Footfall

by Larry Niven

  "You’ll turn left at the next actual road," Richard Owen said. "It’ll be a way. Mind if I doze off? I had a late night."

  "All right by me," she said. She drove on.

  Not very flattering, she thought. Picks me up in Kona, gets me to drive him up the side of a volcano, and goes to sleep. Romantic . . .

  She ran her fingers along her shoulder-length hair. It was dark brown with a trace of red, and at the moment it couldn’t be very attractive since it was still damp from her morning swim. She hadn’t much of a tan, either. Sometimes her freckles ran together to give the illusion of a tan, but it was too early in the spring for that. Damp hair, no tan. Not really the popular image of a California girl.

  Her figure was all right, if a bit athletic; the Army encouraged officers to run four miles a day, and she did that although she could get out of the requirement if she really wanted to. The medium-length skirt and T-shirt showed her off pretty well. Still, it couldn’t be looks that attracted this astronomer to her, any more than she was overwhelmed by his appearance. All the same, there’d been some electricity earlier. Now it was nearly gone.

  He was up all night, she thought. And will be again tonight. Let him sleep. That should liven him up. God knows what I’d be like if I had to live on a vampire’s schedule.

  They drove through alternate strips of pasture and lava fields. At irregular intervals someone had made crude stacks of lava rocks. Three or four rocks, each smaller than the one below, the bottom one perhaps two feet across, piled in a stack; she’d been told they were religious offerings made by the Old Hawaiians. If so, they couldn’t be very old; Mauna Loa erupted pretty often, and certainly this field had been overflowed several times during the twentieth century.

  She turned left at the intersection, and the way became even steeper. The TR-7 labored through the climb. There were fewer fresh lava fields here; now they were on the side of Mauna Kea. "She" was supposed to be pretty thoroughly dormant. They drove through endless miles of ranchlands given by King Kamehameha to a British sailor who’d become the king’s friend.

  Richard Owen woke just as they reached the "temporary" wooden astronomy base station. "We stop here," he said. "Have some lunch."

  There wasn’t much there. Long one-story wooden barracks in a sea of lava and mud, with a few straggly trees trying to live in the lava field. She pulled in alongside several GMC Jimmy fourwheel-drive vehicles. "We could go on up," she said. "I don’t really need lunch."

  "Regulations. Acclimatization. It’s nearly fourteen thousand feet at the top. Pretty thin air. Thin enough here at ten thousand It’s not easy to do anything, even walk, until you get used to it."

  By the time they reached the clapboard barracks buildings she was ready to agree.

  There were half a dozen observatories on the lip of the volcano. Richard parked the Jimmy in front of the NASA building. It looked like an observatory in a Bugs Bunny cartoon: a square concrete building under a shiny metal dome.

  "Do I get to look through the telescope?" she asked.

  He didn’t laugh. Maybe he had answered that one too often. "No one looks through telescopes anymore. We just take pictures." He led the way inside, through bare-walled corridors and down an iron stairway to a lounge furnished with chrome-steel office tables and chairs.

  There was a woman in the lounge. She was about Jeanette’s age, and she would have been pretty if she’d washed her face and put on some lipstick. She was frowning heavily as she drank coffee.

  "Mary Alice," Owen said, "this is Jeanette Crichton. Captain Crichton, Army Intelligence. Not a spook, she does photo reconnaissance and that sort of thing. Dr. Mary Alice Mouton. She’s an asteroid specialist."

  "Hi," Mary Alice said. She went on frowning.

  "Problem?" Owen asked.

  "Sort of." She didn’t seem to notice Jeanette at all. "Rick, I wish you’d come look at this."

  "Sure."

  Dr. Mouton led the way and Rick Owen followed. Jeanette shook her head and tagged after them, through another corridor and up some stairs, past an untidy computer room. All mad, she thought. But what did I expect?

  She hadn’t known what to expect at all. This was her first trip to Hawaii, courtesy of an engineering association meeting that invited her to speak on satellite observation. That conference was over and she was taking a couple of days leave, swimming the Big Island’s reefs and enjoying the sun. She didn’t know anyone in Hawaii, and it had been pretty dull. Jeanette began to make plans to visit Linda and Edmund before going back to Fort Bragg.

  Then Richard Owen had met her at the reef. They’d had breakfast after their swim, and he’d invited her to come up to see the observatory. She’d brought a sleeping bag; she didn’t know whether Owen expected to share it with her, but from little things he’d said at lunch and on the drive up after lunch she was pretty sure he’d make the offer. She’d been trying to decide what to do when he did.

  Now it was as if she weren’t there at all.

  She followed them into a small, cluttered room. There was a big viewscreen in one corner. Dr. Mouton did things to the controls and a field of stars showed on the screen. She did something else, and the star field blinked on and off; as it did, one star seemed to jump back and forth.

  "New asteroid?" Owen asked.

  "That’s what I thought," Dr. Mouton said. "Except . . . take a good look, Rick. And think about what you’re seeing."

  He stared at the screen. Jeanette came closer. She couldn’t see anything strange. You take the pictures on two different nights and do a blink comparison. The regular stars won’t have moved enough to notice, but anything that moves against the background of the "fixed stars," like a planet or an asteroid, will be in two different places on the two different photos. Blink back and forth between the two plates: the "moving" body would seem to jump back and forth. That was how Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto. It was also a standard photo reconnaissance technique, to see what had changed in the interval between two satellite photos.

