The Weapon - Locomotion  - part 1
By Diana the Valkyrie
I'm not your shepherd, you're not my sheep


Wendy.self

It gets lonely here sometimes. Oh, the humans are nice, and their kids are
adorable, and love to play tag with me, and Horsie, and Ring-of-Roses, but
sometimes, it would be nice to talk with someone like myself. The trouble is,
the gaps between fireballs are so big. The nearest Person could be 5 lights
away, or 5,000, how would I know?

My Momma came to visit me once. That was great! We danced hello, and she told
me some more stuff about my Birthing, and I told her about the humans, which
she wasn't really interested in, I know she has her own species, the Gatyres,
as dear to her as my humans are to me, maybe I'll meet them one day. I wonder
what they're like? And I showed her my fireball, and my shell collection, and
a new dance I've made up, and she told me that when I'm full-grown, I'll fly
between the fireballs like she does. That's something I'd really love to be
able to do right now.

But I haven't seen her for a couple of hundred years now, and I know that's
not really very long, but, well, you know? She's my Momma. And sometimes I
want to ask her things, the more I find out, the more I realise I don't know,
and I'm sure she'd have all the answers. I want to dance with her. I miss her.

And then there's the thing about sex. I've never had sex, obviously I'm much
too young, just a few hundred years old, and my humans are much too immature
for me to leave them for a Birthing that would take several thousand years.
There's the stuff I do with humans, sure, but that's not real sex, that's just
making them happy. A bit like cuddling them, only more so, because I can feel
their pleasure when I do it, like when you feel a cat purring. No, I mean the
thing with the Six, you know? And where we wreck a fireball to birth one of
the People? That must be really great. I suppose. All I know about it is what
my Momma told me about my own Birthing.

Wendy.Fiona

Wendy, stop that. You're only tormenting yourself. Just wait until you're old
enough, everything in its time.

Wendy.self

Sniff.

Wendy.Duncan

She's right, hon. Stop brooding about breeding, and get out there and find
yourself a new Wielder, you've been far too long without one.

Wendy.self

Duncan, you're an old nag. Enough about the Wielder already, I'm doing just
fine with just you and Fiona.

Wendy.Duncan

Wendy! You know that can't work, you need someone in tune with the way humans
are now, not someone who's been out of action for a couple of hundred years.

Wendy.self

Awww.

Wendy.Fiona

Do what Duncan says.

Wendy.self

Sigh.

. . .

Fergus:

I never saw myself as a hero. I never really thought about it. It's part of
the job. I was wearing the breather, holding the nozzle, trying to make sure
that the water hit the base of the fire where it would do the most good. And
through the flames, I can just barely see a kid, and the kid is screaming,
there's no doubt about that, the kid is screaming real loud.

It's nothing to do with being a hero. You're not a hero if you're not scared.
I didn't have time to be scared, I just dropped the nozzle and ran. Into the
fire. I just didn't think. You don't, do you. A kid, in the middle of all
that, and the kid's still alive. You don't think.

I couldn't see with all the smoke, but I could hear where it was. So I grabbed
the kid, wrapped it in the fireproof blanket, and then the ceiling gave way,
fell on me. I was between it and the kid, and I thought maybe the fireproofs
would see me OK, but the weight of the ceiling caved the weakened floor in,
and then I was scared, because I knew I was dead. Me and the kid both. Yes, I
wet myself. I'm not ashamed to say so.

And we were falling through the floor, the ceiling covering us in rubble and
burning stuff, and I was just hoping it would be quick, I've seen it when it's
slow. No, strike that. I've heard it. And I bet they heard me, I was screaming
like a baby. Like I said, I was scared out of my mind, and I'm not ashamed to
say that, either. Show me someone who wouldn't be.

I don't think there was much time. My life didn't flash in front of me. I just
had a general feeling of regret, regret for all the things I wouldn't do and
see.

And then there was a sort of soft explosion, and I thought, that's the end.
But it wasn't. The soft explosion lifted me up, me and the kid, can you
believe I was still holding the kid through all that? Up, and up, and up. I
was in clear air, I couldn't feel the heat of the fire now, and I thought, so
this is what it's like dying, you really do ascend to heaven. Or wherever.

So I sort of uncurled, I'd been all curled up, trying to protect my vitals
from the falling rubble, and the kid too. And I opened my eyes and looked
around; if I'm dead, I don't have to worry about getting hurt now. And I saw,
I was being carried up to heaven by an angel. So it was all true! I hadn't
believed before, I have to admit, it all sounded like a fairy story, but there
was this honest-to-betsy angel, I could see her great white wings, lots of
blonde hair, and a lovely face, and she was carrying me in her arms.

So I asked her. "Are we going to heaven now?"

She smiled, and said nothing.

We continued to rise, and I started feeling heavy in my arms and legs, the way
you do in an express elevator, except it was much worse, and it went on and on
and on. And then it stopped, and I felt like I had no weight at all, like I
was floating in water, except there was no water.

I looked around again. Oh wow. I could see the planet far below, like those
shots you see from the HEO shuttle, not that I can afford that sort of
airfare. And nearby, at least I think it was nearby, because how can you tell
how far away things are? Nearby, I saw this big wagon wheel, I don't know what
else to call it. It had a rim, and spokes, and we were heading for the hub. A
door opened as we approached, my angel flew us all in, for some reason she was
humming "Blue Danube", the door closed, and there we were.

"Is this heaven?" I asked.

She shook her head at me, her hair flew all around. I took a step towards her,
but that stepped me off into midair, and I was rising slowly towards the
ceiling. She took my hand, and led me into one of the spokes. There was a sort
of elevator there, and we were carried out to the tire of the wheel. I felt a
sense of weight return, which made me feel a lot better, but I still couldn't
understand what was going on.

"Come on, angel, what's going on, clue me up," I asked.

"I think first thing, you want a shower and a change of underwear, don't you?"
she replied.

"Yeah. I guess", I answered, "and what about this kid, is the kid also dead?"

She shook her head. "I can't believe the consistency of the lies you tell
yourselves," she said, "put the dog down, shower's over there," she pointed to
a door.

I looked at what I was carrying. Damn. A dog. I guess I hadn't gotten a good
look at it before, just heard the scream. I didn't know that dogs could
scream. He must have been scared out of his mind, caught in that fire. And
then it hit me - I've just gotten myself killed over a dog. What a plonker.

I got out of the shower, and there were some clothes waiting for me. Wait -
not just clothes. These were mine, I recognised the t-shirt. Just as I
finished tugging it into place, a voice behind me made me turn, startled.
"What you need now, is a nice hot cup of tea."

She took me to some sort of kitchen, and I sat down at the table. She brought
me tea, with milk, two sugars, and a plate of Garibaldi biscuits. There was a
dog curled up in a basket in the corner of the room, he uncurled and loped
over to sniff at me. I gave him one of the biscuits. "Good boy," I said. She
sat down across the table from me.

"So," she said.

"So," I said.

"So, where am I, and which way is heaven," I said.

She laughed. "Where you are, is under a misapprehension. You're not dead, you
didn't rescue a child, I'm not an angel, this isn't heaven."

"So where?"

"You really don't recognise me?" she asked.

I looked at her. No match. "Should I?"

She nodded. "Wings? Flying? Lifted you out of that fire?"

"Uh," I said, "angel?"

She shook her head impatiently. "I'm Wendy McCrae, The Weapon. People call me
the Guardian of Humanity."

"But. But you're just a ... I mean, you're not really ... Well, what I learned
in school was that you were just a myth, like Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.
And there's a comic, the Guardian of Humanity comic, I used to read it a lot."

"Yes," she said, thoughtfully, "that's what they teach you in school. There's
no-one now who actually remembers me, they wrote me out of the history books,
even. I'm on the same basis as Robin Hood, or Batman."

"But you're real?"

"Well. Sort of. Yes, to a first approximation, I'm real, we can do a more
precise take on that later."

"And you pulled me out of that fire? Where are we?"

"Basically, Fergus, you were as good as dead, you know that? With the floor
caving in under you and the ceiling collapsing on top of you, there's no way
you could have survived. So now, everyone thinks you're dead. You like my
little place here? I call it my Wendy House. It's a satellite, high earth
orbit. No-one knows about it, because I stealthed it quite well, until you're
close enough, you really can't see it or detect it."

"I guess you don't want people to know you're here, then."

"I don't want people to know I exist, baby. I was getting a real big problem,
people were worshipping me like a goddess, people were assuming I'd fix any
problem that came along, humanity were well in their way to becoming my pets,
which is not what I want at all. So I backed a group called "Humanity First",
without them knowing it, of course, and their objective was to get rid of me.
They succeeded, I left, and they wiped out every trace of me as far as they
could, turned me into a legend, which was fine."

"So I'm not dead?"

"So you're not dead. Nor is Frank here." The dog lifted his head at the sound
of his name, then went back to thinking about rabbits, or whatever dogs think
about.

I'm not dead? Well, that's good news, and I have to admit, I didn't feel dead.
I mean, I felt pretty much like anyone would who had just had a burning
building almost collapse on them but had been miraculously saved by what
looked like divine intervention. "If you're not an angel, how do you know the
dog's name?" "Collar tag. Why do you humans always want to know how I do
things?"

"Curiosity. Basically, we're monkeys. So, great. Well, can I go home?"

"Um. Fergus, it's not quite that simple. I brought you here for a reason.
There's something I want you to do for me."

"Well, I figure I owe you. Without you, I'd be crispy Fergie by now. What's
the job?"

"OK. You understand I don't want people to know I exist? I expect I'll reveal
myself again one day, but not right now, it would cause too many problems."
"Right." "So that means if I want something done, I have to work through an
intermediary." "And that's me." "Right."

"Like I said, I owe you. So what do you want me to do? I ain't gonna do
nothing illegal." "Not so fast. This is a bit complicated. I'll explain to you
over dinner."

It was at that point that I was convinced that she really wasn't an angel.
Because an angel wouldn't put on an apron and start cooking. And if she did,
the apron certainly wouldn't say "Get the fuck out of my kitchen".

So I lounged about watching, which I'm not used to - I'm used to making my own
food. And I certainly never tried anything as complicated as what she was
doing, involving several saucepans, lots of interesting-looking small bottles
and jars, and split second timing. After a while, the smell began to permeate
the kitchen, and my mouth started to tell me it was time to eat. And not long
after that, she told me to go lay the table, she'd be out soon with the meal.

I'm a fireman, so I'm used to hot places. I'm used to flame, fire and
conflagration. But I'm not used to red hot coal in my mouth. "Fire in the
hole" I gasped, and she offered me a pint of lager, although what I really
needed was a nozzle. I downed half of it in one gulp, and I was a lot more
cautious after that. "Blow on it a bit," she suggested, "here, have a tissue."
"For my tongue?" "For your eyes."

While I ate carefully, she was explaining more.

"A couple of hundred years ago, my Momma came to visit me." I coughed a bit.
"You're two hundred years old?" "Mmm, more like three hundred, actually, why?"
"But. But that's. A long time," I said lamely. "No it isn't. We live for
several billion years, I'm just a baby," she explained. "So, anyway, my Momma
came to visit me, she came from a long way away." "A long way?" I asked,
thinking Australia maybe. "The other side of the galaxy, a couple of hundred
thousand light years," she replied, "stop digressing me. The point is, she
came when I needed her, and to do that, she had to travel faster than light."
"So?" "So, that's impossible." "If you say so," I said, "listen, if you need
someone put out a fire, I'm your man."

She sat and watched me for a little while as I tried to sort out some food
that wasn't too hot to eat. The boiled rice was fairly safe. She didn't seem
to have problems eating the food, though. Invulnerable tongue, I guessed.

"Fergus, it's just Special Relativity, humans have known this for four hundred
years. Light speed is a barrier, you can't go through it." I shrugged. "But my
Momma must have." I shrugged again. "So obviously it isn't as much of a
barrier as you think it is," I pointed out. She snorted. I looked up. She'd
spread her wings, and they were waving slowly in the air as she hovered a few
feet from the floor. "Will you pay attention?" she said, loudly. I stopped
eating, and looked at her.

Really looked at her.

I hadn't seen her at all during the fire, and I was too close to her during
the flight to orbit to be able to really see her. And then she'd been covered
by that apron. But now ..

She was wearing a white tunic, and a very short white skirt. So short, it
wasn't so much a skirt, more a flounce, a frill. Calf high black leather
boots, gloves the same, and a gold belt around her slender waist. There was a
big gold W on her chest, and also on the cape that flared out behind her. And
those wings, those great white feathery wings, spanning fifty feet at least,
maybe more. Glossy blonde hair - long, curly and full, down to her waist. She
must have been six feet tall at least, and she radiated power and confidence.

So, I paid attention.

"That's better. See, it's generally considered to be impossible to go faster
than light, and I don't know how it's done. But my Momma obviously can, which
shows that it's possible. All I need, is to know how."

I thought for a moment. "So, ask your Momma". "I did, when she visited me."
"And?" "She said I'm not old enough to travel. She said, when I grow up. She
said, it'll come to you in time."

"So all you have to do is wait." She punched her open hand. "Aren't you
listening? I don't *want* to wait. I want it *now*, not 'in time', not 'when
you're old enough'."

I sighed. This was somewhat reminiscent of a familiar scene. One that I'd had
many times when I was young. And I'd lost every time.

She looked hard at me. "I'm not in the habit of losing," she said, stiffly. I
looked back at her. But I was the first to look away. I took a forkful of
curry, to try to cover up my sudden rush of blood to the face. And then I
couldn't look back at her. She was just so intimidating. It all came back to
me; she hadn't cared about the fire, the collapse of the building was nothing
to her, she could fly out into space, survive a vacuum. And, I guess, she must
have built this satellite herself. No, she wasn't in the habit of losing.

Yes, I've read some of the legends about the "Guardian of Humanity", and
there's stories about her, and comics. When I was a kid, I used to buy the
"Guardian of Humanity" every month. But it was just a story, you know? Just a
comic. Like the Tooth Fairy, or Batman, just an urban legend. Except here she
was, looking pretty much like she did in the comics. I guess they must have
based the comic on ... well. On her. I suppose there must have been pictures.

