“What are we testing?” he said, his voice a whisper so low only she could have heard it.
“It’s a… device,” she said, turning back to Swinburne Island. Hall watched her face; it was like she was looking at something else, the way her eyes were unfocused, the way her mouth was open, her lips just a hair apart, like she was watching fireworks on the Fourth of July or admiring a priceless work of art.
“It’s the Russians, isn’t it?” Hall knew it. “The Reds are coming, finally.”
And suddenly he felt… better. Those Communist bastards. This was it. War… the curtain was going up on World War Three, and the United States of America, God bless her, had a goddess on her payroll.
Hot dog.
Now he understood. This was a threat, a very real one, the logical culmination of world events since 1945. And… OK, the Director of Atoms for Peace was a goddess with powers to match, but dammit, she was American, and she was here, asking for his help, here to show him the magic tricks her team had been working on.
“Are you feeling all right, General Hall?”
Hall blinked. She was smiling at him. He straightened his back, and raised his chin.
“Never better, ma’am.” He fought the urge to salute; his hand twitched by his side, and his vision went fuzzy at the edges.
God bless America.
“Now, Madam Director, we’re all eager to watch this demonstration of the… device. Can you fill us in on the specifics?”
The Director’s smile didn’t falter, and after a beat she turned and looked back towards the test rig. Hall followed her gaze, squinting into the bright morning. Then he raised his binoculars again. The device glinted in the sunlight, hardly anything more than a shining star in Hall’s vision.
“It is called a fusor, General,” the Director said. “It’s a portable nuclear fusion reactor, which operates by direct injection of ions into the containment field. The power output approaches maximum when the ion velocity-”
“OK,” said the General, waving a hand. “I’ve got it. You’re here to test a nuclear reactor.”
The Director inclined her head with a smile. “Not exactly, General.”
“A portable reactor, you say? Is it intended as a civilian or military power source?”
“Neither,” said the Director. “The fusor is powerful energy source. But it has another application, one I am here to show you. Recommence the countdown.”
Hall turned to the technicians at the desk behind him, but they were shaking their heads. At the back of the marquee, Hall saw the countdown clock resume even as the technician was giving the directions to his colleagues.
“Sir,” said the technician, “the countdown has recommenced of its own accord. Recommend we-”
Hall held up his hand, and the man stopped. He looked at the Director, but her attention was fixed on the test rig. “Sir?”
“Stand-down. We’re good to go,” said Hall. “I think the Director has this under control.”
“Sir. T-Minus fifty — five-oh — seconds and counting. Goggles down.”
The General and his staff donned their protective eyewear. Through the dark smoky glass it seemed to Hall that Evelyn shone even brighter, her blue glow electric in his eyes. He could see the pulse on her neck quicken as the countdown neared its end.
Hall glanced down at the folder of briefing papers in front of him. He flipped it open and, leafing through, found a summary of the fusor’s blueprints. It was a cylinder, and not a very big one either, about the size of a small artillery shell, no more. The General didn’t know the expected yield of the device, but he had to assume they — and the good people of New York — were far enough away from ground zero.
“Ten… nine… eight…”
Then Hall looked at Evelyn, and she turned to look at him. She stared into his eyes, and he felt the cold spread. Through his goggles her eyes were aflame, glowing, smoking coals, tendrils of energy drifting out of the featureless sockets. Her lips parted as she smiled, and Hall saw she was glowing inside, smoke wafting out of her mouth.
Hall’s chest felt tight. He couldn’t breathe… he couldn’t think… she was beautiful and she was dead and she was… she was incompatible, and she was not here, not really. These thoughts crashed through Hall’s mind. He didn’t know anything about her, but he could feel it, feel her presence like waking up in the middle of the night to find the covers being pulled off and a dead, cold weight sitting on the middle of your chest. The eyes under the bed, the something evil in the closet, the creaking floor downstairs.
Hall wanted to run, to grab a boat and get to Swinburne Island, where he could go up with the test, end it all, his very existence unendurable misery. And still he looked at her, and still she smiled, and Hall remembered the fear and remembered the dark when he’d got lost in the wood when he was four years old.
“Three…two…”
She turned back to watch. Hall felt the tears pooling inside his goggles.
“One!”
There was nothing for a second, and then the test rig — Swinburne Island itself — vanished into a featureless white light. The staff around Hall flinched, some even looking away as others, despite the goggles, raised their arms in front of their faces to shield themselves from the brilliant intensity. Hall’s eyes were wide, as was his jaw, as he watched. He’d seen atomic tests — most people under the marquee had — so he knew what to expect: the flash, the roar, the pressure wave, the heat, and then the spectacle of the expanding spherical cloud that would evaporate in seconds as the famous mushroom cloud of death slowly rolled skywards.
This… this was different. The flash of light was brighter, but the explosion was quieter, the pressure wave not so intense. Standing in the light, the Director was suddenly a person, her skin pale but alive, her clothes no longer monochrome but blue and green, her scarf white. She was wearing make-up: the lipstick a bright red, matching the nail polish on her hands. The blue halo was gone, and for a second it looked like she was standing on the ground, not floating above it.
Hall turned back to the test. The white light faded, replaced by rolling oranges and reds as the explosion cloud collapsed and a column of smoke rose directly upwards. As Hall watched, he saw lightning flicker within the column, arcs shooting both up and down. Of the other artificial island in Lower New York Bay, there was no sign.
Through his goggles he could see the blue glow of the Director beside him; she was as she was before — not a woman, but a ghost and a god.
Then the pressure wave arrived, and Hall didn’t see anything else for a while.
THIRTY-TWO
When Rad opened his eyes, all he saw was green.
He sat up with a yell and rubbed his eyes, but the green was still there. He ran his hands over the ground beneath him: it was smooth, like glass, a little wet under his fingertips, and very cold. Ice. It was a dark night. He was outside. The King’s magic lantern was back on.
He shook his head and looked around. He was lying in a narrow alley in Harlem, and there was a man standing in front of him, wearing a tight, leathery coverall. A helmeted head tilted as the man regarded Rad on the alley floor.
Rad swore and pushed himself backwards until he hit something soft. He turned, sliding on his backside, and saw the prone form of Jennifer Jones lying next to him on the sidewalk, up against the wall.
Rad spun back around, and tried to replay the last few minutes. He remembered the light, he remembered Kane getting out of the box, and then…
He looked up at the man standing over him wearing the leather base of the Skyguard’s suit — without the armor plate, or cloak. The Corsair must have been wearing it underneath the chauffeur's uniform.
“That better be Kane Fortuna in there.”
The man waved his hand dismissively. “Oh, that guy?” he said, and then he laughed.