by Robin Cook
“Welcome, Dr. Newell,” Arak said once their hands had met. “We are particularly pleased that you have come to visit us.” He bowed and took his hand away.
“Well, thank you,” Suzanne said. She was confused yet flattered that she’d been singled out for an individual welcome.
Arak backed away. “Now, my honored guests,” he said. “You will be taken to your quarters, which I’m sure you will find agreeable.”
“Wait a sec, Arak!” Richard called. He raised himself up on his tiptoes. “There’s a gorgeous brunette somewhere around here who’s dying to meet me.”
“And there’s a raven-haired beauty that I want to meet,” Michael said.
The two divers had been scanning the crowd for the women since they’d come up the stairs. To their chagrin they’d not been able to spot either one.
“There will be plenty of time for socializing,” Arak said, “but for now it is important to get you to your rooms since you’ve yet to eat and properly wash. There will be a gala celebration for your arrival later, which we hope you will all attend. So, please follow me.”
“This will only take a couple of minutes,” Richard said. He started forward, intending to walk around Arak and Sufa and mingle in the crowd. But Donald grabbed him as hard as he had when they were downstairs.
“Knock it off, sailor!” Donald snarled under his breath. “We stay together! Remember!”
Richard glared back for a moment, fighting the urge to tell Donald to drop dead. He was so close to connecting with that beautiful woman, it was hard to deny himself. Self-restraint had never been his strong point. But once the intensity of Donald’s gaze gave him pause, he relented.
“I guess some chow’s not a bad idea,” he said to save face.
“You’d better stay in line, bro,” Donald snapped. “Otherwise you and I are going to be banging heads.”
“Just for the record,” Richard said. “I ain’t afraid of you.”
CHAPTER NINE
Suzanne put one foot ahead of the other as she followed Arak and Sufa but she felt disconnected, as if her feet were not solidly on the ground. It wasn’t dizziness that she was feeling, but it was close. She’d heard the psychiatric term depersonalization and wondered if she was suffering some variation of it. Everything she was experiencing felt so surreal. It was as if she were in a dream, although her senses seemed very tangibly engaged. She could see, smell, and hear just like normal. But nothing else was making sense. How could they be under the ocean!
As a geophysical oceanographer Suzanne was well aware that the Mohorovicic discontinuity was the name given to a specific layer within the earth that marked an abrupt change in the velocity of sound or seismic waves. It was located approximately two and a half to seven miles beneath the ocean floor and about twenty-four miles beneath the continents. She also knew that its eponymous name came from the Serbian seismologist who’d discovered it. But despite having a name, no one had any idea what the layer represented. As far as she knew, neither she nor any other geologist or seismologist had ever considered the possibility it was an enormous, air-filled cavern. The idea was too preposterous to have been seriously entertained.
“Please give our secondary humans the courtesy they deserve,” Arak called out to his fellow Interterrans as he moved forward into their midst. “Back up and give us room!” He motioned for the people to give way, and they silently complied.
“Please!” Arak said gently to Suzanne and the others as he gestured toward an open lane leading out from under the roof of the loggia. He moved ahead and waved for them to follow. “As soon as we depart the foreign arrival hall, it will only be a short journey to your accommodations.”
As if watching herself in a movie Suzanne walked between the crowds of Interterreans. She sensed that Perry was directly behind her and imagined that Donald and the divers were close as well. The situation was no longer scary. The beautiful people were full of smiles and gave furtive, almost shy gestures of greeting. Suzanne found herself unable to keep from smiling in response.
Can this truly be happening? she kept asking herself as she followed Arak. Is this a dream? Everything was certainly surreal enough, yet there was no doubt she could feel the cool marble on her bare feet and the caress of a gentle breeze on her cheeks. Never had she felt such subtle sensory details in a dream no matter how realistic it had been.
Sufa turned to Suzanne. “You’ll notice that you people are true celebrities. Second-generation humans are very, very popular. You are all so refreshingly stimulating. I better warn you that you will be in great demand.”