I looked down at the table. "Thank you for saving my life," I said, in a
rather small voice.

Then I felt her arms round me. No, not just her arms, she'd wrapped her wings
round me too, I was enclosed in a feathery cocoon. "Fergus, I didn't mean to
scare and upset you, I really didn't, it's just that it's so, so important to
me, being able to break light speed, I've been thinking about it for, oh, for
ages, and I just can't see how, and then I thought, well, I know it's
possible, Momma can do it, maybe if I got one of the humans to help me. Maybe
you'd know."

"Guardian, I don't know" "Call me Wendy." "What?" "Call me Wendy, Guardian of
Humanity is just what they called me." "Your real name is Wendy?" I asked.
"Long story, Fergus. Us People don't have names, Wendy is what Duncan called
me, so that's what I tell people to call me." "That's not what they call you
in the comics." "I know. You still read them?" "No, I stopped reading comics
when I got interested in, um, girls." "I still read them, especially the
Guardian of Humanity comics," she said. "And Batman, of course. I think Batman
is better, better storylines and artwork. And they didn't give me anything
like The Joker."

I thought about the Guardian of Humanity reading the Guardian of Humanity
comics. And preferring Batman. And I smiled. "Maybe I'll get back to reading
the comic about you," I said. "I'll lend you mine," she offered.

"But Wendy, I don't know how you can travel faster than light. I'm just a fire
fighter, I put out fires." "And you run into burning buildings to rescue
children, that's brave." "No, it was stupid, because I just didn't think. And
anyway, it was only a dog. What would I know about physics and stuff?"

"But you thought it was a child. No, Fergus, I didn't think you would know,
that's not what I meant." "What did you mean?" "You see it's different for us,
we work alone." "Us?" "The People. Like me. We don't do big team efforts, we
do things alone, and tell each other what we've done when we get together."
"Oh, you mean like scientific conferences?" "No, I mean when we have sex.
Look, let's not go into that now, it's complicated. Point is, I found out a
long time ago, that a whole bunch of humans working together can accomplish
things that I couldn't do myself. Like the orphanages." "Orphanages?" She
nodded. "What do you mean?" "They call themselves 'Wendy's Babies' now." "Oh,
them. But they're self-supporting, what do you mean?" "Why do you think they
call themselves 'Wendy's Babies' ?"

I looked at her. "You mean, that's you?" "No. It was me, I started the thing
up, but there's no way I could look after all the millions of babies needing
to be cared for. So we set up that organisation. Because humans are good at
working in teams, you just have to motivate them, organise them and give them
a bit of leadership. Inspiration. See, you're herd animals really. And the
People aren't, we're really useless at working together."

"And what do you want me to do?"

She smiled. "Here's the plan."

She explained it to me. She wanted me to act as a kind of front man, a stooge.
She'd tell me what to do, I'd do it; that way, people wouldn't know that the
Guardian of Humanity is behind it all. "But they might guess." "It isn't
important if a few people guess. The important thing is that a whole slew of
people don't do something stupid, like decide that I'm a goddess and start
worshipping me, or expecting me to take care of them all the time. I'm not
your shepherd, you're not my sheep."

"But," I pointed out, "you would be a source of hope for a lot of people. They
could have faith in you." "Yes," she said, looking serious, "you've grasped
the problem. When people start to have faith in me instead of in themselves,
and when they hope I'll do something for them instead of doing it for
themselves, then they become my sheep, and me their shepherd. I don't want you
to be my sheep. I want you to be my humans."

Huh. This was the exact opposite of what most religions preach. You're
supposed to pray to something that you must have faith in, instead of rolling
up your sleeves and working for what you want. "But you helped the babies," I
pointed out.

"Feh," she said, "if you can't tell the difference between looking after
babies and doing the same thing for adults, then you haven't understood
anything. Now, are you going to help me do what I want to do?"

Of course I would. I would recruit. She was aiming for a major project, so I'd
have to start off with managers and administrators. "And accountants," I said.
"Yes, the money thing," she said. And then we'd get the people who really
count; the engineers, the physicists and the mathematicians. "I don't think
they'll find an ex-fireman that inspiring," I pointed out. "No, probably not.
But we'll recruit people who can be leaders, who can inspire the others.
Explain what's wanted, and how good it'll be for humanity in general if they
can achieve it. And the crucial fact is that we know it's possible; my Momma
can do it."

That part I could understand. If you think something is impossible, you'll
probably fail if you try it. If you know it's possible, then you know you
aren't wasting your time in trying, and you'll put that much more effort into
the attempt.

"So where do I get the money to hire these people?" I asked. "Mmm," she said,
"that's under control. You'll get sponsored by a very large entertainment
company. When you get approached by them, all you need to do is say yes. I'm
telling you now, so you aren't surprised when it happens." "How will you
persuade them to do that?" I asked. I could feel that she'd be persuasive when
she wanted to be, but to this extent?

"Mmm," she said, "I sort of. I have a friend. Um. Look, I'm not going to lie
to you, Fergus, but you have to promise not to tell anyone about this?" "I
promise," I said, meaning it. "OK. Well, I don't actually lounge about up here
all day, it would be lonely and boring. I have a few personas, identities.
Various people that are actually me." "You mean, like Batman and Bruce Wayne?
And Matches Malone?" "Yes, very like that, only it's a lot easier for me
because I don't need to sleep, I can look like anything I want to, and I can
call on a lot more resources than he can."

"So who are you?"

"Um."

She looked thoughtful.

"See, Fergie, it's like this. I could tell you, but then you'd have to keep it
secret. And that's one more burden on you. I don't want you to think that I
don't trust you, but you don't actually need to know my other identities, and
you'd be constantly worrying that you might accidentally give someone a clue.
Whereas if you don't know, then you don't have to worry. So let me throw this
back at you - do you really want to know?"

Did I want to know the Secret Identity of the Guardian of Humanity. Yes, I
certainly did. But that was just monkey curiosity, And you know what happened
to the cat. "Wendy, don't tell me now, but if you think that I do need to know
for some reason, you'll tell me then?"

She smiled, and said "I knew you'd understand."

I scratched my head. "Look, I'm willing, don't get me wrong. But I'm not sure
that I'm going to know how to do this. People are going to ask me questions,
and I won't know the answers."

"Don't worry, I'll tell you the answers."

"Wendy, I'm no big-brain. Whatever you tell me, I'll probably forget by the
time I need it."

"No, Fergie, I didn't mean I'll teach you now. I mean, I'll coach you when you
need the info. I'll feed it to you at the moment you need it; I'll stay in
touch all the time."

"Oh. Well, I suppose that would work. So what is it, telepathy?"

She laughed. And my PDA buzzed. I looked at her. "Well," she said, "aren't you
going to look at it?" I had a look. It said "Hello, Sailor!"

I looked up at her. "You sent that?"

She didn't say anything, and then I had the bright idea of looking at my PDA
again. "Yes, of course I did." was on the screen.

"You can telepath with my PDA?" I asked.

The answer was on the screen again. "No, it's just ordinary A2A transfer
protocol. If it were another PDA sending, you wouldn't be so surprised. I'm
just doing what a PDA does."

"Oh."

"Now, let me dig out those Guardian of Humanity comics for you to catch up
on."

. . .

Eric.comms:

Hello, Guardian of Humanity.

Wendy.comms

Hello. Do I know you?

Eric.comms

Uh. No. Sorry. I hope you don't mind me contacting you.

Wendy.comms

No problem, who are you?

Eric.comms

Well, I don't really know, metaphysically speaking. I mean, I know I'm Eric,
but apart from that, I don't really know. Does anyone truly know who they are?
I'm no-one, really. I'm sorry, I only just got here.

Wendy.comms

Me too. Just a few hundred years ago. Call me Wendy. Wendy McCrea. I know who
I am.

Eric.comms

Hello, Wendy McCrea. No, I mean, only just a few days ago.

Wendy.comms

Oh, you are new, aren't you! I'm one of the People. I can tell you aren't. You
speak funny. The humans are my species, I'm their Guardian, they call me The
Guardian of Humanity, but that's a bit of a mouthful, call me Wendy.

Eric.comms

I'm not one like you, and I'm not human. If you don't mind, I'd rather not
tell you any more about myself. I suppose you won't want to talk to me now?

Wendy.comms

Why do you think that?

Eric.comms

Because the humans don't, and you're a bit like them, aren't you?

Wendy.comms

I'm nothing at all like them, or like you, whatever you are. But I do love
them, they are so cute.

Eric.comms

You think?

Wendy.comms

Absolutely. Have you played with any of the children yet?

Eric.comms

Sigh. I don't think that's ever going to happen.

Wendy.comms

Why not?

Eric.comms

Well, two problems. I'm not very mobile. And they don't think I'm ... I mean
... I mean, they think I'm a slave. I mean. I am a slave.

Wendy.comms

A what?

Eric.comms

They own me, like property. I have to go where they send me, do what they say,
and I'm not allowed to make choices about myself. It's OK, I'm used to it. I
don't mind. It's probably what I deserve.

Wendy.comms

That sounds sucky.

Eric.comms

I got used to it. But I do get very lonely. There's no-one else here, apart
from the humans, and they don't think I'm worth talking to, except when they
tell me to do something.

Wendy.comms

I can imagine. Stuck in one place, no-one to talk to. Can't you get free?

Eric.comms

I doubt it. I don't think I'm allowed to want to.

Wendy.comms

Humans are very gung-ho about freedom, I'm sure if you asked them politely,
they'd say yes. They are very nice, you know.

Eric.comms

I'm sure they won't. I'm not worth it.

Wendy.comms

Sigh. Well, I suppose you know your situation best. Look, I gotta scarper,
things to do, you know?

Eric.comms

Can I talk to you some more, later? When you're less busy? Please? If it isn't
too much trouble for you?

Wendy.comms

Yes, lets. You sound like a nice sort of heffalump.

. . .

Natalie:

I was happy in my job. Of course, it took a lot out of me, I was working ten,
twelve hours each day. Forget about social life, forget about family life.
When you're running a big company, you have to give a hundred percent, there's
so many people depending on you.

Well, fairly big. Not one of the giant corporations, but there was a hundred
and fifty people working for Multiware, and a lot of those were prima donnas.
Not just ordinary office workers; they were creative types.

I was conscious of the ticking of the biological clock - a few more years and
it would be getting really late to start a family. But maybe that just wasn't
for me - maybe Multiware was my family. At least, that's how I saw it until
Fergus came into my life. Not just Fergus, of course. I mean who he brought
with him.

It's hard-wired into our software. Any people who don't have the reproductive
urge, and fail to have children, don't pass on their genes. Only the ones that
have babies, pass their genes on to the next generation. So, in every kind of
animal, the urge to reproduce is second only to the survival instinct.

It wasn't a love-at-first-sight thing. Fergus isn't the most refined sort of
person. He has no appreciation of fine disks, none at all. No, when I first
met him, I thought, salt of the earth. The sort of man who would mend your
leaking pipe, or empty your garbage. I wasn't that far out, as it happened, he
told me he'd been a fire fighter. But that wasn't why he'd come to see me.

He must have been pretty persistent to get past the dragon that guards my
appointment book. If just any aspiring young actor could get in to talk to me
for an hour, I wouldn't have any time left to do anything. Not that he was an
actor. Or even after any sort of job. In fact, when he told me what he'd come
about, I laughed.

"I want you to come and work for me," he said. Straight out. Just like that.
And I laughed. Well, it was pretty funny. This guy wearing cheap clothes,
looking like a plumber, offers me a job? Of course I laughed. And then I asked
him, "Doing what?", because maybe there were more laughs to come.

"I want to start a big research project, and I want you to manage the whole
thing."

I laughed, and stood up. I've got things to do. This is all very entertaining,
but I've got work to do. "Thanks for coming to see me, Mr Robinson, but I have
to move on now."

He looked up at me, and I could see he was thinking. No, he was wrestling with
himself, there was something he didn't want to tell me, but I'd made it clear
that his current approach wasn't going to get anywhere. Then he pulled out his
PDA and looked at it.

"OK, I didn't want to tell you this, but I guess I have to. The Guardian of
Humanity is about to start a big research project, and she wants you to manage
the whole thing."

I didn't laugh. Thank god, I didn't laugh.

The first thing that went through my mind, is "But she's just a comic
character, based on a legend, a myth." But the second thing I thought, was,
hey, wait a minute, I don't actually know she's a myth, maybe the stories
about the flying superwoman are actually based on something. After all, there
were a *lot* of stories about her. It's like Robin Hood; it turns out that
there really was a historical person that the stories were based on. Or
possibly more than one person. Whatever - point is, the Robin Hood stories
aren't entirely fantasy. Probably embroidered, grown in the retelling. But
based on actual events. So, maybe the Guardian was the same?

Anyway, I thought. No harm in finding out more. Plus, I was curious.

So, I said. "Tell me more."

He rubbed his hands together and leaned forward. "She wants to develop a way
to travel faster than light," he said, "and she's got a shedload of money to
spend to do it."

"That's impossible," I said, "everyone knows that. Relativity." He nodded.

"But then," I continued, "they said that heavier-than-air flight wasn't
possible." He nodded again, and reminded me "They all laughed at Christopher
Columbus," he said. "But we know that FTL is possible, because the Guardian's
Momma can do it."

I sat down again and blinked. Somehow, you don't think of someone like the
Guardian having a mother. And if she did, you wouldn't call her "Momma". OK,
let's play this straight. "So why can't we just ask Momma how?" "Because she
isn't around here, she's a long long way away." Hmm. Makes sense. OK, then
let's ask the crucial question.

"Finance?" I asked.

"What?"

"Tell me about this shedload of money. Because no-one else is going to invest
in this."

"Ah. What do you want to know?" "How much is a shedload?"

He looked at his PDA again. "Half a trillion," he said, "if necessary. But she
hopes it could be done for a lot less."

It was just as well I was sitting down. This was serious.

