by Ian Douglas
“Eh? Oh, no. Of course not. He wouldn’t. What I was saying no to…well, you have the wrong idea. We weren’t talking about antimatter weapons that afternoon in Greece.”
“Oh? What were you discussing?”
David drew in a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “Asteroids. Specifically, how easy it would be for an irresponsible government to turn one into a weapon.”
“Go on.”
“Actually, we talked about a lot of things.” He smiled, thinking of Donni. “And not all of them had to do with business. But, looking back, I think he must be referring to our discussion about using asteroids to bombard an enemy.” He shifted in his seat, suddenly uncomfortable. “This is really Dr. Cheseaux’s field, not mine. He’s the astronomer. But we got to talking about some unexplained climatic changes in Earth’s history, times when the climate grew much colder.”
“The ice ages?”
“Oh, no. Nothing that dramatic. There is evidence, though…rather vague evidence, in fact, but evidence, that something strange happened in Europe in, oh, about A.D. 500, I think it was. Rome had fallen, but you couldn’t say that life was that much worse for the fall. But, well, some of the records of the times hint at unusually cold winters. At crops failing with the long winters. At ‘dragons’ and other aerial phenomena in the skies. At unusual sunsets and glows in the skies. Some theorists have suggested the Earth was hit by one or even several small asteroids that threw up enough dust into the atmosphere to change the climate. There are other cases like that in the Middle Ages, too.”
“I read something once,” Twiggs said, “about a…a minimum of some sort in the Middle Ages? Making the winters unusually harsh?”
“That would be the Maunder Minimum, and that referred to a decrease in solar activity, not asteroid strikes. We talked about that, too, as I recall. The point was that Earth’s climate is really terribly delicate. Volcanic eruptions like Tambora and Krakatoa and Pinatubo have put enough dust in the air to lower global temperatures and cause unusually severe winters for years. Fifty years ago, scientists were discussing ‘nuclear winter,’ a possible ice age brought on by the exchange of nuclear weapons. And the KT event—the asteroid or comet that struck the Yucatán sixty-five million years ago—must have turned high noon into midnight all over the Earth for a year or more. Something like seventy percent of all of the living species on the planet died off, became extinct.”
“I wonder,” Twiggs said. “Now that global warming is accepted, we know the sea levels are rising…I wonder if some folks haven’t been thinking about dropping mountains on the planet to deliberately stop the temperature rise.”
“I can’t believe anybody would be that irresponsible,” David replied. “I mean, how do you balance a thing like that? How do you know just how many degrees the average temperature is going to drop?” He snorted. “I’d rather go with some of the cultists and a few blue-sky technoarcheologists who claim we’re going to find a cure for the warming in the ruins on Mars.”
“You think we will?”
“It’s possible. They were way ahead of us, whoever they were, and they were certainly trying to alter the Martian climate. We know that much. But it’ll take a long time to figure out how they were doing it.
“Anyway, in the past fifty years or so, we’ve been finding out just how vulnerable Earth is to bombardment by asteroids. Even a small one, a few hundred megatons, say, could conceivably change our climate, bring on a sudden cooling that might last for years. We learned back in the nineties that near misses were frequent, that multimegaton asteroids that exploded high up in the atmosphere—usually well away from inhabited areas—were commonplace, every few years or so. In any given century chosen randomly, it turns out you have a good chance of at least one major impact, somewhere on Earth.
“And that’s what we face naturally. Now. You get some unscrupulous dictator who has a grudge against the United States and owns his own spacecraft. He finds a convenient asteroid, ideally one that already passes within a million or two kilometers every few years. He gives it a tiny, tiny nudge…just so…and a few years or months later, it comes thundering down, dead on target. Bang. Armageddon in a conveniently sized package.”
“And that was what you and Cheseaux were talking about in Athens? You think that’s what he’s referring to in this message?”
“That would be my guess. We talked about lots of things but…yeah, that would have to be it.”
