2012 Part 21

According to all reports, people in the flooded areas of the Northern Mediterranean were doing better by far than their counterparts in Egypt over the water and further East in Bangladesh, and his journey confirmed this. He was however concerned at the numbers of Asiatic people he saw on the road. He felt that things were only just holding and there was more going on under the surface than he was seeing, or being allowed to see. The coming wave of Southern refugees would swamp even the most organised efforts.

The man at Cyclades Ferries, a run-down operation contacted in desperation, had two small fishing-boats to his fleet. One was out of commission and the other was booked until the end of the week by a group from the UN Environment Programme in a hurry to get to Crete. He silently wished them luck, relieved he was not on board. He had tried all the other available carriers and despite offering fistfuls of Euro's, all was to no avail. There was no regular ferry, the last great storm had sunk most of the Mediterranean fleet, and damaged the few ferries left afloat. The immediate collapse of the tourist trade in the Eastern Mediterranean did not warrant their repair. The few who voyaged were locals in desperate need to maintain life on the islands by fetching and carrying for themselves from the mainland.

Meanwhile Athens, and the other cities and towns on the Northern sh.o.r.e of the Mediterranean were preparing for the flotilla of small boats from the South, which even now arrived in ever increasing numbers, seeking shelter on mainland Europe. Tension was mounting with the sea-levels and was set to finished off what the latest freak hurricane had started. There was not a beach worthy of the name left on the whole Mediterranean coastline. Had the Cyclades been less mountainous, they too would have disappeared along with a number of their more lowly sisters.

He walked over to his hotel balcony and gazed out over the remnants of the harbour and remembered from his youth the bustling port. The streets of rickety hotels of ill repute and the coming and going of colourful local caiques, larger cargo vessels, ferries to the islands and sailors of various navies on sh.o.r.e leave. He remembered sleeping rough for a few drachmas on the flat roof of a hotel on a balmy September night in '63, not far from the one he now occupied.

The Piraeus of the triremes, Phoenicians and the Argonauts was a sorry sight. Foul, slick and grey-foaming seawater, filtered into shattered streets, lapped greedily at makeshift landing-areas of broken buildings, washed in and out the cavities and broken teeth of fallen masonry. From time to time a weak summer-sun gamely tried to penetrate the grey skies suited to more northerly lands.

His thoughts were interrupted by the unexpected shrill of the telephone by his bed. Maybe one of the carriers had found transport for him. The voice was curt, husky with a tinge of irony and a quaintly old fashioned manner of speech.

'Yo man, you the dude goin' to Ios?' Colwyn confirmed the query. 'Like I gotta boat can go there man. You got the spondoolicks? Hey - Like, straight away? Huh?' came the voice.

'What kind of boat and how much? When can we go? and ...,'

'Hey man, cool it baby! You wanna go to Ios?'

'Sure I want to go there. How do you know that's what I want?'

'You like-er-payin' a visit to that Dodonna chick?'

'I'm not prepared to talk over the 'phone, where can we meet?'

'Hey man, cut the cloak and dagger stuff, I'm strictly legit, well almost.' Colwyn heard the sn.i.g.g.e.r in the voice.

'Five hundred Euros man, and you're the only pa.s.senger. Okay? You into this s.h.i.t man? I gotta know like now, you ain't the only dude wantin' a ride. I can get more from them UN guys but like I don't wanna be loooked over too close by them. Incognito's my bag man.'

'How do you know about me?' asked Colwyn. He wondered if he was being spied on by UNPEX for some reason. In the absence of a better opportunity he said. 'I might take up the offer, What's your name? I'll meet you first.'

'There's a joint called Kafenion Thala.s.sa on the block where your hotel is, meet me in the back room there in five minutes - you'll know me when you see me - dig?' The caller hung up.