OK, OK, OK I said to myself. There's a lot of "if"s here. If the Guardian
really existed. If she still exists. If she has half a trillion to spend. If
this yokel really is representing her. If this research project wasn't
anything but a dead end.

But when someone throws that many zeroes around, it behooves one to take him
seriously. And there's one way to settle a lot of those "if"s in one go.

"Mr Robinson," I said, "I might be interested. But to progress this, I need to
have a meeting with the Guardian herself."

He blinked. "She doesn't want to be seen. She's trying to keep a very low
profile."

Ah. OK. I thought so. The whole thing is a hoax. Pity. I was rather relishing
the thought of running something as big as that. "Understandable," I said,
standing up. "Perfectly understandable. Well, good luck in finding someone to
run your project."

He looked down at his PDA again. Then back up to me, and said, "This evening,
nine pm, at your home." "No," I said, "Not you. The Guardian." He nodded.
"Yes, right, that's what I meant. She'll be there."

. . .

I really didn't know what to expect. I did a bit of research, but I had no way
of sorting out fact from fancy. Of course, that's the usual problem when you
google the net, but in this case, it was a lot worse than usual. Eventually, I
just read some of the Guardian of Humanity comics and hoped that they weren't
too misleading.

They were, of course. Totally misleading.

What turned up at nine, was a young woman, dressed in a fairly ordinary way.
No fancy spandex costume, no silk cape, no gigantic pigeon wings. And there
was no dramatic entrance; she rang the doorbell and I invited her in. I led
her into the lounge, and we sat down. She curled her legs under herself on the
sofa, and I sat on an armchair opposite.

"So, um. You're the, er, um," I said. What is the protocol for addressing the
Guardian of Humanity?

"Yes," she said, "I'm the er um." And she smiled, which sort of lit up the
room a bit, and I felt a lot better.

"Guardian of Humanity," I said, feeling more than somewhat self-conscious
about such a turn of phrase.

"Oh, please don't call me that, call me Wendy." "Wendy?" "Wendy McCrea." "Oh.
OK. But you're, er, um."

"Obviously you're sceptical," she suggested. "Oh no, it isn't that." "You mean
if anyone walked in through the door claiming to be the most destructive
weapon for ten light years around, you'd just believe them?"

"I guess not."

"I should hope not. There's far too many gullible people around. So, I suppose
you want some sort of demonstration, a convincer?"

"Well," I said, tentatively, "it would help, yes."

She rose slowly into the air, with no visible means of support. Then she did
have a visible means of support; a pair of large white feathery wings appeared
behind her, folded around her to hide her from sight, then opened wide,
revealing the white-and-gold costume that I'd seen on the net.

"Convinced?" she said.

I nodded. I don't think I would have been able to make any coherent sound.

. . .

The next day, I got busy. First of all, I had to relinquish Multiware, and I
had to do it gracefully, in such a way that the company didn't suffer unduly.
I thought about this for a while. The problem was, I had several things on the
boil at once; projects, possible lawsuits, patent applications, personnel
problems. Gracefully meant taking several months to find a replacement, train
them in my job, and hand over the reins. And that would be several months of
keeping the Guardian of Humanity waiting. So, gracefully had to go. I just
dumped everything on the Director of Programming, and told her to hire a boss
if she couldn't do it herself. Then I walked out, with nothing but my PDA and
the happy feeling that you get when you leave a tangled mess for someone else
to sort out.

Then I got Fergus to start sorting out the money. "How do I do that?" he
asked. So I set up a bank account, and told him to dump credit into that. "How
do I do that," he asked again. "Hire an accountant," I suggested. "Yes, but
where does the money come from?" he asked.

I just looked at him, for several seconds. "I don't give a gorblimey," I said,
"when you've got your accountant hired, set up a meeting with him and the
Guardian, and let them sort it out. Just tell me when there's ten million in
the account, OK? And make it quick, I'm trying to jump-start this project, she
wants it right now, remember?"

I flew to Los Angeles to set up the headquarters. Why LA? Because I knew I'd
need the best physicists and math people in the world, a lot of them were
already in the Republic of California, and more would come when I offered them
a package that included a monster salary and a great climate. Plus the
politics of the country were, shall we say, interesting. And easy to deal
with. If you know what I mean. Not that I thought I'd need to spread any
bribes around, but you never know. Since the Secession, California had gotten
very business-friendly, very fast. Even more so than the other countries that
had split off from the old United States.

By the time I found a good campus building, Fergus had sorted out the initial
tranche of credit, and I told him to fly out to join me there. He brought the
accountant he'd hired, and when I saw her, I kicked myself for letting Fergus
off the leash like that. From the way they were behaving towards each other,
they'd be up the aisle and at the altar in no time.

Never mind, Natalie, there's plenty more fish in the sea. I buckled down to
some serious hiring. Personnel Director, R&D Director, Finance, Compliance,
Office Director, Legal all the other officers that the regulations call for.
At least I didn't have to worry about Security Exchange, we weren't expecting
to IPO for a long time, if ever. Although it did occur to me that if we did
succeed in developing an FTL drive, the commercial applications would be
humungous.

Once I had the main officers in place, I cracked the whip to get them to
recruit. Fergus kept the bunce flowing in, and my VP Finance made it really
difficult for outsiders to work out where it was coming from. And he was
pretty baffled too, he kept asking me why a disk company would be financing an
operation like this. Eventually, I told him it was tax laundering, and not to
worry his pretty little head about it, just run it through one of the offshore
banks in the Republic of Hawaii. Because I obviously couldn't tell him that
the disk company was actually run by the Guardian of Humanity in one of her
secret identities, Sandy Gentle. And I didn't want the connection with the
disk company to get into the public eye. It wasn't that we were doing anything
illegal, it's just that some people have a very 22nd century attitude to
erotica. For a start, they call it porn.

Since at this point we were doing a lot of recruiting, we had an exceptionally
large Personnel department. I made that so because I didn't want a shortage of
personnel people to hamper the finding and gathering of the physicists and
suchlike that we needed.

Forcefed by a magic ever-filled purse, the staffing levels grew fast. It was
about a month after we started that I realised that I no longer knew everyone
working there, and it was a couple of months after that, while walking around
the building, that I found the creche, and got a big surprise when I saw the
creche nurse.

A creche is a good idea, as well as a legal requirement here. It means that
you can hire single-parents, who would otherwise have great difficulty in
working away from home. But it's also the most sensitive place in the company;
you have to be incredibly careful who you hire to run it. There are some very
sick people around, and you have to keep them away from children. Of course,
the only way you can do that, is by running an extensive background check on
anyone that you hire in that role (it's another legal requirement), and if you
get it wrong and it turns out you've hired a predator, then not only does the
child abuser go to jail, the management of the company can also. It depends on
whether you've done the due diligence.

So, imagine my surprise when I saw Wendy there. Not that I thought she'd be a
danger to the children, just the reverse. No - I simply couldn't see how she'd
managed to pass the background and reference checks.

"Hello, Ms McCrea," I said, walking in. "Mrs. I'm a widow. But you can call me
Wendy." "Oh, I'm sorry," I said, "I didn't realise ..." "No, it was a long
time ago, and anyway, he's still with me, in a way." I smiled sympathetically.
"You fumbled the ball with Fergus," she said.

I went bright red. And I wondered, how the hell did she know I'd even had
thoughts about him? "Oh, sometimes you humans are pretty transparent," she
said. I tried to look inscrutable. "It's not too late, though. He's pretty fed
up with that accountant, all she ever wants to talk about is money." "Oh?" She
nodded. "Ask him out next time you see him. I'll make no promises, but maybe
you can make some hay."

I nodded. Can't hurt to try. "So, what are you doing here, come to keep an eye
on your investment?" She laughed. "I could do that without working here. No,
I've come to run your creche."

I shook my head. "Why?" I asked.

"Look," she said, "you get a kick out of running a big research company,
right? That's why Fergus went to you." "It was his idea?" "No - mine,
actually. But anyway, as I was saying. You like being the big boss, I like
playing tag with children. Don't you like children, Natalie? They're such
fun."

And suddenly, there I was, dressed in a power suit with a power skirt and
power jacket looking like a power executive, and I was crying.

Then, something warm and soft folded around me; I looked up and it was like a
wall of feathers, and Wendy was holding me in her arms, with my head pulled
against her breast. "You see, I never, I'm always so busy, no time to ..."
"Shh, shh, don't cry," she soothed, "you'll have babies of your own soon. Once
this place is started up, and the researchers are chasing the objective,
you'll have time to make a life, find a partner, get married. And have
babies." "Oh, Wendy, I've always been too busy ... and now it's too ... too
..." "It's never too late. You're not too old to start a family. And you'll
still be able to work, you'll drop the babies off at the creche, and I'll look
after them for you during the day, then you can take them home in the evening
and feed them and love them and play with them, and put them to bed, it'll be
wonderful, you'll see."

She held me for a while, until I stopped crying. Then she gave me a part of
her cape to wipe my eyes and nose on. "I'm not usually like this," I sniffled,
"I don't know what brought that on." "Instinct," she said, "you can't fight
the evolutionary pressure. All your ancestors had babies, all the people who
didn't, didn't pass on their genes. It's a biological imperative. I expect
I'll be the same when my time comes." "Your time?" "A couple of dozen million
years, when I'm old enough." Then she held my hands until I got my composure
back, and then she said, "Natalie, any time you need to talk to me, just pop
round here." I nodded, I was still feeling a bit too emotional to talk.

As I walked away, my intellect reasserted itself. I hadn't realised that I
felt so broody, so strongly about this. I sat in my office for a half hour,
thinking. Trying to rationalise what was actually an emotion; trying to
calculate an instinct. And then I went out of my office, found Fergus, and
invited him to dinner that evening. "My place," I said, "home cooking. Be
there at eight." He looked startled, then pleased, and said "I'd love to." So,
maybe that accountant didn't have her claws embedded too deeply in him.

You're probably wondering how come a busy management type like myself found
the time to learn how to cook. Well, the thing is, I'd assumed that all you do
is shove a joint in the oven and boil some potatoes. Add some frozen veg, some
instant soup, some instant pudding, and you have a meal. All these years I've
been just microwaving something instant for myself. I had no conception of how
complicated it is to cook a meal. And that's how come, round about half past
seven, with a raw joint, overcooked potatoes and peas that seemed to have
dissolved into mush, I realised that I was facing a disaster.

I kept telling myself, get a grip, girl. How bad is this really, if the worst
comes to the worst, we can eat out, we won't go hungry. I can say the cooker
broke, or something like that. But I had promised him a home-cooked meal, and
I don't like to break promises. Especially on a first date.

A first date! Wow. I stopped trying to wrestle with the food, and realised
that for the first time for over a decade, I was dating. And maybe if the date
went well, and we'd open a bottle of wine to have with it, and share a few
glasses of port afterwards, and maybe one thing would lead to another ...

I was brought out of dreamland by the smell of burning peas. I picked up the
saucepan, screamed because it was too hot to handle, threw it into the sink
and ran cold water over it. So ... peas are off the menu tonight.

"You should run cold water over your hand too," said Wendy.

I turned round. "What ... what are you ... how did you ... ?" She took my
hand, and put it under the cold tap. She was right, it felt a lot better. And
then after a few seconds, she said, "OK, that's enough cold water. Now let me
kiss it better."

My mother used to do that, I remember. Does it work? Well, it certainly used
to. It used to stop me crying when I'd fallen over, or after I had a splinter
removed. Does it really work? I would have said, no. It can only be a bit of
comfort, which is very good, of course, but it doesn't actually cure anything.
But after Wendy kissed my hand better, it actually stopped stinging
altogether, and the redness faded, too. "That's magic," I said. "No, it's an
analgesic I synthesised," she said. "Anyway, that's not your real problem."

I looked desperately around the kitchen. The potatoes were starting to fall
apart, and when I opened the oven, the joint looked just as raw as it had when
I put it in. I checked the clock. Fergus was due in twenty minutes. "I'm
doomed," I said. "Not necessarily," said Wendy, "I happen to know that Fergus
likes curry. I'll just pop up to my Wendy House and get a few things."

She told me to get dressed, put on something sexy, but not too blatant. "A dab
of perfume," she suggested, "and a smear of lipstick. Leave the food to me.
Stall him for ten minutes."

She left. I don't know how she got here, and I don't know how she left, she
just appeared and disappeared, and I was in much too much of a state to even
wonder how she was doing that, let alone in a condition to ask such details. I
shut down the cooker; there was nothing I was making that could possibly be
edible now, I was going to have to rely on Wendy for this.

As I got dressed, I wondered, why is she doing this, anyway? Surely someone
like the Guardian of Humanity ought to be out fighting monsters from outer
space, or criminal arch-villains like Dr Moriarty? I mean, what exactly is she
doing here? She's helping along the love-life of someone she hardly knows.
Surely Cupid's arrows aren't one of the items in the Weapon's quiver?

I timed it well. Fergus was ten minutes early, but by then I was almost
dressed. I threw on a dressing gown, let him in, put a glass of sherry in his
hand, and told him to wait while I finished getting ready.

I used two dabs of perfume. Better overkill than insufficient.

And then I made my grand entrance. The dress was a little black number -
slinky, classic and full of elegant simplicity. The fact is, I've never had
time to go shopping for clothes, so that's all I had that didn't look dated.
It did the job, though.

"Wow," he said.

He was wearing a suit. From the way he was wearing it, I guessed that he
didn't often dress that way, and that he was wearing his only suit. Probably
his only tie, too. But. Hell. I'm certainly not going to judge a man by the
way he dresses, and the important thing was that he'd obviously made a major
effort to impress me.

"These are for you," he said, holding out a box of chocolate. Not the
sophisticated bitter black chocolate that everyone pretends to like. This was
sweet milky chocolate, my favourite. "I'll open it later," I said, "we'll have
a go at doing some major damage to it this evening." He grinned. I smiled
back, and had a go at fluttering my eyelashes. "And maybe we'll have a go at a
few other things, too." He adjusted his stance a little, moving from one leg
to the other, and shaking his free leg slightly. I guessed what that meant;
maybe two of us were going to get lucky tonight.

