Finn led him down the corridor and through a sheet of construction plastic draped over the doorway where his clinic abutted the new school. The hallways here stank of fresh paint. Finn’s hooves left little dimples in the linoleum; the carpet layers weren’t finished. And judging by the rolls of carpeting stacked everywhere-all in bright, kid-friendly colors-they wouldn’t be for a while.
The Jerusha Carter Childhood Development Institute-or the “Carter School,” as people had already begun to call it-was built around a large interior courtyard. A baobab tree grew in the center of the space, shading the playground where Ghost played alongside the dozens of children Jerusha had rescued from Nyunzu. A few of the children had already been adopted; most would need years of counseling.
Wally and Finn strolled along one of the cloisters lining the courtyard. Ghost saw them. (Her name was Yerodin, but Wally still thought of her as Ghost; he probably always would.) She waved, grinning widely.
“Wallywally!” she called. “Come play!” That’s what she called him. Wallywally.
Wally waved back. He recognized her playmates: Cesar, the little boy who had translated for him and Jerusha back at the Nyunzu lab, and the joker girl covered with extra fingers. It made him feel good, somehow, that Ghost had made friends with somebody who had known Lucien.
The trio started up a little chant. “Wallywally play! Wallywally play!”
Wally wiped his eyes and grinned. “I’ll be there in a sec, you guys.”
Finn nodded toward the children. “How is she?”
Wally sighed. “She still has the nightmares. Bad nights, once in a while. Sometimes I wake up and find her standing over me.” He shrugged. “But you know what, Doc? Sometimes I think she’s stronger than I am. Honest.”
Finn gave him a funny look. He turned his attention back to the children on the playground. “Don’t sell yourself short, Wally.” They stood, watching the kids, in amicable silence for a minute or two. “Well,” said Finn, looking at his watch, “I need to do my rounds.”
“See ya, Doc.”
Finn trotted back to his clinic.
Wally tromped across the sandbox, to where Ghost and Cesar were digging a hole with a yellow plastic pail. He sat cross-legged in the sand. Ghost climbed on his lap.
“So. What do you want for lunch today, kiddo?”
“PBM,” she said. That was their special shorthand: peanut butter and mango.
Wally glanced up at the baobab. Sunlight shone through the boughs. He imagined Gardener listening to this, imagined her laughing, imagined her tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. He gathered up Ghost, and smiled.
“Yeah. Me, too.”
White Sands National Monument
White Sands, New Mexico
“What the fuck,” said Jay Ackroyd, biting into an apple, “is that?”
That was a baby triceratops, its colors mottled but otherwise indecipherable in the moonlight that silvered the great white dunes, which stood behind Sprout Meadows in a red Flexible Flyer mired to its hubs in soft sand.
“Kota the Baby Triceratops,” Mark Meadows said, bundled up against a biting winter wind. “It was, like, a popular toy last year, I guess.”
It turned its grinning head with the three little plush horns and the frill toward the sound of his voice and rolled its eyes fetchingly. Jay Ackroyd recoiled from the robot toy as if afraid it would go for his throat. He was as deliberately unremarkable as possible, wearing a bulky brown coat, a muffler, and a wool hat crammed down over his ears. “And you’re dragging it along why?” he asked.
Mark shrugged. “Sprout loves it.”
“Even though he gave it to her,” added Sun Hei-lian.
Ackroyd shivered ostentatiously. “Jesus,” he said. “I thought New Mexico was supposed to be desert. It’s colder than a bail bondsman’s heart out here.”
“You should see the Gobi this time of year,” Sun Hei-lian said.
“Nah, I’ll pass.” The detective dug his free hand into the pocket of his slacks.
“It was good of you to come and say good-bye, Jay,” Mark Meadows said.
Ackroyd shrugged. “Might as well. Can’t dance. You folks sure you want to do this? This is a one-way ticket you’re buying, here.”
“Well, let’s see,” Hei-lian said. “Mark’s wanted for all of the Radical’s crimes. The country I served all my life has a price on my head. We’ve got no family beyond each other. There’s just so much to hold us here.”
Jay looked at Mark. “Did you tell her she’s gonna be spending the rest of her life on a whole planet full of people who make the Borgias look like the Huxtables?”
“I was a Chinese spy, Mr. Ackroyd,” Hei-lian said. “Intrigue I can handle.”
“I remember Takis as well as you do, Jay,” Mark said. “But don’t forget, I was already on the run from the law long before the Radical took over. I can be an actual research scientist again. I can do science.” He felt himself fill with warmth. “And they can cure Sprout.”
“But, Daddy,” she said, “nothing’s wrong with me.”
He stroked her cheek. “Of course not, honey. And they can help you
… learn to do a lot of fun new things.”
“You sure of that?” Jay asked.
Mark shrugged. “If not, I’ll do the work myself. Maybe that’s what I should have been doing all along, rather than chasing a dream that turned into nightmare for the whole world to share.”
Hei-lian’s mittened hand squeezed his. “You did many good things,” she said. “You helped a lot of people.”
“But it doesn’t make the other stuff right.”
“No. But remembering the good helps us to keep going. The world’s beginning anew for all three of us. Don’t throw that gift away, lover; it isn’t offered to very many people.”
“No kidding,” Jay said. “So, no more Cap’n Trips?”
Mark shook his head firmly. “Those days are gone forever. I’m hanging the purple top hat up for good. I learned my lesson way too well. Nobody should have that kind of power, man. I sure couldn’t handle it.”
Ackroyd looked at Hei-lian. “Just one thing puzzles me, Colonel. All respect to my old bud Mark, here, he’s a skinny old geek. You’re a glamorous lady spy. What’s the attraction, anyway?”
She took hold of Mark’s arm and nestled against him. “He’s both a kind man and a good one. Since he’s the first of those I’ve ever met, I decided it’d be foolish to let go of him. Also, thank you for the compliment, Mr. Ackroyd, but I’m no youngster, either. And unequivocally retired from the spy trade.”
Jay shrugged. Taking a final bite of the apple, he hurled it far off over a nearby dune.
“You shouldn’t litter, Mr. Popinjay,” Sprout said severely.
“It’s biodegradable, kid.” Jay Ackroyd looked up at the clear star-crusted sky. “So it ends here where it all began. White Sands, New Mexico.” He held up a forefinger. “I could just pop you there. Save a lot of travel time. Cut to the chase.”
“Thanks, no,” Mark said. “I figure the trip’ll give Sprout a while to get acclimated. All of us, really.”
“Look, Daddy, look!” Sprout said, jumping up and down and pointing at the sky. “A falling star! Make a wish!”
Mark glanced up as the light grew suddenly to the glowing, spiky pink and ochre conch shape of a Takisian living starship descending from above. “I made my wishes, sweetie,” he said, “and they’re all coming true.”
Bunia
The Congo
There is a grove near Bunia, on the grounds of the old estate and around the ruins of the house there: a garden of many strange plants and trees, many of them not native to Africa but all of them blooming impossibly here in apparent ease. There are orange trees, apple trees, mango trees; there are flowers of every description; there are cacti and Joshua trees and palms. Marvelous flowering vines wrap around many of them, blankets of gentle green punctuated with blossoms of vibrant red and electric blue and oranges so bright the color hurts the
