Flying Toward a Secret Sky

Sylvia Brightman had no clue, as she left her apartment that morning, that she was about to have the worst morning of her life, followed by the best afternoon.

She knew her friends envied her career. At the age of thirty-seven, she had the prestigious position as Chief Analyst and Adviser to the President of Innovia himself, Jack Ward. The job came with responsibility, status, a finger in the political pie, and a very good salary.

"You're a lucky rat," her best friend Deirdre had said only the previous evening when the Proton Pussycats had got together for their monthly meet-up. "Jet setting off to Copperfield on Innovia One, while I'm stuck doing the school run."

"I never get to go anywhere, either," Katrina had said. "I'm just stuck in the office week in week out."

"It's not that big a deal," Sylvia had said, sipping her Trinity dry white wine. "It's strictly a working trip, and for me, Innovia One is just an office that flies."

"All the same," Yvette said, "it's pretty cool."

"It gets old after a while," Sylvia shrugged. "Trust me. It's like trying to do your work to a constant droning noise, and every now and then the turbulence makes you spill coffee all over your computer."

"Perhaps," Deirdre argued, "but writing the President's speeches, telling him what to say - you can't convince us that's not a pretty swanky job. Pity you can't tell him just what we think of his new taxes and welfare cuts."

"I can tell him," Sylvia said. "It's my job to tell him what people are saying on Whitter, after all, but whether he listens or not is out of my control."

"I still don't know how you can support that man," Yvette said.

"It's my job," Sylvia said. She had long since given up trying to defend her position to her friends. Sylvia was in a better position than any of them to know the true state of the economy; that the policies her friends wanted to see - more free childcare, public spending on arts, donations to charities; simply weren't sustainable. In an ideal world, there would be all those things, but Sylvia knew it wasn't an ideal world. Jack Ward had to make tough choices if he was going to keep the economy on track. It still hadn't recovered fully from the most recent recession. Her friends could never understand; so Sylvia avoided talking about politics most of the time.

She cut a striking figure as she climbed into the waiting limo. She was slender and dressed in a well-cut, stylish business suit in slate grey, and black stiletto heels with pointed toes. Her hair was pure white. Sylvia had been devastated when her hair had begun to lose its colour before she was even thirty. At first she'd dyed it her natural colour; but eventually decided to make a feature of it instead, bleaching the remaining brown hairs white and sporting a severe geometric cut. In photographs, she looked sharp-edged and angular; people were often surprised, when they met her, to see that her hair was silky and soft, and moved when she did, giving her a much less severe look; and that she knew how to smile and laugh. She never smiled when she was having her picture taken, except when she was with her closest friends.

She wished the driver good morning as she slid into the back seat, placing her designer overnight case on the seat beside her. She chatted easily to him on the way to the airport, asking after his wife and children.

When Sylvia boarded the plane, the President was already in his seat. He looked relaxed, having taken off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. Jack Ward was a tall, well-built man in his early fifties. His hair was peppered with grey, and was still thick, despite his age. His eyes were a piercing blue and his nose straight. His shoulders were broad, in every sense. "Good morning, Miss Brightman," he said with a smile which exposed even, white teeth.

"Admit it, Sylvia," Yvette had once said. "You don't work for that guy because you agree with his ridiculous policies. You work for him because you fancy him!"

Sylvia had denied it vehemently, but Yvette's words had set her thinking about how ugly most politicians were, and how Ward was one of the few exceptions. The good looking men with charisma usually became movie stars instead. Love or hate his politics, no-one could deny that Jack Ward was easy on the eye. As she took her seat opposite him and clicked on her seat-belt, she told herself that she felt nothing for him but admiration - he was a man with the courage of his convictions; not afraid to make himself unpopular for the sake of his country's best interests. Their relationship stayed strictly within professional limits. In any case, Ward was married. Even though most people considered Amelie Ward to be much too insipid to carry the position of First Lady and secretly wondered why a man like Jack Ward had married someone like her in the first place, nobody would dare question it to his face.

"Did you take delivery of your yacht yet?" Sylvia asked as the plane pushed back from the gate.

"Next week," Ward said. "I'm looking forward to it. Do you sail, Sylvia?"

"I have done," she said, smiling to herself as she remembered doing a sailing course with the Proton Pussycats, and wondering how any of them had ever managed to pass given the amount of drinking they'd done every night. "So you and Melie are going to be doing a bit of island hopping, then?"

"Not Melie. She hates sailing. She hates water. She gets seasick standing on a pier. She gets that I love it though, and won't mind if I take myself off occasionally. It will give her a chance to go shopping without me."

"It's a shame you can't enjoy it together," Sylvia said.

"Such is life. How's that new intern doing? What's his name, Wiley?"

"Riley," Sylvia said. "Riley Wilkes. He's good. Taken to the work like an eagle to flight. He's very quiet, incredibly geeky - but what he doesn't know about computers isn't worth knowing. I'll be sorry to lose him when he goes back to university in the autumn."

"You'll just have to use your charm on him and maybe he'll come and work for us proper when he graduates."

"I'm not sure my charm will do it, but interesting and challenging work probably will."

"And the new girl?"

"Maive? Doing brilliantly, too. She doesn't take any crap from the others. I don't think they'll succeed in scaring her off like they did the last one."

The plane reached the end of the runway, and barely stopped before the engines roared and the aircraft picked up speed. Innovia One never had to wait for a slot. It always had priority - the other planes had to wait.

Once in the air, there was no more small talk. There was work to be done. Ward and Sylvia left their seats and went to their offices. "I need you to keep me abreast of what Whitter is saying, and update my speech to answer any new questions or comments that pop up," Ward said. Whitter, Innovia's primary social networking system, was a force to be reckoned with. It's the pulse of the nation, Ward would say. It tells us what people really think.

"I'm on it," Sylvia said.

"Anything from the Freedom From Politics Group lately?" Ward asked.

"No," Sylvia said. "They've gone very quiet recently."

"I'm glad to hear it." Freedom From Politics was a group of activists who believed strongly in the idea that a nation, even one the size of Innovia, did not need a government, or a President, or laws. They argued that politicians suppressed basic human rights - a particular target for their vitriol was birth control. In an attempt to eradicate teenage pregnancy a previous government had brought in a law requiring every citizen to be fitted with a permanent contraceptive implant at birth. Only when a couple could prove that they were financially stable and committed to one another could they apply to have the implant removed and start a family. FFP argued that this would come to mean that people with congenital diseases, who'd suffered even the mildest of mental illnesses in the past, or committed even the most minor crimes as teenagers, could and would be denied the right to reproduce.

FFP claimed to believe that human nature was basically good, and that left to themselves people would usually do the right thing, and if they didn't, local communities were more than capable of administering justice where needed.

While they had a right to their opinion, for freedom of speech was written into the Innovian Constitution, death threats against Presidents and inciting violence on Whitter were not acceptable and were taken extremely seriously. One of Riley Wilkes's tasks had been to purge Whitter of any such posts.