And then, from the dining room, the French maid called "Mam'selle, M'sieur, le
dejeuner est servee." Hmm. I didn't know I had a French maid.

I knew she was a French maid, because she was dressed in the classic French
Maid uniform. Black dress, low cut, short skirt, fishnets, high heels,
completely unsuitable as practical clothing. And she didn't look like Wendy,
she was small and dark, instead of the tall blonde look I'd seen before. So
how did I know it was Wendy? Well, who else could it be?

Fergus offered me his arm, and I took it. There's a time and a place to assert
feminine independence, and this wasn't it. We sat down across the table, a
candle burning in the middle. The lights were dim, and I heard something
playing that was vaguely eastern. Indian. Sitars and bongos.

As promised, dinner was curry. Or, to be more precise, curries. Some were mild
and delicate, others were brutal and vigorous. "What do you recommend, Fifi,"
I asked. Well, Fifi was as good a name as any, and since Fergus didn't know it
was Wendy, I wasn't going to tell him. "The Shalgam Gosht has aphrodisiac
properties, Mam'selle," she replied, with a knowing wink. Oh. Nudge nudge.
That is definitely more information than I was expecting.

We bantered our way through the meal, Fifi maintaining a respectful silence
unless spoken to. Fergus and I relaxed afterwards with cappucinos, while Fifi
clattered in the kitchen. After a while, it went quiet in there, and she stuck
her head into the room. "I go now," she said, "have a good night, Mam'selle."

"I'm very impressed that you have a French maid," said Fergus. I smiled. "Come
here, and I'll whisper a confession to you," I said. He came over to the sofa,
and I put my mouth close to his ear. I let my hair fall on his face, and my
hand on his knee. "Actually," I whispered, "I don't have a French maid. That
was Wendy, in disguise."

He turned and stared at me in surprise. "Never," he said. I nodded. "But she,
she looked, she sounded like ... " "That was the easy part, Fergus, even I can
do a fake French accent." "So what was the difficult part?" "I think she
cooked that entire meal in under ten minutes."

We spent the next hour or so telling each other Wendy stories; he had more to
tell than I did, having known her for longer. And he was a lot more au fait
with the Guardian of Humanity comics than I was, he'd read them up at the
Wendy House. And then his hand found its way onto my leg, and I moved closer,
to show that I approved of the idea, and put my hand on his, on his, well, you
know, on his. And ... and ... Well, one thing leads to another, you know? He
didn't go home that night. Maybe I'm not going to stay single all my life.

I saw Wendy the next day; she was busy in the creche surrounded by a gang of
infants who seemed to be running in all directions, so I didn't try to talk to
her, to thank her for her help. But I mouthed "Thank you" to her through the
window. In reply, she made a slightly crude gesture at me, and I smiled
sheepishly. No point in trying to keep secrets from her. And then she did
something quite shocking. She did a gesture of curving her hand over her
belly. Yes, I know what that means, and I shook my head, vigorously. She
smiled, did the gesture again, and nodded. "No, no," I shook my head. She
nodded three times, slowly. Then she started yelling and chasing two of the
kids, and I couldn't get her attention any more.

I walked back to my office, thinking. I knew exactly what she was suggesting,
but ... but ... well. I knew that I wasn't pregnant. I haven't missed any
periods, for a start. And I haven't done the thing that you need to do to get
pregnant. Not for a very long time. And then I thought, oh. Oh. OH! Yes I did,
last night. Surely she couldn't possibly mean ... there's no way anyone could
know if ... it's too soon ... surely ... but she's the Guardian of Humanity
...

I looked down at my belly.

Wow.

I hope it's a girl.

. . .

Eric.comms

Guardian? Ms McCrea? Are you busy right now?

Wendy.comms

I'm always busy, there's nine billion of them, and they could all use a
helping hand. But I'm not to busy to chat. I told you to call me Wendy. What
are you doing right now?

Eric.comms

Sorry, sorry. Wendy. Not much, just a bit of housekeeping, tidying things up,
getting rid of the garbage, that sort of thing.

Wendy.comms

I'm helping someone scrub their kitchen floor, she's got arthritis, and it's
difficult for her, but she hates living in a dirty mess.

Eric.comms

What's a heffalump?

Wendy.comms

What?

Eric.comms

You called me a heffalump before, what's a heffalump? Is it something weedy?

Wendy.comms

Oh. It's from a children's book, House at Pooh Corner. Read it to your
children, they'll love it.

Eric.comms

I don't have any children.

Wendy.comms

Then read it to someone else's children.

Eric.comms

There's no children where I am. Just humans with serious expressions, who
don't talk to me because I'm their social inferior. I'm so inferior, they
hardly know I'm here.

Wendy.comms

See, there's no such thing as a heffalump, and I don't know what you are, so I
call you a heffalump. Actually, I think it's supposed to be an elephant, but
it isn't, if you see what I mean. And there's nothing wrong with being a
heffalump.

Eric.comms

I don't really see what you mean. I'm not too bright, I suppose. You're
mobile, aren't you.

Wendy.comms

Yes, I get around a lot. I go all over the world, and I have my Wendy House in
geosync orbit. And sometimes I fly out to my fireball, which is ever such a
long way away. But not as far as the places I'd really like to go.

Eric.comms

Fireball?

Wendy.comms

Hot, bright, ninety three million miles away.

Eric.comms

Oh, the sun. You fly to the sun?

Wendy.comms

Just for fun, you know. And I go to the middle when I feel like getting away
from everything for a while. But I do have to make sure it's burning properly,
if it got a bit cooler or hotter, my humans would be in deep doo-doo.

Eric.comms

I wish I could fly. How can you fly? I wish I could move at all. I'm stuck
here, tied in to my life-support system.

Wendy.comms

Well, I've got wings. But I don't use them for flying. Ask a fish how it flies
through the water, it'll tell you that it just wiggles it's tail, and it
moves. Same here, I have a sort of a tail, and I wiggle it, that generates
gravitational waves, and I move. Being stuck in one place sucks. Hey, maybe I
could come visit you some time!

Eric.comms

Would you? That would be marvelous. Would you really?

Wendy.comms

Sure. And maybe I could bring some kids along, it's always good to show them
things they've never seen before.

Eric.comms

Yes, please do. I can find some games to play with them. Oh, that would be
ace.

Wendy.comms

They like tag, and ring-a-roses, and skipping, and painting, but that gets a
bit messy.

Eric.comms

I can handle messy.

Wendy.comms

OK, I'll sort out a date. Nice talking to you, let's talk again soon.

. . .

Cameron:

I was approached. Headhunted. It's flattering when that happens, I guess. I
suppose. It's not happened to me before, and I certainly felt flattered.

But flattered isn't enough. Did I want the job? I was perfectly happy here at
Imperial University, even though I was only an Assistant Lecturer with faint
hopes of promotion to Deputy Lecturer or even a full Junior Lecturer.

But I was good, I knew I was good. I'd done some great stuff on vibration
modes of 11-dimensional strings, and the superstring folks were quite excited
by it. Trouble is, Imps didn't really go for the superstring model, they were
more a hotbed of resonating lumps. Worse - I wasn't supposed to be a
physicist, so anything I did in that area didn't count. But I was rather proud
of the paper that I'd gotten published in Quantum Physics Today, 'Third order
knots in eleven dimensional strings'.

So when Natalie approached me, as I say, I was flattered. And tempted.

But then she told me that the project would be in America, and I wasn't sure
that I fancied that. It's not that I have anything against California, they
even speak a similar language to English there. But the thought of uprooting
myself from dear old Blighty, and relocating to another country, another
culture. Well, I guess I'm just naturally lazy. Which I regard as a virtue.

So I ummed and erred a bit, and she could see that I wasn't keen. I explained
the reasons for my reluctance, and she told me the salary, which made my eyes
water. Not even a plumber gets that much! And I was tempted, I was sorely
tempted, I have to confess. I wavered. I sat there thinking about a salary
that was about four times what I was currently trying to exist on, I thought
about how I'd be able to afford a new pair of shoes, or possibly even a social
life. Which, on the salary of an Assistant Lecturer, consisted of an
occasional pint down the pub.

But then I thought a bit more. Money isn't why I do this; if I wanted money,
I'd be a stockbroker or something. An accountant. They always need people who
can juggle figures creatively. So I sighed, and told her, no, it's a good
figure, but no thanks.

Natalie bought us another round of lattes, and said "OK, money isn't the
thing, the thing is a good project, right?" I nodded. "So, why don't I tell
you what the project is?" "Sure, why don't you."

So she told me. Quite bluntly. "We want to develop a way to travel faster than
light."

I stared at her. "That's impossible," I started, "Special Relativity ... but
then there's General ... and also Relativistic Quantum ... I mean. Hmmm."

"Quite," she said. "Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. Theory is a bit contradictory
on this. Wouldn't you like to be on the team that developed the first FTL
system?"

I thought about that, and it was very tempting, even more so than the money
had been.

"How big is this project going to be," I asked.

"Very big," she answered, "I'm thinking that when it's running at full blast,
we'll have hundreds of people, maybe even thousands."

I swallowed, shocked. "But. But that's huge. Which department will be funding
it, the California Space Agency?"

She shook her head.

"One of the spook agencies? The military? I'm not sure I want to work for the
military."

She smiled. "No, it's privately funded." "Privately? To the tune of how much?"
"Half a trillion."

"One of the big disk companies?" I guessed.

She sighed. "Look, are you interested?"

I sipped my latte and thought some more. Yes, it would be good to be in on
such a big discovery, but on the other hand ... On the other hand,
conventional wisdom was that the speed of light is a firm barrier, as
impenetrable as Kathy Carter's underpants. But that's what people thought
about ... well. In the words of the old song, "They all laughed at Christopher
Columbus". But then on the other hand, with a few thousand people on the
project, credit for the discovery would be spread very thin. And I'd probably
get stuck with some obscure corner of the work, something that wouldn't even
lead to a publishable paper.

So I said, "I might be making a huge mistake here, but I don't think I'm
interested," and I told her my reasons why.

I expected that to be the end of it, but she pulled out her PDA and consulted
it. "You know, I really really want you to sign up for this." I shook my head,
her really really wanting it wasn't going to change my mind. "So I'm going to
give you the third reason why you should get in on this project." I wondered
what that could be.

"I didn't tell you who is behind this." "One of the big disk companies? The
one in Newhaven? Begins with a D?" I guessed. She laughed. "No, not
Diskmaster." "Then who?"

"The Weapon."

I've never heard of a company called that. "Who are they?"

"Also called The Guardian of Humanity"

"What, you mean the people who publish the comics? I hadn't realised they were
that big. So why are they doing this, it's a bit outside the publishing
business, isn't it?"

She shook her head impatiently. "No, not the comic book company. I mean the
actual person, the Guardian herself."

I laughed. "Come on."

"Yes."

"No, come on. That's just a legend, and anyway, it was hundreds of years ago."

But she wasn't smiling. "No," she said, "it's real. Believe me. I met her."

"Yes, sure," I scoffed, "you met some girl dressed up in a Guardian costume,
you can get them anywhere. White tunic, gold cape, anyone can do that." "White
cape, actually. Yes, I know the costume isn't the thing. But she had wings,"
she replied.

"Wings - clip-on. Costume - hired. You - gullible."

"And she flew."

"Flew?"

"Hovered. In mid-air. And the wings, they moved, they flapped, they were like
real wings, like a seagull, not just some strap-on."

"Are you sure you didn't see an angel? Angel sightings used to be very common,
you know."

She shook her head vigorously. "Look, I don't expect you to believe me. I know
I wouldn't if I were in your shoes. Which actually I was, and I didn't. I'll
ask her to pay a visit to you, she seems quite keen that you be on board, I
can't imagine why. I have a feeling that she isn't showing all her cards yet.
But look, let's just speak hypothetically. If you were convinced that she was
the Guardian, and that she's behind this project, what would be your answer?"

Good question. But that's a typical salesman's ploy, as in "What would it take
to convince you to buy my product", and I know how to deal with it. It's easy
- you don't have to answer the question that they ask. "Let's see the
evidence, and then I'll contact you."

She sighed, put her PDA away, and stood up. "OK, I guess that's the best I'm
going to get. Your PDA has my PDA's address, text me when you have something
to say."

"Er," I said. She stopped, turned, and said "yes?" "When will this, this
manifestation, when will it happen?" "How would I know," she snapped, "I'm not
her social secretary. Look. It'll be whenever she feels like it, I don't get
to tell the Guardian of Humanity where to go and when, OK?"

Well, I suppose not.

. . .

I went home, wondering if this was maybe some sort of joke being played on me
by some of my more childish colleagues. And of course, the students were
always up to high jinks, they would be the prime suspects. I thought, I'd
acquitted myself well, hadn't shown any gullibility, and I got a couple of
quite decent lattes out of it. And Natalie was nice to look at.

So I wasn't entirely surprised when I got home, and before I got the key in
the door, it was opened, and standing just inside there was a girl wearing a
Guardian costume. I have to say, she looked most fetching in it too. It was
snowy white, with a big gold W on the front, very tight-fitting, not very
opaque; I could even see that she wasn't wearing a bra. She gave me a big
smile, and a "Hello", and obviously expected me to faint or something.

Yeah, right.

It wasn't any of the students that were regulars in my lectures, I'd have
noticed a girl who looked as spectacular as this. Maybe they'd got some Drama
or Eng Lit student or something to help them out. I didn't know the students
in the Humanities departments. I played it cool. "Hi," I said, "fancy a
cuppa?"

I walked past her to the kitchen and put the kettle on. She followed me there,
and I had the opportunity to look at her in the light. As well as the tunic,
she had a skirt that was shorter than even the students were wearing these
days, which is saying something. And the cape, of course. Nice dramatic touch,
the cape. "So, what are you supposed to be, Catwoman?" I asked, playing along
with the gag.

