‘Yes,’ said Inez. ‘In fact, based on our analyses of some artefacts, we managed to develop a form of faster-than-light quantum-communications device.’

‘I’m not sure I quite understand,’ said Kaur.

Inez spread his hands. ‘Communications instantaneously, without limitations – even across light-years.’

‘So you’ve tested this technology,’ Kaur asked.

‘We did.’ Inez nodded. ‘In fact, we attempted to contact our future selves.’

‘Excuse me?’ said Fairhurst, his expression transforming into outright incredulity.

Fowler realized he had been right to pick Inez for the job. He had an air of authority that made it hard for others to challengeeven the most lunatic-sounding ideas, when they came from him.

‘Specifically,’ Inez continued, his face set like granite, ‘we transported a prototype quantum transceiver to Ptolemy, fifty-five light-years from here. The intention was to communicate with identical transceivers located both here on Luna and on Earth.’

He spread his hands, then clasped them again. ‘Keep in mind that time dilation means Ptolemy, as accessed through the CTC gates, is about sixty years in our future. So when that message was sent from Ptolemy to here, without passing through the gate, it arrived – or, rather, it will arrive – sixty years from now. That means any reply from back here can’t be sent until then.’

‘And?’ asked Kaur, his skin taking on a grey tinge.

‘The only reply we got from our future selves was a montage of video fragments,’ Inez explained. ‘What it showed made us very worried indeed. Once you’ve seen it, it’ll be clear why we need your help.’

Fairhurst made a sound of disgust and leaned back, arms folded, but Inez continued unfazed. ‘Based solely on these video fragments, we made the decision to send a starship carrying a secret wormhole gate back to Earth, from a star system much closer to our own, in order to try and understand what happened.’

‘And this gate arrived back here . . . when?’ asked Kaur.

‘A little over a decade in our future.’ Inez brought up a new set of images that segued from one to the other every few seconds. ‘Before we get to that, you’d better take a look at the video sequence.’

The image of the mottled grey rock changed abruptly to a view from the deck of a ship somewhere on Earth, sailing close to the base of a clearly alien structure rising out of the deep ocean. It looked, at first glance, like some abstract sculpture of a flower rendered in sheet metal and plastic, and painted in gold and silver. Compensation software, built into the contacts of whoever had recorded the footage, reduced natural eyeball jitter.

They watched as the view panned first across and then upwards, thus giving a sense of the staggering scale of the thing. Clouds drifted around its uppermost petals. The view suddenly blurred as whoever was recording it shifted himself to cope with the ship’s rolling motion.