The oak-paneled dining room was of a kind that might be found in any such home. Six straight-back chairs were set out round a decent sized square oak table with a frilly lace table cloth and flash silverware. The five-bulb chandelier hanging over the table was just like the one in Auntie Mavis's sitting room. Jamieson suspected that the painting above the fireplace, which was only slightly less ornately carved than the one in the lounge, was probably a screen since it didn't stand out from the wall like a real painting would have. It looked a lot though like the one in Auckland's art gallery of the Maori first discovering New Zealand Jamieson had seen on that school trip up there.

        - Heavens - Aunt Mavis! She might just have a chance over there in Gisborne. Perhaps he really should...

        But no. She had people all round her. Uncle Bob and two of their three boys were engineers with the Ministry of Works, Derek was with the Council. They would be busy right now - what could he do but get in their way? He never got on very well with them when he'd been there as a kid anyway. They kept on treating him like he was dumb, though he had to admit they were always very polite about it.

        And Gisborne doubtless had its fair share of Bikies and other criminals too.

        "Jamieson," Errol signaled him when the others were seated, Estelle in the single chair at the head of the table at the end near the french doors with their lace curtains. "You might like to give us a hand in the kitchen. That way we can get dinner on the table quicker. Nice and hot."

        "I can do that," Carol looked at Jamieson.

        "No, I'll be all right," Jamieson said. "I'm not entirely useless in a kitchen, you know. Just 'cos I'm a bloke," he grinned back at her as he turned to follow Errol.

        He thought the glass door at the end of the passage would lead straight into the kitchen, but instead it opened onto a small glassed-in porch with a plain wooden floor and a similar glass door leading outside. The two doors on either side of the porch were also glass, Errol opened the one on the right and walked in.

        The long narrow kitchen was a fascinating mix of old and new. Narrow glass panes ran the whole length of the longer outside wall, the far wall had a glass door next to the right-up-to-date stove, which Jamieson realized was gas, he'd only ever seen one before on a trip to Auckland. A stainless-steel sink bench even longer than Uncle Bert's ran for most of the way under the windows, with cupboards beneath. A strip of eye-catching yellow and purple patterned tiles filled the narrow gap between the bench and the window ledge. The opposite wall was wall-to-ceiling cupboards, though what looked like the latest-model fridge occupied an alcove half-way along. Another smaller alcove near the door they had just come through contained a varnished wooden serving trolley on castors.

        Jamieson looked, but couldn't find anything unusual here.

        "If we don't feel like cooking, we just say what we want to the thin air - or ask Estelle - and it turns up in one of those five drawers labeled with our names there," Errol pointed at them. "Don't have to wait long usually. Roasts take longest, around ten minutes, but you wouldn't one too much sooner than that now, would you?" he grinned. "But our dinner should be ready about now, Estelle would have done that when I mentioned it earlier."

        Just as he said that, a `ding' sounded and little green lights came on in the centers of each of the labeled drawers, plus on another drawer below them.

         Okay," Errol pointed behind Jamieson, "grab that serving trolley."

         "And just open the drawers?" Jamieson asked.

        "Yep, that's all," Errol said, opening the drawer with Jamieson's name on it. "Just grab the plates, put them on the trolley here. Simple. - Oh yeah, that sixth draw contains sauces, dressings, anything else we might like. Grab those too."

        Errol did the top draws while Jamieson did the three bottom ones. Roast Chicken! That smell - yum!

        "You like roast chicken?" Errol grinned at him as he fitted the gravy float and small jar of cold sauce amongst the two plates on the trolley's top tier. "You'll love this. - Estelle sure knows the way to your heart doesn't she? Okay, let's get it on the table while it's hot."

        "Where does she get these things?" Jamieson asked him as they wheeled the trolley back towards the dining room. "Got to come from somewhere."

        "It's all artificial - haven't the foggiest idea how she does it. Even the stuff we can cook with in the cupboards, sugar, flour, what have you, comes in packs with brandnames. And you can choose between fresh peas and beans and stuff, or Watties tinned or frozen."

