structure were illuminated by their own lights. On the canopied deck, just aft of the cabin, two men faced each other down. The one was older, taller, white-haired and — bearded. Dressed in a khaki shirt and shorts, he looked almost military in his proud, upright stance. This was Jethro Manchester himself, Jake knew. The younger man, who was holding a shotgun on the first, was shorter, stockier; but his hard, leathery, sun-beaten features were very much similar to Bruce Trennier's, his older brother's, which Jake would never be able to forget.
'Martin,' Manchester's voice rang out in the night, 'can't you see it's all over and you can't run from these people? Man, you're like a walking plague, a pestilence — you and me both — but a far worse pestilence than any in the Bible! And would you take that among the people? I see that you would. Well, and why not, for you brought it down on me and mine! That was sheer treachery, Martin! So say and do what you like, you won't be taking my boat. She's mine and she goes with me… wherever.'
Manchester held a jerrycan with both hands; as he had spoken, so he had been splashing its contents on the deck. The smell of diesel was unmistakable.
'Jethro, I'm not forgetting that I owe you,' Martin Trennier spoke up. It's the only reason you're still alive while we stand here and argue like this. But you're wrong to think this is the end of everything. It's only the beginning! You were the last to be taken — after he'd used your family to get his way — after he'd promised that he would give it all back, and cure us of this thing.
Well, he's a liar, as we've seen, and he made me take you, too. But you were the last and it's still taking hold of you. When it does, and when it has fully taken hold — which it will! — then you'll know I was right. So stand aside and let me get on. Or better still, come with me and let's see what we can make of things together.'
As he had spoken, Trennier had stepped to the port side of the boat to cast off a rope. But Manchester had taken the opportunity to pick up a second jerrycan. This time, before he could begin spilling its contents, Trennier stepped close and knocked it out of his hands. And now he trained his weapon dead centre on Manchester's body.
'I've no time for this, Jethro/ he growled. 'You can come with me now, or stay here. You can live or you can die. One way or the other, it's your choice. So what's it to be?'
Manchester took out a cigarette lighter from the pocket of his shorts. He flicked it once — and it failed to spark! Trennier cursed, but he wasn't about to give the older man a second chance. Sending the butt of his weapon crashing to Manchester's face, jostling him to the side of the boat, finally he succeeded in knocking him overboard. And as Manchester swam towards the side of the channel, so Trennier clung to the deck rail, leaned out over the water, and fired his weapon at almost point-blank range.
Which was as far as Jake was willing to let it go. He and Joe Davis acted together. Davis ran in under the far end of the boathouse, firing on the yacht as he came, and Jake ran to meet him, skidding to a halt on his knees to play the roaring, searing lance of his flamethrower on both the vessel and the man on her deck.
Trennier fired another shot, and another — fired blindly, through the shimmering fire that enveloped and ate into him — while the boat literally erupted in flames and he turned into a jet-black, shrieking silhouette, dancing in agony until finally he crumpled down into himself and lay still.
As Jake shut off his lance, there came the sound of feeble
splashing from the channel. It was Manchester. The flesh at the back of his head, his neck and across his shoulders was a livid, liquid red. 'Let me out!' he cried, climbing sunken steps. 'Let me out and finish it then, but not in the water. I lived in the water — lived for the water — so I don't want to die in it.'
And when he was out, and staggering on dry land, Jake told him, 'Mr Manchester, we heard everything. And we're sorry.'
'I know you are,' Manchester nodded his bloody head. 'Yes, and I'm glad you came. My family… is no more, and I… have no reason or right to be here.' With which he held out his arms in the shape of a cross, stood there and closed his feral eyes.
Then Joe Davis gritted his teeth, and cut the old man down with accurate, merciful shooting; the Old Lidesci went in close and used his machete; and finally, making absolutely sure, Jake finished it with roaring fire. By which time both the yacht and the structure that housed it were a mass of leaping flames, and the three backed away, leaning on each other while they watched it all burn…
In a little while Davis's radio crackled, and call-signs began asking him was it all over? He told them yes, called down Chopper Two, told everyone they could start mopping up. But as he and his party began to make their way back towards the villa:
'What?3 said Jake, whirling on the balls of his feet. His eyes were wide and darting, searching here and there across the sculpted landscape of the gardens, and his ruddily-lit face was shocked and puzzled. 'Liz?' But then his eyes went wider still, in sudden understanding.
It was Liz he'd heard calling for him, yes, but she wasn't here… she was in Xanadu!
Jake! Jake, if you can hear me (her telepathic voice was a tiny, terrified whisper huddling in a corner of his mind), then please, please come and get me out of here!
And behind her sweet voice another — but a loathsome, gurgling thing — like hot tar bubbling in some medieval torturer s cauldron: Ah, no, my little thought-thief. No one can help you now. You though to use your mentalism against me, but Malinari has used it against you! I have lied to Ben Trask — impossible, but I have done it — and I've located and lost your locator. As for your marvellous precog: le senses nothing but confusion, for the death and destruction that he foresaw was his own and yours and Xanadu's, but never mine! And now there's this Jake — your lover, perhaps? But where is he? Oh, ha ha haaaaaa!
'Jesus!' Jake moaned. But he knew what he must do. Korath! he called out into the deadspeak aether. And:
About time, said that one. Butjirst tell me, do we have a deal, you and I, as prescribed? Do you wittingly give me access to your mind?
There was no way around it, and no time to argue. And so: Yes! said Jake. Anything! Only show me those numbers.
So be it, said Korath. And Jake's inner being lit up like a lamp, as those impossible numbers scrolled in not- quite-endless progression down the computer screen of his mind. But not quite endlessly, because he instantly recognized a pattern and suddenly, 'instinctively' knew where to freeze it. Then:
A door! And:
Go! said Korath. And I go with you…
Jake went — stepped in through the door — vanished from the view of Lardis Lidesci and Joe Davis, and was gone.
'What?' Davis stood stock still, frozen in his amazement. And for a moment even Lardis was lost for words, astonished as ever by this thing. But then he recovered and said:
'Pay no attention. It's a trick he does. Just an optic — er, an optical — er…'
'An optical illusion?' Davis's jaw hung slack.
'Aye, something like that,' Lardis said, gratefully. 'Er, but we needn't expect him back. He has his own ways of getting about, that one.' And once again, with a knowing, emphatic nod of his grizzled head, 'Aye!' he said…
In the ultimate, primal darkness of the Mobius Continuum, Jake whirled like a leaf in a gale. 'BUT WHERE TO?' he said, and
was nearly deafened as his words gonged like the clappers of a mad, gigantic bell!
The thought itself would appear to be sufficient, Korath told him, awed in his own right. For I sense this place is the very essence of nothingness, wherefore physical speech — which is something — is forbidden here. But deadspeak, being as nothing, is permissible.
Jake steadied himself— discovered that he could actually steady himself — and repeated, Where to? He could feel the Continuum tugging on him, and believed he knew where it would take him if he gave it the chance: Harry's Room, at E-Branch HQ. But that wasn't where he wanted to go.
Who is it you are concerned for? Korath remained logical.
Liz, of course! She had called out to Jake — asked for his help — and her telepathic voice had been a beacon. Now he remembered it, remembered its coordinates, and went to her. It was as simple as that. At least the going there was simple, but the rest of it wasn't.
When the door formed, Jake didn't know how to make an exit and so simply crashed through it. Into a living nightmare!
It was a room, shaft or cavern, but its lighting after the Stygian darkness of the Mobius Continuum was