Colwyn packed his suitcase, checked out of the hotel and made his way to the Thala.s.sa, it was not hard to find, its name written in Greek and Roman script on a faded green board over greasy windows, streaked with the clammy fall-out from numerous sweaty bodies. He had to push hard at the door which had swollen in the damp atmosphere and was stuck in the jamb requiring significant effort to get it open. His attempt at a discrete entrance was confounded utterly as he fell, rather than pa.s.sed unnoticed, into a long, high room, lit dimly by unwashed strip-lights, one of which flickered unceasingly. Regaining his dignity he noted the barman lounging on the grubby bar, looking him up and down with obvious curiosity. A group, probably seamen by their dress, sat at the table nearest the window, drinking retsina from an aluminium container. The back of the room was in almost total obscurity. He felt all eyes on him.

Until this point of his journey his obvious status as an international business-man had been useful with the military and civil authorities who had control over the travelling public. His McMa.n.u.s ident.i.ty card had been a laisser-pa.s.ser smoothing rights of way in what otherwise in all likeliness, would have been impossible situations. Here, in the depths of Piraeus, he felt highly exposed. To find his quarry, and trying to be inconspicuous, he made his way as nonchalantly as possible to the far depths of the room.

'Hey man, you gotta be Colwyn!' The low voice came from the very darkest corner. As his eyes became accustomed to the atmosphere he made out the form of a small, bent individual. Such light as there was, caught on whitely grinning teeth. The figure motioned him to a chair and leaning forward brought a hairy face too close to his own. Colwyn winced at the mixture of aniseed and garlic which a.s.sailed his nostrils. At this point he felt like a bit part in a 'B' movie. All his instincts told him the whole setting was ridiculous. Only the need to get to Ios and his total inability to find any available alternative transport prevented him from leaving. However, there was something intriguing about the bent creature with the silly voice. He gave off an earthiness which held the interest, a kind of authenticity and integrity which made him hard to ignore, in case he did or said something important, not to be missed.

Colwyn's travels overland had brought him into direct contact with the ma.s.s of humanity who were experiencing a different reality from his own. Part of the privileged minority, he lived in a world where life ran to a pace dictated largely by himself. The contents of his daily life, and those of the people with which he rubbed shoulders, existed on a plane where material needs were taken care of as a matter of course. His was a world of thoughts and ideas free from difficult questions about having enough money to go anywhere he wanted, eat anything he fancied, be warm or cool enough. He knew of course this was not everyone's situation. Especially since the storms, the melting ice caps and great sea rises of recent times, he was acutely aware of the displaced third of humanity and he was proud of the work done by the McMa.n.u.s Press to bring home their difficulties to the fortunate and was in no doubt that its coverage had added to the efforts made by the relevant Authorities.

Until his present journey he knew privation and displacement were unpleasant and thanked his lucky stars he was not directly part of it. He was glad the UN, NATO and NGO's used his taxes to a.s.sist the inundated and did not begrudge paying as some did. It was hard-luck that most of the inundated were the world's poor. The rich had found refuge on high ground as soon as it was clear what was in store. Despite his newsman's cynicism he had developed a grudging faith in the UN and the governments of the industrialised world to be of positive a.s.sistance, especially when pushed hard by the press. It was partly his efforts which ensured the gradual loss of important coastal agricultural lands was now a problem the whole world was taking seriously and he believed the resources existed to make sure things could be well managed. His travels confirmed this belief and although he worried about the longer term effects of the current displacement, he had faith that companies like New-Agric would ultimately be able to cope.

Land travel, as the Dodona's had wanted him to experience, was indeed an eye opener. Few business-men ventured beyond their hotels, company premises or tourist attractions. Casual travel had been banned by the UN Police Executive (UNPEX) and news from the Coastal Rehabilitation Programme was strictly controlled. He was still trying to decide from his travels so far what was truth and what official fiction and in an odd way this little man in the dark corner of a seedy taverna seemed to hold clues and his newsman's instinct was aroused.

'I keeps one foot ahead of them UNPEX guys,' the man breathed over him. 'Them dudes man wanna register all the boats and they keep track of all travellers. They know all about you man, you shouldn't've spent so much time on the 'phone man, they got all the lines bugged.'