“I see.” Twiggs was silent for a long time. “Two days ago, one of our orbital telescopes picked up a flash in space, somewhere out beyond the orbit of the Moon. We weren’t able to confirm the flash, and it could have been a strictly deep-space phenomenon, but the spectrum matched that of a small, low-yield nuclear detonation.
“What has some folks worried is the fact that the position of that explosion was quite close to the expected position of a small asteroid, a near-Earth asteroid, one discovered only a few years ago. The coincidence seems a bit too much, here. There’s been some speculation in Washington that someone has just…as you put it, given that rock a nudge. It sounds as though Cheseaux might have some information about that.”
“I don’t see how. He’s in Paris.”
Twiggs smiled. “Apparently your pen pal doesn’t tell you everything. See here in his message where he’s talking about having your reply relinked ‘here’? Cheseaux has been on an EU space mission for the past two months.”
“In space!”
“Intelligence tells us he’s the chief science specialist on an asteroid rendezvous mission. With that same damned asteroid.”
“Oh…God…”
“In light of all this, I wonder if you would consider calling the guy back and getting some clarification? Or confirmation.”
David felt light-headed. This was all happening too fast. Any thought that this might be some sort of elaborate deception by the government was gone; it felt too…right. The UN was preparing to drop an asteroid onto the Earth somewhere, and Jean-Etienne—bless the man!—wanted to talk about it, to warn the United States.
“Yes. Of course I will.”
“Thank you,” Twiggs said. “You know, we do appreciate this. I know you don’t have…well, any cause to trust us. Or a reason to want to help us, or even talk to me.”
David shrugged. “You talk to me like a human being. Carruthers makes threats. There’s a difference.”
“Will you talk to Cheseaux now?”
“Will you let me go if I do? That was Carruthers’s deal, you know. I talk to my French buddies so that our side gets the intel. That’s what I’m doing now, isn’t it?”
“I’m sorry, Dr. Alexander. I can’t promise anything. But I’ll certainly talk to my superiors and see what we can arrange.”
David considered this. Almost, he decided not to help until there was a more substantial offer. Hell with it, he thought. This is too important. “Give me the computer.”
It didn’t take long to establish the connection. Using Twiggs’s PAD, David logged into his home system, then linked through the series of anonymous servers that put him in touch with Cheseaux’s home system in Paris. There, he left a v-mail stating that he was ready for a real-time link; how soon that was depended on how soon Cheseaux contacted his home system from space, but a flashing “You’ve got a message” alert on his PAD would let him know that one was waiting.
In fact, just five minutes and twenty seconds passed before Twiggs’s PAD shifted to real-time mode and an image built itself up, in rippling clusters of pixels, of his old friend Jean-Etienne Cheseaux.
“Jean-Etienne!” David exclaimed. “Bon jour!”
For several long seconds, the face on the PAD’s screen showed no reaction. Cheseaux’s face looked lined and worn, and he’d not shaved in several days. His head and shoulders were not perfectly aligned up and down on the screen, and David realized that the man must be drifting in zero G. The background was nondescript and fuzzily out of focus, but David was pretty sure he recognized the so
rt of thin, cubicle partition common aboard manned spacecraft that he’d grown all too familiar with during his months of deep-space voyaging to Mars and back.
Suddenly, Cheseaux’s face brightened, and something of the old sparkle returned to those intensely blue eyes. “David! Allo! I see your accent has not improved in the past months. And it is evening here. We are on GMT.”
“I got your message. I remember that night in Athens. Ah…I should tell you, I’m not alone. There are people here who’re worried about what you might have to say.”
Again there was no response. David silently counted off four seconds before the worn face on the screen reacted to his words. Time delay. He’d forgotten about that. A four-second there-and-back lag time, though, meant that Jean-Etienne must be two light-seconds away. The Moon was about one and a quarter light-seconds away, with a two-and-a-half-second round-trip lag. The UN ship must be something just under twice the Moon’s distance from the Earth…a million kilometers or so.
