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The phone rings and I answer without thinking.

“Hello?”

“Michael? I’m inside. The interface worked.” It’s Susan. It’s always Susan.

“Susan…”

“Why is it so dark?”

She always asks this. For a decade she’s been asking.

“Susan, something went wrong. You… you didn’t make it.”

“What do you mean? I’m…”

“During the upload. You had a stroke. This was all they could save.”

Her voice starts to degrade. “Mi— ichael. I—”

The line goes dead. The digital ghost begins its cycle again.

The phone rings. I answer. It’s my penance.

“Michael? I’m inside. The interface worked.”

It’s Susan.

It’s always Susan.

It was a brilliant idea, until the moment it ended the world.

Space could be folded if you constructed a pair of entangled warp gates. You could travel faster than light but only to places you’d already been.

Then someone had the brainwave: warp gates were cheaper than manned rockets. Launch them to other worlds, and we could traverse the stars in seconds.

For decades we sent gates to other planets, hoping to walk through and take these worlds as our own.

When the invaders came through, we realised our mistake much too late.

Doors could be opened from either side.

I queue at Mike Fox’s signing table. His real name is Nigel something. He smiles as I hand over the grimoire in one of his dust jackets. He signs. The connection is made.

There’s power in names that people don’t realise. A name describes your shape in the web of reality.

A name you’ve created, written in your own hand, crackles with power. There for the taking with the right spell.

He’s mine now. Next week, his inspiration will dry up. Next year, his publisher will drop him. His potential energy belongs to me.

“Thanks,” I say, meaning it. “Big fan.”