The Curve of The Earth by Simon Morden Page B

different species. He wondered how long it would be before that became true.
    They’d been booked business class, but Petrovitch had upped the ante and upgraded them to first. He could have bought the airline, but he didn’t normally need one. Just this time – and it wasn’t like he was a frequent flyer – he decided he’d take the easy way out and give himself some leg room.
    The flight attendants treated him like he was an egg, and Newcomen noticed: how they referred to him as Dr Petrovitch, showed him to his seat, asked if they could stow his luggage and to be sure to call if he needed anything.
    He noticed Newcomen’s sideways glance.
    “It’s either because they’re scared of me, or because I’m as famous as a physicist is likely to get. Look out the window.” Petrovitch had the window seat, and Newcomen had to lean over him to see. “Those bumps on the wing? I invented the things inside them. Remember when you were a kid on the farm, and all those planes you used to see flying overhead like little silver crosses? They’re rusting in a desert somewhere in New Mexico because of me.”
    “Uh, sure.”
    “We’re not sitting in cattle class, are we? Even our tame spooks have had to get bumped so they can keep tabs on us.”
    Newcomen looked out of the window again. “It still has wings.”
    “They don’t do much of anything except act as something to strap the engines to.” Petrovitch frowned. “You didn’t honestly think something this vast could fly on those stubby little things, did you? Or did you just not think at all? You flew from Seattle to New York. Then again from there to here.
Yobany stos
, man. Didn’t you notice the difference?”
    “We took off and landed.”
    “Vertically?” Petrovitch threw himself against the back of his seat. “I’m going to throw you out mid-Atlantic. Is that all right with you?”
    The fuselage filled up with passengers; not that many of them came into Petrovitch’s part of the cabin. The secret service guys turned up, dark suits, infoshades, and eased into the rearmost seats. Made aware of their arrival by an alarm he’d placed on the manifest, Petrovitch half stood and gave each one in turn a good minute of his undivided attention.
    They stared back at him in return. He’d rather not have had them on the flight, and it would have been straightforward for him to have made the carrier lose their tickets. But a wave of their badges and they’d have been allowed to board anyway. Only US planes could fly to the US, and the carrier depended on a permit from the government to fly. Petrovitch still had to work within the bounds of what was possible. He wasn’t omnipotent enough to just wish his dreams into being. Not yet, anyway.
    “Problem?” asked Newcomen when Petrovitch had sat down again. He’d been leafing through the safety information on the little handheld screen tucked in the pocket of the seat in front.
    “Spooks. Back of the cabin. Don’t worry about them for now. They’re as trapped here as we are.”
    “Doesn’t mention your name in any of the literature.”
    “Bet you it doesn’t mention Frank Whittle, either.”
    The cabin staff toured the seats, checking all the passengers were sitting comfortably and securely. The pilot started to taxi them to the edge of the runway, nudging the jets to above idle. They rolled on their fat black wheels out away from the terminal buildings, and Petrovitch watched the cracks in the concrete slide by.
    By bending lower, he could see a China Eastern flight coming in from Shanghai, the vast torpedo shape occluding the sky as it drifted overhead. Its undercarriage was down, ready to receive the ground, and its engines pushed it forward until it had a clear space to land on.
    The fat, rocket-shaped body rumbled away into the distance, and it was their turn.
    The pilot engaged the repulsors. The airframe creaked as the weight shifted, and when the wheels were clear of the runway, they retracted with a