“The video is proof of nothing. It shows you driving through the desert and then the picture dissolves into static. All the video proves is that you yourself didn’t fire the rocket launchers that destroyed the base. We will find the men responsible, by the way.”
An apparition appeared alongside Maygar, who seemed not to notice. It stared intently at Luckman as if awaiting his next move. He didn’t know whether it was real or a figment of his weary imagination. But he had long since passed the point where he required reason to define reality. She was here. She needed him to know.
“What about Mel?” Luckman asked.
“What about her? She’s still in a coma. Another of your casualties.”
Mel’s apparition shook her head at the assertion.
“What do you mean another one?”
“You killed Clarence Paulson.”
Mel turned, walked toward the door and disappeared.
“Do me a favour and check on Mel. Something’s happened to her.”
“So you don’t deny killing Paulson?”
Luckman sighed. “I didn’t kill anyone. But why would you care if I had?”
“More evidence your mind slipped a gear out there.”
“Is that the line you’ve been peddling to the Americans?”
Maygar feigned a look of disappointment. “I see we can add delusions of grandeur to the list. What makes you think the Americans care about you? You have ceased to exist.”
“If that were true Colonel it would make me a figment of your imagination.”
Maygar might have smiled if he possessed anything resembling a sense of humour. “There’s one thing you can take credit for – the US Pacific Fleet is about to start bombing western China. Shearer’s wild claim that America wouldn’t come to our aid was dead wrong. You didn’t stop the war, Captain Luckman, you escalated it.”
Fifty-Two
Mel opened her eyes and tears immediately ran down her cheeks. The bright light was blinding and she blinked several times before the room came gradually into focus. It was a hospital room. A clear tube ran from her arm to a saline intravenous drip and a heart monitor was clipped to her index finger.
She had no idea how she had come to be here except that it had something to do with the fact that she had been in a coma. But whether the coma had come about as the natural result of her physical condition or whether it was the consequence of her desire to avoid ending up in some hellish Blank holding pen, she couldn’t recall.
She sat up, immediately catching the attention of a young male nurse.
“Hello there. You’re awake,” he noted, as if in saying it he was removing any doubt.
Mel forced a smile and nodded, disappointed and yet resigned to the fact that her return to the world had been greeted with such ignorance of the battle she had fought to do so. The white gold had been slow to do its work, because she had been administered but one small dose before the Army’s intervention. It had left her stranded for a time between the two worlds. Both were visible to her and yet for days she had existed in neither. It had taken all of her determination and willpower to avoid being dragged back into the horrible nightmare realm those poor damned souls had spun around themselves.
Tasting the firestone upon her tongue had brought her back to herself, if only for a minute. But it was enough for her to remember all that she had been. Enough to suggest to her all she might yet become.
She had recognised the nightmare for what it was – both real and unreal. A world of imagination, of an infinite manifest creativity that the Others had utilised to fashion a place for themselves. The world they called Altern.
She remembered that too.
“Yes, I’m awake.”
“How do you feel?”
“Hungry.”
The nurse appeared to be pleased with her response.
“I need to see Colonel Patrick Maygar. I have something very important to tell him,” she said.
The nurse touched her arm gently. “First things first. The doctors will want to take a look at you.”
“There isn’t a lot of time,” said Mel. “Tell Colonel Maygar I can prevent the war.”
It took longer than she would have liked to convince the doctors she was strong enough to take visitors. However, the man who appeared at her bedside was not the one she needed to see. As he opened his mouth to speak she held out her hand to silence him.
“You’re not Colonel Maygar. I will only speak to him.”
The man smiled condescendingly. “Of course I’m Pat Maygar. What makes you so sure I’m not?”
“Because your name is Peter McKittrick, and you’re not a colonel. You’re not even a soldier – you’re the Prime Minister’s chief of staff.”
McKittrick apparently failed to realise his mouth opened just enough to betray surprise, perhaps even alarm.
“He sent you to work out whether or not you should take me seriously – because the real Colonel Maygar is telling you otherwise.”
There is no way this woman could have linked his face and name, McKittrick told himself. He had only been in the job a matter of weeks, since the sudden death of his predecessor. A leak perhaps? Someone sympathetic to their pro-China cause. Unless she was something else entirely.
“I am something else entirely, Peter,” she assured him. “Some-one else entirely different – come to shatter your illusions and to draw a dark red line through everything you think you know.”
McKittrick now made no attempt to hide his shock. “You can read my thoughts?”
She smiled. He moved to speak but thought better of it, deciding it more prudent to keep his thoughts to himself.
If she truly knew my thoughts she’d know I have no illusions.
“Your world is built upon illusions – you’re in politics.”
How is she doing this? Mind-reading is just a bullshit parlour trick.
“Some illusions you believe, some ‘bullshit’ you peddle as truth to mask harsh realities. Prime Minister Taylor sent you here because he wants to know whether to listen to what I have to say. You have his answer. Now fly away Peter, and send me Colonel Patrick Maygar.”
It was another half an hour before Maygar deigned to show his face. In that time, she was at least able to gain strength from the consumption of a tasteless meal and two tall glasses of sugared water.
“I believe you want to see me,” Maygar said. He thought about pulling up a chair but decided against it when he realised it meant she would be staring down at him.
“You’ve done very well for yourself in this little coup d’etat, Colonel, haven’t you? Future looks bright. You’ve finally stepped out of the shadow of the man you’d grown to despise. The man who drove you so hard as his second in command it destroyed your marriage and once made you consider putting a gun to your temple. Not that Shearer even noticed. And now his life is in your hands. You have him locked in a cell as a traitor. Well done.”
If Maygar was surprised at the accuracy of her summary, he gave nothing away. But the longer he stared at her, the more he found he could not look away. Her eyes were like those of a predator who had cornered her prey.
She had his attention. “I want you to think long and hard by what I’m about to say. Personal ambition is all well and good – it’s been the hallmark of many a great man in history. But I don’t believe history will look kindly upon the man who knew how to stop a war and yet did nothing.”
Maygar felt as if his soul had been laid bare, like he was stark naked and vulnerable. He sat down, suddenly overcome by a sense of insignificance. “I’m listening.”
“The video I shot at the time Pine Gap was destroyed – you still have it.” She wasn’t asking, she was telling. “The evidence is on the tape. You have simply failed to find it.”