“Holy cow.” His virtual hands started to flash over icons, bringing up information. In the end there was so much coming on-line they went into the little office at the back of the salesroom to watch the images on a holographic portal. CST was releasing video segments of the exploration as the starship downloaded its data. The media companies were gleefully swooping on it, putting together their own analysis and commentary teams in the studio.
Olivia had been right, the barrier was no more. Its disappearance was shocking, affecting him like the news of a sudden death in the family; that was one thing he absolutely hadn’t been expecting. Nor had any of the studio experts, judging by the way they struggled to make sense of it.
There was little traffic on the road outside the Ables garage. The Russian chocolate house opposite had the same images playing in their portals above the counter. Customers sat at the tables, drinks ignored as they stared at the incomprehensively massive barrier. He called Liz to see if she was accessing. She said yes, she was sitting with the rest of the staff at the Dunbavand vine nursery where she worked, looking at the scenes on one of the office screens.
Mark watched, awestruck, as the spheres and rings of the Dark Fortress revolved within the portal on his desk. The scale was so hard to appreciate. Then there was the system-wide Dyson civilization. The safe thrill of watching the nuclear firefight between ships made him feel as if he were doing something illicit. None of the commentators Alessandra Baron brought into her studio liked the implications of the battle. She turned to a cultural anthropologist to try to explain why a space-faring species would fight in such a fashion. He clearly didn’t have a clue.
Hours passed without Mark really being aware of them. It was only when Olivia said, “Time for my lunch break,” that he finally glanced around at her, frowning as he tried to work out what she was saying.
“Right. Sure,” he replied. “I don’t suppose anyone’s going to buy a vehicle off us today.” He decided he ought to take a break himself, and shut the garage doors behind him. The promenade was unusually quiet for midday. He pulled up his jacket hood against the bitter wind blowing off the lake. Those who did stroll past had the glazed otherwhere expression symptomatic of someone absorbed by their virtual vision. Everybody was hooked on the starship’s return. It was as momentous as the Cup final, when all through the first half Brazil had actually looked like they were going to lose. Instinctively he glanced up at the Black House where Simon Rand lived, wondering if he, too, was having life put into perspective on this day. The building was a huge Georgian mansion perched on the slope above the eastern wing of the lake’s inlet, set in ten acres of its own immaculately maintained grounds. There were dozens of big houses arrayed on the slopes around it, the most expensive and exclusive in the town, though they didn’t match its grandeur. A lot of them belonged to the first arrivals, the men and women who’d joined Simon’s quixotic crusade and helped lay the highway through the mountains.
It was fifty-five years ago now when Simon Rand arrived at Elan’s planetary station with a whole train loaded with JCB roadbuilders, a fleet of various bots, and trucks jammed full of civil construction systems. He was moderately rich even back then, a first-life son of a minor Earth Grand Family who had cashed in his trust fund to buy a dream. Inspired by legends of the Oregon Trail he was determined to set out for somewhere fresh and new, and protect it from modern desecration. Elan, opened to settlers for only a couple of decades back then, was a good starting point. Developers and investors were cut a lot of slack by the planetary government if they helped establish new neighborhoods and facilities. The idea was such entrepreneurial folk would import entire factories and build housing around them. But Simon’s very different vision of a clean green community was harmless enough, so the bureaucrats granted him his land licenses while privately believing the venture was doomed. After all, the Confederation worlds were littered with the follies of eccentric romanticists and their lost fortunes.
Simon immediately set off for the almost uninhabited southern continent of Ryceel. Once there he began the ultimate foolishness of building his road through the imposing Dau’sing range—as if there wasn’t plenty of open land available north of the mountains. Several news shows ran derisive reports on their bulletins, which attracted other idealists and supporters to his cause, willing to get their hands dirty for the payday of living in a quiet, off-mainstream community when they were finished. And Simon, for all his quirky attitude, had at least prepared for his venture with a pragmatic thoroughness.
