The Tea Machine (12 page)

“And where were your ships?” Hubert asked.

“In Scorpius Major.”

“That is the squid’s home galaxy. It’s a huge gas system. The Empire just came forging through without so much as a by your leave.” Hubert was beginning to sound indignant. Millicent stepped in.

“Why were you in Scorpius Major, Sangfroid?” she asked. “Usually one warring faction invades the other to acquire resources of some sort or to advance its civilization in some way. What exactly did Rome require from a gaseous galaxy?” She was genuinely interested, and Sangfroid genuinely had no answers.

“To get to the other side,” she said with a shrug. “If we see it, we take it, and move on to the next offensive. It’s Rome’s way. Veni, vidi, vicious.”

Millicent looked aghast while Hubert nodded knowingly. “Tell me, Sangfroid, given that you are possibly a trillion light years from Earth, have you even seen the eternal city you fight for so valiantly?” he asked.

Sangfroid knew she had a blank look on her face. A few hours hanging out with the Aberly’s, and she was beginning to recognize the facial muscle set, but this time the question was really hard.

“What’s an earth?” she asked, determined not to feel stupid. Now it was Hubert’s turn to look blank. Sangfroid would have felt smug if she’d understood how exactly her question had confounded him.

“You don’t come from Earth?” Millicent asked, obviously confused.

“I was born on moon base Alpha Zeta IV.”

“Yes, you told me that before.” Millicent was impatient now. “But what planet does that moon orbit? I had assumed it was our own.”

“It’s Rome’s moon,” she said.

“You mean Rome is actually a planet?” Hubert looked confounded.

“Yes. Of course it is.” These two never failed to surprise her. “Rome is the home planet. Every citizen is allowed to see Rome once before they die, if at all possible. We do tend to die young. But no matter where you were born in the Empire, you’re expected to get to Rome at least once before you pay the ferryman,” she said proudly. “Rome conquers all and is all,” she quoted the mission statement.

“You mean to tell me there is no planet Earth, only a planet called Rome?” Millicent looked to her brother. “Of all the puffed up, arrogant… Words fail me.”

Sangfroid squinted at her suspiciously. Words failing Millicent was probably a bad thing.

“I have no idea what has happened to your timeline,” Hubert shook his head in wonder. “I only know the squid will stop Rome. You will throw all your resources into this war and lose, and then you will fall into decline. It will take centuries but it will happen.”

“It will not.”

“It will so.”

“It will not.”

“It will so.”

“It w—”

“Gentlemen, please,” Millicent interrupted. “We have a Colossal squid upstairs, perhaps we need to address that first and then you can continue your playground squabble?”

Hubert removed his napkin from his collar and rose wearily to his feet. “I’ll take her back.”

“And I’m going with you in case something else adheres to your jacket, like a lab bench or a refrigeration unit.” Sangfroid huffed. Hubert was not her friend anymore. He had decried the Roman Empire, so now Sangfroid didn’t give a monkey’s anal gland about dropping him in it with his sister.

“What does she mean, Hubert?” Millicent, as usual, missed nothing.

“She’s alluding to the fact I had to bring some equipment back with me for Weena’s welfare.” Hubert shot Sangfroid a hard look that made her momentarily reconsider the wisdom of upsetting her host, a man a million times smarter than herself. Then she reverted to not giving a monkey’s anal gland and sat back smugly. Hubert would get his good and proper, his harpy-tongued sister would see to that.

“Hubert.” Millicent stood on cue.

Here it comes.
Sangfroid readied herself. Glad someone else was in Millicent’s bad books. Hopefully her turn was over and Hubert’s about to begin.
This isn’t going to be pretty.

“I want a word with you in my study. In private.” Millicent turned on her heel and marched out of the breakfast room leaving Sangfroid feeling a little cheated. Why was the flamethrower tongue for her only?

“When you come begging me for my sister’s hand in marriage, and believe me you will, I shall laugh in your face,” Hubert hissed as he passed Sangfroid’s seat. “And I shall say ‘No.’” He bent close to Sangfroid’s ear and whispered, “Nooooooo.”

Sangfroid sat bolt upright. “Wait!” she said. “Why would I ask you?” Not that she was ever going to ask for Millicent Aberly’s hand. Sangfroid was a frontline soldier, and frontliners never married. She was too hard-nosed to settle down in a nice little villa with a vineyard by the sea as her parents had dreamed of on their moon-dirt farm.

