In that second, Mirren looked upon Hunter as his own personal saviour. He closed his eyes and heard the words again. Whatever capability he might have had to think logically, rationally, had deserted him. All he was able to comprehend was the miracle that Hunter had offered: a smallship to mind-push; an end to all the years of h.e.l.l he'd endured since the closure; the opportunity to once again acquaint himself with the sublime state of being attained when pushing a 'ship through the nada nada-continuum.

Caspar Fekete brought him crashing back to earth.

The Nigerian sat back in his seat and sipped his coffee, his belly straining at the material of his djellaba. Until now he had been polite in speech and manner. Mirren expected him to graciously thank Mr Hunter, maybe even celebrate the occasion by ordering a magnum of champagne.

"I wonder if you would be so kind as to answer me one question, Mr Hunter?" Fekete asked. "Why should we for one second trust someone responsible for the closure of countless Lines and the deaths of several s.p.a.cers?"

Mirren stared at the Nigerian.

"Good question, Mr Fekete," Hunter said. "Of course you have every right to be suspicious. I know I would be if our situations were reversed. The fact is that my opinions have changed somewhat since I left the Danzig Organisation."

Fekete laughed. "And you think we should believe you, just like that?"

Before Hunter could respond, Dan said, "How have your opinions changed - or more importantly why why?"

Hunter caressed his chin where the crimson growth terminated. He considered his reply. "I no longer support the aims of the Danzig Organisation - those aims being the brutal invasion of the free worlds of the Rim, the suppression of political opposition, free speech, free thought thought. The ideals I worked for in the early years are no longer the ideals espoused by the governing forum of the Organisation. I have seen too many atrocities, gentlemen, perpetrated by the Danzig militia, to sit idly by and do nothing."

Fekete clapped his hands. "Words, sir. Mere words! You've succeeded in telling us nothing and making me, for one, even more suspicious."

Dan leaned forward. Mirren sensed that Leferve wanted more than anything to trust in Hunter, but at the same time was wary of being tricked.

"Where do you want us to go," Dan asked, "and why?"

Hunter sipped his wine. He regarded the circle of ruby liquid in his gla.s.s for a long time, his face expressionless. "I am afraid that if I told you the details of the mission, then you might be in grave danger if ever the Danzig Organisation found out. I would not wish to place you in that position."

"Ridiculous!" Fekete snorted.

"So it may appear," Hunter said. "But in keeping my own counsel, I have your safety and the success of the mission in mind. I can tell you that upon arriving at your destination, you will rendezvous with the people I wish you to transport back to Earth. I envisage that you will be on the planet no more than a few hours. For this, I will pay you each, in advance, two hundred and fifty thousand units, and the same again upon the successful completion of the mission."

Fekete was shaking his head. "Farcical. No payment can compensate for the fact that we know nothing, neither what we will be doing, nor the reason why, nor the dangers involved."

Hunter hesitated. "You will be in no danger, so long as you remain in ignorance of my intentions."

"I want nothing to do with it," Fekete declared.

Hunter interrupted. "Please, hear me out. Upon completion of the mission, the smallship will become the property of however many of your team agree to take part in the venture. In effect, you will have a smallship to push as the whim takes you. Yes, it will be expensive to maintain, but with what I will pay you..."

Fekete smiled. Droplets of sweat glistened on his high, chestnut forehead. "Very generous. You overlook one small point, however. The owning and running of 'ships is illegal."

"Mr Fekete," Hunter said, "I suspect you have the ingenuity to overcome this slight consideration."

Mirren leaned forward. "Can I ask you where the 'ship is now, Mr Hunter, and when she'll be ready to phase-out?"

Disgusted, Fekete threw down his napkin.

"The 'ship is at a secret location somewhere in Paris," Hunter said. "She will be ready to phase-out when my technicians have finished their final adjustments - perhaps as soon as tomorrow or the day after, if all goes to plan."

"What about a pilot?" Mirren asked.

"I have already hired the best pilot and co-pilot to be had."

"Do they they know where we'll be going?" know where we'll be going?"

Hunter shook his head. "I cannot take the risk of anyone anyone finding out the destination." finding out the destination."

"You won't be making the journey?" Dan asked.

"I'm afraid that's impossible. I have work to complete here on Earth to prepare for your homecoming."

The band began playing E-Man Blues E-Man Blues. Mirren smiled at the song he had known so well back in the old days. "Nada is ecstasy/ I live for the ride/ And life dirtside, man/ Is hard to abide..."

Fekete said, "There's a old expression which precisely sums up this whole situation, Mr Hunter. It is my opinion that we are being sold a pig in a poke."

"Except, Mr Fekete," Hunter responded with icy formality, "that you are paying absolutely nothing at all."

