The Final Nexus
by David Clarke
Chapter 6
I woke up for the second time that morning at the same time as everyone else, and by the time I'd got washed and dressed and had helped Declan to do the same the door to the staircase was wide open once more. Sam and Ron carried Declan's chair back down to ground level while Jack and I carried Declan, and then we all went to the eating-hall for breakfast. As this was a farm I wasn't particularly surprised to see that eggs, bacon and sausages were on the menu, along with fresh milk that I suspected had still been inside a cow an hour or so earlier. I suppose strictly I should have avoided the meat, but, as I've mentioned before, we never observed the religious diet at home, and I thought it would be a good idea to build up my strength a bit, just in case I ended up having to run later in the day.
While we were eating the director appeared, spoke quietly to Jack for a few seconds and then came and sat next to me.
"I can't come with you myself," he said, "but I've arranged for a couple of my comrades, people who know London a bit, to accompany you. And I've asked Jack to find a couple of boys - preferably ones who can afford to miss a day's schooling - to come along as well, to help you with the chair and basically keep you company."
"Thanks," I said. "Except... schooling? Isn't it Sunday today?"
"Sunday? What.... Ah, that's the old calendar, of course. We don't have those days any more. The calendar was reorganised after the revolution. Now we work for four days and then have a rest day - the five days together are called a quinnick. There are six quinnicks in a month. Anyway, yesterday was the rest day, so today it's school as usual for most of the children here.
"So, once you've finished eating take your friend and wait outside the main entrance. Everyone else will meet you there."
So after breakfast Declan and I went to the main entrance of the building, and a few minutes later Sam and Ron came and joined us. Sam in particular looked very happy.
"I've never been to London," he told me. "In fact I've never been further away than Southampton, so this is going to be really interesting."
"I don't suppose the journey will be, though," I replied. "I hope you've brought something to read, because I should think it's going to take quite a long time."
And when two men and a woman came to join us five minutes later my expectations sank even further, because one of the men was driving a wagon that looked like something out of a John Wayne film, except that in John Wayne's day the horses were probably younger and fitter than the two pulling this wagon looked. In fact they looked almost old enough to have been John Wayne's co-stars in Stagecoach.
The two men hoisted Declan's chair into the wagon while Sam, Ron and I somehow managed to get Declan himself aboard without dropping him. There was a bench running lengthwise along each side of the wagon, so the four of us sat down while the adults got onto the driver's bench and coaxed the ancient animals into a semblance of life. And as we ambled out of the farm I found myself thinking that we'd be lucky to make Andover by nightfall, never mind London.
But once we were out of the farm the horses settled into a steady walk, and while they weren't going to break any speed records we were at least moving steadily along, rather faster than I would have been able to move on foot. And the scenery was nice, too: we had the river on our right, and once the town fell away behind us we were in green countryside. It wasn't all that warm, of course: this was the beginning of January, after all. But the sun was shining, and Declan and I had left home dressed for winter, so we were warm enough. I wasn't so sure about Sam and Ron, because they were wearing their best not-quite Boy Scout uniforms, and that included shorts, but neither of them complained. At least they both had warm-looking jackets over their olive shirts and red neckerchiefs. And they were both wearing berets, too, which probably helped to keep their heads warm.
After about ten minutes we left the river and went up a steady hill, but the horses kept moving, so at least it looked as if we weren't going to have to get out and push every time we came to a slight incline. I had no idea of local geography: I assumed we'd be following the route of the modern A303 and M3, which would take us past Andover and then via Basingstoke and Camberley to the south-west borders of London. If I read all the way there I expected to finish all three of my books before we got there, which would leave me nothing to read on the way back, so I decided to ration myself: I wouldn't start reading until we'd been travelling for an hour. But well before an hour had gone by we came into another small town, and at the far side of it the wagon came to a stop outside what was clearly a railway station.
I suppose I was so used to travelling on electric trains, or diesels, that I'd simply forgotten that the railways predated both: steam power had been around for nearly two hundred years. In any event, we were clearly going to get to London rather faster than I had anticipated.
The ticket office looked like the sort of thing you find on preserved railways - no machines of any sort, just a hatch in the wall with a man behind it selling tickets. The man who had been driving the wagon didn't come into the station - apparently it was his job to take the wagon back to the farm - and while the remaining man and the woman were sorting out the tickets we went through onto the platform.