'I'm on legitimate newspaper business and if they'd have wanted to stop me travelling, nothing could have been easier, I've got nothing to hide,' said Colwyn. 'It's just that there's no available boats to Ios and that's my destination. It's written clearly on my travel doc.u.ments and UNPEX are fully aware of it since they are the ones who made them out.'

'Hey, man, take it easy, It's not my bag where you wanna go. But don't you think it's a bit weird you can't get no transport to Ios.'

'Why should it be weird? I guess travel's hard these days.'

'You had any problems before?'

'Come to think of it, no, the firm made all the arrangements as far as London, England.'

'So why not now man?'

'I've come overland, I've had to find my own transport all the way from London. I expect like all those UNPEX people you want to know why I didn't fly.'

'Nope - not my business man, but I bet you didn't have any real ha.s.sles like.'

'Since you ask, it wasn't straight forward all the way but I suppose I didn't have any real problems until I got here.'

'You don't find that kinda strange then?'

'Why should I?'

'Because, man you're going to Ios to see the Dodona chick. And UNPEX, they don't want you to get there. 'Cept they don't want you to know that 'cos you're an important newspaper man.'

'If they didn't want me to get there they wouldn't have given me leave to travel.' The fascination of the peculiar little man kept him trading conversation. He needed his boat, not his chit-chat and Colwyn was irritated with himself at the things he was saying.

Since the call from Matsuko Morii to tell him his trip to Ios was arranged he felt an unusual loss of control over events. He had not forgotten the conversation in the Guggenheim, but as the invitation never came, he put it down to the Dodona's reticence, and forgot about it and put it to the back of his mind. Matsuko had been very clear about its reality this time and had given exact details about his itinerary. His protests about the difficulties of overland travel were politely ignored by her, if he wanted to go that was how it was to be done. There was no way he would arrive by any other route. After London, he was continually surprised at the ease by which he got through the itinerary provided by Matsuko, like the foul breathed sailor he was speaking to, he had expected official difficulties at least and some personal danger. He was not so naive as to expect an easy pa.s.sage. He of all people knew the official stories would be full of holes filled by events and circ.u.mstances the rich world was considered better off not hearing. Like the little man opposite he had also from time to time thought he was maybe in some kind of set-up. It had been too easy, until Athens. After all he only had the word of the man at Cyclades Ferries that his other boat was out of commission. But if it was a set-up to prevent him reaching Lucina Dodona it was too elaborate, there were easier, more direct ways of preventing the meeting.

'Who are you?' he asked.

'Ljeschi's the handle, Cap'n Pannayotis Ljeschi, at your service. You can call me Cap'n or Pannie.' Colwyn caught the ironic eye of the barman who had appeared with a dusty bottle. He got the distinct impression the barman was amused at the posturing of Cap'n Ljeschi, and was offering in silent observation a clear indication he was an impostor or worse. Colwyn however could not get rid of Ljeschi's fascination which kept him trapped in this 'B' movie sequence. He reasoned none of this was important if Ljeschi could get him to Ios in the absence of any other form of transport.

'Five hundred Euros you said on the 'phone?' he asked.

'You a drinking man? Have a slug, s'good stuff, French brandy, '68 Reserve man, real cool.' He sipped it, it was good stuff, too good to be found in the Kafenion Thala.s.sa.

'Five hundred man, and no other pa.s.sengers.'

'I don't care if you bring a whole scout troop, just as long as I get there! Good brandy, where did you get it?'

'Gotta supply man, and no scout troop's goin' where we're goin dig? Just you, in case you got some woman or good ole buddy keeps you warm at nights.'

'Just me and this suitcase.'

'Great! Finish your brandy an' we'll split.' Two of the men drinking retsina by the door rose, forced open the door to let in the rank air of the newly defined harbour limits and fell into step with them. Colwyn swung his eye at Ljeschi.