        "Good grief - chicken!" Johnstone called out in obvious delight when they wheeled the trolley in. "Haven't had that for years. - Want a hand?" He began to get up eagerly.

        "No, no, just stay there and enjoy," Errol grinned back at him. " - Hope you like chicken, Carol. We can do individual menus if you like, but just for tonight..."

        "No, fine, love it," she said in a way that made Jamieson think she didn't all that much. Perhaps he'd misheard her, surely she must like it. It was pretty damned expensive.

        Once they'd settled in and passed the gravy and what turned to be a white wine sauce around, the lights dimmed. That Maori canoe image on the screen changed to what looked like a sky full of stars. And they looked as bright as Jamieson had ever seen them out in the paddocks when he got up to get the cows in in Winter when he was a kid.

        Then, in a way he couldn't believe, a huge yellow-orange ball which even he knew was the Sun slowly swung in from the left hand side of the screen to occupy it's center. How could that be, Jamieson wondered. You could only see blue sky when the Sun came out. The stars only came out at night.

        "We're ready to leave now, everybody," Estelle said as the outlines of a map of some sort was superimposed over it. "This star-map derives from one of your own, the Norton Star Atlas in fact. Our destination lies, as you can see, toward the Constellation of Sagittarius, which also happens to be in the direction of the center of our Milky Way Galaxy. We won't however be traveling quite that far, the world I have selected for you as the most appropriate introduction to the new life you have chosen is only three thousand three hundred and ninety two light years away."

        "Only three thousand and - what light years away?" Carol shrieked. "We haven't even been to the Moon yet. We mightn't even have gotten there next year when we were supposed to. Or the year after. - Heavens..!" She stared at Estelle.

        Jamieson wondered what this `light year' business was. Perhaps it was some fancy new city-folk slang for those new `kilometers' everybody was supposed to get used to. So that world was only about 3000 kilometers away. But how long was a kilometer? Just over a mile? His head began to spin.

        "Of course, you never got around to going to the Moon yourself, I s'pose," Johnstone laughed at Errol.

        "Good Grief - you've been to all sorts of worlds already," Carol's voice reached an even higher pitch as she stared at Errol.

        Errol laughed back at her gently. "We haven't been anywhere at all, not in Space anyway," he looked at Estelle with exaggerated disappointment. "Estelle thought it unwise, might let something slip, even though most people know I'm well traveled. So we've been to all sorts of places on Earth - heavens, it was only fair that she could see our world before we saw any of hers. It may also have been good training for us, some of those places are off the planet anyway. South America, Nepal, Benin in Africa. And you want to see the Anderman Islands... yeah well, I guess those days of visiting anywhere on Earth are now gone."

        "The Moon..?" Jamieson caught up. He had been thinking about that, and had to admit he would like to have seen it himself.

        "Hey, you really want to see that, don't you?" Errol laughed at him. "Beat the Yanks. Okay - Estelle, is that all right? Quick detour?"

        "We are now in fact several million miles from it," she replied, "but we should arrive there by the time you are ready to go."

        "Gee whiz," Johnstone looked at Jamieson. "Offer the man the entire Universe, and all he wants is the Moon."

         The table erupted into laughter, Jamieson had to laugh with them.

          Anybody for desert?" Errol asked them. "Or shall we wait and have it when we get back, with our tea and coffee? It'll be near bed-time by then anyway. Got to admit its been a long day - and a sad one. Lost our world, lost our folks."

        That still didn't seem quite real to Jamieson - or the others, he suspected. They seemed to be treating it almost as if it was just another event in a day crowded with events. But he guessed it would catch up with them - himself included. He found himself trying not to think of all those people he was leaving behind - and immediately began to feel giddy.

        "You all right?" Johnstone looked at him. "Been especially hard on you, hasn't it?"

        "I can't deny that," he agreed. "But, like you all, I am just going to have to get used to it. We have absolutely no choice in the matter."

