Screams filled the garden and innocent drinkers caught up in whatever was happening cowered behind tables or ran towards the pub. Geoff was on his feet, tugging at Sally’s arm.
He turned as someone said his name, a bearded man who smiled and reached out. He carried a small blue disc — which was inches from Geoff’s chest when a golden figure slammed into the man. One second he was standing there, reaching out, and the next second it was as if he had been replaced by the self-aware entity who spun in search of other attackers.
Calmly, two golden figures walked towards Sally and Geoff, and she was startled to hear a voice in her head. “Do not be alarmed…”
The golden figures approached and did not stop, and Sally cried out as one of the self-aware entities came face to face with her and enveloped her in its warmth. She felt a sudden jolt of energy, a heart-stopping surge of power that made her gasp and cry out again.
Then she was moving, and before she knew it she had left the garden and was travelling at speed; trees and bushes passed in a blur. She tried to cry out for Geoff, and was aware of another figure at her side.
She had the impression of covering vast distances in an instant, and seconds later she passed out.
SHE CAME TO her senses and she was enveloped in blackness. She no longer felt the energy of the golden figure surrounding her. She was alone again, or rather not alone… She felt someone nearby in the darkness, reached out and with a thrilling sense of relief found a hand she knew to be her husband’s.
“Geoff!”
“Sal. We’re okay. As the golden figure said, don’t be afraid.”
“But where are we?”
It was a blackness she had never known before, total and unrelieved, and she felt nothing beneath her feet. She had the sensation of floating.
She repeated her question, and Geoff responded.
“I think I know…”
“But where?”
“Just walk.”
“How?” she almost wept.
“Move your feet. Lean against me and just move your feet.”
As she did so she had the strangest sensation of something gaining solidity beneath her shoes, as if the very action of walking had brought the ground into existence.
Light appeared ahead, an undefined brightness that suddenly exploded dazzlingly in her vision. She exclaimed and threw an arm across her face to protect herself, and she stumbled as solid ground came up to hit her feet.
Geoff steadied her and laughed aloud.
She lowered her arm and, when her vision adjusted to the sunlight, stared around her.
They were in the back garden of their cottage, beside the gate. Before them was the cherry tree and the bench. At the end of the garden the old rectory stood, mellow in the sunlight; Sally thought it had never looked so beautiful.
She stared at Geoff and whispered, “What happened?”
He shook his head in wonder. “We were saved. The golden figures saved us.”
She recalled the men and women bearing blue discs. “From what?”
“I don’t know, Sal. I honestly don’t know. All I know is that they saved us, brought us here — home… but not home.”
She stared at him. “What do you mean?”
In reply he pointed to the sky, and Sally looked up.
Only then did she see the gourd-shape of a silvery moon tumbling erratically through a sky that was a deeper blue than any she had ever seen on Earth.
Geoff took her hand and almost pulled her towards the house. They hurried down the side path, then down the garden path to the front gate.
There they came to a halt, and stared.
Their house, their one hundred and fifty-year-old rectory, was perched on an escarpment overlooking a vast rolling green plain, at once alien and yet oddly familiar. Gone was Wem; gone was the rest of Shropshire.
She turned and saw that their house was one of a dozen lining the very lip of the escarpment, each one of a different design. She made out domes and poly-carbon villas, A-frames and things that looked very much like giant snail shells.
No sooner had she cried out, “Hannah!” than a golden figure appeared on the path from the back garden, a sleeping child in its arms.
The figure approached, halted, and held out the small girl. Sobbing, Sally reached out and embraced her daughter.
The golden figure stood before them, silent, and slowly its swirling depths took on the appearance of a human being.
Kath Kemp smiled. “Welcome to Mars,” she said.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ANA ARRIVED AT the coffee shop on 34th Street fifteen minutes early.
She ordered a mocha and sat in the window seat, staring out at the passing pedestrians. She had the feeling that she had closed a door on the old part of her life, and a new door was opening. She had found Bilal at last, and in that she felt a sense of accomplishment. She believed what he’d told her about not wanting to hurt the little girl she had been, and accepted that he’d had to take the opportunity of an education when it had been offered to him. What still rankled a little was that in the intervening years he had never really attempted to seek her out. She understood that, in a way; he had his new, exciting life, and as the years passed he must have looked back on his old life, and his sister, and thought them perhaps too painful to resurrect.
Whatever, now she had found him.
A big disappointment to her was finding what kind of person he had become. While most of the human race saw the great benefits of the Serene, a tiny minority still held out. And it was just her luck that her brother belonged to this defiant minority.
It was an aspect of his character she was determined to come to understand; only when she fully comprehended his mindset, and how it had got that way, could she even begin to work out how to show him that he was wrong. He would need educating, and Ana had resolved that her long-term project would be to show her brother how right the Serene were. She would invite him to India; they would revisit their childhood haunts together, and she would show him the wonders of the wilderness city.
It would take time, but she had plenty of that.
“Ana…” Bilal smiled down at her.
She stood and they kissed cheeks a little awkwardly, like strangers. While he was at the counter, she took in his sharp black suit, his white shirt and long ponytail. She knew she shouldn’t criticise his style of dress — especially as she was wearing Western jeans and a blouse — but in these less formal times she saw his business attire as a uniform harking back to former, pre-Serene days.
He sat at her table and smiled at her. He appeared today, unlike at their first couple of meetings, a little nervous. He gestured to his coffee. “Old habits die hard. I always liked my coffee milky and sweet in India.”
“You had coffee in India?” It was a luxury she had never tasted until ten years ago.
He shrugged. “In college,” he said.
“They must have looked after you well. Quite apart from giving you a good education.”
He shrugged again. She noticed that his hands, as he stirred his coffee, were shaking. He saw that she was looking at his hand, and self-consciously slipped it into his jacket pocket.
She smiled. “I was thinking… it would be lovely if you could come to visit me in India soon.”
He nodded but did not look her in the eye. “I’d like that.”
“You haven’t been back for fifteen years?”
“I don’t cover India now, just the US. I’ve had no reason to go back.”
She sipped her coffee and asked, “So… what’s it like working for the Morwell Organisation?”
“It pays well, and sometimes the work is interesting.”
“And your boss… What’s his name, James Morwell?”