A Captain Scarlet Story by Marion Woods
Chapter One
Symphony arrived,
deep in whispered conversation with Lieutenant Garnet, to say her goodbyes
before they left Cloudbase. She was
rather thankful that Doctor Fawn had refused to allow her to go back to Etna,
insisting that she rest rather than face another gruelling climb in the
overwhelming humidity of the tunnels.
She turned first to Cadenza and reached out to hug the taller woman.
“I hope it goes okay
and that you find your way home,” she smiled.
Cadenza thanked her,
taking her hand and adding,
“What can I say to you? Except he
doesn’t deserve you and you make sure he remembers that fact!”
“Believe me, Eva, if I ever do
marry Adam, he’ll discover that he is the most
married man ever. Things will change – I promise you
that.” There was a look in her eye that spoke volumes to Cadenza.
“Look after that baby, I just
hope you realise what you are letting yourself in for!
It’s a Svenson, after all, so it’s bound to be a handful. That, at least doesn’t
change,” she warned mischievously.
Karen laughed. “If
it’s a girl I’ll name her after you…”
“Don’t you dare
lumber the poor thing with such an awful name!” Eva laughed and hugged the young
woman once more. “Take care of yourself, Karen.”
Symphony turned to
Scarlet and kissed him. “Goodbye,
Paul. Say ‘hello’ to the Adam in your world for me.” She smiled and hugged him. “I wish you every joy with your
Dianne.”
He hugged her in
return, kissing her cheek. “You know, I will miss you, Karen.
Of everyone here, you come the closest to the woman I know and like at
home. I wish you every happiness.”
His tone revealed that he doubted she would achieve so much.
She smiled. “Oh, I’ll
be all right. After all, I have the
one thing money cannot buy him and he will have to learn to pay my price before
he gets his own way, this time.”
Scarlet’s eyebrows
rose. “Do you think he will ever learn? He’s
always seemed such an unregenerate chauvinist to me. There are occasional flashes of potential, mind you...” he
added in fairness.
“There is potential and, trust
me, I will develop it. I have every incentive to do so.” She
rested her hand on her stomach and smiled.
“What will you name it if it’s
a boy?” he teased, raising one eyebrow at her. He had over-heard her
conversation with Cadenza.
“Stefan,” she
replied, her straight face dissolving into a grin as he pouted.
“Huh, that’s not
fair…” Scarlet grinned – wondering if she was aware that he knew it was the name
of Adam’s beloved Grandfather. It
looked as if negotiations had already started between the couple.
Symphony watched them
all embark and waved from the control room as the hangar depressurised and the
SPJ rose to the runways. His last
sight of her was as she blew them all a kiss.
Captain Blue flew the
SPJ down to Etna for the last time.
The group consisted of a rather subdued Lieutenant Garnet and Captain Ochre,
Cadenza and Captain Scarlet. Both Scarlet and Garnet were in diving suits and
carried breathing gear for their return through the water.
They disembarked. There was plenty of activity on the
site, as local agents cleared away the debris from Captain Black’s attack and
erected a new, smaller portacabin HQ.
With the pacifier dismantled there was no apparent reason to have a permanent
base on the volcano, but Colonel White and the World President had agreed that
some guard should be maintained – to limit access to the tunnels and the portals
beneath them. They were still
considering what use, if any, to make of these phenomena. Before they left Cloudbase, Captain
Scarlet and Cadenza had been briefed with several messages to deliver to their
commanders, concerning mutual defence against any future Mysteron activity that
might make use of the portals. Scarlet was sceptical that his colonel would
believe him though. After all, as
far as he knew, apart from Lieutenant Scarlet’s brief visit to Stingray, no-one
had visited his dimension. Still,
he shared the concerns of the two men. Cadenza promised she would do her best to
alert Colonel Black to the dangers – although how she was going to tell him
that, in every other universe, he was a hunted and dangerous Mysteron agent, was
something she couldn’t even begin to imagine.
Even in the short
time they were on the surface there were several short, sharp tremors, and the
volcano was throwing ash and smoke far into the sky above their heads. A continuous shower of fine dust rained
down on them, along with the occasional lump of pumice. The sergeant in command handed Captain Blue a sheaf of papers
showing the frequency and strength of the quakes.
Cadenza read them
over his shoulder. “Looks
promising,” she commented. “This must be the build-up to the big tremor that
should flip the dimensions back to Captain Scarlet’s World.”
Blue nodded. “We must
make sure we get there before it is due, the time scale isn’t that precise so we
may end up with quite a wait, but we daren’t miss the rendezvous with Dull
Blue.”
She nudged him.
“Don’t call him that,” she protested jovially. “Or I shall have to start calling
you Libidinous Blue…”
He laughed, “I can
think of worse names…”
“So,” she said
significantly, “can I.”
“Oh … point taken.”
“Well,” Ochre
interrupted them, “do we have the green light?
Is it all on track?”
“Yes, Rick, I would
say it is,” Cadenza smiled. She
stretched and gazed up at the dusty sky.
“Time to go home,” she murmured.
Armed with ropes and
torches and a variety of other useful items, the five of them began the arduous
descent into the labyrinth of tunnels. There were new falls of rocks and they
passed several new and unexplored crevices and tunnels.
At each slight tremor, Blue noted the time on the sheaf of papers and
urged the others on.
Finally, they came to
the fissure that led back to Cadenza’s world, and an uneasy silence fell.
She started to remove
the equipment she was carrying, smiling as she checked that she had the twisted
metal she’d saved from the pacifier – ostensibly for Sonata.
“Well, I guess it is
goodbye,” she said with a sad smile as she finished.
“I’ll come through
with you, check it’s okay...” Scarlet offered, preparing to dump his equipment
too.
“No, it’s all right,
Paul, and besides, Adam’s worried that you won’t get to the rendezvous in time.”
“You cannot go
through alone! What if it’s shifted?”
“Tell you what, wait
a few minutes, and if I don’t come back, you’ll know I’m okay,” she reasoned.
“I’ll do no such
thing… anything might’ve happened to you!”
She smiled at him and
took his face in her hands. “You are a sweetie and I’ll be fine. Go and get back to your Dianne – don’t worry about me.”
“Eva…” he protested.
She shook her head
and turned to the others.
Ochre was the first
to extend his hand. “Goodbye Cadenza… Eva.
Hope it all works out for you.”
She leant across and
kissed his cheek. “Thank you, Richard.
I wish the same for you.” She gave a significant glance at Garnet and smiled
sweetly. “Just remember, we’re none of us as
unique as we once thought and we’re all lucky enough to have good friends
willing to help us cope – with whatever fate throws at us, whenever we need it.”
Garnet saluted and
then shook the hand held out to her.
Eva smiled at her and hugged her. “Take care, Claudia. I am sure you will go far
in Spectrum – although maybe not as far as some expect,” she added in a whisper
to the young woman. Garnet
blushed.
She turned to Blue
and spread her arms. “Come on, one kiss won’t hurt you,” she teased and wrapped
him in an embrace. He smiled and
returned her kiss, hardly needing to bend his head to meet her lips. “Goodbye,
Adam, I wish you all the best for the future. Try and stay out of trouble and
look after your family.”
“I sure will. You take care too and… I hope it all
works out.” She was more than a little disconcerted by his knowing smile, but
there was no time to question him now.
Finally, she turned
back to Scarlet. He reached for her
hands and smiled into her smoky-blue eyes, pulling her gently forward to kiss
her cheek. “Give my love to the ‘real’ Adam,’’ she teased. “Maybe you were right
and we would have been friends, I’d like to think so anyway.”
“I will miss you,” he
said simply.
“And I will miss you,
but neither of us will have to look far … Sonata will still be around whenever I
need a friend and I figure Adam will
be there when you need him.”
“That’s the way of
it,” he agreed. She kissed his
cheek and turned to wave at the others before slipping into the fissure and
disappearing.
