“I can take you home,” he promised. Somehow his voice had become hoarse.

Then they were there: Moshi, Alana, Colin, Raina, and Henry. All wearing thick Zagreus-survival coats, their skin flushed from immersion in the scalding water. Smiling, calling out wild greetings. Akkar and Dimon followed them in, looking dazed.

Callum was pulled to his feet and hugged exuberantly.

“We did it, we fucking did it,” Raina was shouting.

“This really is Zagreus, isn’t it?” Moshi said, an astounded smile on his face. “We’ve gone interstellar?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“I had money on it being the Antarctic.”

Nafor appeared, and the reunion damped down fast.

“It is time,” he declared, his gaze never leaving Callum.

“We’ll set up outside,” Callum told him.

Colin and Dimon carried Savi out on her cot, using it like a stretcher. An area was cleared at the end of the stone longhouse, with one of the hot streams bubbling away along the side. People formed a broad circle around them; more perched on the walls of the longhouse. More than two hundred torch beams shone down.

Callum took off his coat and unfastened his backpack. He pulled the half-meter portal out, and a massive cry went up behind the multifaceted wall of beams.

Alana held it steady on the ground, while Moshi stood in front, ready.

Callum studied the status display on his screen lens. The amount of power the portal was pulling out of the grid to maintain entanglement with its twin back on Earth was spiking close to its internal circuitry safety limits. But it was functional. They had a link. “Activate it,” Callum instructed Apollo.

—

Yuri walked along the tarmac lane that ran the length of the Donnington paddock. He was intrigued by all the old vehicles parked there, surrounded by their enthusiastic crews as they prepped the sleek bikes for racing. The noise of the engines was primal, bringing fond smiles to the older faces among the crowds who ambled along, admiring the mechanical history on show.

He gazed at each of the big vans and trucks carefully, making sure his screen glasses got a clear view. Boris ran pattern recognition, throwing up the model and manufacturer of each one.

The white Mercedes Sprinter van stood out anyway. A small canvas marquee had been erected at the rear end, its side panels zipped up. There was a Ducati bike standing beside it, but no crew or riders, as if the whole area had been abandoned. No genuine race team would leave their precious machine untended.

Sloppy, he thought. It’s always the little things.

He went into the marquee and banged hard on the rear doors of the van. There was no response.

“Oh, come on,” he said in a voice tired with the chase. “It’s not as if I brought a tactical team. I’m by myself.”

There was a clunk as the van’s handle turned. Then the rear door swung open.

“Yuri,” Dokal Torres said nervously. “What can I do for you?”