"Nothing but our lives, our freedom if we're caught..."

Hunter gestured reasonably. "But you will not be caught, Mr Fekete. I have planned this venture over a long time and prepared for every contingency. I do not intend to fail at this stage." He paused there, found his gla.s.s and took a drink; as if, thought Mirren, to calm himself. He sensed that Hunter had a lot riding on the outcome of this meeting: he had set his sights on getting the best E-team that money could buy.

Hunter looked around the table. "Well, gentlemen, you have heard my side of the story - regrettably brief as it must be. I wonder if I might solicit your agreement to take part... Mr Mirren?"

Hunter's one good eye, piercingly azure, regarded him.

Mirren replied instantly. He was never in any doubt. It might have been illogical, but whatever danger he faced would be worth it for the chance to flux again. "I'm all for it," he said. "Count me in."

Hunter's halved lips rose in what, if matched by the other half, would have been a wide smile of delight. "Thank you, Mr Mirren. Now... Monsieur Leferve?"

Dan hesitated. He regarded the back of his large hands, spread on the table. He looked up. "I'll do it," he said. "But I want to see the 'ship first, check it out."

"By all means. I'll show you over the 'ship myself." Hunter's gaze found Caspar Fekete. "Your decision, sir?"

"I think I have made my position abundantly clear."

"You will not reconsider my offer?"

Fekete sighed. "Mr Hunter, I am not so desperate that I need your money; nor do I need the flux."

"In that case I regret that you will not be joining the team, Mr Fekete, but the choice is yours." Hunter turned to Mirren. "I will be in contact to arrange another meeting very soon. I'll also arrange to have the payments transferred to your accounts. Now, if you will excuse me, I must depart. I have a lot of work to do over the next day or two."

He stood and shook hands with Dan and Mirren. He turned to Fekete. "If you should change your mind..." he began.

"I have made my decision," Fekete said.

The off-worlder nodded. "Then I'll bid you farewell, gentlemen. I look forward to our next meeting." He bowed formally, stepped from the booth and walked around the gallery to the elevator plate.

Fekete was shaking his head. "You two amaze me. What possessed you? The man clearly isn't to be trusted."

"I need the flux, Caspar," Mirren said. "I need the flux more than anything else in the world. It's as simple as that."

"Me too," Dan said. "And I do trust the guy. Don't ask me why. There's just something about him. I believe him when he says he can't tell us for our own good. He's onto something big and he doesn't want to lose it."

"You'll be getting yourselves into serious trouble."

"Do you know something, Cas?" Mirren said. "I couldn't really give a d.a.m.n. I'd risk anything to flux again."

"Death? Penal servitude?"

Mirren said, "Anything."

Fekete shook his head in a gesture of patronising sympathy.

"I give in. Go your own way." He sighed and checked his watch. "I must be going. I'll leave you to your celebrations." He looked from Dan to Mirren. "You two take care, okay? And keep me posted." He left the booth and hurried around the gallery.

Mirren glanced up at Dan and saw his smile reflected as if in a mirror. He leaned back and sank into the soft membrane of the dome. He recalled spending hours in free-fall aboard the Perseus Bound Perseus Bound, colliding with the trampoline-like inner dermis of the astrodome, as if attempting to merge with the cobalt blue of the enveloping nada nada-continuum outside. He felt euphoria rise in him at the thought.

They took Fekete's advice and celebrated with half a bottle of cognac.

"Here's to Hunter." Dan raised his gla.s.s. "To Hunter and the flux - and screw Caspar!"

Mirren smiled. He was considering how his fortune had changed in just one day. Twelve hours ago his life had stretched ahead in a monotonous round of work and sleep; he'd lived so much in the past that the present was an endless time to be endured, the future an abstraction without hope. Now he was on the verge of realising a dream made possible by a disfigured millionaire off-worlder, and it was almost too fantastic to believe.

"Ralph!" Dan cried. "I feel like giving thanks."

Mirren peered at the Frenchman. It seemed like a good idea. He shrugged. "Fine. How? Where?"

"Where else?" Dan laughed. "The Church! The Church of the Disciples!"

Mirren was too drunk, too elated, to voice any philosophical objections. He recalled that the Church was an old smallship - a smallship similar to the one he'd soon be pushing through the nada nada-continuum.

So why the h.e.l.l not?

Chapter Eleven.

They left the restaurant and made their way to the perimeter of the dome. Mirren was too drunk to pilot his flier; it would have detected the alcohol in his system and shut itself down. Otherwise, buoyed up as he was, he might have taken the risk. He considered the irony of dying in a flier accident mere days before he was due to flux again.

