‘And then?’
What then? She shrugged. She could see that was probably the point at which their paths finally parted. She knew, if Liam was released from any duty or obligations, the time and place he desperately yearned to get back to: he’d be the Sheriff of Nottingham again – that or return to the high seas to become a pirate king once more. Especially if he had Bob by his side.
And what about me?
Nothing quite so ambitious. The dungeon would feel just dark, damp and depressing if it ended up being only her and Becks and that stupid yellow robot living there. She wasn’t going to stay there. And she certainly didn’t want to come back here and be one of the few survivors hacking out a meagre existence – all dust and acid rain.
She could spin a globe, throw darts into a spread-out map, randomly flick through the pages of a history almanac … or she could go somewhere in particular. Find a certain someone who might feel something for her. Someone who might give her a very ordinary, very unremarkable, very happy life.
And what about Becks? Well, first she’d better follow Waldstein’s advice and get her to trash the lab. Then, maybe with a timed charge ticking down to destroy the machine behind her, perhaps she’d let Becks choose her own somewhere to live out her unnaturally long life. Mind you, she had no idea when and where Becks would choose. There’d been several places they’d explored recently that seemed to have awakened her imagination: the savannahs of Africa, the jungles and rainforests. Perhaps she’d enjoy living among the bonobo chimps in deepest, darkest Africa … Perhaps she’d become some kind of female Tarzan.
Maddy smiled at the thought of that. She turned to Becks to suggest that as an idea, but instead found her staring at her.
Becks’s eyes were wide and round. Her jaw hung slack and open. She looked startled.
‘Becks? What’s the matter?’
Her grey eyes settled on Maddy. ‘The decryption-lock condition has just been satisfied. That … or it has just been removed.’
‘What?!’
‘The message, Maddy … the message that was embedded in the Holy Grail. I can now reveal the entire message to you.’
CHAPTER 55
Liam felt the cool embrace of chaos space: tendrils of white mist reaching out and enveloping him. That nauseating, vertiginous sensation of falling, having nothing firm beneath his feet and yet having no visual features to indicate he was falling or, for that matter, travelling in any particular direction.
Just this linen-like, tissue-thin shroud all around him. Endless. Infinite emptiness.
And silence. A perfect silence.
Sometimes chaos space took him and spat him out in a heartbeat. Sometimes, like now, it held him in there, seemingly reluctant to let him pass through and go. Reluctant to be left alone once more. Or did it just feel like that? If there was any way to reliably measure the passage of time in here, he wondered whether the duration would always turn out to be the same, and that it was just his perception of the time that had passed that varied so much.
First time, he’d been terrified.
But this time? What was this … his thirtieth, fortieth time? Now it was an almost soothing sensation. He wondered if it was akin to the reports of return-from-death experiences he’d read about in a trashy magazine back in New York. The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Perhaps when people died … somehow something was left behind in here – call it a soul, call it a spirit, call it awareness – and that very last essence of a life travelled through this, on its way to … somewhere.
Liam …
A whispered voice. He knew who it was. Partly he was scared … partly he was relieved.
‘Sal?’
Yes. Through the mist a ghostly outline began to form. As it grew more distinct, his fear ebbed away and he found himself smiling sadly. Sal. Not some nightmarish creature. She drifted closer and became more defined. Her dark hair floated as if she was suspended beneath water; there was her small oval face, those dark eyes.
‘I thought I’d never see you again.’ He realized his smile had come with tears. ‘I’ve missed you.’
I miss you too, Liam.
‘Are you … alone?’
She nodded. In here … everyone is alone.
Somehow he knew this time around there was no need to be frightened. There wasn’t that sensation of crackling energy held back by force of will, no menace lurking behind, held at bay by her fondness for him.
‘Sal … I wondered if I was ever going to see you again.’
Outside … we can fade. But in here … it’s forever. Her ghostly face cocked with half a smile. It kinda sucks.
The undulating, ethereal outline of a hand reached out towards him. He touched the tips of her fingers, knowing that he was safe. He sensed coolness. Not a burning, vengeful energy.
You look so sad.
‘I’m so … sorry …’ he replied. ‘Back in that cave, I wanted to help you find peace.’
Thank you for trying, Liam. For not being frightened of me. For staying a while. Her cool, ghostly fingers stroked the back of his extended hand. I loved you … you were always my favourite.
‘I wish …’ He felt his throat tighten. ‘I wish there was a way out for you.’
She shook her head. Her dark hair floated in slow motion. There’s eternity in here, or brief existence as a monster out there. Those are my choices.
‘I wish I could do something for you.’
She looked away from him, at the mist around them. End this.
‘Chaos space?’
She nodded. Eternity … an afterlife … isn’t that what everyone hopes for when they die? That there’s a forever after? Something more?
‘It’s what people call Heaven.’
Heaven isn’t this, Liam. Heaven is rest. Peace. Sleep. An end to just being. Can you help me have that?
‘Oh God, Sal … I just wish I knew how to –’
This … She looked around again … chaos space, it should never have been. It’s a net that catches us. A cage that will never let us go.