The station was called Porton, and it wasn't very big - just the two platforms, which again looked like something out of a film, mainly due to the complete absence of any sort of plastic. The benches were wooden, and the clock above the platform was a great big solid-looking thing that probably had to be wound up by hand every evening. And the train, when it arrived fifteen minutes later, was also a museum piece: the engine was a large (4-6-0, Sam told me, though I've never been particularly interested in steam engines), green-painted affair, belching smoke and steam at us as it went past, and the carriages were old-fashioned even by the behind-the-times standard of the old manual-door ones only recently withdrawn in my own world. They were divided into compartments of six seats each, but because Declan's chair took up a bit of room the two adults decided to travel in the next compartment, leaving the four of us alone and unsupervised. And, as there was no corridor, we'd obviously have to stay that way, between stations at least.
It turned out that Ron hadn't been to London before either, so he was looking forward to it as much as Sam was, and their excitement was infectious. Declan hadn't done a lot of travelling, come to that, and while I'd done rather more than I wanted over the past year and a half, even I had to admit that there was something about travelling in a steam train - whether it was the smell or the way the smoke drifted past the window I don't know, but it was still sort of fun. And, after all, this was a lot more comfortable than the wagon, and a great deal warmer, too - there was some sort of heating system in the carriage, and it worked so well that before the train even reached the next station we had all taken our jackets off.
And apparently Ron still felt too hot, because at that point he pulled a pack of cards from his pocket and challenged us to a game, saying that he wanted a chance to get Declan and me back for what had happened to him the previous evening.
"I want to make you two strip," he told us, shuffling his cards vigorously. "I think it would be funny to make you undress on the train - if you're really unlucky you'll have to do it just as we get to a big station, where there'll be lots of people to laugh at you."
"I seem to remember it was you who got laughed at last night," I pointed out. "How do you know that won't happen again?"
"That was just luck! You just got a lot of fluky cards, that's all. It won't happen again. So, are you up for it, or are you chicken?"
"Oh, we're definitely not chicken," I said. "But I like Sam and I don't want to see you drag him down with you, so why don't we play something that doesn't use partners?"
I was giving Declan a rapid translation as I went along, and he of course had no objection at all to playing card games - he could be certain that he wasn't going to lose whatever happened, unless it was a game of absolute chance, like the one we'd played with Godfrey, Peter and the twins. And when Ron suggested poker Declan agreed in a flash.
"Good," said Ron. "I'm looking forward to seeing how you two like finding yourselves with no clothes on in a public place."
"How are we going to play?" I asked. "Are we going to strip as we go - you know, lowest hand has to take something off after each round? Only that might be a bit risky - what would happen if we arrived in Basingstoke with all four of us in our underwear and someone tried to get in our compartment? I think we'd probably get into a lot of trouble."
"Well... perhaps you're right," he conceded. "Let's just keep the score, and the first person to lose ten times has to strip. And then we'll count up how many lives the others have got left - so if you've lost seven times you've got three lives left - and the loser has to stay bare for that number of minutes."
Sam and I agreed to that, and I translated it into Arvelan for Declan's benefit, adding that I thought that it would be nice if Sam and I didn't lose too often.
"Oh, no," said Declan, grinning at me. "We're going to play this game straight, with no cheating. Well, not too much cheating, anyway!"
Suddenly I felt a lot less confident: would Declan hang me out to dry? I knew he'd enjoyed making me do forfeits back at the Home... But it was too late to back out now, because Ron had already put the cards on the seat between himself and Declan and was inviting us to cut for deal.
I'd discovered the previous evening that Declan could actually hold his cards in his left hand, so he was able to manage things on his own - in fact he managed well enough that he won the first three hands, which was more than enough to make me suspicious, especially since I lost two of them. But when I glared at him he just smiled innocently at me - at least, I think it was meant to look innocent...
The game went on, and by the time we'd played ten hands I was starting to think that maybe I was misjudging Declan, because by then the losses had evened themselves out. The train had stopped at a couple of stations, but nobody had come near our compartment and we were able to play on in peace. Even when we got to Andover there were hardly any travellers waiting on the platform, and I was starting to think that we could probably have played the traditional way after all. All the same, I wasn't going to suggest it, but Ron had obviously come to the same conclusion, because he did, and when the rest of us expressed doubts he called us a bunch of chickens.
"Don't worry," said Declan when I translated this for him. "I'm sure I can persuade anyone who tries to get in here to use a different compartment instead."
