Soulwaves : A Future History Part #3

This is the third part of my channeled future history of our planet Earth and humankind. Our hero, Shen, discovers it is he who is to lead a global initiative to save the planet from inundation from losing the ice at both the North and South Poles. He is of course oblivious that this apocalypse is nothing compared to the real reason he was sent as a Councillor to the Earth Plane.

Transcript

This is the third part of my channel future history of our planet Earth and humankind.

Our hero Shen discovers that it is he that is to lead a global initiative to save the planet from inundation from losing the ice at both the North and South Poles.

He is of course oblivious that this apocalypse is nothing compared to the real reason he was sent as a counsellor to the Earth plane.

Chapter 21.

Nanobots.

2079.

30 years left.

After what turned out to be a celibate night in New York,

Shen got a surprise when he boarded the tubeway that would deposit him in central London.

As he checked in,

He was informed he'd been upgraded to first class,

Which gave him a private pod.

He wondered if it was a gift from Cheng or even from Thom.

He settled into his sumptuous pod and scanned through the menu.

He was going to make the most of this crossing and ordered champagne and caviar to start.

All food was prepared in a central pod and transported through a horizontal dumbwaiter in the ceiling and then down the wall into a serving hatch.

While waiting for his first course to arrive,

He began analysing the structural plans of the panel that Thom had given him.

He was looking at it from a big data perspective.

And straight away he noticed something strange that must have eluded Thom and his team.

The graphenium iron cells which powered the plate were constructed using hexagonal graphene allotropes formed into a man-made molecular structure known as Buckminster fullerene.

Essentially it was carbon 60 or C60.

Each pseudo-molecule was made of 20 hexagons and 12 pentagons.

He then looked for patterns in the structure of the self-organising nanofans underneath the plate.

Four tetrahedral fans formed a cell with an equilateral triangle of three smaller fans topped with a larger fan.

Each of the four triangles of fans had aligned itself exactly to the lattice of the graphenium iron battery structure.

Chen realised that the bottom layer providing the lift knew about the structure above that was powering it.

The nanobots had some level of awareness of what was around them.

Intuitively he knew he discovered the what but was puzzled by the how.

He wondered if this was how his mother had levitated.

He also wondered what Chen was up to in sending him to see two nanotech experts when he was on a trip to see the comet flyby on its near hit.

The trip to America had taken its toll and after consuming most of the bottle of champagne Chen decided to skip the rest of the menu and sleep on it all the way to disembarkation.

His dreams were full of multicoloured geodesic shapes that seemed to explode into multidimensional forms.

At exactly 30 minutes before arrival Chen was woken by the whirring of a breakfast tray that slid out of the wall beside him.

As he wiped the sleep from his eyes the last remnant of the dream left him.

He felt someone or something leave the pod as he re-engaged in the density.

This was a bit weird as they were 30 metres below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean somewhere off the coast of Southern Ireland.

When he disembarked he was the first off the tubeway and it dawned on him why he might have been upgraded,

To give him some level of anonymity.

He was disavowed of this notion once he got through the arrivals gate and was met by a blast of paparazzi shouting questions like,

Are you sure the comet will miss us?

Is this the end of the world?

Two burly minders grabbed his bags and both his arms and ushered him into a large limousine.

Chen recognised it as a Rolls Royce and had always wanted to travel in one.

This model was of course electric.

A demure lady in a smart navy dress was already in the car and introduced herself.

Welcome to London Chen,

I'm Sheila Buswell she said.

You're the Mayor right?

To what do I owe this honour?

Said Chen.

He had done a little research into London.

Your discovery of the comet gave us the impetus to start researching how to save this great city,

Said Mayor Buswell.

What we've come up with could help all major low-lying cities across the globe.

Chen was learning the ways of the world quickly.

The British had been and were some of the brightest innovators in the world for hundreds of years.

The inventors of steam engines,

The telephone and television were all British,

Or Scottish more to the point.

Chen suspected that whatever they had come up with needed both Chinese money and resources so it could be upscaled.

It was in London that it started to sink in that Chen's suggestions for whom he should meet were not random nor for his interest only.

His short trip in the roller took him past the Houses of Parliament and Buckingham Palace.

This was a revelation for Chen and such a culture shift from anything he'd seen in the US.

Mayor Buswell gave him a quick guided tour as they passed by buildings with hundreds of years of history.

He picked a rare sunny March day for his arrival in London.

His destination was Imperial College,

Still one of the leading centres for engineering research on the planet.

You'll spend the day here with Professor Mike Spence and his team.

Will you do me the honour of joining me and a few colleagues later for dinner?

Of course Mayor Buswell,

It would be my pleasure said Chen.

His parents had instilled politeness into him from an early age.

And do call me Sheila tonight.

We'll meet at 7pm and we're dining at the Savoy Grill.

Chen wasn't quite sure if she was flirting with him a little but let it pass by.

He'd been told he was being put up at a hotel called the Savoy as a guest but hadn't thought to look it up.

As he got out of the car,

He was met by a tall,

Slightly balding man with round rimmed glasses.

Mike Spence?

Asked Chen.

The one and only.

I am so glad to meet you Chen.

Chapter 22.

Nano Walls.

2079,

30 years left.

Mike Spence was the polar opposite of Thom Waters.

With a rather limp handshake and no immediate eye contact.

Chen suspected they wouldn't be drinking themselves under the table that evening.

Professor Spence whisked him off to his private office and started to grill him on how he found the comet.

It became clear to Chen what he really wanted to know was if the Chinese prediction for sea level rise confirmed his own projections.

So it's a complete melting of both ice caps and 70 metres and by when he asked.

Chen confirmed his suspicions.

Definitely by the end of the century for the melting of the ice caps,

But sea level rise in two waves.

