‘They’re designed to intimidate. Which is why we won’t be intimidated.’
The enforcement vehicles, insignia hovering around them like bright neon banners caught in their slipstreams, were much bigger than the Cessna. But that worked to Geoffrey’s advantage, too. The pilots would look at his little white toy of an aeroplane and see something preposterously old and fragile, not realising that the ancient airframe was in fact much tougher than it looked.
‘Geoffrey Akinya,’ a voice said, cutting through everything just as Lucas’s had done. ‘This is the Civil Administration. Please return to your place of origin.’
‘Sorry, no can do,’ Geoffrey said.
‘An intervention was necessary to prevent the completion of a violent act, Geoffrey.’ He was being spoken to like a child, with great forbearance. ‘Under such circumstances, a process of review must always take place. Submit yourself to probationary restraint and you have nothing to fear. I urge you now to turn around.’ The voice was deep, male, unmistakably Tanzanian.
‘You can’t stop me, can you? There’s nothing in the world you can do to make me alter my course.’
The vehicles came closer. They were as big as houses, armoured like bunkers. This kind of military-spec enforcement technology was like a coelacanth: it had no business still existing in the present. Yet, Geoffrey now realised, it had been there all along, a covert part of his world, tucked decently out of sight until he transgressed against the Mechanism.
‘This is your last warning,’ the voice said. ‘Turn around now.’
That was when the fuel ran out. Geoffrey had never ditched an aircraft before, never even considered that he might one day face the possibility of ditching. Ditching was what happened when things went wrong, when things were miscalculated.
Yet here he was, ditching the Cessna. He came in at just above stall speed, full flaps, and flared steeply at the last moment. The wheels bit water. The aircraft slowed quickly, nose pitching into the sea, and then leaned slowly to starboard until the wingtip was submerged. The engine had stopped. The Cessna rocked in the green swell of the Indian Ocean, silent save for an occasional creak from the airframe, as if it had always been waiting for its time as a boat.
‘Life jacket under your seat,’ Geoffrey said. The sea air tickled his nose. ‘We have to get out. She’s not built for floating.’
Jumai extracted her life jacket. ‘Meaning we swim for it?’
‘Not much choice, I’m afraid.’
‘There are sharks in these waters.’
He nodded. ‘We should be all right. The Mechanism’s probably already clearing any large predators from the area, or euthanising those that don’t take the hint.’
‘You hope.’
‘Right now, being eaten is the least of our worries.’
The Administration vehicles loitered overhead. That was good, in one sense, because it meant they wouldn’t have to wait long for rescue – Mechanism or not, Geoffrey didn’t relish the prospect of spending hours in the ocean. Bad in another sense, though, because once Geoffrey and Jumai were floating, it wouldn’t take the authorities long to work out a way of scooping them into custody.
But the Cessna was definitely sinking. Water had been lapping in from the moment they ditched, splashing through the door seals and engine openings. With their life jackets on, Geoffrey and Jumai climbed onto the sloping surface of one wing, but that would buy them minutes, no more. Jumai was sitting on the inclined wing, her feet dangling over the edge. Geoffrey stood, hands on hips, knees bent for balance, anxiously surveying the horizon. He’d been able to see land from the air, but not now they were down.
‘Whatever happens,’ Jumai said, ‘I’m sorry about your plane.’
‘Me too.’
There was a clunk from under the fuselage: softened by suspension, as if the submerged undercarriage had just touched dry land. With a lurch, the Cessna righted itself, the wing becoming horizontal once more. Geoffrey staggered, nearly losing his footing. Jumai reached out and grabbed his ankle, and nearly lost her own purchase in the process. Water sluiced away in rivulets.
With the smoothness of a rising elevator, the Cessna emerged from the sea.
‘The fuck?’ Jumai said.
Geoffrey offered her a shrug of incomprehension.
There was a black road under the wheels. The black road was rising, forcing itself into daylight: ocean was sluicing off the road as well, down its broad curving flanks. Geoffrey turned slowly around, half-knowing what he’d see. In the opposite direction, the road ran into a sheer-sided black tower, its rounded, tapering form rising to a hammerhead lookout deck.
‘We’re on a submarine,’ Geoffrey said. He had to say it twice just to convince himself. ‘We’re on a submarine.’
Jumai dropped from the wing onto the slick rubber-treaded deck. ‘And is this good, or bad?’
‘I think it’s good. For now.’
The submersible was from Tiamaat; he knew this even before a door opened in the base of the tower and an exo’d merperson came striding out. He squinted against a sudden salty lash of sea-spray.
It was Mira Gilbert. Behind her were three other exo-clad merpeople.
‘Hello, lubbers!’ she said, beckoning. ‘Come inside. We’ll secure the plane, then get under way.’
Geoffrey climbed off the wing, touched a hand to the side of the engine cowling, reassuring it that he would be back. In truth, he had little idea what was going to happen next. His ordered plans, such as they had been, were in