I wasn't entirely convinced, but on the other hand I supposed it would be sort of exciting and so I allowed myself to be persuaded.
"Great!" exclaimed Ron. "Oh, now you're going to pay!"
We removed enough items - shoes and socks to start with - to cover the number of times we had lost so far and then started playing again. And still the game was fairly even, and I couldn't tell if Declan was manipulating things or not - I was fairly sure that he could 'persuade' me to break up a winning hand if he wanted to, but if he did that he was very skilful about it, because I was completely unaware of it.
Two more stations went by, and now it was starting to get interesting: Sam and I had only a couple of items each left, while Declan had three and Ron had four - and he was making a lot of noise about it, too, threatening to push the loser out onto the platform at the next station after they lost. But Sam was obviously enjoying the game, too, even though he was in danger of losing, and I wondered if Declan was manipulating emotions again as he had back at the Home.
"Only a little," he said, surprising me and at the same time reminding me that he could read my thoughts effortlessly. "Sam's a little worried about being caught, so I'm suppressing that a bit. But that's all - they're genuinely having fun."
Sam lost again, and then I lost again, and now Ron was threatening to push both of us out of the train at the next station. I was fairly sure he wouldn't, and equally sure that Declan wouldn't let him even if he tried, but it's hard to think positively when you're only wearing a pair of boxer shorts. Actually my boxers had both Sam and Ron staring: Sam was wearing a pair of white briefs, and I supposed that coloured boxer shorts were unknown in their world.
And then Ron lost twice in a row, reducing him to his shorts and briefs, and at that point the taunting dried up.
"Do you want to stop?" I asked him.
"Of course not! I want to see you standing on a station platform in the nude, with nowhere to hide - and probably I'll push Sam out with you, so you can both fight over one pair of underpants. Whose deal is it?"
Sam picked up the cards, shuffled and passed them to me to cut. This was where I hoped Declan would do something to make sure I didn't lose. He himself still had three things on, so it looked as though he wasn't going to lose, but I was getting nervous. But he just sat there looking inscrutable, and when I looked at my cards I realised I was on my own here: I was looking at a handful of rubbish.
"Five," I said to Sam, who grinned at me and gave me five new cards, and at least these included a pair of jacks - which turned out to be good enough to beat Sam's pair of eights.
"Hard luck, Sam," said Ron. "But I really want a chance to get even with Jake and Declan, so can we keep playing until two more people have lost?"
"I don't mind," I agreed. "Dec?"
Declan apparently didn't mind either.
"What about me?" asked Sam. "Can I keep my pants on until two more people lose?"
"No, I don't think so," said Ron. "Take them off. And you have to keep playing, too, and every time you lose from now on it'll be an extra five minutes before we let you get dressed again."
Sam didn't seem too worried: I suppose he knew Ron well enough to realise that there was no chance of him really being pushed out of the train. So he slipped his briefs off without argument, even though he turned out to have an erection. It wasn't a bad size, either, considering that he still had no hair: it was probably around eleven centimetres long (or call it four and a half inches, since this society used the old imperial measurements) and it looked very hard.
"Sammy's all excited," commented Ron. "I wonder which of you two he fancies?"
"How do you know it isn't you?" I asked.
"Oh, it isn't me. I can tell it's one of you two... perhaps we'll find out in a moment. It's Declan's deal, I think."
Declan could deal, albeit a little slowly, though one of us had to shuffle for him. So I did that and he dealt me yet another pile of rubbish, except that this time I didn't even manage to muster a pair when I took five new cards. At the end of the hand I sighed and pulled my boxers off, and immediately I started to get hard, too.
"Nice one," commented Ron. "And from the way he's staring, I think you're the one Sam fancies. What do you reckon, Sam?"
"It's big, isn't it?" said Sam, who seemed unable to tear his eyes away. "And you've got lots of hair, too. Why does the end look like that, though?"
"It was done when I was a baby," I said. "Some families do that in my world."
I could have explained why, of course, but bearing in mind that this world was not merely atheistic but had apparently demolished all the places of worship as well, I thought it might be safer not to talk about religion. Maybe that's a bit cowardly, but right then it seemed sensible.
"You can admire it later, Sammy," said Ron, shuffling the cards. This time Declan lost, which brought him level with Ron again. I helped him take his shirt off, and the other two stared at his wasted left arm.
"It's been like that since I was born, and no, it doesn't hurt," Declan told them through me. "It's a damned nuisance, but I'm used to it by now."
