It seemed like such an insignificant thing, yet it preyed on his mind more than the impending trip to Eludi-4.
Scott faced the mud-ramp from the top of a gentle slope. He wondered who had attempted it. Probably only kids. Surely any adult, at least over the age of twenty-five, would dismiss it as pointless if not puerile to attempt something which only achieved the plaudits of buddies. But it was there, taunting him, challenging him to overcome his fear.
It was just a small ramp. So with the right balance, the right speed, it could be cleared safely – he knew for sure.
He got on the saddle, one foot on the ground, heart thundering, cortisol and adrenalin priming him as if this were to be some great act of bravery.
But the more he thought about it the greater the fear became.
Do it, now!
He pushed down hard on the pedals, gaining a high-gear momentum even for a descent. The ramp was before him so soon he hardly had time to consider the technique of his approach. And yet, as he reached the ramp, the fear was overwhelming; paralysing. His arms became rigid, and he didn’t even know if his balance was correct.
Too late. The bike, with him somewhere over the saddle but still connected to the pedals, flipped up hard.
He had lost control of the bike immediately on reaching the ramp, was in the air subject to the indifferent force of gravity. And with such inevitability slammed face-first on to the ground. Handlebars buckling awkwardly on what before had seemed like relatively soft ground, but now felt as hard as concrete. Carbonite tubing frame pressing down on his calf. Pedals had detached sensing the impact, as a seemingly futile gesture to safety.
This had been a bad fall, a gross misjudgement. His helmet: the only thing which now meant he was conscious, able to consider his poor technique, the failure of approach. And utter stupidity.
Scott dragged himself off the dirty grass, feeling winded, blood dripping from his face, and checked that all his teeth were still there. He imagined he now looked like some prize fighter of a previous millennia ... or maybe just a complete idiot.
The ride home was a sore affair, compounded with the embarrassment of passing a couple out for a stroll, turning his head to hide the worse injured side, for all that would convince anyone that nothing had happened. It irked him still that normally he’d not pass anyone on this route, certainly on a weekday.
Deanna was at work, likely to be back in a few hours. What would she make of his mad exploit? He didn’t think he could even give a rational explanation.
After cleaning his intensely sore face, Scott forced himself to glance in the mirror. Oh fuck. Even eating presented a problem since his mouth was badly cut. He couldn’t be seen in public like this. The only way to resolve this problem was to visit the institute. Their medical facilities boasted one of the most advanced dermal regenerators. His mandatory health insurance – required for anyone leaving the planet – meant he’d be entitled to any treatment to ensure fitness pre or post journey. But self-inflicted?
Scott took almost an hour contemplating his limited options and formulating a convincing story, until there was only one thing for it. He called the institute, telling the receptionist he’d had an accident, and this was less than forty-eight hours before a scheduled space-flight. An appointment was reluctantly agreed. He ordered a taxi-pod.
After the twenty minute journey, he swiped his hand for the sensor to register his credit-worthiness, and gingerly made towards the institute’s front entrance. After another cursory scan he was allowed into the waiting room, to be greeted by the not-sure-if-she-was-real receptionist. Judging by her lack of response to his appearance, perhaps she was an AI projection after all.
‘The doctor will see you shortly,’ she said blandly, then told him to take a seat, in a way that perhaps a real person would surely not bother.
Scott picked up a data-film and absently scrolled through its latest active content – some kind of current-affairs thing – until the doctor personally appeared and called him through. The doctor was real, this was demanded by patients who never fully accepted the trustworthiness of a robot (although they were still used for the medicare free service). Dr Rengil huffed and hummed in a way that a concerned doctor should, asking Scott to give further details – to which he explained about a tree-root that caught him unawares.
‘I see,’ said Dr Rengil in a slow way which may have indicated scepticism. ‘You’ll have to undergo dermal regeneration for a least thirty minutes, but even then there may be residual scaring.’
‘No problem, doc.’
Dr Rengil indicated towards a door which lead to some kind of outpatients room hosting a varying array of machinery. From one corner he brought out a stand with an extruding arm, on the end of which was a wedge-shaped object. Scott sat in a relining leatherette seat. When activated the device emitted a gentle maroon glow and heat he felt as it swished over his face. The chair’s arm presented a control panel, the red button brought up an HDU display and menu for music or film. He selected music, electropop, which filled his ears from no apparent location.
This had all been so easy. Perhaps he really was someone important now. A pioneer for a new world. Scott, The Architect.
