Winter was here. The world was white, a dull, dark white barely illuminated by the tiny, cloud-covered sun. Loki was gently crossing that fine line between the still bearable and the positively uninhabitable. At minus 20°C, humans could still just function out in the frozen wasteland which they called Lake Bergman. There was no lake anymore, just a block of ice under the snow. Even the cliffs were blurred as every drop of water on the planet froze and fell to the ground. Everything was white, even the cloudy sky above.

Despite the inhospitable conditions, Karim was surveying his territory once more. The parka and synthetic fleeces he wore were protecting him from the worst effects of the cold, but he could still feel it. The freezing air seared his lungs as he breathed through his scarves and the protective flap of his parka. The tiny piece of skin exposed around his goggles was burned by the stabbing of minute particles of ice swept up by the wind. This was not weather to get lost in, he reflected. He instinctively turned to look back at the Dover cliff. There were still signs of human habitation there, reassuring little beacons of yellow light from the windows in the cliff face. Karim was not lost, or only in his thoughts. He turned back towards the invisible lake.

Three months. It had been nearly three months since Tony Verdeschi died, and Karim felt as though he was carrying the weight of the universe on his shoulders. The whole solar system seemed to be watching him, analysing, criticising, dissecting every one of his moves to see if the second generation kid would live up to Tony's trust. God, he had to be so careful. Any mistake now and both Dover and his whole generation would suffer.

The last three months had been a frenzy. The first thing Karim had done when he heard of Tony's death was sort out his private life. He had urged Brenda to return to Alpha, arguing that the last thing a Chief Administrator needed was a mistress. The last thing any self-respecting Alphan needed was a mistress, in fact, but Karim couldn't change the past. His only consolation was that his relationship with Brenda had probably run its course.

Karim sighed, breathing warm, humid air into the flap of his parka. He looked up at the white sky and wondered why life was so complicated. He had a good wife and five beautiful children; everything he had always wished for. Everything that duty dictated he should have. Just two years earlier, Karim would have sworn that was all a man needed.

Karim impatiently dismissed the thought. He didn't have time to think about such trivia. The early arrival of the blizzard season, two months sooner than in the last winter, meant that the base had to be closed earlier than expected. There was always plenty of work for the Chief Administrator; with the growing season finished, there were the factories and greenhouses to worry about, and a population of over a hundred men, women and children to organise. It never ceased to amaze Karim how litigious people could be, even with neighbours they had known all their lives. His duty was to settle other people's petty problems, rather than worry about his own.

As Karim watched, a small, orange streak briefly illuminated the dull sky. A meteorite, rare in this area, but common in the northern hemisphere as Loki drifted past the asteroid belt. Davey Kano would probably say that Loki was sending him messages or some other such crap. Karim had little patience for Alpha's self-appointed visionary; all the more so as Helena kept raving on about him.

Karim realised that he could barely feel his feet. The penetrating cold had truly penetrated, leaving his extremities numb and awkward as the blood retreated to warm and protect his vital organs. There was no reason for Karim to be out here. He had wanted to say one last goodbye to the outside and now that was done, it was time he got back to work.

As he slowly made his way through the thick snow, Karim could see two figures leaving the base by the main airlock, the only one that was still open. He reflected that he probably wasn't the only one who wanted to bid a last farewell to the fresh air. Even if "fresh" currently meant "freezing".

The two figures were heading up to the Heights, so Karim didn't pass them as he approached the airlock. The climb up to the top of the cliffs struck Karim as a particularly dangerous endeavour at this point in time. The hillside was completely obscured by large drifts of snow which blurred the features of the ground underneath. As it fell on dead vegetation on the Heights, the snow also sometimes created dangerous pockets of air which would collapse as soon as someone walked on them. Ellen Najim, a first generation Doverian born in Utah, had filed a complete report on her experience of harsh winters on Earth which detailed all the dangers of heavy snow. The conclusions of that report had been included in training for Dover's young; there was no reason for anyone to ignore the dangers.

Karim tried to call the mysterious pair walking up the hill, but his voice, muffled by his parka, got lost in the wind. Irritated, Karim entered the airlock and waited for the temperature to warm up. Once the computer indicated that he could remove his protective clothing, Karim undressed and impatiently tossed the various garments into their allotted storage areas. The parkas and thermal trousers were all shared items; manufacturing them required a great many artificial products which were expensive and wasteful to produce, so Tony Verdeschi had suggested making only a dozen of these suits, but leaving them at the airlock so that anyone could use them.

Once he was dressed only in his usual Dover uniform, Karim ignored the automatic opening of the inner door and accessed the computer terminal to find out who were the last people to leave the base. Given the weather conditions, only adults or accompanied children were allowed out of the base, and they had to log in to the computer at the airlock before it would let them out.

The names came up rapidly: Davey Kano and Sue Ellen Collins. Since he was alone in the airlock, Karim let out an audible growl. That damn Kano again. The man was really more trouble than he was worth, and his growing influence was a growing irritation. Karim sometimes wished there were some way he could extradite Davey back to Alpha. Let Koenig sort the lunatic out.

As he kicked on his indoor slippers and left the airlock, Karim allowed himself a wan smile at the pertinence of that thought. "Lunatic" did refer to someone under the Moon's influence after all. Karim wondered what the hell Davey was doing out on the Heights. He hoped the man would be wise enough to bring Sue Ellen back before her sister Becky found out.

Davey lifted his head and smelt the clean stream of air that flew past his face, momentarily oblivious to the biting cold that was freezing the membranes of his nose.

"Mmmm, it's good to be outside!" he shouted over the wind, reluctantly covering up with his scarf.

Wouldn't do to get frostbitten, or those damned Dover medicos might start enquiring as to whether he was looking after himself properly, and whether he was bothering to take his medication...

"What did you say?" asked Sue Ellen, stepping out of the airlock behind him.

"I said it's good to be outside," repeated Davey. "Although we're safe and warm living inside the cliff, I can't think as clearly in there as I can when I'm outside. It'll be a relief to climb up to the Lion's Jaws and meditate for a while."

Sue Ellen dipped her head, struggling to follow him as the wind pushed against her.

"Do you think all the snow we've had lately will have covered it?" she gasped, trying to draw breath without freezing her lungs. "Are you sure you'll be able to find it?"

"Of course I will!" replied Davey, smiling to himself. Sue Ellen had been eager to see his secret place of worship ever since he'd told her about it, a couple of weeks ago. She'd given him no peace until he'd agreed to take her to see it today, when they both had time off.

"I can't wait to get a look at that view you were talking about," said Sue Ellen, imagining how romantic snuggling up to Davey and staring out over the hill country to the south of Dover would be.

Romantic; everything about Davey Kano was romantic. His fascinating ideas, the way he looked, the way he spoke, his quiet air of authority and wisdom...

Davey strode forward through the cold, loving every minute of it. This would be his first winter on Loki, and he was certain it would be a time of many great spiritual discoveries for him. When the long cold season finally passed and the sun shone warmly on the planet again, who could tell what wondrous changes might have taken place in his life? The girl beside him, for instance -- what part would she play in his future? Hopefully an important one, but only Loki knew for sure.

As they toiled up the snowy incline towards Dover Heights, a meteorite blazed a brilliant orange trail across the sky.

"Look!" yelled Davey, as it disappeared into the clouds. "Loki is putting on her very own fireworks display, just for us."

"And for whoever that is," laughed Sue Ellen, pointing down towards a lone figure trudging across Dover Bay, on its way back to the airlock.

"Karim Habibi, no doubt," said Davey. "Master of all he surveys, and metaphorically rubbing his hands together with glee, now that Verdeschi is dead."

Sue Ellen didn't reply, merely pulling the hood of her parka more tightly around her head in an attempt to avoid the wind. She rather liked Karim and felt sorry for him, now that he had to shoulder the immense responsibility of being Loki's Chief Administrator. She would never say so to Davey though, as she knew he hated the very name Habibi. Something had happened between him and Layla, Karim's sister. Layla had upset him terribly in some way, when he first came to live permanently on Loki. Karim was Layla's brother, ergo...

The air was growing colder by the minute as Davey and Sue Ellen crested the Heights and passed the mound of icy snow that was the Temple. Looking out across Lake Bergman, Sue Ellen noticed a strange bank of white cloud, hanging close to the distant shoreline. Impenetrable to the eye, it cut off all vision of the countryside beyond it. She recognised what it was immediately.

"Davey, there's a blizzard coming," she said, pulling on his arm. "Do you think we should turn back?"

"Not necessary," replied Davey, coming to a halt. "I checked the weather forecasts a few hours ago and that blizzard should pass well to the south of us."

"I hope Mrs Verdeschi and her forecasts are right," shivered Sue Ellen. "That wall of cloud is so thick that you could almost imagine the world ends beyond it."

"Don't worry, Loki would never hurt those of us who believe in her," said Davey, taking her gloved hand in his own and pulling her onwards. "Remember; it's through each of us that she is reborn!"

Sue Ellen nodded vigorously. Davey had explained this part of his philosophy on the planet more than once to her. She knew she wasn't the brightest person and it had taken her a while to catch on to what he was talking about, but now she fervently believed in everything he said. Loki had a soul; a living entity at its heart that governed everything that took place on the planet. Davey called it The Spirit of Loki and every time a new child was born to one of the humans who lived on her, a little of that spirit entered the new being. This pleased Loki, as it brought a part of her into the corporeal world.

"We're almost there," said Davey, increasing his pace and forcing Sue Ellen to break into a jog. "You're the first person I've shown the Lion's Jaws to, and I hope you like it as much as I do."

The place Davey had nicknamed the Lion's Jaws was a natural rock formation that he'd discovered, shortly after returning to Loki. Shunning Layla Habibi-Garforth and her Temple, he'd walked along the cliff edge for a further couple of kilometres past Parnassus and Heathcliff, searching for a place of solitude where he could pray. There he'd stumbled across a strange rocky outcrop that resembled the head shape of an old Earth creature he'd seen pictures of, called a lion. The outcrop was hidden from view by a small bluff and he knew from the moment he set eyes on it that it was special. The jaws of the lion hung out over the cliff edge and he quickly found a way to climb down and sit inside them. The view was awe inspiring... prayer inspiring... voice and vision inspiring...

"Is that it?" asked Sue Ellen as they rounded the bluff, and the outcrop became visible.

"Yes!" shouted Davey exultantly, pulling her into a tight bear hug. "And just look at it -- the lion is wearing a crown of ice!"

The pair stared in awe at the strange icy snow crown, clinging to the top of the rock. It sparkled weirdly, the millions of snow crystals it was composed of refracting the dull daylight.

"Now follow me very carefully and don't let go of my hand," he continued, in a more serious voice. "It's not easy to get down here the first time and if you slip, there's nothing to break your fall for several metres."

