He opened the window as much as it would allow—which was not a lot—and let some of the wonderfully cold exterior air come in. Despite the smell, it calmed his stomach a bit, but he still found himself shaking his head back and forth over and over again.
He thought about the question his beloved Adikor had asked him upon his return from his first visit to this world: “Are they good people, Ponter? Should we be in contact with them?”
And Ponter had said yes. The fact that there was any further contact with this race of—of murderers, of warriors—was his own doing. But he’d seen so little of their world the first time, and…
No. He’d seen plenty. He’d seen what they’d done to the environment, how they’d destroyed vast tracts of land, how they bred unchecked. He’d known what they were, even then, but…
Ponter took another restorative inspiration of the chill air.
He had wanted to see Mare again. And that desire had blinded him to what he’d known about the Gliksins. His nausea wasn’t caused by the shock of what he’d just learned, he knew. Rather, it was caused by the realization that he’d deliberately suppressed his own best judgment.
He looked again at the Peace Tower, tall and brown with some sort of timepiece near its apex, right at the heart of the seat of government for this country he was in. Perhaps…perhaps the Gliksins had changed. They’d created this organization he would visit tomorrow, this United Nations, specifically, so its charter had said, to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.
Ponter left the window open, moved over to his bed—he doubted he’d ever get used to these elevated, soft beds the Gliksins favored—and lay down on his back, arms behind his head, staring at the swirling plaster patterns on the ceiling.
Ponter and Tukana, accompanied by Hélène Gagné and two plainclothes RCMP officers who were serving as bodyguards, were taken by limousine to Ottawa International Airport. The two Neanderthals had both been exhilarated by their earlier flight from Sudbury to Ottawa: neither of them had ever seen the terrain of Northern Ontario—which was the same mixture of pines and lakes and shield rocks as in their version of Earth—from such a wonderful vantage point.
At first, Ponter had felt some inferiority in light of all these advanced Gliksin technologies—airplanes and even spaceships. But his research last night had made him realize why these humans had progressed so much in these areas; he’d gone back to exploring various articles in the encyclopedia.
It was a central concept for them, deserving of its short designation.
War had made—
Even the phrases they used to describe these breakthroughs were martial.
War had made the conquest of air, the conquest of space, possible.
They pulled up to the terminal, Hak noting the irony of this term’s double meaning. Ponter had thought the building the miners used for changing clothes was huge, but this massive structure was the largest enclosed interior space he had ever seen. And it was packed with people, and their pheromones. Ponter felt woozy, and also rather embarrassed: many people were openly staring at him and Tukana.
They dealt with some paperwork formalities—Ponter didn’t quite follow the details—and then were led to an odd oversize wicket. Hélène told him and Tukana to remove their medical belts and send them down a conveyor, and also to empty the storage pouches on their clothing, which they did. And then, at Hélène’s gesture, Ponter walked through the wicket.
An alarm immediately went off, startling Ponter.
Suddenly a uniformed man was waving some sort of probe over Ponter’s body. The probe shrieked when passing over Ponter’s left forearm. “Roll up you sleeve,” said the man.
Ponter had never heard that expression before, but he guessed its meaning. He undid the closures on his sleeve, and folded back the fabric, revealing the metal and plastic rectangle of his Companion.
The man stared for a time at this, and then, almost to himself, he said, “We can rebuild him. We have the technology.”
“Pardon?” asked Ponter.
“Nothing,” said the man. “You can go on ahead.”
The flight to New York City was quite brief—not even half a daytenth. Hélène had warned Ponter both on this flight and yesterday’s that he might experience some discomfort as the plane descended, since the air pressure would be changing quickly, but Ponter didn’t feel a thing. Perhaps it was a peculiarly Gliksin affliction, caused by their tiny sinus cavities.
The plane, according to an announcement over the speakers, had to divert to the south and fly directly over the island known as Manhattan, to accommodate other air traffic. Crowded skies, thought Ponter. How astonishing! Still, Ponter was delighted. After having his fill of hearing about war last night, he’d turned to the encyclopedia’s entry on New York City. There were, he discovered, many great human-made landmarks here, and it would be wonderful to get to see them from the air. He looked for, and found, the giant green woman with the dour expression, holding aloft a torch. But, try as he might, he couldn’t spot the two towers that supposedly rose above the surrounding buildings, each an incredible hundred and ten stories tall.
When they were at last on the ground, Ponter asked Hélène about the missing—he found the word poetic—“skyscrapers.”
Hélène looked very uncomfortable. “Ah,” she said. “You mean the World Trade Center towers. Used to be two of the tallest buildings on the planet, but…” Her voice cracked slightly, which surprised Ponter. “I—I’m sorry to have to be the one to tell you this, but…” Another hesitation. “But they were destroyed by terrorists.”
Ponter’s Companion bleeped, but Tukana, who had clearly been doing research of her own, tipped her head toward Ponter. “Gliksin outlaws who use violence to try to force political or social change.”
Ponter shook his head, once more astonished by the universe he’d come to. “How were the buildings destroyed?”
Hélène hesitated yet again before responding. “Two large airplanes with tanks full of fuel were hijacked and deliberately crashed into them.”
Ponter could think of no reply. But he was glad he hadn’t learned this until he was safely back on the ground.
Chapter Sixteen
When she had been eighteen, Mary’s boyfriend Donny had gone to Los Angeles with his family for the summer. That had been before widespread e-mail or even cheap long-distance calling, but they’d kept in touch by letter. Don had sent long, densely packed ones at first, full of news and declarations of how much he missed her, how much he loved her.
But as the pleasant days of June gave way to the heat of July, and the sweltering humidity of August, the letters grew less frequent, and less densely packed. Mary remembered vividly the day one arrived with just Don’s name at the end, standing there alone, not preceded by the word “Love.”
They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. Perhaps it does in some cases. Perhaps, indeed, it had in the current case. It had been weeks since Mary had last seen Ponter Boddit, and she felt at least as much, if not more, affection for him than she had when he departed.
But there was a difference. After Ponter had left, Mary had gone back to being alone—not even a free woman, for she and Colm were only separated; divorce meant excommunication for both of them, and the process of pursuing an annulment had seemed hypocritical.
But Ponter had only been alone when he was here. Yes, he was a widower, although that wasn’t the term he used for it, but when he’d gone back to his universe, he’d been surrounded by family: his man-mate Adikor Huld—Mary had committed the names to memory—and his two daughters, eighteen-year-old Jasmel Ket and eight-year-old Megameg Bek.