We'll get a 35 to 40 metre rise by the end of 2099 and presumably a gradual 30 metre rise over the following 20 years or so,

Said Mike Spence,

Pushing for confirmation.

Something like that,

Said Chen.

Let me show you what we've been working on,

Said Professor Spence.

Chen sensed that Mike Spence couldn't wait.

They walked down a long corridor through two security checks and Mike ushered Chen into a changing room.

We'll need to be clean,

So that means showers and suiting up I'm afraid,

Said Mike.

This was a new one for Chen,

But it just increased his excitement.

Suited up with breathing apparatus,

Chen followed Mike through an airlock and into a large square room.

In front of them was a large scale model of the City of London and the surrounding counties.

They approached the model from the mouth of the Thames estuary.

This is one neat bit of 3D printing,

Said Chen.

No it's not,

Said Professor Spence.

Erect another set of buildings in Dockland,

Simon.

Chen then noticed someone at the end of the room who waved his hand over a console and then Chen heard a slight hum.

In front of them,

Where the estuary narrowed and London began,

Several buildings emerged right along the side of the river in a clear bit of land.

There's the printer,

Said Chen.

These aren't printed,

They are grown from the soil,

Explained Professor Spence proudly.

We're using nanobots to eat the soil and just like termites,

Build structures by regurgitating it.

Now watch this.

Simon go for a ten metre rise.

Some gurgling started and the water around the model began to rise.

As it did so,

At what must have been ten miles in from the coastline,

A wall came out from nowhere,

Angled at around 30 degrees.

While some of the low-lying areas became quickly covered in water,

The centre of London was surrounded by a protected wall and the river was barricaded.

Nanobots again,

Asked Chen.

Chen said you were a quick learner.

Now watch this.

Go for a one metre wave height,

Simon,

And dim the lights.

Ripples appeared on the surface of the water and the tiny buildings and roads started to twinkle.

So don't tell me,

Are the walls generating from wave power,

Said Chen.

You got it.

We found that this specific angle for the walls gives us maximum energy conversion,

Said a previously quiet Simon,

Who couldn't contain his enthusiasm for what had been his idea.

33.

33 degrees is what the nanobots iterated to give maximum energy transfer,

Said Professor Spence,

Cutting Simon short.

Chen started to walk around the model and saw that to the south of London,

Two ridges of hills were now islands.

There were also islets north-west too,

A walled corridor spread out to the west,

Creating a dry inland area of urban carnivation.

So this would save Shanghai and the low-lying areas in Hong Kong,

Asked Chen?

And cities like Amsterdam,

New York,

Rio de Janeiro,

Tokyo,

Dubai?

You want me to go on?

No,

I get it,

Said Chen,

Thinking there was not much time to get all of this up to scale.

Chen looked around as another suited figure entered through the airlock.

Shen's mask hid his surprise when he heard the unmistakable voice of Chen say,

Professor Spence will be in Beijing when you get back from your grand tour.

Welcome to your new project.

Shen's mask also hid a grin that went from ear to ear.

So not only had he discovered the cause of the impending global catastrophe,

But he was going to be working on the solution too.

The four occupants of the room went back through the airlock and got back into their normal clothes.

Shen learned that Simon was to join the project as well,

And was glad to have someone closer to his age on board.

Shen left the college in her roles again,

But this time with Chen.

They were driven to the Savoy Hotel and deposited in adjoining suites with river views.

Meet me for afternoon tea at 4pm,

Said Chen.

But don't eat too much then,

As we've been taken out for dinner by the mayor.

Shen had a much needed power nap.

The late night with Son and the tube lag had got to him.

After what seemed like hours but was only 45 minutes,

Shen's alarm awoke him.

He got into fresh clothes and met Chen in the most elegant and opulent tea room he'd ever experienced.

Chen asked him how he got along with Son Waters.

Shen shared his early research into how the nanolayer seemed to have some low-level awareness of the upper graphene layer.

Are these two nanoprojects related,

Asked Chen?

That's for you to find out,

Replied Chen,

Somewhat enigmatically,

And to make sure neither team finds out about the work of the other.

Chen then brought him up to speed on the scope and scale of the nano seawall project.

We're funding all the research and the construction projects,

Shen,

And in exchange,

China is going to become the provider of energy for all the world's major cities,

Said Chen.

That's cool,

Said Chen,

So they will pay us back in electricity bills.

Shen was still a little naive about real political agendas.

That's about it,

Said Chen,

So Professor Spence will be the project lead,

But you are effectively in charge.

So how will that work,

Asked Chen?

Simple.

He will think he's making all the decisions,

But you and I will be steering the ship,

Chen said.

Shen suspected that what Chen really meant by this was that Shanghai and Hong Kong would get this technology first,

And London would be the third in the queue.

Chapter 23.

Peaks and Troughs.

2079,

30 years left.

Supper at the Savoy Grill would be one of Shen's most memorable dining experiences to date.

He and Chen were ushered into a dimly lit private room at the back of the main restaurant.

As Shen expected,

The mayor was there.

She had told him that she would bring her chiefs of fire,

Police and water services.

Professor Spence was there too,

But disappointingly for Shen,

No Simon.

What he hadn't even considered,

That he would be introduced to the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The Prime Minister,

Rosemary Bailey,

Could only be in her mid to late thirties,

And the Chancellor,

Gary Plunkett,

A few years older.

They both shook Shen's hand warmly and asked him to sit between them.

Just as he settled,

The doors opened,

And everyone stood up.

And then,

Even more surprisingly,

President Miang and two others he recognised from his presentation in the Grand Lecture Theatre,

Walked in.

The President made a beeline to Shen and shook his hand first,

Then sat opposite him.

He discovered that the two he recognised from three years earlier held the equivalent roles to the UK's Prime Minister and Chancellor.

They sat on either side of President Miang,

Opposite their counterparts.

Shen learned their names over the course of the evening.