Sue Ellen felt a thrill of fear that was almost erotic, as she carefully followed Davey down to the edge of the cliff. The wind pushed incessantly at them, refusing to give them a moment's respite from its bullying blast.

"Only ten more steps," panted Davey.

Sue Ellen began to count them.

"Seven, eight, nine, ten," she whispered.

And then they were there, sitting inside the jaws of the lion. They sheltered in a shallow cave at the back of its throat, staring out across their cold and inhospitable world.

"Hear the wind," Davey whispered in Sue Ellen's ear. "It's talking to us as it flies past, on its way around Loki. Hear its voice. Hear the Spirit in its voice."

Sue Ellen shut her eyes for a moment and listened carefully, as the wind moaned and wailed around the rocky walls of their shelter. At first she heard nothing, but gradually, she fancied she could catch the odd whisper of a word in the noise.

"I hear it!" she exclaimed, as a particularly large gust of wind pushed its way between the rocks.

She opened her eyes again and noticed that the daylight had become noticeably dimmer. Flurries of snow and ice were pouring off the clifftops in eerie plumes, flying away on the ever increasing wind.

"Davey, I think the weather forecast was wrong," she shouted in his ear. "The blizzard is almost on top of us!"

"Don't be frightened," said Davey, turning to Sue Ellen and resting his forehead on hers. "It'll pass quickly and no harm will come to us here. We can use the time to meditate."

The expression on his face was so relaxed and happy that Sue Ellen was immediately calmed.

"If you say so," she smiled. "And we're not cold here, sheltered as we are in --"

Suddenly Davey heard a strange groaning noise above them.

"Listen!" he said, holding up his hand.

The noise grew louder and dirt began to trickle down from the roof of the cave.

"It's going to collapse!" screamed Sue Ellen. "Davey, this whole thing is going to collapse. Let's get out of here!"

But there was no time. Before Davey could reply, the Lion's Jaws snapped shut...

"A blizzard?" repeated Karim, leaning forward on his cushion.

Mrs Verdeschi nodded calmly. "It was originally heading further south, but now it looks as if it's coming this way. I'm sorry about the short notice. It only changed course today."

Karim observed his senior staff thoughtfully. They were assembled in the meeting room, some sitting on chairs, others on floor cushions. Karim had become accustomed to sitting on the floor like his Arab ancestors, and since cushions were much cheaper to make than chairs, he felt that the practice reinforced the frugal image he wanted to project. Most of his second generation staff had followed suit today, though the number who did varied according to each individual's mood.

"Does that mean no Eagle until next week?" asked his wife Helena, who as Facilities Coordinator was also in charge of shipment. "We have a last container of foodstuffs to send up. What will we do with that if the Eagles can't leave?"

"For that matter, what about the people who wanted to leave?" asked Mrs Verdeschi. "My son and Michael Osgood have applied for jobs on Alpha, but they're not going anywhere in this weather. From the look of things, this blizzard will be the first of many, same as we had in year 19. This winter is simply harsher than the last one, and starting earlier. It's due to minute variations in Loki's orbit."

Mrs Verdeschi didn't seem too upset at the idea of her son being stranded at Dover. Karim knew that his own mother would have killed him rather than let him go to Alpha at fifteen. His little sister Aisha was also due to go to Alpha this winter, and Karim had to admit he didn't mind the idea of her being stranded on Loki either.

"So what should we do with our surplus products?" asked Pete Sauique, who was seated on a chair next to Mrs Verdeschi's. "We're currently running on an off-world production schedule in the food processing plant. Obviously, we can switch to a Dover-only production, but that still leaves us with some overproduction."

Karim shrugged his shoulders. "Get whatever you've got that's likely to spoil into a state where it can be kept until the thaw. Make pasta instead of bread, bleach all the rice, put the fruit into jam. Whatever it takes to minimise our losses."

"So your solution is to make all the wheat we have into pasta," said Sauique dubiously, a hint of disdain in his voice.

He was one head of section who found it difficult to adapt to Karim's leadership. Karim had done a short apprenticeship in the agricultural section as a teenager, and proved so useless at it that Sauique asked Tony to transfer him to a different section after only three weeks. It was clear that Sauique resented having his incompetent apprentice as a boss.

"So what do you want to do with it, Mr Sauique?" snapped Becky Collins, the Administrative Assistant. "Make it into bread so it can go stale? Wait for those damn mushrooms to get into it again? Karim's right. Get it processed into something that will keep a couple of years."

"As if either of you knew..." started Sauique.

"Do we have to discuss this right now?" interrupted Layla, her arms crossed on her maternity uniform. "The important thing is that there's a blizzard coming and we're going to be completely stranded. This isn't the first time, it won't be the last. Our priority should be to double-check our equipment and make sure the new computer systems know what they're doing. As far as the food is concerned, we can just do whatever we did last winter."

As if on cue, everyone looked at Mrs Verdeschi. Even Karim hoped she could refresh their memory on the subject.

The alien smiled at Karim and then said, "We did very much as Karim suggested. The raw materials were made into products that would keep, and then we just stayed put and waited for the storms to pass."

"We had a lot fewer raw materials left over," insisted Sauique. "The blizzards didn't start until the middle of year 18, by which time we'd reduced our stocks down here and sent most of our finished products to Alpha."

Karim sat up straight on his cushion, acutely aware that Sauique's chair was giving him a physical advantage in the discussion, reinforcing the advantage of his respectability and experience.

"We'll just have to do the same on a larger scale," said Karim firmly. "With any luck, we'll get some periods of calm in between the storms. Helena, contact shipping on Alpha and let them know our situation. See if Mr Carter has any suggestions about breaking our isolation. Do it before this evening; communications with Alpha are bound to be disrupted once the blizzard hits. Now, any more bad news before we break up?"

There was no more bad news, just a couple of general housekeeping items. Karim breathed a sigh of relief when Becky finally ushered everyone out of the room. He walked across the corridor to his office and leaned against the door after closing it, enjoying the silence and the strange musty smell from the wooden panels. The meetings were always a strain, and it was unfortunate that the blizzard just happened to be heading this way on a meeting day. Any other day, Karim could have dealt with the situation by messages and one on one discussions.

Leaving the door, Karim walked over to the window. The carbonite was warm to the touch, conducting none of the cold outside. It revealed a white landscape; a light mist blurred the distinction between the snowy ground and the cloudy sky, and a fine snow was falling. Karim hoped that nobody was outside. Mrs Verdeschi had already issued a blizzard warning which was broadcast to all the slates, so everyone should know they were supposed to stay within the base.

Thinking about the meeting again, Karim rested his forehead against the carbonite and sighed. It was bad enough when the base was open, but with the whole complex sealed, the fishbowl Karim worked in would be even smaller and more transparent than before. The confinement would amplify everyone's petty concerns; they would heap all of these on Karim and then sit back to see how well he coped.

Maybe it would have been easier if his whole team had started their jobs when he did. As it was, his own wife was the most recent arrival in her job, having started it just six months earlier. Everyone else had been in charge of their sections for years; they were used to reporting to Tony and found it difficult to treat Karim with the same respect. The fact that most were women and/or related to Karim was a help, but not a very big one. He wondered if he would ever live up to Tony's trust; he wasn't doing a very good job of it so far.

Karim banged his forehead on the window. It was no use berating himself for not being an instant success. It would be months, perhaps even years, before he would earn the same regard as Tony had enjoyed. Some people, Sauique perhaps, would never respect him and there was nothing he could do about that. Karim knew he had to do the best job he could, and he was confident that, eventually, he would be such a good Administrator that Tony's gamble would be thoroughly vindicated.

"Braining yourself isn't going to sort old Sauique out, you know."

Karim recognised Becky's voice and was annoyed that she hadn't knocked. He spun around and glared at her. She was standing by the door, but she had already closed it, ready for the weekly post-mortem of the meeting that she liked to inflict on him. Her favourite hobby was telling Karim how Tony would have handled things better. But Karim could give as good as he got.

"It might get me away from people who were raised in a barn, though," he said, sitting at his desk. "Can't you knock? I could have been naked in here."

"Great. That would seriously get everyone on your case. Tony Verdeschi's successor: a womanising nudist. The old folk would never trust us again."

Becky swished over to the window, just behind Karim. He automatically looked down at her skirt as she passed. This recent addition to the Dover uniforms certainly met with his approval. It highlighted a woman's hips and although it revealed as little as the traditional trousers, Karim liked the idea that a skirt could easily be lifted to uncover what was underneath. Even though his chances of getting anywhere near Becky's skirt were non-existent.

"Neat view. Looks like Alpha," she said noncommittally, staring at the white landscape outside. She then turned back towards Karim. "You know, we could run this place without the old guys. Maybe we should set a retirement age, speed them on their way. Sauique must be in his seventies by now. It's time John took over anyway."

"John?" Karim was amused. "I take it this sudden suggestion is motivated only by a desire to help me, not to advance your big brother's career."

"I wouldn't do that!" protested Becky, though with enough of a sly smile to make it clear she was joking about John's promotion. "But you have to admit Sauique's getting to be a pain."

"It isn't his fault, he just doesn't like me."

Becky lifted one eyebrow mischievously. "The man has a point. Maybe I should be supporting him and plotting your downfall. Do us all a favour."

"Especially yourself. I assume you'd get my job."

"Hey, now there's something I hadn't thought of. Be prepared to get a knife in your back any day now."

Karim chuckled. Talking to Becky was sometimes like talking to Layla -- better, even, since Becky seemed to have absolutely no respect for him, while Layla apparently entertained some measure of hero worship for her big brother.

"Was there any particular reason you came in here, or is just Karim-Bashing Day again?" he asked.

"It's always Karim-Bashing Day for me," she replied glibly. "You need feet nailed to the ground for this job, without the sort of big head your little sisters give you."

"And you're the one with the nails."

"Exactly."

Karim smiled smugly. "Ah well, nails, whips, chains. I'm game for anything a pretty lady has to offer."

As expected, Becky rolled her eyes and her confident, flirtatious smile vanished. Karim knew that a blatant pass was always the best way to curtail one of their interminable verbal bouts. It was something he had noticed while he was still an apprentice, when Becky liked to lord it over him because she was Tony's assistant and he was nothing.

Becky looked out of the window, her expression serious. "Actually, I came to ask you if you could something for me." She paused and then sighed, turning to look at Karim with determination. "Look, I'm probably just being stupid, but my sister's slate is turned off and I'd like to know where she is."

"Oh." Karim wondered what he should tell her. The truth was probably simplest. "The last time I saw Sue Ellen, she was leaving the base with Davey Kano. They must be back by now."

"That damn loony!" exclaimed Becky. "I was afraid of something like that. He's been after Sue Ellen ever since he came back here with his half-baked ideas about worshipping this bloody planet. She's only seventeen, and he's been filling her head with all this crap about how women should have dozens of children to give homes to the souls floating around in the air, and God knows what else! He's insane."

"Unfortunately, he's also voicing a very popular view about our population."

