The pilots turned back. ‘Here,’ said Pennyroyal. Straightening Luke up, he zipped his hood up over his chin until only his eyes showed. Smallhope was doing the same for Jane.
‘You should have warned them,’ she said reprovingly to Geoffrey.
‘Just get on with your job.’
They shrugged and turned away.
Bad mistake, thought Jane, without quite knowing why.
This world was quite silent. No birds sang here. There were no black specks wheeling around the thick grey sky. Although they could see drifts of snow piled everywhere, there was, at this moment, no wind. The clouds above were bulging with more snow. A few flakes drifted silently down. The world was utterly still and utterly silent and, as far as Jane could see, apart from themselves, utterly empty.
They trudged through the snow, Mr Geoffrey in particular finding it heavy going.
This is the real stuff, thought Jane, looking back at their footprints. Not the girlie snow we get in England. This is real snow. Thick and white and deadly. You wouldn’t build a snowman out of this stuff. It would turn on you and rip your throat out.
The ground was rough under the snow and several times they staggered and nearly fell.
‘We keep putting down a walkway,’ panted Mr Geoffrey, struggling on, ‘but it gets buried in only a few hours. Sometimes even before we’re back inside again. We have plans to build a proper landing area and install a tunnel that would run from the pod to the facility. With airlocks, of course. Easier for everyone. We’ve had to dig pods out before now.’ He attempted another joke. ‘Good job it’s the summer season at the moment.’
No one laughed.
The two pilots had reached the facility and were holding the door open for them. Gratefully, Jane and Luke stepped inside and found themselves in some kind of locker room. Jane suspected the temperature in here was only just above freezing but it seemed almost tropical compared with outside.
Luke stamped his feet free of snow and sniffed the air appreciatively. ‘Ah, this takes me back. Locker room lilac. I should perhaps inform everyone now that my fagging days are long gone.’ He grinned at Jane. ‘Don’t look so panic-stricken, Jane. It’s not what you think.’
Following Mr Geoffrey’s example, he sat down on a bench and began to divest himself of his outer clothing. Jane followed suit. Mr Geoffrey indicated convenient lockers behind them for storing their cold weather gear.
They struggled out of their thick clothes. Jane, who had dressed for a London summer, began to shiver.
‘This way, please,’ said Mr Geoffrey, indicating another door. ‘Luke?’
‘Mm?’ said Luke, all his attention inside his locker. Shielded by the open door, he slowly reached out and touched the logo stamped in the top left-hand corner. A small diamond enclosing the letter ‘P’.
‘Luke?’
‘What? Oh, sorry, didn’t realise you were waiting for me.’ He slammed the door. ‘Ready when you are.’
Pennyroyal was holding the door open for them. A blast of warm air swept over them.
‘Does anyone else think it’s all rather like a supervillain’s lair?’ asked Luke chattily. ‘Will there be henchmen, do you think, Jane? Or a pool of piranha, possibly?’
‘Alas,’ said Mr Geoffrey, again venturing into the un-familiar world of humour, ‘the temperatures are not conducive to piranha.’
Complete silence followed this remark. Luke winked at Jane and followed her through the door into another small area, empty apart from a rack of shelving against one wall.
‘Please put these on.’ Mr Geoffrey pulled down a number of shrink-wrapped packages containing what looked like sterile wear.
‘What’s this?’
‘Sterile coveralls. You can pop them on over your own clothes. And the overshoes, please.’
‘Why?’
‘We can’t take any risks.’
‘Any risks with what?’
‘The livestock. Come this way.’
Behind them, the two pilots, slowly removing their own gear, watched them go. As soon as the door closed behind them . . .
‘Quickly,’ said Smallhope. Wrenching open a locker she seized Jane’s cold weather gear and boots. Bundling it all up, she opened the outer door. Cold air snapped at her lungs. A few snowflakes whirled around her head. She carefully placed it all against the wall a few feet away from the door. Pennyroyal did the same with Luke’s. Then they both stepped back inside and closed the door behind them.
The wind moaned again. The snow fell gently, slowly covering two piles of cold weather clothing.
Jane and Luke emerged into a long white corridor which curved away from them to the left and right.
‘This way,’ said Mr Geoffrey, setting off left.
‘What is that smell?’ asked Jane, wrinkling her nose against the pervasive, musty animal smell with its overtones of faeces. ‘It’s like the zoo.’
‘My apologies. We keep the facility as clean as we can but I’m afraid the livestock smell does tend to permeate everywhere.’ He opened the door. ‘This is our central observation room. The best place, I think, from which to give you a flavour of our activities.’
To Luke, the words observation room conjured up images of shining white tiles and a huge transparent panel overlooking a pristine science area where important science things were being done by important science people in nice white science coats.
This observation room was nothing like that.
Yes, it was a room and yes, it was painted a white more brilliant than the snow outside. And yes, there were three large, dark windows, evenly spaced out around the curved walls, with rows of comfortable seats for viewers. They sloped upwards in three tiers and the whole effect was that of a very tiny cinema.
‘You will get a good view from up here,’ said Mr Geoffrey, leading them to the front. ‘And for your comfort and convenience, we provide refreshments for our guests.’
Jane looked across. Tiny triangular sandwiches, vol-au-vents, canapés, petits fours, flasks of coffee, jugs of fruit juice. It was all laid on. ‘You knew we were coming?’
‘Oh no,’ said Mr Geoffrey, ‘they’re laid out every day. For any guests who . . .’
‘Happen to be passing,’ said Luke, spoiling his joke.
‘Exactly. No alcohol, I’m afraid, but you can ring for fresh coffee at any time.’
‘Never mind all that,’ said Luke Parrish, playboy. ‘I’ve got a table booked at Fiori this evening, so is it possible to speed things up a little, please?’