"Just because they've gone quiet doesn't mean they've gone away," Sylvia said, "but I'm monitoring it."

She went into her office and settled into her seat. As she waited for her computer to finish booting, she took a moment to glance out of the window at the landmarks of Innovia's capital, Sprawling, spread out below; the Golden Circle Bridge, the Jubilee Tower, the Presidential Palace, where Sylvia imagined Melie Ward would just about be waking up.

**

Marmaduke Forbes, leader of FFP, may have been quiet in terms of social media, but he had been far from idle. He had been meeting people face to face, recruiting to his cause. He had grown tired of the perception of FFP as a bunch of hippies belonging to an outraged underclass. He had been working to bring in a more respectable element - creative geniuses, top scientists, even a few compliance agents.

There was another facet to his efforts, other than mere respectability. The kind of people whose support he'd elicited of late could also help further the cause; hit at the establishment from within. There was even one of his people on the President's Analysis team, one Jorge Baltimore, who'd been surreptitiously sending details of the President's engagements, which had proved very useful indeed.

Today it was all going to come together. The status quo was going to get one hell of a shake-up. Forbes sat in a dark room, his eyes fixed on a radar screen. His contact in Air Traffic Control at Proton Airport was streaming it to him. She had told him how to distinguish Innovia One from any other air traffic, and he smiled as it appeared on the very edge of his screen, entering Proton airspace.

Time to call Jed Hart. "Duck to Drake, the goose is in the air," Forbes said into the microphone.

"What's its ETA at the duck pond?" Hart's voice came over the receiver.

"Twenty minutes. I trust everything is ready?"

"Affirmative," Hart replied. "In another half an hour, the goose will be cooked."

Innovia had no real human enemies. The only other continent, Classica, was a good twenty hours flying time away, and in any case had not developed technologically at the the same rate. None of the thirty or so nations it comprised had even discovered flight yet. They were too busy warring with each other to bother about a place that would take months to reach by ship.

The biggest threat to life in Innovia came from natural disasters. One thing that particularly struck fear into the population was the possibility of an asteroid strike on the planet, which scientists said could happen any time and would wipe out life entirely. Hence a major research institute had been set up in Innovia's scientific centre, the city of Proton, to look at ways of countering that threat. The latest solution under test was a missile, designed to home in on a moving target, such as an asteroid, and blow it to bits before it could hit; the Asteroid Detection and Destruction System, or ADDS for short. There were occasional tests, using unmanned drones. On days when these took place, air traffic had to be grounded in Proton, and other planes that routinely flew over the city had to be diverted - for the missile was not intelligent enough to distinguish between an asteroid and a Speedbird Pterodactyl, or any other passenger aircraft.

There was no test scheduled for today. There was very little air traffic in the area, either, thanks to a protocol that ensured Innovia One was not at risk of collisions or near-misses with other planes. Innovia One would be the only plane in range at Zero Hour. Tomorrow, Forbes thought with satisfaction, Innovia will be free.

Miles away in Proton, Jed Hart had initiated the launch sequence. This was normal - the ignition system was tested regularly, usually aborted before actual launch. Today it should be, too - but Jed Hart had no intention of shutting it down this time. He'd figured out exactly the kind of technical glitch he was going to blame it all on.

The one potential problem for him was the group of students from a college in Sprawling who were there on some sort of field trip and visiting the various facilities. Hart would have to make sure the students were not in the room when the missile launched - they would have to be taken for a coffee and cake break moments before the appointed time. Hart reassured himself that they were only students and even if any of them got close enough to his screen to see the countdown, which they wouldn't, it was unlikely they'd understand what they were seeing.

As he explained to the little group of young people what his job entailed, he had one eye on his watch and one ear listening for commands from Forbes. He was nervous, which at least one of the students, an earnest young man named Nathan Tate, had noticed, and wondered about. Not used to addressing a class, Nathan supposed. That didn't stop him from asking the man questions about the system, and in particular, the safety regulations. "What would happen," Nathan asked, "if the missile went off by accident?"

Hart wiped his brow. This was the last question he'd wanted to be asked today. "Well, it won't hit Proton, if that's what's worrying you. It would keep on going up and explode in the upper atmosphere where it can do no damage."

"It could hit a satellite, though, couldn't it?" Nathan asked, "if it detected one moving?"

"It's possible," Hart admitted, hoping that neither Nathan nor any of his classmates would come to the logical conclusion that passing aircraft might be at risk, as well.

"What would happen then?" Nathan wanted to know.

"Depends which satellite got hit," Hart said. "It might knock out some communications. People wouldn't be able to watch TV and people who rely on sat navs in their cars might get lost. Nothing life-threatening." Nathan nodded, sagely. He appeared to be looking right at the screen. Hart was thankful that the young man could not possibly read the scrolling text from where he was standing. All the same, he had to get rid of these kids and soon.

"I believe it is time for your coffee break now," Hart announced. "My technician will take you to the rec room. If you have any more questions I am sure he will be able to answer them for you." It was handy that he could use the students to get his assistant out of the room as well; and, come to think of it, he could even blame the "accident" on being distracted by the group and all their questions. He could make out it was all young Nathan's fault.

The students filed out of the room and followed the technician along the corridor. One side of it was glass, so they could clearly see the missile on its launch pad. "Is it supposed to smoke like that?" Nathan asked.

"We test the ignition and launch sequence daily," the technician said, "and it's normal for it to burn a little when we do that."

"There's never been an accident, where they couldn't stop the test in time?" Nathan asked.

"No," the technician said. "Never. Here we are - coffee and cake through these doors, here."

The students entered the room eagerly. Only Nathan hung back. "I'm not hungry," he said, "and I can't have coffee at the moment - I'm in training." The technician nodded. He'd figured Nathan was probably on a scholarship to play ironball for his college, given the way he was built, so the technician wasn't really surprised. "I'll wait for you guys outside the front door," he said. "I need a bit of air."

The technician saw no reason why the young man shouldn't wait outside. There was no way he could get into the launch field, surrounded as it was by ten foot high fences and security guards. If he wanted to sit and watch the rocket for a while, that was no problem.

Nathan went outside and climbed a grass bank, where he could get a better view of the still smoking rocket. He could hear the distant sound of a plane, high up in the clear blue sky. He could make out its tiny white shape way above him. He had no way of knowing it was Innovia One. He did think how vulnerable that plane and all its passengers would be if the rocket did accidentally go off.

**

Inside Innovia One, Sylvia was scanning Whitter feeds for comments the President might need to address in his speech that afternoon. Her eye was caught by the FFP logo, the yellow lightning strike on a purple background. Funny that they should suddenly start posting again, just after she'd said to the President that they seemed to have gone quiet.

"TODAY IS THE DAY THAT THINGS ARE GOING TO CHANGE - FOR EVER. TODAY IS THE DAY WE BECOME FREE! TODAY IS THE DAY WE FINALLY SHAKE OFF THE YOKE OF JACK WARD AND HIS LAWS, ONCE AND FOR ALL!!! WATCH THIS SPACE! WATCH THE NEWS!!"