Out of the mist Liam saw other shapes beginning to form. Their faint outlines grew clearer as they slowly drifted towards him. Faces … men, women, children. Dozens. Hundreds. Fading out into the mist … thousands. None of them seemed threatening. None seemed to be aware of any of the others. All of them lonely ghosts making a solitary plea to him.
If you care for me, Liam … let me die, whispered Sal. Let me go.
She suddenly cocked her head, reached a hand out and touched his face. You’re crying, Liam. She smiled sadly. Thank you for not being afraid of me.
He felt the warmth of tears on his cheeks. ‘Why would I? I loved you too.’
Then, please … help me sleep.
‘How?’
You, me and Maddy, we found the start of it … and now you’ve found the other end, haven’t you?
‘Yes.’
Find a way, Liam. Please make it stop …
‘OK, Sal.’ He nodded. ‘OK … I’ll try.’
Thank you. She stroked his cheek again. And afterwards … will you do one more thing for me?
‘What?’
Live what you’ve got left, Liam. Don’t waste a precious second of it.
CHAPTER 56
Liam landed with a heavy thump into darkness. Perfect darkness. He looked around, trying to find something to see. No dazzling vertical beam of light. Nothing. Complete darkness.
‘Bob?’ he whispered.
There was no answer.
‘Bob? You there?’
Nothing but the sound of his own breath and the thud in his ears of his own beating heart. The antithesis of chaos space. A featureless black instead of a featureless white.
It took him a moment to realize his orientation was completely wrong; he wasn’t even standing. He was lying flat on his back. His hands probed the ground. It was soft. Then he realized it wasn’t the ground; it wasn’t a hard, smooth surface but a coarse material. He lifted himself on to his elbows an
d heard a soft creaking beneath him. He was on a bed.
‘Hello?’ he called out. His voice bounced back at him. Not, as he’d expected, awash with the reverberation of a large void, but the bounce-back of a much, much smaller place.
‘Hello?’ he called again.
He heard something else. Faintly. A muted clattering rumble from above. Vaguely familiar.
I’ve heard that sound before.
Something else: the soothing sound of heat fans whirring. The clicker-click of computer hard drives. The faint wail of a distant police siren. His eyes were adjusting to the complete darkness, and now he could see the faintest pinpricks of green lights that flickered along with the clicking.
A light snapped on above.
He saw a low brick archway above him, crumbling mortar and perishing bricks beneath flecks of white paint, a light in a wire cage dangling from a foot of electrical flex.
Jay-zus. This is our old archway.
He heard the clack of footsteps coming from somewhere out in the darkness. Approaching him.
‘Hello? Bob? Is that you?’
The footsteps on hard concrete. The clink of ceramic against ceramic. Then, out of the darkness, a figure finally emerged. ‘Coffee?’
Liam’s eyes rounded. The old man was holding a tray with chipped mugs and a carton of doughnuts. He set it down on the end of the bed, then sat down.
‘Foster?’
He smiled kindly. ‘Hello, Liam O’Connor.’
‘I … I don’t understand.’
‘I know this must feel very strange to you.’
‘This … this is how …’
‘How it all began for you? I know.’ He looked around. ‘This, I believe, is your first real memory. Waking up here, in this place.’ He turned back to Liam. ‘Your first real properly experienced memory, that is.’
‘How … am I here? How are you even alive?’
‘I’m afraid I’m not who you think I am. I’m not Foster. But you can call me that … if it helps you.’
Liam tapped the frame of the bunk. ‘This was my bed. This is our old archway in New York.’
Foster shook his head. ‘No … It’s an illusion. Our best attempt to present you with something you can understand. Your first proper memory, Liam.’
‘Where … Where am I? Where’s Bob?’
‘Bob? The other one who entered the field with you? He’s not here right now. It’s just you and me.’
‘I’m … back here in the past? Right?’ He looked up at the archway. ‘Beneath Jerusalem?’
‘No. You’re in a pocket of space. Our own little universe, if you will. Just this place, you and me. It was created so that you and I can talk.’
‘Who … who the hell are you?’
‘I’m a projection made in the image of your friend, Foster. But who am I really? Well –’ he settled back against the wall – ‘I have a story to tell you. Would you like to hear it?’
Liam nodded.
‘Once upon a time …’ He smiled. ‘That’s how you begin a good story, isn’t it? Once upon a time,’ he continued, ‘there was a universe. An infinite universe. At first it was lifeless. Then just over seven billion years ago it began to come to life; chance encounters of amino acids in bubbling pools of heated water.’ He smiled. ‘The story of life always starts the same way on every world, you know, Liam. In a muddy pool. We wind the clock forward seven billion years, and, Liam, the universe is inundated with life.’
‘No, it isn’t.’
‘Oh, but it is. Billions of worlds, humming with life. Among them, millions of worlds populated by intelligent beings. And, among them, many thousands of races who have surpassed humanity on their way to a fully enlightened intelligence.’
He passed Liam a mug of coffee.
‘But there have been those races that have been a cause for concern. Those with a particular agility of mind to understand the universal language of science. Like genius children, they are so very advanced in one particular thing, and yet so very childlike in all other matters.’ He shrugged. ‘And that, I’m afraid, typifies humankind … the archetypal talented child. An enfant terrible.’