Cadenza stepped out into the corridor and
smiled. Sitting cross-legged on the floor
opposite was Sonata, with a cushion at her back, a blanket over her shoulders, a
magazine in her lap and a pile of sweet wrappers, apple cores and a flask of
coffee by her side.
She looked up and grinned “Oh, you’re back…
that wasn’t so long. If we hurry we
can be in time for the last waltz…”
“Don’t you want to know what happened?”
“Of course I do, and when we’ve got the time
to spare you can tell me all about it. Right now, I want to make sure no-one
gets that last dance with Jules but me….especially not that tarty little piece
from Navigation.”
“Oh sure, got to get your priorities right,”
Eva smiled and extended her hand to help her friend up.
They collected Sonata’s things and walked
together towards their quarters.
“So,” the dark-haired woman asked as they
pushed through the swing doors, “was it fun?”
Cadenza gave a wry shrug.
“I wouldn’t call it fun, exactly, but it was certainly an eye opener.
Look, Paula, you go to the dance…I really need to speak to the colonel.
“What about Kevin?
He’s been frantic about your disappearance…”
“Yes, I imagine he would have been. Tell him… tell him, I’ll see him later –
but right now, duty calls.”
Sonata gave her friend a perceptive glance
and nodded. “All right, but … well, just watch
yourself, okay?”
Cadenza grinned and patted her friend’s
shoulder. “The colonel sent me on this mission,
Paula; he can hardly crucify me for obeying his orders.”
“That isn’t what I meant…” Sonata muttered as
she watched her friend stride away.
Colonel Black looked up from his circular
desk and barely acknowledged Cadenza’s presence.
She saluted and accepted his invitation to sit on one of the stools that rose
from the floor at a touch of a switch.
The Perspex surround came down, creating a sound-proof environment. She glanced at the communications desk
beyond the raised dais. A young
woman in a pale cream tunic was busily entering data. She raised an interrogative eyebrow.
“The new communications lieutenant, she
arrived yesterday. Lieutenant
Flaxen. Given a decade or two, she might make
the grade,” Black said with the driest of smiles.
“Yes, I rather imagine she might,” Cadenza
said, placing the shard of the pacifier on the desk between them. “Well, Colonel… it’s like this….”
Black listened intently, not asking any
questions until she concluded her report.
Then he picked up the metal and examined it.
“We must investigate this thoroughly, and it won’t do any harm to introduce
security procedures to protect the World Government’s financial interests,” he
said briskly.
Cadenza nodded. “Will you investigate if
there are any such tunnels under Mount Etna here, sir?”
He glanced at her.
“I sent Blue and Grey down there once you had… gone AWOL. They were unable to make any definitive
search… the volcano is erupting and a huge flow of lava is currently coating the
mountainside. I should imagine that
any internal ‘tunnels’ will be plugged.”
“Undue gravitational force from the astral
alignment?” she asked quietly.
He shrugged. “The boffins are debating it. I expect they’ll find an answer that
suits themselves, eventually.” He put the shard of metal down and looked
straight into her eyes. “We, on the
other hand, know better…”
She could feel a flush creeping up her face,
and said rather breathlessly, “If that is all, Colonel, I’d like to get some
rest…”
“Eva… this Captain Black – this other me… he
is hated and feared in all these other dimensions?” he asked quietly, as she
stood.
“Yes, he is. Because of what happened on
Mars.”
Black swallowed and gazed into her pale blue
eyes. “Then, for the first time, I am glad I did not go on that mission, for
that would have irrevocably placed you and me on opposite sides in this war.”
“Yes, it would have,” she agreed quietly.
“You risked your life to save him, because
you thought he was me…?”
“I made a mistake – I should have got the
full information and not jumped to conclusions,” she admitted, chastened by what
she saw as a rebuke.
“Thank you,” he said. She looked at him in
confusion. “I am sure I don’t deserve such loyalty, in the light of my … neglect
of you.”
“Conrad, don’t… please.
I can cope if you just leave me alone.”
“Do you love Kevin Wainwright?” The stark
question was a complete surprise.
“I don’t know… possibly.”
“Do you still have … any feelings for me,
Eva?”
“No, Conrad, you ordered me to forget the
past, remember?”
“And if I tell you that I cannot follow my
own orders? That your absence – and the possibility
that you might never be able to return - brought it home to me – without you
here, Cloudbase is just another posting on another base. I am glad you are back…my dear.”
“Con, this isn’t fair… “
He reached out and took her unresisting hand. Gently he raised it to his lips and
kissed it. “In your own time, Eva,
and whatever you decide…”
Lieutenant Flaxen swivelled her chair around
and tried to remember which switch was the connection to Spectrum’s Berlin
office. She swivelled it round again in surprise
as she saw the colonel gently take Cadenza Angel in his arms and kiss her. The Angel pilot’s arms rose to encircle
his neck.
“Flaming Nora….” she muttered and whooshed
down to the other end of the console.
Life in Spectrum’s control room had just got a whole lot more interesting….
~oo0oo~
The atmosphere in the
tunnels was tense for some time after Cadenza vanished into the crevice.
“We should have gone
with her,” Scarlet repined, “made sure she got back okay.”
“If she hadn’t, she
would have come back,” Blue reassured him.
“Besides, the local agents have been monitoring the tremors carefully – it
should have been a straightforward walk for her.”
“Should have been, oh
yes, should have been… like when we ended up in Boston.”
“Paul, you don’t have
time to follow Eva. The time-frame for the next big quake starts in less than
one hour… you have to be there. God
knows what might happen if you miss your Blue this time.
Since the pacifier was closed down, the tremors have been far stronger
even though they have been – more or less - as predicted.”
“That shouldn’t
affect the portals,” Scarlet frowned, “should it?”
Blue shrugged. “I
don’t know, but I feel sure it is your best chance to get out of here. And –
don’t forget, Ochre and I would like to get out of here before the next big
tremor closes the tunnels or drops a roof on top of us.”
Scarlet gave an
apologetic grimace. “You are right; I just can’t help worrying about her.”
“Look, Eva’s tough
enough to look after herself – wherever she ends up – but I bet she’s bopping
away at the Officers’ Dance as we speak.”
“She thought you
didn’t like her much,” he confided as he followed Blue across the cavern towards
the next exit.
“To be honest… she
reminded me of my mother and that was unsettling, in more ways than one.” He
sighed. “It might go some way towards explaining why my Dad couldn’t stand the
sight of me after she died, though. I never thought I was much like her, until I
saw Eva.”
“Did you show her the
portrait Svenson gave you?”
“Yes, she said it was
her mother, and it was done for their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.” Blue smiled shakily. “Sarah’s presence obviously made a big
difference to the man I became… and the woman too,” he added.
“But now you have
Karen – don’t you?”
“Oh, she’ll come
around. I’m sure she will. She knows how much I need her…and she’s not the kind of
person to refuse to help someone in genuine despair.” He flushed slightly. “You
see, I…I am in love with her, I have been ever since we first met. The hardest
part of the whole mission was having to hurt Karen.”
“I know, it is never
easy hurting the one you love,” Scarlet sympathised. “With you two it’s the old
irresistible force meeting the immovable object – something’s gotta give. Take my advice, Adam, and let that
something be you.”
Blue smiled at him.
“I have no intention of losing her, Paul, but I know her well enough to
understand that I’ll have to take my punishment before I get forgiven. I reckon I’m man enough to grin and bear
it. There is too much at stake for me to
louse this up…”
They passed a narrow,
crevice and a gust of surprisingly cold wind blew across their path. Scarlet hesitated.
“Wasn’t that was the
Boston portal?”
Blue nodded. He saw
the expression on Scarlet’s face and replied, “We don’t have the time…”
“I just hope he’s
okay…”
~oo0oo~
The house was in total darkness and the
fitful light from the sliver of a new moon was barely enough to cast a shadow. A tall, dark-haired man rose from where
he had been crouching by a freshly dug grave and surveyed the simple wooden
cross he had just erected.