Sylvia shuddered, her blood turning to ice in her veins. It might be no more than posturing and rhetoric, but equally it could mean that there would be an attempt on the President's life during his time in Copperfield. She would have to make sure he knew about this. She printed the post, and walked quickly to the office where the President was working. "I think you need to see this, Sir," she said.

**

"The Golden Goose is in range," Forbes' voice came to Hart through his ear-piece. "I repeat, the Golden Goose is in range. Time to slaughter the Golden Goose."

"Copy that," Hart said, relieved that he was alone in the room; that his assistant and all those kids, especially that Nathan, who asked far too many questions, were out of the way. He glanced at his own radar screen. Sure enough, a blip had appeared. Innovia One.

A sheen of sweat covered Hart's top lip. A lot depended on him, now. ADDS was still experimental - he couldn't be sure it would achieve a direct hit on a target smaller than most asteroids; it might miss and explode harmlessly in the upper atmosphere without so much as spilling Ward's coffee. Hart had not told Forbes the likelihood of this scenario. Had he not offered Forbes a sure-fire guarantee of success, he wouldn't have been paid the advance. The advance, Hart had calculated, was enough to cover his legal costs (including bribes to jurors) if charges of neglect or even corporate manslaughter were brought against him, with enough left over to buy him a particularly flash sports car. The balance, if Innovia One did come down, would buy him a mansion on Bird Island and be enough to live off, in luxury, for the rest of his life.

Once he'd pressed the final launch command, his remaining task was to delete all files and records that would show it had been a deliberate act. Erase all his communications with Forbes. If anything went wrong, if he missed the tiniest thing, he'd be living his life out on a much less salubrious island - Sprawling's off-shore prison.

Hart's eyes were fixed on his screen as he watched the missile streak up into the sky. He was not the only one. The technician and the students, hearing the roar and feeling the rumble, had come rushing out of the coffee room just in time to see the rocket take off.

"I thought there wasn't a test today," a girl said, a blonde with long plaits, whose name was Bettina.

"There isn't," the technician said, going pale.

"Is it a real asteroid, then?" Bettina cried.

"Course it's not," said a lanky young man behind her, whose name was Jonny. "Don't you listen? They said they're tracking the asteroids all the time from the observatory in Lavaland. They know months in advance if one's going to hit us. They don't just suddenly appear."

As he finished speaking, the technician was running back along the corridor to find out from Jed Hart what the hell had just happened.

**

Ward stood up. "Thank you, Sylvia," he said. "I'll show this to my security chief right away. He'll know what to do." He started to take a step towards the door. At that same moment, there was a blinding flash of light and Innovia One pitched violently. The ADDS missile had clipped the port wing of the aircraft. It wasn't a direct hit; that would have turned the plane into a fireball, killing everyone instantly, but it may as well have been. It took off a section of the wing and sent Innovia One into a severe roll no pilot could have recovered from.

As the plane began to tumble from the sky, the President and Sylvia were thrown across the room, landing on top of one another on what had been the ceiling. Suddenly they were no longer boss and employee, but two human beings united in the knowledge that, in a few seconds, they would be dead. They clung to each other, taking what comfort they could in their last moments.

There was an abrupt jolt, as the plane's fall halted. Ward and Sylvia slid to the floor as the aircraft miraculously righted itself. Slowly and carefully, they loosed their hold on each other. It seemed that they weren't going to die after all, even though, as they could see through the window, one wing was hanging off and an engine was missing. The plane was flying; level, and smoothly. Ward got up and went to the intercom. "Captain?"

"Yes, Sir?" came the reply from the cockpit.

"That was a remarkable piece of flying, Captain. I thought we were gonners."

"I have to be honest, Sir, so did I. I'm not doing this. There was no way I could have got us out of that spin. The plane seems to have done it by itself - and it's circling back to Proton Airport, all on its own, without any input from me."

"Do you know what happened? What's happening?"

"We were hit by something, Sir. I have no idea what, but it damaged a wing and took out an engine. All I know is that we shouldn't be flying - but we are. We're on course for Proton Airport as if the plane knows what to do. It looks like it might try to land itself. If you'll excuse me, I must contact Proton Air Traffic Control and tell them we're coming in for an emergency landing. I can't promise we're out of the woods, yet; so I'd advise you to sit down, buckle up and brace for a bumpy touchdown."

"It's a miracle," Sylvia said, as she clicked on her seat-belt. "I can't think of any other explanation. The gods have saved us." A thoroughly modern woman, Sylvia had never professed any belief in the gods before; but she could think of no other explanation as to why they weren't in a million pieces on the ground.

Even so, there was no guarantee that they'd survive the landing, and the two of them sat side by side, clasping each other's hands and not speaking.

The landing was remarkably smooth, considering, and as Innovia One drew to a halt, Sylvia finally dared look out of the window again. She could see the control tower and terminal building in the distance, and the burnt-out dummy plane the emergency services used for training. She could see daisies growing in the grass beside the runway. Then she saw a sudden movement; a blur of blue and red, which seemed to shoot out from under the plane. For a second, Sylvia thought it was a fire fighter - they'd got here quick. OK, so this was Innovia One and was going to get top priority, but even so, that was fast.

The figure shot up into the air, and Sylvia wondered if it was some kind of large bird, but she didn't know of any birds that big which could actually fly and which sported those particular colours. It seemed to be a flying man. He was wearing a red cape and flying very fast, without wings or the aid of any kind of device that she could see. He looped the loop, and shot off in the direction of Sprawling.

"Did you see that?" Sylvia asked.

"Yes," Jack Ward said. "It looked like a flying man."

Moments later the emergency services arrived; the plane was efficiently and rapidly evacuated; and paramedics treated minor injuries and shock. By some further miracle, the worst injury was a broken arm suffered by one of the security staff.

The President’s meeting was postponed until the next day while the passengers and crew of Innovia One had time to recover, and be interviewed by compliance agents who were trying to piece together what had happened and who was responsible.

Cars were sent to drive people to the luxury hotel at the edge of the airport. Sylvia, Jack Ward and the pilot were in the same car. It was during the short drive that the Captain told them about the conversations he'd had with Air Traffic Control as they were coming in to land.

"I told them all my instruments were showing that we were on course for Proton Airport and we were descending at a steady rate compatible with a normal landing there," he said, "but that neither the co-pilots or I were actually flying the plane - so I had no idea what would happen when we got there. They suspended all other flights, cleared the runway, evacuated as many people as they could from the terminal building and waited. I kept in constant contact with them, and on approach, I lowered the landing gear, which thankfully seemed to be working. Then they told me something unbelievable."

"What?" Ward and Sylvia asked in unison.

"They could see the plane from the outside - they could see part of the wing was missing and the fact that we were still flying and on a controlled descent was nothing short of miraculous. They were watching closely so they'd see at once if that changed. When we were in sight of the tower, they told me what they saw. We were being held up by what looked like a man..."

"In red and blue and wearing a cape?" Sylvia asked.