I lost the next hand, and Ron was quick to tell me that it would mean an extra five minutes before I could get dressed again. Then Sam lost the next one, and Ron changed his mind.
"We'll let you both off the extra time if you kiss each other, like I had to do with Jack," he offered.
"Well..." I began, but Sam quickly said, "Yes, all right!" and that decided it. Ron made us stand up, but there was a six-inch height difference, which, combined with the swaying of the train, would have made it awkward for us, and so instead he told me to lie down on the seat and let Sam lie on top of me. And that worked a lot better.
For a couple of seconds I held back, thinking of Stefan: kissing other boys when naked was something I didn't think I ought to be doing. But then Sam's lips met mine and I stopped worrying about it, because it felt sensational. I don't know whether Declan was doing anything to influence the way I was feeling or not, but having Sam's warm body pressing against mine felt amazing. So did the way his erection was rubbing against my body...
I put my arms around him and held him, and for a minute or so everything else melted away: I was no longer aware of Ron and Declan watching us, or of the movement of the carriage, or anything else, just of Sam's closeness and warmth. And I would probably have remained in that blissful state indefinitely if Declan hadn't leaned across the aisle and shaken my shoulder.
"I don't want to worry you," he said, "but we seem to be coming into quite a big town."
The look on Sam's face as he lifted his face away from mine suggested that he had been as lost in the experience as I had been myself: he looked as if he had just been woken up from a deep sleep.
"I don't think we should let them get dressed," said Ron, grinning at me over Sam's shoulder. "After all, we haven't finished the game yet. Go on, Jake, ask Declan if he agrees with me - and don't change the question!"
So I relayed the question, and Declan, the bastard, actually thought about it for a few seconds. But then he said that he thought we should put our trousers back on - "I might be able to stop anyone getting in the compartment," he went on, "but it would probably be sensible to cover up just in case I can't."
To be fair to Ron, he didn't argue, though he did say that we could only have our trousers and nothing else, not even our underwear. So we quickly pulled our trousers on, got the rest of our clothes out of sight in our bags and then looked out of the window as the train drew into Basingstoke station. I was still nervous, because although we were just about decent we were all still bare-chested and barefoot, and that would almost certainly have provoked questions if anyone had got in with us.
We sat in the station for a nerve-racking five minutes. At one point a man did seem to heading our way, but he stopped a couple of metres short and veered off to one side, having presumably decided - or been persuaded by Declan - to choose a different compartment instead. After that nobody came close, but I was still greatly relieved when the train started moving again.
"Right, now you can take them off again," said Ron. "You don't have to keep kissing -unless you lose again, of course.... It's Declan's deal, I think."
Sam and I had lost our erections while we were sitting nervously in the station, but Sam's started to return as soon as he took his shorts off, and of course that got mine interested again. I shuffled for Declan and waited for him to deal, and of course now that it was too late he dealt me three aces. In fact Ron lost that hand, and the one after, and that was effectively the end of the game.
"You're so lucky," said Ron to Declan as he removed his briefs. "But I'm still going to get you back: we'll play again on the way home. Anyway, I suppose we might as well get dressed now."
He picked up his briefs again, but Declan stopped him.
"You shouldn't get away with losing that easily," he said. "I think you three should play one more hand. The winner can get dressed, but the other two have to stay naked until we've stopped at three more stations."
I translated that, and Ron didn't look too enthusiastic.
"Chicken!" I added, and that did the trick.
"Right," he said, "but if you two lose you'll have to do some more kissing. After all, you both lost before I did."
So we played another hand, which Ron won comprehensively, and as soon as he was dressed he got Sam to lie down on top of me again. And once again the touch of his lips on mine drove everything else out of my head, and the next thing I knew was Ron tapping me on the shoulder and telling me to wake up.
""We're in another town," he said. "It might even be London, so I suppose you'd better get dressed."
He helped Sam to sit up, and I managed to stand up and get my bag down from the luggage rack. The first thing I put on was my boxers, and the second was my watch, which seemed to have gone haywire.
"What time is it?" I asked Ron.
"Half past ten. You two were lying there for over half an hour. We didn't want to disturb you because you looked so sweet."
I stared at him. I couldn't remember anything about the last half hour at all, just that it had felt warm and relaxing and exciting at the same time, and that it had been amazing. Ron was trying to look superior, but there was another expression that was slipping through...
