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Authors: Stel Pavlou

BOOK: Decipher
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“There's got to be a language that shares that trait as well, hasn't there?” Matheson prompted.
“There is,” Pearce responded in place of the linguist as Scott drained the last of his coffee.
“It's called Hebrew,” Scott said. “In Hebrew, in the traditional Torah, the scripture was written out with no punctuation. And no spaces to denote words. Just a stream of letters. And in Hebrew, every letter also represents a number.”
He eyed Hackett, realizing the importance of what he'd just said. The linguist followed the physicist in perfect unison, both turning on a dime to study their own computer screens once more. Matheson was on his feet, followed by November.
Numbers. Letters. Spirals. Patterns … Cities.
“You still don't know what this number stream is?” Scott asked quietly.
“Uh-uh. I thought it might be an algorithm. But I can't be certain.”
“The two must be linked.”
Hackett folded his arms. “How?”
Scott took a deep breath. “It took Fischer seven years to crack Rongorongo, the Easter Island script. It took Michael Ventris five or six years to crack Linear B. David Stuart first translated Mayan at the age of ten, but he spent his whole life dedicated to that one language. He found that present-day Mayan is similar to the ancient Mayan glyphs and that they're phonetic. He translated what was written at the Temple of the Sun, at Palenque, in a day, when it had taken previous scholars a lifetime to attempt. It's a complex language. It deserves a lifetime dedicated to it. But I've been at this
two days, and I have—what?—a couple of days left, maximum. They had a point of reference to refer back to. A garbled modern language, or a similar script that had already been cracked—even a century of previous research to build upon. Just what the hell have I got here?”
November took it all in quietly before responding: “You have the words.”
“What?”
“Why don't you try looking at it in a different way?” she suggested.
Scott didn't appear moved.
“Dr. Scott, in your lecture you said, in the beginning was
logos
—the word.”
“Yeah, well, I oversimplified.
Logos
also meant ratio, reason, discourse—even account.”
“Richard, you know you're onto something. We can all feel it,” Sarah insisted. “You said it yourself, word in action. You have the words. And in order to read them—what's the action?”
Scott studied the screen thoughtfully. “I didn't have enough information back in Switzerland,” he said. “Those pieces of rock didn't make up a large enough text. I need to see what this stuff looks like spread out on a flat surface.”
Hackett was with him every step of the way. “The node,” he suggested.
“Right. Hey, Ralph, that oil node you sunk into the sea floor. That's not too far from here, is it? Can you operate it remotely?”
“That's what it was designed for.”
“So you could power it up? It had a camera on it, didn't it.”
“Sure.”
“Call the bridge,” Scott said. “Tell 'em we need to power up some kind of transmitter—or whatever it is you do to access that thing. And tell them it's imperative I take a look. I need to see what's down there.”
The flight deck heard the engines of the approaching F-24 labor as it fought the volcanic ash jamming up its innards. In the ward room, they were preparing for a task force meeting when they got the word. Up on the bridge, Rear Admiral Dower stood side by side with Captain Henderson, counting the squadron home when a young crewman reported: “It's Captain Ryman, sir. His eagle just blew an engine!”
All senior officers rushed for the windows to see a thick trail of black smoke billow out from behind the F-24. A Lieutenant at the window flinched as he tracked the source through his binoculars and a loud explosion cracked out across the sky. The whine of the second engine fighting to compensate was horrendous, but with all the volcanic ash it was clear that the plane was losing power.
“This ash is too thick, Captain,” the Lieutenant commented quietly. “Recommend we don't deploy any more jet patrols for a while.” Henderson agreed darkly, issuing more orders.
“Aye, aye, Captain. Switching to choppers.”
As they watched the plane coast in, the pilot, Captain Jeff Ryman from Iowa, with two small children and a wife waiting back home, struggled valiantly with the controls, and as they all said a silent prayer he even managed to bring the nose back up for a moment. But the engine failure had hit at just the wrong moment. He was too low to bail out, the chute would never open. And he was just too far out to make it to the flight deck. In the end, Ryman was just a fireball tumbling across the surface of the ocean.
Henderson looked away. “Never lost a plane on my watch,” he said. “Never. Poor bastard. What a way to go. This fucking weather's gonna kill us all.”
Another thin young officer approached his captain. Saluted crisply. “Captain Henderson, sir!” A slack salute back. “Major Gant aboard
Polar Star
is on comm requesting permission to deploy their sonar transmitter array.”
“What the hell for?” the captain barked, rummaging around in his khakis for another breath mint to chew on. The crewman explained about the camera on the Rola Corp. deep drilling node but Dower was already on it. Back at the comm desk, he hooked the radio up to his mouth. “Larry, what's up?”
“The team wants to take a look at the Atlantis wall, Admiral. All kinds of reasons. Engineering. Geological. Is there any enemy activity in the area?” Gant asked flatly.
“All clear, Major. And Major … ? Tell Mr. Pearce thank you very much. The information he provided was accurate, as expected. We now have two SaRGE units each within seventy-five kilometers of
Jung Chang.
Recon reports the base is abandoned. Possibly destroyed.”
“I will tell him, sir—”
Suddenly a wave of activity shot across the comm desk. Double-manned duty officers switched over to radio-based communications. “We've got McMurdo on line!”
“Hold on, will ya, Major?” Dower snapped, expectantly eyeing the comm officers for more information. One young officer hastily jotted down everything he heard on a notepad and underlined key sections of his scribble with thick graphite from his pencil.
“Sir! We got a window! McMurdo reports a break in the weather. We got four hours to get the team in there by air. McMurdo requests some indication of whether to expect an airlift.” He spun on his chair to face his captain. “What do we do, sir? The longer we stay on line the more chance the Chinese will be able to tap in.”
Dower swung on Henderson. “Captain, what have you got with a 1,500-mile range?”
Henderson looked to his men. “V-TOL,” a Lieutenant answered apprehensively.
Henderson seemed unconvinced. “At that range?”
“We strap a couple extra fuel tanks on those babies, they'll make it all the way, Captain. I'd bet my life on it.”
V-TOLS were Vertical Take-Off and Landing vehicles. Planes that took off like choppers, but flew with the speed and configuration of a fixed-wing aircraft. They were great aircraft but Dower was concerned. “They don't have that kind of range.”
“If my crew says so, they can do the job.”
The communications officer fidgeted at his post. Finally decided to take a chance and butt in. “Sorry to interrupt, sir, but McMurdo's waiting on a response.”
Dower demanded: “How long will they take to get ready?”
“How many do you need?”
“Two. One for crew, one for luggage.”
“Forty-five minutes.”
“You got half an hour,” Dower ordered, returning to his radio. “Major, did you catch that?”
“Most of it, sir. Yes.”
“Get all the team's cargo up on deck.
Polar Star
has a Dolphin chopper—is that correct?”
“Affirmative, Admiral.”
“Good. Start ferrying everything over to the
Truman.”
“What about that node access via the sonar, sir?”
“Tell Hackett he's got fifteen minutes. He can poke around all he likes but I expect to see that entire team on this flight deck in half an hour or there'll be hell to pay.”
“Sir! Yes, sir!”
 
