Walt and Leigh Richmond

by The Lost Millennium (html)

  "Incidentally, it's fascinating to note that in the Old Testament, the word sin or evil translates out sick or diseased. The word holy translates out healthy."

  "Now just where," the engineer demanded, "to start at the beginning, do you get enough carbon 14 to be a major genetic threat? To require a catastrophe like the flood or the conditions you've described?"

  "Take an electrical discharge of sufficient intensity to upset the balance of a planet. Feed that discharge-arc through a predominately nitrogen atmosphere. You get carbon 14 and lots of it. Remember, that arc continued for seven days."

  "And the carbon 14 would still be sufficient to be a major genetic threat except for your flood." The engineer nodded in admiration. "You've certainly worked this out to the last detail."

  "I have simply looked for the evidence—and refused to discredit the evidence, geological and historical, that is to be found throughout the planet," said the archaeologist dryly.

  "Score!" said the engineer. "Okay," he added. "The evidence makes good listening. What happens next?"

  The archaeologist smiled. Even for a man who credited his own senses in defiance of the traditionalists, and was determined to prove the theories behind the solar tap—even for him, such a complete new look at history was difficult, he thought, and felt a deep weariness. Would the race of man ever grow up, ever quit clinging to preconceived notions in the belief that those notions represented security? Stubbornly determined that Santa Claus must come down the chimney, refusing to recognize the love behind the myth as sufficient security to make it possible to discard the myth. But the child must grow up now! His voice took on a gentleness, a quiet.

  "As I said, Lord David may just have been underseas according to his scheduled plans, when the avalanche occurred. But it is just as probable …"

  It was after midnight, and Zad, David and Bon were deep into the details of the work of the memory tap. David was not only convinced, he was becoming more excited by the moment with the manner in which this work could supplement and dovetail with his own. Coffee cups sat around, and the air was blue with smoke.

  The phone at Zad's elbow suddenly took up its customarily insistent ring. Puzzled, she answered.

  It was Memph Luce's voice, strained but unemotional. "Professor Shara," he said formally, "can you tell me where to find Lord David Lyon?"

  "Of course. He's right here." Zad was about to take the receiver from her ear to hand it to David when she heard Luce's voice continuing.

  "I am so sorry to bother you at this hour, but I wonder whether you would undertake to locate Lord David for me? Tell him that government officials are at the laboratory now, and would like to question him. I am being detained for questioning myself, and the laboratory and the animals have been impounded. They tried to find Lord David at his quarters, but he wasn't there, and they feel it quite important that they find him immediately."

  Zad caught her breath, trying to assimilate the details of what Memph was saying. "Of course," she said. "Are you at the laboratory now?"

  "No. I have been taken to the police station, and will be held here for questioning. I gather for some time," he added dryly. "I stood on my rights as a civilian to be allowed one phone call to my superior or lawyer. Please tell Lord David that the officials will expect him at the laboratory."

  "Is there any more that you can say?"

  "No. No, that is all. Just see if you can locate him and let him know that he is expected. Of course, if he has … already gone on a … trip, it is too late to reach him." Abruptly, Memph hung up.

  Zad turned to the other two, paling. "David—Dade and Pacia didn't wait until morning. That was Memph. Your laboratory's been impounded, the officials are looking for you, and Memph has been arrested. That's not how he put it," she added lamely, sinking back into her chair.

  There was absolute silence, not one of the three moving, until suddenly Zad sprang up.

  "Memph said they'd looked for you at your quarters. He sounded strained, of course, but he was trying to tell me much more than he could say over the telephone. They were undoubtedly monitoring his call, for he called from police headquarters. David! They'll probably come here looking for you!"

  David raised his head, his deep eyes hollowed. "What can I do?" he whispered. "What can I do?"

  "How near ready is the Juheda?" Zad's voice was fierce.

  "Nearly … There's not much … there's not much that's not aboard that I'd have to have, except the personnel."

  "Take off!" It was a command, not a suggestion. "Just before he hung up, Memph said that if you'd already gone on a trip it would be too late to reach you. David, get as many of your gang together as you can, and take off. Now. Tonight."

  "I'd be … I'd be stopped. I couldn't get them all together. Maybe the investigation won't be too serious. Maybe I can make them understand…" Abruptly the biologist pulled himself together. "You're right," he said firmly. "I'll be completely stopped unless I can leave before they…any publicity would bring out the regeneration factors and people would fight for premature release … those who didn't understand… Yes, I'll be completely stopped unless I can leave before they take me in for questioning. But Memph … ?"

  "You'll have to leave him behind. But I'll get him out, somehow, and hide him—somehow. Anyway, that's what he was trying to tell me over the phone. For you to leave, right now."

  "I'll have to get my people together."

  "David." It was Bon speaking for the first time. "I'm going with you, if you'll have me. Give me a list of your people and let me contact them, get as many aboard as possible. How long do you suppose we have?"

