Seconds later, he found himself weightless and was aware both Maura and Chen had been screaming at the top of their voices. All signal levels were off scale, the screens were black, and there was no way of telling where they were. Was this the wormhole? How long would it take to reach Earth? He thought back to where Europa and Earth had been in their orbits, and calculated in his head. If they were really travelling to Earth down some sort of express highway at the speed of light, they should reach their destination in forty-three minutes. But his answer was purely academic. With all their control and instrumentation systems offline, they had no way of measuring time. Geoff was in a dream state, almost comatose. In spite of feeling a reluctance to speak or even look at the others, he glanced quickly at Maura. She was frowning with her eyes closed. They were in limbo, and all they could do was wait.
After what seemed like hours, Geoff made a conscious effort to raise his head and look around. Like him, Chen and Maura were slumped in their seats. He pulled his com-phone from his pocket and was surprised how heavy it felt. He checked Maura and Chen’s biometrics and then his own. They had all retained a high adrenalin level but their pulse rates were almost normal. But what had happened to the whale-bot? It was eerily quiet and still. The screens were blank, and there was only profound darkness outside the observation windows.
He turned to Maura. ‘We seem to have survived, but where are we?’
Reunion
Maura booted up the navigation console. ‘Ac-tu-all-y,’ she said, and then paused, her face expressionless, ‘we’re back on Earth. You can unbuckle your harnesses now!’
Geoff and Chen cried ‘Thank God’ and ‘Aiya!’ in one synchronised shout. They climbed out of their seats and swung each other like square-dance partners before collapsing in laughter.
‘Hey, steady on,’ said Maura. ‘We’re too weak for high jinks. We should have done more training.’
‘Maura’s right,’ said Geoff. ‘We must take it easy. And we don’t know what we’ve come back to yet. Whereabouts on Earth are we, Maura?’
‘The instruments show we’re on the seabed at the bottom of the Pacific.’
‘What’s happened to Kai and the others. Where are they?’
‘Give me a few minutes. I’ll try and share with Leona.’
‘Okay,’ said Geoff. ‘You do that and I’ll run some status checks to make sure everything still works.’
Maura returned from her cabin and joined the others in the wardroom. ‘They’re all here: Kai, Leona and Huang. They’re on Roosevelt Island. They want us to join them.’
‘Roosevelt Island – in New Amsterdam?’ asked Geoff in surprise.
‘Sorry, I mean the one in the Ross Sea.’
‘D’you mean Antarctica?’
‘Very good, Geoff. Make sure you put on a thermal suit.’
‘So we’re not too far away from them. Have the Thiosh made it through okay?’
‘To tell you the truth, I’m worried about that,’ said Maura. ‘Leona seems to think most of those who came are followers of Voorogg. He’s in telepathic contact with Kai. I gave Leona access to some of my MIT files. Kai wanted to know the location of thermal vents at the boundary between the Pacific and Antarctic’s tectonic plates.’
‘Wonderful – the Thiosh’ll be able to live there in peace.’
‘But strangely Leona told me not to give them all the information. Why d’you think she said that?’
‘Hm. She’s a woman of mystery, all right,’ said Geoff.
Geoff stood at the distraydar screen and watched the edge of the ice shelf draw closer. ‘We’ve made good time. The bot seems to go about thirty per cent faster since it’s been reshaped.’
‘It’s grand, don’t you think?’ said Maura, and Geoff smiled in agreement.
It wasn’t easy to distinguish Roosevelt Island from the background landscape but, using the coordinates Leona had given Maura, they located the tumbledown shacks of the old whaling station.
‘I hope this place doesn’t make the whale-bot nervous,’ joked Maura as they approached the quayside.
They scrambled down the rungs of the vessel’s body and out onto the landing stage, where they stood awestruck by the scene before them – jagged mountains rising out of a sea of ice, brilliant white peaks casting indigo shadows, and ice sculptures backlit with sugared rims. A group of penguins began a wobbly march towards them as if in greeting. But soon the chill of the wind reminded them of their need for shelter.