Keung Luan had been the longest serving Prime Minister since the Communist Revolution,

In his post for 27 years.

Shen made a mental note that evening,

To do some digging on the Chinese Chancellor,

Who had only been in her role for two years.

He would learn later that she had been drafted into this role specifically to broker this deal.

He would also glean that she spoke fluent English,

Although she pretended all evening she didn't understand the word.

What intrigued Shen,

Though,

Was her name.

Surely it was no coincidence she was called Wu Zetian.

Between everyone's cutlery was a wireless earpiece.

Shen followed as everyone put on their translation devices.

Translation these days was done by AI and was virtually instantaneous.

Shen took his off discreetly when he realised he didn't need it,

Being fluently bilingual in Chinese and English.

Let's eat first,

Pronounced Miang.

A flurry of servers appeared from the shadows.

Wine glasses were charged,

Which pleased Shen,

As this was all a bit high-powered for him.

He needed something to calm him down.

The starter dish was Shen's most memorable of the evening.

The flavours of the glazed omelette Arnold Bennett were sublime,

With the smoked haddock not too overpowering.

Miang surprised everyone by saying,

We have Enoch Arnold Bennett,

The author of The Imperial Palace,

To thank for this.

First created in the 1920s,

I believe.

Nobody else had even heard of Bennett,

Not even the British Prime Minister,

Who held an Oxford degree in English literature.

Course followed course,

And sometime in between the beef wellington and the blueberry drenched mandarin posit dessert,

The pleasantries were replaced by a more serious tone.

A slightly tipsy Shen,

Who had not said no to any of the wines,

Had never been to a meeting of this nature.

It brought home to him the seriousness of how his discovery was to affect matters on a global scale.

It was agreed that Professor Spence would relocate to Beijing,

With Shen seconded to his team,

And both reporting directly to Cheng.

It emerged Cheng was busy on another important project,

On which no details were shared.

Shanghai was indeed to be the location of the first pilot project,

Followed by London.

Representatives from low-lying cities around the globe would then be invited to visit either location,

And a technology license was to be offered free of charge.

China would receive the lion's share of the revenue from power generation.

London was to be the banker and broker,

Handling and managing the legalities and the collection of revenues,

In return for a service charge.

And what if the city doesn't want to pay for the electricity,

Asked Chancellor Plunkett.

Simple said a translated Wuzetian,

Quite coldly.

They will get to the back of the queue,

And they can pay for construction.

And timescales,

Asked Prime Minister Bailey.

Cheng said,

It's best if Professor Spence answers this.

Shanghai's nanowalls will be in place by 2083,

He said,

And London one year later,

With other cities soon after that.

Cheng cut in.

Once deployed,

The walls established themselves in less than a year.

After the design has been done,

The system builds itself using local raw materials,

We just monitor it.

Cheng was a little surprised it would be so soon,

Having only just seen a scaled-down prototype.

Conversations then split,

And translating earpieces were removed,

As people migrated to a private bar.

Cheng went to sit with Professor Spence,

And discovered that the project was much more advanced than the small model he'd seen.

A full-scale working prototype had been in operation for a year,

In a small coastal town called Cromer in Norfolk,

Around 140 miles northeast of London.

Locals had been told it was a wave power project,

As the potential sea level rise wasn't yet in wide circulation,

Being contained only to conspiracy theory websites.

As the evening came to a close,

Everyone made a point of saying goodnight to Cheng.

Cheng went up to his suite,

Along with Cheng.

He changed into his student garb,

Put his baseball cap on,

And made his way out onto the strand.

He found a local pub to process what he'd learned.

He tasted warm English beer for the first time.

After three pints of Sam Smith's OBB,

He introduced himself to three ladies at the end of the bar,

Explaining,

With a faux accent,

That he was in London for the first time,

And wanted to improve his English.

The three girls welcomed the charming young Chinese man,

And taught him the choicest of traditional and contemporary English swear words.

Cheng ended up taking one of them up to his suite,

Not realising she would be his very last dalliance.

The next day,

Cheng and Cheng had a brunch in Cheng's suite.

Cheng sensed Cheng might have been up a little late the previous evening.

Cheng explained how the project would unfold,

And how and when Cheng was to report to him.

He also explained that Cheng's external role would be as an ambassador for the project,

And this would be starting in Amsterdam on his way over to Iceland.

Chapter 24.

Sea Rise.

2079.

30 years left.

Cheng didn't have to check out of the Savoy,

As everything was already pre-paid.

As he walked out,

A limo purred up just outside the door.

Cheng tossed his luggage in the trunk,

And insisted on walking down the embankment and over Westminster Bridge to embark on the tubeway to Amsterdam.

As Cheng had told him,

Cheng would be met by the mayor of Amsterdam,

Who was not yet to be told about the narrow wall project.

The Dutch were very able civil engineers,

And had been holding back the sea for hundreds of years.

It would be best if they continued with their own efforts,

Just in case they came up with any better solutions.

The trip across the North Sea only took 30 minutes,

And Cheng was greeted by the mayor,

Martijn Ollongren,

Who reminded him of a slightly older Monique.

Intuitively,

He knew she was unavailable.

Mayor Ollongren and a few cronies took Cheng to The Five Flies,

An upmarket restaurant with original works of Rembrandt on the walls.

The setting was polished,

But the company was on edge.

They wanted to extract from Cheng what he knew about the predicted rise in sea level.

Cheng had told him to be open with his answers,

And not to give them a rose-tinted view.

After lunch,

Cheng got deposited at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel,

Where once again he found a suite had been pre-arranged and paid for.

Martijn thanked him profusely for being so forthright,

And handed him a goodie bag full of local paraphernalia.

He was sure she winked at him as she said her goodbyes.

That evening,

Cheng was left to his own devices,

And discovered Genova gin and the joys of marijuana.

He got annihilated,

And ended up alone in his posh hotel room.