  "Not five more minutes, if you stay here. That was a pretty broad hint that Memph gave me, and it won't take the police long to tumble. Take David to your place, Bon, and do what's necessary from there. They won't connect you with this. I'll stay here and lead them astray when they come looking. They're bound to come here."

  Zad was at the door, impatiently ready to let them out. David reached her side, then stopped.

  "Oh," he said. "The ultrasonic separator. It's still at the lab, and …"

  "Where is it and what does it look like?"

  "It's on a bench at the left of my desk. It's a small black box. About the size of a portable typewriter."

  "I'll get it if I can, and I'll get it to the Juheda by dawn." Zad's voice sounded more positive than she felt. "You'd better leave before sunrise. They'll think of the Juheda sooner or later. If they don't know of it now, they will be the time they've talked to a few people. That gives you less than six hours, you two."

  David started to open the door, Bon behind him, but suddenly Zad gestured them back. "Reconnoiter," she said, went to the window and peered out. "There's a police carajet just landing," she called over her shoulder. "David, you stay behind Bon, let him lead the way. Go out the back. You may have to walk. They're in the parking lot."

  "No." Bon was getting into stride now. "David, you go out the back way and go over to … to the back of the electronics building yonder. Keep in the shadows. I'll go out the front way to the parking lot, get my carapet and take off in another direction. Then I'll circle back and pick you up. But stay out of sight."

  "Good boy." Zad was delighted, beginning to enjoy the situation for all its dangers. "Meantime, I'll lead 'em a chase of some sort. Now, scat. Fast. They're coming."

  The door closed behind the two men, and Zad turned out the lights, then watched from the window until she could see Bon nearing the parking lot, while two uniformed figures, having passed him, headed towards her building.

  Quickly she let herself out of her apartment, down the hall to the front entrance, and out. Ignoring the approaching uniformed figures, she strode purposefully, and as fast as she could move without appearing to run, at an angle towards the biology lab.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw the two figures hesitate, then one turned to follow her, the other continued towards her building. Satisfied, she forced more speed into her legs,
still keeping below the pace that would appear to be a run.

  "Professor Shara?"

  She pretended not to hear the voice. She was nearing the biology building now, and she broke into a run. Throwing open the main door as though forcing her way through a barricade, she turned into the lab at the right.

  A guard just inside the lab door stopped her. She glared up at him.

  "I understand you have impounded the biology laboratory and its animals," she told him fiercely. "I have come for my personal equipment and for my personal animal."

  "You'll have to get a permit." The guard stood squarely before her.

  "At least I shall check to see whether my babustin is being mistreated!" Zad's figure, though small, could take on a good deal of dignity and authority, and she gave it the full treatment as she walked deliberately around the guard. He reached a hand towards her shoulder to check her movement, but a haughty glance stopped him, and she made her way past, striding towards the door that led to the babustin's cage.

  She had reached the door before the guard caught his breath, and she pulled it open without heeding his command to stop. Seizing the collar and chain that hung beside the door, she spoke, to the big cat that stretched lazily as it approached her.

  "Meig! Here!" She slipped the collar over the huge cat's neck, and turned to face both the guard who had stood at the door, and the official who had followed her, who was just entering.

  "This is my animal." She spoke as though no question had been raised. "That equipment," and she pointed to the black box that lay on the bench beside the main desk in the room, "was loaned by my department to Lord Lyon. I do not know what question has been raised in respect to his department, but I do not intend to have my own work slowed down by official impertinence."

  As she spoke, followed by Meig on her leash, Zad made her way quickly to the box and picked it up. "If you would like a receipt," she continued, moving directly towards the two who stood between her and the exit, "I shall be glad to sign anything that you have in mind."

  The newly-arrived official smiled briefly and rather as though the smile were painful.

  "Professor Shara," he said, "we have no intention of interfering with anyone's work, not even that of the biology department. However, we have impounded …"

  Zad continued directly towards him. "You have not impounded my department nor its property." She had nearly reached them, but they didn't move.

  "I am sorry…"

  "Meig!" Zad spoke sharply, giving a flick of the leash towards the two guards.

  Meig launched herself without warning, a snarl that was near a roar in her throat, claws bared. Both guards threw themselves from her path, and Zad was through the opening, Meig turning behind her and continuing to snarl as she kept pace with the girl.

  "Stop or I'll shoot the beast!" the voice behind shouted as the door slammed behind her. Without pause, Zad pushed through the front entrance, and ran to the big gouphra tree nearby. Scrambling up its low branches, Meig beside her, she crouched just above head height as the two officials catapulted out the front door and stopped to scan the empty campus, silent under the star-filled sky.

  "You go back and guard that damned lab," one of the figures barked. "I'll circle the building."

  The instant the two figures were out of sight, the one back into the building, the other around its corner, Zad, with Meig, slid lithely from the tree, ran to the next building, and then they made their way cautiously through the back areas of the campus to its border, the farthest from the parking lot.

  I'll have to find a phone, thought Zad. A cab would be dangerous. But…yes, Rahn.

  V

  "The cannus and babustin …" The engineer stretched and filled his pipe again, settling back. "I understand that you mean a cat and a dog, but why the fancy names?"

