Flypaper: A Novel

by Chris Angus

  Everyone went over and stared down into the gloom. There were a number of torches lying about on the ground. It was difficult to tell for certain, but it did seem as though few of the bodies were moving. After several minutes, they wandered back to the library.

  Diana said to Marcia. “So let’s say, for the sake of argument, this thing seeded humanity. Why would they need to make the probe virtually immortal? Once the seeding was done, it seems to me the oval would have been expendable. It had done its work.”

  “Maybe not all its work,” said Marcia.

  The others looked at her blankly.

  She sighed. “This is speculation, I grant you, but suppose you seeded a planet with life. Wouldn’t you want to know the results of your efforts over time?”

  “For God’s sake, Marcia,” said Alan. “We’re talking about millions of years—billions of years. Even if that were the purpose, any race involved would have been working on faith—trying to project itself into the future. There’d be no way for them to know the outcome and no reason to create some immortal probe.”

  “You’re assuming they would be creatures like us. But suppose they are immortal. Time would mean nothing to them.” She smiled. “Maybe they wanted annual reports—forever. Who knows? Actually, my current hypothesis is that the probe was given such long life because its job really wasn’t done once the seed was planted. It had to make those reports or, maybe, it had another function to perform at some point.”

  “What function?” asked Logan.

  “What point?” asked Alan.

  “Suppose,” said Kessler, “the probe was also a control of some kind? You know—in case something went wrong with the experiment.”

  “What could go wrong with the experiment?” asked Alan. “Once they set life in motion it was going to go in whatever direction evolution took it.”

  “You think so?” Kessler turned back to her papers. “I can’t prove it, but I’m convinced this probe is related somehow to the epidemic that’s been sweeping the planet. Remember, there was a similar epidemic that hit the monks two thousand years ago when they first uncovered the oval. That calamity was what led them to work so tirelessly to decipher the symbols. Somehow, the monks must have managed to turn on the genetic anomaly, intentionally or otherwise, just as we think the Chinese must have done in their experiments on the ice woman’s foot. But then, incredibly, the monks managed to stop the process after it had begun. I can’t explain how, but I can tell you that after my studies, I’ve developed a new respect for what those monks were capable of. In any event, I think whatever happened, it wasn’t what the seeders wanted. And the probe was designed to end the experiment if that happened.”

  “End what experiment?” asked Alan, exasperation creeping into his voice.

  “Life.”

  “But the disease is only attacking humans. No other life forms have been affected, so life, evolution, DNA—will all go on.”

  “Suppose it was only intelligent life the seeders didn’t want to happen. Suppose they didn’t seed Earth with DNA billions of years ago, but merely sent the probe out to find planets that already contained the secret of life. When it was encountered, the probe then inserted the new genetic information, which was designed to turn on once intelligent life appeared.”

  “I don’t get it,” said Alan. “How would a probe ever know if intelligence suddenly appeared?”

  “Perhaps turning the genetic debris on was the test,” said Marcia. “If life reached the point of being able to do that, of having both the technology and the curiosity to do it—well, that would certainly be a sign of intelligence, wouldn’t you say?”

  “But intelligence is the natural end to evolution—the highest form,” said Alan. “Why would they want to destroy it? Intelligence is the whole point.”

  “Who says so? It’s not as if we have a lot of empirical evidence to go on. We only have one planet we know contains life, much less intelligent life.”

  Diana said, “Maybe the purpose was something really mundane—like creating a food source, a planetary freezer they could go to when they happened to be vacationing in this part of the galaxy. Intelligence would just get in the way. Like having a chicken farm full of really smart birds. As fast as humanity is wiping out species, I’d say they were on to something.”

  “Come on,” said Alan. “You’re talking about an intelligence so far advanced beyond ours that the need for food would quite likely be obsolete. If they could create a probe like this, food production hardly seems like something they’d be concerned about.”

  “I agree,” said Marcia. “More likely, they just didn’t want to create any possible competition for themselves. They liked the status quo. Why rock the boat?”

  “Then why bother with the entire enterprise?” asked Alan. “If it’s not for food and it’s not to create evolving life elsewhere, then what’s the point?”

  “Damn!” said Logan. He moved away from the others. “This is all a nice little mind game, but I don’t know what good it does us.” He stared at the oval. “Whether this thing comes from another galaxy or from the enlightened mind of one very exceptional, two-thousand-year-old monk, we’re not ever going to know, if you ask me.”

  Marcia stood up. “You’re right. At least with the resources we have here. Which is why I want to try to contact the White House. I’m hopeful the cave opening and our height will allow my sat-phone to work. Maybe if things haven’t deteriorated too far, they’ll still have the resources to help decipher the problem.”

  The President’s last remaining aide appeared in the Oval Office doorway. “Mr. President?”

  “Yes, William?”

  “Sir . . . there is a most unusual call coming in for you. From China. I really think you should take it.”

  President Klein followed his aide to the outer office. The main phone system was no longer functioning, but an elaborate satellite telecommunication system that operated off its own battery was. The White House emergency generators had ceased to function several days ago. There was unlimited fuel, of course, from the emergency stores, but there were no operators or repairmen left. As soon as there had been any sort of mechanical problem with the equipment, the system had shut down. With it went all lights, heat, and even the plumbing, which required power for the elaborate filtration system that had been installed at the beginning of the War on Terror.