It was not like him to ignore the charge of a cannabis-induced erection,

But that night the effects of the gin won.

The next day,

He took the maglev to Copenhagen,

Which gave him an hour to sift through the contents of his loot bag.

It was mostly trinkets and tourist trophies that he left on his seat for someone else to enjoy.

What he did keep was a set of VR glasses,

Labelled Sea Rise,

And trademarked.

In Copenhagen,

He transferred to another maglev that would take him across country,

Via Odense on the island of Funen,

Over to Aarhus in Jutland.

He'd been told Skolgade,

The drinking street,

Was well worth a visit by the bartender who supplied him his joints in Amsterdam.

As he travelled across the very flat country of Denmark,

He donned the Sea Rise glasses,

And followed the intuitive in-glass menu.

Some invented Amsterdammers were making a small fortune selling these glasses that could simulate what the surrounding world would look like with any rise in sea level.

It appeared that Funen would end up being one tiny island of a few square kilometres,

Based around its highest point,

Frohburg-Wagnerhof.

After what was indeed a great night in Skolgade,

Shen hailed a self-drive with a guide to take him over to the western port of Eshberg.

His guide,

A small man who just shared his first name of Kurt,

Was pleased for such a high-paying passenger,

But a little surprised to find Shen wanted to go to Himmelberge,

The sky mountain,

Which was a fair diversion.

When they arrived at the foot of the highest point in Denmark,

Shen instructed Kurt to wait at the bottom in the self-drive,

While he walked,

Alone,

The 147 metres to the top.

He was glad for the exercise.

It was a clear March day,

Just two days before the comet was due to fly by.

It had been a naked eye object for a few weeks now,

And the world's press was in full frenzy.

Some people were starting to panic,

Even though many astronomers were confirming it would be a near-miss.

The sceptics weren't assuaged,

Because they were beginning to understand the significance of the comet's tail not being visible.

All that was discernible was a fuzzy cloud around the nucleus.

This is what a comet looks like when it's heading right at you.

At the top of Himmelberge,

Shen donned the sea-rise glasses,

And dialed in the predicted 70-metre sea-level rise.

The ground below him disappeared,

And he was left standing on a small islet.

In the distance,

He could see a few tiny peaks,

Including one in the direction of Funen.

As he got back into the self-drive,

And they made their way to Eshberg,

They didn't pass any ground much more than 20 metres high.

It was then that Shen realised some areas of the planet could not be saved.

Some people were just going to have to move.

The stubborn ones would perish.

Chapter 25.

Pulling Strings.

The tubeway journey from Eshberg to Reykjavik was a mere two and a half thousand kilometres.

This was relatively short,

Compared with Shen's crossings of the two largest oceans.

Shen found he had been upgraded to another first-class private pod.

This time,

He'd established at the check-in desk that it was paid for by the Icelandic government.

He'd already noticed his booking at the Hotel Borg had been credited back to his account.

At first,

He thought it might be because he'd been bumped out of his suite with the best view in the city.

A queue mail confirmed his booking was in place,

Including the booking for the smaller suite next door.

Increasingly,

He was getting the sense that he was not in complete control of his life events,

And that strings were being pulled from on high.

He was not sure if Cheng or President Miang was his main puppet master,

Or if Cheng might even be pulling Miang's strings.

As the tubeway set off for a crossing that would take little over an hour,

A queue mail from Thom Waters came in that only strengthened Shen's intuition that there was more going on than he was privy to.

Thom sent some new plans of the underside of the devices that showed the nanofans had reconfigured themselves yet again.

The tetrahedrons had now stacked themselves,

So three small tetrahedrons rotated on the corners of the larger tetrahedron.

Thom reported that the lift had increased fourfold.

Shen was pretty tired and had planned to sleep,

As he was sure the forthcoming party would be full on.

As he slept,

The 11 remaining counsellors,

Hanging round in the everywhere and everyone,

Noticed that the timelines had straightened again.

Ripples and distortions appeared in the high dimensional view when events in the density went a little off track.

Such deviations were necessary to introduce randomicity and innovation.

The previous nanofan configuration was an example of such a deviation.

It was a nice idea not yet fully landed.

Counsellor 7 had made the adjustment just when the time was right.

The metaphysics of the void had again influenced the physics of the density.

At the nano level,

This influence no longer had to go through a channel or medium.

The counsellors could pull these nanostrings directly.

By the time Shen was arriving in Reykjavik,

Cheng and Miang were nearly back in Beijing.

They had gone overland and,

Like the counsellors of which they had no awareness,

Generally agreed everything was running smoothly just as planned.

In the void,

The counsellors were happy the transition to epoch 6 was on track.

Only counsellor 7 knew that their collective strings were being pulled too.

She had a direct line to the top of the chain of command,

In this universe at least,

But did wonder who or what might be pulling strings higher up still.

Chapter 26.

The Key.

2079.

30 years left.

As soon as Shen disembarked from the tubeway in Reykjavik,

He knew he could no longer hope to pull off the anonymous student guys.

The weather was being kind and he arrived to bright blue skies on a cold March morning.

The forecast was clear skies for the whole of the evening.

Reykjavik was in for a treat as nothing would obscure the full moon that evening.

Shen didn't know his mother had seen to that.

Shen was the first passenger ushered off the tubeway and was met by a barrage of reporters and flashing cameras.

He was instructed by the driver of the tubeway to walk down a red carpet.

He then met several dignitaries,

Starting with the manager of Hotel Borg,

The head of tourism,

The heads of emergency services,

The mayor of Reykjavik and finally the president of Iceland herself.

Thank you Shen for coming to our country at this momentous time,

Said President Minerva Dutte,

Handing him a large gold key that she had been passed by Mayor Ullafur Bryndarsson.

It's my honour to be here,

Madam President,

Says Shen,

Genuinely moved by the occasion.