Foster patted Liam’s arm. ‘You are not the only ones. There have been others. And they have all been dealt with in a similar manner. Isolated, quarantined.’
‘Quarantined?’
‘Kept out of harm’s way.’
Liam frowned. ‘We’re a danger?’
‘To other intelligent beings? Yes, of course you are. Humanity is capable of incredible things: your ability to comprehend multi-dimensional space, to construct music more beautiful than any other species. But you are still children, dangerous children, naive enough to destroy your own world. To harvest its resources to depletion, to kill each other when your opinions or philosophies differ. To allow humanity into the greater universe would be inviting a shark into a bathing pool, a wolf in among the sheep. I’m afraid … your race still has so much growing up to do.’
Liam gazed down at the mug of coffee in his hands. It felt real. ‘Who the hell are you?’
‘We are those who’ve been entrusted. You can think of us as Caretakers.’
‘And what right do you have to judge others?’
‘Oh, we were judged in our infancy, I assure you. Judged by others who came before us. Who also called themselves “Caretakers”. A long time ago.’ He smiled. ‘It’s a very, very old universe, Liam.’
‘So … you … are you the ones who made those transmitter things?’
He nodded. ‘We did. Those “transmitters”, as you call them, are what hold you in this state of quarantine. Everything – your world and everything you can see from your world, the sun, the planets, the stars, all of it – just like this space we’re sitting in, exists in an isolated pocket. A pocket universe.’
Liam narrowed his eyes. ‘I’m not sure I …’
‘We identified the period of your timeline in which humanity experienced its greatest growth spurt of knowledge. Approximately the last two thousand years. During this period of time the pursuit of scientific knowledge and your understanding of it increase exponentially. It explodes. In such a short period of time, your species goes from understanding the concept of the number zero … to understanding zero-point energy. From the simple wheel to the Hadron Collider. From the bow and arrow to the fusion bomb. In that respect, you are a truly remarkable childlike species that has entered an accelerated puberty.’
‘And dangerous?’
‘Yes. Quite dangerous. To allow your species out just as you are …?’ He shrugged. ‘I know your last history so very well. How humans have interacted with the less technically advanced. For example, how Native Americans and Maoris fared, not so very well, after the arrival of men in sailing ships.’
‘Our last history?’
‘Yes, Liam. Your pocket universe has been going for quite a while. The last two thousand years have been looped through a number of times. And every time round you have proved to us the same thing … that you just can’t be trusted. You can’t be released from captivity. You seem unable to grow up.’
‘So … what’s going to happen to us?’
‘Are we going to destroy you? Is that what you’re asking me?’
Liam nodded.
Foster smiled. ‘No. We’re not barbarians. We’re not Old Testament angels of vengeance and destruction. We want you to join us. We want you so very much to rejoin the greater community of this universe. We want you to succeed. But … you’re just not ready.’
‘So … what? This looping thing goes around again?’
He nodded. ‘That is what has been happening. These transmitters, as you call them … they are our device for doing this. They are your quarantine.’
‘The beam and, wait …’ Something occurred to him. ‘Is chaos space something you people created?’
‘Chaos space? Is that what you call the field?’ He nodded slowly and smiled. ‘Perhaps that’s not such a bad name for it. Yes,’ he acknowledged
with a sigh. ‘It’s a dangerous, non-cardinal dimension, a place … a regrettable place but a necessary by-product. It has to be handled so very carefully. Which is why we had to intercept a certain person I think you may know?’
‘Maddy?’
‘Is that one of your colleagues?’
Liam nodded.
‘No … earlier. The very first human to dabble with time travel.’
‘Waldstein? My God! Are you talking about … Roald Waldstein?’
‘Yes. The man is a perfect example of what I have been talking about. A brilliant, exceptional mind, but … even then, capable of childlike, irrational behaviour. The prodigy of a species that isn’t ready. His discovery and manipulation of this artificial dimension – chaos space, as you call it – was a problem we had to deal with. He was using our field in a way that it shouldn’t be used.’
‘Time travel? Are you saying time travel?’
‘I’m saying time travel is possible only because of the field we created. Chaos space. Waldstein was not the first. There have been those in previous loops, equally brilliant minds, who chanced upon the field, discovered it could be manipulated and harnessed to allow a person to travel through time.’
Foster sighed. ‘And therein lies the big moral dilemma for us. The issue that has been troubling us for a while now.’
‘What dilemma?’
He got up off the end of the bunk. ‘Liam, are you ready to dispense with this illusion? I constructed it so that we could talk more easily. So that you would not be unduly alarmed at my intervention. Will you come with me to a real place?’
Liam nodded. ‘Where are you going to take me?’
‘We’re going where you intended to go.’
‘The transmitter? Beneath the temple?’
‘Yes. I would like to show you something.’
Liam stood up. He looked around at the darkness beyond the pool of light. ‘Do you have a portal or …’
‘No. We’ve no need to actually travel.’ He spread his hands. ‘Because we’re already there.’
CHAPTER 57