*
Torbin knew they would return to him. Always waking him from his sleep, a time when he felt the most vulnerable. Never wanting to reveal their true appearance, yet this time the two Elusivers resolved to become tall spindly figures. He studied the nearest; he could see no face, just a dark mass with light from behind, seeming to shine through his bedroom window. Somehow he knew the B’tari would not be aware of their presence, in spite of having installed a monitoring device for every conceivable disturbance in the space-time continuum. Somehow the Elusivers had evaded detection in every visit, and he guessed this time would be no exception.
They were silent, just wanting to impose their looming presence, make him feel helpless. And indeed as he sat up in bed, feeling paralysed in a way that was not entirely physical, he was completely at the mercy of these alien demigods. But he could now see another figure emerge, just an ethereal shape but distinctly human. Torbin knew, even before the figure was fully formed. It was his wife, Emelda.
She stepped forward now, her face in focus, suddenly lit by some ambient light. ‘Torbin, I know this must seem strange to you after all these years,’ she said in a voice as sweet and familiar as caramel. ‘But you have to believe me: I am with these beings you call the Elusivers. They saved me at the moment of my death, took me back twenty years before it happened, before I even met you.’
‘No,’ Torbin insisted, trying to retain some presence of mind, holding to the logic that even the Elusivers had their limits. ‘That cannot be. You died. There was evidence.’
The near Elusiver stepped forward. ‘The evidence was from fake cloned parts we placed in the burning vehicle,’ it said in an androgynous voice that seemed to lack any accent. ‘We sent her back using an isolation bubble within a temporal eradication field. We gave her another chance because we knew she could make you see sense.’
Torbin shook his head. ‘This deception won’t work. I’m not some idiot, you know.’
‘Of course not. That is why we will allow her to be with you for as long as it takes.’
She was there before him, wearing that scarlet figure-hugging dress, revealing just a tantalising amount of cleavage and emphasising her voluptuous figure that she always seemed to be trying to slim down. Not that he didn’t prefer her as she was. Her wavy copper-red shoulder-length hair framing a face that he always thought beautiful, perhaps not in the classical sense, but he was never one for convention.
‘It can’t really be you,’ he said, sounding quite calm, but his heart was racing.
‘I’ll prove it,’ she said simply, as she became the only other in the room.
He got out of bed and made towards her as if drawn by instinct. In only his underpants it must have been clear to her that he was aroused. Emelda threw herself at him. He pressed her in tightly, his hands on her bottom, and she responded in kind. Her body felt good – all encompassing. She smelled of that familiar perfume he couldn’t quite name, and he was so excited by her presence, he knew he would climax very soon.
‘That’s okay,’ she said mildly, responding to his embarrassment. ‘We can be together for a few more hours.’
In his bed, after they’d made love for the second time, he had to ask her: ‘How could you be hidden from me for all those years?’
She brushed aside her wild hair, and seemed to consider his question as if it were an uncomfortably bright light on her face.
‘I wanted to be with you, my love. So often I’d yearned to leave the protection of the Elusivers. But they had my best interests at heart.’
It struck him just how inadequate her answer seemed, how all her talk of those ‘benevolent beings’ just didn’t mesh with his own experience of them. To her he said, ‘They saved you and protected you from what they intend for the rest of humanity. Is that it?’
‘Yes,’ she replied meekly.
‘And I suppose if I am on board, that is: give up my plans to stop them, then we can be together.’
‘Yes, we can be together.’
‘I was nice to relive the memory. But I don’t believe you are my Emelda, however real you may seem.’
‘Don’t you want to believe?’
‘I really did want to believe my Emelda had survived somehow, was not burned to smithereens in that ... crash. But really it stretches credibility that she could have been saved at that crucial moment before her car incinerated.’ His voice sounded coldly logical now; he felt as if a spell had been lifted.
‘Very well. We had to try.’ At that moment the woman who looked like the love of his life transformed into a dark creature, a spindly form much like the other Elusivers, and floated away.
Torbin knew he ought to feel horrified, disgusted with himself that he’d been so intimate with that creature messing with his mind. But he actually was glad to at least relive a memory of someone so precious. The only thing that did disappoint him was that for a few moments, when he become so enraptured with that memory, he truly did believe she was real.
Emelda was gone for ever. This experience could bring the closure he had needed for so long. Now there was another woman in his life. And even though she had betrayed him, Torbin knew she was a good person deep down; he even entertained the possibility that she would be the one to make it all right again. At least, now, he knew, no one else could.
***