She replied,

Please call me Joanna and this is your key to the city of Reykjavik.

All the bars and restaurants have been told to give you what you want for free.

You have single-handedly brought so much business to our country,

We cannot thank you enough.

Shen blushed at such an accolade.

The president beckoned the hotel manager over.

Mr Sigurdsson will see you settled in your room,

Shen.

Will you join us for lunch?

Of course,

Replied Shen,

As the hotel manager walked him over to his transport to the hotel.

Bizarrely,

Shen was about to have a quick tour of the city in a horse and cart.

The streets were lined with people taking pictures.

He'd become a minor celebrity.

By the time he got to the hotel,

His blushes had abated and he was getting to like the idea of a small amount of fame.

The staff at Hotel Borg knew exactly who he was and showed him deference,

As if he was a foreign head of state.

Mr Sigurdsson introduced him to an attractive young lady called Freya.

Anything you need,

Freya is your concierge and will get it for you.

She'll take you anywhere you like over the next two days you are with us,

Said Mr Sigurdsson.

Can I see my suite,

Asked Shen,

Pleasantly surprised at this turn of events.

Freya walked him over to the lift and guided him to his suite,

Where he found his bags had already been deposited,

Along with four heavily protected flight cases he'd shipped from China before he left.

Shen knew exactly what he wanted to check in the tower suite.

He went straight up the stairs to survey the neat living room with a panoramic view over Reykjavik.

Is everything as you wanted,

Asked Freya?

More than perfect,

Could you give me a hand to set up some equipment,

Asked Shen.

It was then that Freya began to realise Shen wasn't just some lucky student who discovered a comet by accident.

With her help,

Shen turned the room into something looking like a mission control room,

With a bank of monitors and an array of devices that Shen had carefully aligned at one point in the sky.

After an hour or so,

Shen donned his baseball cap and grabbed the gold key.

All set to record,

He announced,

Shall we go and see what doors this key will open?

Sure,

I know this city like the back of my hand,

Said a confident Freya.

Shen asked,

Where's your favourite bar,

And not the most popular bar,

But the one you like the best.

Shen got Freya to take him out of a back door and they walked a few blocks to a bustling student bar.

It was only midday but the city was heaving.

Freya showed the key to the barman and explained who Shen was,

And how the bar would be reimbursed for anything they drank.

Shen ordered a large craft beer for himself and was pleased that Freya wanted the same.

He then surprised himself and the occupants of the bar when he stood up and said,

I've got this key,

Who'd like a beer?

They're free for the next hour.

Shen had intentionally created the resulting pandemonium so he could chat to Freya alone.

The bar was deluged with people ordering as much as they could carry.

Beer in Reykjavik was always costly and prices had been inflated even more for the comet transit.

From the moment he'd set eyes on Freya,

Something was stirring inside Shen,

Beyond his usual base cravings.

His heart was literally buzzing.

He didn't know that hers was too.

Neither of them knew that their meeting was no accident,

And one of those cell wave manipulations in the density that the counsellors could pull off easily.

Shen found out that she was a primary school teacher from Akureyri in the north of Iceland.

At 23,

She was only two years into a job,

So the only way she was going to be at the best party in the world was to work.

She'd applied for loads of jobs and was unsuccessful.

She'd all but given up when just two months ago,

Her headmaster got a request from Hotel Borg for someone to act as a personal guide for one of their guests.

She was interviewed remotely and got the gig.

Shen started to tell Freya about the aftereffects of the comet's passing.

He so dearly wanted to share,

With someone of his own age,

His new role in the seawall defence project,

When they were interrupted by the thunk of fresh drinks at the hands of a buoyant barman,

Clearly pleased with his rise in takings.

Shen realised that the time was fleeting,

So they gulped their beers quickly and headed back to the hotel.

They entered by the back door and made their way to the lobby to be greeted by a relieved hotel manager.

Lunch is starting in five minutes,

Shen,

He said,

And you are at the TV station at 3pm.

Freya will pick you up from there at five.

This was news to Shen,

Who was slightly gutted that Freya was leaving him and that his day was being somewhat stage managed.

He was sandwiched between the president and the mayor for lunch and he sensed what was coming.

After a strange amuse-bouche of something fishy and indescribable,

They started grilling Shen about what he knew about the rise in sea level.

The news had reached heads of government but was not generally known by the populace.

As the first of seven courses arrived,

Each with its own matched wine,

Shen told them probably more than he should have about the nanowar project.

He realised the two large beers before lunch were probably now a bit of a mistake.

The president wanted to know how the rollout for other cities was being decided upon.

Shen genuinely didn't know at that time that it was going to be his call,

But he asked to borrow a tablet.

He showed them how Reykjavik was an ideal candidate,

As it was surrounded on three sides by reasonably high terrain.

They stopped the interrogation once they learned that their basaltic soils were perfect fodder for the nanobots and the defences would only take two years to build.

Shen was smart enough not to let on what he knew about how the acquisition of the technology would be funded.

Iceland was self-sufficient in thermal energy generation,

So they would have to pay for it.

Chapter 27.

Everywhere and Every When.

In the latter part of the 21st century,

One of the most interesting and useful places to hang out was in Shen's pineal gland.

Counsellor Seven was spending a lot of time there,

Which is why Shen was getting an increasing sense that invisible strings were being pulled.

When you sit in higher dimensions,

It is easy to see how those in lower dimensions are so blinded to the true reality.

In the density,

For example,

Time is linear,

So everything has to happen in sequence.

To a counsellor,

Everything happens at once,

And the lines of time and how everything is connected are clear to see.

Counsellors were not restricted to hanging around humans.

They could be,

See and feel what it's like at the centre of a star,

Or the molten core of a rocky planet.

They could envisage life in the clouds of a gas giant,

Or at the depths of an ocean of methane on an icy moon.