'Crew!' he said with a broad grin. Colwyn nodded, in the gloom their faces were unreadable. His misgivings about the whole adventure increased by whole factors as they walked between broken buildings, down opened cellars, along murky banks of loathsome waters. Travelling overland grounded him in the reality of the Mediterranean inundation.

He was pretty sure there was an UNPEX gloss which veiled the actual face of suffering to fit the perception of a communicating world unused to bare truth. He recognised his own sense of cynicism had been softened by his own media. Recent days had brought home the reality of the world as a double-headed coin, one clearly etched warts and all, the other cleaned and sanitised, its resemblance to the other correct but smoothed and rendered harmless. One threatened - the other seduced. The effort of sifting the truth was too great most of the time. This Ljeschi character seemed to make him more aware of the need for a more healthy distrust.

He accompanied the group of sailors in the dark for some time, as far as a makeshift, plank bridge between fallen walls, above sewage laden murk, down a flight of steps belonging to a mangled block of flats to confront a small blue and white fishing caique, its vague outline barely illuminated by a hurricane lamp swinging from its short mast. The night was chilly and Ljeschi offered a thick woollen blanket in exchange for five new hundred Euro notes.

'Welcome aboard Mr Colwyn - Yo! Let go man!' The latter remark addressed to the seaman on sh.o.r.e caused this worthy to toss the restraining line aboard, jump in after it and push them off.

Colwyn in the thwarts astride his suitcase in lieu of a seat, made an incongruous figure in his business suit. In the gathering gloom he was just able to make out his transport as a poor man's ark made up of numberless chickens forced into plastic crates. He thought he also heard pigs and goats. The smell and noise, mixed with hot diesel from the engine's throb, wrapped the whole experience into a totally unpleasant bundle. This was no slipping quietly out of the makeshift harbour. He felt as exposed as he had falling into the Taverna a while ago. He also thought twelve or fourteen hours on a suitcase in this loathsome din was going to be unbearable and was considering how to manage things better when a bright light poked suddenly and angrily out of the darkness and into his eyes with an intensity requiring him to shade his face with his hand. In the still air the tinny sound of a Tannoy loudspeaker sounded particularly imperious and frighteningly close.

'THIS IS AN UNPEX VESSEL - HEAVE TO - WE WILL COUNT TO FIVE AND THEN OPEN FIRE - ACKNOWLEDGE AND COMPLY!'

's.h.i.t man!' this latter from Cap'n Ljeschi - 'We're too tied up in this bleedin' wreckage to out-pace them.'

'ONE!' shouted the tannoy.

Ljeschi spoke fast in Greek to the mariner at the wheel and then turning to Colwyn, grinning from ear to ear, said, 'I kinda hoped we'd get well out to sea before they spotted us. There aren't enough of them to bother to chase us in the dark, they like hang around the harbour trying to block us in man. We'll try and hide in the wreckage and hope they'll give up an' split.'

'THREE!'

The second mariner flung tarps over the crates of animals in a vain attempt to quieten them. Colwyn, finding the whole episode quite madly dangerous, in a reflex action fished his wallet from his inside pocket and extracting his McMa.n.u.s pa.s.s from within..., 'FOUR!'

....waved it at the light, shouting, 'COLWYN! MCMa.n.u.s! LAISSER-Pa.s.sER! OFFICIAL BUSINESS!' It had worked well enough so far.

He had time to hear the count 'FIVE!' - see the flash but not hear the crackle of automatic fire and see simultaneously the figure of Ljeschi launch himself over the side before the thud in his chest turned everything in his head to a ball of fire which reached out beyond his skull to the black firmament above. It Lit the world for an incandescent instant, to fall back swiftly into a profound blackness drawing him into a whirling black hole of nothingness, down and down. The light collapsed in on itself until there was only a pinpoint of extreme brilliance which extinguished as the third of half a dozen bullets aimed in his direction tore through his heart and lungs followed by the rest travelling fast from left to right, but of which he was totally unaware.

