LITMIR.BIZ

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scolding Leveque for not taking proper care of you.’

      I gave a whimper of heartfelt despair. ‘And then boring him by chatting about my childhood!’

      Fian shook his head. ‘Leveque’s quite capable of reassuring Candace and getting rid of her at high speed. I’m betting the conversation was his idea. He likes collecting information.’

      ‘But why would Leveque want information about me?’

      ‘No idea. I’d better call my mother. My father too I suppose.’ Fian stood up and gestured at my untouched plate. ‘Please eat something, Jarra.’

      I watched with a frown as Fian backed off a discreet distance and tapped his lookup. Fian’s mother would be worried about his safety. She might join in his father’s attempts to split us up.

      ‘Jarra,’ said Dalmora.

      I turned to look at her. ‘Yes?’

      ‘Eat!’ Dalmora, Amalie, and Krath chorused the word in unison.

      I sighed, picked up a toasted wafer and took a bite. It tasted of Osiris lilies. ‘There’s no need to nag.’

      ‘You always stop eating when you get hurt or upset,’ said Dalmora. ‘It’s bad for you and it worries Fian.’

      Fian’s call to his mother seemed to end amicably, so I relaxed and dutifully munched more scented breakfast, then recorded a quick message about how I was fine but hated stinking of perfume. I sent that to all my friends from Next Step, and then wrinkled my nose as I considered my ProDad. I’d always felt he cared about the money he got from Hospital Earth, not about me, but he might be worried. I’d just sent him the message too when Fian shouted a single word.

      ‘No!’

      The background chatter of the class abruptly stopped, and everyone turned to look at him. A Major standing in a characteristically Military pose, his left arm raised in front of him as he gazed at the lookup on his left sleeve with a grim expression. I felt a stab of shock, remembering the Deltan boy I’d met at the start of this year, and realizing how the last few months had changed him, had changed both of us. My Deltan wasn’t a boy any longer.

      ‘I told you, the answer is no.’ Fian’s voice was only slightly quieter than before. ‘I’m not coming back to Hercules, I’m not studying science, I’m not quitting the Military, and I’m not leaving Jarra for some drearily dutiful Deltan girl. Goodbye, sir!’

      Fian gave his lookup an aggressive stab to end the call, and lifted his head. All around the room, people hastily faked an intense interest in eating. Fian marched back to our table and sat down, his simmering anger obvious enough that even Krath wasn’t fool enough to say anything.

      The awkward silence continued until Playdon stood up and walked to the front of the hall, indicating he wanted to start his lectures. The class automatically responded by dumping the remains of meals into the waste disposal, putting dirty dishes into the cleanser, and moving furniture. Within three minutes, the tables were stacked at the side of the hall, the chairs were lined up in rows, and we all took our seats.

      ‘Half of human knowledge was lost in the Earth data net crash in 2409,’ said Playdon. ‘Science, technology, history, literature, medicine, all obliterated in a mass of data corruption. There are no surviving detailed records of the history of this area between 2100 and 2250, but at some point in that period there were either one or two massive earthquakes.’

      Playdon tapped his lookup, and a weird image appeared on the wall vid. ‘Records from 2250 show that several old cities had been replaced by a single new city, San Angeles. Humanity had defied nature by building this new city directly across the earthquake fault line, on the vast artificial platform we call the California Land Raft.’

      He turned and gestured at the wall vid. ‘This platform consisted of four hundred independent islands, connected together by flexible bridges. You’re seeing the view from the ground of one of the eight huge, automatically adjusting legs of one of these islands. The city of San Angeles was abandoned by 2380, but even now, over four centuries later, most of these legs are still fully functional and compensating for the ground movements resulting from earthquake activity in this area.’

      Playdon tapped his lookup again, and the image changed to show something with eight long spiky legs, and a flat shell-like back. ‘This is a side view of one of the islands.’

      Krath summed up the reaction of the whole class, including me. ‘It looks like a weird, creepy, mechanical spider.’

      Playdon changed the image again to show a whole army of spiders. ‘Here we can see a view of the full Land Raft. Virtually all of the flexible bridges between the islands have collapsed, and the few remaining ones are far too hazardous to use. Twenty-three islands nearest the fault line have exceeded the adjustment capability of their supporting legs and also collapsed. A further thirty islands are highly unstable and too hazardous for further exploration.’

      His next image was a patchwork of coloured squares. ‘These are the hazard colour coded islands of the Land Raft. Black islands have fallen or been abandoned. Red islands have an estimated survival time of less than fifty years, and amber between fifty and one hundred. Green islands have experienced relatively little movement and may still be standing for many centuries. Current archaeological efforts are concentrated on salvaging what we can from the red islands. Since these sections are nearing their safety limits, any earthquake activity is very dangerous and …’

      Playdon broke off his sentence, stood for a moment in silence, and then strode straight past us and out of the hall.

       7

      ‘What the chaos?’ Krath twisted round in his seat to watch the hall door close. ‘Did Playdon get a message on his lookup?’

      ‘I didn’t hear it chime.’ Dalmora stood up for a moment, gave the door a worried look, then sat down again. ‘I expect he’ll be back in a minute.’

      A few people got drinks, while others started checking their mail on their lookups. After five minutes, Dalmora turned to me. ‘You should go and see if Lecturer Playdon is all right, Jarra.’

      I replied without thinking. ‘Me? Why not you?’

      Dalmora looked embarrassed. ‘He might not like it.’

      I could have slapped myself. The whole class knew Dalmora had a crush on Playdon and he was carefully avoiding being alone with her. I’d been as tactless as Krath at his worst. ‘Sorry.’

      Amazingly, it was Krath who saved the awkward situation by speaking in a chattily cheerful voice. ‘The highest ranked officer present has to take command, sir.’

      I giggled from pure relief. ‘We aren’t under attack, nardle brain!’

      I stood up and went out of the hall to look for Playdon. He wasn’t in the corridor, but I could hear the sound of voices coming from the portal room. The rest of the class were all back in the hall, so who the chaos …?

      Remembering the ambush the previous day, I drew my gun before peeking cautiously into the doorway of the portal room, but relaxed as I recognized the two men with Playdon. They were his friends, Rono and Keren of Cassandra 2 research team. Playdon and Keren had their backs to me, but Rono’s eyebrows shot up as he saw my gun. I pulled a face of silent apology and put it away.

      Rono patted Playdon on the shoulder, and gave Keren a nod, before coming over to me. He touched his lips with one finger, then gave a beckoning gesture and led me back into the hall. Most of the class didn’t know Rono, so they stared at him in total bewilderment as he went to stand in front of the wall vid.

      ‘I’m Professor Rono Kipkibor, senior team leader of University Cassandra Archaeological Research Team 2. Some of you’ve already met me, and the rest of you will remember helping rescue my team from under a collapsed skyscraper at the New York

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