“What do you mean, ‘second-generation humans’?” Suzanne questioned.
“Now, Sufa,” Arak chided gently. “Remember what we decided! These guests are going to be introduced more slowly to our world than we’ve done with others in the past.”
“I remember,” Sufa replied. Then to Suzanne she added: “We’ll be discussing everything in due time, and all your questions will be answered. I promise you.”
The group soon emerged onto a spacious verandah that opened up into a stupendously colossal underground cavern so immense, it gave the impression of being outdoors. The illumination was like daylight although there was no sun. The domed ceiling was a pale blue like the color of the sky on a hazy summer day. A few thin clouds floated lazily with the breeze.
The verandah was at the side of a building located on the outer edge of a city. Stretching out from the balustrade was a bucolic vista of rolling hills, lush vegetation, and lakes with a few towns in the near distance. The buildings were constructed of black basalt, highly polished and fashioned into a mixture of curves, domes, towers, and classically columned porticos. In the far distance a series of conical mountains rose up from wide bases to fan out against the dome above to form gargantuan supporting columns.
“If you’ll all wait for just a moment,” Arak said. He then spoke softly into a tiny microphone on an instrument attached to his wrist.
The five “second-generation humans” were spellbound by the unexpected beauty and breathtaking dimensions of the subterranean paradise. It was beyond anything that their imaginations could have possibly conjured. Even the divers were speechless.
“We’re waiting for a hovercraft,” Sufa explained.
“Is this Atlantis?” Perry asked, his mouth agape.
“No!” Sufa said, mildly offended. “This is not Atlantis. This city is Saranta. Atlantis is due east from here. But you can’t see it. It’s behind those columns that support the surface protuberances you people call the Azores.”
“So Atlantis does exist?” Perry said.
“Well, of course,” Sufa said. “But personally I don’t find it nearly as agreeable as Saranta. It’s a young, upstart city with rather brazen people if you ask me. But you’ll have to judge for yourselves.”
“Ah, here we go,” Arak exclaimed as a domed, saucer-like craft silently materialized at the base of the steps. It arrived so quietly, only those who happened to be looking in the proper direction saw its arrival.
“Sorry it took so long,” Arak said. “There must be a particularly high demand at the moment for some reason. But please, after you.” He gestured down the steps toward an open entrance port that had miraculously appeared on the side of the saucer.
The group descended the steps and boarded the craft, which was hovering motionlessly several feet off the ground. It was about thirty feet in diameter with a clear, domed top similar to the kind of purported UFOs seen on the covers of tabloids at grocery checkout lines. Inside was a circular banquette cushioned in white with a black, round central table. There were no controls.
Arak was the last to board, and as soon as he did, the entrance port disappeared as silently and as mysteriously as it had appeared.
“Ah, it’s always the way,” Arak complained after glancing around at the interior. “Just when we’re trying to impress you we get one of the old hovercrafts. This one is on its last legs.”
“Stop complaining
,” Sufa said. “This vehicle is perfectly serviceable.”
Suzanne glanced at Donald, who raised his eyebrows ever so slightly. Suzanne looked around the hovercraft. She was so full of questions she didn’t know where to begin.
Arak placed his hand, palm down, in the center of the black table and leaned forward. “Visitors’ palace,” he said. He then leaned back and smiled. A moment later the scenery outside began to move.
Suzanne reflexively reached out to grasp the edge of the table to steady herself, but it wasn’t necessary. There was no sensation of motion nor was there any sound. It was as if the craft were staying still and the city moving as they rose some hundred feet before accelerating horizontally.
“You’ll be instructed how to call and use these air taxis very soon,” Arak said. “You’ll have plenty of time to explore.”
Several heads nodded. The Benthic Explorer team was overwhelmed by everything they were seeing. They seemed to be cruising through the center of a bustling metropolis with countless people going about their business and thousands of other air taxis zipping in every direction.
