Mindgames: Fool's Mate (15 page)

At a height that must have been over five miles
, the converter halted its ascent and began to turn over. It was then that Carroll saw its shape and, of course, it was hexagonal. He also saw something falling from it like dust from a table top. Ash? Mirrored buildings? Weapons? People? Carroll felt tears well in his eyes, yet they were not tears of grief. It was as if his body was frantically searching for a suitable emotional response to something beyond it compass. Perhaps next would come laughter, or madness.

Soon the converter exposed its top side to him and he saw the multihued glimmer of what he had known as the game
-board. Then, as if some god had flicked on a light switch in fantastic heaven, the game-board flared with power, and rainbow light stabbed down at the plain below. Carroll shielded his eyes for a moment, then lowered his arm as fascination drew his gaze back. Below the matter converter lay a hole miles in diameter and descending into darkness.

‘
They made their base in this duct which leads to the main storage tanks of the disc,’ came the Clown's thought. ‘It is from here that the sea rises.’ And as Carroll assimilated those words there came a roar as of titans. For a moment he thought he saw four black shapes rising from the hole, but in that moment they were erased by a vertical explosion of cubic miles of water. Carroll shook his head. This left him in doubt as to who was master here now. The time of the Four had certainly ended.

At length the light from the converter went out over
the tsunamis below. As shock waves and spray crashed around the craft the gigantic shape of the converter began to move again. Mostly in silhouette it seemed to suck away the stars like some vast maw then spit them out behind. It made no noise now that its first piece of work was done.

‘
The seas first,’ came the Clown's introspective thought, ‘from them came the first life on your world.’

‘
How long will it take now?’ Carroll asked, repressing the urge to ask if it would take seven days and seven nights with the usual rest period.

‘
The mass for the seas is stored within the disc. It will take one Earth year to bring it all to the surface.’

‘
Will it flood all the surface?’ asked Carroll numbly.

‘
No, there are hollows in the disc to be filled up. We are in one now. Many large oceans are required here for balancing and cooling. They can be pumped to different areas of the disc should there be any precession or major heating stresses...’

‘
Then what?’

‘
Then land. Two years, perhaps more. It will take time to sculpt mountains and deserts and the like.’

‘
Deserts?’

‘
Yes... and for the enjoyment of the life I will bring into being here, the matter converters will themselves be converted into fusion furnaces – miniature suns.’

Carroll
could not keep the wonderment from his voice as he asked his next question.      ‘And life... how long?’

‘
Another hundred years,’ the Clown replied, swivelling its terrifying head towards him, ‘already there are planktons and algae in this ocean. The matter converter did not merely bring the water to the surface. A less complex mechanism could have done that. In a year all the oceans will be in place and shoaling with life, but it will take longer to establish the larger fauna and flora whose information I have stored.’ The head tilted then in what might have been introspection. ‘Perhaps a decade or so after that will see all checks and inspection completed, then it will be time to resurrect the human race.’

Carroll
swallowed dryly and licked at his salty lips. Nearby lay his bag, and in it the discs of his friends. A hundred years, he thought. In that time he knew he would see wonders. And it was little enough time to wait for eternity.

THE END