The Rock (19 page)

"The explosion at Vredefort Dome was not done by either of our governments," Hawkins tried explaining.

"It was done by a native of the third planet."

Hawkins went into detail, talking about the two missing bombs and the fact that he had been part of a team trying to recover them. He felt shackled with the inability to use his hands and by the total lack of response from the three points of light. There was no indication that he was even being heard, until he had finished. The reply was not what he had hoped.

"We are not interested in the factionalism among the natives of the third planet except as they directly affect the Coalition. The destruction of the relay site at Vredefort Dome did so affect us. We wish to avoid such occurrences in the future. For that reason we have shown you the three options we are considering, along with the perspective the Defender and the Mediator have on those options.

"The fact that you have a weapon still missing and uncontrolled that is capable of such power as that which destroyed the Vredefort Dome relay was a very significant factor when we considered your species on the scale for acceptance into the Coalition or even simply protection by the Coalition.

"We carefully selected four personnel from each of your two factions in terms of the skills of those personnel so you could understand the options and the relative merits of those options. We chose one military person to be able to understand the Defender's analysis. We chose a statistician to understand the risk-and-benefit projection of each option. A geologist to be able to help you uncover the relay sites so we might bring you here. And a physicist to understand scientific matters as they might come up to affect your decision."

"Where are we now?" Tuskin asked.

"Our present location is classified," the Speaker replied.

"Are we on Earth?" Tuskin persisted.

"No."

"How did we get here?" Tuskin asked.

"Through what you call the portals or Walls."

"We know that," Tuskin replied. "I want to know how we traveled through space to get here."

"Even if we told you, you would not understand."

Hawkins was frustrated. He had the answers to many of the questions they had been struggling with prior to going through the portal. But those questions were no longer important in the face of what the Speaker had presented. "You have shown us your three options. You have also indicated which option you are inclined to pursue. You say you want our perspective, yet you seem to know all you need to know about humans to make your decision. What true options do we have? What can we do to influence your decision? You must have brought us here for some reason other than simply to explain the situation to us."

"We felt we must apprise you of the situation out of respect for you as sentient beings. The Mediator also desired to hear from you should there be anything that might change the analysis of the situation."

There was a long silence and Hawkins was surprised when Debra was the one to break it. "You said you wanted our perspective, but you ask it only after presenting us with information we were not aware of, and which in itself would change our perspective. Our race is still very young as compared to yours. We need time to develop and we need time to adjust to this new information."

Tuskin stirred. "You chose us, but we are not the ones that make decisions for our species. We can bring your message back to those who do. That may change things on our planet enough so that your first or second option may be feasible. If our governments cooperate, we can make this planet a worthwhile place to defend."

"We will consider this. Wait." The room went totally dark and Hawkins was left with the image of the lights etched on his retinas, slowly fading away.

Hawkins was sweating despite the cool temperature. He directed his question in the general direction of Tuskin. "You were sent four names?"

Tuskin's voice sounded very far away. "Yes. A message to our space lab. Very directional. It came up from Tunguska. That, along with the message out of Ayers Rock, led us to dig. We have long known there was something strange about what happened at Tunguska so many years ago."

"Why didn't your government send the four people named in the message?" Levy asked.

"Why didn't yours?" Tuskin countered. "Why did you infiltrate our country to try and find out what we were doing? We can ask questions all day, but if they come back through that door and say they want nothing more to do with us, everything as we know it may be over!"

"The last time this Swarm attacked Earth was 1908," Hawkins observed. "It may be a long time before they do it again."

"The simple fact that they are out there is enough!" Tuskin spoke harshly. "You know as well as I do that the Coalition's most feasible military option is to pull back and shorten their defensive line."

"I take hope from the fact that they didn't simply do that," Debra said. "That they chose to speak to us is important."

Tuskin seemed not to have heard. "We have been groveling in the dirt fighting each other since the beginning of civilization, yet now suddenly we look up and realize that we have been so infantile!" His voice lashed out at Hawkins. "I kill you because you are American. You kill me because I am Russian. Yet we are all human." Hawkins heard him spit. "Stupidity. It is too late. It is all over."