For Suzanne, this world seemed full of strange contradictions. The city and the advanced technology seemed so futuristic yet the trees and vegetation had a hauntingly prehistoric aspect. The flora reminded her of what had flourished during the Carboniferous period three hundred million years ago.
Soon the shiny black basalt multistoried buildings gave way to a less dense, apparently residential area with grass, trees, and pools of water. The crowds of people disappeared as did the swarms of air taxis. Now there were only individual people or small groups walking in the parks. Many were accompanied by curious-looking pets that Suzanne thought were a chimeric combination of dog, cat, and monkey.
The scenery began to slow as they approached a magnificent walled palace compound. It was dominated by a large, central, domed structure supported by fluted black Doric columns. Sprinkled around the enclosure were numerous other smaller buildings oval in shape and constructed of the familiar polished black basalt. Walkways snaked through crystal pools, expanses of lawn, and patches of luxurious ferns.
The air taxi stopped its horizontal movement and rapidly descended. A moment later the port opened as silently and as mysteriously as it had before.
“Dr. Newell,” Sufa said. “This will be your cottage. If you wouldn’t mind, please disembark. I will accompany you to be sure you are comfortable.” She gestured toward the exit.
A flustered Suzanne glanced from Sufa to Donald. She had not expected to be separated from the group, and she was well aware Donald felt they should remain together.
“What about the others?” Suzanne asked. She tried to read Donald’s expression, but couldn’t tell what he wanted her to do.
“Arak will see to their accommodation,” Sufa said. “Each will have his own bungalow.”
“We were hoping to stay together,” Suzanne said.
“But you will,” Arak said. “This palace and its grounds are just for you visitors. You’ll take your meals together and if you want to double up in the lodges for your sleeping arrangements, that is up to you.”
Suzanne’s and Donald’s eyes met. Donald shrugged. Assuming that left the decision up to her, she climbed out of the hovercraft. Sufa followed. A moment later the saucer silently moved across the lawn to stop at a neighboring cottage.
“Come on!” Sufa encouraged. She’d started up the walkway but had turned back when she was aware that Suzanne wasn’t behind her.
Suzanne took her eyes off the hovercraft and hurried to catch up with her host.
“You will be meeting up with your friends for a meal shortly,” Sufa said. “I just want to be certain your accommodations are acceptable. Besides, I thought you’d like to take a quick refreshing swim before eating. That was my first wish when I emerged from the decon experience.”
“You experienced what we went through?” Suzanne questioned.
“I did,” Sufa said. “But it was a long, long time ago. Several lifetimes, actually.”
“Excuse me?” Suzanne said. She assumed she’d not heard correctly. The phrase several lifetimes didn’t make any sense.
“Come!” Sufa said. “We have to get you settled. The questions must wait.” She took Suzanne’s arm. Together they climbed the few steps from the walkway and entered the cottage.
Suzanne stopped just beyond the door, awestruck by the decor. In sharp contrast to the black exterior, the interior was almost exclusively white: white marble, white cashmere, and multiple mirrored surfaces. It reminded Suzanne of the living quarters where she had so recently slept but on a much more lavish scale. An added feature was an azure pool that stretched from inside the room to the outdoors. The pool was fed by a waterfall that cascaded out of the wall.
“The room doesn’t please you?” Sufa questioned with concern. She’d been watching Suzanne’s face and mistook her wonderment for dissatisfaction.
“Whether I like it or not is hardly the question,” Suzanne said. “It’s unbelievable.”
“But we want you to be comfortable,” Sufa said.
“What about the others?” Suzanne asked. “Are their quarters anything like this?”
“They are identical,” Sufa said. “All the visitors’ cottages are the same. But if there is something else you might need, please tell me. I’m sure we can provide it.”
Suzanne’s eyes moved to the enormous circular bed, which was on a raised marble dais at the center of her quarters. A large canopy was draped above it. From its circumference hung gathered bundles of sheer white fabric.