"Oh yeah. I forgot. You don't need wandering souls and religious mumbo-jumbo to encourage you to have children," she said disdainfully. "You and Helena are on a mission to repopulate the human race."

Irritated, Karim turned back towards his desk. "We've fulfilled our mission: five children. That's as much as anyone needs to have. In fact, for your information, I've been toying with ideas to limit our fertility rate. Maybe we could suggest that couples should have between three and six children. Enough to keep the population going, but without completely overrunning the planet."

"I'm all for limiting the population," agreed Becky. "Some women don't actually seem to do anything except lay kids. But you'll have riots on your hands if you start messing around with people's families."

Karim shrugged his shoulders. "Commander Koenig got away with forbidding any new births at all during the wandering years. Asking people to have fewer than six children isn't exactly a big demand."

"Asking them to have at least three is, though. Some people don't want to have any."

"Which is why three to six is the way to go for those who do want children. In order to increase the population, every couple should have at least three children. But since some people won't have any at all, we also need couples with more than three children, to make up for those who aren't contributing. On the other hand, we don't want to be overrun, and smaller families mean better individual care for each child. So that's how I hatched my bright idea."

Becky didn't seem interested. She glanced thoughtfully out of the window. "I don't like the idea of Sue Ellen going out there with that crazy Kano. I don't trust him. I... I'm afraid of what he might be doing to her. Who knows what a man like that is capable of?"

"You know, as long as he's taking his medication, he's not a danger to anyone," said Karim, trying to remain impartial. "That's the official word I got from the Alphan CMO herself. Halima has no experience of insanity, so she can't quite go against what Dr Koenig and Dr Mathias said about him. He's actually a nice guy once you get to know him. We shouldn't judge him just based on his medical record. Most people here don't know he's taking medication, and they seem to like him. Helena certainly does."

"That's all crap and you know it, Karim. You don't like him any more than I do. Look at the way he went on about your sister marrying Neil!"

Karim shrugged, conceding the point, though he added, "I wasn't exactly overjoyed at Layla's marriage either. One shotgun marriage is bad luck. Two is downright careless."

Surprisingly, Becky didn't seize this opportunity for a rant against Layla. "Karim. Can you track Sue Ellen's slate and at least tell me where she is?"

"What do I get in exchange?" he asked with a teasing grin. He could tell Becky was getting upset, and was trying one of Tony's favourite calming techniques: inappropriate joking. Not that it had ever worked for Tony. It didn't work for Karim, either.

"Look, cut the crap, Karim," snapped Becky, now leaning over him to point at his slate. Her chest was level with his eyes. "I know Layla made you a program to locate a slate even when it's off. Just turn it on and tell me where Sue Ellen is. I don't care if she's in Davey's quarters humping him. I just want to know she's in here and not out there. Inch'allah they came in when Maya sent the warning."

"They would only have received it if they turned on their slates." Karim realised this wasn't a reassuring thing to say, and added, "But believe me, no one would stay out there for two hours. Even Davey can tell when his toes are about to drop off."

As he spoke, he accessed Dover's security programs and ran a search for Davey and Sue Ellen's slates. The computer first informed him that both slates were switched off. It then said that Sue Ellen's slate was in her bedroom, and that Davey's slate was in his living room.

"See? Nothing to worry about," said Karim, who was very relieved himself. The last thing he needed were two missing persons when there was a blizzard on the way.

Becky didn't seem convinced. "No, I went by Mom and Dad's, and they hadn't seen Sue Ellen all afternoon. They were worried too; they would have called me if she had turned up... You said you saw them leaving. What about the airlock's logs?"

"What about them?"

"What about them tracking the number of people who come in and go out. As in did as many people enter the base as left it?"

With a sudden feeling of dread, Karim accessed the appropriate logs. The re-entry log was two people short.

"Oh shit," muttered Karim.

"Davey?" coughed Sue Ellen. "Davey, where are you?"

The fall of snow and rock had cut off all outside light to the little cave and she knew a moment of panic. They'd been entombed. They'd never get out. They'd freeze to death in this fierce cold, before anyone found them...

"Daveeey!"

Firm hands grabbed her shoulders and pulled her into a reassuring hug.

"It's okay, I'm here," Davey panted. "You're not hurt, and neither am I. I told you, Loki would never deliberately harm us. This is an accident, that's all, and one we're going to get out of."

"But we're trapped, aren't we?" sniffed Sue Ellen. "That great chunk of rock has collapsed on top of us!"

"I don't know," said Davey. "Just wait a minute and I'll try to find out."

He sat Sue Ellen down and stumbled forward in the dark, completely disoriented.

His hands soon met smooth rock and he realised he was touching the undamaged interior of the cave.

"Progress," he muttered, moving sideways.

Gradually he worked his way around the wall until his hands met rough, newly fallen rock and then ice. Carefully Davey began to dig, and the ice fell away with surprising rapidity.

"Here!" he said, as dim light streamed in, revealing that the body of the cave was miraculously undisturbed, and the upper jaw of the lion was resting in a single slap against the lower. "We're not trapped at all; we should be able to climb out and make our way back up the cliffside with ease."

Sue Ellen stood up and walked over.

"Not yet we can't," she said, as gusts of wind and snow blew past the cave. "That blizzard is almost on top of us, and it's so strong that we'd never make it back down to Dover if we tried to walk out of here."

"Then we'll sit it out," grinned Davey. "Surely it won't last more than a day or two and if we pray for assistance from the Spirit, then she may lift it earlier."

"People will worry about us. Becky and my parents will be frantic," sighed Sue Ellen.

"There's nothing we can do about that," said Davey. "With luck, they won't miss us for ages. We left our slates switched off and in our rooms, and neither of us are due back on duty until tomorrow. It's remarkably warm in here, sheltered as we are by all this rock. We'll be fine."

He pulled off his gloves and stuck a hand in one of his parka pockets, pulling out two high energy confectionery bars.

"After months of travelling around Loki on my pilgrimages, I've learned never to go anywhere without carrying a few days' worth of compact food supplies. Water never seems to be a problem on this part of the planet, but it's not always easy to find something to eat."

Sue Ellen moved to the back of the cave and sat down again. Just enough light was filtering in through the hole to allow her to see her surroundings. Davey was right; they weren't too badly off, all things considered. They wouldn't freeze and apparently, they wouldn't starve to death either.

I should have more faith in him, she told herself. If he isn't panicking, neither should I.

Davey came to sit next to her, handing her one of the bars with a smile.

"Tell me one of your stories about Loki," she said. "I've got so much to learn."

"They're not stories," Davey frowned. "They're truths."

"I believe you," Sue Ellen said earnestly. "Tell me the one about the children of Loki. How we must all have as many children as we can, to bring the Spirit into the corporeal world."

Davey looked at the woman sitting beside him. A smudge of dirt marked her chin and he gently ran his thumb across it, wiping it away.

"Why that particular truth?" he asked. "Why now?"

Sue Ellen was suddenly shy, glancing away as her cheeks turned red.

"I was hoping that today... that... well..."

"That I might tell you I felt something more than friendship for you?" asked Davey. "Oh, I do! I just wasn't sure if you felt the same way."

"How could I not?" Sue Ellen replied.

Davey had a brief flashback to a conversation he'd once had with Layla Habibi.

"You can't feel this way about me, Davey. You don't know me. You can't possibly be in love with me!"

"How could I not, Layla? How could I not?"

"Davey? Are you okay?"

Sue Ellen was staring at him with a frown on her face.

"Have I said something wrong?"

"No, no," he hastened to reassure her, pulling himself back from that bitter time in his past. "I'm just thinking. Well, trying to build up a little courage, really."

"What for?" asked Sue Ellen.

The words burst out of his mouth, almost of his own volition. He knew it was the right thing to do. He knew it was what the Spirit would wish.

"To ask you to marry me. To bear my children for Loki."

Sue Ellen's mouth opened and closed in amazement. It was the last thing she'd expected. Davey wanting to marry her? She'd hoped he would perhaps consider sleeping with her, but this great, remote, wise man wanting to marry her?

"I... I'd love to," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "I love you, Davey."

"Don't cry," whispered Davey, kissing her eyes and working his way down to her lips. "Be happy. Be exultant. The future is just beginning for us."

"I am happy," said Sue Ellen. "Believe me, I am."

And the blizzard roared over the top of the fallen outcrop, piling more snow on top of it, covering any evidence that two people had trekked into the area a short time ago...

Karim only had to look at the expression on Pedro and Friedhelm's faces on the split screen to know that the next words out of his friends' mouths would be bad news. The Chief Administrator leaned back in his chair and braced himself for the inevitable.

"They're definitely not in the base, sir," said Friedhelm. "We've looked everywhere. We even checked the silos and the factories here at Koenigshafen. There are only so many places they could be hiding. They're not inside."

"We've checked the Temple and all the other places I could think of on the surface," continued Pedro Nuñez, who was inside the Temple. His dark complexion and slanting eyes made him look like an Eskimo in his thick parka hood. His cheeks were red and raw from the brief exposure. "It's seriously cold out there, and dark too. We couldn't see further than a few metres, but we used the heat-sensitive binoculars and still couldn't see anything. If they're outside, they're not in the bay or on the near Heights."

"They probably wandered further away from the base," suggested Friedhelm with a sigh. "Davey is a great one for going walkabout. Inch'allah he's gone somewhere he knew he'd be safe. He must have heard about the blizzard warning."

Karim shook his head and drummed his fingers on the table. "The fact that the blizzard was heading this way is something we only learned after he had left. He might have thought the blizzard was still heading south." He paused. "Okay, thank you both. Pedro, you and your team go home and get warmed up. Friedhelm, you stay on stand-by at Koenigshafen, I might need you later. But you can tell everybody else to return to their duties."

There was no point keeping the base on a full alert. After Friedhelm and Pedro had signed off, Karim called Raoul Martinez, who was in charge of the partially constructed Eagle base at Koenigshafen. Dover had a limited number of aircraft permanently based there; this currently included three Swallows and one passenger Eagle for emergency evacuations. That was as much as the unfinished hangar at Koenigshafen could currently hold. It was already an improvement on the total lack of means of escape the previous winter. And right now, those craft were going to prove very useful.

Martinez was slow answering the comm signal; he presumably wasn't wearing his slate. When the old man finally appeared on screen, he was out of breath.

"Mr Martinez," said Karim, "is there any possibility we might get a Swallow or an Eagle out to look for Davey Kano and Sue Ellen Collins?"

Martinez's miniature image on the comm screen shook its pixelated head. "The winds are up to 100kph, enough to topple a Swallow, and I wouldn't be happy to risk our only Eagle in this weather either."

"But the Eagle could fly, couldn't it?" insisted Karim.

