The Long War

‘I’m sure you will.’ Captain Chen Zhong approached now, bustling across the carpeted floor of the deck. As he passed, his crew subtly straightened up, and their faces became more solemn. Chen shook the hands of Jacques and Roberta. He brandished some kind of control box in his left hand. ‘In a moment we’ll be off! Of course we are already in the air, but soon we will be swimming stepwise too . . .’

His accent was stronger than Wu’s, but more complex, some of his phrasing almost British. Aged around fifty he was short, a little stout for a military man, Jacques thought, but sleek, supremely confident. Jacques would have been prepared to bet he was a survivor of the fallen Communist regime.

‘So glad you could come with us, that all the various formalities were overcome. A tricky process given the newness of our nation. Of course the welfare of Ms. Golding is a top priority.’ Now he faced Roberta. ‘I hope you’ll have time to enjoy the experience. Such a pretty thing! Forgive me for saying it. Yet you are so serious.’

Roberta, taller than he was, just looked back at him.

Chen winked at Jacques. ‘Quiet one, is she? But observant. No doubt you’re drinking in the details of the airships even as they are launched. The unusual mode of propulsion, for instance.’

To Jacques’s relief, Roberta deigned to reply to this. ‘The flexible hull, you mean. Strung with some kind of artificial muscle, contracting when electrical impulses are applied?’

‘Very good, very good. With the electricity provided by solar power. You can see why such a system is appropriate? When we observe the worlds we explore, why not do it with as little noise and other disturbance as possible? We hope to reach Earth East 20,000,000, our nominal target – nearly ten times further than any human has ventured into the Long Earth before! – in a mere few weeks. We estimate we will also need to maintain a velocity, that is a lateral velocity, of over a hundred miles per hour in the process. I’m sure you can see why.’

Roberta shrugged. ‘That’s trivial.’

Jacques exchanged a glance with Yue-Sai. That was one of Roberta’s more annoying verbal tics; the need for a sideways speed might be obvious to her, but wasn’t at all obvious to Jacques, or, it seemed, to Yue-Sai. The point went unexplained.

Chen said, ‘You know your engineering, then. But what of your wider education? Are you aware of the provenance of the names of our pioneering ships?’

‘Liu Yang was the first Chinese woman in space. And Zheng He was the eunuch admiral who—’

‘Yes, yes. I can see we have little to teach you.’ He smiled. ‘Then let us explore together.’ He held up the gadget in his left hand; it was like a television remote, Jacques thought, and on it was a familiar corporate logo: a Black Corporation marque. Chen said, ‘I hope you have all been following your nausea inoculation regimes? Now – are you ready? – every journey must begin with a single step.’ He pressed a button.

Jacques felt a familiar jolt to the gut, but faint, a ghost sensation.

The crowded landscape of Datum Henan was whisked away. Suddenly rain clattered on the windows and bounced off the great hull overhead. The trolls, apparently unperturbed, sang on.

Chen led the party to the big downward-looking windows at the gondola’s prow, so they could see better. At first glance Jacques could see little difference in the landscape below, Henan East 1, compared with the original: more, cruder factories and coal-burning power stations belching smoke, roads like muddy tracks, a smoggy tinge to the air. Yet in the distance there were patches of green, of forest, and that wasn’t like the original.

Chen said, ‘Henan! Long ago the cradle of Han civilization, you know. But in more recent times something of a hellhole, exploited, over-industrialized. A hundred million people crammed into an area the size of the state of Massachusetts.’ That was a Datum Earth reference that meant little to Jacques, but he got the idea. ‘Datum Henan was once a prime source of migrants to cities like Shanghai, who became the cleaners and the clerks and the barkeeps and the prostitutes. You can imagine that on Step Day a rather large proportion of the population of such places as this wandered over into the new worlds with alacrity. It took the authorities some time to restore order. You should not underestimate the impact that stepping had on the Chinese people as a whole in those early days – and not just the economic or other practical effects. I mean rather the psychological, as you will see. Of course you know that the disruptions after Step Day eventually led to the, ah, retirement of the last Communist regime.’ He studied Roberta, evidently curious about her reaction. ‘So we begin our exploration, Ms. Golding. Here we are on Earth East 1, of twenty million. What do you understand the purposes of this expedition to be?’

She thought before answering. ‘To see what’s out there.’