by Morgan Rice
“But we have you to translate, don’t we?” another reporter called out. “Doesn’t the public have a right to hear these messages?”
“They do,” Dr. Levin said, and again, Kevin had the impression of her speaking up before Professor Brewster could say anything. “Which is why we’ll be holding regular press conferences from now on, where Kevin will try to decipher the signals we’ve recorded from that region.”
Professor Brewster stood up. He had a smile fixed in place that looked as though it might crack at any moment. “Okay, folks. I think we shouldn’t tire out Kevin too much. That’s enough for one day.”
***
This time, Professor Brewster had more than enough time to shout.
“You ambushed me, Elise!” Professor Brewster said. “Regular press conferences?”
“Come on, David,” Dr. Levin said. “You know it’s the right thing to do, and this way you get to keep everything orderly, rather than having people trying to break in to get information. You’re a scientist. You don’t believe in hiding things away.”
“I also don’t believe in getting our funding cut because someone in Congress thinks I’m giving away something we should hold onto,” Professor Brewster said, and Kevin could hear some of the worry under the anger.
Kevin wondered what it must be like to have Professor Brewster’s job. Presumably, he’d wanted to be a scientist when he was Kevin’s age, had wanted to discover things. Now, it seemed as though he mostly spent his time organizing things and worrying about money. It sounded like the kind of thing someone had to do if they were a manager or something, not a scientist. It wasn’t something Kevin would have wanted to have to do.
“We’ve announced them now,” Dr. Levin said.
“You’ve announced them,” Professor Brewster said. “We can still—”
He found himself interrupted by a call, and something about his expression as he answered said that this was different from the calls he’d received so far about this.
“Hello? Yes, this is he… I’m sorry, did I hear you correctly?... Yes, at once.” He looked ashen as he put the phone down. “We need to go to the lobby, now.”
“Why?” Kevin asked.
“Because they’re saying that the President is here.”
Kevin might have asked if he was joking, but one look at Professor Brewster’s face made it obvious he wasn’t. Kevin’s heart tightened in his chest at the thought. The President was coming here, to see him? Somehow, even the presence of the aliens seemed more possible than that. Kevin suddenly found himself wondering if he’d just done the right thing, nerves rising up through him. It didn’t seem right somehow that he was meeting the President.
He followed Professor Brewster and Dr. Levin to the research institute’s lobby, having to hurry to keep up. It was obvious that they didn’t want to keep the President waiting. As they got closer, Kevin glanced out of the building’s windows, seeing a long motorcade there, full of vehicles with blacked out windows.
By the time they reached the lobby, the President was already in the building, and he wasn’t the only one. Secret Service agents in dark suits spread out as if expecting a threat at any moment. Advisors and assistants trailed him in a huddle, some of them looking a little surprised that they were there. Kevin saw other people too, with badges proclaiming them to be from the military, the NSA, the FBI, and more. It seemed that no one had wanted to miss out on being a part of this.
The President walked over as they arrived, taking Professor Brewster’s hand, then turning his attention to Kevin. Kevin swallowed nervously as the older man stared at him.
“So this is the boy?” the President said, looking Kevin up and down as if expecting far more.
“Yes, sir,” Professor Brewster said, sounding positively deferential. “This is Kevin.”
“Kevin? All right, Kevin, do you know who I am?”
“You’re the President,” Kevin said. Inside, a small voice was repeating the words you’re talking to the President over and over. He did his best to ignore it, because if he listened too much, he suspected that he might not be able to say anything.
“Good lad. Now, tell me honestly, can you really talk to aliens?”
“No sir,” Kevin said.
“Ha, I knew it!” the President said. “I told them in the emergency contingencies committee that—”
“I can’t talk to them, but I do receive messages from them,” Kevin went on. “They send information about themselves and their planet, and I can translate it.”
The President’s expression changed, as if he didn’t quite know what to say to that. Kevin was getting used to that expression from people by now.
“Well then,” the President said, wagging a finger. “Just you remember that this information was given to us, in America. It was obviously intended for us as the most advanced nation on Earth.”
“Sir,” Professor Brewster said, “the signal hits the whole world. Kevin is just the one who is able to translate it. You should also be aware that we’ve agreed to press conferences so that we can’t be accused of hiding the information.”
Kevin was surprised to find the man sticking up for sharing the information like that. Sticking up for him like that. An advisor came up to the President and whispered something in his ear.
“Well,” the President said, “maybe that’s a good thing. Other countries will see us sharing it and know that they wouldn’t have gotten it without us.”
“Yes, sir,” Professor Brewster said.
“But now, I’d like to see a demonstration. Kevin, can you show me what you can do?”
Kevin looked to the others, who nodded. “We can only do it if there’s a signal,” he said.
But even as he said it, he could feel the pressure in his skull that preceded one. An alarm sounded and they hurried in the direction of the room where he did the translating, sitting and waiting. Kevin sat there, while outside the President and his advisors stood around, looking as though they didn’t know what was happening.