        Johnstone looked round at the others. "Attaboy, Jamie, old son."

        "Okay, one quick trip to the Moon coming up," Errol said as he rose from the table. The others followed suit. "We should see all we want to see in about ten or fifteen minutes. I understand it's actually a pretty boring place to go."

        " - Oh, one question, Estelle," Carol asked her as she got up. "If we are moving to the moon right now, how come we don't feel any acceleration?"

        "That's because the mechanisms which move my ship through space act on every single particle within it equally, including those you are all made of. I'll show you how that works when we resume our voyage to our stellar destination."

        "I see - thank you," Carol replied.

        Jamieson was glad she could see it. He certainly couldn't.

        It was pitch dark when they left the house, though quite a lot of light spilled from the windows and the two globes lighting the front verandah, certainly enough to light their way across to the garage.

        They went round to the front of the garage this time, an exterior light coming on over its double doors as they approached. Jamieson looked down the driveway in front of the garage as Johnstone and Carol did, and saw two strips of red-graveled asphalt disappearing through a trellis gateway covered with hedge. He had wondered earlier what the slightly wider than usual garage contained, he imagined now it must be some sort of little spaceship - perhaps it was even one of those flying saucers!

        Errol swung one of the wooden doors open, Johnstone quickly stepped across and opened the other. When both seemed to lock themselves into a natural position, they all stared in to look at what turned out to be an old open-top car, now brilliantly lit from above by a pair of bulbs with conical shades hanging from under the rafters.

        Jamieson couldn't believe what he saw. It looked like something out of Laurel and Hardy. Nobody would be seen dead going round in an old jalopy like that except during the Christmas Parade. Perhaps they had to drive to the spaceship for some reason. But why in something like that?

        "We supposed to be going to the Moon in that?" Carol said. "You've got to be kidding, Errol."

        "Have I ever lied to you?" he grinned back at her. "Okay, so it's an open tourer Model A Ford. But it does have a few modifications. - Remember that Walt Disney film `The Absent Minded Professor'? Had Fred McMurray in it. Well, this is the new super-duper improved space-going non-flubber version."

        "Yeah. With thirty-three and a third percent more bullshit power," Johnstone laughed. "Come on, Errol. Pull the other one. Even I know the Moon hasn't got any air round it. Not even hot air."

        "Hop in," Errol said as he opened the car's left rear door, "and I'll show you how it all works. You three in the back, Estelle's with me in the front. She might need to teach me a little more about how to drive the thing. 'Specially where we're going."

        "You've driven this thing before, I take it?" Johnstone asked as he got in and moved over to the other side. Carol then followed him in.

        "How do you think we got round all those marvelous places on Earth?" he replied as Jamieson climbed in beside Carol, shutting the door behind him. "Pan Am?"

        "All comfy then?" Errol asked them once Estelle had settled herself in properly with her bulky frock. "I'll start her up."

        With that he pressed the starter button. The ancient-sounding engine turned over, but didn't catch.

        "Stop that at once, Errol!" Carol actually sounded annoyed.

        Johnstone burst out laughing. "Your flash new super-duper space-going tin lizzie appears to have a flat battery."

        "Sorry folks," Errol said as he started it up properly this time and put it into gear. "Carol's right this time, I was just kidding. Had to fool them natives somehow, you know."

        The car hadn't picked up much speed as it passed through the trelliswork - and suddenly the sky was an even darker black than Jamieson had ever seen it before. He looked down - and saw jagged black mountain peaks below.

        He must have jumped a foot.

        " - Christ..!" Johnstone shouted, leaping up and hanging out over the door.

        Carol first strained over him, then over Jamieson to try to get a look at the view below. Jamieson could feel her bony chest pressing into his shoulder and her hot breath in his ear.

        At first the mountains reminded him of that spectacular film of the Swiss Alps he had once seen in Vistavision, that too had begun with a view from a plane flying over them. But though these were jagged, their edges were sort of rounded, and they didn't seem quite so high. They were also a deep black rather than snowy white except where the sun caught them, there they looked a dirty orange color. To his eye they now began to look rather moldy.