"He's jealous," Declan told me. "He was feeling something of what you two were feeling, and he wishes he could feel like that, too. So do I, if I'm honest, because that was pretty deep. All right, I did help it along a little, but I don't think I really needed to. It was fairly clear before we even started playing that Sam likes you a lot, and now I think he's in love with you. So it's a good thing you like him too, isn't it?"
"Yes, but... bloody hell, Dec, I'm spoken for!"
"Not at the moment, you're not: your Stefan isn't even in the same world as you. Besides, you were happy to share my bed, so I know you're not strict about only having one partner at a time anyway. And quite right, too - that's a stupid attitude.
"Look, you know you're not going to stay in this world indefinitely: you're only here for as long as it takes to find a way back to the world you belong in. So if someone's prepared to offer you friendship while you're here, why not take it? I would."
I thought about that as I got dressed. It was true that virtually all of the worlds I'd been in - certainly the ones I'd liked most - seemed not to set great store on exclusive relationships, and it was also true that it might be a long time before I found my way back to Stefan. And it was also the case that I'd got physical with other boys since Stefan and I got together: Alain, the Grey boys Haless and Issin, Harlan, Terry (and Caradoc) - and of course I'd played sex games with Declan and the other boys at the Home in Sarutaale. But in every case that had just been sex... well, perhaps it was a bit deeper than that with Harlan, but even so...
But this felt different, somehow. Although we'd been naked, this hadn't been about sex, but about closeness. There was no denying that I liked Sam - his enthusiasm, his cheerful attitude, his inquisitiveness, and his intelligence were all attractive, and physically he was really good-looking: he had eyes of the same sort of green as Nicky and Hansi, and I've always found eyes of that colour attractive. His hair was a nondescript mid-brown and cut fairly short, like that of all of the boys I had met in this world, but he had a little splash of freckles across his nose (I also like freckles) and a stunning smile, and all in all I found it amazing that such a perfect boy could be interested in me...
The train stopped as I was tying my shoelaces, and when I looked out of the window I found that this was Kingston, so we still had a while to go before we were in central London. I looked at Sam and he smiled at me, not seeming remotely embarrassed about what had happened. And at that point I decided that Declan was right: I wasn't going to be in this world for very long, and it would be stupid to push Sam away. And so I returned the smile, and he scooted closer to me, and I put an arm around his shoulders and gave him a quick hug.
The train started moving again, and about half an hour later we reached Waterloo. By then I'd discovered that this version of London was substantially different from mine: the buildings alongside the tracks were mostly drab, dirty-looking tenements, interspersed with warehouses and occasional factories. And when we emerged from the station it looked even less like my world, because there were no cars, just large numbers of horse-drawn vehicles. In theory the lack of cars ought to have made the air clearer, but it wasn't: instead there was a pall of smoke over everything, and I realised that virtually every building was probably using coal for heating - at least, every building seemed to have chimneys that were contributing to the general haze.
Joe and Karen, our two adult escorts, led us out of the station. Declan's chair was getting some funny looks, and after we had gone a hundred yards or so Joe suggested that I should push the chair, rather than letting it move under its own power, since that would look rather less strange. So I took up position behind the chair and pushed it, though for some reason that didn't entirely stop the peculiar glances of passers-by.
After a bit we turned onto Westminster Bridge, and here at least was something that looked familiar: the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben looked exactly the same as in my world. But the smoky atmosphere and the horse-drawn vehicles made it feel more like being inside a Sherlock Holmes story. The only jarring note was that a large percentage of the passers-by were wearing the same near-military jackets and trousers that Joe was.
At the far side of the bridge we kept going for a short distance and then turned right into a cul-de-sac, at the end of which was a monolithic office block. We had to carry Declan and his chair up the flight of stairs that led to the entrance - whoever had designed this place hadn't been told about wheelchair ramps - though once we were inside the building and had passed the security desk just inside the entrance we discovered that things were a little easier: at least someone in this world had got around to inventing the lift. We travelled up to the tenth floor, where we were met by a couple of armed guards who escorted us along a corridor and into a waiting room.
After about half an hour a woman pushed a trolley into the room and served us all with sandwiches (a very basic cheese or a very basic ham - they might have invented the lift, but apparently nobody had invented a decent sandwich) and a cup of tea served from a teapot and using a tea-strainer the way my granny did it - granny didn't believe in teabags, and neither, apparently, did the Marxist civil service. Though, to be fair, the tea tasted quite good.