Oblivious in any sentient way of the profound black nothingness into which he had plummeted, Colwyn, had he any shred of awareness left, would have agreed with himself that he was no longer anything. This being the case he was unable, at this moment, to register astonishment when the terminal pinpoint of light rekindled in the depth of his void and grew ever so gradually in breadth until what might have been a hundred years later, his vision of the world behind closed eyes that would not open, try as he might, was a curtain of diffused brightness as of a heavily draped window. Sounds also, filtered into a previously unheeding mind. Voices, one calm the other raised in irritation. Unable at that instant to register forms of speech, had he been fully conscious and could he have connected on L1 he would have heard and seen Pannie Ljeschi, still in his overdrawn mariner's garb, being admonished by a livid Hera on the terrace of Psathi, bathed in the clear Mediterranean light that was its trademark. He was yet to be amazed at the untouched state of the island in this turbulent and murky sea.

'I said you were to see to it he got here in one piece!' Hera stood at her most statuesque, communicating on L1 with calm deliberation just holding her anger in check; the effort of which suffused her magnificence with a heightened grandeur entirely lost on the incorrigible Pan. (Zeus, listening on the 'sphere smiled with satisfaction - what a wife! Of all his consorts she was The Magnifica, especially when angry. He wondered vaguely if it was just to see her thus and spar with her that he eyed other females so, but a call from Athena, on a far timeline, turned his attention to more important things). Pannie meanwhile sat knavishly astride the bal.u.s.trade and endured his tongue lashing without overt demonstrations of dissent. He knew Hera's anger was not to be exacerbated and he knew she knew it meant nothing to him and that soon enough she would get it off her chest and he would have her laughing with or at him again.

'He is so My Lady - I did your bidding and brought him overland from that desperate and dank city we once so loved, it is now.....'

'Shut up Pan, I wanted him to see things as they really are, but I told you to see he got here without harm. He was to see, note and believe. There was no need for him to get physically injured! Now there are things to undo and re-do. It all needs energy, as if there was not enough to do already! Really! You never use your head Pannie, too concerned with the joke to consider the real thing!'

This last deliberate barb was designed to get beyond his laconic exterior and hurt. It was effective. With astonishing speed the little manikin launched from his perch and kneeling at his mistress' feet, clasped her knees and thrusting his hairy head into the fold of her rich thighs raised his conversation to L2 and communicated his undying devotion, his ever-ready love, his eternal loyalty to the Pantheon despite all the good offers he had from elsewhere. He prided himself on his ability to see the funny side of everything, which made him such a good guide and scourge of the pompous; but he never ever lost sight of the serious meaning of things. To be thus accused by his mistress was particularly distressing. The comedy of his entreaty, made the more so by his sincerity and the fact that his greasy sailor cap was thrust over his eyes, made Hera laugh out loud. Her amus.e.m.e.nt knew his honest care was not feigned, had it been, he was truly lost. He knew his place in the scheme of things and knew how to keep it safe.

'See he wakes - immortal mother - would I give you work undone? I have foreseen; thought ahead. A good joke no?' He shared her laughter and looked at her so dog-like she all but patted him.

'You moved his timeline?' she queried.

'Not me - too much like hard work, I asked the daughters of Zeus and Themis and well, Clotho came through and struck him another yard or two at the very last moment. Me and them Moerae girls, well let's just say we've got a thing going for the time being. So his time was not up, you said he had work yet to do. I thought he would do it better if he realised the urgency of the job and felt he was on borrowed time. He will think he died and got another chance, which ain't exactly a lie. My idea was to let the j.a.panese lady tend him, he'll like that and work all the better for it later. Antropos can't lie and she said it'd be okay.' Hera shook her head in feigned serious censure.

'You're insolence and audacity will bring you down in the end my lad - but all is well and your plan will work. I think on balance I prefer it when you are less creative with your solutions. Still, we waste time, bring him to Matsuko and leave them. When he is fully recovered I will speak with them all. He will not be long in illness?'

'No, some days only.'