‘Here comes a rocket-sledge,’ said Maura, the wind dispelling her misted breath as she spoke.
Leona climbed out and welcomed them, hugging and kissing them, while the trio from the whale-bot returned her greeting with equal enthusiasm. She led them aboard the sledge and handed them elastomeric thermal suits, gloves and reactive goggles. But, even after they were fully encased in thick layers of insulation, Leona continued to embrace and kiss them. Her body language was easy for Geoff to interpret – it was obvious she was mightily relieved to see them, and was in no hurry to transport them to the tumbledown shacks that comprised the whaling station. He was happy to be part of a celebration. After all, both groups had come through life-threatening trials since they were last together. But he suspected there was another reason. Did she now identify herself more with the whale-bot crew than with the Aquila’s? If so, he would have to watch Kai and Huang very carefully.
Geoff mentally parked his misgivings and concentrated on the sensation of returning to Earth. After five years in space, the brightness of the sun, the cloudscape, and the sight of the jagged ice mountains filled him with joy. It was clear his companions were similarly excited, judging by the way they were giggling like school children. Leona was just as animated as she told them of the adventures she’d had with Kai and Huang in the Aquila. But when Maura asked about the fate of the Mohawk, she became more sombre.
At last Leona fired up the sledge and piloted the new arrivals to the whaling station complex, past the derelict shacks and broken equipment. Geoff was pleasantly surprised to discover the building they entered had been impressively restored. Once he’d taken off his outer garments, he felt very comfortable in the homely but well-appointed living space. The blazing log fire soon thawed the chill from his bones. Huang offered them shots of rum, evidently left by previous occupants, and the disquiet Geoff had felt as they’d journeyed through the wormhole became a faint memory. Kai came in and, in contrast to Leona, greeted them formally before asking Huang to show them to the prefabricated cabins he’d prepared as their sleeping quarters. Then Leona enquired if they all liked fish stew. Geoff had the impression it would make a frequent appearance on the menu.
After breakfast the next day, Kai called a meeting and related news of the war. He told them he’d been able to follow developments via Hesperian and Khitan radio and TV transmissions. There’d been no nuclear exchanges for some time, but the Hesperians had recently won a series of battles fought conventionally. Their army had invaded Khitan territory and had marched westwards across Kathay. The forces of the Empire were in retreat, but this was deliberate. The Khitan strategy was to destroy everything in the path of the Hesperians, to ensure none of the resources of their land could be used by the invading army. The Khitan government had withdrawn to the high plateau region of Xizang, and had set up a command centre in Lhaza. The invading force had become snowbound in the mountains. But with spring coming, they would soon be on the move.
‘The conflict has almost destroyed the Empire,’ said Kai. ‘The war is yet another illustration of humankind’s base stupidity and ignorance. Once again, the homo sapiens species has been profligate in its expenditure of resources on a pointless venture, which is driving it to extinction.’
‘I believe the Khitans launched an unprovoked attack,’ said Geoff.
‘Only because you Hesperian bastards planned to do the same,’ responded Huang. For the first time, Geoff mentally sized up his muscular frame, and pondered how telekinesis could be used to defeat him in combat
.
‘Nothing has revealed the inferiority of human society more than the example of the Thiosh,’ continued Kai. ‘As a biological domain, they are clearly superior to us humans, in either the east or the west. They are welcome here on Earth. We must bow to their will and use our low-level intelligence to give them our full support.’
‘Kai, this isn’t like you,’ said Geoff. ‘What’s happened? You are the wisest, most sensitive person I’ve ever met. Why are you talking like this?’
‘The old ways have passed. There will be a new order, and the weak shall be swept aside.’
‘Just a minute,’ said Geoff urgently, but Maura gripped his hand hard and whispered to him to shut up.
He followed Maura outside to their cabin. They went in and Geoff slammed the door. ‘You stopped me speaking. Are you on his side too?’ he demanded.
‘I am not. You’d better believe it. I just didn’t want you to go head to head with him yet.’
‘What the fuck is he talking about? Clearly superior? It’s racist – or should I say domainist talk. You’re the biologist.’