Then we waited some more. We were just starting to wonder if anyone would be offended if we got the cards out again when a guard came in and asked Joe to go with him, so at least it looked as if someone was aware that we had arrived. And fifteen minutes later the same guard came back and asked the rest of us to follow him.
He took us down a corridor and into a large conference room, most of which was taken up by a long oval table with nineteen chairs around it, though not all of them were occupied: twelve of the chairs were in use, holding nine men and three women, all of whom were wearing some sort of non-dress military uniform. And I recognised the one at the head of the table: Sir Aubrey, who today looked even more like Grand Moff Tarkin than he had in his portrait, because now he was also in uniform. The guard directed us to a set of chairs beyond the far end of the table, one of which was already occupied by Joe, and told us to sit down.
Sir Aubrey himself said nothing, leaving it to an elderly woman in glasses to conduct the interview.
"Good afternoon," she began. "I am Edith Leamington Five, Commissar for Science and Technology. Would you introduce yourselves, please?"
I let Karen, Ron and Sam go first, and then I said, "I'm Jake Stone of Harrow..." I thought my place of birth would cause less eyebrow-raising than the main alternative, which would have been Milhüsa. "And this is Declan of Sarutaale. I'm afraid he can't speak English."
"And why is he in that chair? Was it the result of an accident?"
"No, he was born disabled," I told her.
For some reason that caused a murmuring around the table, though Commissar Edith ignored it and went on, "We understand that you claim to come from a different world - a claim, I should say, that the Director of Amesbury Two gives some credence to. If he did not you would not be here. So we'd like you to tell us what brought you here and where you came into our world."
"She doesn't believe it," said Declan quietly. "Not do most of the others. They think we're wasting their time."
"Do you have a map of the area west of Amesbury?" I asked. "I don't think I'll be able to show you exactly where we arrived, but I can probably get fairly close."
The man on Sir Aubrey's left got up and left the room, presumably to look for a map. I decided to carry on.
"Some scientists in Declan's world have been doing research into parallel interchanges," I explained. "That's a place where it's possible to move from one version of reality, or of history if you prefer, to another. And apparently they cracked it, because first they took me from my world into theirs, and then later, when they opened another portal into this world, Declan and I managed to sneak through when they weren't looking. Really I want to be able to get back to my own world, but it is interesting to see someone else's world - and obviously Declan has never had a chance to see a different world before..."
"Obviously," she said. "Is there any way you can substantiate this improbable claim?"
"I expect the director told you about Declan's chair," I said. "It's mostly made of a substance that doesn't exist in this world."
I helped Declan to move to one of the spare chairs alongside mine and then pushed the wheelchair over to the conference table.
"This is called plastic," I said to the Commissar. "It comes in different types - soft, like the cushion and the back of the chair, and hard, like the handles at the back and the little joystick here on the right armrest that Declan uses to control it. See for yourself. And it's powered by a battery - Sam, why don't you tell them about that?"
Until now Sam had been sitting quietly, trying not to be noticed: normally he never met anyone important. But now his enthusiasm overruled his nerves, and he quickly opened the panel at the back of the chair, disconnected the battery and put it on the table.
"This is a Volta pile," he said. "But it's far stronger than the usual type - and look how well the top fits on! You could use this almost anywhere without it breaking or spilling the acid."
Sir Aubrey got up and came to have a look, and at that the rest of them followed suit. I stepped back out of the way and let Sam show them the battery and explain about it only needing distilled water for top-ups.
"And apparently these last for years!" he ended. "Isn't it amazing?"
"Yes, I should say that it is," agreed Sir Aubrey, thoughtfully. "And clearly this 'plastic' has a great many possibilities, too.... You'd better tell us a bit more about the place where this chair was made, I think. Do the people there have a large army?"
Apparently Sir Aubrey had moved straight through acceptance of the existence of another world into wondering if it could be successfully invaded.
"Big enough, I think," I said. "And of course their military technology is quite advanced, too. And they control the portal, so they could close it at any time."
"Then we'll just have to ask our own scientists to find a way to open one. After all, if someone else can do it, so can we."
Just like your scientists have already invented the telephone, the internal combustion engine and the electric train,I thought.
"Or perhaps we could persuade them to sell it to us," he went on.