"Yes. It seems he put us gently down on the runway and then flew off. Looped the loop in front of them and disappeared."

"I saw that," Sylvia said.

"Do they know who - or what - it was?" Ward asked.

"None of them had ever seen anything like it," the pilot said.

"Was it one of the gods?" Sylvia asked. "I mean, nothing human could carry an aeroplane through the air - it's impossible."

"We thought of that," the pilot said. "While we were waiting for the emergency services we went through all the Gods. There's nothing in the Classican Pantheon that looks even remotely like that. This was something else."

"A hero," Ward said.

"More than that," Sylvia said. "Heroes are human. This was a... super-hero."

"We must find out who he is," Ward said. "I want to thank him, personally, and award him a medal."

He repeated the sentiment to the nearest compliance agent as they got out of the car and walked up to the hotel. "We've been trying, Sir," the agent said, "but he literally vanished. Nobody knows where he came from or where he went."

When Sylvia had been shown to her room, she immediately logged on to Whitter to see if there was any information. Whitter had gone wild. The story, complete with a grainy picture taken by someone in Air Traffic Control of Innovia One hovering above the runway with the "super-hero" clearly visible, supporting the belly of the plane, had gone viral.

Freedom From Politics had claimed responsibility for the attack on the plane. They cursed the "super-hero" for ruining their plans for Innovia and warned the President that they were not going to give up.

There were a number of posts about the superhero. Saving Innovia One was apparently not the first thing he'd ever done. There were descriptions of someone fitting his description going after muggers and burglars, and felling them with some kind of "Power Blast" that seemed to emanate from his fingers. Until now, compliance agents had assumed he was a vigilante with some sort of high-tech weapon, but now they were realising he was much more than that. Sylvia made a compilation of the reports - from the earliest she could find, the foiling of a shop break-in in Northlake, to today's events, and printed them off before taking a shower.

Jack Ward did not rest, either. He systematically visited the rooms of all his staff, checking that they were all right; finding out which of them were prepared to continue on to Copperfield on the back-up Innovia One next day. Those who seemed too shaken up were told they could go back to Sprawling - either on a first class flight, or by rail if the very idea of getting on a plane brought on a panic attack. Ward made sure they knew there was no shame in that; he'd fly in people to replace them if need be, and if they needed time off, counselling or anything else, he'd make sure they got it.

His last port of call was Sylvia Brightman, whose room was next door to his own.

She answered the door in a fluffy hotel robe that was too big for her. Her hair was wet from the shower. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears as the enormity of what had nearly happened had caught up with her the moment she no longer had anything to occupy her mind.

Ward had only ever seen her as the polished, professional, geometrically styled corporate machine who did her job efficiently and accurately. It was the first time he had ever seen her vulnerable side; the first time he had ever felt such a powerful attraction to her.

"Are you all right, Sylvia?" he asked, as he had asked all the others.

"I'm fine," she said. "A little shaken up, I guess, but I suppose that's understandable since we all nearly died today..." She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of the robe. "Sorry, Sir," she sniffed.

"There's no need to be," Ward said, gently, touching her arm in a fatherly manner.

As he did that, Sylvia could hold in her emotions no longer. She began to sob uncontrollably. Without another word, Ward pulled her into his arms. "That's right," he said. "Let it all out. No apologies. We've been through a lot today. It's not good to hold it in." He stroked her hair as if she were a child.

After a while, she gathered herself and stepped back. "Thank you, Sir," she said in a small, quiet voice. He looked into her eyes and smiled.

Looking back at that moment, neither of them could ever remember who made the first move; who kissed who, just that they kissed. They kissed with an almost violent passion and insatiable hunger. Neither of them had ever felt such an intense desire for another person before.

Half an hour later, they lay together on the bed, naked and wrapped in each other's arms. Sylvia curled against Ward like a contented cat, and he stroked her hair. She had had lovers before, but none like this man, who'd achieved just the right balance between tenderness and masterfulness. None of the others had ever satisfied her so completely.

Ward looked at Sylvia, thinking how different she was to Melie, who'd just lie underneath him and shudder a little, and then she'd get up and shower the moment he rolled off her. Melie, who barely acknowledged him most of the time, wrapped up as she was with her so called friends (who Jack was certain would never come around if Melie wasn't First Lady) and her shopping. He found himself wishing he'd met Sylvia first. It wasn't just about sex. He knew if they were together, they'd have conversations. Sylvia was intelligent and well-informed; she read books and watched the news. Melie read nothing but trashy novels whose protagonists were obsessed with shopping and shoes, and watched nothing but soaps and reality shows. As it was, he had made vows to Melie, and a President of Innovia must always keep his word, or the people wouldn't trust him in anything else. "This can never happen again," he said, "you know that, don't you, Sylvia?"

"Yes," she said.

"No-one must ever know."

"I understand," she said. She felt the tears welling up again. She had found the perfect man, and she couldn't ever have him. She wiped her eyes quickly - he must not see her cry again. He mustn't see her crying over him.

Someone was knocking on the door of the President's room. "Mr President, are you there?" The voice sounded urgent. The Chief of Security. Sylvia and Ward looked at each other. They knew if he got no answer, he'd go looking. He'd knock on this door, next. They could ignore the knock, but the Security Chief would be determined to know where the President had been and they both knew that could be difficult.

Sylvia pointed to a door in the wall between the two rooms. She had tried the door earlier, believing it to be a wardrobe. It had been locked, but there was a key in the lock. She'd guessed then that it led to the next room and had left it alone. "I think that door leads to your room," she whispered. "Try it."

He got up and turned the key. Sure enough, it opened, and behind it was indeed the President's room, with his overnight bag open on the bed. Without a word, Ward gathered up his clothes and stepped through. Sylvia closed the door behind him, feeling desolate that there had been no time for a proper goodbye. It was rushed and unsatisfying.

As she had predicted, the knocking began on her own door. She pulled on the robe and wrapped it tightly around her before opening the door and peering out.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, Miss Brightman, but you wouldn't know where I could find the President, would you?"

"As far as I know, he's in his room," she said.

Ward appeared at the door of his room, also dressed in a robe. "I'm sorry I didn't answer," he said. "I was about to take a shower. What can I do for you?"

"There's been a development in the investigation," the security chief said. "We had a call from a student in Proton. Young lad called Nathan Tate. He says he was on a visit to the ADDS facility today with some classmates. He saw the rocket launch, and he claims to have seen something suspicious on a computer there just before the launch. We're sending a couple of agents over there to talk to him and get the full details, but if he's telling the truth, it looks as if one of the operatives there let off the missile on purpose. If Mr. Tate's story checks out, we may be in a position to make an arrest. I'll keep you posted."

"Very good," Ward said. "Thank you." He turned and went back into his room, closing the door behind him.

Sylvia gave the security chief a wan smile and did the same. She hoped the man hadn't guessed what she and Ward had been doing just prior to his arrival.