Hawkins could understand where the other man's anger came from. Tuskin had spent his life dedicated to fighting for a government that had fallen apart at the seams just a few short years before. The carefully cultivated myth of duty, honor, and country in the Russian military had had the rug pulled out from under it. Now what had happened to Tuskin's country was happening to the planet. If a trained military man like Tuskin was affected this way, Hawkins wondered how others would react when they learned what he had just been told in this room.

He was still pondering that when the lights reappeared. "You will have twenty-four hours to return to us with both a proposal and actions completed to indicate that we may consider options other than number three."

"What?" Debra exclaimed. "This system has existed for hundreds of thousands of years and you give us only twenty-four hours to do something? We must have more time."

"The relay sites you came through will return you to where you started. In twenty-four hours the portals will shut down." The lights disappeared. With a rumble the elevator door slid open behind them and the light from it spilled out into the room. Hawkins again felt a flicker of pain on the back of his hand. He pulled and this time his hands came out without any resistance. The arm swung away and he stood and turned for the elevator.

RETURN 

Ayers Rock, Australia

22 DECEMBER 1995, 2300 LOCAL

22 DECEMBER 1995, 1330 ZULU

On the surface night had settled in, but it made no difference to Fran down in the chamber. She sat on the rock floor, her eyes staring at the Wall as if simply by looking long enough, she could see through and discover what had happened to Hawkins and Debra.

Tomkins had gone off shift an hour before, replaced by a young lieutenant whose presence was an irritating buzz to Fran as he worked on the remote gear that would be sent through as the next probe. Don Batson had stayed down here, joining her in the watch, his eyes reaching to hers every so often for encouragement in his own personal trial. A few feet away Dr. Pencak sat as still as the floor she was on.

"Debra seemed to know what she was doing." The words came out before Fran even realized what she was saying.

She looked over at Don, who was running his hand along the smooth stone wall, for perhaps the fiftieth time in the past hour, taking comfort from the rock itself, something he understood well. "For all we know she was crazy," he commented. "Maybe she's on her own form of medication," he added wryly, holding out his own hand, which shook slightly. He jerked a thumb up toward the surface. "Lamb's convinced Hawkins and Levy came out in Tunguska and the Russians have them."

"The Russians!" Fran said bitterly. "Always the Russians. Or the Iraqis. Or the Cubans. Or the Libyans. Or whoever our enemy of the week is."

Don shrugged, glad to be thinking about something other than his own problem. "You've been at the Hermes meetings. They spend most of their time trying to worst-case things and looking at everyone as an enemy." He looked at her. "Hell, Fran, that was your job--worst-case things. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that a large spur for us even being at some of those meetings was your analysis of present trends and where they are likely to lead us."

Fran leaned forward. "Those were statistical projections based on what was happening. Those projections will come true if nothing is done to avert the disastrous course we are on."

"Yeah, I know," Don said. "Hell, the last tasking I got from Hermes--along with a hundred-and-sixty-thousand-dollar grant--was to work on finding natural underground shelters that could be developed by the military into bunkers for minimum cost. They even had me do up a study on how Mammoth Caves could be converted by the military in a crisis."

"Bomb shelters!" Fran exploded. "They want to handle the world's problems by building bomb shelters? That kind of thinking belongs back in the fifties."

"Then I guess I belong back there too," Don said quietly.

"Thinking like that is more concerned with surviving than living," Fran continued as if she hadn't heard.

"What's the difference?" Don asked.

"Animals survive," Fran replied. "Humans live."

"Animals don't build nuclear bombs and lose them," Don retorted. "What do you really think is going to happen if that second bomb is exploded?"

"It depends on where it goes off," Fran said.

"Regardless of where it goes off," Don persisted. "What do you think will happen?"

Fran looked at him. "I think we're going to be in even deeper shit than we know we are in now. There are a lot of variables and therefore a lot of outcomes, but over ninety percent of them are bad. And that's the only number I'm concerned with."