‘I know, I didn’t like what I was hearing, either,’ said Maura. ‘Kai’s like a different person. Leona says something happened to him when they landed on Euphrosyne. Something that fundamentally changed him.’
‘He didn’t seem very surprised by our arrival via a wormhole. How did he know about it?’
‘I don’t think Leona told him we were coming. It must have been Voorogg. All the Thiosh knew about it.’
‘You listen to their thought waves,’ said Geoff. ‘Why did Voorogg make the trip and not Atherlonne?’
‘Not all Thiosh wanted to leave. Atherlonne thought it was her duty to protect those that remained.’
‘Has the wormhole always been there?’
‘Speaking as an oceanographer,’ said Maura, ‘if it’d been a feature on Earth for any length of time, I’m sure we would have known about it. Perhaps the Thiosh made it as an escape route from Europa.’
‘You know, I can’t believe that. I read about Thiosh history when we were in the cavern, but there was no hint they had lived anywhere else but on Europa, nothing about them using wormholes. If they’d had space-warping technology, they would have travelled before, wouldn’t they?’
‘I s’pose so. But if Thiosh didn’t make the wormhole, who or what did?’
Lost at Sea
Over the next few weeks Leona and Chen organised the domestic arrangements of the settlement, and Huang occupied himself improving their accommodation. No one quite knew what Kai was working on. He disappeared for long periods and the others suspected he’d found a sort of hideout within the complex where he could meditate, or telepathise with someone or something.
Geoff busied himself monitoring the terrestrial uni-net so he could identify parts that were still active. He was disappointed to discover the Unified Nations seemed to be defunct. There’d been no activity on the UN network for over six months, and his encrypted messages of enquiry remained unanswered. As far as he could tell, the war had ground to a standstill. He was pleased neither side appeared capable of a knock-out blow, but frustrated there was no dominant power he could contact about the Thiosh.
He had hoped to win the support of the UN to reserve some areas of the seabed where Thiosh could live undisturbed. He’d known this would never be easy, but it was certainly impossible while the Federation and the Empire were at war. He discussed this with Maura, who agreed they had no choice but to wait to see what would happen. Meanwhile, she planned to carry out some scientific studies to assess how much the Earth, and its oceans, had been changed by the war.
Chen reported to Geoff that the top half of a satellite dish was sticking out of the snow on the west side of the settlement. They enlisted Huang’s help and, after a day and a half spent cutting into the ice with a power saw and hacking out the blocks, they uncovered a brick building. Some of the windows had been smashed by what must originally have been a snowdrift. It had then compacted into solid ice, and this had sealed and protected the structure from further degradation. They sprayed de-icing fluid into the crevices around a heavy oak door. It was clearly the main entrance and, as it was not locked, it was relatively easy to open.
They had stumbled upon a laboratory. At some stage a group of research scientists must have based themselves in the complex, and much of the apparatus appeared still to be usable. Even the lights worked off the generator supply. Geoff and Maura busied themselves, restoring the lab to working order.
‘The equipment here’s pretty antiquated, but it’s adequate for some basic research,’ Maura told Geoff. ‘Shall we use the whale-bot to carry out some surveys? I want to see how badly the sea’s contaminated.’
‘Good idea,’ said Geoff. ‘It’s two years since the Khitan nuclear strike. Any fallout will have been carried around the Earth’s oceans. It may have largely dissipated.’
‘We can take the old Becquerel monitor to see if there are any hot spots.’
‘Right, and if we dive down to the plate boundary, you could check out the extremophile microbes you love so much – and maybe we’ll see how the Thiosh have settled in.’
‘That’s grand,’ said Maura. ‘Shall we take Chen? He can help us get ready to sail.’
In the event, Kai made Huang available to help them rather than Chen. After five days’ intensive preparation, they were ready to leave. Geoff looked for Kai before they left, but he was nowhere to be found. Chen took them down to the quayside in the rocket-sledge. They called up the whale-bot and climbed aboard. Geoff was elated. Their strange vessel felt like a second home, and he’d come to realise he was happier at sea than on land.
