The Long Cosmos by Terry Pratchett Read Free Book Online Page B

figure out what the story of the Damaged Woman meant in terms of seeing, and stepping, and living in an infinite ensemble of potential worlds.
    And beyond.

7
    T HE I NVITATION CAME to all the worlds of the Long Earth from space. And it was on a world on the edge of space that the work of responding to the Invitation began.
    Dev Bilaniuk and Lee Malone, in identical blue jumpsuits, stood nervously outside the entrance of the GapSpace facility. It was a cool April day. Around them stretched the local version of northern England, a sandy, grass-strewn coastal plain studded with scratchy farms and workers’ villages, giving way to rounded hills further inland. The songs of trolls, contentedly labouring in the fields and building yards, lifted on the fresh breeze off the sea. It was a mundane panorama, Dev thought, and it was hard to believe they were some two million steps from the Datum.
    But before them stood the tall fence that contained the heavily policed interior of the GapSpace facility, with all its expensive and high-energy engineering. To support the facility was the sole purpose of the scattered community in this landscape.
    And beyond that , in a sense, lay infinity.
    Forty years earlier Joshua Valienté had discovered an alternate Earth that was no Earth at all. Big spaceborne rocks hit the planet all the time, and in that particular universe the all-time champion world smasher had happened to hit dead centre. The result was the Gap, and it had turned out to be damned useful for those elements of humanity who still harboured dreams of spaceflight. Because from here, to reach space, you didn’t need Cape Canaveral and rocket stacks the size of cathedrals. You only needed to step sideways, into a Gap where an Earth used to be, into vacuum. People had been venturing into space from this place ever since.
    And now the Next were coming here. Dev felt Lee’s hand slip into his own.
    They had come out a little early; waiting for their Next visitors to arrive, they’d been too nervous to sit around. Lee, tall, slim, dark, wearing her hair shaven close to her scalp, was a few years younger than Dev, in her mid-twenties, and he was her nominal superior in the GapSpace management hierarchy, such as it was. She was ferociously bright, however, and he had a feeling that their working relationship wouldn’t stay the same for long – even if their tentative personal relationship lasted. For now, though, she needed his support.
    He squeezed her hand. ‘Take it easy. I mean, you know Prof Welch from Valhalla U. The Next might browbeat you, but they don’t actually bite.’
    â€˜It’s not that. Well, maybe a little. It’s like being back at college, and being brought in before some ferocious supervisor who’s going to pick your work apart.’
    â€˜And they have been bringing money into GapSpace, remember. Why, the Cyclops radio telescope project was their initiative in the first place.’
    â€˜But they weren’t interested in us before, were they? They saw the Gap as just a handy place to hang a big space antenna. But now there’s the Invitation, and here they come, taking over.’
    Dev shrugged. ‘Well, they’re not taking over—’
    â€˜And we’ll get railroaded.’
    The Next were a new kind of people – genetically and morphologically distinct – who had emerged in the strange crucible that was the Long Earth. And they were, without a doubt, categorically smarter than regular-issue folk.
    â€˜Humans are kind of disposable when the Next are around. That’s what they say.’
    â€˜We can deal with it . . .’
    A sleek airship appeared above their heads with a soft pop of displaced air. As soon as it arrived it began to descend, and a passenger ramp like a long tongue unrolled and reached for the ground not far from the facility’s security gate. Shadowy figures moved in the ship’s interior.
    â€˜I hope