“Ask?” Hubert was bitter. “Ask? You will have to
beg
me and hope that I am kinder than you. And you had better believe I shall not be!” And with that Hubert slammed out of the room.

CHAPTER 12

Millicent awaited Hubert in her
study. It was unusual for him to visit her here, but there had been those rare occasions when he had outstripped the mark with some experiment or other. Then she would haul him in to stand fidgeting on her Persian rug before a blazing fire and an equally blazing sister. This was one such occasion, and she could hear his footsteps dragging along the hall to her study door. She sat on the edge of her chair as he entered. He looked miserable and defeated, and she was annoyed that Sangfroid had not been more circumspect with her disclosures.

“Hubert,” she said when he at last stood before her. “I do not think it is proper for you to love a squid.”

He started, his eyes alight with defiance and a little shame.

Millicent immediately softened her tone as his pain was all too apparent. “It is obvious you care very deeply for Weena,” she said.

As expected, he came back with the only argument open to him—the one that wounded her the most, though she refused to show it.

“And is it proper for you to love a soldier from the future? And furthermore, one who soldiers for a tyrannical war machine,” he cried. “And has died at least a dozen times? Why, the woman is as good a ghost.”

He was justifiably angry at what he reasoned to be Sangfroid’s betrayal, but Millicent knew this was more than a simple fall out of friends over inter-species galactic warfare. This argument was really about the heart and how Hubert had to abandon Weena to a cruel fate in dangerous and uncertain circumstances.

“No, it is not proper for me either,” she agreed. “I am a pacifist, and you had only to rest at the word
soldier
for it to be improper. The word
woman
is also quite conflagratory, but the less said about the Sapphic elephant in the room, the better.” Her answer directed him to the core of his upset—the impropriety of the human heart. He sank onto the Chesterfield with his head in his hands.

“Forgive me, Millicent,” he said. “That was cruel. I do like the big gal tremendously, you know. She sort of grows on you.”

“And I like and respect what little I know of Weena. But our hearts are silly creatures,” she continued, kindly. “They see things simplistically, always looking into the mire of everyday life and trying to magnify any small thing that will make us happy, and in doing so, our logic becomes distorted.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Not because I brought Weena here; I’ve always known she’d have to go back. But not to that laboratory,” he added quickly. “I’ve been trying to surmise the best location to return her to, where she would be safest. Rather…” and here his shame clearly showed on his face. “Rather, I’m sorry that this whole damned time travel adventure has turned our lives upside down and set both of us adrift on emotional seas we are barely able to navigate.” He looked at her with anguish in his eyes. “You and I are intelligent, rational creatures, Millicent. And now our safe, little, orderly life here at Christie Mews will never be the same again. We have crossed our Rubicon.”

She took his hands in hers. “And we crossed it shoulder to shoulder as we always do and always will. Now, take me to see Weena. As lady of the house, I should like to welcome her to our home,” she said. “Has she really grown that much?” They linked arms and moved together into the hallway.

“Don’t believe Sangfroid. She is nowhere near as big as a house. She fills Papa’s old bathtub; that is all.” He smiled at her in weary relief, and she was glad they had not fought.

“Sangfroid is an idiot,” she reassured him. “Squid terrify her.”

“Hey, I heard that.” Sangfroid joined them as they passed by the breakfast room.

“Is it not true?” Millicent teased her in an effort to dispel any residual awkwardness between her and Hubert.

“It is true.” She conceded with good nature. “But I didn’t survive in the frontline as long as I have by not having a healthy terror for them.” She caught Hubert’s eye, and the look they swapped convinced Millicent all would be well. Soldier and scholar, each stood by their own experience and formed as honest an opinion of their separate worlds as possible. And that was that. They were far too good of friends to fall out for long.

“We are going upstairs to see Weena,” Hubert said. “And discuss with her what is to be done next.” He hesitated a moment, then said, “Would you care to join us?”

Millicent was proud of his quick forgiveness. Hubert arose from his earlier shame on wings of white—a man of vigour, prepared to grasp the stinging nettle and set things right. Sangfroid was just as quick to let bygones be bygones and slapped Hubert on the shoulder in a stout, friendly fashion.