“Perhaps you could tell me what you feel is lacking,” Sufa said.
“Nothing is lacking,” Suzanne said. “The room is breathtaking.”
“Then you do like it,” Sufa said with relief.
“It’s stunning,” Suzanne said. She reached out and touched the marble wall. Its surface was polished to a mirrorlike perfection, and it felt warm as if heated by inner radiation.
Sufa stepped over to a cabinet that lined the wall to the right. She gestured down its length. “Inside here you have media consoles, extra clothing, reading material in your language, a large refrigerator with a selection of refreshments, personal toilet articles that you’ll recognize, and just about anything else you might need.”
“How do I open it?” Suzanne asked.
“Just use a voice command,” Sufa said simply. She pointed at one of two doors on the wall opposite the cabinetry. “Personal facilities are through there.”
Suzanne walked over to stand next to Sufa and faced the cabinet. “What exactly do I say?”
“Whatever it is you’re looking for,” Sufa explained. “Followed by an exclamatory word like ‘please’ or ‘now’.”
“Food, please!” Suzanne said self-consciously.
No sooner had she uttered the words when one of the cabinet doors opened to reveal a sizable refrigerator well stocked with containers of liquid refreshment and solid food of varying consistency and color.
Sufa bent over and glanced inside. She shuffled through some of the contents. “I might have known,” she said, standing back up. “I’m afraid you have just the standard selection, even though I requested some specialty items. But it doesn’t matter. A worker clone will get you anything you might desire.”
“What do you mean, ‘worker clone’?” Suzanne asked. The term sounded ominous.
“Worker clones are the workers,” Sufa said. “They do all the manual work in Interterra.”
“Have I seen a worker clone?” Suzanne asked.
“Not yet,” Sufa said. “They prefer not to be seen until they are called. They favor their own company and their own facilities.”
Suzanne nodded as if she understood, but it was not in the way Sufa surmised. Suzanne nodded because she knew that in most situations of bigotry, the dominant group always attributed attitudes to the oppressed which made the oppressors feel better about the oppression.
“Are these worker
clones true clones?” Suzanne asked.
“Absolutely,” Sufa said. “They’ve been cloned for ages. Their primary origin was from primitive hominids, something akin to what you people call Neanderthals.”
“What do you mean, we people?” Suzanne said. “What makes us different from you besides the fact that you are all so gorgeous?”
“Please . . .” Sufa begged.
“I know, I know,” Suzanne repeated with frustration. “I’m not supposed to ask any questions, but your answers to even simple questions always demand some explanation.”
Sufa laughed. “It’s confusing you, I’m sure,” she said. “But we’re just asking you to be patient. As we’ve intimated, we’ve learned from experience that it is best to go slowly with the introduction to our world.”
“Which means you have had visitors like us in the past,” Suzanne said.
“For sure,” Suzanne said. “We’ve had many over the last ten thousand years or so.”
Suzanne’s mouth slowly dropped open. “Did you say ten thousand years?”
“I did,” Sufa said. “Prior to that we had no interest in your culture.”
“Are you suggesting—”
“Please,” Sufa interrupted. She took a deep breath. “No more questions unless they are about your accommodations. I have to insist.”
“All right,” Suzanne said. “Let’s get back to the worker clones. How do I call one?”
“A voice command,” Sufa said. “It’s the same for most everything in Interterra.”
“I just say ‘worker clone’?” Suzanne asked.
“ ‘Worker clone’ or just ‘worker,’ ” Sufa said. “Then, of course, it has to be followed by an exclamatory word that you feel comfortable with. But the phrase has to be said as a true exclamation.”
“I could do it right now?” Suzanne asked.
“Of course,” Sufa said.
“Worker, please,” Suzanne said. She maintained eye contact with Sufa. Nothing happened.
“That wasn’t enough of an exclamation,” Sufa explained. “Try it again.”
