The Long War

into life. ‘Josh, can you hear me, mate?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Ha ha. How you doing down there?’
    ‘Making a restaurant reservation.’
    ‘Funny you should say that. If it does all go tits up and you need supplies quickly there’s a cache, only a mile or so downstream.’
    ‘A cache? Of what?’
    ‘Survival stuff. A little shelter, a bit of food, knives, tools. Spare laces for your boots. Left by combers, for combers.’
    Joshua sat on his sleeping bag. ‘Bill, what is this place? Why did we stop here? I mean, in a Joker ? Who the hell stops in Jokers?’
    ‘Combers do. That’s the point, really. You want to know the story of this world? How Earth West 110,719 got its locusts? Our best guess is that pterosaurs never evolved on this world.’
    ‘Pterosaurs?’
    ‘And other flying dinosaurs. Back on the Datum, before the pterosaurs, big insects ruled the skies. Got as big as they could, in fact, exploiting the high oxygenation of the air. Then when the pterosaurs came along the big insects got hunted down, and only the little ones survived, and they never got so big again. After that the skies belonged to the pterosaurs, and later the birds. Here – no pterosaurs, for whatever reason. And later, the birds didn’t have a chance to grow large either. So here it’s not swallows chasing flies; here huge rapacious dragonflies hunt down birds the size of big moths . . .’
    ‘Not a world for humans, then.’
    ‘No chance.’
    ‘But the combers come here.’
    ‘Of course. And to survivable refuges in other Jokers. Joshua, a Joker is a whole world, and it isn’t going to be the same all over; there are always going to be safe places, refuges like this. You get to know them.’
    ‘How?’
    ‘Through other combers. There’s a whole subculture that people like you, and even Lobsang, know nothing about. And we like it that way.
    ‘ You think the story of the Long Earth is about colonies like Hell-Knows-Where, or Helen’s Reboot, or cities like Valhalla, and wars of independence and whatnot. All the mad old stuff from Datum history projected into the new worlds. Well, that isn’t the story, Joshua. It’s about a new way of living – or maybe a very old one. The combers haven’t colonized the Long Earth, Joshua. Nor have they adapted it to suit themselves. They just live in it, as it is.’
    This lecture surprised Joshua, who had grown up with Bill, and now shared a town with him, and thought he knew him. ‘How do you know?’
    ‘Oh, you know, you have your sabbaticals. I take off for a bit of an old stroll meself from time to time. I always come back. Too fond of my home comforts, that’s my problem. And of the odd drink. But it’s always a grand vacation. Anyhow I know how these fellas think.’
    Joshua thought that over. ‘And we need comber thinking now to find the trolls, right?’
    ‘Because trolls live in the Long Earth too. And they know the secret places, the places to hide out, like combers are learning . . . It’s getting dark.’
    ‘I noticed.’
    ‘Joshua, you’re happy down there for the night? There are various exotic horrors lurking, needless to say.’
    ‘But you’ve got infrared sensors, sonar motion sensors. You’ll spot any moving bodies, hot-blooded or cold-blooded. Right? Wake me if you need to.’
    ‘No worries. Sleep tight, buddy.’
    ‘And you.’
    He woke up in a grey, moist dawn.
    Even before he opened his eyes he was aware of an uneasy prickling at the back of the neck, the product of a million years of animal sensitivity trying to kick its way past the doorkeeper of the cerebrum.
    He was being watched.
    And he heard words: ‘ Path-less-ss one . . .’
    Still in his sleeping bag, he sat up.
    The elf was leaning against a tree trunk a few yards away, blending into the shadows so perfectly that Joshua might never have noticed it if it hadn’t turned its head and grinned. Low dawn sunlight fell on two rows of perfectly triangular teeth.
    Then the elf stepped out into the open light, reaching the sleeping bag in a couple of strides.
    It was no more than four feet tall, and was squat and strong, with a face that owed something to a solemn baboon and a punk-rock hairstyle that owed everything to a cockatoo. It wore a sort of leather loincloth, and carried a leather pouch at its waist. It was bootless, showing feet that were quite human except for the talon-like toenails. Joshua looked for other weapons and couldn’t see any.
    He was oddly reminded of a mole,