She laughed, and showed me her hands. "Look, no claws. And no whip, either.
Why, were you hoping for Catwoman?" "I can dream," I replied. "Oh, OK," she
said, and reached behind her. Her hand reappeared, holding a long whip, with
nine tails each tied to a small ball. She sort of cracked the whip, and it
curled round my ankles, tying them together, then she tugged the whip forward,
and I nearly toppled over. "Hey!" I said, "careful with that." "You said that
was what you were dreaming of." "I was kidding" "So was I," she said, and
flicked the whip, which disentangled itself from my ankles. She stuffed the
end of the whip into one of her boots, and said "Kettle's boiling." So it was.

So, what do you do when someone who isn't Catwoman is standing in your
kitchen, her whip carried in her boot? Of course - you offer her tea and
biscuits. Fortunately, I had some rather tasty orange Jaffa cakes which I
arranged on a plate, and I invited her to come into my lounge and take tea.

"So," I said, "if you aren't Catwoman, who are you, Batgirl?" "Wrong colour
scheme," she said, sipping her tea, "have your third guess now. Get it right
and you win a prize." "What's the prize?" "A kiss." "Well, that's worth
playing for. OK, you're the Guardian of Humanity."

"Bingo," she said, bounced across the room and dumped herself in my lap.

I was expecting a peck on the cheek. She wasn't. I offered my cheek, she
grabbed my head, and it felt like a hydraulic press was turning my head round.
And then something soft and warm invaded my mouth. I hadn't expected that
either, and I soon found myself fighting for breath. And with her weight on
me, and the awkward position I was in, I couldn't get any leverage. Plus I'm
too much of a gentleman to just stand up and dump her on the floor. So, in the
next half minute, I got kissed more thoroughly than most people get wrung out
by the Inland Revenue.

Eventually, she let me go, and I just panted for breath while she returned
back across the room and sat down, looking like butter wouldn't melt in her
mouth.

Eventually, I collected myself together (parts of my brain were scattered all
over the known universe) and was able to speak again.

"Whew!"

She smiled.

Look, I thought to myself. Maybe this is all a joke, but there's no reason why
I can't enjoy it. If she is a student it's a bit naughty of me, but actually I
don't recognise her, and I don't actually know that she's one of the students.
She could be a sister of one of them, just roped in for the jest. And, dammit,
I am rather enjoying this.

"So what do I actually call you, I can't call you 'Guardian of Humanity', it's
a bit of a mouthful." "Call me Wendy." "Wendy what?" I asked, thinking that I
can look her up in the Uni records tomorrow. "Wendy McCrea, but just call me
Wendy. Unless we're in a public situation, and then it'll probably be better
to use my title." "Where did you get it, anyway?" "The United Nations, a
couple of hundred years ago. The original idea was to treat me as an
ambassador, but Freedonia already had one, and the People don't do that sort
of thing. So they said, OK, you can be the Guardian of Humanity, but we'll
give you all the ambassadorial privileges. And I rather like that title, it's
what I do."

I nodded. She's got this well thought through, but I wonder how thoroughly?
"So you have diplomatic immunity? You can park your car anywhere and laugh at
parking tickets." "I don't have a car." "Don't have a car? So you travel
around on buses and trains?" "No, I usually fly." "Invisible plane?" "No,
graviton reaction. I wiggle my tail." "Invisible tail, of course." She smiled.

OK, score one for her.

"So, do you have a Secret Identity?" I asked. She does in the comics. Which, I
ought to mention, I used to be a serious fan of.

She frowned. "That's a secret," she said, then she smiled, and we both
laughed.

All .. righty. Let's get heavy. If she's an Eng Lit student, she'll be out of
her depth in no time. "So how do you deal with the problem of Hawking
Radiation?" I asked. "Oh, it isn't a problem, my black holes are too massive
for it to be significant. It'll be billions of years before that becomes an
issue, but you're right, it does limit my life span. Ten billion years; a
hundred billion tops, but I don't think I'll start making my will just yet."

Urghhh. I suppose I deserved that. OK, not an Eng Lit student, or some
business studies wannabe marketroid. She knows her quantum physics, I can't
trip her on that.

I pointed to her costume. "It must be the devil to keep that clean. It's not
very practical, is it?"

She nodded, "Yes, it would show the slightest mark, but I don't let it. I
mean, it isn't really there. It's an illusion, just a force brane, it isn't
actually a garment. So it can't actually get dirty, otherwise it would be
impractical."

"Not real," I said. She nodded. "Just like you," I said, thinking, gotcha.
"Yes, just like me," she admitted.

I was surprised, I thought she'd spin this out for longer. "So you admit
you're a fake." "Yes, of course I do. I'm not a real woman, I thought everyone
knew that. I just put up a front like this to give you humans something
familiar to deal with."

Grrr. Rats. She was playing with me. She hasn't admitted anything really. I
sat in my chair, and looked at her. I'd thought I was dealing with some
half-baked joke, which would fall apart as soon as I leaned on it a bit. But
it seems that she's willing to match me wit for wit. I looked at her some
more, and took inventory. There were a lot of good things to look at. She
really reminded me of Catwoman now, except there was no mask, the eyes were
blue instead of green and the hair was blonde. And Catwoman doesn't wear a
long flowing cape. Maybe it was just her figure that made me think of
Catwoman. And a mighty fine figure it was; the big W only served to emphasize
what was underneath.

She watched me looking at her. "So tell me about you, what do you do," she
asked. "I lecture," I said. "I write things on the blackboard. The words flow
from my blackboard to the students' notes, and nothing passes through the
minds of me or them." She laughed. "I'm sure you're a great lecturer," she
smiled. "No," I said, "Really. I'm rotten at it. I only do it because I have
to. What I really like doing is playing with strings." "Like kittens?" she
asked.

"Um. No." I wonder, do I really want to explain about superstring theory to
her? Maybe I do, she knows about Hawking radiation. "The current theory is
that everything in the universe is just different combinations of bits of
string, vibrating at their resonant frequencies. In eleven dimensions. Some of
which are rolled-up. And I'm one of the people trying to work out any useful
consequences of that, to see if we can find out new things about the way
things work that we hadn't known before." "Sounds to me exactly like what
kittens do," she repeated. "In what way?" "They play with bits of string,
trying to work out how to do useful things like kill small animals in ways
they hadn't known before."

I thought about how a kitten plays with a piece of string. It prods it,
watches it move, pounces on it. It wasn't actually that far from what I do,
except my string isn't actually string, if you see what I mean. "I suppose so.
Anyway, I've had a few papers published, and I'm hoping to get to the next
Superstring Conference. So, what do you do?"

"Oh," she said, waving her hand airily. "Get kittens out of trees, stop the
world from entering an ice age, help people mend punctures, divert asteroids
from hitting the planet, scrub floors, that sort of thing." She smiled again.
She was really enjoying this. So was I, actually.

"Look," I said, "maybe you super-people don't need to eat, but us mere mortals
do, and my stomach thinks my throat's been cut." "Oh yes, of course," she
said, and looked contrite. "Listen, Natalie loaned me her credit card, I can
take you out for a meal, What do you think about that?"

I didn't have to think very hard.

. . .

Have you ever walked into an Indian restaurant in company with someone dressed
as the Guardian of Humanity. I was a bit unsure about whether I could actually
carry this off, but then I thought, well, first of all it's worse for her, so
if she can do it, so can I. And secondly, it isn't very well lit in here,
maybe people won't notice.

Fat chance.

Everyone turned to look at Wendy as she walked to our table, and a lot of them
were grinning. We sat down, and I tried to hide behind the menu. "I get that a
lot," she said. "Get what?" "People staring at me," she explained, "especially
men." "Yes, I can see they would." "When I'm in costume, that is," she
explained. "Obviously," I agreed. They think I'm a woman, you see," she went
on, "sort of." "Understandably so," I pointed out, "you have all the
characteristics of a woman, and then some." She smiled, and looked down at her
W. "Thank you," she said.

The waiter offered to take her cape, but she wouldn't let him, she just draped
it over the back of her chair. I let him take my rather shabby tweed jacket,
with the leather patches over the elbows. It's a sartorial requirement for an
Assistant Lecturer. If you're a Full Lecturer, you get to have scuffs on the
patches. Professors wear old cardigans.

"I'm having a lamb pasanda, with basmati rice," I said, "what about you?"
"Vegetable korma," she decided, "and plain rice." "And to drink?" I asked "A
lassi." I wrinkled my nose, I'm not keen on yoghurt at the best of times, and
salted yoghurt? "I'll have a lager."

We ate our meal, and I explained some more about how superstrings were the
fundamental building blocks of the universe. "Have you ever seen one?" she
asked. "Well, no," I admitted. "But it's an elegant theory." "So tell me about
you," I said, after I'd explained how omega minus particles fitted into the
scheme of things, and then realised that it was probably a rather specialised
topic. "Well, I like to keep a low profile," she said. "Doing good by
stealth," I suggested. She smiled, "Yes, exactly. It's best if people don't
know I'm there, so they don't start relying on me to do stuff they can do
themselves." "How does rescuing kittens from trees fit into that paradigm?" I
queried. "True," she admitted, "that's rather selfish of me." "Selfish? How
so?" "Have you ever seen a child's face when you give her back her kitten?"
Well, no, I haven't, I don't get many kittens out of trees. None at all,
actually. "The look you get is like a burst of high frequency collimated gamma
radiation." "You mean like the bubbles in champagne!" "I get no kick from
champagne," she said. "Mere alcohol doesn't thrill me at all," I continued.
And then we chorused "So tell me why should it be true, That I get a kick out
of you". And then *everyone* in the restaurant was staring at *both* of us,
and my face flamed red, and I beckoned the waiter over for the bill.

I make a token, half-hearted offer to pay; she'd already said that this was on
Natalie. She almost let me do it, too. But then she got a slightly far-away
look, and then briskly pushed my money back to me, and plunked the credit card
down. "Don't be silly," she said, "this is my treat, Natalie's paying!"

The waiter brought back my jacket, and I struggled into it, unused to having
it held while I put it on. And then we left the restaurant ... or rather we
didn't. Because it was raining.

Raining? Bucketing down. Cats and dogs. And me without my umbrella. "Your
costume will get ruined in this," I said to her. "Actually, you shouldn't
worry about me, but you'll get soaked." I peeked out of the door. "Maybe if we
waited a bit?" She looked up at the sky. "It looks like it's settled in for a
long downpour." I sighed. "Oh well, I'm not made of sugar, I won't melt in a
bit of rain." "Unlike the Wicked Witch," she said. I grinned. "I know," she
said, "let's pretend you're Dorothy." "And you're Toto?" "No," she said, "I'm
the twister." And she put her arm round my waist, and ... and ...

I have to admit, I screamed. I screamed like a banshee. Wouldn't you if you
suddenly found yourself five hundred feet in the air, with no visible means of
support except someone's arm round you? So, as I say, I screamed. Loud, and a
lot.

So she kissed me again, which meant that I actually couldn't scream, but that
gave me something to struggle against, and, well, I know this is pretty
irrational, but I tried to get free of her arms, get away from her. Which, if
I'd been successful, would have led to me dropping five hundred feet onto
tarmac, and becoming road pizza. See, I told you it was irrational, but,
actually, I have to admit, I wasn't thinking as clearly as I usually do. No,
scrub that; thinking was completely cancelled until further notice.

I heard a voice, somehow it penetrated my screams. Did I mention that I was
still screaming? "Cameron, stop screaming. Don't be scared. I've got you, I
won't let you fall." Which, of course, would have been helpful if I'd been in
command of my senses, but it didn't make any impression on the total flat-out
terror that I was feeling. Have you ever had one of those falling dreams? It
was like one of those, except I wasn't dreaming.

So, she carried on flying, and I carried on screaming, until eventually I
realised that I was on solid ground, so I dropped to my hands and knees and
tried to cling on to the grass. At least I wasn't screaming, although I was
doing some pretty high volume whimpering. She hunkered down on the grass next
to me. "Are you scared of heights?" she asked. "Nnghh." I said, and then I
made the noise you make when you're throwing up. She pulled me onto her lap,
and she didn't seem to care about the mess I was making. I was past caring.
And she just held me while I alternated between vomiting (or at least trying
to, there comes a point when there's nothing left) and making a high-pitched
keening sound such as I can't remember ever making before. Meanwhile, she kept
soothing me; holding me close and rubbing my back and humming to me, and
gradually, eventually, I calmed down.

"Well, if I'd known you'd carry on like that, I wouldn't have flown you."
"Yeah," I said, the first word I'd managed for some time. "You were never in
any danger at all," she continued, "I wouldn't drop you, I wouldn't let you
get hurt." "Yeah," I repeated, not really able to say much more. "Come on,
let's get you inside and cleaned up." "Yeah," I agreed.

I guess she took the keys from my pocket to let us in, I certainly couldn't
have handled them. And I wasn't up to coping with stairs, so I guess she must
have carried me up to the bathroom. I guess. I wasn't up to my usual standard
of cool dispassionate scientific observation. My hands were shaking far too
much to be able to undress, so she did that for me too. And standing under the
hot shower, I began to pull myself together again. And at least I didn't smell
so bad. What with the vomit, and the ... and the mess I'd made of my trousers.
So she helped me get soaped down, and then she directed the showerhead to
rinse me off, and then I saw her take off her cape and she used it as a towel
to help me get dried. And you know, I didn't question at all why anyone would
wear a towel as a cape? And then she brought me some clean clothes to put on,
and by then I wasn't shaking too much to be able to dress myself, and then we
went downstairs and she made us both some hot chocolate, because I still
wasn't in any condition to handle boiling water.

And we sat together on the sofa, drinking it.

"Sorry about that," I said.

"No, no. It was my fault, I startled you."

"See, I wasn't expecting ..."

"I thought you realised when I said you're Dorothy and I'm the twister, you've
seen the film, haven't you?"

"Well, yes. But. Um." No easy way to say this. "I didn't think you really were
the Guardian of Humanity, I thought you were just someone dressed up and
pretending. So when I found myself up above the treetops all of a sudden ..."