"Yes, but it's in storage," said Martinez, obviously not keen to take the Eagle anywhere. "We can't use it in this kind of weather or it might get damaged. You'd get ice on all the superstructure, and those winds will make it difficult to handle. Especially as it's a passenger Eagle; that big passenger module makes it less stable than a standard craft. And it's our only Eagle."

"I know, but we have two people missing and a blizzard on its way," said Karim sternly. "We need to survey the area as rapidly as we can, and the way to do that is to use the Eagle. I'll meet you at Koenigshafen with a rescue team."

"But Karim..."

"No buts, you have your orders," growled Karim. "Get that Eagle ready for launch. You let me worry if things go wrong."

Martinez seemed to hesitate, but then muttered an unwilling "Okay", and signed off. Karim banged his fist on the desk. He was sick of being questioned. This was not the time for people to be treating him like a little boy.

Still annoyed, Karim got in touch with all the people he wanted on this expedition; Neil as the pilot, because he knew Davey, Sylvia as their geography expert for the unpopulated areas north and south of Dover, and Sylvia's husband Friedhelm on general principles. Friedhelm was big and strong and took orders well. He was also an excellent pilot in his own right. Karim called Helena and told her to get four winter suits to Koenigshafen; she was currently taking care of their children, but as Facilities Coordinator, she was also in charge of equipment. Karim had no doubt that she would find someone to carry the clothes to Koenigshafen.

Having arranged everything, Karim drew a deep breath and after a split second of steeling himself, he called Becky's quarters. Jorge answered and then left the screen to a visibly distraught Becky. She had removed all her makeup, which made her look uncharacteristically vulnerable. Karim thought she looked about twelve years old.

"We're sending out an Eagle with a search party," he informed her, recovering from his surprise at her looks. "I'll let you know as soon as we find something... or as soon as we get back."

"We?" asked Becky, her large hazel eyes narrowing menacingly. "Who is 'we'? Tell me you're not part of the search party, Karim."

"Look, Becky..." started Karim, who wasn't about to have an argument about this.

"No, I won't 'look'," she snapped. "You're the Chief Administrator, Karim, you can't just go waltzing off in this weather. What if you get killed?"

Karim smiled wryly. "Then it's your lucky day. In the meantime, you'd better come over here, because you're in charge. I have to be off."

"No you don't!" he heard her protest as he turned the comm off at his end.

Pausing only to secure his personal terminal and slip on his indoor shoes, Karim hastened out of the door. He didn't want Becky to catch him before he got a chance to go to Koenigshafen.

She was right, of course. As Chief Administrator, it wasn't Karim's job to lead rescue missions. But he had the legacy of Koenig and Verdeschi to live up to, two leaders who unlike Karim, had trained as pilots and were only too eager to hop into an Eagle any time a crisis broke out. By nature, Karim was more cautious and conscious of his responsibility as Chief Administrator, but he also instinctively sensed that this was a golden opportunity to prove his worth. People would be more inclined to allow him to remain in his office if he had already shown that he was willing to take risks. While saving Davey Kano seemed an unnecessary risk to take in his opinion, he knew he would earn brownie points for attempting to personally rescue Sue Ellen. If nothing else, it might earn him some more respect from Becky.

"Nothing out here," said Sylvia, checking her instruments.

Karim's heart didn't even sink. They had been surveying the Heights without success for over an hour now. The Eagle's external sensors were set to detect heat, even the heat of a live human being trapped under snow. The underbelly camera was also scouring the thick mantle of snow which covered everything, but there was nothing to be seen so far. Nothing but the dim whiteness of the fog and snow.

The Eagle had been the full length of the west coast of Lake Bergman, even though there was no chance that Davey and Sue Ellen could have walked as far as the north or south end of the 200-kilometre long lake. With no sign of them along the coast, Karim had reluctantly ordered the Eagle to search the lake and crop fields. He had consulted Ellen Najim back at Dover; she felt that there was little chance of finding Davey and Sue Ellen alive there, because both areas were flat and would offer no cover whatsoever. Human beings were unlikely to survive freezing winds of 120kph and a surface temperature which had dropped to minus 30°C. Even the Eagle was buffeted by the elements. But Karim had decided to leave no stone unturned.

"Karim," came Neil's voice over the comm line.

Karim left his observation of the external camera output in the passenger module and joined the pilot in the cockpit.

"What is it, Neil?"

The young man cast Karim what could only be described as an apologetic glance. "I'm sorry, sir, but it's getting very hard to control the Eagle. We're also beginning to get snow in all our joints..."

Neil let his voice trail off, evidently unwilling to tell Karim the bad news: they would have to turn back.

"Okay," said Karim, patting his brother-in-law on the shoulder. "The blizzard is getting dangerously close and we can't afford to lose the Eagle. Turn it back towards Dover." He slid into the co-pilot's seat and activated communications with Koenigshafen. "Dover, this is Eagle 8; we're coming home."

"I wish I could be of more help," said Neil once Karim had transmitted his message. "I keep trying to think of places Davey might have gone to, but the only place I could think of was the green lagoon, and they couldn't have reached that in such a short time."

Karim sighed and looked up at the sky visible through the cockpit windows. The clouds were a menacing dark grey. The Eagle swerved violently as a gust of wind caught it before Neil could stabilise. Another gust hit it again, and then a third. Neil finally regained control with a sigh of relief.

"Wow. That was worse than most of the simulations I've been in," he said. "We'd better get back quickly before we find ourselves adrift."

"Yes," agreed Karim. "The last thing Dover needs right now is to lose our only Eagle." The Eagle shook again. "Woah. I think we've really pissed off Mother Nature for some reason."

"Maybe it's Loki stopping us from finding Davey," suggested Neil. He grinned, though he kept a cautious eye on his controls. "Well, that's how Davey would see it, no doubt."

"No doubt," growled Karim.

"Maybe they've found refuge somewhere. Davey's obsessed with surviving alone in the outback, so maybe he took some supplies with him. I mean, would we still be able to detect their body heat if they were in a cave?"

That was a good question, and one which possibly explained why the Eagle couldn't detect them. It also gave Karim some hope that Davey and Sue Ellen might be able to survive the blizzard.

"Oh no," said Neil suddenly. He was silent for a moment, checking his instruments frantically. "Damn, I can't get the navigation satellite... Oh here we go... No, it's gone again. Oh, come in, GPS1, where are you?"

Karim also checked their link up with the satellite; it was nowhere to be found. He felt a sudden rush of panic. The GPS was the Eagle's main way of knowing where it was; without it, they would have to navigate blindly, using the altimetre and compass. The only way to find Koenigshafen under these circumstances was to follow the Dover beacon and then hope to make a correct course correction towards the hangar. One false move and they could end up splattered on the Dover cliffs or nose first on the Flats. But then Karim calmed himself. He had two experienced pilots on board, men he could trust; there was no need to panic.

"You need a pilot who knows Dover," said Karim, pulling himself out of his seat. He opened the cockpit door and called Friedhelm. "I'll get Friedhelm to take my place for the approach. Sylvia and I can start looking for that navigational satellite."

"The GPS is out?" exclaimed Friedhelm as he passed Karim and took the co-pilot's seat. "Sheiß! Let's hope one of those meteorites didn't hit it!"

That was statistically improbable, but certainly not impossible. "If that's the case," said Karim, "I might well start believing that Loki has it in for us."

Sue Ellen opened her eyes with a start, realising that she must have fallen asleep. Her body felt stiff and cold, despite the protective layers of clothing she wore and the shelter from the elements that the Lion's Jaws cave was providing. She remembered Davey holding her as she'd drifted into a doze, talking about his great plans for the future. Now he was sitting cross-legged on the opposite side of the cave, deep in meditation. The wind was a dull roar outside and within, rivulets of water trickled down the walls as the slight warmth of their bodies melted the ice crystals that had tumbled down with the rock fall.

Suddenly, Sue Ellen became aware of a third noise outside the cave.

"That must have been what woke me," she muttered hoarsely, struggling to her feet. "Davey! Davey listen; it's an Eagle! I can hear an Eagle passing somewhere close by."

Davey didn't appear to hear her at first, but then he slowly stirred, uncrossing his legs and frowning deeply.

"Please don't ever disturb me when I'm meditating," he said.

"I'm sorry Davey, but I thought it was important," replied Sue Ellen. "I heard an Eagle outside; Karim must have sent a search party to look for us."

Davey went to the hole in the cave wall and peered out into the dark maelstrom.

"If it was there at all, it's moved on now," he coughed, wiping the sleet from his face. "Don't worry about it Sue Ellen. It might not have been a search party at all, but simply a pilot returning to Koenigshafen before the storm gets any worse. There's going to be a lull soon, and there should be just enough time for us to leave here and make it back to Dover before the storm hits again with renewed force."

"Are you sure there's a lull coming?" asked Sue Ellen, not wanting to doubt Davey's judgement, but unable to forget the last fierce winter the Alphans had passed on Loki. "These blizzards can go on for weeks without a break at this time of year."

"Trust me," he smiled, putting his hands on her shoulders. "Loki knows we're here and she'll make sure we get out unharmed. We don't need help from Dover."

Sue Ellen shivered, and lay her head against his chest.

"I know you're right, but like I said earlier, the others will be worried," she whispered.

"There's nothing we can do about that," said Davey sadly. "Most of them don't believe; they don't have the faith in Loki that we do and they never will. It hurts me to say that, but it's the truth."

"There are plenty of people who do believe in your teachings though, Davey," said Sue Ellen. "Helena Habibi for one, and... and the more who hear you speak, the more will turn to the Spirit. You have to give it time."

Davey shook his head and sat down with his back to the cave wall, pulling Sue Ellen onto his lap.

"There are powerful people both here and on Alpha who think I'm nuts," he sighed. "They even had me believing it myself at one point, back when my father died. I'm sure you must have heard that I had a kind of nervous breakdown when Neil, my father and I went on a camping trip to the green lagoon. Gossip spreads fast down here, so don't try to tell me that you haven't, in an effort to spare my feelings."

Sue Ellen simply nodded, not wanting to interrupt Davey. He continued to speak, absent-mindedly running his hand up and down her back as he did so.

"There was nothing wrong with me Sue Ellen. Nothing at all. I was naturally upset at the loss of my father, but the doctors couldn't understand when I began to talk about the Spirit of Loki. I think it frightened them, to tell you the truth. Especially Ben Vincent, who was about to lose his wife to cancer at that time.

"They put me on medication that dulled my senses and blocked the call of the Spirit. I took it because they told me to and it ended up making my life meaningless. I even stopped playing my music and gave all my instruments into the care of Neil Garforth. He took them and while I was incapable of stopping them, he took..."

"Took what, Davey?" Sue Ellen asked softly.

She felt sure it was coming -- the answer to her question about the bad feeling between Davey and Layla Habibi.

"Nothing," sighed Davey, drawing back. "He took nothing worth having. But... when I returned here from Alpha, I suddenly realised that all the medication the doctors were feeding me was doing me harm. So I stopped taking it, although they don't know that."