Words filtered into his mind, the translation happening automatically.
Our world was destroyed. The words sounded flat, without emotion. We had to flee. So few survived.
Kevin repeated the words, and he could see the President’s expression changing, first to surprise, and then to something like wonder.
We hid everything we were, the voice said, and Kevin repeated it, as much of ourselves as we could before the fire came. Messages were sent out, so that people would know of us. We sent capsules in every direction, toward all of the inhabited worlds.
Kevin tried to imagine it, spaceships sent in every direction, trying to find safety. How much effort would it have taken to organize that? How would they have been able to organize it with a disaster threatening them?
Each vessel holds a record of our history, the voice continued.
Coordinates will be sent along this path, the voice said, but the vessel’s seal will be tight to preserve us. You must find it. You must prepare to receive us…
Kevin gasped with the effort of translating, the world around him coming into focus again as he stopped. He could see the President staring at him now, then looking over to Professor Brewster.
“What does all this mean?” he asked. “What are you telling me?”
Kevin could answer that one.
“I think…” Kevin said. “I think the aliens are coming here.”
The President stared at him. So did the others. Then the chaos started, with a dozen people trying to talk at once. The President spoke over them.
“That’s enough,” he said, gesturing for them to quiet down. “I know all of your concerns. Professor Brewster, there are those on my team who feel that Kevin here isn’t safe in your facility; that he is vulnerable to being snatched or attacked by our enemies. They want to move him to a secure site.”
“You mean you want to hide me away in some kind of bunker,” Kevin said. He shook his head. “I don’t want to do that.”
“With respect, Mr. President,” Professor Brewster said. “Kevin’s wishes on the matter should count for something. He has not committed a crime, so it would be wrong, even illegal, to lock him up. This is a secure facility, and if the others here want to contribute to that security, that would be very helpful. But they should do that here, where there is the technological knowhow to study what is happening.”
Kevin was surprised to find Professor Brewster standing up for him like that, even if he knew that it was partly because he didn’t want to risk losing the chance to be a part of all this. It seemed that the President was a little surprised to hear it too.
“That’s a very… forceful point, Professor,” he said. “Very well, the boy will stay here. We will provide your facility with whatever it needs, but you will coordinate with my office. I need you to understand the seriousness of this.”
“Yes sir,” Professor Brewster said. “Thank you, Mr. President.”
Kevin wasn’t entirely sure what the professor had just agreed to. It sounded as though he’d just given away a lot of the control of the project.
“I need you to understand the seriousness of this too, Kevin,” the President said. “I thought before I came here that this was nonsense, and now I’m not so sure.”
“It’s true,” Kevin insisted.
“The truth is that it doesn’t matter,” the President said. “Not now. We have reports of Russia and China mobilizing their militaries, conducting ‘exercises’ in case of some kind of attack. There have been riots in the Philippines, because people think this means the end of the world. We need to be very careful about all this, Kevin. I’m going to allow things to continue for now, but there will be people here to watch what’s happening.”
That didn’t matter to Kevin. What mattered was that they kept going. The aliens were sending something to Earth, and whatever it was, Kevin was determined to find it.
CHAPTER TEN
Kevin sat in his room, listening to nothing. There were signals, recorded by the scientists through their long-range equipment, but none of those signals turned into words within his mind. None of them seemed to have meaning.
Kevin was starting to get worried about that, and it seemed that he wasn’t the only one.
“Why aren’t you hearing anything, Kevin?” Professor Brewster asked. He and Dr. Levin stood there watching, waiting for whatever would come next.
Kevin didn’t have an answer. “I don’t know. Maybe there’s nothing to listen to.”
“You must try, Kevin,” Professor Brewster said, with a disapproving look, as if the solution to it lay in simply doing more, or pushing past the difficulty of contact.
“David,” Dr. Levin said. “Don’t pressure Kevin. Can’t you see that he’s getting sicker?”
Kevin knew that part was true. He’d started to notice a small tremor now in his left hand that would stop if he concentrated, but quickly started again whenever he was stressed. That meant most of the time now in the research institute.
“Then we need to get him more medical attention,” Professor Brewster declared. “Kevin, you have to understand, I have government departments I’ve barely even heard of calling me up to know what’s happening. I had a four-star general call me earlier, wanting to know if there were any potential military applications for this information. With the President wanting to know what’s happening, this isn’t a good time for us not to be able to say anything.”
“I can’t translate things if they aren’t there,” Kevin said. What did they want him to do? Make things up? Maybe they still thought he was doing that, despite everything. Kevin hated that thought.
“Maybe you just need a break,” Dr. Levin said. “Go for a walk around the institute, try to relax a little, and we can get back to listening for signals later, when you’ve rested a little.”