At the same time,

They could be inside the compound eye of a fly,

The steaming gut of a cow,

Or inside a cell as it divides.

It was always fascinating to observe the very start of a life,

Or the moment of death and reabsorption.

The experience of being outside,

Yet inside,

The multidimensional mind of a human or dolphin,

At any time in history,

Was of course uniquely special.

It would seem bizarre for the vast majority of humans,

Who have no idea that they are 3D crystallizations with multidimensional minds.

Dolphins did realize that is exactly what they are too,

But just took it for granted,

Especially when they went traveling.

This ability meant that counsellors could impart a small part of their essence to any being.

This was somewhat less permanent than insertion,

And much less tortuous than extraction.

An essence could be bestowed as quickly as it could be withdrawn.

All woo,

Like Gia and Freya,

Could tap into this essence,

As did channels and mediums.

Such awakened beings were conscious of other intelligence working through them,

Although most of the time did not fully comprehend its true nature.

Many inventors,

Entrepreneurs,

Scientists,

And change makers were also influenced by the essence.

It imbued them with a certain prescience.

Thom Waters and Mike Spence were under the illusion that it was their brilliance and inventiveness that allowed them to innovate and go where nobody had gone before.

As for Shen,

His strings were being pulled too,

But not by Cheng,

Who was similarly imbued and unconsciously influenced.

Sublimely,

These strings were the very fabric of this particular universe.

They were the soul waves that attached all to all.

All counsellors were weavers of the fabric,

But in the density there was one place they were not allowed to go.

Black holes were no-go areas.

These points of infinite density and zero time were off-limits for counsellors,

And for that matter for any beings who value their very existence in the 3D world.

Only counsellor 7 knew why this had to be so,

And how to go where the other counsellors could not.

She had come from infinite density and zero time in the first place,

Which is why the other counsellors had no memory or consciousness of her insertion.

Chapter 28.

Fireworks.

2079.

30 years left.

Lunch was over by 2.

30,

And they all left on convivial terms.

The President and Mayor felt they had a direct line through Shen to a project that could save their capital and coastal cities.

He also liked them a lot and told them he would genuinely do whatever he could to help.

He knew that the project would benefit from testing many different soil types,

And made a mental note to make this project a special case.

Of course,

Only the counsellors knew at this point the importance of the Icelandic soil being most alike to that on the surfaces of the Moon and Mars.

Shen was handed back to Freyr,

Who sat closely to him in another horse-drawn cart on a short trip to RUV,

The Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

They looked like a couple made for each other already,

As they were fated by increasingly drunk revellers lining the streets.

When he got to the centre,

He was told he was to be the guest of honour for their television special that would be running from 6pm right through to sunrise the next day.

Shen had other plans for 9.

46pm,

The exact time of the full Moon and the transit,

And was already hatching other plans for later that night too.

He discovered that Freyr was bunking down with a sleeping bag in a sports hall 20km north of the city.

She could not believe her luck when she discovered she was to stay in an adjoining suite to Shen,

With the best view in the city of the transit and subsequent fireworks.

He explained to the producer that they had him until 8pm,

As he'd been invited to join the precedent for the transit itself,

And then he'd be back around 11pm.

In all the excitement of that evening,

His little white lie would be forgotten in the noise floor.

He was miked up and taken straight into the studio.

Around the table were two excited hosts,

Flanked by a panel of experts.

Shen recognised a few of them as being prominent astrophysicists.

Their intensity was palpable.

So too was the high voltage charge in the air,

Driven by the unprecedented nature of the live stream global event.

At last,

We are so thrilled to have the person who first discovered the comet,

Said the male host,

Whose first name was Magnus,

And second name unpronounceable to Shen.

Shen explained how he,

A mere student,

Had discovered it,

And how they still didn't quite know where it came from.

A big countdown clock behind him was ticking down to the actual transit time.

Even though it was Shen's first experience on live TV,

He just wanted to get back to Freyja.

The few hours in the studio seemed interminable to him,

And Shen was glad when the astrophysicist started to muscle in and answer questions on his behalf.

Promising again he'd be back later,

Shen left the studio a sliver before 8pm,

And he and Freyja went back to the same bar they'd been to at lunchtime.

They took a self-drive as the horses had been stable by this time.

After ordering themselves a double round,

Shen generously flashed the key to the city again,

Treating the whole bar to another hour of free drinks.

The barman cleared a booth for them,

And Shen finally got to know more about Freyja.

So my parents split up ages ago.

My mother lives in London,

And my father in Washington DC,

Said Freyja.

And yours?

Well my dad makes a living selling 3D models of solar systems,

Said Shen,

And my mum is a healer.

And so is mine,

Said Freyja.

I don't understand what my dad does though,

Something to do with blockchain at the IMF.

Shen spotted the double coincidence,

As both her father and his dad had amassed considerably large crypto accounts from millions of micropayments.

A sudden flicker in his being made him wonder if Freyja was a Wu,

Just like his mother.

As they got to the bottom of their second beer,

Shen said let's get back to watch the transit,

And we should eat something too.

The city streets were packed,

And there were singers,

Dancers,

And three entertainers in every square and on every corner.

This was one party city.

They sneaked in by the back door of the hotel,

And took the lift to the suite.

They walked up the steps into the upstairs living room in the tower suite,

And in between the banks of monitors,

Freyja was thrilled to see a table for two set up with a bottle of champagne on ice,

And a lavish buffet.

They were both ravenous,

Even though Shen had had a large lunch.

Shen had wishfully ordered enough food for two when he booked the room three years ago.

The hotel hadn't let him down,

And everything was on hot plates as requested,

So he wouldn't be interrupted by anyone serving.

At around 9.

15,

They stopped eating and looking at the monitors,

And like the rest of the city and the whole world,

Were mesmerised by the fuzzy white head of the comet.