It was dark now. Sylvia went to bed. She lay in the darkness, but barely slept. Instead, she re-lived every moment of her time with Ward that afternoon, over and over. The very memory aroused her. She was all too conscious of the fact that only a thin hotel wall and a now unlocked door separated them. It took every ounce of her will power not to creep through that door and go to him. Several times, she got out of bed and stood with her hand on the handle. Then his words would come back to her: "This must never happen again, you know that, don't you?" and she would sigh and go back to bed. It was only much later that Ward admitted to her that on the other side of the door, he'd been doing exactly the same thing.

The next day, everything was back to the nearest approximation of normal possible given the events of the previous day. Ward's speech took place, a day late, and with the addition of a personal thank you to the "Power Blaster" who had saved his life.

His attitude to Sylvia seemed as professional as ever, except if anyone looked particularly closely they might have noticed a certain solicitousness in his manner towards her; an extra smile, an extra enquiry as to how she was faring. It could easily have been explained by a normal and natural concern for a member of his staff who had been through a traumatic event and chosen to battle on where others had been all too willing to board a train home.

Whitter remained on fire with "Who Is Power Blaster?" speculation. The grainy pictures of the previous day were zoomed in on as far as possible, but the close-ups were too pixelated to show his facial features anything like clearly. He could be absolutely anyone who was tall, had brown hair and worked out regularly. Pleas for "Power Blaster" to come forward and identify himself were either ignored, or he simply didn't see them.

Zinette Manson on the morning news show interviewed an expert in the Classican religion about whether it was likely, or even possible, that there could be a new god, or that Power Blaster was some kind of hitherto unknown divine being brought into service for the express purpose of saving the President. Sylvia watched on the TV in her room as she ate her room-service breakfast.

"The gods are not like us," the priest said. He was a tall, thin man with a shock of grey hair that stood up on his head like a duck's bottom. "They do not engage in sexual congress and they do not reproduce. Being immortal, they do not need to. So this Power Blaster as you are calling him cannot be a new god or the offspring of any of the gods."

"Could he be a servant of the gods, then?" Zinette asked. "A messenger, or something?"

"Again, the gods do not have supernatural servants because they don't need them. If they need something done that a human follower could not do, they will do it themselves."

"A god in disguise?" Minette suggested.

"No. Where the gods intervene, they would want it to be clear it was they who did it. They don't do incognito. They want the worship - and they won't get it if they are not completely recognisable. So I believe we can rule out the idea that this Power Blaster is anything to do with the gods."

Other theories suggested that he was an alien, a being from another world, or that he'd been a guinea pig for scientific research into super-soldiers, or a new approach to the potential asteroid threat. Why rely on a missile when you could engineer an intelligent human being to fly up there and push the space rock harmlessly off course and not mistake planes or satellites for asteroids?

Secondary to all the speculation and virtually buried by it, was the story that, thanks to evidence given by the young man Nathan Tate, Jed Hart had been arrested, charged and imprisoned, and that he had quickly broken under interrogation and led compliance agents straight to Marmaduke Forbes, who was also behind bars.

As for Nathan Tate himself, the course of his life was set to change. The previous day, he had been all set to pursue a career in the construction industry, but now he found his interest turning to a different path. He'd watched the news; he'd seen the President and various members of his staff talking about the events of the day, and realised that he wanted to be like them, and serve the President more closely. As Sylvia watched the news, Nathan Tate was contacting his mentor to discuss the possibility of changing courses.

Back in Sprawling, Sylvia went back to her usual job, thankful that she did not have to spend too much of her day in the same room as Jack Ward; for the very sight of him was enough to set every last one of her nerve endings jangling with desire. She could just about control her feelings for the duration of the morning briefing. After that, her work, and managing her small team, kept her mind off her hopeless love for her boss.

Maive, the usually efficient and brisk redhead, seemed distracted, too. Sylvia had to reprimand her for looking at Whitter when she was supposed to be working, which she'd never had to do before. Sylvia caught her peering closely at one of the pixelated pictures of Power Blaster. "You don't know this guy, do you?" Sylvia asked her, "because if you do, the President would really like to know who he is."

"No, I don't know him," Maive said with a sigh, "but I wish I did. Don't you think he's hot?"

"I suppose," Sylvia said. Not as hot as the man working in the octagonal office down the hall, she added to herself, but I can never admit to that.

She went back into her office and set to work on a report. The research, writing and editing process kept her mind occupied until Maive and Lissa popped their heads around the door to let her know they were leaving for the day, and that Sylvia would be alone in the office now. There was nothing unusual about that. Sylvia often worked late, especially if she was meeting her friends for a meal later in town. Not today, though. She wanted to get her report done.

Sylvia Brightman had always been conscientious and thorough, but now even more so, because she wanted Jack Ward to admire her work. As Lissa closed the door behind her, Sylvia realised that in all probability there was no-one on this floor of the building now apart from herself and the President.

She could not help but think of Jack Ward, seeing him in her mind's eye, hard at work in the octagonal office. He would have rolled up the sleeves of his crisp, white shirt, exposing his tanned, hairy forearms. He might have loosened his tie, or even taken it off. His chiselled jaw would have a shadow of stubble on it by now, which would feel scratchy against her skin if he kissed her. Sylvia realised she had been gazing out of the window at the Golden Circle Bridge for a good five minutes instead of finishing the report.

As she forced herself to turn back to the screen, there was a knock on the door. "It's open," she called, expecting to see the office cleaner come in with the vacuum cleaner and a bin bag.

"Good, I'm glad you're still here." She looked up to see Jack Ward standing in front of her desk.

"I've nearly finished that report," she said, hoping he couldn't tell how flustered she was suddenly feeling. "Another half hour, I'd say."

"I don't need it until noon tomorrow," he said. "That's not what I came to talk to you about."

"What, then?"

"I know this is completely wrong," he said, "and you would be perfectly right to tell me to leave right now and go back to the octagonal office. It might be for the best if you did; but I have to say this."

"Go on."

"Sylvia, I have not been able to stop thinking about you since that afternoon in Proton. I haven't been able to concentrate on running the country because I can't stop thinking about your body, your face, your eyes... I've tried to stop, but I just can't, knowing you're only a short walk away. When I'm with Melie, I wish I was with you; I imagine I'm with you and not her. It is wrong. It's very wrong, but I just can't stop myself..."

Sylvia got up and walked around the desk until she was standing in front of him. "I understand," she whispered, placing her hand on his cheek. "I've been feeling exactly the same."

Sylvia's desk was not as comfortable as the bed in the hotel, but neither of them cared.

"I won't say this can't happen again," Ward said, as they stood at the window looking out at the bridge together, "because I think we both know now that it must. But no-one can ever know. We must find a way to meet in secret, away from cameras and prying eyes."

"That won't be easy," Sylvia said.

"No, but I do have an idea. My yacht. I took delivery of it yesterday. I always intended it to be a bolt-hole away from work, and away from Melie. I don't intend to make it public that I own it, and I've moored it on one of the islands, not in Sprawling. The plan was that I'd fly out there on a small plane and go sailing, by myself, and nobody would know where to find me. I'll tell you where it is; you can catch a ferry to the islands, go to the marina and just come aboard. We could go there next weekend, and as often as we want."

