Battle for Earth (8 page)

Quickly the chamber began to drain. As the level dropped below Johnny's chest, fluid oozed out of him and a vacuum hose like an elephant's trunk descended to suck up the remaining gloop. He couldn't help feeling a pang. Whenever he'd used to
travel this way, he'd had to hold onto the locket his mom had given him, to stop it disappearing up into the tube and away. Before Bram reassumed power, the mad Regent and scheming Chancellor Gronack had tried to have Johnny executed by firing squad. He would have died had the locket not proved to be a personal shield, saving him and turning the weapon's fire on those shooting at him. Now it no longer hung around his neck, stolen by his clone and lost forever. It was sad that he no longer had such protection, but he didn't miss it for that—until then he hadn't even known what it was. What he craved were the pictures inside: one half showing his mom and dad smiling, with a very young Bentley; the other of Johnny, Clara and Nicky, together in a line. Occasionally he would still look at the pictures in Clara's locket, but it wasn't the same as having them with him all the time.

Sol announced the return to normal space and Johnny swapped the capsule for his captain's chair at the very center of the bridge. They had unfolded to just beyond the asteroid belt, the band of failed planets between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Outside, in the distance, Johnny could see one of the irregularly shaped rocks tumbling along its path around the Sun. Sol switched to her powerful dark energy drive and the ship was soon speeding toward the rendezvous. Alf emerged from his pod, placing his bowler hat carefully in position, and then Bentley appeared, shaking out his coat and showering orange goo across the deck. The android chased the Old English sheepdog around the bridge, which looked the most fun Bentley had enjoyed all day.

After all Alf's hard work making the ship spotless, Johnny didn't have the heart to tell the android they'd received a request to transport over to the Emperor's ship. Feeling it wise to vacate the scene, he made his way to sickbay to check on Clara, but his sister wasn't there. At Sol's direction he
found her sitting on the rocky outcrop near the center of the garden deck, dressed in an outfit similar to his but with seven lilac stars in the shape of the Big Dipper on her front. Her eyes were nearly entirely black. Open on her lap was a bright pink notebook in which she was writing. Their dad's journal, recounting a trip he'd made long ago, was on the flat rock beside her.

“Are you OK? Can you see to write?” Johnny asked.

His sister looked up, smiling a little manically. “Never better,” she replied. “Are we there? Shall I fold us across?”

“We have to take a shuttle,” said Johnny, unnerved by the way Clara was looking. “You know Alf hates not being able to get through the fold.”

“OK—I'll drop these back in my room and see you over there.”

“No, I think it's better if we all go together.” Johnny left before his sister could argue. He collected Kovac and went down to the shuttle bay, waiting in the pilot's seat of the
Piccadilly
for a couple of minutes, trying to ignore the computer's persistent chatter. Alf joined him with Bentley, both of them clambering on board and taking their places on the lower deck, before Clara unfolded directly onto the back seat.

The
Calida Lucia
was vast and flawless, a sparkling ribbon of light stretching for tens of kilometers, looking nearly as magnificent as Saturn's spectacular rings. There were no airlocks on the Imperial Starcruiser so Johnny guided his shuttlecraft to the appointed place where the walls, themselves made from powerful force fields, opened to allow the London bus inside. Through a succession of these fields, the
Piccadilly
was led into the gigantic central chamber that ran the length of the Emperor's ship.

Once before, Johnny had been here and seen it nearly empty, save for the
Spirit of London
standing alone against one wall. Now there would not have been room for his beautiful craft—the central hold teemed with life and ships. He handed over control to the mind of the
Calida Lucia
herself, who guided the shuttle between giant battleships and medical transports, steering clear of flying maintenance crews and floating platforms carrying the fearsome Imperial Guard. As they went they passed
Cheybora
, the warship he knew best. Johnny thought about the ship's captain, his friend Valdour, who died trying to save him from the Regent's firing squad. It was still hard to believe that the first and best space captain he'd ever met was no longer alive—that his battle-scarred face would never again fill Sol's viewscreen.

The
Piccadilly
settled in the only available space, close to a stack of what looked like hugely magnified dandelion seeds, but which Johnny knew to be the Emperor's own shuttlecraft. Bram stood, his face more lined and wrinkled than Johnny had ever seen it, waiting beside the bus doors, his arms wide apart, a pulsing white sphere the size of a beach ball hovering above each open palm.

“A gift for the people of Earth,” said the Emperor as everyone trooped out. His sparkling eyes lingered over Clara, but he made no comment on the blackness within hers. Johnny came last, carrying Kovac.

“Shield generators?” Johnny asked, remembering when the
Spirit of London
's had needed replacing.

“Very good,” said Bram. “Your planet is too close to Alpha Centauri to withstand the gamma-ray bombardment from the Star Blaze.” The Emperor was talking about the recent supernova. “Humanity needs protecting.”

“But that's not for years yet,” said Johnny.

“Three and a half years is but a twinkling of some cosmic
eyes,” Bram replied. The spheres drifted through the open door and settled softly in the
Piccadilly
's luggage rack. “You will come to understand why it must be done now. The generators are to be placed at gravitational wells within the Earth-Moon system, from where they will not drift.”