They pa.s.sed through the arched exit and walked into the heat of unprotected Paris. It was four o'clock in the morning and the temperature was still in the eighties. The Church was two kilometres away, in the run-down Montparna.s.se district, but for once Mirren didn't mind the walk. They pa.s.sed through the respectable, well-kept streets bordering the centre, but the farther they progressed towards the outskirts, the more neglected and disreputable the streets became. They pa.s.sed shop-fronts at first barred, then boarded up - though the premises were still in use - then derelict and vandalised, and finally given over to the alien creepers which marked a district as beyond redemption. In one area, as they progressed down an avenue whose buildings on either side were solid banks of vegetation, he and Dan were the only things visibly of Earth in the landscape. They stopped in the middle of the street, a layer of lichen slippery underfoot, and stared at the strip of night sky between the high canyon walls. There, rising slowly beneath the stars of Orion, were the red and white lights of an orbiting industrial satellite.

At one point the undergrowth, which so far had restricted itself to the sidewalks, flowed across the street and became so dense that they stumbled and fell. They proceeded by holding each other like drunks wending their way home over treacherous ice. Mirren clutched Dan's shoulder, feeling the hard ridge of his occipital console.

He pulled his hand away and halted, swaying in the tropical night. "Dan, last... last year I thought of having it removed."

Dan peered at him. "What?"

He touched his shoulder, felt the light alloy spar beneath his flying suit. "My console."

They continued walking, leaving the lichen and the creepers behind as they entered a plasma-lighted district of bars and bistros. Prost.i.tutes stood in groups on the kerb. Garishly lighted shops clearing cheap African electronics belted out the latest popular music; revellers danced. It was as if they had stumbled from a jungle and into a party.

Finally, Dan asked, "Why?"

Mirren laughed. "Because it was... obsolete. The rationalist in me said that it served no purpose. I didn't need it to remind me of the good times. I felt like a walking antique."

"So..." Dan's belch poisoned the air with acid cognac fumes "...why didn't you?"

"Because... because it was part of me. It'd be like getting rid of this." He held a finger before his eyes. "And anyway I couldn't be bothered..." He gestured feebly, aware that he was rambling. He'd lost the point of his little speech.

Dan reminded him. "Fernandez, Ralph! Thank Fernandez you didn't have the op!"

Mirren recalled the sensation he'd experienced on touching Dan's console: the delicious shiver of terror at the thought that he'd decided against the cut.

A young girl fell into step beside them.

Dan smiled and indicated the tattoo on his bicep.

The kid shrugged. "We could always talk."

"About what?" Dan asked.

The girl blinked at something intimidating in Dan's tone, stopped and watched them make their way along the lighted boulevard. They pa.s.sed jazz clubs and bars named after colony worlds, all-night holo-shows and films from all around the Expansion. The occasional flier roared overhead, drowning out the music.

Mirren clutched Dan's arm. "Dan..."

The big man looked around.

"What do you think Hunter meant when he said we'd be returning to Earth with some people? Why can't they go through a 'face?"

"We'll find out soon enough, Ralph. Have faith. We'll soon be pushing again, that's the main thing. I trust Hunter, whoever the h.e.l.l he is, whatever he's planning..."

They pa.s.sed a cafe and the rich, bitter aroma of fresh coffee drifted out on the hot early morning air. They crossed the street and sat at a table on the sidewalk, ordered coffee and croissants and watched an alien bird, as big as an eagle, skim the length of the street.

Mirren stared at the skyline. Far to the north the interface was on an open phase, and the night sky in the vicinity was bright with the light of an alien sun.

Dan said, "It doesn't seem like ten years since we were last doing this. Remember the cafe we used a couple of blocks away?" He frowned, trying to recall its name.

"Rousseau's?" They'd spent many a night on the sidewalk outside the cafe between shifts, watching the bigships at Orly rising into the sky and phasing into the continuum. Life then had seemed a simple fact of fluxing and recuperation, a stable existence which promised a future without threat or change. In retrospect, Mirren could not recall ever looking any further ahead than the next push.

Dan said, "How's Bobby, Ralph?" in a gentle voice which acknowledged Mirren's reluctance to talk about his brother.

Of course Mirren had always been aware, back then, of the infinitesimally rare hazards to which Enginemen were p.r.o.ne. But he had always dismissed them with the thought that they could never happen to him.

It had been so long since he had last spoken about his brother that he was not offended now, but almost relieved. He shrugged. "Much the same as he was five years ago. You saw him. He was introspective then, a little withdrawn." Mirren realised what cliches these were to describe his brother's condition, almost as bad as when, a couple of years ago, he had told someone that Bobby lived in a world of his own.

"But neurologically? There's been no further lapse?"