"Well, perhaps," I said, "but there's going to be a language problem. Nobody in that world can speak English. I've had to learn the local language, and that isn't easy - as you can see, it doesn't even use the same alphabet as we do." And I indicated the label on top of the battery.
"I see. Then perhaps the best thing to do would be to get our scientists to take that apart, analyse its composition and work out how to make it themselves," he said, looking at the battery. "And they could do the same thing with the different types on the chair."
"Yes, but... I mean, Declan needs his chair - he can't move without it," I protested.
"Well, I suppose we could just take samples. But you can push the chair, so he won't need the Volta pile. Ah, here's the map you wanted..."
His colleague had just returned with a number of maps, one of which covered the area around Amesbury. I had no intention of telling them where we had really come through, of course: at the moment it looked as if the only way out of this world would be back through the same portal, and I didn't want to find our access to it blocked by either the Marxist army or a mob of political negotiators. So instead I traced a path back past Stonehenge and then followed a smaller path a couple of miles south and west of the monument.
"It was somewhere round here," I said, indicating a piece of woodland. "I'm afraid I can't be more exact, but it was somewhere around that point. We'd been walking for about an hour and a quarter when Sam and his friends captured us, and that was in this wood here - wasn't it, Sam?"
Sam checked the map and confirmed that this was indeed the West Wood, where we had first met.
"All right," said Sir Aubrey. "Now I'd like you and your friends to go back to the waiting room while we discuss what's to be done about this."
So we went back to the waiting room - and this time Joe came with us - and sat about for the best part of an hour, before one of the guards came and summoned Joe back on his own. And while he was gone a couple of studious-looking types came in and cut some tiny samples from various parts of Declan's chair. They were careful about it, only taking small amounts, but they were thorough, too, making sure they had a sample of each different type of plastic.
Joe came back just as they were finishing up. He waited until they had gone and then told us that the council had no more questions for us at the moment, and that we could go back to Amesbury.
"They said that if they have any urgent questions they'll send a telegram, but that one or more of them will probably come out to visit us and to look for the place where you crossed over in a week or so," he went on. "I just have to go back for five minutes or so to collect a despatch they're writing now for our director. Get your things together so you're ready to leave as soon as I get back."
"I don't like the feel of this," Declan said quietly, once Joe had gone. "It's not just the way they completely ignored me, either: there was a lot of hostility around that table."
"Really?" I said. "Are you sure? They seemed all right to me."
"It wasn't you they were hostile to. It's not because I'm a foreigner, because otherwise they would have been the same with you, but they weren't - at least, I don't think so. Perhaps they just don't feel comfortable around people in wheelchairs. I know there are people like that..."
"I'd trust your feelings over mine any day," I said. "Okay then, perhaps it's time we headed back to your world."
"How? I'm immobilised now that they've pinched my battery, unless you're thinking of pushing me all the way."
"I will if I have to, but we can get a bit closer before I start, I think. If we manage to keep the adults out of our compartment on the way back it'll be easy enough: all you have to do is shut Sam and Ron down - as long as you can do it without hurting them, of course - and then we'll be able to slip off the train in Andover. It shouldn't be too hard to find someone with a wagon, and then you can persuade him to drive us back to Stonehenge. We know that communication is pretty primitive in the world, so there's almost no chance of them being able to alert anyone before it's too late."
"That sounds good. And even if the adults do come with us I think I should be able to send them all to sleep. They won't wake up until the train reaches the terminus, wherever that is, and by that time we should be almost back home. But do you think it'll be safe for you to come back? If they've missed us, your copper's going to be pretty mad at you."
"I don't think he'll be half so angry if I go back of my own accord," I said. "If I tell him we just wanted to explore a bit and then come back I might be okay. Of course, if Irfan asks me about it I could be in more trouble, but even then the fact that I went back voluntarily should help. And we'll be able to tell them quite a bit about this world, too, and that has to count for something."
Privately I wasn't sure that this was true. Although I hadn't left the Arvelan world with the clear intention of not going back, it's certainly true that if there had been even a sniff of another portal in this world I'd have taken it. And so if Irfan asked the wrong question I could still find myself in trouble. But I wasn't sure that I wanted to stay in this world, either. Okay, I liked Sam and Ron and the other boys I'd met, but this was still a world lacking in modern conveniences, and I had the clear impression that all that awaited most of the boys when they left school was a life of manual work on the farm. And that wasn't my idea of the perfect career.
