When we left the Nova
Initiative, Vienna had just been destroyed and Chrissie was in a very bad way. I'm very late posting this. Sorry.
I
came to in the forest. The machines that should have been monitoring my
condition were silent, unlit. Some of the administrative staff from Project
Utopia were staring in horror and, to be honest, with the pain I was in I
wasn’t surprised. A quick check revealed I was missing a lot of flesh – hand to
my face told me I was lucky to have vision in both eyes, because I don’t think
my right eye should have survived.
The
members of Team Tomorrow who’d come through Mark’s portal with us gradually led
away the civvies – I think mostly or exclusively their staff – until it was
just Adam, Mark and I remaining in the glen. I was trying very hard not to cry
with the pain and focused on worrying where Stef was. Adam reassured me she was
safe – Benedict had said so – so Mark took us back to the Hub. Straight to the
medi-bay for me, and we were told Stef was safe.
I
fell gratefully unconscious again. Adam watched over me for a while, then thought
back to Benedict’s final instructions to him, “There’s a package on my desk. I
forgot to give it to Jen. Make sure she gets it.
“I
need you to look after the Nova Initiative now.”
Adam
went to Benedict’s office. It felt strange without Benedict – an expectant
emptiness. The room was immaculate: the package stood in the centre of the
desk, with three letters, one for each of Adam, Jen and I. He brought them back
to my bedside, where Jen joined us shortly.
I
imagine the other two letters were much like mine: very personal, fondly
written, offering congratulations on achievements and guidance to help build on
these. It wasn’t the pain that brought tears to my eyes. But alongside the
powerful sorrow and pride was an excitement: within the letter was encoded my
own access to Benedict’s personal lab, allowing me to use it whenever I wanted.
The
package was a thick book, densely filled with Benedict’s tiny writing. Jen
exclaimed as she looked through it, amazed at what Benedict had foreseen. She
went quiet, after a while, and a few days later the book vanished and was never
mentioned again. Adam and I didn’t ask.
The
world had fallen apart when Vienna burned. Jen arranged for those we cared
about – our friends and family – to be taken to safe houses whilst London
rioted. Whilst I lay on my bed rebuilding my body, other novas (my team and
Team Tomorrow amongst them) worked to quell the worldwide violence and rebuild
fractured society.
We
quickly learnt we couldn’t run at quite full power. Adam and I found our normally
over-active mental link was cut completely dead – as dead as most communication
networks. Even once I was mended and back in the air, even once London had
calmed again, there was a lot to do.
We
did as much as we could. Adam and I ran replacement cables under the oceans as
St John Enterprises attempted to reconstruct the internet. Jean and I travelled
around the world revisiting our pre-nova lives as doctor and nurse. Adam ran
messages.
We
went back to what was left of Vienna. To look. There was hope that maybe,
somehow, we’d find Benedict. The crater was slowly healing and filling with
water, but under that I could see the flows and falls of quantum that drenched
this place. No doubt this was what was causing the difficulties in accessing
our powers – and in the world at large.
Eventually,
we started looking skyward. We needed to gather information from the Nova
Initiative satellites, and get them working again. I flew Adam and Stef up
there to fiddle. Stef, at our suggestion, also bugged the Project Utopia communication
satellites whilst fixing them up. We also gathered the various other satellites
floating uselessly about, downloaded any data they were still holding – and destroyed
them. We felt that too much information about what had happened – about Vienna –
getting out would be dangerous.
Whilst
floating about, I spotted the moon didn’t look quite its normal self: it seemed
the blast that took out Vienna had carried on out of the atmosphere and clipped
the moon. A quick calculation suggested we could fly there in about 20 hours,
so we set off (bribing Stef with how cool it would be to be on the moon).
The
stars and stripes left by the US astronauts all those years ago was faded
beyond recognition. I took my shoes off and ran to leave naked footprints
across the surface of the moon. Adam sketched a beautiful piece of art as a
signature. We took a quick photo of the three of us with the detritus left by
the Apollo crew.
The
crater left by the blast was perfectly circular and passed straight through the
moon. I’m sure I’ve heard it said a stone with a hole in it is lucky: we were
standing on the largest bit of luck I’ve ever seen.