Don nodded. "Well, listen, Fran. I may have had my head up my ass for the past fifteen years working for the government-I did what they told me to do and took their money and didn't think much about it. I didn't think much about anything. Hold it"--he held up a hand as Fran started to interrupt--"let me finish." He pointed at the Wall. "But the events of the past forty-eight hours have opened my eyes. I'm not sure what's going on here, but I do accept that I have a responsibility beyond my own little world."

Pencak had been so quiet that it took both of them by surprise when she spoke. "Very good, but even now you still refuse to accept the possibility that the unacceptable may have to be accepted." Pencak's words hung in the air for a long moment.

"I can accept the unacceptable if I know what it is. This is all so--" Batson's words were cut off as the Wall suddenly glowed brightly and Hawkins and Debra stumbled through. They looked no different than if they had just gone through a revolving door. Hawkins had his hand on Debra's shoulder and was holding her, as they both blinked in the glare of the high-power lights pointing at the wall.

The lieutenant was yelling into his com-link as Fran, Batson, and Pencak gathered around the two travelers. "Are you all right?" Fran asked as the two tried to get their bearings.

"We're fine," Hawkins answered, looking back over his shoulder at the portal.

"What happened?" Batson asked.

"We met the creators of all this," Debra said, gesturing around at the chamber. The way she said it told Fran right away that she wasn't talking about the Russians.

Hawkins held up a hand as they were barraged with questions. "We'll tell you everything, but I want to do it only once. We don't have much time."

"We don't have much time for what?" Fran asked.

In reply Hawkins pointed at the hole. "Let's go up. We need to brief Lamb so he can relay it to the President."

22 DECEMBER 1995, 2307 LOCAL

22 DECEMBER 1995, 1337 ZULU

Fran listened in amazement as Hawkins gave a detailed account of what had happened to Debra and himself from the moment they went through the wall to the time they returned. Debra occasionally added a comment or small fact, but it was obvious to Fran that Hawkins was well versed in giving such reports. She imagined he had to do this after every mission he went on-she was also sure, though, that he'd never experienced anything like what he had just gone through.

When he told of the twenty-four-hour time limit, Lamb was shaking his head. Fran didn't know what to make of it all. Not having gone through herself, she thought it all sounded very distant and outrageous. Hawkins's dry and factual accounting of the events didn't lend them an air of credibility. They sounded like stories from a supermarket checkout tabloid rather than an army officer's after-action report.

"Did you see the Russians go back through their portal?" was Lamb's first question.

"No," Hawkins said. "We were let off the craft at our portal first. It lifted and headed toward where I presume the Russians' portal was-near the opposite wall."

"So for all you know, the Russians might still be there," Lamb said.

A look of frustration flashed across Hawkins's face. "That is a very slight possibility. I'm sure they would be in as much of a rush to get back to their superiors and report what happened as we were."

"Unless they set this whole thing up," Lamb returned.

Hawkins leaned forward. "They didn't set this up. There's no way they could have set it up." He pointed out the door of the tent toward the mine shaft. "How do you explain the portal? How were we transported? There's never even been a hint that Russia possesses such a capability. And where were we transported to?"

"That's what I'd like to know," Lamb said. "They said you weren't on Earth, but if these aliens could transport people that easily, how come they didn't come here?"

"Would you have come here if you were the one in control like they are?" Hawkins countered.

"What about Richman?" Batson wanted to know. "If you have to go through one Wall or portal to get here, and another to get to Tunguska, how did he get directly from Tunguska to here?"

"The Coalition said they had Richman for those eight hours," Hawkins explained.

"You said you were in some sort of large building--maybe underground. Why do you think it wasn't here on Earth?" Lamb demanded.

"It didn't feel like Earth," Hawkins said. "I know that sounds strange but the air, the building, the machinery, which I didn't recognize-the whole thing just felt very different, like nothing I've ever experienced before."

"Why did they hide from you?" Lamb asked.

"For all I know they weren't hiding," Hawkins said, his voice taking on an edge. "They probably weren't even on the same planet as us. It looked like a transmission. Maybe those points of light were members of the Coalition."

Fran spoke for the first time, trying to get the conversation back on a productive track. "What is it exactly that they want from us?"

"They didn't say they wanted anything," Debra said.

"Then why the twenty-four-hour time limit?" Fran asked.