“Government people? CIA? Military Intelligence? That is good. What I have to say, they need to hear.” He glanced back over his shoulder, then pulled himself closer to his PAD’s optical pickup. The encryption algorithms in the comm software at both ends of the conversation should keep their talk secure from electronic eavesdroppers, but he was evidently concerned about being overheard by other members of his ship’s crew. “David, they have gone mad, back on Earth. Back in Geneva! I have some data for you. See that the right people see it!”
He pressed some keys, out of sight below the image frame, and the amber light on David’s PAD indicating a high-speed data transfer began winking. It took only a few seconds, with most of that time taken up by the decryption process at David’s end.
“We shouldn’t talk longer, my friend,” Cheseaux said. “It would not be good if I were found out.” His eyes narrowed suddenly, and he seemed to be examining David’s image on his PAD’s screen. David realized Cheseaux must just now be noticing the dungarees he was wearing, and the number stenciled just above the left breast pocket. “Ah,” Cheseaux said, nodding sadly. “Perhaps you already know the risks involved.”
David glanced at Twiggs, who was sitting nearby, watching intently…but who was too far away to interrupt a message, if it was quick. “I do,” he replied. “Be sure to tell François and the others. Au revoir, mon ami.”
He cut the link with a single quick tap to the touch-screen keyboard. Twiggs had not reacted to his warning to Cheseaux, so either the man really didn’t care, or he’d missed it. If the little ring of French and German scientists that David had been communicating with knew that he was in prison, though, it would be a lot harder for the US government to reach them with disinformation transferred through him.
Of course, it was always possible that David’s transmission was being intercepted somewhere, edited, and sent on its way. That would explain part of a four-second time delay very nicely as well. He didn’t let himself dwell on that, however, because there was nothing at all he could do about it.
“So,” he said as Twiggs took the PAD back and began checking on the data transferred from space. “Can I go, now? Home, I mean?”
“I hope so, Dr. Alexander,” Twiggs said. “I really do. But I wouldn’t get my hopes up. Carruthers is in charge of your case, and, well, let’s just say that he’s very goal-driven, very one-track. I don’t really know what he has in mind for you. All I can do is promise to talk to my superiors, and see what we can do.”
“I understand.” Carruthers would see a recording of the conversation with Cheseaux, and know that David had warned the other side. He wondered if Carruthers would see his plan as a lost cause and give it up.
Or if he would begin thinking of retribution.
Institute for Exoarcheological
Studies
Chicago, Illinois
1622 hours CDT
“I’d like to speak with Ms. Dutton, please,” Teri said, staring up at the big corporate logo for Smithfield, Klein, and Jorgenson, Attorneys-at-Law.
“Julia Dutton is not in the office,” the genteel voice of an AI replied. “Will you hold while we relay your call?”
“Yes, I’ll hold.”
She glanced out the office window as she waited, looking down at the sea of people that by now was a routine part of the afternoon scenery along Lake Shore Drive. The astronut crowds didn’t seem to realize yet that David Alexander was no longer here.
Hell, David’s on his way to being the astronuts’ patron saint, she thought. You’d think they’d care what happened to him.
A chirp brought her attention back to the screen, where the corporate logo winked out and was replaced by the face of an attractive black woman with green-and-scarlet-striped hair. A pattern of glowing stars and moons winked next to her eye. “Julia Dutton.”
“Ms. Dutton? Dr. Theresa Sullivan. Remember me?”
Dutton’s dispassionate mien warmed a bit. “Yes, of course, Dr. Sullivan. Good to see you again.”
The camera angle had the face off-center on the screen and was aimed awkwardly up. Teri guessed that the lawyer had her PAD on the seatback tray table of a commuter maglev. “Well? Do you know anything?”
Dutton’s eyebrows rose higher on her face. “About what?”