He bowed his head in a mark of respect and
then wiped the dirt from his hands as he turned to where a slender, blonde woman
was waiting, leaning for support against a damaged trellis. Two battered shovels
lay at her feet.
“I
don’t really know what to say… I’ve always avoided funerals…” he confessed. “But
I feel sure he would have liked someone to say something.”
“It was enough for him that we both survived,
Paul.” Karen Wainwright stood upright and moved towards him. She looked at the anguish on his handsome face, realising how
much he needed the
comfort
of knowing he had performed the rituals as his best friend would have wanted. If it helped him to come to terms
with the situation, she was content to let him do as he wished.
For herself, beneath the numbness of
unbearable loss, her over-riding emotion was relief. It had taken all of her
courage to hold that once strong and athletic body, now wasted and worn out by
the mental and physical torment he had endured, without showing him her grief. It had broken her heart to see Adam like
that. Through the long hours
of darkness when they had lain together in the makeshift bed and she had felt
the tears seeping from his sightless eyes onto his gaunt cheeks, she had
experienced waves of pity that almost threatened to drown her love for him.
Now Adam’s ordeal was over and in the final days of his life, he had had the
happiness of knowing that his closest friends had both survived.
Paul had sworn to his dying friend that he would look after her and, reassured,
Adam had drifted peacefully into his final sleep.
When Metcalfe reached for her, she willingly
clasped his strong hand and allowed him to draw her to the graveside.
He cleared his throat and said:
“I don’t even know where to start, I don’t
have a prayer book and I can’t remember the proper words to say. All I can say is -
I will miss you, Adam - and you
should know that whilst there is any strength in me, I won’t stop fighting. There is one quote I can remember
and I can’t think of anyone it would apply to more than you:
‘a faithful friend is
a sturdy shelter: He that hath found one hath found a treasure. There is nothing
so precious … and no scales can measure his excellence.’ Rest in peace, my
friend.”
Karen’s tears started to flow once more and
she buried her face against his rough sleeve.
Desperate to calm her, he explained, “I read it in my family’s old bible;
it kind of stuck with me. I hope it was a suitable thing to say…I certainly
meant every word.” She nodded,
still speechless. He continued, although he wasn’t sure if he was talking to
Karen or to his late partner. “If only I had got here sooner. When Cloudbase crashed, it took a long
time for me to recover. Whatever
that weapon was that the Mysterons used against my plane, it was very nearly the
end of me. After I managed to reach
a village, I began to hear rumours that another Spectrum officer had survived. But by the time I found the people who
had nursed him and realised that it was Blue – he had started his journey. I was always several days behind him and
there were so many calls for help from the devastated communities I encountered,
I never made up those few vital days. I would to God that I had. ”
“You did what you had to – what you thought
was best, Paul. Adam knew that. You guessed he would
come here, much as I did.” She smiled.
“It seemed the only obvious place,” he agreed
with a wry smile in return. “And at
least I got here in time to speak to him.”
She nodded, remembering the hope that had
shone in Adam’s face as he heard that familiar clipped accent.
Her eyes filled with tears once more and she bit her lower lip.
“Yet,
given the choice, I’d say he was better pleased that you survived and made your
way back to him, Karen,” Metcalfe said gently, sensing the depth of her misery. It was still less than twenty-four
hours since Adam had died, cradled in her arms, his good hand grasping his
friend’s.
“Not at the first he wasn’t. He took some convincing that I wasn’t a reconstruct. He couldn’t really see me - he was
already virtually blind by the time I arrived - and it was days before he would
relax in my company.”
She obviously needed to talk, and Metcalfe
wrapped an arm around her. “Then, on the third night I was here with him - when
he had obviously decided that if I was a reconstruct I would have attacked him
before this - he reached out to me, held my hand and told me such a strange
story, about visitors he believed he’d
had from a different dimension. A dimension where the Mysterons had not
triumphed over Spectrum and where another Adam and another Paul were still
fighting, still believing they could win.
He asked me if I was another one – another visitor - I told him I was the same
Karen he’d always known. I told him
- I was his girl, as I have always been - that I survived the plane crash and
when I heard Cloudbase had been destroyed, I made my way to Boston knowing that,
if he had survived, he would come here when all else failed him.”
She blinked back another surge of tears and
continued, “He touched my face and my hair, as if he wanted to match their
contours to the memories he carried.
He never said anything and I still wondered if he thought I was a Mysteron. But by the end, I believe he knew I was
telling the truth – I have to believe that when I lay in his arms – when he made
love to me - he knew I was truly his Karen; for my own sanity, Paul – I have to
believe he knew that.”
Her
tears started to flow again and Metcalfe tightened his embrace, stroking her
hair absently. “Adam knew,” he reassured her. “There is no way he could ever
have mistaken you – even for your own doppelganger...”
When her tears subsided he continued, “Now I guess we have to decide
what we’re going to do next. We
can’t stay here, however much we want to.
I have heard that there are pockets of resistance in the far south. I plan to make my way there and see what
can be salvaged. It is just
possible that, having torn the Earth apart, the Mysterons will leave now and
what few of us remain can try to build a kind of life for ourselves in the
debris. Will you come with me, Karen?”
Karen Wainwright looked at the newly dug
grave and the two more established mounds alongside.
She gave a brief nod of her head.
“Yes, Paul, I’ll come. There is
nothing else I can do for him – except to keep fighting as he did.”
She knelt beside the grave and laid her hands
on the wet earth for a long moment. “Goodbye, my love. Wherever I am, my heart
will be here with you and to the last breath of my soul I will love you. Wait for me…” she whispered as her
tears fell unheeded to the ground. “I won’t be long.”
Captain Scarlet swallowed compulsively as a
lump formed in his throat. He now had no hope that one day he might be able to
lay down the burden of a life that was becoming intolerable. He had survived the
very worst the Mysterons could throw against Spectrum and seen everything he
cared about destroyed. Outside of
the all too fragile life of this grief-wracked woman, he had no-one. The one
woman he had truly loved had been blown from the skies, before he ever took to
the air to investigate the numerous ‘flying saucers’ that had brought the
Mysterons to the Earth. Half of him
hoped that Adam had been right, that somewhere beyond the destruction of this
world, he fought on alongside the finest friends and comrades a man could have. He looked down at the wooden cross
and whispered,
“So
long, partner. See you around,
mate…”
~oo0oo~
It took them longer
to reach the entrance to the waterside cavern than Scarlet had remembered it
taking before. He noticed that
Lieutenant Garnet and Captain Ochre were in no hurry to reach their destination. They had been very quiet together ever
since they left Cloudbase.
Part of him
understood their feelings and sympathised. He knew it would be hard for Ochre to
lose his darling a second time, yet he could see no alternative. The thought that Garnet might be allowed
to stay was preposterous, even though he knew almost everyone had given it some
thought. Besides, however much she
thought she loved the man - Claudia barely knew Captain Ochre and could have no
concept of what it would mean to her life if she remained here. She’d be better off at home, with her
friends and family. and there was always an outside chance she might meet the
real Captain Ochre and things might develop from that. He couldn’t risk skewing the time lines.
He was so busy with
his own thoughts he bumped into Captain Blue, who had stopped and was looking
back to where Ochre and Garnet were dawdling across the cave.
“Sorry,” Scarlet
muttered.
But Blue wasn’t
concerned. He said, “You know, I’m having serious
doubts about those two.”
“In what way?”
“I don’t think she
wants to go back with you.” One glance at Scarlet’s face told him more than
enough. “Neither do you, it seems,” he added.
“Look, I can
sympathise; it’s tough on Ochre and obviously Garnet feels flattered by his
attention and all, but she can’t stay here. Think of the consequences…”
“One happy Ochre…one
happy Garnet…” Blue made to count on his fingers.