Sylvia knew she was breaking every rule she'd ever made for herself. Never get involved with anyone at work, especially not your boss. Never get involved with a married man. Never get involved with anyone you have to meet with in secret. She didn't care. "I'll be there," she said, kissing him.

**

"Who is he, Sylvia?" Yvette placed the drink on the small table beside Sylvia's sun lounger.

Sylvia opened one eye and squinted up at her friend. "What are you talking about?"

The Proton Pussycats, Sylvia, Yvette, Deirdre and Katrina were enjoying their annual spa day, away from work, husbands, and in Deirdre's case, children.

"You know very well what I'm talking about," Yvette said, sitting down on the lounger next to her. "You've had that silly grin on your face all day. You can't hide it from us. You've got a new man, haven't you?"

The four of them had known each other since their first day at university and were as close as sisters. They had supported each other through just about every conceivable kind of triumph and crisis; it was hard to hide anything from them.

"All right," Sylvia said. "There is someone, but it's really early days. I'd rather not talk about him yet."

"Anyone we know?" Katrina asked.

"No," Sylvia said. They'd all heard of Jack Ward, but none of them had ever met him. She couldn't tell even her closest friends the whole truth, much as she would have loved to share it with them. They'd respect the "early days" thing. All too often one of them had met a man and the Pussycats had started planning the wedding, only for the romance to fizzle out within a week.

"Where did you meet him?" Deirdre asked. "Can you tell us that?"

"On the Copperfield trip," Sylvia said.

"So it's a long distance thing, then?"

"No. He lives in Sprawling."

"It's not that superhero guy, is it?" Katrina asked.

"No." Sylvia laughed, but she knew she'd have to shut the speculation down before they got too close to the truth. If they asked outright if it was Jack Ward, she wasn't sure she'd be able to deny it. "What's the time? I've got a massage booked before lunch."

**

It was Longest Day. In Innovia, the longest day of the year was a public holiday and celebrated with family picnics, parades and fireworks. The Proton Pussycats always got together on this date, and the guest list expanded on this date to include partners, families and friends. In recent years the venue had been Deirdre's garden. She was the only one who had a garden - the rest lived in apartments. Deirdre's husband Tam was an expert with the barbecue, and their three growing children could play on their swings and slides while the adults talked. There was even a large TV screen built into the outside wall so the men could watch the Longest Day Ironball game while lounging on the patio.

Yvette had brought her partner, Marko, as usual - the others were sure he was going to propose marriage to Yvette any day now, and they watched with interest to see if he was going to do it today.

Katrina's new partner was called Elizabeth. The Pussycats had lived through the traumas around Katrina's coming out; the hopeless crush she had once had on Deirdre; and they were pleased to see her settled and hoped Elizabeth would stick around.

Only Sylvia was still single. The Pussycats had started quipping that she must be married to her work; so to hear that there was now a man in her life was the juiciest gossip of the year. For months now, Sylvia had remained tight-lipped about this man, deflecting the curiosity of her friends in every way she knew how. All she had told them was that he lived in Sprawling and had a yacht. She knew she'd be in for an onslaught when she arrived at Deirdre's without him; but not going at all wasn't an option, and bringing Jack with her was impossible on any number of levels.

"You're on your own, then?" Deirdre said when Sylvia walked into the garden, alone.

"Yeah," Sylvia said.

"I thought you'd be bringing Himself for us to meet," Deirdre said, not bothering to hide her disappointment.

"He has to work today," Sylvia said. That was true. The President always gave a "State of the Nation" address somewhere in public on Longest Day. It was to be a shopping centre in Northlake this year. The other side of town.

"On Longest Day?" Katrina asked, raising an eyebrow. Few people worked on Longest Day. Shops, offices and banks all closed.

"He's a fire-fighter, I bet. Probably the one who carried her off that plane," Deirdre said with a wink.

"You must bring him tomorrow, then," Yvette said. "They don't usually make people work the whole weekend."

"He's busy," Sylvia said, simply. "What?" she said as she saw them all looking at her.

"Oh, Sylvia," Yvette sighed. "He's married, isn't he? Working, my arse. He's got to spend the weekend with his wife and kids. No wonder you're so secretive."

"He really is working today," Sylvia said.

"But not tomorrow," Katrina said.

"You're right," Sylvia sighed, "he's married." The Proton Pussycats could never hide secrets from each other for very long. There was no point in trying to deny it.

"I knew it," Deirdre said. "Oh, Sylvia, you know what we think about married men - present company excepted, of course," she glanced at Tam, who smiled back wryly. "We've all been there. Well, apart from Kat. Married men - all the same. They want to have their cake and eat it. I suppose he's swearing blind he's going to leave her, like they all do, but he won't, Sylvia, they never do."

"He's not saying that," Sylvia said. Jack was making no such promises. They both understood he couldn't divorce the First Lady whilst he was in office - not if he wanted to be re-elected.

"I don't care what he's saying, or not saying, Sylvia, you need to ditch him. ASAP."

"I can't," Sylvia said. "I've never loved anyone the way I love him."

"If I had a nova for every time I heard that one, I could give up my counselling practice and buy a mansion on Bird Island," Yvette said. "If I was you I'd end this before you get hurt."

"I'm not you," Sylvia said.

"I know. Just don't say we didn't warn you."

"I won't, I promise. Now, is somebody going to get me a drink, or what?"

"Are we going to watch the President's speech?" Elizabeth called.

"We don't need to," Katrina grinned. "Sylvia here can tell us what's in it. She probably wrote it."

Elizabeth's eyes widened. "Is that right?" she asked.

"Yeah," Sylvia said. "I'm his Chief Analyst. He'll say a lot of stuff that I told him to say. We should watch though. I need to make sure he gets it right!"

"Yeah, guys, turn that ironball off," Deirdre ordered.

"One more minute and the game's over," Tam said.

"Come on. No way are Whitworth City going to beat the Sprawlers in one minute! Turn over. Now."

"Whatever you say." Tam picked up the control and flicked the switch.

As he did, shocking words came over the TV.

"...assassination of Jack Ward as he was about to begin his speech today. The perpetrator, a sniper on the roof of..."

No-one was listening any more, because Sylvia had fainted.

Tam carried her gently into the house and laid her on a couch. Yvette knelt beside her, fanning her. After a few moments, she opened her eyes. There were tears in them. "Jack Ward's dead?" she said in a weak voice.

"That's what it sounded like," Yvette said. "I'm sorry."

"What happened?"

"I don't know any more than you do. Do you want to turn the TV on, or..." Sylvia shook her head and turned her face away from her friend.

Katrina came in. "Thought I should tell you - it was an attempted assassination. Jack Ward is alive. Someone took a pot shot at him, and would have got him if it wasn't for that superhero guy."

"Power Blaster?" Sylvia said, sitting up.

