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"How the hell could anyone be pleased about that?" shouted Louise. "We want to go home. We don't want to be collected and studied. Can't you understand that? Don't you have laws against imprisoning people against their will?"

The alien looked confused.

"There is no imprisonment involved in this transaction. You are without a colony and we have found you one. One who is prepared to take you in."

"Can't you help us find our old colony?" asked Nick.

"We are artists and theoreticians, Nicholas, not explorers. And you . . . you have no awareness of your colony's location. We searched within your memories but found no such knowledge. Your old colony is lost."

"But it's got to be close to where you found us," said Louise. "Can't you look it up on a map or something?"

"The place where we found you is a desert. There are no nearby planets. Your old colony is lost. We cannot locate it and neither can you so why not accept the inevitability of your situation? Without a colony you cannot function. Perhaps your new colony will help you in your search? We expect that is why they were looking for you. They are an explorer/life science community."

Unbelievable. Louise was ready to explode.

"Don't we have a say in the matter?" she snapped.

"Of course. It is your wish not to accompany your escort to the new colony, is that correct?"

"Yes," she said, glancing at Nick, ready to shout him down if he disagreed.

"Very good," said the alien, pausing for an instant. "Your views have been taken into account. We are sure that you will come to see the wisdom of our decision."

"Whoa," said Louise. "What decision?"

"The colony has voted. We are agreed. Your best interests lie with your future colony."

"When do we get a chance to put our side of the argument?"

"Your views have already been disseminated throughout the colony. We would share our viewpoint with you so that you can see the wisdom of our decision but . . . our attempts to communicate appear to give you pain. It is regrettable, yes?"

"What if we refuse to go?"

The woman looked horrified. "Individual choice must give way to the needs of the majority if anarchy is to be avoided. Surely you know this?"

Louise was lost for words. She looked at Nick. "Aren't you going to say something?"

He sat there, staring into the fire, pulling at the straggly ends of his moustache. Then he stopped and looked directly at the alien. "While we're waiting to be taken to our new colony," he said, "how about a game?"

Louise looked at him, her lower jaw probably somewhere around her ankles. What the hell was he playing at now? A game? Had he lost his mind?

"What kind of game?" asked the alien, looking intrigued. Louise shook her head in disbelief. Was she the only sane person left in the room? Or was this all part of the interrogation process? Soften the poor human up so she doesn't care what's happening to her any more? Was that Nick over there or another alien playing the part?

"A game that would stretch even your abilities," said Nick. "And help me prove a theory of mine."

Louise snorted. Whoever was playing Nick had the part off to a tee.

"What theory is this?" said the woman, walking over to where Nick sat.

"You are a colony of theoreticians, are you not?"

"We are. Artists and theoreticians, that is our specialty."

"Well, I think you could calculate the exact co-ordinates of our home planet from information stored in our memories. We . . ."

The alien cut him off. "We have already told you. We found no awareness of universal co-ordinates or spatial perception within your memory."

"That's what makes it a challenge. I believe there is a way. All you have to do is analyse the image of our planet's night skies that we hold in our heads and compare those star patterns with your own charts."

Louise held her breath. Come on, say 'yes.' Say, 'yes' and get this thing over with.

"Our charts are not extensive, and we don't discriminate between physical and non-physical matter as you do."

"But you can do it," urged Nick. "Even if your charts aren't that extensive, all you need do is take us to the nearest boundary with the physical universe and take another snapshot of the star patterns from there. Take as many samples as you need, visit as many boundary points as you need. With enough data points you have to be able to calculate the exact position of our home planet."

There was a long pause. Louise watched her mother's face. It was blank, impossible to read. Was she communicating with the other colonists? Were they voting?

Her mother spoke. "You realise that this will not change your situation. We are still contracted to deliver you to your new colony."

"Of course, but now our new colony will have the information they need to take us home."

The alien nodded. "We are agreed. This game has merit. We will extract all images concerning star configurations from your memories and begin as soon as that is concluded."

They were split up. Nick was taken to the boundary while Louise remained at the island city—the colonists' insurance policy against flight. Not that Nick had anywhere to flee to. Unless the nearest boundary opened slap bang next to a planet he could recognise—Earth, Saturn or Jupiter—where would he go? Aim at the nearest point of light and hope it was the sun?

The boundary layer flickered before him, hundreds and thousands of tiny shimmering stars. It was like a hazy, moonless, autumn night back on Earth. And it was wonderful.

Even if he couldn't recognise any constellations, it felt good to have left the void, to know that the physical universe was out there waiting, and somewhere—up there, down there or over there—was Earth.

"Sufficient data has been collected," said his invisible companion. "We shall now return."

Nick returned in silence, riven between a desire to bombard the colonist with questions and the need to keep his thoughts to himself. How can you plot an escape when your mind could be read at any moment?

And how could anyone who called himself a scientist ignore the vast repository of knowledge that the colonists had to possess?

A dilemma, replete with sharp, pointy things.

The colonists had to be centuries, if not millennia, ahead of Earth. Wasn't it his duty, his responsibility, to find out as much as he could from them? It was a once in several lifetimes opportunity, a chance to push the frontiers of human knowledge centuries into the future.

And yet . . .

He couldn't risk the prolonged contact. The longer he spent with the aliens inside his head the more likely they were to discover his intentions. Which meant he had to keep his head down and his distance. What good was knowledge if he couldn't get back to share it?

"Well?" asked Louise on his return. "Did you find the boundary? Did you see Earth?"

"We found the boundary but . . . we must be light years away. I couldn't even see Orion."

He projected a question towards the colonists. "Is it okay if we fly around your colony and explore the sights?" he asked.

"By all means," said a voice in his head. "You are our guests."

