have to go to the south of Germany."

Windemere frowned. "Why Germany?"

"We have access to a hidden transition substation in the Bavarian Alps. It was built by the Nazis in 1944 with some extradimensional help. I believe it was designed to be an escape route for Adolf Hitler at the end of the war. Later it was carrier plugged and modernized."

"Did Hitler actually use it?"

Smith shook her head. "I've no idea."

French was eyeing Smith and frowning. "Should you have told him all that?"

"Any harm that could be done has been done already."

Gibson was thinking again. "How are we getting to Germany?"

"I imagine we'll have to take a scheduled Lufthansa flight to Munich and drive from there. There isn't time to do anything fancy."

"Isn't that kind of exposing ourselves?"

"Perhaps, but it can't be helped."

Windemere laughed. "You don't have to do that. There's a transition point just a couple of hours out of London."

Smith's eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"

"It's a very ancient one, near a village called Glastonbury. It' s under a pyramid earthworks

"Are you sure about this?"

"It's been there for fifteen thousand years."

Smith was not quite buying the idea. "You've used it?"

Windemere shook his head. "Not me, I've had quite enough fun to keep me busy here, but I do know a couple of individuals who have."

Gibson stuck his iace into the conversation. "They came back intact?"

"They looked okay."

Smith glanced at French and Klein. "You think we should take a chance on this?"

Klein shrugged, but French looked doubtfully at Windemere. "I don't think we should trust either it or him."

Now it was Gibson's turn to start running out of patience, "You don't trust Windemere but you're prepared to trail all across Europe with me being a sitting duck for whatever may turn up next to have a shot at me? That's real smart, French."

Klein nodded. "I hate to say it, but I think Gibson's right,"

Christobelle joined in. "I don't know if I'm supposed to have an opinion, but I also think Gibson's right. You say your orders are to get him to this Luxor place alive, and it would seem obvious that the less he's exposed to danger the better."

Smith actually looked worried. "I'd use the transition point in a moment, if I thought that it would actually take us to where we wanted to go."

Windemere poured himself a drink and then did the same for Gibson. "I imagine that it would be a damn sight more reliable than a bunch of botched-together Nazi mad-scientist gear. This is superbeing hardware. I don't know how much you people have studied this dimension, but that stuff was supposedly built to last to infinity." He glanced slyly at Smith. "Of course, if you don't know how to operate the ancient stuff, maybe you'd better stick with this Kraut setup of yours."

Smith wasn't going to let Windemere's slur on her competence go unchallenged. "I think what we'll do is go to this Glastonbury place and see what's there. If it doesn't seem right, we can always fall back on the Bavarian transition point."

French still wasn't happy. "Suppose Windemere's sending us into a trap of some kind?"

"That's a chance we'll take."

With a decision made, Smith got down to the details. "How long will it take us to drive to this place?"

Windemere put down his drink. "Two, maybe two and a half hours, but you could be there a lot faster if you used the lays."

"The lays?"

"The laylines, imposed tracks of magnetic force also laid down by the superbeings. This whole island is riddled with them. The Glastonbury Tor, that's the name of the earthworks, is a major convergence. Any line in southern England will take you right inside. I assume you have a Cody Groove?"

Klein nodded. "Sure, its hard-wired into the subframe of the Caddy."

"So all you have to do is hook into the wavelength and that's it. If you don't have a computer that can figure it, I'm sure one of mine can. Why don't you come down to my study and I'll show you some charts

Windemere and the streamheat left the room. Gibson and Christobelle were alone.

Gibson put his hands on her shoulders. He suddenly felt a great deal of warmth for the woman. "You think we'll see each other again?"

"I'm optimistic."

Gibson raised an eyebrow. "You mean that?"

Christobelle looked him straight in the eye. "Yes."