He looked at Sue Ellen with such a pleading expression on his face that tears filled her eyes.

"You must never tell them I'm not taking their poison anymore, my love. As my future wife I wanted you to know my secret, but don't breathe a word of it to anyone."

"Oh, of course I wouldn't!" exclaimed Sue Ellen, looking shocked. "It's none of their business! But Davey, what did they say was wrong with you? People aren't just put on permanent medication without a diagnosis."

"A form of bipolar disorder, Doctor Koenig called it," he spat. "She's my Godmother, and yet she doesn't know me well enough to see that I'm as sane as she is."

"Bipolar disorder," Sue Ellen repeated softly.

Her forehead creased in a frown and her eyes narrowed defensively. Davey wasn't mad -- he was saner than she was, and so wise. How could they be so stupid? She had liked Doctor Koenig on the two occasions that she'd met her. Obviously her opinion of the woman had been wrong. Doctor Koenig and the rest of them were all narrow minded bigots, seeing someone different and special as insane, instead of respecting them for their true selves.

"I hate them Davey!" she hissed. "How could they treat you like that?"

"Don't hate them my love," he whispered. "Feel sorry for them, but don't hate them."

Sue Ellen pushed the hood of Davey's parka back and kissed him fiercely on the mouth.

"I'll never betray you, or Loki," she said. "Never."

Davey kissed her back, harder. His hands went to the front of her parka and felt for the zip. Bitter cold air seeped in as he pushed it open and his hands went to the clothes beneath. Gasping, Sue Ellen reached for his zip and began to do the same.

"Do you think this is okay Davey?" she shivered. "I mean, will the Spirit object?"

"Object," murmured Davey. "No, no, she'll approve. It's what she wants. It's exactly right."

Sue Ellen was freezing cold and a small, disloyal part of her felt that she was doing a very stupid thing. They were trapped out here in the middle of nowhere and it had to be well below minus 20 degrees outside. Undoing their outer garments here in this little cave was asking for trouble. Wouldn't it be better to wait until they were safely back at Dover? But Davey's hands were all over her and Davey knew best. She forcefully rammed such mutinous thoughts into the back of her mind, concentrating on the delicious feelings that he was arousing in her.

The Eagle landing had been rough. The Koenigshafen bay had filled with snow in the time since they had left, and the Eagle's thrusters had turned all this into slush before the craft landed. Neil was obliged to take off and land again to make sure the Eagle was properly aligned with the hangar's entrance in the cliff. Because Eagles couldn't be taxied, they had to be pulled in by a mechanical device. The Alphan engineering team had promised that the Eagle II would have wheels, so Koenigshafen was designed with a cliff-side entrance, rather than a top-loading launchpad like the ones on Alpha -- something which would have required three to five years longer to build.

It wasn't until the entrance mechanism had caught the Eagle and started to pull the craft into the cliff that Karim was able to relax a little. The Eagle wasn't damaged and the number of places where Davey and Sue Ellen could be was now narrowed down to any caves or crevasses in the area. Unless, of course, they were already dead, in which case there was nothing to be done anyway. Either way, he felt that he had been right to take the Eagle out.

The air in the Koenigshafen hangar was only slightly warmer than the air outside as Karim and his companions walked out of the Eagle. Martinez was there with Jorge and Trevor; they were evidently planning to give the Eagle a thorough check-up after its 90 minutes in the wind and snow. Martinez seemed relieved that the Eagle was still in one piece, and politely enquired as to how the search had gone.

"Well, at least we know where they're not," said Karim. "We can only hope they've found refuge somewhere."

"I'm sure Davey Kano will find a way to survive," said Martinez confidently. "He seems to have a special connection with the planet. If the planet really has a spirit as he says, it'll probably protect him."

The old man said this with a straight face, so Karim assumed that he really did take Davey's 'Spirit of Loki' mumbo-jumbo seriously. On the other hand, Raoul Martinez was the man who had lived forty years with Saskia Van't Hooft, whose childhood in a free love commune had left her with a great deal of strange ideas about spirituality. Karim smiled politely and said something about hoping that Sue Ellen and Davey would be fine.

Karim joined his other companions in the tiny sealed unit that was the Koenigshafen base proper; just four living quarters and a common room with minimal cooking facilities and an office overlooking the hangar. Karim was surprised, and not at all pleased when he found out who else was there.

Layla had come to greet Neil, which was fair enough, but Becky, on the other hand, had obviously come to give Karim an earful.

"Can I have a word with you?" she asked, putting on a bright, false smile. "In private?"

Karim indicated Martinez's office and the two went in.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" snapped Becky as soon as the door was shut. "You go waltzing off like some superhero and the next thing I know, Koenig is calling up to find out how we're preparing for the blizzard, and I have to tell him you've taken our only Eagle into it."

"Is that what you told him?" exclaimed Karim.

"Not like that I didn't," she said with a shrug, sitting on Martinez's desk in front of the window. "I told him we'd lost two people and you were heading the search party. Nothing about you taking our only Eagle into storm winds. He seemed pleased to know you had the situation in hand... He even seemed to think that you really did have the situation in hand!"

Karim smiled. "He's the sort of person who would do exactly what I did; risk three more people, the base commander and the only Eagle for the sake of saving two people." He became more serious, remembering who one of those people was. "Becky, I'm sorry. We didn't find them."

"Obviously." Becky turned away, her forehead wrinkled with concern. "Christ, I hope she's all right. My parents are mad with worry! That blizzard is going to last at least 24 hours, Mrs Verdeschi says."

"I know," said Karim gently, moving closer. "We... we won't be able to do anything until the storm lifts. But there is a little bit of good news. The fact that we didn't find any trace of them might mean that they found refuge in a cave somewhere --"

"--Or that they're already dead."

"Don't be so pessimistic," he responded jovially. "The cave possibility is more likely. Davey knows the area well; it's probable that he and Sue Ellen were heading for a specific place. And given the cold, that place was probably somewhere sheltered. I want to consult with Sylvia and Mrs Verdeschi to determine what caves are within walking distance of the base. They can't have wandered that far away." He put his hand on Becky's shoulder. "Now, why don't you go home and comfort your parents?"

Much to Karim's alarm, Becky suddenly burst into tears. "Not... not... not without Sue Ellen," she hiccuped. "How can I be any comfort when Sue Ellen is out there with that madman?"

"Hey..."

Karim embraced Becky and let her cry on his shoulder. He realised that she must have been under a great deal of strain ever since her little sister had disappeared. Karim tried to imagine how he would feel if one of his sisters, or worse, a daughter went missing. He then decided he preferred not to think about that. He could only sympathise with Becky.

After a moment, she drew away a little, still holding onto him. She was looking at him, her large hazel eyes filled with tears, her lips parted in an effort to breathe in spite of her blocked nose. Karim thought she had never looked so beautiful.

"I'm sorry," she started.

"Shh." He gently brushed a tear from her cheek. "You're upset, I can understand that."

"No, it's... yes, I'm upset. But this... outburst... it isn't me, it's the hormones."

"Hormones?"

"I'm pregnant."

Now there was a surprise. Karim stared at her and then nodded thoughtfully. She had been going out with Jorge for some time now, and although she had never mentioned marriage or children, there was no reason to think that she wouldn't eventually make their relationship more permanent. It wasn't as if she discussed her relationship with Karim.

"Drat! And there I thought it was my lucky day," he said with a grin.

He was about to release her, but she still had her arms around him.

"Why do you always do that?"

"What?"

"Bring every conversation we have back to sex."

"It's a characteristic of men who aren't getting any, isn't it?" Karim had no sooner uttered the words than he wished he hadn't said that. "Besides, it gets your goat and you're very pretty when you've got the goat."

"You smooth talker, you," she said, stepping away from him.

Karim suddenly became serious. "I won't continue if it makes you uncomfortable. I don't want to be threatening or anything."

"Don't be stupid, Karim. You: threatening?" she said with a smile. The expression faded. "Inch'allah Sue Ellen is safe. Between the worry and the hormones, I'll have a nervous breakdown if she isn't all right!"

"I'm sure they're both fine."

Becky harrumphed inelegantly. "Both? I don't care if Davey Kano gets changed into a block of ice."

"Ah, but think of the satisfaction of beating him up if he gets through this alive," said Karim with a grin. He put his arm around Becky and they walked out of the office. The others had already left. "Now, I suggest we go back to Dover and work out where that crackpot might be hiding."

Karim was feeling defeated when he went home late that evening. Sylvia and Mrs Verdeschi had come to the conclusion that the natural cave formations around peak 214 were the only place where Sue Ellen and Davey could safely weather the storm. There was a large cave there which Sylvia had nicknamed the Dragon. Sue Ellen had apparently mentioned something to her mother about a sacred area Davey called the Lion's Jaws. If this was the same place as the Dragon, then it was possible that Davey and Sue Ellen had found refuge in that cave. On the other hand, the seismic sensors had recorded a mild tremor there, consistent with a collapse in the cliffs, which was not unusual in that area when the weather was violent. As he walked home later that evening, Karim tried not to think about the two of them possibly trapped in a collapsed cave.

He had gone to see the Collinses after the meeting to offer his moral support, for what it was worth. They were frantic, just as Becky had said, and naturally distressed to know that it would be another day at least before search efforts could be resumed. Karim had also received a short message from Dr Koenig to say that Mrs Kano was taken ill at the news of her son's disappearance, and that Karim should forward any progress reports to the doctor. Another message from Kano's brother-in-law Joshua Devers also asked for news once there was some. Karim found it slightly bizarre that neither of Davey's remaining relatives had been able to contact him in person.

The children were already in bed when Karim came in. He looked in on them, admiring their little forms lying pell-mell on the beds. The bottom section of the Governor's Mansion, where the Habibis now lived, was destined to be knocked through into an adjacent apartment, so that there would be plenty of room for the children. But for now, they all shared the room which had been Salvatore's.

Having checked on the children, Karim got himself a drink in the kitchen and then went into the master bedroom. He stopped in the doorway, his heart suddenly filled with revulsion. Helena was praying, cross-legged on the floor with her eyes closed and a picture of Davey in her hand. There was a candle on the dresser. Helena's previously mild interest in Davey's Spirit of Loki had recently turned into religious fervour. While Karim recognised that Helena was entitled to pursue whatever hobby might make her feel better about her life, her zealousness was beginning to worry him.

"Praying for his safe return, are you?" he asked humourlessly.

Helena didn't answer for a moment, but then opened her eyes and stared at him. "Yes, of course I am. You were incapable of helping him, but the Spirit can save him."

"Of course, it would help if this Spirit existed," said Karim, sitting down on the bed and sipping his drink. "I'd ask it to help us myself then."

His wife got up and extinguished the candle. "You're blinded by your own ambition. You don't see the Spirit because you don't want to, because it threatens your control over this place."