"Yes. Him. He must have spotted the sniper just in time. Caught the bullet in his hand then stood in front of the President until they could get him covered and out of there. Then Power Blaster went after the guy, caught up with him in no time and handed him over to compliance agents. They're saying Ward's a bit shaken up but he wasn't even scratched."

"I have to go," Sylvia said, getting to her feet.

"Oh, no you don't," Yvette said, laying a hand on Sylvia's shoulder. "You should rest."

"I'll rest later," Sylvia said, pushing her hand away. "I have to go. Work to do."

"Promise me you'll see a doctor tomorrow," Yvette called after her, even though she knew Sylvia probably hadn't heard and would ignore the advice, even if she had.

"There's probably nothing wrong with her," Marko said. "It was probably shock. I mean, if the President was killed, she'd be out of a job, wouldn't she?"

**

Sylvia boarded the Arrow to Northlake, and once there, made her way straight to the base of operations the compliance agents had set up. People were milling around, hoping to get another glimpse of the President - this told Sylvia he was still in the building.

She was about to get out her ID to show to the agent on the door when Jack Ward himself came out of the building. Sylvia could tell he was shaken; he walked slowly as if in a daze. By his side, and holding his arm tightly, was Melie Ward. Sylvia had forgotten that the First Lady had almost certainly been present for the speech. It was one of the few Presidential engagements she was required to turn up for. Melie's eyes were fixed on her husband. Ward looked straight ahead. His eyes briefly met Sylvia's, but he turned away quickly without acknowledging her at all. He walked past her, his head bent towards Melie. The couple were bundled into an armoured limo and were driven away. Jack Ward did not once look back.

Sylvia gazed numbly after the car, even after it had gone. She stood there for a long time, barely aware that the crowd was dispersing around her. When she finally looked around, she was alone in a deserted shopping mall. She fell to her knees and sobbed.

She didn't go home that night. She turned up on Yvette's doorstep instead, seeking the comfort of one of her closest friends. When Yvette saw her there, bedraggled and dripping wet, for the typical Sprawling bank holiday weather had kicked in by now, red eyes and mascara running, she scooped up her old friend and brought her inside.

"Who is it?" Marko called from the bedroom.

"It's okay, it's Sylvia," Yvette called back. "Go back to sleep."

Turning to Sylvia, she said, simply, "What happened?" but that was enough to cause Sylvia to break down in tears. Yvette led her to a chair and waited patiently until Sylvia felt able to speak again.

"He blanked me," she said. "His wife was with him and he blanked me. I thought he was different. I really did, but he isn't."

"That must have been such a shock for you."

"Yes." Sylvia knew why she had gone to Yvette rather than any of the other Proton Pussycats. She didn't judge, not in a crisis like this. She simply seemed to understand exactly what Sylvia was feeling. There was no "I told you so," or "Married men are all bastards who want to have their cake and eat it, you were dumb to think this one was any better." Just acceptance.

"What are you going to do?" Yvette asked, gently. Any of the others would say, "Ditch him!" but Yvette would simply let her talk until the best solution for Sylvia emerged all by itself.

"I don't know," Sylvia said. "It's complicated. I can't not see him again."

"Someone from work."

"Yes."

"Your phone is ringing," Yvette pointed out. It had been ringing on and off all evening, but Sylvia had ignored it, feeling too devastated to talk to anyone. In the company of someone else, the ethic that a ringing phone must be answered promptly re-asserted itself; although by the time she had fished the device out of her bag, the ringing had stopped. She saw twelve missed calls from Jack Ward. She turned the phone off. "Was it him?" Yvette asked.

"Yes. I can't talk to him yet. But the day after tomorrow I have to go to work, and he'll be there and I can't avoid him."

"Someone you work closely with, then."

"Yes. Yvette, if I tell you something, will you promise not to tell any of the others?"

"Yes - I promise I will not tell the rest of the Proton Pussycats or anyone else that you've been sleeping with Jack Ward."

"What? How did you..."

"It was obvious. Let me put it this way. If someone shot my boss dead, I'd be shocked, worried about what would happen with my job, and I'd be sad, because he's a decent bloke. I wouldn't faint dead away. But if someone shot Marko and killed him it would be a different story."

"Oh. Well. You're right. It is Jack Ward."

"For what it's worth, I think you'd make a much better First Lady than that Melie woman. She seems to do nothing but buy shoes, have her hair done and swan around at official functions. I doubt she could hold up her end of a conversation about politics the way you do."

"Thanks - but she's still got him."

"I know. So what will you do?"

"I can't go on working for him, not after this. I shall have to resign. Start looking for another job."

"Well, with an impressive CV like yours, you shouldn't have any trouble finding something."

"If another employer could see past the fact that I resigned from being Jack Ward's right hand woman for no obvious reason. I don't know what reason to give in my resignation letter, either. It will go on my file, so I can't tell the truth."

"You'll think of something," Yvette said. "You always do - but now isn't the time to be working on that. You should go to bed, get some sleep and tomorrow you can figure out what you're going to say. I'll help, if you want me to."

"Thanks," Sylvia said.

**

Two mornings later, Sylvia went home to change into her work clothes. The screen on the wall told her Jack had called several times and left messages. She deleted them without listening to them. She put on make-up, slipped the envelope containing her resignation letter in her handbag, and steeled herself to face him.

The office was a short Arrow ride away. Sylvia went straight to her office, as normal. Maive, Lissa and Jorge were already at their stations and hard at work. Maive looked up when Sylvia entered. "The President is looking for you," she said.

"I'll bet he is," Sylvia muttered under her breath.

"He said to tell you to go and see him the moment you got in."

"Thank you," Sylvia said. "I'll go when I've checked my messages." She went into her office and closed the door.

"What's the matter with her?" Lissa remarked.

"I don't know," Maive said. "She looks quite ill to me. She's tried to hide the dark circles under her eyes, but she hasn't quite managed it. I hope she's okay."

"I'm sure she is," Jorge said. "She wouldn't be at work if she didn't feel up to it."

"You clearly don't know Sylvia very well," Lissa said. "She'd get off her deathbed to come to work."

"I expect she's shaken up by what happened on Longest Day," Maive said.

"We all were," Lissa replied.

Jorge said nothing.

"Power Blaster was just amazing," Maive said, "the way he just appeared from nowhere and caught that bullet in his hand! That assassin didn't stand a chance! And still nobody got a decent picture of his face."

Sylvia sat motionless at her desk for a few moments. There was nothing she could do to put off her encounter with Ward for any longer. She fingered the envelope in her hand. Once she'd given it to him, there would be no coming back. Her resignation, effective immediately. She would not be coming back to this office, ever again. Security would escort her from the building without giving her a chance to come back and say goodbye. She hated goodbyes, so perhaps that was for the best.

She looked around. Being one hundred percent professional at work meant that there were few personal effects around her desk; nothing to distract her from her work. The one item she had there was a picture of herself with the Proton Pussycats on the Magnum ride at Funland - screaming as the car they were in began the final sheer drop at the end, their hair appearing to stand on end. She slipped the picture into her bag. There was nothing else she wanted to take with her.

