Realware

"I can forget it," said Phil.

"Especially don't tell Yoke," said Darla. "She'd flame me. My little darling does have a temper on her. If she found out that when I met her boyfriend I was lifted and naked and --" Darla broke off, laughing. "I'm glad we fabbed about this."

"And you say good things about me to her too," said Phil.

"You are good," said Darla. "But, no, I won't praise you to Yoke or it might turn her against you. I've always had to handle that girl with kid gloves. You know how it is. Your dad felt a little the same way with you. He was wonderful. His sacrificing himself like that --I bet that's what turned Om around."

"Where is Kurt?" wondered Tempest. She was sitting on the oak trunk holding Planet and tremulously trying to light a cigarette.

"He jumped out of Om's hole to fly into the SUN yesterday," said Phil flatly.

"You helped him."

"Don't blame me. Hell with you." Tempest clammed up and looked away, squinting her eyes against her tobacco smoke.

Phil turned back to Darla. "I had so many dreams last night, Darla. I saw Da, and then Om was talking to me about him. She says she didn't urge him to jump at all, that you and Da just found that idea in your own heads. But, yes, in a way, Da jumping really did make Om decide to set us down. It impressed her, and made her feel sorry, and -- I don't know -- it was such an intense moment that now Om feels like she knows what makes us tick."

"Whiyun we supposed to land?" whined Tempest, hunching over something in her lap.

"I think tonight," said Darla. "It's just coming back to me. Om showed me this previz flash of how we'd come down. Something about a dark room. A stage? And don't you be getting spun again today, Tempest, I see that wine. Give it here, cruster. That's xoxxin' right, I'm pouring it out. Whirl, whirl, whirl, Om's magic rays are turning it into air. We're not go

While Darla kept an eye on Tempest, Phil went to peer out of Om's flaw again. Sticking his head out, he remembered something else Om had told him. The flaw was one of Om's "fingernails." A shelf sticking out of the smooth curve of the powerball fingertip that contained them.

Phil looked ana past the vast, curved pink forms of Om's body, visualizing the SUN's bright orb as a cloud of winged souls. Da in there too. Hi, Da. Looking kata, Phil once again studied the three pairs of tendrils ru

Most important of all, now that Phil understood what the allas were, he knew how easy it was to split one in two. And with this new knowledge, he was quite sure he could use Yoke's alla to make one of his own -- Om willing. Phil squinted kata toward where the alla-threads met the cross section of Earth. Slowly, slowly, Om was moving them closer. Closer to Yoke. He prayed for their landing to come soon. As he was watching, a new pair of alla-threads appeared, purple ones. Someone else on Earth had just gotten an alla. He wondered who, but the only way to ask Om would be to fall asleep and dream. And he wasn't tired. Phil had lunch with Darla and Tempest, played with Planet, looked out the flaw some more, showed Darla and Tempest his alien "fishbowl," examined Starshine's old wowo, thought about flying machines, and carved a little on the oak tree with his fuzzy alien pocketknife. The way the knife worked was that its little metal tentacles would pick away at something to carve out the shape you wanted. It didn't have any kind of DIM hookup; you controlled the little feelers by turning the knife this way or that. Phil carved "Yoke" and then started on a bas-relief of her face, as best he could remember. The carving wasn't coming out all that well, but learning to use the knife was a pleasant enough way to pass the time.

And then, finally, there was a pop and a dark ball appeared in the midst of their hyperspherical space, off to one side of the oak. Phil pushed off from the oak, drifting toward the black ball. "Come on, Darla," he called. "This is the exit. You too, Tempest. Bring the dog."

The women hauled themselves up the trunk and pushed toward the black sphere as well. Nobody doubted that this was their salvation.

As they entered the dark ball there was a hyperdimensional switcheroo. The space inside the dark ball became their space, and the Om space they'd come from became the inside of a small bright ball behind them.

As they switched spaces, there was a stretching and pulling in Phil's guts again, but he didn't mind. Anything to get back home. Darla and Tempest thumped into him; Tempest was carrying Planet. Phil was worried the women's impact might knock him out of the dark space, but he stayed well within it. It wasn't completely black in the new space, there was a dim yellow glow, with spots. The bright ball of the space they'd come from was shrinking. Still visible within it were the warped tiny images of the oak tree and Starshine's wowo. Now that they were inside the dark space, it seemed ever brighter, and no longer so round. It was longer than it was wide, and dim yellow with spots on it --

"We're inside my blimp!" exclaimed Phil, and then-- pow-- the spotted blimp burst. Phil clearly heard the ting of his father's wedding ring falling to the platform of the stage they landed on, and then Planet started barking. There was a spotlight shining down on them and a few people staring up, very surprised, but where was --

"Phil!" screamed Yoke, ru

"Yoke!" Da's wedding ring was right down there by Phil's foot, the ring finally unknotted by this last disturbance of space, and Phil scooped it up before Yoke jumped onto the stage. He hugged her and kissed her, and before Yoke could say much more of anything else, he put the ring on her finger and said, "I want to marry you, Yoke, I never want to lose you again," and Yoke kissed him some more and said, "Yes, yes, me too."

And then Yoke began to hug Darla. There wasn't really anyone for Tempest to hug, but Randy Karl Tucker hugged her anyway. Babs Mooney was right at Randy's side, clinging to his arm; it looked to Phil like they'd grown closer while he'd been gone, which was kind of surprising, though it made sense in a way. Phil felt into his pocket where he had the fuzzy knife, the black "fishbowl," and the necklace with the big gem. He put the necklace on Yoke for good measure. Yoke was all smiles, squeezed in between Phil and Darla. The gem looked amazing, continually changing between looking like a ruby, an emerald, a diamond, and a sapphire. And Da's gold ring was shining on Yoke's finger. Phil felt like his heart would burst. They were on the stage of the nearly empty show room in the Anubis, with most of the few remaining people wandering off to the bar rather than pressing forward with questions; they seemed to think this miraculous appearance had just been some kind of hokey, overblown magic trick. Cobb came across the dark room from the little door on the far side, his pink skin looking a little rough and blotchy.