It was below the full moon,

But discernibly getting closer to it by the minute.

At 9.

46 exactly,

The comet's head joined the moon,

And for less than a second became a black streak transiting the face of the moon,

Bottom left to top right.

The footage of the transit in super slow-mo hit the airwaves a few minutes afterwards,

And the irregular edges of the space rock were clear to see.

What surprised everyone,

That it was not oval or round,

But more like an irregular elongated cigar shape.

The earth had just experienced a near-miss firsthand,

And humanity could breathe a sigh of relief.

For an hour or so,

An anticlimactic air filled the capital,

And people started to wonder what all the fuss was about.

A small black cigar-shaped object had silently crossed the face of the moon after all.

If you blinked,

You would have missed it.

Then the earth and moon system moved into the comet's tail,

And the fireworks began.

Telescopes trained on the moon captured thousands of impact flashes.

Seismographs on the moon's surface were used to measure their mass.

Nobody was that interested in the lunar surface,

As the earth was deluged by the most amazing meteor display.

Shen explained to Freya that the bright orange and red colours were due to the large amount of iron in the comet's head.

He omitted to tell her that the earth's magnetic core was about to go unstable.

He didn't need to,

As Freya confirmed to him that she must be a Wu when she clutched her heart with a sharp pang of pain and said,

Mother Earth's heart just stopped beating and started again.

Shen couldn't wait to start analysing data from magnetometers and seismographs that he was tapped into across the globe.

That would have to wait though,

As he and Freya snuggled up on the large sofa and watched the celestial display until the early hours.

He had never felt so comfortable with another human being.

Shen kept awake until he heard Freya gently snoring.

He allowed himself to sleep too,

Knowing their own fireworks would have to wait another night.

The near hit brought the world together.

Virtually all 9 billion self-aware inhabitants of the planet watched it live or near-life.

Humans collectively breathed a sigh of relief.

It was known too that the comet wasn't coming back.

Several feats of engineering were pulled off that night,

Unseen by most.

Firstly,

The evacuated CSS had been cocooned in a mesh.

It was like a protective blanket,

Which absorbed any impactors at the time of transit.

Secondly,

Many geostationary satellites were moved to the side of the earth facing the sun for a few months.

As it happened,

Only a handful of satellites were disabled by debris from the tail.

Thirdly,

The Chinese successfully docked,

Landed and attached two iron engines to the comet.

Shortly after leaving earth orbit,

They were ignited and their controls set to take the comet into the heart of the sun.

This was a neat method of extraction of the comet for the counsellors,

As no evidence would be left behind for any subsequent sentient life forms to uncover about how the comet got there.

Tectonic activity on earth had been used to prevent anyone from Epoch 5 from discovering their true heritage.

On Mars,

Water and wind erosion had been less than successful as a mechanism.

It was just as well that when members of Epoch 5 discovered evidence of the root race of Epoch 4 in the next century,

That they would have no way to tell anyone about it.

What would never be fully appreciated by the human race is that some bits of the comet didn't miss at all.

The counsellors had successfully achieved the perfect hit and insertion that they planned.

The comet's trajectory meant the tail burnt up over Iceland,

But the larger remnants that made it down to the earth plopped straight into the northern ice cap.

As they were hot,

They just melted their way through the ice and floated down to the arctic ocean bed.

They would remain there undiscovered.

Some fragments did hit Greenland and were brought back for analysis by the Russo-Chinese team based there.

The remnants proved to be mostly iron,

As Shen predicted from spectral analysis.

There was lots of excitement about some complex hydrocarbons,

Which had researchers talking about panspermia,

Life seeded from space rocks.

A catalyst initiates a chemical reaction,

And just a few of its atoms or molecules get consumed in the reaction itself.

Similarly,

As the counsellors knew Epoch 5 was on its way out,

The seeds for the creation of Epoch 6 had been successfully inserted on planet earth.

Crystals from the comet,

Deposited on the ocean bed,

Were resonators that would interact with the noosphere if and when the time was right.

The counsellors always had seeds inserted on many planets as a backup should any experiment self-terminate.

It turned out that Freya was pretty spot on when she picked up intuitively that the heart of the earth had missed a beat.

The nucleus of the comet was only 2km in diameter,

But it was 15km long,

Like a cigar.

It was big enough for it to be a naked eye object as it flashed across the face of the moon.

It was the pure iron nucleus that was causing all the stir,

And especially the stirring of the earth's magnetic field.

In a heartbeat,

It had caused a north-south pole flip.

Temporarily,

The side of the earth exposed to the sun had been subject to a massive dose of ultraviolet radiation.

This would lead to the untimely demise of a large number of people.

Remarkably,

The earth's magnetic field stabilised rapidly by the time morning broke in Europe,

But with the north pole somewhere between South America and Antarctica.

The following few decades would see it collapse and flip back to its old orientation.

The devastation to life on the planet would be catastrophic as a result.

The scientific community was coming to the conclusion that the comet was a wandering superconducting magnet,

With a field millions of times stronger than the earth's.

They were puzzled as to why it wasn't detected ahead of its passing.

The counsellors had made sure the field was very localised and pointed at the earth just at the time of nearest transit.

This particular messenger had been sent earth's way over a million years ago from a magnetar at the centre of the galaxy,

Which harboured thousands of such objects.

They were useful magnetic bullets,

Used to flip the poles of planets from time to time.

The counsellors were happy the first step had been carried out successfully in the termination of Epoch 5 and its evolution to Epoch 6.

Shen,

Of course,

Had no idea of his real role in all of this,

But he had his finger on the right pulse,

Measuring how much the earth itself was tilting as a result of gyroscopic induction.

Chapter 30.

Conjunction.

2079,

30 years left.

Freya and Shen woke just after 7am,

And in the dim light of pre-dawn,

Meteor flashes were still discernible.

