EDGE OF DAY

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

"Oh," said the droid, somewhat disappointed. "Hang on." She tilted her head a little, sending internal communication. When she'd got her reply, her head tilted back and she smiled.

"There's been an opening one week today!"

"Oh, that's too bad," Day said, pushing around the droid. She was five meters from the exit.

"When?" the droid said, sounding panicked.

Day stopped. "Now."

"But it's 7 a.m."

"No time like the present."

The droid was on her internal communication system again. Day waited.

"Oh my goodness!" she said when she came back into communication with the environment and Day. "There is a vacancy right now, isn't that incredible!"

"Incredible."

"We'll have to hurry."

"Lead on."

The guide droid took her through a maze of corridors, away from the Living Dome, and eventually lead her into a gigantic, empty office, twenty by thirty meters long. The exterior three walls, all glass, looked across vast dune land. Day had only been out of the Arc twice in her life. Both had been school trips—one to visit a preserved twenty-first-century city, the other to an animal reserve.

The view was unsettling, wasteland for miles. Definitely not a hologram. The woman standing beside the far window was an even stranger sight. She wore a peacock-colored dress with a low back and bare shoulders. Her piled-up hair had corkscrew curls sticking out at the sides and several loose strands curving out of sight over a shoulder. One satin high heel was green, the other red.

"Hollis Day," she said, without turning around. "Welcome to the Vanquisher's quarters." The drawl in her voice made her sound ironic.

"Thank you. But I asked to see the Committee."

"Et voila!" The woman spun around, throwing up her arms with a theatrical twist of the wrists. Her sunglasses had red-rimmed edges. Large, flapping points pushed up from the bustier of her dress to her throat. She settled into a pose, one hand on her hips, chin tilted upwards. Through all the make-up Day guessed she was in her forties. "Already tired of being pampered?"

"Who are you?"

"I'm the chief wig, darling. The one upstairs. I'm the penthouse. Miranda," she said, rolling the "r" of her name, "for want of a better name."

Day's blood congealed. At best, the woman was eccentric, at worst, bat-shit crazy.

"You're in charge of the Multi-verse?"

"No, I'm in charge of access to the Multi-verse. The Multi-verse," she said, tilting her sunglasses down her nose and raising an eyebrow at Day, "bows to no man. It is a conundrum unto itself. Hence the little pickle we now find ourselves in."

"I was told I would have a meeting with the Committee."

"Nobody wants to be on the Committee. Have you seen this place? It's dead. Dead as doornails. Dead as mice. Apart from all the dollies, we're running on a minimum crew. Sixteen nurses for one hundred and fourteen thousand souls."

"Dollies?"

"The social androids, my dear. Now Hollis Day, give me one good reason I should let you sign the disclaimer and enter the Multi-verse."