“One bone of
contention with Lieutenant Scarlet,” the Englishman reminded him. “And one
rocket for me, from my colonel, if I leave her here.”
“Who’s to know you
ever found her?” Blue mused.
“She met Adam, don’t
forget.”
“And he’s so
heartless he’d insist on making her leave?”
“He may have reported
finding her to Cloudbase. Colonel
White was worried about her.”
“Look, in your World
she’s deemed to be as good as dead anyway,” Blue reasoned. “She doesn’t expect
to be greatly mourned either, from what she was saying over dinner yesterday. I
am sure you could convince Adam not to say he’d seen her – or if he already has
- to say she didn’t make it back.
My guess is he’s just as soppy as the rest of us, if you ask him nicely.”
“Get thee behind me,
Satan,” Scarlet muttered. “I daren’t risk it, Adam.”
Blue shrugged. “No, I guess you are right, but it seems
a shame, especially when you know they both want her to stay….” He jerked his
head towards the approaching couple. Then he turned to start his trudge towards
the portal again.
“Contrary to what you
seem to expect – we can’t always have everything we’d like. Life isn’t like that,” Scarlet panted as he strode after him.
“Very profound of
you, Captain,” Blue grimaced. He walked on for some minutes and then stopped
suddenly. “I think we’re here…”
When Ochre and Garnet
joined them, they all peered down into the hazy gloom of the water cave.
Garnet sighed, “It is
the right place, there’s the rock fall where I found… the bodies.” She shook her
dark head and rubbed her eyes. “It is so hard to believe what’s happened over
the past days. I felt so sorry for her and Lieutenant Scarlet, and then he came
back – saved by Captain Blue – but Claudia didn’t.
Somehow I can’t help feeling I owe her a life – here in this dimension, I
mean, since she was deprived of her second chance by Captain Magenta’s
assassin.”
“Whatever happened to
Lieutenant Garnet in this world is not your fault,” Scarlet insisted. “Claudia, you have to understand that
Lieutenant Scarlet’s survival may well have been a fluke anyway – Adam’s
presence in the cave at the time must’ve altered the timeline – and we don’t
know if that was for good or bad.
We have to leave here, every moment we stay we risk contaminating their future…”
“And what if, by
leaving, we are doing just that?” she wailed.
“What about your
family and friends? Surely you
don’t want to leave them?”
“I have no family – I
was an only child and my parents died in a car crash when I was fifteen and I
stayed with my father’s cousin until I was old enough to leave for college. It may sound strange, Paul, but I feel
more at home here!” She reached out to grab hold of Captain Ochre’s hand. “I want to stay here – with Richard!” It
was the first time she had openly spoken of her growing dream to remain behind.
“Lieutenant Garnet,”
Scarlet snapped, “pull yourself together – and that is an order!”
“S.I.G., Captain
Scarlet,” she sniffed, but she held on to Ochre’s hand, nevertheless.
“Don’t bully her,
Scarlet,” Ochre said belligerently.
“I’m not! Look, we have to go home – I thought we were agreed on that?”
There was no response
from the other three. Even Captain
Blue said nothing in support of the argument, despite Scarlet’s unspoken plea to
him. Scarlet looked away from the
couple. Somehow Claudia had always seemed more at home in this dimension than he
ever could hope to be.
“Claudia, if you
don’t come now you may never have another chance to get back – if all this …
doesn’t work out for you.”
Sensing that there
might be a chance she could convince him, however slight, Claudia looked at him
with renewed hope.
“There is nothing
here that could harm her,” Ochre said gruffly.
“I will see to that, you have my word on it, Scarlet.”
“It might do
irreparable damage to the fabric of space-time…” he said, failing to convince
even himself by his tone and making Blue snort with derision.
Scarlet sighed. “Do
as you like, I wash my hands of it,” he said with gritted teeth.
“You really mean
that, Captain?” Garnet asked, her expression one of uncertain hope.
“I’m out-numbered,
aren’t I? And you obviously all think I’m making a mountain out of a molehill
over this. I don’t know what’s right, Claudia – any
more than I know that Cadenza got back safely – I’ll just have to take it on
trust. If you want to stay, and …
the others …want you to as well, who the hell am I to say that they are wrong?”
She came to his side
and threw her arms around him, kissing his cheek.
“You are the nicest man…” she gushed.
“Yeah, so I keep
being told,” he said with some ambivalence. He wondered just how unpopular
Lieutenant Scarlet had made himself in this dimension.
He was further surprised when Ochre grasped his hand and shook it fervently.
Even Captain Blue was
grinning. “Aah, gee,” he drawled,
“I love a happy ending…”
Scarlet sniggered.
“Shut up, you,” he threatened genially.
Chapter Two
Ochre prepared the
rope for Scarlet to shin down and dropped it down into the cavern below them. They could hear the waves pounding on
the shoreline and another slight tremor shook the floor. Behind them, rocks crashed down from the walls and the echo
bounced around the enclosed space.
Blue glanced at his
watch. “They’re getting more frequent.
I suspect the big quake will come sooner rather than later, you may not have
long to wait, Paul.”
Scarlet nodded and
moved to say his farewells.
Once more, Ochre
shook Scarlet by the hand. “Goodbye, Paul.
It’s been… interesting.”
“Say that again,”
Scarlet grinned. “It’s been a revelation.
Somehow, knowing I am not the only one the Mysterons… altered, makes it all seem
less extreme.”
Ochre nodded
thoughtfully. “And maybe what Blue said is true – we don’t react to each other
because we are not ‘proper’ Mysterons, after all.”
“Yes, he occasionally gets a
few good insights…” Scarlet lowered his voice.
“I hope you will try to give him the benefit of the doubt in the future.”
“He’s an annoying
s-o-b,” Ochre growled, “but he’s not as bad as all that.”
Scarlet grinned. “At least he can sing….” Ochre’s eyebrows rose in surprised enquiry. “Get Blue
to tell you all about it,” he suggested.
He turned to Garnet. She smiled sheepishly at him and then
threw her arms around him. He
hugged her. “You are sure about
this?” he asked her.
“As sure as I have
ever been of anything in my life, Paul,” she reassured him. “I told you in
sickbay that I felt comfortable with these people, didn’t I?
I am sure I can make a good life for myself and Richard here. Don’t worry about me, Paul. I will never forget you…”
“I hope you’ll be
happy here, Claudia. You’ll have to
deal with Lieutenant Scarlet,” he reminded her.
“I am not the Claudia
he loved,” she reasoned. “Just as
you are not the same man he is… he’s the one who will have to deal with it.”
He acknowledged the
truth in that with a wry grimace. “Good luck, Claudia.”
He kissed her, and after a final hug, turned to Captain Blue, who was
watching him with a broad grin on his face. He extended a hand towards him. “So
long, partner,” he drawled.
Blue grinned and
slapped his shoulder. “Yeah, so long, Paul.
See you around, mate.”
Scarlet laughed at
his execrable attempt at an English accent. “There is so much I could say, but I
guess good luck sums it up pretty concisely.”
“You too,” Blue
responded with an understanding smile.
The trio watched as
he shinned over the edge and down into the cave below.
Blue knelt down and peered over the edge.
“You okay, Paul?”
“I’m fine. I guess I just have to wait until Adam
gets here.” He reached up to catch the canteen of drinking water Ochre was
lowering to him. Then they lowered
his air tanks and diving gear.
“You won’t have to
wait alone. We’ll be here. If it
doesn’t work… if the rescue party doesn’t arrive, we’ll get you back up and try
again tomorrow,” Ochre shouted down.
“I don’t think it’s
quite that simple,” Scarlet called back.
He wandered over to a convenient low rock and made himself as comfortable as he
could. He glanced back at the aperture to see that Blue was sitting on the edge,
his legs dangling into the void.
“Careful, Adam, if
there is another tremor you might fall,” he called.
Blue waved a hand in
acknowledgement of the warning, but he didn’t move.