Colwyn did not regain full consciousness for another twenty-four hours. When he finally climbed by his fingernails - up from the great profundity into which he had fallen (Its unspeakable depth gave him serious heeby jeebies for the rest of his remarkable and potentially extremely long life) the first thing he saw upon reaching the plateau of his consciousness was the white moon of a face.

The part of the mind which connects to external things, slowly closed a trap-door over the pit from which he had so painfully climbed, and leaving it ever so slightly ajar, was left in the background. The face swimming before him gathered consistency. When it ceased to move and had coalesced fully he spent some time connecting it to other fixed objects in the place he was in. Consciousness finally took over with its usual shock of immediacy to leave him fully awake and totally disoriented.

'Mr Colwyn San, you can hear me?' He knew from somewhere the inflection of the voice and the finely drawn face. A cool hand was placed on his hot brow and he closed his eyes but unable and unwilling to find his way back to the darkness, he concentrated harder, sat up with a painful jerk and recognised Matsuko Morii leaning over him. He tried to speak, a severe pain in his chest reduced his attempt to an unintelligible rasp.

'You will be well, Mr Colwyn. Mrs Dodona had sent her physicians to you and you are recovering fine.' He tried once more to speak, Miss Morii sensing his need spoke his concerns and smoothed his rising anxieties.

'You are on Ios, and you are among friends. You were shot, three bullets pa.s.sed clean through your thorax, it was a miracle, but you are not harmed substantially. The worst is shock. You strengthen by the hour and will be fit enough by tomorrow morning to meet with Mrs Dodona. Sleep now, I will return later when you wake. Rest a.s.sured you are watched over. We are glad you came, you will be needed. Welcome to Ios.' Overcome with fatigue, Franklin T. Colwyn, President of McMa.n.u.s Press, slept like a baby, and to his own surprise, as lightly as a feather.

Chapter 2.

As Franklin T Colwyn on Ios was coming back to his life, the world he had suddenly and violently left for the bright clear island continued to change insidiously but inexorably.

The world's media was full of it. Climatologists, vied with doom-mongers, governments contended with experts of all kinds. Reports from solar scientists, astronomers geologists, ecologists, geographers, oceanographers, s.p.a.ce scientists, psychologists, environmentalists, astrophysicians, physicists, farmers, mathematicians, biochemists, agricologists, businessmen, miners, albedologists, Paleontologists, Hydrologists - in short anyone who had anything to do with earth information of any sort, plus some of the more arcane specialisms of Astrology, Dousing, Mayan Astro-Mathematics, plus a whole range of Eastern Religionists, New and Old New-Agers argued with Aquarians - the list went on and on.

Numberless experts appeared from the woodwork and crawled, pupated and flew through the newspapers, through news reports on TV programmes during the day and late at night on a thousand variants of TV Specials. They also appeared in learned and not so learned journals and newspapers. The tabloids almost ran out of extreme headlines. Every appropriate and irrelevant PhD thesis was trawled for nuggets of new information and even the most obscure received their fifteen minutes of media fame.

There were the extra-terrestrialists, with their sun-spot maps of positive and negative ions together with complex and beautifully crafted computer models of doomsday caused by reverse polarisations described by Magnetologists. There were the Tectonicologists, Eustaticologists, Geodesists, Oroginists and Epieriogenists, arguing with Galacticologists, Uplifters, Precessionists and Polar Wanderers, Abyssal Oceanographers, Seismic Tomographers, Quaterinarians, Mantle Convectionists, Mohorovicic Discontinuitics, and Isotopic stratigraphicologists.

Then yet more appeared. Some of them actually agreed about what was happening. Better still, some came together to increase their corporate ways of interpreting what they knew. The internet was alive with every conceivable piece of information to do with the complexity of the earth.