Once the mountains of Antarctica had dipped below the horizon, Maura asked Huang to take the helm so she could spend time on deck with Geoff, standing in the bows while the wind frosted their faces with salt spray. They stayed like that for a long time before climbing down to the bridge.
The terrestrial GPS system was no longer functioning and they navigated by dead reckoning. After three days, Geoff’s calculations showed they were above the Pacific–Antarctic Ridge, the divergent zone between two tectonic plates. He fastened the hatches and, returning to the bridge, he asked Huang to steer them slowly down to a depth of two kilometres. Maura sampled the water at one-minute intervals and detected alpha radiation at a level significantly greater than normal. Geoff periodically checked the profile of the seabed, and his attention was drawn to an area of activity.
‘Maura, look at the sonar scanner,’ he said. ‘What are those objects shuffling back and forth?’
Soon they found themselves sailing though a group of Thiosh robots. Some were very familiar, and there were other types they’d not encountered previously. But the objects that fascinated Geoff most weren’t moving at all. They were rectangular solids, spheres and cylinders. Such regular geometrical shapes were out of place in a marine environment. They had a metallic appearance, gleaming in the glow of the whale-bot’s floodlights. Interspersed were irregular cones of non-reflective material. Geoff surmised they were heaps of spoil from excavations.
‘You know, I think the Thiosh have joined the construction industry,’ he said. ‘It looks like they’re building industrial plant.’
Maura checked the instrument readouts. ‘The pH has gone up. I think there’s sulphuric acid present. Perhaps the Thiosh are extracting sulphur from subterranean coal reserves. They’re not bothering to crowd round the vents like they did on Europa.’
‘What do you make of those rows of circular slabs?’
‘A parking zone for mini-subs?’
As part of Geoff’s duties at the Unified Nations, he’d had to review a great deal of secret information. Not for the first time, his experience weighed heavily upon him, and he wished he could be as innocent as Maura.
‘They’re the same as I’ve seen many times before,’ he said, ‘in secret reconnaissance photos. We’re looking at missile silos under construction.’
&
nbsp; Geoff realised the whale-bot had stopped moving. He looked up at where Huang had been standing at the helm, and found himself staring at the spiked electrode of a tezla gun. Geoff was momentarily bewildered. Then he laughed. ‘Very funny, Huang. I like your joke.’
‘Both of you, stand still with your hands on the chart table!’ Huang ordered.
‘What’s the problem?’ demanded Geoff. ‘Have we spotted something we weren’t meant to see?’
‘It does not matter what you see. Soon Thiosh will govern the Earth. They will colonise the oceans, not just your plate boundaries. They will build great cities under the sea.’
Geoff made his voice sound confident. ‘They’ll have to talk to us humans first. We may agree to them staying, but they cannot take our resources without asking. The Southern Ocean is under Hesperian jurisdiction.’
‘Your Federation will have no choice. The Thiosh will control the Earth from orbiting satellites. Any resistance will be vaporised with gamma rays. You are about to see a new world order!’
‘And Kai, you and Chen will be honorary emperors, I suppose?’ said Maura, her hands on her hips.
‘Perhaps not Chen – he is too weak. But Kai and Voorogg understand each other.’
‘I see,’ said Geoff, putting his arm round Maura to keep her calm. ‘So what is it you want from us, Huang?’
‘I want you put away. You are Hesperian, and you know too much. But our friend Voorogg has a safe place for you. You will not be harmed, just kept where you cannot interfere.’
The tezla pistol glowed red hot. Huang yelped and it clattered on the deck. Geoff gave Huang a sharp poke in his solar plexus, hard enough to incapacitate any normal man for several minutes. But Huang wasn’t a normal man. He stepped forward into a low stance and, with a shout, released a thrust-punch. Geoff was thrown sprawling over the main control desk. Huang bent over him with his fist clenched for a second punch. Maura leapt on his back and gripped him in a stranglehold. Huang slashed back with his elbow, knocking her across the bridge. Geoff rejoined the fight, but Huang sliced his legs from under him with a low spinning heel kick.
The Hesperian Dilemma Page 13