She couldn't tell her team. They would want to know why. They deserved to know why, but Sylvia couldn't tell them. Saying goodbye would be so hard. Sylvia was thankful that when she came out, Lissa was not at her station and Jorge was on the phone; but Maive looked up. "I have today's stats from the Agricultural Department," she said.

"Good. Print it out and leave it on my desk. Good work, Maive."

Maive frowned. "It's only what I do every day."

"I know. But what you do every day is good. I wanted you to know that."

"Thanks."

"I'm going to see the President."

"Okay."

Sylvia bit her lip as she turned away. It would be the last time she would see Maive. She blinked back her tears as she walked to the octagonal office.

"Come," she head Jack say as she tapped on the door. She went in. "Sylvia," he said, getting to his feet. "Close the door. We need to talk."

She closed the door and walked up to his desk. "There's nothing to say," she said, handing him the envelope.

"What's this?" he asked.

"My resignation. Effective immediately. I can't do this anymore, Jack. Not after what happened on Longest Day."

"I'm sorry that had to happen," Jack said,"but it did have to, and I want to explain why. I couldn't get you on the phone, so I need you to listen to me now."

"Like I said. There's nothing to say. You want to have your cake and eat it."

"No. Heaven knows I don't get much cake from Melie."

"You blanked me, Jack. A smile or a nod wouldn't have cost you anything, but you blanked me, and I'm not sure I can forgive you. Goodbye, Jack." She turned to leave.

"Wait." He strode around his desk to catch her by the wrist. She stopped walking, but did not look at him. "Just hear me out. Let me explain."

"It won't make any difference," she said, "but go on, if you must."

"I must. We both know that the office of President of Innovia carries with it the trust of the people; that the President must be someone who is a man of his word. Someone who, if he makes a promise, keeps it, no matter what. You know, and I thought you understood, that if I am seen to break my vows to Melie, the people of Innovia will not trust my word in other matters. If I leave her, if I am unfaithful to her, I will no longer be seen as a man of my word. That would mean that come the next election, they'll vote Angus Soubris into office, and we both know that he is not fit to run this country, so as long as I am seeking to remain in this office, I have to appear totally faithful to the First Lady."

"I know all that," Sylvia said, "but smiling at me when you're with her is hardly being unfaithful. Surely you'd just be acknowledging a citizen. She doesn't know who I am."

"You don't know Melie. True enough, she doesn't know you now, but sooner or later there is going to be a public function and you and me and Melie will all be there. If I smiled at you, she'd commit your face to memory - and you're not easy to forget. When she sees you again, and realises you work for me, she'll remember seeing me smile at you. She will assume there is something between us. She will cause a scene and she'll file for divorce - and Innovia goes down the drain."

"Let me go, Jack," Sylvia said. "I told you. I can't do this anymore."

"Neither can I," Jack said. "I can't do any of this without you. Please."

Something about his tone made her look up into his face. His eyes were brimming with tears. "I can't lose you, Sylvia. If you are dead set on resigning..."

"I am," Sylvia said.

"...then I will resign, too. Today. I'll walk out of this office with you, right now. I'll tell Melie that I'm leaving her and we'll go away together. Take the yacht and live out on the ocean."

Sylvia looked at him. "Do you mean that?"

"I do. I'd rather leave this office and never come back than stay here without you. If I do it now, I can say that I'm leaving for personal reasons and the VP can take over - hopefully he can win the public over before the election."

"You can't do that," Sylvia said. "We both know Bill is nowhere near as popular as you and nowhere near as able to do your job. You can't let that happen."

"Walk out now, Sylvia, and that is what will happen, because I will walk out right after you. Whether or not you agree to go away with me."

"That's blackmail."

"No. It's the truth. I want you more than I want this job, and I will regret to my dying day that I ignored you."

"You're serious, aren't you? You really mean this." Sylvia had come to learn when the President had set his mind on something, and would follow through, no matter what the cost.

"Yes."

"I can't let you do that," Sylvia said. She picked up the letter on the desk, still unopened, and tore it in two. "I'll stay. We're in this together. I just want your word that when you decide to leave office, or you're voted out, then you'll leave Melie."

"You have it. If I'm not in office, she has no hold over me. In the mean time, we do still have to be discreet."

"I know." Sylvia wanted nothing more than to gather him into her arms then and there; but she knew that would be far from discreet. The security staff watched everything that took place in the octagonal office, so that they could intervene if an intruder got in. She knew equally that they didn't listen unless the President chose that they should and turned on the audio feed. They would not have heard a word either of them had said. They would simply have seen the President talking with one of his staff. Sylvia knew that the camera could not see that he was holding her by the wrist. Even now, Ward had thought of that and made sure he was positioned so that the camera wouldn't pick that up.

"I'd better get back to work, then," she said.

"That's probably best," Ward said, letting her wrist go.

Sylvia walked back to her own office, her mind in a turmoil. She loved Jack. He loved her, enough to give up the Presidency rather than lose her. Like him, she wanted the best for the country, and she'd made a decision to put up with the status quo for the sake of the country - only with the promise, which she knew would be kept, that one day Jack would no longer be President and then they could be together openly.

Her friends wouldn't understand the choice she had made, but she trusted their love for her as much as she now trusted Jack's. They would tell her she was being stupid; but they would still be her friends.

She paused by the door to watch her little team at work. They were all bent over their screens. Jorge was talking almost furtively on the phone. He had a thing about people listening to his calls. Lissa was twisting her hair around her finger, as she had a habit of doing. Maive had acquired a plastic figure of Power Blaster and had placed it on the shelf in front of her. Sylvia felt a surge of affection for them. She was glad that she'd decided to stay. They would never know that when she'd walked out of the door less than half an hour ago, she had thought she would never be coming back.

"Are you all right, Sylvia?" Maive asked, looking up. "You looked very tired this morning."

"I was," Sylvia said, "but I'm fine now. Thanks for asking."


This is an excerpt from my new novel, Secrets and Skies. See below for full details!

New!

Jack Ward, President of Innovia, owes his life twice over to the enigmatic superhero, dubbed Power Blaster by the press. No-one knows who Power Blaster is or where he comes from - and he wants it to stay that way.

Scientist Desi Troyes has developed a nuclear bomb to counter the ever present threat of an asteroid hitting the planet. When Ward signs the order giving the go ahead for a nuclear test on the remote Bird Island, he has no inkling of Troyes' real agenda, and that he has signed the death warrants of millions of people.

Although the island should have been evacuated, there are people still there: some from the distant continent of Classica; protesters opposed to the bomb test; and Innovians who will not, or cannot, use their communication devices.

Power Blaster knows he must stop the bomb from hitting the island. He also knows it may be the last thing he ever does.

Meanwhile in Innovia, Ward and his staff gather to watch the broadcast of the test. Nobody, not even Troyes himself, has any idea what is about to happen.

Part One of The Raiders Trilogy.

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