I was reasonably confident that the plan would work: in fact it would work best if the adults travelled with us, since that way Declan would be able to send them to sleep, and by the time the train reached its destination - which if we were really lucky might turn out to be Exeter, Plymouth or even Penzance - we'd be long gone. But in the event we never got the chance to find out.
Joe came back ten minutes later, looking very happy with life.
"They were pleased with us for finding you two and bringing you here," he told me, "and so they've fixed it for us to go home in style. They've arranged for us to travel on the Irish Mail."
That didn't mean anything to me. I assumed it was a fast train heading for a port on the west coast somewhere, but I was wrong, as I discovered when we were led out of a rear door to the building and out into a large open space - in the middle of which an airship was tethered. It was about the size of the one I'd flown in while we were in Vogesia, but it looked more old-fashioned, somehow.
"What does it use for lift?" I asked Sam, quietly: I assumed he'd be likely to know, and I was right.
"Hydrogen, of course!" he replied. "You don't think it would work with just hot air, surely?"
"No, I was rather hoping it would use helium," I said, seeing a nasty mental image of the end of the Hindenburg.
"Helium? But that's quite rare, isn't it?"
"I suppose it probably is in this world. I think most of it's in America, and as you don't have any contact with them... oh, well, I suppose they don't crash that often..."
"What, airships?" Sam looked shocked. "Of course they don't! They're very safe - I don't think I've ever heard of one crashing."
"Yes, but since you don't have radio or TV I don't suppose you hear of very much that doesn't happen in Amesbury, do you?"
"Well... no, not really, unless it's something that affects us - like if the quotas are increased, or something. Then the director tells us at mealtimes. So... are you saying airships are unsafe?"
"No, not really. Actually they haven't been used in my world since 1937. I've travelled in one in another world, though - though I think that one used helium."
In fact I didn't know whether the Vogesian ship had used helium or not, but since there was regular contact with the USA in that world I'd just assumed it did. Still, the sky was clear and there wasn't a lot of wind, and so I supposed it would be safe enough. And once we were aboard and it had started its ascent I stopped worrying about it and just enjoyed the view.
London seemed to be rather smaller in this world, and there was an almost abrupt boundary between the edge of London and the surrounding countryside. In my world the built-up area continued beyond the M25, following the motorways, but of course in this world there weren't any, and once we left the city behind the scene below the ship was one of open green fields, woodland and the occasional village or small town.
None of the other boys had ever flown before, and they loved it, staring out of the gondola windows, pointing excitedly at the villages below and marvelling at how small everything looked, We probably weren't that high, in fact - after all, there were no aircraft flight paths to avoid, so there was no need to fly higher than five or six hundred feet. I doubted that the engines would have the power for too much work, anyway. When I asked Sam about the power supply, he was happy to tell me all about it.
"There are four rotators," he said, "and they run off Volta piles - it's safe enough to use them in an airship, of course, because there are no big bumps or sudden movements. They're in the third gondola, so you can't see them from here, but perhaps they'll let us look when we land. There are an awful lot of them, though - maybe if our scientists can use Declan's one as a base they'll be able to design something more efficient, and that'll give the ships a greater range. As it is they have to change them over halfway through the journey.
"The crew are mostly in the first gondola, and passengers travel in this one. That means that we don't get in the crew's way."
And it also meant that Declan couldn't 'persuade' the captain to land us anywhere other than at a proper airfield. Not that he would have been able to do anything on this trip, because we weren't the only passengers: with us in the gondola were one of the Council members ("Dan Dublin Industry Eight" was how he introduced himself) with three guards, and two other men in a rather more formal military uniform. And that was far more people than Declan could send to sleep at one go.
So I settled back to enjoy the flight. Without the main roads to guide me it was hard to make out exactly where we were, but the view was interesting: I could see a dusting of snow on some hills off to our right - the Chilterns, I thought - and further on we flew over a couple of towns, one of which I thought had to be Basingstoke, though really it was impossible to tell from up here. And then the airship started to descend.
It was starting to get dark by now, and I thought that it might be possible for us to slip away, especially if Declan was able to shut down our adult escort: I hoped that Ron and Sam wouldn't do anything to stop us. But that hope was dashed as soon as we landed: apparently a telegram had been sent, because the director and three other adults were waiting to meet us. They had brought a couple of wagons with them, and soon we were aboard and on our way back to the farm - and it only took ten minutes, because the airship had landed right on the edge of Amesbury.
Once again it looked as if we were stuck where we were...
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