"They gave us twenty-four hours because we asked for it-or to be more precise, Colonel Tuskin asked for it. I got the feeling that they were going to shut the system down in twenty-four hours anyway and were just letting us know that. We wanted a chance to come back and tell our leaders what the situation is. If any move is going to be made, then we need to be the ones to make it and then present it to the Coalition."

Lamb threw his hands up in the air. "This is the craziest thing I've ever heard. I can't go to the President with this. He'll think I'm insane. We have no evidence other than your story."

“If you don't go to the President with this immediately, then you might be dooming this planet," Hawkins returned hotly. “If he won't believe what he's told, then ask him to get on a plane and fly here." He pointed down. "There's hard evidence right below our feet. The President can make it in less than four hours aboard the X-27"--referring to the Air Force's super-secret spy plane capable of traveling at eight times the speed of sound. "He can go through with us and see for himself. If you wait too long, the portals will shut down and we'll never know if I was right or wrong."

Lamb looked at Hawkins incredulously. "How did you know about the X-27?" he demanded. "You weren't cleared for that!"

"I know a lot of things I'm not cleared for," Hawkins replied ominously. "I know if you decide to get off your ass and tell the President exactly what's going on and recommend he come here, that we can do something positive for once. Let's use our resources for good."

"There's no way he'll come here," Lamb argued.

"Well, he has to do something!" Levy blurted.

Batson tried mediating. "I don't understand why the aliens-if that's what they are-have to do anything. Why can't they just leave things alone? If this story is true, then things have gone all right for a very long time."

Hawkins shook his head. "The loss of their relay station under Vredefort Dome has apparently reduced the capability of their defense system below an acceptable level."

"Why can't they just fix it, then?" Batson asked. "If they can send you back and forth so easily, why don't they send someone through with a toolbox and fix the damn things? I'm sure the sites can be guarded from here on out from another incident like the one that happened in South Africa."

"You don't understand this from their perspective," Levy said. "We're a minor irritant to the Coalition. It's as if we put a radar site for our nuclear early warning system on some island in the Pacific in the middle of a war. And there's a bunch of monkeys on that island that threw coconuts over the fence around the radar. And finally one day one of those coconuts breaks the radar. What would our reaction be?"

"We'd wipe out the monkeys," Hawkins answered succinctly. He turned to Lamb. "I think Debra's point is valid. We should be thankful that they even bothered to talk to us. The twenty-four hours is their time line and they probably feel they don't have to explain their agenda to us. What we have to do is give them a proposal to make it worth their while to either fix the system here or extend their perimeter."

"I think it's much more likely that both of you were the victim of some sort of mind-control technique." Lamb looked at Hawkins and Levy. "Maybe these memories were implanted in your brains or were part of a computer simulation. Maybe you didn't go farther than three feet on the other side of that Wall." He pointed at the small red mark on the back of Hawkins's hand. "You were probably drugged and all this was implanted in your memory. We've had some success working with mind-altering substances and computer simulations that can do that."

Hawkins stood. "It was no computer simulation and it was no mind game. This is real. That damn chamber down there is real and that portal is real. Richman going through in Tunguska and coming out here is real. Voyager getting destroyed is real. The transmission is real. And we know for damn sure that second bomb out there is real!"

Lamb stood, looking anything but convinced. "I'll relay this to the President. We'll see what he wants to do." He left the shelter, leaving the team members to consider each other. Fran was surprised when Pencak broke the silence.

"There will be no action." She looked at Hawkins. "You know that, don't you?"

Hawkins reluctantly nodded. Fran felt her stomach churn with anxiety. When she'd first heard Hawkins and Debra tell their story she'd felt a breath of hope that her calculations might be overturned. Now she realized that hope was premature. In fact, if an adequate response wasn't presented in twenty-four hours, things could be even worse with a non-Earth threat added on top of all the man-made ones. The portals closing would simply be the exclamation point on Hawkins and Levy's story-with no chance to change the ending other than wait for the threat from the Swarm that might not materialize for generations or might appear in a day. Fran didn't think there would be anyone left in a few generations to face that threat anyway.