“Sure, I’ll join you,” she said happily.

Millicent’s smile remained as she led the way upstairs. She was happy for the robustness of their growing friendship and how quickly they had resolved their differences. They gathered together in Hubert’s dressing room—three humans and a young Colossal squid. Weena was probably adolescent in size, Millicent surmised, if her previous state were to be classified as juvenile. Also her pinkness had faded. There was a greyish hue underneath her iridescent sheen that reminded Millicent of the patina of the adult squid. It was interesting to witness these initial stages of development. She could understand Hubert’s fascination.

Communication with Weena had improved and was a much more fluid affair. Now it was clear to Millicent when Weena was conjoined with her mind and when she was having an independent thought of her own. It was a sophisticated process, and Millicent felt she had attained the level where Hubert had been on his first meeting with the little squid. His greater intellect had allowed an intimacy of understanding from the very start, whereas Millicent was still adapting to it. Though she suspected this was not due to any advance in her own skills but rather the maturing of Weena’s. There were no changes in Sangfroid’s ability to communicate that she could see. She stood on the threshold looking ill at ease, completely unaware of the thaumaturgic interaction Millicent, Hubert, and Weena were engaged in.

“So,” Sangfroid asked, “what’s the plan? Are we just going stand around looking at each other intently?”

“Weena is reminding me of the time I went back and almost got caught by one of your techie chappies in the lab,” Hubert said, his face wreathed in smiles. He and Weena were inordinately fond of touching one and other, Millicent noted. They exchanged little pats and taps of fingertips and tentacle, and once he even gently touched her mantle. He was much more demonstrative with her than he had ever been with Sophia.
And that’s the difference between a squid and a cold fish.
She immediately chastened herself for being mean minded and focused on what Hubert was saying.

“You mean you calibrated your arrival to a time before the ship was attacked?” Millicent suddenly realized the significance. “Before Sangfroid and the space corps centurions arrived?” She turned to Sangfroid. “Can you remember where you were before the attack?” If it were somewhere safe, maybe she could go there and somehow prevent Sangfroid even beginning her fateful journey to the doomed ship? How simple. Why hadn’t she thought of it before? All those attempts to save Sangfroid in the heat of battle when all she had to do was stop her getting anywhere near the fray.

Sangfroid shrugged. “Funnily enough, my last true memory is of being in the casino with Gallo before we were deployed. Then we go to the Amoebas to shoot up squid and poof, you’re there and my memory gets wiped.” She tapped her temple. “It goes all hazy for me the minute you turn up. Like uncorking the tequila.”

“So we can move to either side of Sangfroid’s arrival on the ship.” Hubert and Millicent both spoke at the same time.

“That was spooky.” Sangfroid looked at them warily. “I was thinking the same thing.”

“That is because it was really Weena’s thought transmitted to all of us,” Millicent told her. “I think she’s finally found your wavelength. You must have a very low frequency.”

Sangfroid stared uneasily at Weena. “I’m not sure I want a squid inside my head,” she said, then turned to Hubert. “Okay, so you can arrive on the Amoebas anytime you want, so what? All you do is steal stuff.”

“More importantly, we can arrive before the squid attack,” Hubert said, ignoring the jibe.

“I still don’t get it. Why does that matter?”

“The squid attacked for a reason,” Millicent told her.

“Yeah. The Amoebas was a Roman ship and the squid are our enemy.” Sangfroid was impatient. “They attacked a peaceful scientific research ship.”

“You can hardly call the work carried out in those laboratories peaceful,” Hubert said. “They’re more like floating torture chambers. Also, the Amoebas had a special cargo onboard.” He reached out and stroked Weena’s coral arm. “Your scientists had stolen a juvenile queen from the squid spawn. Weena is royalty,” he said proudly.

“She’s what?” Sangfroid blinked in confusion. A large, singular, blue eye blinked back at her.

Somewhere in the house, a clock chimed out eleven, and the rattle of china on a tea tray could be heard downstairs. Growing squid apparently needed a lot of rest, so Hubert shooed them out of his dressing room and down to his laboratory for elevenses. Millicent poured tea while Sangfroid gave the time machine a lingering examination with Hubert as her guide.

“So how did Weena get here?” she asked, eyeing the dimensions of the machine sceptically.