  Gordon Page and Paul Littlefield watched the president leave. All three men were essentially camping out on the floor of the Oval Office. The most famous room in the world now looked like the site of a recent frat party. Sleeping bags were pushed up against a wall during the day. The president’s desk contained food items carried up from the kitchens, a small portable propane stove with two burners, and two plastic jugs of drinking water. There was also a large box filled with packages of potato chips and candy Gordon had gotten by smashing the glass fronts of the vending machines in the press room. A large Remington bronze of a bucking horse and rider was being used as a clothes hangar and had disappeared beneath a pile of sweaters and flannel shirts, for the nights were getting cold in the unheated building.

  Sitting around the propane stove for heat at night, staring out at the darkened city, silent except for the occasional gunshot or crash of glass as yet another storefront window was broken, had served to bring Gordon and Paul closer together. Like Boy Scouts around the campfire, they’d grown talkative as a way to keep the darkness and unknown dangers of the night at bay.

  “So you still claim God is killing these countless millions of people, Paul, because they refuse to accept His teachings, as determined by you?”

  “I haven’t personally determined anything,” said Littlefield. “I believe in the tenets of Creationism. I admit this is a terrible scourge wrought upon Earth, but it has been brought down on us by our own failings. Those who accept Jesus Christ as the reconciling Redeemer and coming King will be saved.”

  “In other words, not one of those billions of diseased people out th
ere is a Creationist?”

  “That is what I believe. God will not forsake those who have faith in Him.”

  “But—and I really want to understand this—it’s only your God that works, right? The billions of Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Taoists, hell . . . Wiccans, Witches, and Voodoo believers are simply lost souls. They’re all wrong and you’re right.”

  “You left out scientists. They may be the worst of the nonbelievers. Look, everything in the universe was created by God in the six literal days of the creation week, as described in Genesis 1:1-2:3 and confirmed in Exodus 20:8-11. The creation record is utterly historical, factual, and clear. Theories of origins based on evolution in any form are fraudulent. Biological life didn’t come about as a result of natural processes from inanimate systems, but was supernaturally fashioned by the Creator.”

  He stood up from the sofa and went over and stared out the window at the fires flickering on the lawns around the reflecting pool and the new World War II memorial. There were apparently still some looters healthy enough to build fires on the grounds. He wondered absently what was keeping them from a target as tempting as a defenseless White House.

  “Then you honestly believe,” said Gordon, “the billions of years of fossil evidence, of erosion, and compaction and uplift, and volcanic expulsion all happened in the last six thousand years?”

  “I do. The first humans didn’t evolve from animals, but were created, fully formed, as humans from the start. Each of the major species of plants and animals was also created functionally complete from the beginning. The complete history of the Earth, as preserved in its rocks and fossils, is a record of catastrophic intensities of various geological processes, operating under uniform natural laws, rather than one of gradualism. There’s plenty of scientific evidence that supports this concept of a relatively recent creation of the Earth and universe . . .”

  “God help me! There you go again. You Creationists love to call on scientific evidence when you can twist it to your own purposes. What you just said is the worst sort of hypocritical gobbledygook. I don’t know why I bother talking to you.”

  “Possibly because there is no one else,” Littlefield said. “God is God, Gordon. He is Jesus Christ, our Savior. Any of those suffering, misled souls can be redeemed into the faith and thus be saved. No one is forbidden God’s love.”

  “No. They just have to renounce their own beliefs, disavow everything they were ever taught from the time they were infants by their own faith, parents, and culture, and accept what you, Paul Littlefield, declare to be the truth.”

  “It is God’s truth!”

  “But can’t you see every one of those other religious people is saying the same thing about you. That you are a lost soul because you don’t believe what they believe.” Gordon felt as though he was a character in a bad comic book—a religious comic book. “Look. You started your missions in China in order to convert people, right? To save souls. Suppose, at the same time, some of the Buddhists over there came to the United States to try to convert Christians to Buddhism. Don’t you see it’s a prescription for endless turmoil? Unless we find some way to cut through all this ridiculous conversion nonsense, the entire planet will never cease being a cauldron of competing religious fantasies and wars. Is the Middle East really the model you want for the world?”

  Littlefield sighed. “I can’t help what I believe. Those who do not accept Jesus Christ will not receive eternal life. They will ultimately be consigned to the everlasting fires of hell under the dominion of the devil and his angels.”

  “Oh, I give up.” Gordon threw up his hands. “Look out the window, Paul. There’s the devil’s work if I ever saw it. In all its majesty. I couldn’t conceive of anything more horrible happening to the world in my worst nightmares.”

  Suddenly a tremendous explosion shook the building. They looked nervously at one another.

  The president came back into the room. His face was drawn and he looked like he’d lost his last good friend in the world. He crossed to his desk and sat down, his diminutive figure almost hidden behind the boxes of food.

  “That was very close,” he said. “I sent William over to the East Wing to try to determine what caused the explosion.”