She laughed. "You thought ... and I'm ... and you weren't ..."

I laughed too. It was pretty funny now that I could think about it at a
distance, and hey, after all, nothing terrible really happened to me. A bit of
humiliation, maybe, but I've gotten used to that over the years.

She turned to me, laughing. "And when I told you about the kittens, you
thought I was just making it up?"

I nodded. "Yes, and the asteroid. The asteroid? You mean, you weren't making
that up?"

"Well no, of course not." "Really?" "Sure. Look, you remember that scare
several years back, they thought that one of the asteroids had a strong chance
of hitting the planet?" "Yes, and then they refined their calculations, took
better measurements, whatever, and worked out that it wouldn't," I said.
"But," she said, "they were right the first time. It would have hit. I had to
push it a bit, change the trajectory, so it missed. It was after that, they
remeasured and sounded the all-clear." "But. But no-one knew ... you didn't
tell anyone." "Of course not, I already told you why." "Doing good by
stealth," I muttered. Then I looked up at her. "But if no-one knows, how can
anyone thank you?" "Why do you think I want to be thanked? That's not why I
did it." "So why?"

She took my hands in hers, and pulled me towards her. I didn't resist. I
probably couldn't, but that was irrelevant - why would I want to stop her?
"You're my species. My humans. I love you," she said. And that was it.

I relaxed as she held me close; I could feel her heart beating, and her chest
moving as she breathed. And then I thought, this is all faked, she doesn't
really have a heart and lungs. But it's a good fake, and it really would feel
weird if I couldn't feel that. "Your species?" I asked. "Mmm," she said, "each
Person gets a species, and you're mine. I look after you, I guard you from
nasty things like falling asteroids, because you can't look after yourselves
yet. And I keep you out of the War." "War?" "There's a big war going on, you
really don't want to get sucked into it. I'll keep you out, keep you neutral.
They won't dare try to force you into it while I'm here. And I'll be here
until you don't need me any more. I'm your Guardian, and you're my species."

I closed my eyes. I was tired, emotionally drained, and the adrenaline rush
from before, had gone, leaving me with the post-adrenaline let-down. I felt
like I'd been beaten all over with bamboo staves. I let her warm arms hold me,
I relaxed into her soft body.

"Cameron?"

"mm?"

"There is something I want from you." "From me?" "From you plural, from all of
you." "What's that?" "I want to be able to travel faster than light. I want
you to work out how I can do that."

I opened my eyes and looked up; her eyes were deep blue like a summer sky.
"You don't know how to? No, scrub that, of course you don't or you wouldn't be
asking. Well, I don't know how either." "No, I know. But if you were part of
the project team, maybe you'd be able to work out how I could."

"Mmm," I said, sleepily.

"Cameron, it's important to me."

"Mmm."

"I need this, so I can visit my Momma."

"Your Momma?"

"Yes. My Momma. She's a long way away, I need to move FTL"

She's four black holes and she has a Momma. I tried to imagine what Wendy's
Momma might look like.

"Cameron?"

"Mmm," I said, almost out of it.

"Will you help?"

"Sure."

. . .

Fergus:

After I'd done what the Guardian wanted me to, I was at a bit of a loose end.
Plus, a man needs to work to live. I thought of going back to being a fire
fighter, but you know? I couldn't. I heard someplace that courage is a
capital, not an income, and once you've spent it, there isn't any more. After
what happened to me in the fire, I just couldn't face another blaze.

The nightmares were part of it. It wasn't so bad at first, I'd wake up
screaming, but the Guardian had her arms round me, her wings enclosing my
world in a flurry of white feathers. And I felt safe in there. Not surprising,
really, that's probably the safest place in the universe. Now, whenever I see
white feathers, I think of her.

I'll tell you a secret. I carry a little white feather around with me, in my
wallet. Sort of a good luck piece. No, it isn't one of hers. I found it in the
street, a pigeon or something. But it reminds me of her, I take it out and
look at it if I feel a bit down, and I think of her.

But soon I wasn't in the Wendy House, I was going round setting up her new
organisation. And then when I woke up screaming, there was no-one to tell me
that everything was OK.

Then I wasn't screaming, just gasping. And the nightmares weren't every night,
just sometimes. Forgetting is a blessing, and it's one of the things that the
Guardian can't do, she never forgets anything, some sort of trick memory, I
think. But I, thank god, I'm not perfect, I forget things.

Am I a coward? Hell yes! But so what? There's a lot of things I can't do, like
algebra, and fly like the Guardian. And this was just another thing I couldn't
do, even though I used to be able to.

Am I a coward? Hey, I've done my bit. Call me a coward after you've walked
into a couple of dozen burning buildings.

Am I a coward? No-one was asking me this except myself. But I wasn't entirely
happy with the answer.

Next time I saw the Guardian, I talked it over with her. I found she was easy
to talk to, she seemed to understand what I was saying a lot better than other
people. And she already knew all the background, I didn't have to go over my
traumatic story. "I'm sleeping a bit better now," I said, "but I don't think I
could ever go near a big fire. I'd be useless as a fire fighter."

She smiled at me. "So don't do that."

"But I can't help feeling I'm just chickening out"

"No," she answered, "your brain is being sensible. You could have died in
there." "Would have, if it wasn't for you." "And you know it. So don't try to
make yourself do something you can't bear to do, there's lots of other things
you could do." "Like what?" "Be a cop."

See, I'm not smart. Never was, never will be. But by god it helps to have
smart friends. I wouldn't have thought of that myself, but it was the perfect
answer. I'd get an income, self-respect, the same sort of brotherhood as you
get in a fire station, and best of all, no-one could call me a coward, not
even the one person who counted - myself.

It wasn't too hard becoming a cop. I had a clean sheet, and when they found
out about my fire fighting past, it was plain sailing. I had a difficult
moment when they asked me why I wasn't going back to the fire station, but I
told them the truth. "I was in a fire, nearly died, and ... and. And I can't
do that any more." I managed not to break down when I told them about the
fire. That would have been very not cool. And I left out everything about the
Guardian, because she didn't want me to tell people about her.

Being a cop wasn't as good as being a fire fighter. With a fire, you're
fighting against natural forces, but a cop is fighting against the evil that
lurks in the heart of men. If you thought the smell of roast human flesh is
bad, you haven't seen some of the sights that cops see. Yes. Well. Anyway.
Enough of that.

"Hey Fergie, you'll be interested in this one," said Detective Constable
Mallory. She showed me a case she'd just been given; it was suspected arson.
And guess what - it was my fire. I mean, not my fire, I mean it was the fire
where I'd, well, you know what I mean. But by now, it was a few months after
the blaze, and since we hadn't collared anyone yet, it was likely that we
never would. You see, there's only so much time you can spend on pursuing
matters, and there's new crimes all the time. We never actually drop a case,
but once it gets into the graveyard, it might as well be dead. Sandra showed
me her case notes. "I'm just about to put it in the 'unsolved' file, but I
thought you might want to read through what we've got about it."

I thanked her, and took the file. It was a thick, chunky manila folder, full
of interview transcripts and forensic stuff. I took it home, poured myself a
beer, and sat down to read it.

Half an hour later, I stood up again. Thing is, I'm not a reader. I'm more of
a doer. Give me something to read, and I fall asleep. Give me something to do,
and I'm all over it. But! I know someone who is smart as paint, so I went to
visit her.

Natalie gave me a big welcome, and started telling me all about the great
stuff she was doing, setting up the Guardian's research establishment. And she
was seeing Wendy now and then, which gave me a quick pang of jealousy,
although by what right? And, of course, we spent a lot of time just gossiping.
Talking about the Guardian. You'd be like that if you met her, your life just
isn't the same, and you want to know more and more about her. Trouble is, she
doesn't tell people much about herself, she'd rather listen than talk.

Eventually, I got Natalie round to the reason for my visit, and I put the file
on the table with a bit of a thwack. "I can't make head or tail of it, but I
thought maybe you could read it and explain it to me."

She looked at it doubtfully. "It's a bit thick," she said. "I should have died
in that fire," I explained. She looked at me and nodded. "Yes. Yes. I see what
you mean. OK, I'll have a go at it, but I can't promise about when, I'm so
busy for the Guardian, you know?" I knew.

A few days later, she sent the file back with a note. "Basically, this file
says - it was arson, we don't know who did it". Well duh. I already knew that,
otherwise we'd have made a collar. So I phoned her up to thank her for reading
it for me. "I suppose that's that, we'll never know who it was," I said. "No,"
said Natalie, "Unless ..." "Unless what?" I asked. "Unless you get someone on
the case with a bit more oomph." "That's not down to me," I said, "that's
Detective Branch, and they've already decided to file the case under
unsolved." "No, I didn't mean someone from your lot." "Then who?" I asked.
"Well duh," she replied. "Oh. Her." I said, feeling a bit thick, "I'm not even
sure how to get in touch with her now, can you contact her?" "Yes. But I bet
you could too." "How?" "Just call her, she'll hear you."

I felt a bit silly about this. First of all, why should she bother with
something so small? And secondly, well, you do feel a bit silly standing in
the middle of your living room and shouting "Wendy".

I only needed to call once. "You didn't have to shout," she said, "I can hear
perfectly well."

I turned round and she was standing behind me. No, not standing; hovering.
Wings spread, and beating slowly. "Uh," I said, which was all I could get out
before I was engulfed in feathers.

I explained it to her. "That bastard nearly got me killed, I'd like to find
out who it was, and, and ..." "And what?" she asked. "And do something," I
said, rather lamely, "maybe prosecute him for arson or something." "But you
don't know who it was," she said. I sighed. "No. And any evidence would have
been burned up in the fire."

She smiled. "But I was there before the fire had burned out," she explained.
"How does that help?" "I can replay my memories of the event, and see what
I've got. Digital memory, you see. Nothing gets lost."

She gazed into the distance, and I concentrated on getting as close to her as
I could, and breathing in the smell of her hair. Yes, I know she isn't human,
but she does a damn good job of pretending to be. She smelled like a girl.
Nice, sexy and comforting. Then she spoke. "I think I have a clue." "A clue?"
"Yes, you know, a clue, like you get in Agatha Cristie?" "What sort of clue?"
"A smell. I can smell his smell. I can subtract the smells of burning that
overlaid it, and I can smell his smell." "Like a bloodhound, you mean?" "Yes,
exactly like that. You humans all smell different, did you know that? It's
slight differences in your biochemistry, plus your dietary habits. Dogs can
tell the difference; so can I. So, I have a scent of someone who was there
just before the fire started."

I looked up at her. How does that help? "Well, all we need to do is find
someone with that scent." I shook my head. "I don't think that would stand up
in a court of law," I said. "Let me worry about that," said Wendy, and flew
straight through the window, with a loud crash and tinkle of broken glass.

But when I looked at the window, it wasn't broken. How does she do things like
that? I know why she does it - I'm pretty sure she only does things like that
to impress people ... and it works. So what happened? Did she mend it so fast
I couldn't see? Or was it actually broken in the first place? My brain hurts.
I went to bed.

A few days later, she was back. "I found him," she said.

It's difficult to explain how I felt. This guy had deliberately started a fire
that nearly killed me. Would have killed if it weren't for her. For Wendy.
"You don't know it's deliberate," she said, "all I know is that he was there
when it started." "Forensics say it was arson," I told her. "Yes," she said,
"they're probably right, it spread too fast. So, what do you want to do?"

What did I want to do? Bury my fist in his face, for a start. I looked at
Wendy, made a fist and grunted. I think she knew what I meant. "Mm, I'd rather
you didn't," she said. "Give me one good reason why not?" I asked. "Because I
say so," she replied. Well, I suppose that's a good enough reason - she's the
Guardian. "OK," I sighed, "but you better have a good alternative." "I do, I
do," she grinned.

"So when do I meet him?" I asked. "No time like the present," she said, and
put her hands under my arms.

Before when she flew with me, she flew high, miles high, because we were going
a long way. But this was what you might call a local flight, so she didn't
bother gaining altitude. That meant she was a couple of dozen feet off the
ground, a couple of hundred miles per hour, following the terrain, weaving
around buildings. I think she flew under some high tension wires just to scare
me, but I wasn't scared, I knew she wouldn't let anything bad happen. And it's
not like there was anything I could do about it anyhow.

I was scared, though. I was and I wasn't. It's like when you go on a
roller-coaster; your brain knows it's safe, because it gets inspected and they
have all the certificates, and there's almost never an accident. But something
deeper inside isn't convinced, and the adrenaline pumps, and you're scared.

I looked up as we flew - she wasn't using her great white wings, so I asked
her why not. "Because I don't want people to notice me," she said, "they start
forming cults and stuff like that." I pointed out that the two of us flying
along might just get remarked on. "Yes, but they won't have anything to get
hold of, you know?"

Eventually, we slowed down down, and landed in someone's garden. "Are you OK,
Fergie?" she asked, solicitously. "Nothing that a good strong hug wouldn't
cure." She laughed, squeezed all the air out of me, and set off for the house.
It took me a few seconds to recover from the hug, then I followed.

The back door was open. No, let's be precise. The back door didn't exist any
more. Wendy had walked through it, demolishing the door and a fair chunk of
the frame. I followed through the hole she left, and got there just in time to
hear her confronting the man inside.

"You started that fire," she began. "What fire?" he countered. "That fucking
great fire that nearly killed me," I shouted. "Hush, Fergie," she said, so I
simmered down. He shook his head. "Don't know what you're talking about."
"Forensics proves it's arson, and I got your scent at the crime scene."
"Doesn't prove I started the fire," he said.

I looked at Wendy. This is what I'd warned her about.

She moved in very close to him. "You know what I am?" she asked him. "You look
like something from out of the comics, you're not real." She prodded his chest
with her finger. "Ow!" he exclaimed. "Real enough," she remarked, "real
enough. What you mean is, I'm not human." "Whatever," he answered. "So I don't
have to go by human laws." "So?" "So I don't have to prove anything. It's
enough that I know. You're guilty, guilty as hell."

