'Daddy! Daddy!'
Alexander is crying.
Ryan is unable to move. Cold light falls on the dancers. They come closer to the ship, closer to Ryan, standing terrified at his window.
'DADDY!'
Ryan hears the insistent voice and frowns. Is Alex really up?
Ryan smiles. The boy was never one to stay in bed if he could help it.
But Alexander Ryan is not in bed. He is in hibernation.
The dancers dance on.
They are not real. Ryan realises that he should give his attention to his son, not to the illusory dancers out there in space. They can't get in. They can't confront him. They can't take off, in one terrible gesture, the glasses which encircle their eyes, revealing...
'GET BACK TO BED ALEX!'
They are very close now. The music slows. They are just a few paces from the ship. They turn to face Ryan with their blinded eyes. Slowly they take a step.
One step...
Two steps...
Three steps towards Ryan.
They are clustered, some thirty of them, a foot from Ryan, standing just outside the window. And then Ryan realises with greater terror that it has been an illusion. The dancers were not outside. What he was seeing was a reflection in the window. The dancers are actually behind him. They have been in the ship all the time. He dare not turn. He stares instead into the mirror.
They stare back.
Then Ryan sees the other. Behind the crowd of dancers are his friends and relatives. All stare at him from blank eyes. All stare at him as if they do not know him. As if, indeed, he does not exist for them.
Josephine—her plump face expressionless, her blonde hair tumbling to her plump shoulders, cruel in her indifference.
His two sons, Alexander and Rupert, startled expressions in their round eyes. Uncle Sidney, his stringing arm gripping the two boys round their thin shoulders, his lips drawn back in a snarl, his eyes on an object somewhere above Ryan's head.
There are the Henry twins, one healthy, one tired by pregnancy, but hand in hand and staring through Ryan with identical hazel eyes. There is Tracy Masterson, looking vacuously past Ryan's left shoulder. There is Fred Masterson, Ryan's oldest friend, a sympathetic expression on his face. There is brother John, puzzled, tired, uncomprehending. There is Isabel, looking bitterly at John.
There is James Henry, red hair gleaming in the mirror-light, glaring meaninglessly through Ryan.
And as he looks, Ryan sees the dancers in front take their last step towards him. He wheels to face them.
He stares into the cool, orderly control room. The screens, the dials, the indicators, the instruments, the computer console.
Grey and green, muted colours, quite...
He looks back at the porthole. There is only blackness.
In one way this seems worse to Ryan. He begins to beat at the porthole, howling and cursing.
'Where are you? Where are you? You shits, you cunts, you bastards, you bleeders, you fuckers, you horrors...'
They are there again. Not the dancers. Only his friends and relatives. But they still cannot see him.
He waves to them, mouths friendly words at them. They do not understand. They come a little closer.
And suddenly Ryan feels their malice, is shocked and horrified.
He looks at them and his expression is puzzled. He tries to signal to them—that they know him, that he is their friend.
They crowd closer.
'Let us in!' they cry. 'Let us in. Let us in. Let us in. Let us in. Let us in. Let us in. Let us in.'
The clamour around the ship increases. Hands claw at the window.
Hands tear their way through the fabric of the porthole.
'You fools! You'll destroy the ship. Be sensible. Wait!' Ryan begs them. 'You'll bring the deaths of all of us! Don't—don't— don't!'
But they are ripping the whole of the wall away, exposing it to frigid space.
'You'll wreck the expedition! Stop it!'
They cannot hear him.
His throat is tight.
He faints.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ryan is lying on the floor of the control room. His sleeve is rolled up and an ampoule of ICC Proditol lies near him. The ampoule is empty.
He blinks. At some point he must have realised what he had to do to stop the hallucinations. He is impressed by his own strength of will.
'How are you now?'
He knows the voice. He feels fear, then relief. It is his brother John's voice. He looks up. His jacket has been folded under his head.
John, stalwart and stolid, looks down at him.
'You were in a bad way, old son!'
'John. How did you wake up?'
'Something to do with the computer, I think. There's probably an emergency waking system if anything happens to the man on duty.'
'I'm glad of that. I was a real idiot to carry on on my own. I realised everything else about my condition except the extent of the strain. I was insisting to myself that I didn't need anyone else to help me.'
'Well, you're okay now. I'll help you. You can go into hibernation if you like...?'
'No, that won't be necessary,' Ryan says hastily. 'I'll be able to manage now I've got someone to share my troubles with.' He laughs feebly. 'It's just plain old-fashioned loneliness.' He shudders. He still thinks he can see things in the corners of his eyes.
'I hope.'
'Of course,' says John. He is convinced, he isn't just trying to humour Ryan. John was always a hard man to convince, therefore Ryan is satisfied.
'Thank God for the emergency system, eh?' says John a trifle awkwardly.
'Amen to that,' says Ryan.
He wishes the emergency system had awakened that other member of John's family his young wife Janet. If someone had to be awake... He dismisses the thought and gets up. Being with John is almost like being alone, he thinks, for John is not the most voluble of men. Still...
Ryan gets up. John is efficiently checking the instruments.
'You'd better get off to your bed, old chap,' says John. 'I'll look after things here.'
Gratefully Ryan goes to his cabin.
*
He lies in the dark, grateful for the drug which has driven away his visions, slightly nervous of the fact that John has joined him.
John probably knows about the affair he had with Janet, John's younger wife. Perhaps he doesn't care.
Then again, perhaps he does. John isn't a particularly vengeful man, but it would be just as well to be on guard.
Ryan remembers the other affair he had. The affair with Sarah Carson—old Carson's daughter...
*
Carson's toy business had been Ryan's closest competitor.
Carson was Chairman of Moonbeam Toys and had known Ryan for years. They had both started off with Saunders Toys in the old days and had been running pretty much neck and neck ever since.
Their rivalry had been a friendly one and they often met for lunch or dinner before the habit of communal eating became unfashionable. When that happened they would still converse over the video..
Carson became a fanatical Patriot one day and, as far as Ryan was concerned, no longer worth speaking to. But by this time it was evident that the Patriots were by far the most powerful political group in the country and Ryan decided it would do him no harm to be Carson's friend. He even attended some meetings with Carson and other Patriots, registering himself as a member.
It was at one of these meetings that he met Sarah, a tall beautiful girl of twenty-two, who did not seem particularly convinced by her father's views.
Josephine was going through a particularly bad time, as were the two boys. All three of them spent two-thirds of the day under sedation and Ryan himself, though he sympathised with their problems, needed some form of relaxation.
The form of relaxation he chose was Sarah Carson. Or, rather, she chose him. The moment she saw him, she made a heavy play for him.