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said, “Haven’t the Kéthani set up... I don’t know what you’d call them—clinics? Anyway, places you can go to talk about what’s happened, how it affects you personally...” He stopped there. Ben, alone in our group, was not implanted, and he had never told us the reason why—but that’s another story.
    All across the world, stricken citizens remembered life before the Kéthani, grieving over loved ones who had died—died and gone to oblivion everlasting—while accepting the gift for themselves and suffering the consequences of renewed grief and guilt. I’d read about the psychiatric clinics set up to help us.
    Richard Lincoln said, “Representatives of the Kéthani, humans recruited to do the administrative work of the aliens, have started counselling stations. The thing is, there are rumours.”
    I looked at him. “What do you mean?”
    He shrugged. “Look, this is just hearsay. But I’ve heard that these counsellors... well, that they’re actually representatives of the Kéthani race.”
    We stared at him. As a ferryman, his words on these matters carried a certain weight.
    “You’ve heard that at the Station?” I asked.
    “Unofficially, of course. Personally, I don’t know what to think...”
    Jeffrey said, with a distant look in his eyes, “To think of it, I might have been pouring out my woes to an extraterrestrial.”
    For the rest of the night, we chatted about the pros and cons of this idea.
    The thought of the Kéthani amongst us...
    Jeffrey said, “Whether I’ve been talking to a human or an alien,” he smiled, “I know that it’s done me some good. Some things just can’t be handled alone.”
    I was to remember these words, a few weeks later, when Jeffrey suffered another tragic loss.

TWO
    ONWARD STATION
    That winter was the coldest in living memory, and January saw a record fall of snow across the north of England. On the last Monday of the month I sat in the warmth of the staff room and gazed out across the snow-sealed moorland, my mind completely blank. Miller, Head of Maths, dropped himself into the opposite seat, effectively blocking my view.
    “Jeffrey,” he said. “You take year thirteen for Film Studies, don’t you?”
    “For my sins.”
    “What do you make of the Hainault girl?”
    “I was away when she started,” I said. It had been mid-December, and I’d had other things on my mind.
    “Oh, of course. Sorry. Well, you take them today, don’t you?”
    “Last period. Why?”
    He had the annoying habit of tapping the implant at his temple with a nicotine-stained finger, producing an insistent, hollow beat.
    “Just wondered what you’d make of her, that’s all.”
    “Disruptive?”
    “The Hainault girl?” He grunted a laugh. “Quite the contrary. Brilliant pupil. Educated privately in France before arriving here. She’s wasted at this dump. It’s just...”
    “Yes?”
    He hesitated. “You’ll see when you take the class,” he said, and stubbed out his cigarette.
    I watched, puzzled, as he stood and shuffled from the room.

    “Tomlinson, Wilkins—if you want to turn out for the school team on Wednesday, shut it now.”
    Silence from the usually logorrhoeic double act. I stared around the class, challenging.
    “Thank you. Now, get into your study groups and switch on the screens. If you recall...” I glanced at my notes, “last week we were examining the final scenes of Brighton Rock. I want you to watch the last fifteen minutes, then we’ll talk.”
    I glanced around the room. “Claudine Hainault?”
    The new girl was sitting alone at the back of the class, already tapping into her computer. She looked up when I called her name, tossed a strand of hair from her eyes, and smiled.
    She was blonde and slim, almost impossibly pretty. She appeared older than her eighteen years, something about her poise and confidence giving her a sophistication possessed by none of her classmates.
    I moved to her desk and knelt. “Claudine, I’ll run through