“I should have
brought a book with me,” Scarlet remarked casually. He drew the bar of chocolate
out of his pocket and broke off a section to chew.
He was more nervous about this than he cared to admit – even to himself.
Blue’s voice echoed
down from the roof, “I spy with my little eye, something beginning with R…”
Scarlet laughed.
“Rocks,” he replied, adding, “You don’t have to wait with me, Adam.”
“I’ve nowhere else I
need to be right now. It’s your turn.”
They went through
‘water’, ‘boulders’, ‘sand’ and ‘more rocks’ – which caused some dispute. Blue
maintained, with his annoying air of superior logic, that, as the rocks in
question were different from the first ones he had ‘spied’, he was entitled to
use them, although he conceded, in the face of Scarlet’s amused indignation,
perhaps he should have used D R – different rocks – instead. Such inane and good-humoured arguments
were so familiar, that Scarlet began to forget his anxiety about meeting up with
‘real’ Adam, and relaxed back into the trivial game with a new found serenity.
Suddenly, he leapt to
his feet.
“Watch it, Adam, the
ground – it’s moving!”
Blue scrambled back
from the edge, Ochre hauling him to safety as the whole volcano seemed to twist
and shift. Around the cave, the
shingle poured towards the water’s edge and the larger boulders sank down into
the heaving ground. Scarlet
struggled to keep his footing and to save himself from being swept into the
water, which had begun to bubble and swirl in its rock cauldron.
He heard Blue’s voice
shouting his name, and yelled back an inarticulate cry, to prove he was still
alive. Then, as suddenly as the quake had
started. it stopped, and the crashing of the rocks quietened. He raised himself from where he had been lying face down on
the shingle and got unsteadily to his feet.
He looked up at the aperture, but there was no sign of anyone there.
The rope that Ochre had left hanging was gone and he was alone.
Well, I can only hope Adam was ready and that
he’ll be here soon,
he thought glumly.
It had not occurred to him that he would lose contact with his party before his
rescue arrived.
Scarlet had another
piece of chocolate and sat down to wait. The water was still churning but it
wasn’t long before a blond head broke the surface. Adam Svenson emerged from the
sea, stumbling up the shingle. He
removed the regulator from his mouth. “Hello, Paul, I hope you haven’t been
waiting long? I wasn’t sure you would have got the message.”
“Yeah, I got the
message. Good to see you, Adam.” Scarlet emulated his friend’s casual
tone, but he could sense his partner’s underlying relief at their reunion.
“Captain Tempest is behind me
with extra air tanks and Phones is waiting beyond the cliffs with the sea-bugs
to ferry you back to Stingray. We couldn’t be sure one of you wouldn’t have been
injured. It wouldn’t be so long-winded, if I hadn’t crashed one of the sea-bugs
yesterday.”
“I have the necessary
diving equipment, but it sounds like you have thought of everything, as usual.”
“I try,” Adam said,
with a modest roll of his eyes.
Scarlet laughed.
Captain Blue looked
around the cavern, a frown appearing between his eyes.
“Where’s Lieutenant
Garnet?
I felt sure you would
have met up with her – I met her, with a Karen from the same dimension you were
in. Isn’t she here?”
“No, she… didn’t make
the trip back,” Scarlet said.
“What happened to
her?” Blue asked in concern. “She
said she was fine, but that she wanted to come back with you… Karen mentioned
some subversives who were causing trouble in Spectrum – did one of them harm
her?” he asked angrily. He was momentarily distracted when Captain Tempest broke the
water and made the climb out to the beach.
“It’s a long story,”
Scarlet said, “but I promise I will tell you all of it –
back on the real Cloudbase…”
Adam flashed a brief
glance at him and, noticing the caution on his friend’s face, said brightly
enough, “Now, it seems like have I heard that phrase before...” He introduced
Tempest to Scarlet and the two men weighed each other up momentarily.
“Before we go, Adam,
tell me, what’s happened to the pacifier?” Scarlet said, as Blue helped him to
strap on the air tanks.
“Nothing. We’ve been picking up such pieces as we can find – but I
doubt if we’ll ever be able to get it to work again. Gaspari and Dincerler have
disappeared; I guess we can assume they were Mysterons.”
“And the one at
Vesuvius?”
“Very badly damaged. The boat house caught fire.”
“As soon as we get to
where we can radio Cloudbase, we must have the colonel order its immediate
destruction. It has to be smashed beyond repair.”
Blue pursed his lips.
“Why? What do you know that I don’t?”
Scarlet told him of
the Mysterons’ plan to travel the dimensions, using the machines to annihilate
all life on every world.
Standing beside them,
Captain Tempest caught his breath.
“I never realised these Mysterons posed such a threat, Captain Scarlet. We only
hear about the things Spectrum manages to foil and they always seem isolated and
unconnected attacks.”
“The Mysterons are a
far greater threat than the public realises, Captain,” Scarlet agreed. “I trust you will not discuss anything
you hear beyond this cave?”
Tempest nodded. “Every organisation has secrets that are
not widely known, Captain Scarlet, even the WASPs has its share.”
Blue laughed. “Oh
yeah, I bet you’ve found Atlantis and have a whole undersea civilisation tucked
up your sleeve, Troy!”
“Why stop at one?”
Tempest managed to joke in return. The Spectrum officers laughed. “Is there no
way we can stop the Mysterons – and anyone else - from using these ‘portals’?”
he asked as the laughter died down.
“I have some
suggestions from the World President and the Commander of Spectrum from the
dimension I was in,” Scarlet shrugged.
“It isn’t exactly going to be easy communicating with the others though.”
“We should get out of
here,” Blue said with a glance at his watch.
“The aftershocks will start soon, if they follow the usual pattern. We might get
ourselves lost if we’re not careful.”
They moved to the
water and Tempest led the way in.
Blue smiled reassuringly at Scarlet as the Englishman adjusted the regulator in
his mouth.
“Sure is good to have
you back, Paul. It won’t be long
now before we’re on Cloudbase. I
know one Angel who’ll be overjoyed to see you again.”
Scarlet removed his
regulator and said, “How is Symphony? I’ve missed her.”
He grinned, diving away from the sweep of Blue’s arm as the American
laughed.
Seconds later he
heard the splash as Blue followed him into the black depths.
~oo0oo~
Atlanta Shore watched
Symphony as she prowled the deck of Stingray once more.
It seemed the Angel pilot wasn’t going to stop worrying about the men
every time they left the sub.
Atlanta adjusted her reading glasses and turned the page of her magazine. I
have far more confidence in Troy than Symphony has in her young man – that is
obvious,
she thought complacently.
Symphony glanced at
her companion as she caught the sound of the page turning. How can she sit there so smugly? she
raged. Doesn’t she
have the imagination to visualise what they might all be suffering out there? That quake was the biggest yet… I can’t
see the sea-bugs anymore. Oh, hurry
up, Adam, or I shall go distracted here!
She reached for the
binoculars and trained them on the distant cliffs.
Suddenly the sub
began to rock violently. Atlanta
jumped to her feet, her magazine discarded in the turmoil. She made her way to
join Symphony, who was staring with hopeless fear out into the sea. Around them, the currents tore seaweed from its moorings and
tossed huge boulders around, and even Stingray’s powerful stabilisers were not
enough to hold the sub steady.
“Any sign of them?”
Atlanta asked.
Symphony shook her head. With a supreme sacrifice, she handed Atlanta the binoculars and continued to peer out into the rapidly worsening gloom. The seabed was being raked by the tremor and the water was turning to a fine mud.
“Look!” Atlanta
squealed, handing the binoculars back. “Over by those cliffs, I can see a
sea-bug. It’s Troy, it must be!”
Symphony squinted
through the glasses, “No… looks more like Phones to me,” she said. Atlanta gasped in dismay and reached for
the glasses again.
It was Lieutenant
Sheridan, wrestling with his sea-bug in the choppy water. Symphony caught the
distorted sound of his voice over the radio and went to adjust the setting.