        "If you'd all care to look directly up, you will see an old friend," Estelle said.

        Jamieson looked up and saw what looked like another Moon, in one of its quarter phases, he never knew which was which. But this Moon was much bigger, and was blue and white, with that swirling cloud-stuff he had seen on Estelle's screen in the lounge...

        "Oh, how beautiful..!" Carol exclaimed the instant Jamieson realized just what he was looking at. "I just can't believe it."

        "And how sad..." Errol said.

        "Yeah. First the bastards raped our `old friend'. Now they've murdered her," Johnstone said. " - And, just for the record, what's the date today?"

         Jamieson couldn't even begin to think about that at all. Nobody could.

         "Friday, 13th December, 1968," Carol said finally. "Glad you raised that, Johnstone. That'll stay in my mind forever."

         Jamieson knew she wasn't being sarcastic.

        " - Don't forget who's doing the driving," Estelle told Errol sweetly as the car started to veer to the left during the silence that followed. "Like me to take over?"

        "No way!" he shouted. " - Where are we, anyway?" he added, looking round at that incredible scene below.

        "We're flying over the Moon's Alps, as they are in fact called, and are now approaching the Mare Imbrium. There - you can see Mount Piton coming up, standing on its own on the Mare itself. If you do veer slightly to the left now, you'll get a better view of the Crater Cassini," she pointed, "and lots of little craterlets. Theaetetus and Aristillus are just about to come over the horizon ahead. - And whatever you do, don't look at the Sun. Just because there's so little of it above the horizon doesn't mean it can't blind you."

        "Can we go down for a closer look?" Johnstone suggested. "Is there any way we can land this thing," He peered forward around Errol to look at the controls.

        Jamieson couldn't resist doing the same, though he had to peer over Estelle's shoulder. She turned briefly and smiled at him. She was actually quite pretty seen close up.

        "It's very little different from an ordinary car," Errol explained. "Accelerator and brake pedals are go and whoa as normal, the steering wheel turns us, and banks us at the same time if we have speed on. And this gear-stick here allows us to to rise and fall vertically if we're hovering.- Oh yes, this steering column moves back and forward to tilt us up and down when we are moving, just like the elevator on a plane. In fact what we have here is a combination between a helicopter, a plane, and a spaceship. And it's wonderful to drive. See. No hands!" And he lifted his hands from the wheel.

        "Don't do that, Errol," Carol shouted at him.

        "You've just met the first backseat driver in Space, everybody," Johnstone chuckled.

        Jamieson felt Carol whirl round and glare at him.

        "Could we go down then and park for a while?" Jamieson suggested. "Then we can have a good look round."

        He remembered that that was what his Dad always did when they saw a nice view. He had loved those little holidays they took when the cows were drying out over summer.

        "Can we do that?" Carol giggled. "Have a little picnic? - Don't be absurd, Jamieson," she actually squeezed his knee. "Our blood should have boiled dry by now and our eyeballs should be sticking out on the ends of stalks."

        She giggled again in a way he didn't like very much.

        "It's Jamieson's party," Errol said to her. " - Is that actually possible, Estelle? I mean, I know we're surrounded by a couple of force fields which keeps the air in and meteorites and things out," he glanced quickly round to Carol again. "But wouldn't they keep the surface of the Moon out too? How close can we go?"

        "We can land on the surface, but only if I halve the strength of the fields," Estelle replied. "That will mean we'll lose air through them, as well as run a slightly increased risk of fast-moving dust particles coming through. Even I can't exceed the laws of physics," she smiled round at them sweetly. "I can only give you five minutes."

        That admission of a limitation left Jamieson with mixed feelings. There were some things she couldn't do, which he found a little frightening. On the other hand though, it made her seem a little more like a real person somehow.

        "I'll go left a little more so we can land near those little craters," Errol said. "Then I guess I'll slow to a stop and let her sink until the field contacts the surface. We'll see how things go from there."

