Randall spread his hands and grinned. ‘Just . . . people. I don’t know where I was, exactly. There was a coffee shop on the other side of the road. It looked like Albuquerque, where I’m from. Everything just looked . . . normal.’

Selwyn stepped over to the laptop and picked up the scrap of paper Randall had left lying there. ‘Me next,’ he said, tears trembling in the corners of his eyes.

We all agreed to take turns, even Winifred. But first we argued, and made arrangements, even in some cases made farewells. Randall wasn’t coming back. Neither was Selwyn, once he realized his destination was his hometown of Cardiff. After confirming where the coordinates would take him, he came back just long enough to say goodbye, and then he was gone forever. Winifred went and looked and came back, and so did Yuichi. So far, all the coordinates functioned perfectly.

By now, there were just four of us left. Me and Chloe and Winifred and Yuichi.

‘I guess it’s good to know I could go there if I really wanted to,’ said Winifred. ‘That’s enough for me.’

‘You’re staying,’ I said.

‘I already told you.’ For the first time, I saw her smile, really smile, and it made her look like an entirely different person. ‘Does that seem crazy?’

‘I think you explained yourself well enough before,’ I said. I looked over at Yuichi. ‘Well?’

He gave me a scornful look. ‘C’mon, Jerry. Give up my chance to be a wasteland warrior?’

I grinned, glad not to lose him.

‘That still leaves you two,’ said Winifred, studying Chloe and me.

‘I’ll go with Jerry,’ she said. ‘Nothing could induce me to go to any place like where I came from, pre-or post-extinction.’ She looked at me uncertainly. ‘If . . . that’s okay with you?’

I could sense the fear in her voice. She was thinking about Alice, of course, and whether some other version of her might be found at the coordinates Haden had given me.

‘I’m going,’ I said. ‘But not just for five minutes.’

Chloe swallowed. ‘You’re . . . you’re not coming back?’

I turned and put both hands on her shoulders. ‘You don’t understand. I am. But I just want a little more than five minutes to look around. Are you okay with that?’

She gazed into my eyes, and I thought she had never looked so beautiful as in that moment. ‘Sure.’ She nodded, then smiled uncertainly. ‘Okay.’

I looked up at the other two. ‘An hour,’ I said. ‘That’s all.’

Yuichi regarded me sceptically. ‘You’re sure? We’ll need to shut the link down, then reopen it again after an hour. I wouldn’t advise wandering too far in the meantime.’