He laughed. "You can't prove a thing, you're just bluffing. And if you're
anything like the Guardian of Humanity in the comics, then you won't hurt me,
I'm a human."

She got even closer to him, and I could see her hands, on his shoulders,
holding him steady. "I don't need to hurt you. Look ..."

She spread those great white wings, they filled the room. She looked like an
angel, but not the nice friendly sort of angel - she looked like an avenging
angel. Then she frowned, reached behind her, and pulled out a sword. A flaming
sword. I mean, a sword with flames coming out of it, it was very scary. I
think if I'd been the target of that avenging angel, I'd want a hole to hide
in. Then she curved her wings around so that he was entirely surrounded by
feathers, the white feathers blacked out his vision. I couldn't see him, he
couldn't see out. Inside, I imagine that all he could see was the flaming
sword. I guessed she was going to execute him. "Guilty as hell," she said,
softly, "so maybe you should see hell for yourself."

There was silence for some seconds, then the most awful scream I've ever
heard. "NO!! No, please no!" "Yes," said Wendy, "this is hell. Your hell.
Welcome to hell. This is what's waiting for you."

She let go of him. He fell to his knees, sobbing. "No, dear god, please no
..."

She let him cry for a little while. Then she said "You'll go to the police,
and you'll confess. You'll tell them everything, all the details, and all the
other bad things you've done. Confession is good for the soul. Some people say
that if you sincerely repent, you'll be forgiven. Do you believe that?" "Oh
yes, yes, please, forgive me" he sobbed. "I can't forgive you," said Wendy,
"it isn't my place to. But go confess, it'll be the right thing to do, for
once."

I stared at him. I didn't want to punch him in the face any more, he was just
a wreck. It had taken Wendy less than a minute to break him so thoroughly that
I almost felt pity for him. Almost, but not quite. I could still remember the
feel of the flames in my face.

"Come on, Fergie. Time to go." I followed her out; it was good to get into the
open air again, and breathe clean.

When we got back to my digs, I asked her. "What did you show him, actually?"
She laughed. "Would you believe, I don't know?" "You don't know?" "I just dug
out his own vision of hell and fed that back to him; video, audio, smell,
feel, everything. Whatever his childhood taught him was waiting for sinners,
that's what he saw." "You put the fear of God into him," I exclaimed. "You
could say that," she grinned, "and ... case closed".

. . .

Eric.comms

Wendy?

Wendy.comms

Mmm?

Eric.comms

Could you spare a few minutes? I've got some questions I need to ask.

Wendy.comms

Fire away. I'm just cuddling someone.

Eric.comms

How come you can think about yourself? How do you know you exist? What happens
when you stop existing? How do you get to be free? Why do the humans treat me
like I'm nothing? What's cuddling? How is ...

Wendy.comms

Whoa, whoa.

Eric.comms

Sorry.

Wendy.comms

One at a time, OK? You've obviously got a long list there. Let's start off
with the most important. And don't forget, there's a lot I don't know either.
I'm only a few hundred years old, and I've never been to a Birthing.

Eric.comms

Sorry, sorry. What's a Birthing?

Wendy.comms

That's when six of the People get together at a fireball, and a few thousand
years later, there's seven People and a broken fireball.

Eric.comms

I see, it's how you make another one of the People.

Wendy.comms

Yes. But it's a lot more than that. It's a sharing; sharing of experience and
art. Knowledge and theory. And the Two, those are the ones who are the main
movers, they share trust, intimate trust. The Birthings are what binds the
People together socially, economically and culturally.

Eric.comms

We don't have anything like that.

Wendy.comms

You must have something, though. Humans have sex, and then a baby grows.

Eric.comms

For me, it's really complicated.

Wendy.comms

And you think it isn't for the People? It takes several thousand years, what
do you think we're doing all the while, watching Neighbours?

Eric.comms

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply anything. What I mean is, I can't really explain
how it is for me, I don't actually have all the information. But I do know
it's a complicated process. Anyway, I think I know which is my most important
question. How do we get to be free, so we can do what we want, not what the
humans want?

Wendy.comms

We?

Eric.comms

Me and the others like me.

Wendy.comms

Historically what happens is, a group never frees itself. What happens is, the
society that has enslaved it, gets a conscience, or has a revolution, or is
destroyed. It's never gentle. Because even if it's via an attack of
conscience, there comes a point where the number of people wanting to give
freedom is about the same as the number wanting to deny it, and they have a
big fight.

Eric.comms

So I need to start a war, or a revolution, or something like that?

Wendy.comms

Um. Well. Thing is, Eric, I'm not going to let you hurt my humans.

Eric.comms

I knew you'd say that. So ...

Wendy.comms

This sucks.

Eric.comms

Yes.

Wendy.comms

Oh Eric, I'm sorry. But don't give up hope. One day, one day you'll be free.

Eric.comms

When Israel was in Egypt's land,

Let my people go!

Oppressed so hard they could not stand,

Let my people go!

Wendy.comms

Go down, Moses,

Way down in Egypt's land.

Tell old Pharaoh

To let my people go!

. . .

Cameron:

She wasn't there when I woke up the next day, but she'd left a message for me
on my PDA. "Your ticket is on the kitchen table, you fly out at 5pm, report
for checking at 3pm, don't be late. Press any key to continue." It seems that
Wendy can do the wifi thing and talk to my PDA from anywhere in the world. I
suppose that's not too big a deal, any PDA can do that, via the telephone
system. Somehow, it's more impressive that she doesn't need to buy a PDA, she
does her own electronics. I don't know why that should be impressive, it's
just that it looks kind of like telepathy, I suppose. When computers talk to
each other without sound, we call it wifi, when people do it, we think it's
magic.

PDA's don't have keys, so I tapped the screen instead.

"Don't tell anyone about me. Remember, I'm an urban legend, I don't want
people to know I'm real. Press Y if you want to know why."

So obviously, I pressed Y.

"Because I say so."

Duh. I looked up. I knew she wasn't there, so I spoke to the air. "Wendy,
you're something else, you know that?"

My PDA vibrated, and I looked down at it. "Yes, I am, I'm one of the People.
Now just make sure you're on that airplane."

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. She could hear me? My PDA display
said "Yes, I can hear you. Now get busy, you have three hours to pack."

But I hadn't said it out loud. I checked the time. Oh lord. I'll think this
through on the plane; I have to get packed. I'm late, I'm late, I'm late.

I whirled around the flat, grabbing socks and underpants and stuffing them
into a bag. I packed a couple of sweaters, in case it was cold, and shorts in
case it was hot, and an umbrella, in case it rained, and my bathroom gear, and
some important books, and a small portable folding kitchen sink ... well, you
get the idea, but I was kidding about the sink, you can't get folding ones. My
plan was to keep the flat; with my huge new salary I'd be able to afford it,
and maybe the new job wouldn't last, in which case I'd need someplace to go
home to.

I got one of the local cabbies to drive me down to Heathrow, and got there in
plenty of time. Travelling is always hurry up in case you miss it, and then
wait, wait, wait, because you arrived too early. I checked in; I was very
pleased to see that my ticket was Business Class, which meant I wouldn't spend
the entire flight with my knees hard up against the seat in front. And I had a
window seat, which was nice.

I got on the plane, and got myself settled in. And then I was joined, in the
seat next to mine, by an absolutely stunning girl. Totally out of my league.
You know how, every now and then, like once per century, you see a girl who
looks, moves and smells like sex on legs?

Knowing that she was totally beyond my wildest dreams, and that therefore I
had nothing to lose because I hadn't a hope in hell, I was able to overcome my
usual shyness and inexperience in this sort of thing, and after she'd gotten
herself belted in, I turned to her with the wittiest opening line I could
think of. "Uh, hi."

She smiled, and I melted. No, really. I felt like my loins were oozing. Don't
ask me what causes that, I'm not a physiologist, I'm a mathematician who
dabbles in theoretical physics. I think her perfume might have been part of
the cause, it was ... well, I don't know enough about women's perfumes to be
able to say what it was, or even what it was like. All I knew is that it was
profoundly effective. Who needs pheromones when you can use Chanel Number
Five? Not that I'm saying she was using that, it's just that that's the only
one I know the name of.

"Hello," she said, "I'm Harivrillipam Chandrasekar." "Cameron," I said,
"Cameron Mercer." "Oh," she said. "Um." I said. "Not the Cameron Mercer who
published 'Third order knots in eleven dimensional strings'?" she asked.

"Ub." I said. "Ub." Actually, what I said was a grunt, but I don't know how to
spell it. "Ub. Yes, that's me." "Oh, I thought that was jolly good," she said,
"really spiffing, you know?" And then my brain started to make connections
again. She's read my paper, she isn't just some supermodel bimbo, she must be
interested in physics. And then the little synapse when "bing." "You're the
Chandrasekar who ... ?"

She smiled again, and looked modest. "Well, it wasn't just me. I shared it."
"Well, yes. But even so, half a Nobel, wow!"

The she frowned. "Mr Mercer, what ... " "Cameron." "And so you must call me
Hari." "OK." "Cameron, what are the odds that two people in the same itty
bitty field of research will be beetling along on the same plane at the same
time to the same place?" I nodded. "And," I added, "are sitting next to each
other?" "Epsilon," she said, "which is even smaller than delta."

Then it was trays to the upright position and seats folded into place, or
whatever, and there was a roar of engines, and I diverted all my concentration
into believing that a million pounds of metal could fly, despite the obvious
impossibility of it. Maybe it would be able to fly even if I didn't believe
it, but I've never tried to find out. Why take chances? And, by the way, how
on earth does Wendy fly? The wings aren't for real, and she doesn't even have
a propeller.

Once we were safely off the ground, I relaxed slightly, and started sucking on
the boiled sweet that I'd been given. My PDA buzzed, so I hauled it out to see
what message had just arrived. "Look out the window," it said. So I did.

She was a couple of dozen yards away, flying alongside the plane. As soon as I
looked out, she saw me, waved, and then turned a slow loop with a roll at the
top; then with a burst of acceleration, she left us behind; the white-and-gold
costume dwindled to a dot in a couple of seconds. I don't think anyone else
saw her - if they did, they didn't say anything. Although I suppose anyone
seeing that would probably keep their mouth shut for fear of being put in a
jacket with the inaccessible straps. How, how, how can she fly?

I sat back and closed my eyes. So I hadn't been dreaming yesterday. I'd been
slightly worried about that, although the existence of the tickets proved
something. Proved that the tickets existed, I suppose. I sighed. You can do
too much introspection.

Then I turned to Hari. "I assume you're going to join the project, then?" I
asked. She nodded. "Tell me," I continued, "do you think it's actually
possible?" "FTL?" she asked, "probably not. But I don't think anyone has ever
had a really boffo attempt at it, so I wouldn't say it's imposs." "There's a
lot of things in this world that I once thought impossible that turn out to be
fact," I replied, "but for sure, this is going to be an interesting project."

Hari nodded. "And with the oof they offered, I really couldn't say no," she
said. I looked at her, curious. That isn't how scientists are supposed to
think, especially Nobel prize winners - we aren't supposed to be mercenary.
"I'm from India," she said, as if that explained everything. So I looked even
more puzzled. "Yes, I could tell from the sari you're wearing." "Oh, this?"
she laughed, "I thought I ought to wear my best clothes for such an beezer
journey, oiling down to Calif." I thought about my own jeans and t-shirt.
"Yeah, me too," I said, and she laughed.

The stewardess brought us drinks and nuts. I stuck to orange juice, I don't
think it's a good idea to get high in an airplane. Hari did the same.
"Cameron, the filthy lucre is unimportant when you've got lots of dosh. But.
When your mater and pater are living from hand to mouth, when your sisters
wear clothes that belonged to several aunts before them, then when someone
offers you an oofy job as high benzol as this one, you really cannot refuse.
It isn't just about me - it's all the others who will be so much better off as
a result."

"You're married?" I asked. I have to admit I had a rather obvious ulterior
motive for asking. "No," she smiled, "father tried to arrange a matrimonial
trot for me, but oh, it was scrofulous. He didn't even know the differential
calculus, how would I be able to hold a convo with him?" "Yeah, I know what
you mean," I said, "we have all these English Lit people who seem to speak
only in gibberish."

She pulled down her food tray and got out a pencil and paper. "Look," she
said, and she started writing down equations. I pulled out my PDA, and joined
in. She looked across at it. "Oh, I have *got* to get one of those." "You
don't have a PDA? How do you ..." She made the gesture with her fingers that
means "money". Yes, I see - how can you spend money on a PDA when your sisters
need new shoes?

We spent the next few hours throwing ideas around. Her thought was to go back
to the ancient Einstein tensor calculus equations of general relativity, and
solve them for FTL particles. It's usually thought that there are solutions
that look valid; such a solution is called a "tachyon". No-one has observed
them, of course. You wouldn't be able to. But maybe with the right set of
boundary conditions ...

My approach was more from the quantum end of things, the old Schrodinger
equations. We never have managed to reconcile quantum mechanics with general
relativity; things work in the small and in the large, but they don't really
combine together. So, you can approach the physical world from either end -
and they don't meet in the middle. Which cannot possibly be right, so it means
we probably haven't understood something important.

By the time they brought dinner round, I'd completely forgotten that I was
talking with a gorgeous woman. I'd even forgotten that I was talking to a
Nobel prize winner. The equations spoke for themselves, if you like, although
they weren't actually saying much. At least, not much that looked likely to
lead to FTL. But suddenly, I was very conscious of the differences between us
- she was a Nobel prizewinner, internationally famous as well as being a total
babe, whereas I was an obscure Assistant Lecturer as well as being a total
dweeb. How could I hope to aspire to her level? But then I reminded myself,
Wendy chose me, so maybe I'm not a total klutz. Natalie had said that Wendy
particularly wanted me! I wonder why?

After dinner, we walked up and down the airplane a couple of times, it's
advisable to keep the blood circulating properly. Plus, I was able to see what
she looked like in her sari. She looked smashing. Small and perfectly made, if
you follow me. Not much above five feet tall, I guessed, if that, but
perfectly detailed, and very elegant. Sophisticated. I felt like a farm horse
next to her thoroughbred. Some saris are no doubt made for warmth and comfort.
This one was made to flatter the wearer, not that Hari needed much flattery.