Airline seats were reserved exclusively for scientists, politicians, civil-servants and businessmen going to and coming from conferences on UN strategies and commercial and manufacturing damage limitation. Sociologists, medics, NGO's, social workers and volunteers travelled on UNPEX pa.s.ses to stricken areas to spend aid and charity cash on water and housing, warmth and such care as could be made available to the dispossessed. The world was on Orange Alert moving to Red Explanations and solutions, consequences and a.n.a.lyses were on all lips, made into bites, digitised, synchronised, synthesised. Earth Rescue Foods were sold in restaurants. The 'Save the Earth for G.o.d's Sake', Globalthon raised half a billion dollars, another half-billion came from an 'Earth-Aid' concert simultaneously broadcast on the World-Wide-Web, and international TV.

The Earth and what people did with it, as well as what the sun and stars, black holes, big bangs and mega crunches, did, together with what it did for itself, over aeons, millennia, centuries, decades, years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds and nanoseconds: became the stuff of endless and cacophonous debate.

Everyone agreed something cosmically serious was going on.

Everyone asked, 'what the h.e.l.l is it?'

n.o.body exactly knew.

Everyone had at least one theory.

The inundated knew the sea was misbehaving. The unexpectedly parched knew the rains were behaving badly. The wind-lashed knew what a good old hurricane in unexpected places could do. It wasn't, said all the experts, just that things were happening. They always had. It was the way they happened. There was more than usual inconstancy where there had been predictability. Expected long-term variations occurred out of time between predicted short-term variations and affected them in incalculable ways. Previous models of Earth behaviour were distorted enough to skew all known calculations.

At first the signs were weak, too weak to make safe scientific predictions. It would settle down, it might not, could not, would not, would, who knows? Adaptation was the name of the game.

There would be severe changes for a sizeable minority unfortunate enough to be caught up in local unpredictability. The Standing World Conference on Climate and Demogeographic Change had it under a sort of control. UN bodies were given executive powers over the territories of badly affected national governments and regional bodies. UNPEX policed, UNO made laws and resolutions. Corporations and individuals did what they felt necessary to survive until tomorrow. Old fortunes and reputations were lost and new ones gained. Adaptation theory went ape.

Marina and Ric, stayed at Markham where the hardware was installed and were in touch with the rest of the Advisory Group's members and the team of useful people they had brought permanently to Ios. Ric worked as usual in close collaboration with Hep Mulciber. They were in touch with Penny on the electronic ether. Ric was working with Hep on a new communications package which he said would make the internet seem like the Wells-Fargo Pony Express.

Ric and Penny talked together about a technology of an entirely different order of sophistication from anything they had ever encountered and Ric confessed he was at the extreme edge of his knowledge and in danger of being left behind by the manic and ever more worried genius of Hep. The new invention had more to do with, biophysics and motor-neurones than bites, electronics and computers.

Marina, whose detective's nose had never ceased sniffing around the trail left by Barboncito, disapproved of Ric's communications on the internet, despite encryption and coding and the other security measures he devised. She too was at her wits end. She kept JNO's anonymity safe by confusing the rest of the world about the activities of its many disparate parts, but since the disappearance and supposed death of Alexander she felt she was living in a giant colander, every plug she made in any one direction was counteracted by leaks in two others. Barboncito had done his work well. Although he had been stopped, the whole of her intricate system was now riddled with 'worm-holes'. Something was at work. She and Ric kept tabs on the commercial and demographic effects of the change in the climate and made what adjustments they could using the JNO system of connections. Their network of people were well placed in strategic positions in the UN, NGO's and national governments as politicians, civil servants, academics or business people.

But each step they needed to get an overall view and control was scotched by a countervailing energy, sometimes in ways she was barely able to detect. She was convinced JNO's strategy was compromised, despite the best efforts of Ric and the Ios command post run by the Advisory Group. Furthermore, her investigations into Fourthworld and Manny Kanuho's communications empire had led her into some curious by-ways of the internet. Her other investigations into Penny, Lucina Dodona, Hep, Alexander and Pannie led her into entirely unexpected worlds.

From the time of the so called disappearance of Alexander she had been digging, following clues, disappearing up garden paths and all the while finding new continents of material. She persuaded Ric in the interests of security to use a proportion of GAIANET and HIGO's energy and time to co-ordinate her dossiers, hunches and other information.