  “What about your call from China?” asked Gordon.

  “It was Dr. Kessler, with some disturbing news. She’s still on the line. I wanted her to tell you her findings herself. Especially you, Paul. I’ve switched the call in here to my speaker phone. It seems to work off the same battery system as the sat-communications.”

  He leaned over and flicked the switch. “Dr. Kessler? You may go ahead. You’re on the speaker phone with Gordon Page and Paul Littlefield also in the room.”

  There was a moment’s silence, then Marcia’s scratchy voice penetrated the room clearly.

  “Good day, gentlemen. From what the president has told me, you’re in not much better shape than we are here in China. I’m very sorry to hear that. We were counting on the resources of the White House to help us.”

  “Right now,” said Gordon, “the resources of the White House consist of a Coleman lantern, propane stove, and candy stolen from the vending machines. Probably not what you had in mind.”

  “I understand,” Marcia said after a moment. “Consider this call to be merely for your own information then. So you will have some comprehension of what is happening to the world. Though I doubt it will provide you with much comfort.”

  “You’re saying you know what has caused the epidemic?” asked Littlefield.

  “I believe I do. It’s a bit of a long story . . . if you’ll bear with me.” She proceeded to tell them everything that had happened, right down to her current speculations about what the purpose of the oval might be. When she was finished, the silence in the president’s office could have been cut with a knife.

  “My God!” said Gordon, finally. “I’d give anything to be there and see the thing. Our first contact with another intelligence!”

  “First and probably last,” said the president.

  Littlefield was clearly agitated by what Marcia had relayed. “You can’t honestly expect us to believe that some—thing—you found in a cave in China has come to us across space from another world with the express purpose of destroying us.”

  “Not us, specifically,” said Marcia. “No. I believe they had another purpose, but when that purpose, whatever it was, failed, the oval was designed to wipe out their mistake.”

  “The mistake, I gather, being us,” said Gordon.

  “I think the last thing they intended was the creation of intelligent life,” Marcia said. “That would have meant creating something that could conceivably turn around some day and bite them back.”

  “This is ridiculous,” said Littlefield. “In the first place, the Bible tells us that man is God’s creation, the pinnacle of all the beasts. Even if He created other life elsewhere in the universe, He would not have made it superior to us.”

  Gordon shook his head, laughing silently. “Oh what a blow this must be to you, Paul! Not only is there another, superior, intelligence in the universe, but they, not God, may have created us. What a perfect little irony for all you Bible-thumpers. And having created us, the little green men have now apparently decided we’re not worthy and so they’re wiping us out. It’s beautiful, really.”

  “Please, Gordon,” said Klein. “This is difficult enough.”

  “Let me make something clear,” said Marcia, “I’m not definitely saying that the oval actually created, or seeded, life on Earth. I think it’s a reasonable possibility given the presence of the DNA symbol on the object, but there’s no way to prove it. However, after studying the symbols and hearing the translations of the scrolls from Xuemin, I do think it’s quite clear that the object is absolutely the cause of the epidemic.”

  “So regardless of its initial purpose,” said Gordon, “it’s now wiping out humanity completely. The sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, of course, is why?”

  �
��Which brings me to my final theory,” said Marcia.

  “I can hardly wait,” said Littlefield.

  “Actually, I think you’re going to find a certain affinity in it to your own life’s work, Paul,” she said. “Here goes . . . Suppose the probe was designed to destroy intelligent life wherever it encountered it?”

  Her words were met with stunned silence.

  “But why?” asked Gordon. “Why would they do that? They’re intelligent themselves. Why wouldn’t they have respect for that—for the importance of it?”

  “For one thing, as I’ve already proposed, to avoid any possible competition with themselves. But I have an even more plausible explanation—at least I consider it so. I think they were intolerant.”

  All three men stared at the speaker phone blankly.

  “I don’t think they believed there could be any higher form than themselves. They considered their species to be the pinnacle.”

  Littlefield seemed to shrink down into his chair. “I don’t have a clue what you’re trying to say,” he said in a small voice.

  “Oh, I think you do. You went off to China to convert the heathens because their way was all wrong in your mind. I grant that you believed you had a high purpose—to save their souls—but nonetheless, you were working on the presumption that you alone were right. You were intolerant of the beliefs and even the right to exist of other, unsaved souls. They were automatically condemned to hell and damnation.”

  “But I was trying to save them! Save their souls! That was my purpose.”

  “And so you convinced yourself you were on a noble mission. I don’t think the creators of the oval care a whit about that. They have no more interest in humans than we might in an ant or a rock. Simply because they knew they were the be-all and end-all of everything. For that reason, they sent out their probes with the explicit purpose of killing off other intelligent life forms. Think of it as . . . flypaper.”

  “What?”

  “Intergalactic flypaper. They were simply eliminating unnecessary, bothersome species. Much like we put out rat traps or mosquito zappers. They sent out probes to destroy intelligent life, which was a threat to them, to their dominance, to their sense of themselves as supreme beings. You were attempting to wipe out unworthy religions, Paul. They’re doing the same with entire species.”