“Say again, Phones,”
she shouted. “Say again!”
The words were
disjointed, but between them they could piece together the message,
“The entrance to the
cave has been blocked by a huge rock fall. Troy and the Spectrum captains are
trapped in there! I am on my way back… we must try to clear a way!”
Atlanta watched
Phones approach, and grabbed Symphony as the lieutenant was caught by a tide of
water and swept further away from the submarine and back towards the rocks.
“It’s a whirlpool!” Symphony watched as the water began to
swirl around; dragging Phones and anything else not anchored firmly back towards
the rocks. She turned to the control panel and stabbed a few buttons.
“What are you doing?”
Atlanta cried in alarm.
“Can you drive this
boat?”
“I know how to,”
Atlanta confirmed.
“Then fire two
rockets at the cliff face, break up the rocks, and with luck it’ll also stop the
water’s spinning momentum.”
“There are people out
there!”
“Who will be killed
if we don’t do something to help!”
Atlanta shook her
head. “We might kill them.”
“If we don’t, that
whirlpool will. Turn the boat about through 45 degrees and that’s an order,
Lieutenant Shore.”
Under protest,
Atlanta adjusted Stingray so the missile tubes faced towards the rocks. And
whilst she was doing that, Symphony studied the armaments firing system; it was
nowhere near as sophisticated as that of the Interceptor jets – but she could
see how it worked.
As Stingray came to
rest, she set the target co-ordinates and with a silent prayer, pulled the
launch lever. Two sting missiles snaked from the submarine and crashed into the
cliffs. With an agonising slowness, the tops
crumbled under the impact and fell to the sea bed, causing an updraft of water
that flung Phones clear of immediate danger and up towards the surface.
Symphony sighed,
adjusted the co-ordinates, and, praying her luck would hold, launched another
two missiles. The women watched them as they swerved down into the newly opened
area of cliff and detonated, the blast wave even making Stingray rock.
As the debris
cleared, they could see an opening in the cliffs.
It was jagged and irregular, but it was an opening.
“Come on, Adam, Paul,
come on…” Symphony breathed.
Atlanta pointed.
“There! I can see someone moving!”
Sure enough, a figure
was wriggling from the hole. As the
dark-haired man hit the open water he turned and appeared to be waiting. A second figure emerged, and even from
this distance Symphony could see the fair hair.
He turned and went back into the hole.
Symphony bit back a
cry of dismay. The first figure
grabbed Blue’s legs and tugged, slowly, like drawing a cork from a bottle, Blue
emerged from the tunnel, dragging a third body with him.
Phones arrived on his
sea-bug, and the three of them manhandled the injured man onto the handles, and
Phones headed back towards the submarine.
“One of them is
injured!” Atlanta cried. “Troy, oh,
Troy!” She hastened to the air-lock and opened it to receive the sea-bug and its
passengers.
Symphony continued to
watch as the other two divers – one of whom was Adam – made their way slowly to
the safety of the submarine. As she heard the airlock open, she turned and went
to see if she could help. Atlanta
was already there and as Phones helped the patient out, he said, “Here, Atlanta,
get him to a couch. He’s hurt
pretty bad.”
“Oh, Troy!”
Phones gave her a
quick smile. “No, Atlanta, it’s Captain Scarlet.”
“Paul!” Symphony came
alongside and helped stretch Captain Scarlet on the couch.
They removed the air tanks and fins, whilst she examined him. There was a
deep gash across his forehead, disappearing into the black hair. Blood ran freely down his face. Symphony mopped it up, and cleaned the
wound.
Tempest and Blue came
out to the airlock and walked straight over to where Symphony was busy with
Scarlet.
“How is he?” Blue
asked.
“I tell you, Adam, he
must be dead. No-one could survive
being hit by a boulder that size,” Tempest said, as he accepted Atlanta’s
fulsome hug of welcome.
“He’s bleeding a lot,
but I guess he’ll be okay,” Symphony said, ignoring Tempest and looking with a
wan smile at her own beloved captain.
“We were approaching
the cave mouth when the second quake hit.
There was a jagged overhang of rock and a huge slab was dislodged by the tremor. It came crashing down and I’d have been
right under it, except that Paul shoved me out of the way, but it caught him a
glancing blow as it fell. He was knocked unconscious, lost his respirator and
was swept down away from the exit.
I had to get him back and by then the cave mouth was blocked by a rock fall
outside. It was good thinking to
blast another way out. I guess we all owe you two ladies our lives.” Blue turned
to include Atlanta in his thanks.
She blushed.
“Actually, Captain Blue, you should thank Symphony, she had the idea and she
fired the missiles.”
“But I couldn’t have done it without Atlanta’s help. She lined the sub up and held her steady.” Symphony smiled at the younger girl.
“I’ve always said
Atlanta is a great girl,” Troy said with a grin. “And now it seems that the
WASPs don’t have the monopoly on great girls… fine shooting, Symphony.”
Symphony was about to
give her usual sharp reply to what she saw as any sexist remark, but she caught the pleading look on
Blue’s face and merely said, “Why, thank you, Captain Tempest. The Angels aim to please.”
“Aim to please,”
Tempest laughed. “That’s a good one!”
On the couch, Scarlet
stirred and opened his eyes.
“Symphony,” he slurred, “have you had your baby yet?”
“He’s delirious,” she
said, taken aback by the remark.
“He’d better be…”
Blue remarked caustically.
~oo0oo~
The crew of Stingray
were impressed by the speed with which Captain Scarlet regained his health and
vigour. Symphony carefully wrapped his head in
what Scarlet maintained were enough bandages to have effectively mummified him. She hushed his complaints by explaining
that, as he had been bleeding so much, the Aquanauts needed to believe the wound
was still dangerous under all the bandages – unless he wanted to explain it away
some other way.
Sitting in the rear
of Stingray as the sub cruised on the surface, Scarlet gave a heavily edited
version of what he’d experienced, concentrating on the potential danger of the
pacifiers.
“It sure is a shame
those machines are dangerous, Cap’n,” Phones commented, watching the smoke
pouring out of the volcano. “’Cause I reckon this one’s gonna blow its top.”
“In a way, I rather
hope it does,” Blue murmured. “That way, it ought to damage enough of the
tunnels to block most portals.”
“I rather fancied
doing some exploring,” Scarlet said with a shrug.
“Properly prepared and knowing what to expect, it could be a fascinating
experience.”
“Yeah, hundreds of
Captain Blacks… remember?” Blue cautioned him.
“That was what was
odd, Adam. Apart from Cadenza’s colonel, we only
saw one Conrad Turner. The man in
the pacifier’s cave was the same Captain Black we all knew – except Cadenza, of
course.”
Blue shifted
uneasily. “You mean the Mysterons don’t need more than one of him?”
“Perhaps to them
every dimension is the real one…”
“That was a nasty
bump on the head you got,” Blue jibed, and sipped at his third cup of coffee. “You know, I reckon Spectrum should
recruit Lieutenant Shore.”
“Why?” Scarlet could
see the amusement in his friend’s eyes.
“She makes a damn
fine cup of coffee…”
Atlanta simpered her
thanks and blushed prettily as Troy started to protest…
Scarlet met Blue’s
eyes and they both dissolved into laughter.
Chapter Three
Colonel White closed Captain Scarlet’s report for the second time and gave a
sceptical sigh. He had already read
Captain Blue’s report of the rescue mission and the failure of the search to
find any serviceable parts of the pacifier. The machine from Vesuvius was also
useless. So, although Scarlet had
verbally passed on the message from the ‘other dimension’, events on Sicily had
rendered it pointless. The
newscasts had been full of the devastating eruption of Mount Etna; in which
millions of tons of lava had spewed from every vent on the volcano, flowing down
and effectively creating a new surface to the whole mountain. If the theory that
the Mysterons could function in any number of dimensions was true, they would
have to find another way to access this one, at least.