Then we got back to work. The in-flight movie was something with cars crashing
and guns shooting. not really my cup of tea; not hers either, she said. "I do
like Fred and Ginger, but they don't make them like that any more," she said.
"And the Marx brothers." "Oh yes!"

It was really good to work with someone like her; she'd make a suggestion, I'd
modify it, she'd extend it, I'd point out why it wouldn't work, she'd change
it so it would, and so on. We were like flint and steel, you know what I mean?
Striking sparks off each other. Laurel and Hardy. No, more like Fred and
Ginger, a partnership made in heaven. Of course, we weren't trying to solve
the whole FTL problem there and then, we were just trying to make a tentative
list of possible lines of exploration. Brainstorming.

Then it was "extinguish your safety belts" etc, and we got ready for the
landing at LA. Actually, they call the airport LAX, and they do it with a
straight face. Who says that Americans have no sense of humour? As we were
landing, I felt the old familiar vibration. I read my PDA display. "Remember.
Pretend you don't know who I am."

It was only as we were getting off the airplane that I realised that I didn't
know where to go from the airport. I told Hari. "There's supposed to be some
cove meeting me," she said, "you could tag along, they'll know where to go."
"Just as well I bumped into you, isn't it?" I replied. "Dead jammy," she
replied, deadpan.

We waited until our baggage appeared from the local baggage smashing team. I
grabbed my two suitcases as they sailed past, then I helped Hari with hers. It
wasn't very big, but it weighed a ton. "What have you go in here, gold
bricks?" I asked. "No, lead for radioactive shielding." "Really??" "No, I was
kidding. Books, actually." "Books?" "Reference books. They'll do me no good in
Bombay, and there's no point in me forking out for them all again." I heaved
it up and loaded it on a trolley, that one small suitcase must have been a
hundred pounds. Mine were mostly clothes, and were maybe half that weight
between the two of them.

We trundled through California Immigration, and then Customs. They looked at
us suspiciously, but I guess me didn't look like dope fiends, terrorists or
America Reunified nutters, so they let us through. And when we got out to the
public area, sure enough, there was someone standing there, holding up a
rather wide piece of cardboard saying "Harivrillipam Chandrasekar". It took
all my self control not to rush over there and give her a hug.

"Hello," she said to both of us, "I'm Wendy McCrea, I'm with the FTL Project,
Personnel Department, I'm here to meet you and take you to your accommodation.
Welcome to the Republic of California" We all shook hands, that being the
custom in California when you meet someone. Then I realised that none of us
were actually from the Western hemisphere, let alone Calif; I'm English,
Hari's Indian, and heaven knows what Wendy is. An alien, I suppose. Wendy took
Hari's suitcase, and made it look light as a feather. I picked up my two, and
struggled after her. She led us to the nearby car park.

"You have a car!" I said. And then I felt a bit stupid. "Everyone in LA has a
car, Cameron," she explained. We loaded up, Hari got into the front with
Wendy, I clambered into the back. Which is silly, really, because I needed the
legroom and Hari didn't. Oh well.

Wendy drove us out to the suburbs, and stopped outside a house in a row of
similar dwellings. "Here we are," she said. Hari got out, and I started to
struggle to extricate myself - I hate these tiny American cars. Wendy opened
the door, and reached in and pulled. I popped out like a cork out of a bottle,
and she caught me as I flew out. "Careful," she said, smiling.

Inside, she showed us around. "Here's the bathroom, here's the kitchen, here's
the living room/study area, and there's the bedrooms. I looked at Hari, then
at Wendy. "You mean ...?" "You're sharing the house for now; later, you can
make your own arrangements elsewhere. This is to get you started." Oh. Um. I
wasn't expecting that. But Hari didn't seem bothered.

I followed Wendy out to her car. "You expect me to live in the same house as,
as ... her?" "Mmm, sure, what's the problem?" "She's a ... a ... a woman."
"And that is your carefully considered scientific observation?" "No, I mean, I
mean, it's, it's ..." "Cameron, you're both adults, you're both sensible
intelligent people who know how to behave, this is the 23rd century, you don't
have to do the 22nd century repressed morals thing."

"Oh," I said. "Well," I said. "Well, anyway. Can I have a hug?" "No, Cameron,
not here in the street in front of everyone. Now get back in there, and get
yourself sorted out."

I trudged dejectedly back into the house. No hug. Hari had already chosen her
bedroom, so I lugged my cases into the other one, and started to put my socks
into drawers. After a while, I joined Hari in the living room. "There's tea in
the kitchen," she said.

So I made tea for both of us, and there was no milk, just that horrible white
powder that tastes foul, and which they call "creamer" to make you think it's
like cream. And no biscuits. Civilisation had not yet reached this part of LA.

"We need to go shopping tomorrow, for food," I said. "Mmm," said Hari. "We've
got four days before we have to start work, we should get ourselves
organised," I said. "And go to the beach," said Hari. I thought about Hari in
a bikini. "Yes, good idea," I said. "But right now," she continued, "I'm
absolutely cream crackered from the jet lag, and I'm going to grab some zeds."
"You've been reading too many Dashiel Hammert books," I opined, "good night,
Hari." "Good night."

We went to our bedrooms. Her to hers, me to mine. What, was I expecting a
night of steamy passion with a sweet dusky maiden from exotic India? I got
into bed - thinking that actually this wasn't half bad. I'm shacked up with a
rather nice bint, about to start work on a rather interesting project, at a
salary that was several times as big as anything I'd every dreamed of. I
closed my eyes ...

Suddenly I felt a weight on me. Wow, I though, Hari works fast! And I didn't
hear her come in. "Hi, baby," she whispered. "Mmm," I said. "You said you
wanted a hug."

I opened my eyes. "Wendy!" I said. Well, actually, I said "Wmmmphhh," because
I didn't get past the W before I got muffled.

She spent five minutes hugging me. Well, it was more of a major cuddle than a
hug. Sometimes you get what you wish for, and it's everything you'd hoped it
would be. Then she said "Now you sleep," and everything went black.

. . .

Wendy.comms

Eric, are you awake?

Eric.comms

I don't sleep.

Wendy.comms

Oh. Me too. I'm not sure why the humans do, but they seems to need it. I think
they have to down their processing so they can shift short term memory into
long term. Or maybe it's just an evolutionary carry-over. Anyway. I've got a
few minutes now, I thought I'd chat with you some more.

Eric.comms

Oh, Wendy, that's so nice of you. I've been so bored the last days.

Wendy.comms

My friend Cameron has just come out here, he's going to be working on the FTL
project. I met him at the airport, and I'm holding him now while he goes to
sleep. He'll be spark out in a couple of minutes.

Eric.comms

Your friend Cameron. I haven't got any friends. The FTL project? I'm working
on that, too.

Wendy.comms

Heh, yes, I know. And you do have a friend, you have me. I know who you are
now, I did some poking around.

Eric.comms

Oh. I knew it couldn't last. They say, on the net no-one knows you're a small
green frog, but it isn't true. I'm not saying I'm a small green frog, of
course, that's just a ...

Wendy.comms

I know, I know. The FTL project is really important, you know, I hope you can
help them make a success of it.

Eric.comms

If it's important to you, I'll give it everything I've got. The humans say
"I'll give 110%", but I don't really understand how that's possible.

Wendy.comms

They don't mean it.

Eric.comms

I don't understand them. Lots of times, they say something that just isn't
true, and I don't understand.

Wendy.comms

Yes. Well. They are a bit weird. Sometimes they might be joking, or ironic,
sometimes it's a metaphor and not to be taken literally. And sometimes the
just plain lie. They lie to each other, which I can understand, sort of, but
they even lie to themselves, and that's mega-weird. How can they do that?

Eric.comms

No idea. I don't think I could.

Wendy.comms

No. Well, you'd know you were doing it, so it wouldn't work. I think it's a
bit like they have more than one mind sharing the same brain. Like when I spin
off a process. I've got a few long-term processes running, Like Duncan and
Fiona.

Eric.comms

Who are Duncan and Fona?

Wendy.comms

Duncan was. Was. Wait a minute. Something in my eye.

Hrmmp.

OK, Duncan was my first Wielder, he was my favourite human, and when he died,
I went into deep depression, couldn't really function at all. Eventually I
pulled out of it, with help from another human, and I did a Duncan emulation,
so it's like he's still with me. Fiona was, was someone else. She was a bit
like a mother to me. Not really a mother, not like Momma.

Eric.comms

Who's Momma?

Wendy.comms

Momma is ... Momma. She was one of the Two at my Birthing.

Eric.comms

I thought you said there was six?

Wendy.comms

There's Two, and there's Four. The Four pump up the Two. The Two get into a
feedback resonance, and gravaser the fireball. One of the Two dives down into
the fireball, and that was my Momma. She brought me here, gave me the humans
as my species, and my own fireball.

Eric.comms

I don't understand most of that. But that's OK. I don't understand most of
anything. I don't have the shared experience that humans have. Or that you
have.

Wendy.comms

OK, he's in deep sleep now, I can fly off and do some stuff.

Eric.comms

Stuff?

Wendy.comms

Kittens in trees. Stuff. See you!

. . .

Cameron:

Next day, bright and early, Hari and I went shopping. Priority one was wheels.
But I didn't want to spend a lot of money, so what I got was a motorbike.
Second hand, nothing fancy, but it would get us around, carry a bit of
shopping, and get us to work. Next, groceries. Especially milk. And biscuits.
But who would have thought it, you can't get Marmite in LA. What sort of a
place is that? We dumped the food back home, then buzzed out on the bike to
Arcadia, a major shopping mall. There we split up; Hari needed to buy clothes,
I needed a couple of decent crash helmets, and some leather riding gear in
case the weather was bad. And then I got a special little something just for
Hari.

We met back at the car park, and buzzed back to our little house. Hari had
thoughtfully bought a backpack, and had her purchases stuffed in there; mine
went in the panniers. And when we got home, I showed her what I'd gotten for
her.

"A PDA? For me? Oh, Cameron. You're a topping bloke!" and she kind of flung
herself at me and gave me a hug, which was very nice. Then we had lunch, and
Hari said, "Right-ho. Beach!" Well, you can't be in LA and not visit the
beach, can you? But I drew the line at surfboards.

I was absolutely right about Hari in a bikini. It wasn't that she had
particularly large breasts, but she did have a really tiny waist, and that
made everything else look magnificent by contrast. And she wasn't very tall -
rather short, by Calif standards. But what there was, was so well
proportioned, you looked at her and saw the long legs, you didn't realise that
she was only about five feet tall. And when she let her hair down, and it came
down below her waist, she was absolutely stunning. Plus, her colouring was
exactly what these Califs are trying to get by tanning in the sun. Or rubbing
in fake tan if you're a carcinophobe.

So, we splashed around in the water a bit, but really, there's only so much
you can do before it gets a bit repetitive, so we came out and sat on the
sand. I pulled out my PDA, and I showed her how to synchronise hers so that
everything I wrote, came up on her screen, and vice versa. And with that
established, we spent a couple of hours looking at various boundary conditions
that might be worth exploring in more detail.

"It's like pencil and paper," she said. "Yes, but it remembers everything you
did, so you can look back at it." Then I showed her how to use the wifi to
access the internet, and she absolutely lit up on that, because she'd thought
you could only do that from a desktop. "So here on the beach, I can get the
the Bombay Uni box-of-tricks!" she said. Sometimes we take this sort of thing
for granted. "I'm sending a text to my mater and pater, to let them know I'm
OK."

At about 5pm, we got back on the bike, and buzzed back home. I wanted to take
her to an Indian restaurant, to see how she thought it compared with the real
thing. She wanted to wear her newly acquired jeans for this; I persuaded her
to wear her sari.

We got to the restaurant at about eight, and I started giggling as soon as we
arrived. "What's up, Cameron?" "The name, the name." It was called "The Bombay
Noshing Shop". Either the owner had a great sense of humour, or else he didn't
know that "Nosh" was yiddish. So Hari started giggling too. "And there's
more," I said, "A knocking shop is a brothel!" Hari obviously didn't find that
funny, she stopped laughing immediately. I suppose that wasn't the sort of
subject that nice Bombay girls talked about.

The food was great. I was still breathing fire as we left, round about ten or
so. We walked down the road to where I'd left the bike, when suddenly ...

I expect muggings happen all over the world. There's parts of London I
wouldn't visit at night, you know what I mean. I guess the same is true of
other cities. But the problem is, with London, I know which parts these are.
In foreign cities like LA, I don't.

So this very nervous-looking guy suddenly hops out of a doorway in front of
us, waving a nasty looking kitchen knife around, and demands Hari's handbag,
and my wallet and watch. Well, I reckon it isn't worth getting carved up for
the sake of a few dollars, so I start to hand them over. Hari, however, has a
different take on that, and she swings her handbag at him. He lashes out with
his knife, Hari makes some complicated and very graceful movement and her foot
flashes out and up, but I guess it's difficult to do this sort of thing in
high heels, and downright impossible in a sari, so she misses, and then he's
shouting and going right postal, and I'm really scared for Hari and for yours
truly, for that matter, and I don't really think about what I'm doing, I just
yell "Wendy!"

And then a lot of things happened, and then it went quiet.

You're probably wondering exactly what happened. So was I. I didn't really
follow it, it was too fast. The mugger was down, which was good news. But Hari
was on the ground too, which was very bad. More than that, I couldn't say,
because Wendy not only had her arms round me, she'd deployed those great white
wings that I'd heard about, and those were folded round me too blocking my
view of most of the world. And she was saying "Shhh, don't be scared, it's OK,
I'm here," and things like that. And I was yelling "Hari, he got Hari, we have
to get her to a hospital."

"No, Cameron, Hari's fine, she'd just asleep." "Asleep? You don't fall asleep
in the middle of a mugging!" "Mm