“L4 and L5 if I am not mistaken, which I very rarely am,” came the voice from the end of Johnny's arm. Kovac's casing glowed in time to the words. “The stable Lagrangian points.”

“Ah, this must be Kovac,” said the Emperor. “Welcome to the
Calida Lucia
.”

“It is an honor to be aboard, Your Imperial Majesty,” said the computer. “I have been looking forward to exploring a proper spaceship.”

“Yet how will that be possible,” said Bram, “when you are tied to Johnny's arm, and it is my hope that this arm, and the person it is attached to, will accompany me elsewhere?” The Emperor clicked his fingers and Johnny felt a strange lightness at the end of his wrist. He let go of the quantum computer, which remained hovering in midair. Then Kovac flew forward of his own accord.

“That seems to have done the trick,” said Bram. “Alf, my old friend.” The android's face took on a definite pink sheen. “Several of these engines need to be checked over before we set out and, as you can see, my people appear somewhat behind schedule.” The Emperor pointed to some battleships berthed nearby, many of which looked as if they'd seen better days. “Perhaps you can show them how it's done?”

“It will be a pleasure to be of assistance,” said the android, bowing and then vanishing in a blur at full speed.

“I'm sure Bentley will be happy to relax nearby,” said Bram, clearly remembering how, the last time he was on board, the gray and white dog enjoyed having his paws massaged by the carpets in the
Calida Lucia
's corridors. “And, Kovac—my ship
is at your disposal. Go where you wish. Clara and Johnny—I would like you to accompany me to Titan.”

Saturn's largest moon housed a secret. It was called the Fountain of Time and, apparently, had been built by their mother the Diaquant. One of the giant dandelion heads separated from the stack at the end of the Imperial Starcruiser's hold and settled on the ground, so that some of its pointed white quills were close to the Emperor. He blew on the nearest few, which parted, and a walkway extended from the central hub out to where he was standing. “Follow me,” he said to Johnny and Clara, and then he walked, very slowly, up the ramp.

From the inside, the Emperor's shuttle was completely transparent and they could see Titan's thick orange clouds swirling around them. Clara sat on the floor of the ship, her forehead glistening as her fever became worse. Bram stood in front, hair blowing in a nonexistent breeze, waving his hands over the controls. In very little time they broke through into the lower atmosphere and the landscape below came into view. With its mountains and valleys, oceans and rivers, it looked remarkably like Earth.

They settled on a rocky outcrop beside a large, featureless plain, bounded in the distance by a chain of small hills and all under the heavy orange sky. Bram turned to them both and said, “We shall not be alone at the Fountain of Time. There are … beings who have sought sanctuary here. I urge you to treat them kindly.”

Although the ship's sensors told them there was no oxygen outside, the walls opened and a ramp extended. Bram led the way, walking slowly down before disappearing midway, through an invisible curtain.

“I don't feel well,” said Clara. When she looked up her eyes were now totally black. “I think I'd better stay here.”

Johnny was scared, but tried to sound calm. “Come on,” he said. “You love this place—it'll make you feel so much better.” He reached out and pulled her gently to her feet. With his sister leaning heavily on him, they descended the ramp together. At the point where the Emperor had disappeared, everything changed. Sweet smells of heather and honey filled Johnny's nostrils, a sky dominated by Saturn hung overhead and in front was a beautiful lake of liquid gold, filled with chronons—particles of time.

Bram stood by the edge of the lake, but he was not alone. Two dozen figures robed in scarlet hovered around him. The creatures within the flapping cloaks were strangely fuzzy—out of phase with the regular universe, making the bodies inside the cloaks almost invisible. Even so, they were still far clearer than when Johnny had last seen them. These were Owlessan Monks, strange beings who worshipped the galaxy itself. Like Clara and the Plican, they had developed the ability to fold space, but only by working together. One on its own could do next to nothing, but two acting in tandem were twice as strong. Add a third and their abilities doubled again—ditto with a fourth and a fifth. Twenty-four of them in the same place would be immensely powerful.

By now Clara was a deadweight on Johnny's shoulder. As he half carried, half dragged her toward the edge of the lake, the Monks shrank back as though afraid. In the past they'd always seemed curious, wanting to touch him, but sometimes not quite daring.

“It is your sister,” said Bram, in response to Johnny's questioning look. “She has treated space badly, folding and creasing it too much. They sense she is tainted. I hope that, in this place, time will heal and cleanse.”

Lifting a palm upward, Bram spoke softly and Clara lightened, until she was practically floating beside Johnny. Together, followed at a distance by the flying Monks, they skirted the edge of the lake, arriving on the far side at a grotto of blue crystal pillars, within which a large transparent dome stood on a crystal plinth.

It was here that Johnny had finally come face to face with his clone. He shivered—that day he had been certain he was going to die. While he laid his sister carefully down, the Emperor stepped onto the strange path that led toward the center of the lake, to the Fountain of Time itself. The scarlet-robed Monks remained by the shoreline. Some of the liquid was defying gravity and spilling up over the sides, where it clumped together, like blobs of golden mercury, before sliding back into the main pool.

Clara opened her eyes—a couple of tiny white spots were visible among the blackness. “You were right, it's so peaceful here,” she said, sitting up and resting her back against the plinth.