Colonel White was
familiar with his officers’ report styles and he had an uncanny ability to tell
when things had been omitted. He
felt sure now that Scarlet was skating over the fate of Lieutenant Garnet. Captain Blue had reported seeing ‘a
Lieutenant Garnet’ who fitted the description he had of Claudia Vecchio – a
woman who had refused to accompany him.
Captain Scarlet spoke of her as being present in the ‘new’ dimension –
right up until his return to the rendezvous with Captain Blue. Questioning had not really provided much
more information, although Scarlet would not say outright that she was dead.
The colonel decided
on ‘missing in action’ – he typed the words onto the screen he had open on his
computer, saved and closed it down.
There would be plenty of time later to think of a suitable replacement for her
in Naples. He paused to consider the
attractive young woman he remembered and mentally wished her well.
He glanced at his desk clock
and decided to call it a day. He pressed his communication link to the
Officers’ Lounge and asked Captain Ochre to take command for the remainder of
the shift. Lieutenant Green was
busily working at his computer banks, but he had only recently come back on duty
and he was used to working with the other officers when doing night duty. In fact, White suspected, they had a
fair old time – swapping stories.
Once he had left the Control Room, he ambled around
Cloudbase as was his custom - he always did the rounds of his command, before he
turned in for the night – he liked
to think of it as part of a long tradition, going right back to Henry V before
Agincourt. The ‘little bit of Harry in the night’ that Shakespeare had written of.
His stroll came to its conclusion on the Promenade Deck, as always. He was in the habit of star-gazing for a
time before turning in, and had a small telescope mounted on the wall that
formed the end of the flowerbeds.
As he moved towards it he saw two men - one fair-haired and one dark - both off
duty and casually dressed in sweats and jeans.
They were sitting dangling their legs over the wall, staring out into the
dark night sky and beside them stood an almost empty six-pack of bottled beer.
The colonel made a move to reprimand them, but as he approached, he heard the
dark-haired man say,
“I wonder if the others ever do this.”
“Drink beer that’s been smuggled on board?”
“Drink smuggled beer with a good friend and count shooting stars and just
generally lounge about.” He took a swig from the bottle in his hand.
“Look, there’s another one! That’s
35 to me and… 18 to you. You’re not
concentrating.”
Scarlet drained his beer. “Sorry.”
“Have another one,” Blue offered.
“I shouldn’t.”
“No,
I shouldn’t. It won’t affect you at all. Finish it off, Paul, I can hardly take
it back and ask for a refund, can I?”
“S’good stuff, where did you get it?”
“That would be telling.”
“How do you always get to know about these scams anyway?” Scarlet asked.
“Money talks.” Blue tapped a finger against the side of his nose and grinned.
“You’d better watch it or that could become your answer to everything,” his
friend warned.
“If you’ve got it, flaunt it!” Blue said jovially, in the face of his friend’s
sudden solemnity.
“Where on Earth did you pick up that expression?”
“Dianne…”
“Oh, that figures, there’s a woman who knows all about money…”
“And still prefers you to me. Incomprehensible really…” Blue shook his fair head
and swigged at his beer.
The dark man laughed and stretched a hand out towards the velvet-black and
starlit night sky. “Maybe there’s
hope for you yet - somewhere out there, Adam.”
“No, I have all I need right here,” Blue said contentedly. He glanced at his friend and asked the question that had been
bothering him since Scarlet first explained about his adventures. “Was I really
a woman, somewhere out there?”
Scarlet smiled. “Sure
you were, but then so was I and Magenta and Green too.
Dianne, Karen and Juliette – if
you can believe it - were guys… that took some getting used to.”
“I’ll say.” Blue
grimaced and sipped his beer again. His imagination was really struggling to get
to grips with some of the concepts.
“Eva is just as
uncertain about the fact that her doppelgangers are men, as you are about the
fact that she’s a woman,” Scarlet
remarked and saw Blue’s eyebrows rise in disbelief.
“She wasn’t really
called Eva, was she – you are having me on?” he pleaded.
Scarlet shook his
head. “No, she was Eva Svenson. The other Adam didn’t think much of it
either, but she was far more ‘laid-back’ about it all. So much so, that she even gave me a kiss
for you…” he teased.
“That’s okay.” Adam
squirmed. “You can keep it. I’ll take it as read.”
“Everywhere else we
went, you were a guy,” Paul reassured him with a smile.
He remembered the injured Adam in Boston and frowned. “Not every dimension had experienced the
same events as here, or not with the same results, anyway. That was even more disconcerting.”
“From what you were
saying, the Mysterons in the other dimension were far more… subtle than those we’ve experience of here,” Blue mused. “Undermining the financial probity of
the World Government, infiltrating business organisations, and corrupting
politicians, sure beats blowing up oil refineries, and the like, as a means of
prosecuting a war of nerves. Maybe
we ought to make a case to the colonel, for a squad of officers to perform
spot-checks outside of Spectrum? We
can’t afford to let them get a toe-hold – far better to stop it starting, than
have to stop it once it’s started.”
Scarlet swigged his
beer and asked, “You going to volunteer?
I can just imagine you sweeping into SvenCorp with a warrant to check the
books….”
“Hey – my father may
be a complete bastard, but he’s a completely honest bastard!”
“Whoa! Down, boy - it was meant as a joke, Adam! Jeez, you Svensons – you fight like
tigers amongst yourselves, but like demons if anyone takes a pot-shot at any one
of you!” He glanced at his friend, who appeared mollified by his response.
“Joking aside, you might have a point and it could have added benefits too…”
“Oh?” Blue said
coolly. The dig at his family’s company still rankled.
“Yes, it could keep
Agent Conners out of our hair. If
he did the investigating, he’d be far too busy to bother with the likes of us…”
Scarlet suggested, remembering the World President’s enthusiasm for the idea.
“Conners,” Blue
snorted. “No, Paul, you couldn’t do it. Using him as the investigator
would probably contravene several articles of the Geneva Convention, for a
start!”
“But wouldn’t it be
worth it, just to see the faces of some of those World Senators, when he started investigating their finances?”
Blue chortled. “Well, I’d sure pay good money for a
ringside seat.” Scarlet grinned.
"But what makes you think Conners would actually leave Spectrum? It’s just wishful thinking, Paul!"
“No, not necessarily,” Scarlet said,
deciding to play Devil’s Advocate. “We know Mr. Conners is a man with a sense of
mission. I’m sure he could be made
to see how vital his participation in a ‘clean-up-everywhere-else’ campaign
would be. Who else could Spectrum
trust to be incorruptible and dedicated to his task, in the face of what will be
undoubted hostility and opposition?”
Blue face was a picture. He raised his hand to his mouth and made a gagging noise. Scarlet laughed.
“Well, I guess anything's worth a
try, if it gets rid of him, I suppose,” the American conceded.
“If that fails, there is always a
strong kick in the posterior whilst he’s standing on one of Cloudbase’s runways. That could do the trick....”
“Well, you’ll have to administer it, Paul.
If you fall over the edge as well, we'll pick the bits up later.” Blue teased.
“Thanks very much, Adam, that’s awfully decent of you, old chap!” Scarlet grimaced. “You know; it’s little
things like that, that make me really glad I came back....”
Blue joined in the laughter, and they clinked their beer bottles
together in a mutual toast to their friendship.
They drained the
bottles and sat in silence for a while, and then Scarlet continued, “Do you
suppose there is a reality where Conrad never ordered those shots fired? Where the mission to Mars was a success and the Mysterons are
our allies?”
“More than likely - there may even be a reality where you and I are not
friends.”
“Oh come on, don’t you think that’s pushing things a little too far?”
“Yeah, well maybe….”
Scarlet swigged his
beer and said, “Believe me, Adam, just as north is always true, you were always… just the same…despite
appearances to the contrary and regardless of what sex you were!”