As Dower crossed the bridge to leave, one of the communications officers tackled the Admiral delicately: “Uh, sir? There's this guy on the other channel. Says he's calling from the Vatican City. Says it's important he speak with Professor Scott.”
“Tell him he's in transit right now. Advise him he can reach him at McMurdo station in—” He glanced at his watch. “Four hours.” Dower flicked the peak of his hat at Henderson on his way out.
“What do you think you're doing?”
“Getting my stuff.”
“They said we'll be taking it with us.”
“These things don't leave my side. And besides, I don't
trust 'em,” Sarah said through gritted teeth, leaning into the crow-bar and jimmying the wooden crate open. She prised the splintered lid off and fetched out the device she had brought with her from Egypt.
Pearce seemed surprised as she stuffed the object in her backpack and went for the next crate.
“Well, are you just gonna stand there or are you gonna help me?” she demanded, throwing the empty casing aside and struggling to get the next crate into position.
“You're full of surprises, aren't you, Sarah Kelsey?”
“I try,” she panted, straining to jimmy the lid.
“What is that?”
“I have no idea. Just thought it might be useful. Thought they all might be useful. I wanted to go through them with everyone upstairs but we're running out of time.”
“What do they do?”
“As far as I'm aware, they respond to sound. Look, Bob, things are a little hectic. Are you gonna stand there with your thumb up your ass or
are you gonna help me?”
Pearce grabbed another crow-bar and started forcing planks of wood off of packing cases, cursing as he sliced open his thumb.
 