"Oh don't be ridiculous," he sighed. "I don't give a fig about the Spirit. Davey, on the hand, is definitely a potential threat. He's a manic-depressive who has already been involved in the death of his father and who now has a dangerous fixation on my sister."

Helena retreated behind the screen to change into her night clothes. Why she needed to hide her naked body from her own husband was a mystery to him, particularly as the entire base had already seen her all but naked on hot days. Karim went to brush his teeth and get ready for bed. The conversation continued when he returned to the bedroom.

"If Davey has such a fixation with Layla, then how come he went out there with Sue Ellen Collins?" said Helena, still behind the screen.

Karim got into bed. "Yes, that's what we'd all like to know. Especially her family. I went over there this evening. Her parents are both worried about their daughter being stranded in the blizzard, but I got the impression that Mr Collins was also very upset at the idea of what she was doing out there with Davey in the first place."

Helena came out from behind the screen, wearing an unappetising pair of pyjamas. In the interest of revitalising his marriage after Brenda left, Karim had tried to convince Helena to wear a night dress, but in vain. Not that he thought there was any garment that would make his wife more attractive to him. She was too big and ungainly.

"Do you suppose he's going out with her?" asked Helena thoughtfully as she got into bed with Karim.

"How would I know? You're his disciple," said Karim with a shrug. "What I do know is that Sue Ellen is a very impressionable young girl with very little to say for herself. If Davey wanted her, she wouldn't put up much of a fight. Particularly as she's already bowled over with his Spirit stuff."

"Don't call it 'Spirit stuff'," admonished Helena. "Anyway, it's time Davey settled down, and Sue Ellen would make a good wife for anyone."

"Anyone who isn't looking for intellectual stimulation, that is." Noticing Helena's disapproving glare, he continued, "Oh, she's very sweet and lovely, and yes, I'm sure she'd make an excellent wife for someone. I just hope she doesn't end up marrying Davey. There are plenty of other men out there. Sane ones."

Helena huffed impatiently. "Oh do stop saying Davey is insane. He went through a bad patch, but you've heard what Halima says about him, that he's perfectly sane as long as he takes his medication. His 'disease' is what put him into contact with the Spirit of Loki in the first place. I believe him when he says that this planet has a spirit of its own. How else can we explain all the events that have led to us settling here? Breakaway, the moon orbiting the Lokian sun, the fact that we're able to stay here at Dover through the bad seasons even though everyone said it was impossible."

"Good luck and advanced technology," said Karim without hesitation. "I wouldn't put it all down to some imaginary entity whose name sounds like that of an aeroplane. And nothing you've said so far is any different from what Layla says her god has done for us. You might as well follow her."

"The difference is that Layla doesn't communicate with the entity she worships. Davey does. He can hear the voice of the planet."

"And you don't find that remotely suspicious? A man suffering from a bipolar disorder which is known to cause hallucinations just happens to be the one person who hears this planet talking to him?"

Helena shook her head. "He was the first human conceived on the planet, so he has more of the Spirit in him than any other person. That makes him different from the rest of us. Maybe he isn't ill at all; maybe the doctors are mistaking the signs of his association with Loki for a known disease, just because it's easier to believe that he's ill than to admit that something else might be happening."

"We're talking about the same doctors who spent years charting Salvatore Verdeschi's psychic abilities until they disappeared, aren't we?" said Karim. "So in Salvatore's case, they recognised that the voices he was hearing as a child were real and due to his alien heritage, but in Davey's case, they just categorised him off-hand as a manic-depressive?"

"Salvatore is a hybrid, everyone expects him to be a freak," argued Helena with an impatient gesture. "But everyone expects Davey to be normal. They'll put any strange behaviour down to illness rather than look for more profound causes. Doctors only ever find what they're looking for -- what they already know."

"Well, I suppose that's true," conceded Karim. "I still wish all these gods didn't always talk to nutcases. I'd be more inclined to believe in religions if I felt I could trust their gurus."

"You can trust Davey!"

"You would say that." Karim made himself comfortable, ready for a night's sleep. "In the interest of peace, I'm prepared to cut the man some slack as long as he keeps taking his pills and doesn't go the way of most human gurus. But as soon as he starts demanding material possessions and sexual favours from his disciples, he'll be on the next Eagle back to Alpha."

"He won't be like that! Davey would never take advantage of his followers. He certainly wouldn't demand sexual favours," said Helena confidently.

Oh yeah? So what's he doing lost in a blizzard with his youngest and prettiest disciple? thought Karim censoriously as he turned out the light.

It had been a restless night. Sleep had evaded Karim until the small hours of the morning, and when it came, it brought him no rest, nothing but the visions of horror which his conscious mind had refused to consider. Sue Ellen dead in the snow, her body frozen solid, perhaps destined to lie undiscovered until the thaw. What of Karim's standing as Chief Administrator if he let a seventeen-year-old girl die in the snow?

The blizzard had continued to rage all day. The view from the Administrator's office offered nothing but a vision of whiteness. White clouds showering white snow that fell almost horizontally in the strong winds.

Karim had again visited the Collinses and contacted Davey's family on Alpha. Mrs Kano was now well enough to talk to him, though she still looked ill, her elegant wrinkled features chalky and strained as she struggled to talk to Karim without completely giving in to her worry about her son. She was grateful for Karim's attempts to find Davey, and he nearly felt guilty for all the nasty things he had thought about her son.

It was now the middle of the afternoon and there was still no visible sign of the storm letting up. Karim had been trying to concentrate on his usual duties, but with little success. He turned to the bulletin boards for a moment, perfunctorily checking the automated logs of births, marriages, divorces and deaths in case there were any congratulations or condolences to send. A new entry in the Birth section announced '05-Feb-Y28: Owen William Koenig (m), to Dinah Fraser and Alexander Koenig'; Karim made a note to send the couple a congratulations message. Alex was an old school friend.

Karim also noticed that there was a new entry in the Divorces list. This was still rare, though the divorce rate was gradually increasing as the second generation got older. This latest entry caught Karim's attention immediately. Emile Castellano and Brenda Blackmore-Lameroux. So Brenda was free of her husband. He remembered their time together and felt regret at the way things had ended. Maybe he should send her a congratulations message too.

He looked up as there was a knock on the door. Hastily turning off the boards, Karim instructed his visitor to come in. It was Mrs Verdeschi.

"I have some good news for you, Karim," she said when she entered. "First, the satellite is still up there, but it's damaged and its frequency has changed. I've just managed to locate it again and get it to send me some pictures of the storm. The blizzard is going to lift, Karim!"

"When?"

"In about two hours' time. The satellite picture shows that we're nearly at the edge of the blizzard. There's another one behind it, but we should have a twelve hour lull in which to search for Davey and Sue Ellen."

"No time to lose, then," said Karim, turning to his computer. "Let's get a search team ready to go to area 214. I'll also have the Eagle on standby in case we need another long-range sweep."

"I can also do a survey on my own if you like," suggested Mrs Verdeschi. "I know of some birds that were good at flying and hunting in this weather."

"Thank you, but I think I'll try other methods. We don't want you freezing out there. Let's send some expendable dogsbodies out first." Karim paused and sighed. "Let's just hope those two idiots are still alive!"

Davey sat against the wall, chewing a tough nutrient bar while Sue Ellen slept, her head in his lap. He knew she was becoming hypothermic; by his reckoning they'd been in the cave twenty-four hours now and after they'd made love, she never really got warm again.

"Never mind, my darling," he whispered, dropping a hand to her head. "The time to leave is almost upon us."

The wind had been calling to him; telling him to make ready to leave. The Spirit had spoken, and the lull was coming. Finishing his bar, he methodically folded the little bag it had been wrapped in into a tiny square and tucked it into a pocket. Sue Ellen stirred and opened her eyes.

"Davey?" she asked groggily.

"Who else," he grinned, helping her to sit up and handing her another bar. "Eat this, but don't be too long about it. We'll be leaving soon." With teeth chattering, Sue Ellen struggled to obey him.

The blizzard that raged across Dover and its environs scoured and polished everything in its wake, changing the landscape dramatically and blanketing everything in a hard white crust. When Davey stepped out of the Lion's Jaws cave and into the gale force wind, dragging Sue Ellen behind him, it took him a few minutes to get his bearings.

"Are you sure this is the lull?" Sue Ellen shouted over the wind, her feet slipping on the steep icy slope.

"Yes," Davey replied. "This is it."

"Which way is Dover?" wailed Sue Ellen. "I can't tell!"

Davey struggled to raise his arm and point.

"That way; come on!"

The pair stumbled forward, their feet sometimes breaking through the ice-encrusted snow and landing them knee deep, as they moved as fast as they could towards safety. In spite of the fact that it had eased to approximately half the strength it had been at full blow, the wind still so strong that it threatened to lift them off their feet and they had to bend double to stay upright. There was no more time or energy for conversation; they simply ploughed on as best they could.

Sue Ellen began to have serious doubts that she was going to make it. She had lost most of the feeling in her feet and her face was also numb.

I have to keep going, she thought muzzily, her brain fogged by the hypothermia. I can't let Davey down.

Drawing on every reserve of strength she possessed, she held tight to his hand and kept going.

Davey didn't doubt for a moment that they would arrive safely back at Dover. A break in the thick snow cloud allowed him to see how far they had come and he knew they were approaching the Temple, even though it was so deeply buried in snow that he couldn't see it.

Suddenly, Sue Ellen screamed and he felt her drop like a stone behind him. She had fallen through an air pocket beneath the ice crust and was buried up to her neck in thick snow.

"Davey!" she cried, thrashing about. "Help me!"

"Hold still," he ordered, lying flat on his stomach and inching his way towards her.

He stretched out a hand and she gripped it with surprising strength.

"I'm going to pull you out very slowly, and you mustn't struggle or more of the snow will give way. Do you understand?" he gasped, the cold beginning to take its toll on him also.

Sue Ellen nodded.

With all his strength Davey began to pull, inching himself backwards. Soon Sue Ellen was out of the hole and lying on her stomach on the snow.

"I can't go any further Davey," she whispered. "I need to rest."

Davey glanced up at the sky and knew that their time was running out. The Spirit had been merciful and granted them a clear path back to Dover. It had been up to them to make the most of it and this they had not done.

"We can't stop," he said, pulling her almost brutally to her feet. "We'll be swallowed up by the blizzard if we do.

Sue Ellen fell to her knees again, whimpering, but she did as he said and began to crawl doggedly forward.

"Not far to go now," he said, more to himself than to her.

Then, he caught sight of a tiny pinprick of light and the distant sound of a skidoo motor blew towards him on the wind.

"I think someone's located us," he panted. "Over here! Over here!"

Sue Ellen struggled to her feet once more and staggered against Davey, trying to lift an arm and wave. Soon the sound of the motor became louder and a large yellow skidoo pierced the fog.

"See, I told you we'd be okay," smiled Davey, hugging Sue Ellen.