        "Aye, aye, skippur," Johnstone said in his best Scottish accent. "Tak 'er dun gently, mon. Let's nut be scrapin' 'er buttum now."

        Jamieson laughed with the others as he felt the car already beginning to slow and, as Errol moved the `gear-lever' forward, descend.

        "You'll need to be very careful about your landing if you don't want me to assume control," Estelle said to Errol. "You mightn't believe this, but with the lunar surface, you can't always tell whether you're five miles up or five feet. This is because fifty-mile wide craters can look just like five feet wide ones. That speedometer doubles as an altimeter here too, you will really need to keep your eye on it."

        It took them longer than Jamieson expected to make their descent, but finally they were down.

        Jamieson noticed that Errol looked a little pale.

        "The force-field migrating its way into the surface probably saved you from bouncing us right off again," Estelle said. "All right, everybody, five minutes, starting now. The inner force field is in the shape of a dome whose sides are about twenty feet away from the sides of the car. Don't attempt to walk through it. Although I've reduced the air pressure, it is still strong enough to push you right through it. Getting you back would be difficult, and I cannot guarantee your survival. Also, you'll find gravity is much weaker here as soon as you step away from the car. So please, no sudden leaps into the air, you may well find yourself exiting through the top of the field."

        Jamieson got out of the car as carefully as he could. Finally he was standing on the surface of - the Moon!

        Suddenly he felt a little light-headed and queasy again. He turned to look at the others. It was fortunate Estelle was right beside him to grab him, otherwise he knew he would have lost his balance and fallen over. She grabbed his right hand and upper arm in a way that made him feel like an old lady being helped across the street. Estelle, on the other hand, seemed as steady as a rock.

        They both carefully turned their heads round to look at Johnstone and Carol. They were supporting each other as best they could; as one left the ground, the other fell back to it.

        "Grab the side of the car if you feel unsure of your footing," she called to them. "Don't try to walk, keep your knees and feet together and hop, just as if you were in a swimming pool with the water up to your armpits. That's good. Carol, you're doing well. Johnstone, this is not a good time to attempt a handstand."

        "Yes, Auntie Estelle," Johnstone grinned crazily at her from his position in midair. He looked almost as if he was flying except his arms and legs were akimbo.

        Jamieson noticed that a fair amount of dust had followed him up there, and that some of it was beginning to stick to him. He looked down at his own feet. They were difficult to see in that black shadow from the car, but it was clear that some of the dust he had stirred up from that moldy surface himself was now settling on his trouser legs in that unnaturally slow way. He became alarmed.

        "It's all right, Jamieson," she said, "It won't harm you. Might be a little hard to wash off, that's all. You others - mind that dust! You're already beginning to look like golliwogs!"

        Jamieson, now gripping the side of the car, watched as Johnstone appeared to land on his hands behind the car.

        "Oooof..." He heard him say.

        "Johnstone - !" Carol shrieked.

        Estelle walked swiftly round the front of the car, she appeared to be completely unaffected by the slow `grabbity' or whatever it was that was doing all this.

        "It's okay, I'm all right," Johnstone pulled himself up Estelle's outstretched arm. "Just out of practice, that's all."

        "You could have hurt yourself!" Carol shouted at him. "Low gravity, maybe, but you always hit the ground the same speed as you leave it."

        "I'm sorry everybody," Estelle said, "I should have prepared you a little better. Your five minutes are nearly up now in any case. I must ask you to get back into the car."

        Jamieson couldn't believe the time had gone by so quickly. In spite of the problems he'd had, he didn't want to get back into the car at all now. Now that he had gotten used to it, he was quite happy just to stand there, hand now grasping the door handle, and gaze round.

        "Johnstone - come on, cut it out!" Carol sounded annoyed, but her voice had a giggle in it.

        Johnstone had wandered off a bit and now stood with their backs to them. It was only when Jamieson heard the sound of a thin stream of water landing on soft soil that the penny dropped. He couldn't stop a silly smirk from spreading across his own face.