  "Haven't you ever wondered at the basic difference between the wild and the domestic animals? That the domestic animal seldom goes successfully wild, and that the wild animal seldom domesticates? The cat and the dog were pre-avalanche experiments in developing companion animals, and very successful ones. But they were not made on the Juheda. They were pre-avalanche and went with the ships; only the last two ships, at that. Their first real appearance on Earth is in Egypt for the cat; at Crete for the dog.

  "The ancestors of the cats, the entire feline strain that we know as lions and tigers and cheetahs, et al, the animals from which Lyon developed the cat, survived the avalanche on Earth, wild; and the wolf-family, the ancestors of the dogs. But the dogs and the cats themselves came back with the Vaheva and the Vahsaba.

  "There were further experiments and developments in the cats that were first brought back by the Vaheva. A number of animals showed the psi tendency, and work was done to see how far the intelligence could be developed. But especially with the cats. The whole sphinx and cat mythology, the cat-bodied people of Egypt, stems from that. There are indications that cross-strains with the human form were successfully tried on various animal lines, though if they were tried they proved genetically unstable, for there is no evidence that any of the strains continued. It is possible that the mythologies of human-animal crosses are a development from the use of psi-able animals as monitors, but it seems more probable that some of the crosses were successful, and that instances of the cat-bodied, the bull-bodied, the hawk-headed actually existed; that a satyr, a centaur and others, really lived for a brief span.

  "At any rate, we know that someone who had worked with the molecular biologist returned with the Vaheva, and remained when Lord David left. We've called him Memph Luce of Furra, and his story links back into that of the Lord and his chosen people.

  "But the indications are that someone else took over the work that Luce was doing, and took it in directions other than those in which it was first initiated. The whole story of animal worship stems not from Luce, but from that other, I think; the story of Ba'al and the like: and Lord David's fury at the results when he came back in 2200 BC must have been something apocryphal. That's when he selected out Abraham and his tribe from the descendants of those who had survived the flood, who were now scattered across the face of the planet. That's when Sodom and Gomorrah were blown up.

  "At the time of Abraham, you have three types of animals—the wild animals; the domestic animals; and the animals in which, obviously, are represented induced mutations, around which religions were built, probably in order to support the work of the laboratories and to handle the care and feeding of the delicate mutations. These last disappear shortly after 2200 BC, and may be presumed to have been genetically unstable. The religions built around the induced mutations lingered for centuries—there are still traces of them—but the mutations themselves disappeared.

  "But notice the domestic animals—the cow, the horse and the sheep, for instance. Lyon developed those aboard the Juheda; probably created them from cells from meat he had aboard; then bred them for domesticity to serve his people. And whereas the induced mutations did not stabilize out, Lyon's domestic animals, developed from cells and selectively bred, did stabilize and survive."

  "It's not fair," said the engineer petulantly, "to make fairy stories—or mythology—sound true."

  The series of phone calls from Bon's apartment consisted of brief, implicit instructions, giving no time to the parties at the other end for foolish questions. The Juheda was leaving at dawn. If they wished to be aboard, they would report there by that time, fully equipped, and as unobtrusive as possible, making sure they were not followed. Under no circumstances were they to go near the biology building, or do anything to call official attention to their movements.

  What the extent of the police inquiry would actually be, in these pre-dawn hours, was a matter for guesswork, because they could not be sure what Dade and Pacia might have said, nor what force they might have placed behind their arguments. But in every case it was made clear that there would be no coming back, no second chance, for those that might be left behind. The Juheda was one of the few ships quite
capable of disappearing into Atalama's vast ocean and remaining hidden indefinitely; the plan was to do just that.

  The submersible variety of the ship—the submarine some called them—had never been of any practical or commercial importance, its uses limited to the scientific exploration of the sea; so there was relatively little chance of pursuit if they could get under way. Since the launching site was in another governmental district, it was also improbable that communication would be fast enough between the bureaucratic divisions to halt a surprise launching. However, should they be stopped, anyone aboard would be vulnerable to a charge of attempting to thwart a governmental investigation, and it was explained to each that the decision was his own.

  There was one possibility that Bon foresaw only at the last moment—that of an all-points bulletin for David himself. "Best," Bon decided, "we stay right here until the last possible moment, leave it to those aboard to prepare the ship to be ready to leave the minute you make your appearance." One more phone call took care of that, and then the two turned to scavenging Bon's apartment for whatever it afforded that might be useful.

  The first streaks of light were just touching the skies when, with everything that either could think of as needed from his living quarters loaded into his carapet, Bon switched on the motor. David, an unaccustomed hat pulled low over his face, came from the building to join him.

  Atalama seemed hauntingly peaceful as they flew south. The rosy fingers of dawn touched the night sky caressingly; mist shrouded most of the ground below with a contented mystery and the animosities of mankind seemed almost inconceivable. David found himself wondering briefly whether he were not being over-hasty. The thought was quenched in the facts that underlay his flight, even as it formed.