She couldn't answer; speech was now beyond her.

"Sue Ellen was hypothermic and she has severe frostbite on her hands and feet," said Astrid. She and Karim were sitting in the medical office. "Benito and Halima are working on her right now; they might have to amputate one of her toes."

Karim felt sick at the thought of that sweet little girl losing her toe just because of Davey's stupidity.

"What about Davey?" he asked.

"He got some frostbite and a mild case of hypothermia too, but he fared better than Sue Ellen because he's bigger and didn't lose his body heat so easily. Halima has him in Intensive Care and no one is to see him until she's finished with Sue Ellen."

"What's she afraid of, a mob?"

"Something like that," said Astrid with a smile, uncovering the gap in between her front teeth. "Davey isn't exactly Mr Popular right now. Not with the Collinses anyway."

Karim nodded and leaned forward dejectedly, resting his arms on his knees. He looked down at the linoleum floor, feeling tired and depressed after twenty-four hours of stress and worry. And now they had Davey and Sue Ellen back, but the girl was in bad shape. Karim's leadership of Dover was really off to a rocky start.

"That poor girl," said Astrid suddenly. "I remember when she was just a wee bairn."

"Yes, I have some memories of her as a wee bairn, too." Karim didn't want to think about that. "Talking of bairns, how are you getting along?"

Astrid's smile returned briefly and she put her hand on her belly. "Oh, I'm doing all right. Just a month to go. It's a boy, so we're calling him Uwe Karim, since you're our new administrator and Hamish is already named after Tony."

"Hoover?" asked Karim, misunderstanding the name.

"Uwe. It's a German name. We're working our way through our ancestry, like everyone else."

"Oh yes, we'd have done that too, only Helena hated every single Arab and Italian name my parents listed. The children ended up mostly with English names my mother-in-law came up with." Karim realised this was no time to be airing his marital problems from the past. "Anyway, good luck. You're in plenty of company from what I gather. I'll have to put up a wall-chart to keep track of you all."

"You're right, there are quite a few expectant mothers around," said Astrid thoughtfully; she would know since she was primarily an obstetrics nurse. "Layla, Marion and Sylvia for a start."

Karim was about to say, 'not to mention Becky', but it then occurred to him that if Astrid hadn't mentioned her, it was possible Becky hadn't been to the Medical Centre about this yet. It wasn't up to him to tell the medical staff that she was pregnant. Something else occurred to him as well.

"Sylvia's pregnant?"

"Yes... oh, she only found out for sure today. I really shouldn't have told you. She and Friedhelm have been debating with themselves whether to have a fourth child, and finally decided to go for it."

"I knew they were thinking about it..." Karim thought about him bringing Sylvia on the rescue mission the previous day. That trip in the Eagle could have been a major disaster. "I suppose everyone is having children now because they know they'll have plenty of time to look after them during the winter."

"I wondered about that too," said Astrid. "But on the other hand, I know a few mothers-to-be up on Alpha and Ceres II as well."

"Year 28 will evidently be a good vintage for Alphan fertility," said Karim with a grin.

He still had mixed feelings about the Alphan bid for reproduction. But looking at Astrid's contented demeanour and remembering how close Dover had come to losing six of its precious working adults, he realised he was worrying about the wrong thing at the wrong time. He could afford to worry about overpopulation once there was enough population to run the place and make up for any losses they might incur on the way. He was just letting his misgivings about his own large family colour his judgement of other people's lives.

Astrid and Karim's conversation died out as both fell silent and drifted into their own thoughts. After about ten minutes, Halima came to join them in the office.

"Karim, Davey would like to talk to you," she said.

"Me?" Surprised, Karim got up and followed Halima to the ICU. "How's Sue Ellen?" he asked before they got there.

"A lot better than she was when she came in, but she really wasn't lucky," said Halima. "The cave they were in must have been teeming with bacteria; some of the areas of her body that were frostbitten got infected. I had to amputate one of her toes."

"Bloody hell. Yes, Astrid mentioned that."

"There something else." Halima stopped Karim before they entered the ICU section. "She had frostbite in some pretty strange places and... well, to put it bluntly, there's evidence that they had sexual intercourse while they were in the cave."

"By minus 20?" asked Karim. "Wow. There's the power of passion for you!"

"Another opportunity for our friends the bacteria I might add," said Halima disapprovingly. "More to the point: I should remind you that Sue Ellen is underage."

Karim shrugged his shoulders. "And he isn't. I know what you're getting at, but I don't think it's worth getting worked up about. Sue Ellen will be eighteen in two months' time, and they can do what they like then... unless he forced her?"

Halima shook her head. "Nothing suggests that."

"No, so they were simply doing exactly what we all thought they were doing," said Karim grimly.

They entered the ICU; Halima indicated the cubicle Davey was in and left Karim to go and check on Sue Ellen.

It was warm in the cubicle; Davey was lying under a thermal blanket to restore his blood temperature. Karim had expected him to look sick in some way, but he didn't. Except for a bandage on his face, he looked just as healthy as always. Thinking of Sue Ellen with her amputated toe and frostbite 'in strange places', Karim glared at Davey unsympathetically.

"Ah, Karim, thank you for coming," said Davey with a smile. He extended his hand, but Karim didn't take it.

"Was it your idea to go walkabout in the snow?" asked Karim sternly.

"Yes," said Davey, looking Karim straight in the eye. "I wanted Sue Ellen to see a place I had found, a cave. We didn't think the blizzard would reach Dover; the forecast before we left said that it wouldn't. By the time we realised it was heading this way, we were already at the cave and took refuge there. I'm really sorry about what happened; I want to apologise to Sue Ellen's family for all the grief this must have caused."

Davey's apologetic tone threw Karim momentarily. After all the murderous thoughts Karim had had about him, here was Davey freely admitting his guilt. That didn't make him any less guilty, though.

"Why didn't you take your slates with you? You'd have saved us all a great deal of trouble if you had. That's exactly what they're for, so that people can be found again when they wander off."

"Sue Ellen and I wanted to be alone," explained Davey. "You're right. It was a very stupid mistake, and again I have to take full responsibility. Things get a little cramped in here, and I know that Sue Ellen's family don't like me very much. We wanted to seize our last opportunity to go outside and be together... Sue Ellen really means a lot to me, Karim. I never meant to put her into any danger."

"Maybe you should save your speech for her parents. I don't think Mr Collins will be impressed to hear his daughter is going out with you."

Davey laughed shortly. "It's not just 'going out', Karim. I love Sue Ellen. I've asked her to marry me."

Karim reflected that he should have seen that one coming a mile away. Helena was right; Sue Ellen was wife material, not the sort of girl a man would go out with to have some fun.

"I doubt Mr Collins will think much of that, either," said Karim.

"It doesn't matter. We're not thinking about marrying until the anniversary of my christening, in September. It's a date with special significance to me. That gives us several months to prove the strength of our love to Mr Collins. In any case, Sue Ellen will be eighteen by then, so she can marry me even if he doesn't approve."

Logical little sod, thought Karim. He's got it all planned out.

"Why are you telling me all this anyway?" he asked.

"Halima told me you headed a dangerous search party to find us," said Davey, lowering his eyes. "I know you must have been pretty angry at me for causing so much trouble. I felt I needed to apologise and try to explain how this happened. I was relieved to hear that no one was hurt." He raised his black eyes again and fixed them on Karim. "You're a good administrator, Karim. I'm sorry to have caused the first crisis of your leadership."

If Karim hadn't already been suspicious of Davey's motives, the flattery would have tipped him off. They had never been friends, even back in the days when they were children together on Alpha. Their hitherto virtually non-existent relationship had then taken a sudden turn for the worse when Davey returned to Dover in Y26 to find that Layla had married his friend Neil and was expecting their first child. Davey had evidently entertained strong feelings for Layla and turned his bitterness into resentment against all the Habibis.

"I know we've never been friends," continued Davey, who was evidently having the same thoughts. "But I feel it's time to turn over a new leaf. I want to build a life here with Sue Ellen and put all the past behind me. This past day in the cave has made me realise how much this place means to me, and that I must learn to work with all the people who live here to make it the most desirable location in the system."

Karim merely nodded, waiting to hear what else Davey had to say. Plenty more, evidently.

"I realise you're also concerned about my spiritual beliefs. That's certainly understandable given all the problems that religions caused on Earth. I don't want a war of religion with Layla. Many of our beliefs are the same, and it was merely my pride which made me refuse to admit that. I will make my peace with Layla and see if we can work together. Humans have a natural need to worship, to feel that there is more to their lives than their short material existence, and we can fulfil that need without causing partisan conflicts. So I'm calling an end to the hostilities, Karim. I want to be at peace with Dover and for Dover to be at peace with me. What do you say?"

Davey held out his hand. Karim hesitated. Davey had expertly pushed every button at his disposal, from flattery of Karim's leadership to praise for Dover and a promise to end his feud with the Habibis. He was either sincere or lying through his teeth. Karim strongly suspected the latter.

But it would be illogical to refuse a peace offering, however insincere. Karim shook hands with Davey.

Sue Ellen lifted a bandaged hand and awkwardly tried to wipe a tear off her cheek, as she lay in her cubicle in Intensive Care. She had begun to hurt all over as the feeling slowly returned to her extremities and despite powerful analgesics, she still couldn't get comfortable. Her hands and feet felt as though they were on fire, and there were patches of skin on her back and buttocks that felt the same. And her face...

"Astrid," she sniffed. "Astrid, is my face okay?"

The kind nurse turned around and gave her a reassuring smile.

"You look as if you've got a bad case of sunburn, that's all," she said. "Don't worry, there'll be no lasting damage."

Sue Ellen thought miserably.

There was a knock on the door of the cubicle and Karim poked his craggy face inside.

"Is it okay if I come in for a few minutes?" he asked, looking from Sue Ellen to Astrid. "I cleared it with Halima..."

Astrid nodded and left the two alone.

Karim came to stand awkwardly by Sue Ellen's bedside. He smiled gently at her, reflecting on how much she'd been through. No matter how many olive branches Davey Kano offered him, he couldn't quell the spark of outrage that rose in his gut, every time he thought of that loony dragging Sue Ellen out on such a dangerous adventure.

"Thank you for rescuing us," said Sue Ellen. "I'm sorry we caused so much trouble; we thought the storm was going to pass well to the south of us and had no idea we might get trapped out there."

Karim nodded.

"I know," he said. "I had a good talk to Davey about it earlier, shortly after the pair of you were brought in. You shouldn't have wandered so far from Dover and I wanted to make it clear to him that --"

"He hasn't done anything wrong," Sue Ellen interrupted, struggling to sit up. "Everyone's so angry at him, but he saved my life!"

"Don't do that," said Karim, quickly putting a hand out to prevent her from trying to sit up. "I'm not... accusing Davey of anything Sue Ellen, and I know he did everything he could to get you back here safely."