        "Sorry, I couldn't find a stick to draw my name on it," he grinned as he zipped himself up. "Guess that'll have to do instead."

        "Vandal," Carol laughed as Johnstone hopped his way quite expertly back to the car. Grabbing the top of the door, he pulled himself straight over its side and deposited himself in an untidy heap upside down in the middle of the back seat.

        "Well, I'm in," they heard his muffled voice as he carefully began to work his way upright.

        Suddenly Errol started laughing, and they all joined in, Estelle included. "Come on everybody," she said, walking back round the front of the car. "Now it really is time to go."

        Once they'd settled themselves in, Errol started her up, then moved the gear lever back a little way. Jamieson could feel the car slowly begin to lift off its springs.

        "Slowly does it," Estelle said, "until the field unsticks from the surface. - That's it," she said after they had lifted away from the surface altogether.

        "Time to get you all home now, I think," she said. "Too much excitement in one day isn't good for you. Now, Errol, can you see the Gate up ahead? Follow the same procedure as before. Just keep her going as she is, and the Gate will pass itself over us."

        Jamieson could just pick out four flashing blue lights forming a rectangle against that black starry background ahead. It was approaching at a speed he couldn't judge.

        "Take your last look round folks," Errol said. "We're nearly home." Jamieson took his advice. He snatched a quick final view round the Moon's surface. Then he looked looked up again to see the Earth just before two of the flashing lights passed over him.

        Then, suddenly, all he could see was the trelliswork. They were rolling back along the driveway to the garage. A moment later they were inside it, Jamieson looked round to see its three bare weatherboard walls with a door in the back one, and the two shaded light bulbs dangling from the wooden rafters above.

        " - Crikey!" Johnstone said as the car sank back down on its springs. Jamieson was halfway wishing Johnstone wouldn't keep saying that when he started to feel disoriented. One second ago they were soaring above the Moon's surface, the next, here, not moving, silent, still, though he could hear a little wind outside.

        "Good God..." Carol breathed.

        "I'll close the doors," Johnstone offered after the few moments in which nobody moved.

        "Thanks, but there's no need, they've just closed themselves," Errol said. "We can't get back to the house that way anyway. A tunnel-shaped forcefield connects the garage to the Gate in the trellis. Anytime we come back from anywhere either by car or that door we first came through, we have to pass through the workshop. It stops any bugs and other nasties coming through with us."

        "Decontamination, I see! " Carol said. "The Americans were going to do the same sort of thing for their visit to the Moon."

        "Chances are they wouldn't have needed theirs," Estelle said, "but you and I will need ours where we are going. - That's if you still want to come with me."

        They were all silent again for a moment.

         "Yes, of course," Johnstone took it on himself to speak for them all. Well, they had already really decided that, hadn't they?

        "Okay, through the workshop and home," Errol said, stirring himself to get of the car. " - I guess I've been thinking of - here - as home for a while now. Long story, tell you all some time."

        "Yes..." said Carol absently as they all got out of the car. Even she was too tired to ask Errol a bit more about that.

        "Hey, how do we turn the car round for next time?" Johnstone asked.

        "Sits on a turntable," Errol said, pointing down. "Bit hard to see, nice fit."

        Jamieson looked down, but it took him a moment to pick out the fine circular line that went right to the walls of the garage. He guessed that that was why it was wider than normal.

        Errol then opened the ordinary wood-paneled door leading to the workshop.

        "I have to tell you that my flies are picking up evidence of a second-wave nuclear strike," Estelle said as they walked across the grass to the house. "No more bombs have reached New Zealand as yet. So far the exchange appears to be confined to the U.S.A and the U.S.S.R."

        "The bastards just cannot get enough of it, can they?" Johnstone said.

        Errol did not led them to the front of the house this time, but round the back, through the porch, and into the wash-house. To Jamieson it looked more like a hotel bathroom in that there was no washing machine or tubs or anything, just five deep fancy-looking shower stalls, all in a row, each with their names on the door.