Nick led Louise out of the city, not stopping until the gleaming towers covered less than a quarter of the sky.

"Well?" asked Louise as soon as he stopped.

"We've got to be careful what we think. They might even be monitoring us out here."

"Did you see Earth?" she asked, no doubt thinking he'd been lying earlier to mislead the colonists.

"No, Lou, we really are light years away."

He looked to the horizon, wondering if he could even find the boundary again. It had been so dark he'd barely registered its existence until the colonist had told him they'd arrived. The result of being in deep space, he assumed. At least close to a star there was a wash of light.

"How are we going to get back?" asked Louise. "Even if they give us the co-ordinates are they going to mean anything to us?"

What did he know? He'd had an idea and run with it. He wasn't sure what he'd expected. That maybe the colonists would relent and show them the way home? Or they'd reach the nearest boundary and it would be Earth?

"If nothing else it means that the new colonists will know where we come from," he said. "Maybe we can persuade them to take us back."

"That's another thing I don't understand. How could they have known we were coming? It doesn't make any sense, does it?"

"Maybe they weren't expecting us, maybe they're xenobiologists conducting a survey on a particular section of space and subcontracted out the specimen collection."

"That's supposed to make me feel better? I'm a fish caught in a trawler's net waiting to see if I'll be thrown back in?"

"It could be worse," he said. "Explorer/life science colony sounds a hell of a lot better than warfare/animal experimentation colony."

A thought which triggered another. Had he put the Earth in danger? He'd been so desperate to persuade the colonists to locate the planet he hadn't considered the ramifications. He'd given an unknown species with untold powers the means to locate Earth.

But they're friendly, he told himself. They'd gone out of the way to show that several times.

"Friendly enough to sell us on like slaves," said Louise. Again he hadn't realised he'd been projecting his thoughts. Great, how the hell was he supposed to keep secrets from the colonists when he was leaking thoughts like a rusty sieve.

"It's different customs, Lou," he said. "You can't expect them to think like us. But they're an intelligent species and sooner or later they'll realise we are too and help us."

"As we would if the roles were reversed?"

"Yes."

He braced himself for another attack on the failings of the human race. Why was it that all animal lovers hated humans so much?

"You really believe we would? If an alien landed on Earth you think the human race would patch them up and help them on their way again?"

"I would like to think so, yes. Maybe not a few decades ago. But we're a more mature civilisation now, less paranoid."

"God, you're so naive, Nick! The military would have that alien locked away, interrogated, tortured and its technology dissected before anyone else knew it had arrived. That's if they didn't kill it first."

He sensed her anger but couldn't share it. They were billions of miles away from Earth arguing about . . . what? The iniquities of human prejudice?

"Lou, the colonists are an ascended species. They're beyond all that. Look around you. Have you seen a single weapon? Their city is a work of art. There are no gun turrets or space cruisers . . ."

"You don't need a gun to be a bully. You just have to be bigger and meaner. And as for being ascended, I judge as I find. They're not treating us as intelligent beings, they're treating us as animals to buy and sell."

Nick didn't have time to disagree. A different voice dropped inside his head. "We have completed the calculations," it said.

"You've found Earth?" asked Louise.

"We have located the source of your memories, yes. It was a stimulating exercise."

"Where is it then?" she asked. "Could you show us which direction from here?"

Subtle, thought Nick, then immediately wished he hadn't. When would he ever learn how to master his thoughts? He threw up a wall, hoping there was such a thing, a thought-proof wall he could hide behind and plot in secret.

"It would be of no use," said the alien, hopefully to Louise's question and not Nick's. "It is better that you do not know."

"I don't understand," said Louise. "Why?"

"Your destiny lies elsewhere. Better to forget the past. Your new hosts agree it is for the best."

"You've spoken to them?"

"We have communicated. They have more experience in dealing with other species."

"They told you not to tell us, didn't they?"

"A consensus was reached."

"But no one asked us! How can you have consensus if the main party is excluded from the argument?"

"You are not the main party. There is much you do not understand. It is better to leave important decisions to those with the knowledge."

"We disagree."

"That is as may be but why distress yourself over something that cannot be changed?"

Nick saw it first, a growing speck on one of the many horizons. One of the advantages of his 360 degree, up down, all around, no-chance-of-being-crept-up-upon vision.

"Lou," he said.

"What?" she snapped.

"I think our escort's arrived."

The shape changed from speck to colossus. It was immense, hovering above them, a rippling, pulsing, jellyfish of a creature the size of a small ship—larger if you took the trailing fronds into account.

Louise fled, not caring where, not thinking, everything trampled in a rush to be free from that thing sent to fetch them.

She blurred into the void, using the creature as a point of reference and thinking away. Fast!

Blackness surrounded her. The void, featureless and infinite. She kept going arrow straight, not daring to think or look or doubt. Faster, she urged, faster.

A smudge of grey appeared behind her. She ignored it, thought herself into an arrowhead, sleek and smooth. Faster, she cried, speed of light and beyond.

The smudge grew, sliding towards her, slow, inexorable, swallowing the void behind her.

She veered to the right. The smudge followed. She dived, twisted, pulled left, pulled right. The smudge followed. She thought invisible, she thought silent, she thought teleport. Teleport me now, any place, any time. Just get me out!

The smudge followed. It covered a third of the sky and was still closing.

No!

She accelerated again, thinking speed beyond comprehension, speed beyond imagination.

The smudge followed, gaining all the time, beginning to flow around her, the void compressing into a shrinking jet black tunnel.

No! There had to be a way, there had to!

Desperation. She summoned the image of a distant galaxy, the farthest object her imagination could produce, held it in her mind and tried to drag herself towards it, tried to suck the light-years between them into nothingness, tried to pull herself out of space-time itself.