“God, how boringly
predictable that makes me sound.” Blue gave him a horrified grimace.
“Not at all – it’s a
comforting certainty, in a strange world, to know that whatever seems to be
wrong - the essential decency that is the bedrock of your character will be a
constant.”
Blue snorted with
laughter, but the colonel could see a blush mounting in his tanned cheeks. He suppressed his own amusement as
he heard Blue mutter, “You should get a job as a PR man…I am sure my father
could use your talents.”
“I just might at that…” he
chuckled.
Smiling, Colonel White
turned away and walked silently back to the door. Just once
wouldn’t hurt, he guessed, but tomorrow he was going to have to get
Lieutenant Green to discover who was smuggling alcohol aboard and then he’d have
to deal with it.
Most severely.
~oo0oo~
Paul Metcalfe strode past the abandoned house they had chosen to
use as shelter and looked towards the beach.
In the distance, he could see the two of them, Karen sitting on the sand whilst
the child pottered about collecting shells to decorate the huge, shapeless mound
she had made. The breeze brought snatches of her excited prattle back to him. He
smiled contentedly.
He had had few expectations about life after the Mysteron attacks
but they had managed to do pretty well for themselves. All over the planet there
were small communities, managing to survive and starting to slowly rebuild a
civilisation that had almost vanished forever.
Karen and he had travelled aimlessly, until they decided to see if what Adam had
told them about his inter-dimensional visitors had a basis in truth. Now they
were here in Sicily, but he did not know if they would stay here much longer.
Part of the hunger in his soul was to see his home again, and Karen had always
said she did not mind where they went as long as they went together.
He
quickened his pace and called a greeting to them both.
Hearing him, they both turned and the toddler began to run to him
with the ungainly speed of all infants.
He hunkered down and opened his arms to her.
She threw herself into his embrace and giggled in delight as he stood and raised
her above his head, twirling her around until he began to feel giddy.
“Daddy, I made a castle, a big, big castle.
Mummy says it’s the biggest castle she’s ever seen!
I’m gonna put pretty shells on it and we can all live there for ever…”
“That’s nice, Hope. Can I see it?”
She nodded and squirmed to be put down.
Then she raced off again, her golden hair streaming behind her like a flag.
After he had duly admired the ‘castle’ and the child had wandered
off looking for more treasures to adorn their new home, he joined Karen on the
sand.
They sat side by side in companionable silence for a while, keeping a
wary eye on the little girl as she skipped along the beach.
Finally Karen asked quietly, “Did you do what you set out to?”
“Yes, more or less. Adam was right, there are tunnels under
Etna and they do seem to connect to ‘other realities’ and with other moments of
time. I think his visitors were real ones.
There was a series of minor earth tremors whilst I was there, which
opened passages to other parts of the volcano.
I spent some time exploring them and then, after one ‘quake I met
someone…”
“Was it…?”
“No, it was me… well, another me.
I didn’t see anyone else,” he lied convincingly. “I told him what we knew – or
rather what we believe to be the case.
I think he believed me.”
“You are not sure?” she smiled.
“Well, he seemed a rather stiff-necked individual.” Paul smiled.
“Not like me at all…”
Karen laughed. “Oh, not at all…”
He grimaced at her. “You have to admit, I’m not as bad as I used
to be… Anyway, this guy said he was a lieutenant.
He took some convincing, but I think I managed to make him believe me, in the
end. He wanted me to go with him to Cloudbase, and I was tempted to, I admit,
but I was worried about getting back to you, and so I had to leave him. The first tunnel took me back to the Svenson house – and no,
I didn’t stay - the place wasn’t even damaged, so it must have been years ago.
I went back into the tunnel and waited for the next quake to re-shift the
portals. I didn’t see Lieutenant Scarlet again… the timeframe must
have shifted once more.” He sighed
and smiled at her. “We have done all we can, sweetheart. We have to hope the other dimensions do all they can.”
“It is still hard to think there are other realities - places
where maybe… things are different.”
“You still miss him.” It was a statement delivered without
emotion. He had been right not to mention the other Adam Svenson he had
encountered.
It would only have opened old wounds.
“Part of me will always miss him, Paul, just as part of me will
always love him. How can it be otherwise when every time
I look at his child I see him?” She reached out and touched his arm, smiling up
into his carefully expressionless face. “But it has been almost four years now
and you have become so very important to me and to Hope - who adores you.”
Paul smiled. “As I do her, she is a constant delight,
Karen. I never expected to
have the luxury of a family life.
Whenever Dianne and I talked about it, we were always uncertain about having
children of our own; we could never be sure what effect my Mysteronisation had
had on me, or what it might do to any child of mine.
To me, Hope is the daughter I always wanted, I couldn’t love her more if
she
were
my own.”
She kissed his bearded cheek and rested her head against his
shoulder as he supported her with his strong arm.
“I love you, Paul Metcalfe. I
love you for your kindness, your generosity of spirit and your strength, for the
way we can share memories and the way we … we have grown… comfortable together.”
“Karen…”
She placed a finger against his lips and continued, “I can accept
that I may never mean as much to you as Dianne did and that’s as it should be.
But I know neither Adam nor Dianne would want us to mourn forever. I am content with the way things are. I hoped you were too.”
He smiled. “Of course I am.” He looked along the
beach to where Hope was dragging a long strand of seaweed back towards them. “We
are a family, the three of us.”
“And what if that was about to change?”
He frowned at her. “Change?
How?” Realisation dawned as she smiled at him.
“Karen, do you mean…?”
She nodded. “We’ll see what the future holds, Paul,
but it looks as if Hope won’t have to grow up all alone and that, God willing,
you will soon hold your own child in your arms.”
He hugged her, speechless with a fierce and yet anxious joy. As
the little girl drew near, calling for her mother, Karen moved towards her
daughter and Paul leant back on the warm sand with an absurd feeling of
contentment.
“You know,” he said conversationally to the vast blue emptiness above
him, “sometimes I get surprised at just how wonderful life can be….”
Authors Notes:
Synchronicity – where to start?
This began life in the summer of 2003 as a possible Halloween Challenge Story
and developed into a much longer and far more complex story than I have ever
attempted before. It suffered as much as from being
put aside for me to write stories that did become Halloween and Christmas
Challenge stories, as from its length and complexity.
The first completed version was revised -and largely re-written- once the
earlier parts were posted. My
apologies for the delay.
That it was ever finished is due to the unflagging and generous support I
received from the usual culprits: Chris Bishop (The Boss), Hazel Köhler, Sue
Stanhope, Mary J Rudy and Caroline Smith.
They have seen the story twist and turn through innumerable dead-end versions,
until it emerged in the present form.
I only hope they feel that it was worth their efforts.
My thanks are also due to Hazel Köhler for her
impeccable beta-reading, and for her patience with someone who will keep putting
capital letters where they do not belong. We won’t mention the commas and semi-colons.
It only remains
for me to say – as always – any mistakes are mine alone.
I never claim to be an expert, so where I have erred, I apologise.
I have no
rights to any of the main characters or organisations used in the story – their
creation is entirely the work of imaginations far greater than mine.
The Agent Conners mentioned in the story was created by Chris Bishop, as were
the members of the Svenson family.
Lieutenants Garnet and Flaxen, as well as the Cerise, Mauve and Cobalt mentioned
in the story are mine – so are Sergeants Ruffolo and Harcourt. I guess I am also
responsible for the alternative versions of the Spectrum Captains and Cadenza
and Sonata, with the inhabitants of their respective worlds.
‘Attack on
Cloudbase’ remains one of my favourite episodes of the TV series and I thought
it would be nice to extrapolate different conclusions to the story – depending
on whether Symphony was dreaming or not.
The possible results from the event not being a dream led to the scenes in the
ruins of the Svenson House in Boston and the final scenes on Sicily.
It is not necessarily how I hope, or imagine, the war of nerves ended.
If you managed to read to the end – well done! – and thank you.
September 2004