        "If you want a bath," Errol explained, "there's one - and only one - in the bathroom back in the house, and we take turns like anybody else. But when we return from a world - as we just have, we may all need a quick cleanup and change of clothes in a hurry. - Now," he opened the one with his name on and pointed inside, "you'll see a cabinet here with your fresh clothes all neatly cleaned and pressed, towels and things below. Behind is the shower itself, just like the one you're used to at home except there's a chute under the taps you shove your old clothes into. - Okay folks, see you all in the lounge in a few minutes."

        He stepped in and closed the door behind him. With a smile and a quick friendly wave, Estelle promptly hopped into hers.

        The rest of them looked at each other, Johnstone shrugging his shoulders. He then looked down at himself.

        "Looks like we've been rolling in it," he laughed as he stepped into his cubicle.

        This time Johnstone helped Errol out in the kitchen while the others settled themselves in the lounge. The clothes they wore were duplicates of what they had been wearing when they first came aboard, so far as Jamieson could see.

        The dessert certainly proved waiting for, it consisted of small bowls of fruit salad and ice-cream with little dollops of creamy custard on top. Little slivers of those royal crackers Jamieson loved so much had also been inserted in them.

        An image of Earth just as they had seen it from the Moon then replaced Mitre Peak on the lounge's screen. It made Jamieson feel sad as soon as he saw it.

        "Do we stay or do we go?" Carol raised the question again after Errol had put the rapidly-emptied bowls back on the trolley and taken them out into the kitchen.

        Jamieson hadn't thought about this. Their `little' trip to the Moon had left him feeling very tired. Besides, it was way after his bedtime.

        Nobody else seemed to have much of an idea either.

        "You're all more tired than you think," Estelle said. "I wouldn't recommend it now."

        "Would give us an opportunity to see what happens - back home - if we stayed until the morning at least," Errol said. "Not that there's going to much that's worth knowing. With this second strike, the planet's dead anyway. Even if nothing more gets dropped on New Zealand, our folks, well, you know..."

        During the silence that followed, Jamieson began to feel guilty about eating that delicious desert. He had never thought about the starving millions he had seen picture of in news bulletins, they were just too far away. But now the whole world was going to die, and here he had just eaten a big bowlful of fruit salad and ice cream. He couldn't stop thinking about that.

        "Let's just go," Carol said. "There's no point in hanging round here any longer. Everything we have ever known, well it's gone, hasn't it? We have to get used to it - like Jamieson said. Best to start now. - How long would our trip take Estelle? Assuming we go to the star system you picked for us earlier?"

        "I estimate we can do it in around one hour and ten minutes, Carol."

        " - An hour!" Carol shrieked, looking round at the others. "That's impossible! That's way beyond the speed of light! They don't even go that fast in `Startrek'."

        Errol laughed. "This is a bit different from Startrek, Carol, Good show and all that, love it, but all the same... If Estelle says `one hour ten', then I think you can take her word for it. She can probably even explain the physics behind it as we go."

        "I can do that if you like, Carol," Estelle said as if she were offering her a nice piece of candy. "But if we do go, you will all have to promise that you'll go to bed as soon as we arrive, no matter what."

        "Like good likkle children," Johnstone laughed.

        "Like healthy human beings, if you want to stay that way," Estelle looked at him coolly.

        "Okay, I'll promise," Johnstone said. "Carol obviously wants to go. Errol? Jamieson?"

        Errol looked at Jamieson, obviously waiting for him to decide.

        Jamieson wondered just when these people usually went to bed. Ten o'clock? Even eleven? How could they stay up that long? But he didn't want to stand in their way, even though he couldn't quite tell whether Errol wanted to go or not from the look on his face.

        "All right," he said. He decided he just couldn't resist the temptation, even at this late hour, to find out what doing three thousand kilometers an hour felt like. Boy, that was faster than anything he had ever heard of!

        He could understand Carol getting all excited.