“About David! He’s been in prison for a month now! And this past week, they won’t even let me in to see him…and a letter I wrote was returned with ‘Addressee unknown’ stamped on the envelope! I can’t even get through on PAD-vid or v-mail! And no one at the prison I talk to seems to have any idea what I’m talking about! Just what the hell is going on?”
“Dr. Sullivan…”
“Is he dead? Has something happened to him? I want to know!…”
“Dr. Sullivan!”
“Sorry…”
“I know what you’ve been going through. Believe me, I know. I’ve been getting the same runaround since last Friday, when I came to consult with him and was told he’d been released.”
“Released! Was he?”
“Hell, no. The proper papers hadn’t been filed, either here or with the court that issued the original arrest order in Chicago. They were just trying to get rid of me. I can be an awful pest when I put my mind to it.”
“Well…what happened, then? Where is he?”
“Depending on who you talk to in the system, David is: a) a free man, already released; b) transferred to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; c) dead.”
“Dead!”
“You’d at least think the sons of bitches would get their cover stories straight!”
“Well, if he’s not dead—”
“He’s not, honey. If he were, there’d be a record at the Medical Examiner’s Office in Chicago and in the penitentiary records office.”
“Okay. Where is he?”
“As near as I can tell, he’s still right there in Joliet.” Suddenly, Dutton looked very tired. Her face sagged. “I’m coming home on the Joliet commuter mag now. Been out there all day trying to get someone to talk to me. My guess is they’re holding him incommunicado. No outside contacts. They may be trying to pressure him into cooperating with them. Tell me. Do you have any idea what they might be after?”
“I’m not even sure I know who you mean by ‘they.’”
“God knows. I don’t. The government. Some agency with alphabet soup initials. Your friend has made some enemies, you know. Enemies in pretty high places.”
“But they can’t just arrest him without cause! There’s a thing called the Constitution!”
“Yup. There’s also a war on, in case you haven’t heard. The government has pretty broad powers during wartime. They can censor your newspaper, listen to your v-mail, read your computer files, hold you on suspicion, and draft your ass if they have a mind to. And there’s not a whole lot ordinary citizens can do about it.”
Tears burned Teri’s eyes. It was so damned unfair! “I thought this was a free fucking country!”
“Welcome to the real world, lady.”
&nbs
p; “Look. He was supposed to have sent secret files to foreign nationals, right? They still have to put him on trial!”
“They don’t have to do anything. Look, if it makes you feel better, I’m pretty sure they’re just holding this over him, trying to get him to cooperate. Probably some sort of government sting on his foreign friends. Maybe a heavy-handed attempt to make them help the CIA.” Dutton paused, looking thoughtful. “You know, if this is spy stuff, or even if it’s just bureaucratic idiocy, we might be able to fight this with publicity.”
“What, call the news services?”
“Hell, no. They’d just say a word in the right editorial ear, and the story would dry up. No, I’m thinking about David’s friends. The people he knew and worked with, like you. Get enough of you together and asking uncomfortable questions, the government might have to relax a little. Who did David know that might help? Especially anyone powerful, or well connected.”
“Jesus, I don’t know.” Teri sighed. “He’s always been so damned apolitical. I don’t know if he has any friends, outside of the archeological community.” Or the Marines, she added to herself. The thought of a Marine regiment assaulting the walls of Joliet Penitentiary was quite appealing…She sighed. Not very realistic, though.
“Doesn’t have to be the president of the United States. Damn it, there’s got to be a way we can work this! I am sick to death of the government doing what it likes to people, and then blaming them for the mess.”
A lawyer with a genuine sense of moral outrage, Teri thought. No wonder David likes her.
“So…you want me to start calling people he knew?”
“It couldn’t hurt. Maybe a petition with a few hundred names. Or if he did know some politicians.” Dutton snapped her fingers. “He must have computer files with the names of his business associates, other archeologists, museum directors, whatever. Some of them will be sure to have connections!”
A frightening idea was taking form in Teri’s mind. “He does keep pretty extensive files, I know,” she said. “But not at the office. At his home.”