Millicent handed her a delicate china cup and saucer and winced as she clumsily handled the wafer-thin material. “We think it’s by being in close proximity to the traveller. By touching, in fact.”

“But that machine could barely hold me, never mind Weena. She’s gotten big.” She juggled the cup before she gave up on the teeny little handle. Ignoring Millicent’s consternation, she wrapped her hand completely around the porcelain cup.

“Don’t worry,” she told Millicent. “I’ll be careful. I remember how upset you got when you broke the other one in the hangar.”

“Yes,” Millicent said, drily. “A pinnacle moment. All else pales.”

“It doesn’t matter what size you were.” Hubert got them back on track. “You didn’t materialize in the machine with Millicent. You popped up on the settee in the evening parlour, remember?”

“Rather inconveniently, too,” Millicent murmured.

“But it gave me the idea that maybe I could transport Weena the same way.” Hubert sipped his tea. “All I had to do was assure she materialized when the house was quiet. I chose an evening when Millicent was at her Chartist meeting and that Edna had off. Cook always goes to bed early.”

“You brought Weena here the day before yesterday?” Millicent was surprised.

“But she was on the ship yesterday when we were fighting in the lab?” Sangfroid said.

“No, I brought her here last week. It’s time travel. Remember? Different rules.”

“I can’t keep track of all this.” Sangfroid stared moodily into her cup. She hadn’t met Hubert before yesterday, yet he felt like a good, long-standing friend. Her feelings for Millicent were more complicated. They went deeper, to places she had never known existed inside of her, constricting her with panicked palpitations until her breathing grew shallow and her skin slick with sweat.

“It’s harder for you,” Hubert said. “Millicent and I are firmly rooted in this timeline along with the time machine. Try and see this room as a sort of terminus. We can get on and off the time machine as we would an omnibus, but we’re always circling our home route and ending up back here.”

“Whereas you have hopped on the wrong bus entirely,” Millicent added. “And Hubert and I have to deduce where you got on and how to make sure you get off again at exactly the same stop. Understand?”

Sangfroid thought about this for a moment and said, “No.” She bit into her third scone and wiped her sticky fingers on her pant leg, ignoring the disapproving look Millicent gave. “So, can we send Weena back on the bus the way she came, especially now she’s bigger? She’ll break the lab bench if we don’t do it soon.”

“I don’t really want to send her back to the lab as—” Hubert said.

“Hey,” Sangfroid interrupted. “Maybe I can go back with her?”

Hubert and Millicent exchanged glances.

“What?” Sangfroid demanded. “You said we could go back at any time which means we can go back to before I died.”

“Sangfroid, I have often gone back, and believe me,” Millicent said. “It just doesn’t work. In fact, the only reason you are here now is because you pulled me into the escape pod with you. Despite my best efforts, I sincerely doubt you would have been saved at all.” She sighed. “I have become quite despondent at your lack of longevity.”

“You mean…” As usual Sangfroid grappled with a bottleneck of ideas until Millicent gently uncorked her.

“I mean I have never once managed to save you,” she said. “I thought you were going to explain all this at the club?” She accused her brother.

He went red. “I tried,” he said. “But events took over.”

“You mean you got drunk,” Millicent gave them both a hard look. “And imbecility took over. I shall never forgive you for that dance.”

“I thought it looked very virile and Cossack like,” Hubert defended Sangfroid, though rather lamely.

“It’s all in the thighs.” Sangfroid slapped her own. “You should see how high I can bounce when my knee’s not ban-jaxed.”

“Can we please get back to the subject in hand,” Millicent said sternly.

“But you saved me; that’s why I’m here,” Sangfroid said. This was met with silence. “Well, isn’t it?”

“When Millicent and I went back, that initial time, it didn’t exactly go as expected,” said Hubert.

“Not that we had any defined expectations,” Millicent added. “We didn’t know what would happen.”

“We hadn’t much of a plan at all,” Hubert agreed.

“In fact, it was all very
laissez faire
,” Millicent said.

“What happened?” Sangfroid sighed and settled back in her chair with a defeatist slump.

“Well,” Hubert began, “as I told you last night, we arrived on the Amoebas and went straight to the laboratory where I met Weena for the first time. Then suddenly, the doors of the main laboratory burst open with lots of smoke and noise and the like.”