Kevin nodded, and went out into the institute, deciding to go search out his mother. When she wasn’t in his room now, she was usually somewhere near where Phil was working, or in the small space the research center had given her so that she could stay near Kevin. Kevin decided to check there first, and set off along the halls.
There seemed to be more people in the research institute now than there had been before. Kevin could see people in military uniforms and others in suits wearing earpieces. A trio wearing NSA badges stopped as Kevin went past, looking at him as if wondering how he was allowed to just wander the halls like that.
One of the stranger people there was a man who looked to be in his forties, with the short-cropped hair and erect posture of some of the military people, even though he was wearing a leather jacket and jeans instead of a uniform, and clearly hadn’t shaved for a week.
“You’re wondering who I am,” he said, as Kevin stared at him.
Kevin nodded nervously. He suspected some people wouldn’t react too well to being stared at like that.
“You have good instincts,” he said. “The number of scientists who have walked past me without wondering that… with so many people going in and out, anyone could get in here if they aren’t careful.”
“Anyone?” Kevin asked. “Who are you?”
“I’m Ted,” he said, extending a hand. A group of soldiers went past and Ted nodded to them. To Kevin’s surprise, one of them gave him a brief salute.
“Are you with the military?” Kevin asked. “The CIA? The police?”
“Something like that,” Ted said. He thought for a moment. “Actually, nothing like that, these days. And you’re Kevin, the kid who can decipher the alien signals.”
He was probably the first person who’d gotten that right. Most of them seemed to think that he was getting a live stream from an alien civilization, or could actually talk to them. That part made him want to stop and talk to this man, but even so, there was something about his presence there that made Kevin pause. He didn’t fit in.
“I’m sorry,” Kevin said. “I need to get going.”
“That’s fine, Kevin,” the man said. “I’m sure we’ll see one another again.”
Kevin hurried off. He could practically feel Ted watching him as he went. He found his mother in the small bedroom that the institute had provided her with so she could stay close.
“Kevin, are you all right?” she asked. “You look a bit pale.”
“I’m okay,” Kevin said. “Mom, there’s a man out there, and I’m not sure…”
He staggered slightly as the room swam. One moment he was upright; the next, he was on the floor, with people surrounding him. It took Kevin a second or two to realize that he must have had a seizure. There were medical staff there, and researchers, and of course his mother, but no sign of the man who had been there before.
“I’m okay,” Kevin said, struggling to sit up. He still felt dizzy, though, and only his mother’s arm around him stopped him from falling back again.
“You’re not okay,” she said. “Come on, we’ll get you back to your room, and then I’m going to ask Professor Brewster why he isn’t taking care of my baby.”
“Mom,” Kevin managed, because he wasn’t a baby, he was thirteen. Even so, he let his mother help him back in the direction of his room. Somewhere along the line, Phil joined them, the two more or less propping Kevin up between them until they could get him back to his bed.
“I’m going to go find out why they aren’t looking after your health better than this,” his mother said, and she set off with the determined look of someone who needed to get angry about something before she started crying.
“I guess we should work out exactly what’s happening,” Phil said, as she left. “What do you say, Kevin? Are you up for some more tests?”
“More tests?” Kevin countered.
There were, because Phil wanted to get an MRI, and then bloodwork. Kevin had only realized in the last couple of weeks just how much he hated having needles poked into hi
m, because it seemed that everyone wanted his blood for something. Researchers and medical staff came and went, all explaining what they were doing as they went about it, almost none of them using words that Kevin could actually understand.
“We’ve made advances with anti-seizure medication,” one of the nurses told Kevin, “but the doctors are currently in discussions with all the people here, asking if it’s the best thing.”
Meaning that they were worried it might block off his ability to understand the signal, whenever it next showed up. Kevin could imagine them there, trying to balance the possibility of missing the information that might lead to the aliens against the possibility that Kevin might die and never give them anything else. Probably only a few of them would think about what it all meant for him, and so far, none of them had thought to ask what treatment he wanted.
“Is it the best thing?” Kevin asked.
The nurse shrugged. “Officially, I’m not supposed to have an opinion on that. Unofficially… I hear a couple of the doctors are talking about using variations on gene therapies developed for people with other illnesses, like Alexander’s syndrome.”
“I didn’t think there was anything like that available for me,” Kevin said, thinking back to the consultation with Dr. Markham, and all the ones that had followed it.
“There hasn’t been, but you currently have most of the biggest brains in the country on your side. If anyone can tailor something to your condition, it’s them.”
And then Kevin would find himself taking an experimental treatment that might cure him, might do nothing, or might make things worse. Would that be worth the risk of losing the alien signal completely?
“For the moment, though, you have a visitor.”
She nodded to the doorway and the short figure coming through it. Kevin’s eyes widened at the sight of Luna, looking as casual as if she’d just called around to his house to see if he wanted to ride bikes down to the reservoir.
“Luna? How did you get here?”