Coincidentally,

And completely overlooked by Shen in all his research,

The planets Venus,

Jupiter,

Saturn and Uranus were all visible near the horizon,

Not far from the setting full moon,

And in close alignment.

The three outer planets were just dipping below the horizon when they woke up,

With Venus following not long behind.

The comet was by this time on a new course,

Right into the heart of the sun,

After its lunar deflection and tweak by the iron engines.

Downstairs in the suite,

Shen had ordered a large breakfast for two,

Along with another bottle of champagne to go with the oysters.

Starting early,

Said Freya?

I thought you might show me Iceland today,

Said Shen.

I've ordered a cell drive so we can indulge a little.

I hope it's a 4x4,

Said Freya,

Knowing immediately where she wanted to take him.

That's what they recommended,

Said Shen,

Who didn't appreciate quite why.

After eating as much as they could,

And packing the rest for a lunch on the go,

They went down to a very quiet lobby,

As Reykjavik was nursing a collective hangover.

Shen was amazed how rugged the roads got so soon outside the capital.

Freya had dialed in the geyser called Strokkur as their first destination,

And was surprised how packed the simple track road was so early.

A quick search online revealed why.

The great geyser nearby had started to gush again,

After being dormant for over 15 years.

That's the pole flip,

Said Shen,

Who was checking news channels every 30 minutes,

Much to Freya's annoyance.

Nothing had leaked out yet about north being south,

And vice versa.

It was difficult to get near the two geysers,

As they were surrounded by some of the less hungover tourists,

So Freya took Shen off to see the amazing waterfalls at Gullfoss.

They spent a couple of hours walking around,

Before eating their packed lunch upstream of the waterfall,

Away from all the tourists.

On the way back to the capital,

Shen called Shen out of the blue,

And asked him where he was.

Just on the way back to Reykjavik,

After some sightseeing,

It feels like I'm on the surface of the moon,

Said Shen,

As they were crossing massive lava fields.

You know about the pole flip,

Asked Shen,

Changing the subject?

Of course.

And have you detected any tilt of the planetary axis,

Asked Cheng.

It's within normal deviations,

But out by 0.

001 degrees this morning.

Before you leave,

Tell the president that,

After much consideration,

The special topography of Reykjavik made it an excellent location to test the new nanowall technology,

Said Cheng.

What about the licensing fee,

As they already have thermal,

Asked Shen.

Cheng was pleased that Shen was developing commercial sense,

And said enigmatically,

No charge,

We need them more than you know.

What's this about,

Said Freya,

Cutting in.

Are you not alone,

Shen,

Asked Cheng.

I'm with my concierge.

Apart from telling the president face to face,

Please say nothing about this to anyone,

Said Cheng,

Sounding a little annoyed.

See you back in Beijing.

The line went dead,

And Shen blushed.

He intuitively knew he could trust Freya,

So he started to tell her about the significance of the north-south pole flip.

They drove to the Blue Lagoon thermal baths,

And Shen decided this was as good a place as any to let her into his world,

As they were at sea level.

So as the earth tilts,

The ice caps will melt,

Explained Shen.

And the sea levels will rise too,

Asked Freya.

As they relaxed into the hot yet smelly water,

Shen said,

In less than a hundred years time,

This will be about 70 meters below the waves.

So my hometown will go under,

Asked Freya,

Feeling the weight of his words.

Once one city is protected,

The technology can be transferred and redeployed anywhere,

And fairly quickly.

It will be down to your government as to what they save and protect,

But it will be feasible to save any large town.

So is this what you're working on when you go back to China,

Asked Freya?

Yes indeed,

Said Shen proudly.

Will you need a concierge,

Asked Freya wryly.

Shen was falling in love with everything about her,

Especially her twinkly eyes and the small dimples on her cheeks when she grinned.

So that evening over dinner,

At the exclusive Grilmar-Kardurin restaurant,

Freya and Shen hatched some plans.

The key had procured a table for them,

Even though the place was booked solid.

In less than 24 hours,

The soul waves beaming from each other's hearts were entangling.

Freya saw the opportunity for a new life away from her humdrum world of being a part-time teacher.

Shen sensed his role was enormous and that he would need some support.

Both of them knew they would make love that night.

Shen had no idea though that Freya would introduce him to the delights of tantric sex.

They shared each other's bodies where they had slept last night,

Under another spectacular meteor shower from the comet's tail.

The showers would continue for another three months and then repeat annually on what Iceland would call Shen Day.

The next morning,

After little sleep,

Shen knew his days of sleeping around were numbered.

He had fallen in love and so had Freya.

Over breakfast he told Freya about his plans for the remainder of his grand tour,

Taking a slow route back to China.

He figured this might be his last chance to see some of the places he had in mind to visit.

Freya had already decided to resign from a teaching job and had hoped the concierge gig would open doors.

An opportunity like this one was beyond her wildest dreams.

Along with his ability to access big data,

Shen had learned how to hack the most secure of systems.

It took him 10 minutes to secure a Chinese working visa for Freya.

He made sure he got a special class of visa that would allow Freya to become a Chinese national,

Should they ever marry.

Shen was always thinking ahead.

Within another hour,

Shen had upgraded the Tubeway tickets and various hotel bookings for two.

It made financial sense to upgrade to a private pod.

His technical kit was all packed up and being sent directly back to Beijing so that he could travel light.

First they had to take a quick trip to Akureyri to pick up some of Freya's things and to say some goodbyes.

The Tubeway North had only opened the year before and Freya had never travelled on one,

Always taking the bumpy five-hour road trip.

As they made their way down into the lobby,

They were greeted by the hotel manager,

The mayor and the president herself.

Shen was relieved as he wanted to give her the message in person.

Shen took the president aside and told her exactly what Shen had relayed to him.

In kind,

She told Shen that the key to the city was open-ended.

Neither of them knew that this would be academic.