        "Okay, I'm in," Errol said, obviously trying not to look relieved. "We're away," he looked at Estelle.

        Instead of seeing the Sun as it was before when they were about to leave earlier, the screen now showed a colored diagram instead. Everything was labeled, even what was obviously the Sun. This now sat in the middle of a white background with black stars in it, odd but far easier to see. Near the bottom of the screen to the right was a tiny image of the Earth and the Moon. A long looping line left the Earth, looped right round the top left of the screen, back towards the Sun, passed through that, then turned into a long arrow pointing in the direction of a five-pointed star near the bottom right of the screen just above the Earth. Jamieson read its label: Kah Kahrain. That sounded foreign to him, he wondered how they'd all get on if nobody there could speak any English.

        "We have just started along that path you can see starting from the Earth. We should pass along it and through the Sun in about five minutes-"

        " - Pass through the sun in about five minutes..." Carol repeated quietly, nodding as if she didn't really believe it but would listen politely to what she said anyhow.

        It took only a few moments for the dot representing the ship to move round the curve and into the straight bit leading into the Sun itself. Yet Jamieson couldn't feel anything moving. He had heard what Estelle had said, but didn't really believe it. He looked at Carol, but she seemed happy enough, eyes fixed on that screen. Johnstone didn't seem concerned either.

        He couldn't understand it.

        " - Damn, forgot the tea," Errol jumped up quickly. "Jim sure looks like he could do with a cup. I want mine too, but I also want to see this," he pointed at the screen before he quickly made his exit with the trolley.

        "I am able to accelerate at high rates because I have a small nuclear fusion powerplant with the capacity to supply the electricity needs of a country the size of France," Estelle now seemed to talk to Carol directly. "Most of this energy is applied to engines able to loop spacetime round on itself and rotate it. I pull myself through space just as I were turning a pulley in a piece of string fixed between two solid points. That's why you feel no acceleration as I said earlier. It is now in fact over 100g..."

        She illustrated this with another diagram that briefly took the other's place. Jamieson didn't even try to understand it. He couldn't tell whether Carol was following Estelle's explanation or not, though he did see her nod her head occasionally.

        Meanwhile, Errol returned with the tea. Jamieson was grateful when he gave him his cup first. No cakes and things accompanied it this time. Errol quickly shoved the trolley out of the way into a corner and resumed his chair, teacup precariously balanced on its arm.

        "Here we go," Estelle said as the diagram dissolved to be replaced by the real Sun in true black Space right in the middle of the screen.

        Jamieson noticed it was growing a little larger as he watched. For a moment it grew in size quickly, then, peculiarly, it shrank again even more quickly. Then it expanded once more. Its size kept changing in this way even though he could see it was getting bigger overall. Even odder, it changed color every time it changed its size.

        He heard Estelle talking about more things that he knew were way over his head, like `tackyonic space', `ultraviolent rays' and `X rays'. He wasn't sure he had heard that correctly, they were for seeing people's insides, weren't they?

        Meanwhile that sun was beautiful, the way it kept growing bigger and bigger all the time now... It made him think back to the time when he was a kid and he had gotten on a horse for the first time in his life. It was Molly's from the other farm next door, and she said he could sit on it if he promised not to do anything stupid. She helped him up onto it, but just as he reached for the front of the saddle to steady himself - he found couldn't seem to spread his legs wide enough somehow, he remembered now - the horse stepped forward and he lost his balance and slid off its other side. He landed flat on his back on that prickly stubble left from the newly-mown hay, completely winded. All he could do was let out a long low moan as every scrap of air was expelled from his lungs. All he could see was that beautiful golden sun high up in that throbbing blue sky... and when he could breath at last, Molly had shooed the horse away and she had bent over him. He could smell her scent mingling with that wonderful smell from the hay... and when her face drifted over that sun... and she looked just like Estelle...

        It was the last thought he had before he drifted off to sleep, and it nearly jarred him awake: did that car they all went to the Moon in have any number plates?