Sue Ellen relaxed slightly and lay back on the pillow. She wanted to believe Karim, but there was something about the way he spoke Davey's name. A hesitation.

"Sorry," she sighed. "Davey said we'd be okay, and he was right. But everyone's so angry at him! Mom and Dad came to see me and Dad's furious. Doctor Ofori had to tell him to calm down or leave at one point. Then Becky paid me a visit and she actually burst into tears when I told her that Davey and I... that Davey and I are getting married. I think she'd like to murder him."

Karim thought wryly.

Sue Ellen paused for a moment, fearful that Karim too might disapprove of their impending nuptials. When he didn't say anything, she realised that Davey must have already informed him of their intentions.

"We love each other," she murmured.

"It's your choice Sue Ellen," sighed Karim. "But think very carefully about what you're doing."

"I have," replied Sue Ellen.

Karim patted her on the shoulder in a big brotherly fashion.

"We'll talk about it again later, when you're a bit stronger. Get some rest."

Then he was gone and Sue Ellen found herself alone with her pain. She closed her eyes and began to pray to the Spirit, trying to concentrate on the sentient being that Davey had told her lay at Loki's heart.

A noise in the cubicle made her open her eyes. Davey himself was standing over her, smiling. He had a bandage stuck to one cheek and the skin on his face was a rosy red colour but otherwise, he looked fine.

"I thought you were asleep," he whispered, leaning forward and kissing her cracked lips.

Sue Ellen shook her head.

"Are you really okay?" she asked. "They told me you were, but I wasn't allowed visitors at first and I wasn't sure they were telling me the truth."

"I'm fine," said Davey, fingering the bandage on his face. "A little frostbite on the toes and under this bandage, but nothing serious at all. You're the one we've been worried about."

Sue Ellen smiled. There was a gentle and protective tone of sympathy to Davey's beautiful voice that made her feel a whole lot better.

"I just had a visit from Karim," she said. "He told me that you and he had talked."

"Ah, our illustrious Chief Administrator," sighed Davey. "Yes, we had a conversation of sorts. I informed him of what had happened to us and he understood. Don't worry, everything's going to be fine."

"Is it really?" asked Sue Ellen, tears suddenly filling her eyes again. "Davey, I lost my toe. Did anyone tell you that? I got frostbite and then some sort of infection. The doctors said I'm lucky that I didn't lose some of my fingers too. I feel so... deformed."

Davey lifted one of her bandaged hands to his lips and kissed it.

"Don't cry, my love," he said. "You're the most beautiful girl on this planet, and the loss of a toe isn't going to change that. I see now that the blizzard was sent as a test, to see if we were strong enough to be together. We passed that test with flying colours and a beautiful future lies ahead of us."

Sue Ellen felt light-headed with relief. Davey still loved her! He still wanted to marry her! Then she saw his face take on a worried look.

"When Karim came to visit you, you didn't mention to him that the Spirit brought us the lull in the storm, did you?"

"No," replied Sue Ellen. "I would have if I'd thought about it, but he wasn't here very long."

"Don't," Davey warned her, shaking his head. "Unlike his wife, Karim is not receptive to the idea of the Spirit, and I doubt he ever will be. He doesn't understand these matters at all and mention of it only turns him further against me. It's best to keep quiet about our beliefs around him, for the moment."

This puzzled Sue Ellen. Davey had always been so insistent on speaking out; on preaching the Word of the Spirit. Why the change? Still, he must have good reason...

"If you say so," she agreed.

Davey sat on the bed beside her and stroked her head, staring sightlessly off into the distance.

"Our marriage on the anniversary of my Christening will be a very special occasion," he murmured, as much to himself as Sue Ellen. "And there will be children, so many children..."

Sue Ellen watched his face take on a beatific look, and felt better. Davey would smooth everything over with her parents and Becky. If he could do it with Karim, he could do it with them too. And the Spirit would help, the Spirit would guide them. They'd survived the blizzard because of her and losing a toe was a small price to pay for being chosen as Davey's mate. She thought back to their lovemaking in the cave and wondered if it was possible for her to have conceived there and then. The odds were against it, but it would be so romantic. Davey himself was conceived at the edge of the green lagoon -- another of his sacred places. If their first child could come into being in such a way, it would be perfect.

"I love you Davey," she whispered.

"I love you too," he replied, standing up. "I'm free to leave the Medical Centre now, so I must go home and pray. I'll visit again as soon as I can."

Sue Ellen watched as he strode out of the cubicle and out of sight. She shut her eyes and drifted off to sleep, thoughts of their marriage and future children easing the pain she felt.

Snow and ice were all that was to be seen out of the window now. The planet was moving ever further away from the life-giving sun, and all the Doverians could look forward to now were nearly three years of cold and dark. The carbonite bulkheads and nuclear generators were all that stood between the humans and the now-hostile world they lived on.

The population had dropped to half the size it had been during the Autumn, though Karim could tell it would increase again before the season was over. This was good reproduction weather. With little work and little entertainment to keep them busy, the Doverians resorted to the time-honoured peacetime activity of baby-making. New Buchanans, Vincents, Nuñez, Garforths... maybe even a new Habibi some day; Helena's insistence on a sixth child was beginning to wear down Karim's defences. Ah well, they were right. There wasn't so much else to do. Winter work was boring -- spinning, weaving, cooking, general base maintenance, some continued agricultural activity in the Hydroponics section. It was a good season for baby-making.

It wasn't a good season for weddings, on the other hand; no traditional open-air party at this time of year. But people still wanted to be married. Becky and Jorge were the most recent couple to take the plunge; they had decided they might as well get married since they were expecting a child together. They would be followed by Davey and Sue Ellen in September. More babies, more mouths to feed, more plants to grow and harvest, more food and clothing to make. More work for Karim to make sure everything got done. But also more people to do the work some day.

He looked away from the window as he heard the door open. He smiled when Becky came in. She stopped in the doorway and folded her arms.

"Aw, shucks. Still not naked."

"Still can't knock?" said Karim, though he laughed at her joke.

"Can't be bothered," she replied, coming to sit down. "Those millions of diapers you ordered us to make are ready, O Great Administrator Person. The Hydroponics people promise to have more kapok plants next time around so they can make more 'cotton'. And I don't mind if I never stand at one of those weaving machines again. The noise is astounding."

Karim sat at his desk and put on his professional air. "That's why we keep all that stuff at Koenigshafen. I'm glad to know we're adequately prepared for our baby boom this time. I remember trying to make do with shermeen nappies a few years ago; you might as well use plastic sheeting for what that's worth... Anyway, how are you doing? Looking forward to the baby?"

Becky looked down at her maternity uniform and made a face. "I'll be glad when it's all over, when I have the baby and can get Jorge to carry it for a change. I'm especially looking forward to smelling food again without wanting to throw up. So much for the idea all that only lasts one trimester."

"The joy of reproduction," said Karim. He hesitated and then said, "Your sister seems to be doing all right, and she's actually working in food processing."

"Don't talk to me about that one," said Becky, lifting her hands in irritation. "She's enjoying it so much it's insulting. Personally, I think it's a load of crap. She's putting on a show to prove how happy she is. Like that's going to make everybody happy. Dad is still behaving like she has some terrible disease. Mom is happy as long as Sue Ellen is happy. We haven't heard from Blake in months, Matthew is just taking Dad's side because that's what Mary told him to do, and John's busy patching things up with Akiko, which is his excuse for ignoring the whole issue. Some happy family, huh? That girl and Davey have been nothing but trouble."

Karim shrugged his shoulders. "They're both adults -- or so the computer reckons. They can do what they like. I have to say I appreciate Davey more these days; he isn't rocking the boat, and that's just how I like people."

"You certainly changed your tune since they got lost."

"I'm not about to buy that stuff about the spirit. Sounds as if he's been listening to too many stories about that planet that was controlled by an entity who unwittingly turned against the Alphans. Still, he's free to bore people into the ground with it as long as that's what they want to hear. He's made his peace with Layla and Neil, and I have no reason to speak ill of him. I still don't trust him, but then I don't think I trust anyone. I can't afford to let people get the better of me."

"The sign of a great leader, no doubt," said Becky dubiously. "Doesn't sound like you."

"Well, I think I'm doing pretty well so far," protested Karim. "I've headed rescue missions, kept this place afloat and then some, and am currently presiding over one of the most fertile periods in our history. And yes, I know I've changed my tune about that, too. If it takes one person one hour to harvest five kapok plants, we're going to need a lot more people to do it. Only fools don't change their minds. Besides, how can I resist the pleasure of so many beautiful pregnant ladies around me?"

He eyed her deliberately and Becky laughed. "Some of you guys amaze me. I'm surprised you're not out there chatting up beach balls. You need your head examined." She got up. "Well, I've got to go home and get Jorge to wait on me for a while. I'll be deafening myself at the clothing manufacture again tomorrow, so I probably won't see you for a couple of days."

Karim stood up and accompanied her to the door, which he gallantly opened for her. "Thanks for coming by. I hope you've put yourself back on office duty for next week."

"Aw, you can't live without me, can you?" she cooed, stopping in the doorway.

"I don't want that future kapok-picker to be damaged by excessive noise pollution, that's all," he said, pointing at Becky's belly. He wondered if she would object if he put his hand on it. He decided she would probably clobber him. "Anyway, no, I don't really need you. I'll have you know I'm the best administrator this place has ever had. I can run it single handed. Piece of cake."

"Yeah, right. Well, I'll be back on Monday." She looked out at the corridor thoughtfully. "I still can't believe my little sister is having a baby. And with Davey the Loony of all people."

"Amazing how things work out, isn't it?"

"Or don't work out. I wonder how long it'll last?" she said.

"Well, maybe you should give them the benefit of the doubt until the end of the season."

"Plenty of time for some more little Kano kapok-pickers, right?"

"Tsk. She sees right through me," he said, pretending to be disappointed. "No, I don't know. I can't say I know Sue Ellen all that well, but she and Davey are getting a hard time from your father. Maybe the rest of us should cut them some slack for her sake. Who knows, maybe it is true love that will last forever."

"That only exists in books," said Becky.

"Yes. Personally, I think he's just out for someone pretty who won't give him any argument about anything, and that she wants someone big and strong who can shield her from having to deal with things herself. But then I've had a hard love life."

"Haven't we all?"

Karim nodded thoughtfully. He knew happy couples at Dover; some people had found happiness without having to compromise too much. He just wasn't one of them, and for all her recent marriage, he knew Becky wasn't either.

"Weren't you leaving?" he suddenly remarked.

"Yeah. See you on Monday," she said, walking down the corridor. She turned as she was leaving. "Maybe you're right. Maybe Davey and Sue Ellen will live happily ever after. Stranger things have happened. Maybe you'll even be the best administrator we've ever had." She turned away with a laugh.

"What do you mean 'maybe'?" Karim called after her.