They were packing up the lab all around them. Boxing up data tapes and notebooks. Rolling up maps and transferring computer information onto terabyte disks for transportation to McMurdo Station. It was like an entire university faculty had just been shut down, but the professors had refused to go home.
Huddled around Matheson as he fiddled with the communications protocols and awoke the deep drilling node from its slumber, Richard Scott hopped on one leg as he struggled to get into his bright orange survival suit in preparation for the journey to mainland Antarctica.
Ralph, it seemed, had done it a thousand times before. He had kitted up in a matter of seconds. November for her part was making sure he hadn't forgotten anything, while Hackett simply eyed the screen intently, and watched the flashes of white noise with quiet interest, as if he were willing the transmission to kick its way through.
“We're connected,” Matheson stated intensely. “Gimme a second here.”
Scott glanced at his watch. “We got six minutes, Ralph, and then they want us up on deck.”
“What do you want me to do when we see this stuff, Doc?”
“Take a snapshot,” he ordered. “Take as many snapshots as you can. As high a resolution as you can. We can analyze it all later.”
The idea of the original first language of mankind was quite a notion. At the last count there had been 6,000 separate tongues since the dawn of time. And why had they diverged? Nobody knew. The Qu'ran said the languages of man separated through natural processes. The Bible spoke of Babel, and God smiting mankind with a confusion for attempting to build a mighty tower to the heavens. But no one really knew why.
The Genesis Language.
Could this be it?
“Brace yourself, Dr. Scott. We've got power,” Matheson announced excitedly. His fingers bounced off the keyboard as he wrestled with the data on his screen. Punched in commands and sent out orders. “Camera is operational. Powering up lights … bingo!”
Instinctively the entire team leaned in closer to get a better look. And not one person in the room saw what they expected to see.
 
It didn't match the video, for starters.
That shaky piece of raw footage Matheson had shown Scott had revealed destruction on a massive scale. An ancient crystal wall had been blasted apart, revealing an expanse of open water beyond and a hint of further structures.
But on the screen was something different. This was a crystal wall, for sure. But in a perfect state of preservation. No hole. No destruction. Not even a crack.
“Where's the damage?” Scott inquired, baffled. “You're sure this is it? We're not anywhere else?”
Matheson checked his readings out of courtesy, but he was adamant about the facts. “There is no other node, only this one. This is it. But I'll be damned if I can tell you what's going on.”
November squinted as she tried to make out some of the
writing. The water was a little cloudy and particles were floating past the lens. “What kind of a wall,” she asked, “repairs itself?”
“Bob said something was alive down there,” Hackett remarked roguishly.
Matheson eyed his colleague incredulously. “You think somebody went down there and repaired this? You can't repair a crystal wall.”
“Not some
body
. Some
thing
. Like the Chinese soldier said, there's something alive down there. Not somebody. Not a person like you or me. But something unnatural.”
“Jon,” Matheson said apprehensively, “sometimes you really know how to unnerve me.”
“I unnerve you?” Hackett tossed back, heading for the door. “Whoever repaired that thing should be the one unnerving you. I'll be on deck,” he said. “You've got two minutes. If I were you I'd start snapping.”
 
Matheson took thirty-five pictures in all, some closer in than others. He wrote them all straight to disk and placed the disk in the top pocket of his survival coat. He printed out a copy of each picture on glossy photographic paper for group study on the flight, and handed one to Scott as they climbed the steps of the helideck.
There was a pattern to the placement of the glyphs across the flat surface of the wall, all right. They seemed to be arranged in an interlocking weave of spirals that crisscrossed constantly.
In fact, it resembled very much the pattern displayed in so many designs in nature—most notably, the seed arrangements of sunflowers. Quite simply it was a dazzling display.
Scott showed the picture to Hackett as they boarded the Dolphin together for the quick trip over to the
Truman
. The physicist reacted with amazement. The pattern, he explained, was a fundamental property of the very fabric of complexity theory itself.
The pattern did indeed conform to the series of numbers called the Fibonacci scale. And that in itself might just hold the goddamn key to cracking this thing.

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