We
travelled through the tunnel, and as we neared the centre I heard a strange
voice speaking in an almost-language, like no language I’d ever heard. The others
couldn’t hear this, but like me did spot the metal girders floating…
There
was a room, or half a room. It had evidently been clipped by the blast, but had
previously been deep within the moon. There was a flickering light, tiled floor
and walls, and a large metal door – too heavy even for me to force open. Stef,
after a bit of fiddling, found a panel beneath a floor tile and used this to
open the door. Heading in, we realised we were now in an airlock and the
previous room had been a sort of waiting room. It led on to one of the
strangest experiences of my life so far: a da Vinci’s workshop, of sorts; a
room overwhelmed by complicated contraptions made of a marvellous mixture of modern
and ancient materials and technology, warm and well lit and dominated by a giant
portrait of Jennifer St John.
Once
we’d recovered from the shock, we went back to exploring. The gramophone in the
corner was playing no record, but seemed to be the source of the voice I’d
heard. Closer, the others still couldn’t hear it but I recognised the voice as
Benedict’s.
My mind flashed: was he
here, somewhere? Could he have been thrown here in the blast and been unable to
return but set this up? He’d had several months, but it seemed unlikely: where
would he have got the materials from?
Had he been thrown back
in time and created this as his sanctuary? This felt even more likely when we
found the room filled with paintings of Jenny – some drawn lovingly, some with
such a ferociousness of need and loss that they almost hurt to look at. Some of
her younger than now, some older. And in the centre, a portrait of Benedict,
but his bright blue eyes were stormy grey. But if this was his timeless
sanctuary, where was he? We could find nobody, no signs of recent habitation,
although the library revealed copies of things written in the last 100 years.
And diaries, but we didn’t feel comfortable reading those.
Adam
found another workshop with a sheet of material on the bench. He touched it,
curious, and it clung to him – glided over his skin and settled there as though
part of him. He called Stef and I over: we found several more sheets and again
each, on touching one, found it attached itself to us. There were enough sheets
for each member of our team and two over. We leapt to the assumption Jen and
Alastair. We also discovered we couldn’t even touch a sheet intended for
someone else: they backed away.
We
flew back as fast as we safely could. The other members of the Nova Initiative
were pleased to see us: our detour to the moon meant we’d been gone several
days longer than expected and, whilst the satellites we’d fixed were up and
running, they’d had no way to contact us. The scientists had developed short-range
sub-vocal communicators that were working, though, so we each took one and the
material that had collected to us (I’m refraining from calling them ‘suits’
because Adam has been ranting about how they’re superhero suits since we found
them) absorbed the mic and retained its function. This is clever stuff that I
need to explore more.
We
grabbed Jean, Robert, Rachel, Mark and, of course, Jen; found somewhere private
and explained we needed to go to the moon. They looked at us like we were crazy
but eventually agreed – although Jen refused to take Alastair. We suited her up
– the rest of us able to survive in a vacuum – and used the photos we’d taken
for Mark to warp us there.
They
were amazed by the airlock – we’d cleared away the manmade debris to try and
hide the entrance should anyone else come up here, so it came as even more of a
surprise to them. We led them in and Jen was stricken.
She’s
a very brave woman.
Everyone
was quickly suited up in the fibre Benedict seemed to have left us – we had
been right in assuming one was for Jen. With the rest of the team around, Stef
found another panel from that second workshop that led us deeper into the moon
and deeper into the mystery.
A
ship, like something out of Adam’s comics, dominated the hangar we found
ourselves in. A bit more exploring and we found a room of computers from
ancient stone to things that wouldn’t look out of place in the Hub. Stef said
the room gave her fizzy knickers so we left her there whilst we carried on.
There was a habitation ring of sorts, and it felt like Benedict had built this
place with us in mind.
I
wondered again if he’d been thrown back through time, but Mark thought it more
likely Benedict was older than we knew and had foreseen everything. I don’t
know – Jen remembers him as a child; they grew up together. And I’ve met his
parents. Or people who believe they’re his parents… Mark’s theory on the
portraits is that Benedict had precognition and fell in love with Jen before
she was ever born. But I don’t think we’ll know the truth unless we find
Benedict again – or if Jen finds something in one of his books that’s she’s
prepared to share with us.
The
ship in the hangar let us in. Benedict’s face appeared, talking in that strange
not-language of the gramophone. With the password of ‘Alastair’ being given,
the ship revealed its cockpit: the whole ship had seemed empty at first, but
seats and panels appeared as we needed them.
With
imperceptible motion, the ship flew through a forcefield appearing like a wall
and flew us back to Earth: through the Antarctic, through the Earth and back to
a level of the Hub deeper than we’d known existed.