  "What’s the problem?" Owen asked.

  "That’s moving too far for the interval."

  "It’s close . . ."

  "Not that close," she said. "I got the plates from a few weeks ago. Rick, I had to trace back damn near night by night, it’s moving so fast! It’s in a hyperbolic orbit."

  "Come on, it can’t be!"

  "It is," Dr. Mouton said.

  "Excuse me," Jeanette said. They both turned to look at her. They’d obviously forgotten she was there. "What’s a hyperbolic orbit?"

  "Fast," Owen said. "Moving too fast for the sun’s gravity. Objects in a hyperbolic orbit can escape from the solar system altogether."

  She frowned. "How could something be moving that fast?"

  "Big planets can make it happen." Richard said. "Disturb something’s orbit . . ."

  "It’s under power," Mary Alice Mouton said.

  "Aw, come on!"

  "I know it’s silly, but it’s the only explanation I can think of. Rick, I’ve followed that thing backward for weeks, and it has decelerated most of the way."

  "But . . ."

  "Jupiter can’t do that. Nothing can."

  "No, of course it—Mary Alice?"

  "The computer plot fits perfectly if you assume it’s a powered spacecraft." Dr. Mouton’s voice had taken on a flat, dry note. "And nothing else does."

  An hour later. Two more astronomers had come in, looked at the plates, and left shaking their heads. One had insisted that whatever else they found, the early plates were genuine; he’d taken them himself. The other hadn’t even admitted seeing anything.

  Owen used the telephone to call Arizona. "Laura? Rick Owen. We’ve got something funny here. Did any of your people happen to get pictures looking south of Leo the past few weeks?" He read off a string of coordinates and waited for a few moments.

  "Good! Looked at them? Could you please go look? Yes, now. I know it’s not convenient, but believe me, it’s important."

  "You don’t rea
lly believe that’s a powered ship, do you?" Jeanette asked.

  Mary Alice looked at her with haunted eyes. "I’ve tried everything else, and nothing fits the data. And yes, I remember the pulsars!" which meant nothing to Jeanette.

  They drank coffee while Owen talketh. Finally he put down the phone. He looked flightened. "Kin Peak has seen it," he announced. "Chap named Tom Duff, a computer type, spotted it. They didn’t believe it. It’s just where we saw it. Mary Alice, you may have a problem about credit for discovery."

  "Bother the credit, what is it?" Dr. Mouton demanded. "Rick, it’s big, and it’s under power, and it’s coming here."

  In California it would be three in the morning. Linda heard the phone ring three times, then the sleepy voice. "Yes?"

  "Linda, this is Jenny."

  "Jenny? But—well, hello, is something wrong?"

  "Kind of, Sis. I need to talk to your husband. Fast."

  "What?" There was a pause. "All right."

  "And get him some coffee," Jenney said. "He’s going to need it."

  Presently she heard the newly awakened voice of Major General Edmund Gillespie. "Jenny? What’s wrong?"

  "General, I have something strange to report . . ."

  "General. Are you being official?"

  "Well . . . formal. Yes, sir. I’ve already called my colonel, and he agreed that it would be a good idea to call you."

  "Just a second, Jenny. Linda, where’s that coffee? Ah. Thanks. Okay, shoot."

  "Yes, sir." As she spoke, she tried to imagine the scene. General Gillespie sitting on the edge of the bed, growing more and more awake. His hair probably looks like his head is exploding. Linda pacing back and forth wondering what in the world is going on. Maybe Joel had been awakened. Well, there wasn’t any help for that. A lot of people were going to be losing sleep.

  "Jenny, are you seriously suggesting that this is . . . an alien ship? Men from Mars and all that?"

  "Sir, we both know there can’t be any men from Mars. Or anywhere else in the solar system. But this is a large object, it’s moving faster than anything that could stay inside the solar system, it has been decelerating for weeks, and it appears to be coming here. Those are facts, confirmed by three different observatories." Suddenly she giggled. "Ed, you’re an astronaut. What do you think it is?"

  "Damned if I know," Gillespie said. "Russian?"

  "No," Jeanette said.

  There was a long silence from the other end. "You’d know, wouldn’t you? But are you that sure?"

  "Yes, sir. I’m that sure. It is not a Soviet ship. It’s my job to know things like that. I’ve been monitoring the Soviet space program for ten years, and they can’t build anything like that. Neither can we."

  "Jenn—Captain, if this is a joke we’re all going to be in trouble."

  "For God’s sake, General, why would I joke about this?" she demanded. "I told you, I already got my colonel out of bed! He’s going through channels, but you can imagine what’s going to happen to a UFO report."

  "I can think of people to call," Gillespie said. "I’m just having trouble believing it."

  "Yes, sir," Jenny said dryly.

  "Yeah, I know, so must you," Ed Gillespie said. "But I see your point. If it’s an alien ship, we’ve got some preparing to do. Jenny, who is your C.O.?"

  "Colonel Robert Hartley G-2 Strategic Army Command, Fort Bragg. Here’s the phone number."

  * * *

  Linda watched as her husband put the phone down. He looked worried. "What’s my kid sister done now?"

  "Maybe earned herself a medal," Edmund said. He lifted the phone and began dialing.

  "Who are you calling now?" Linda asked. "This is crazy!"

  "Hello, Colonel Hartley? General Ed Gillespie here. Captain Crichton said you’d be expecting my call . . . Yeah. Yeah, she’s always had a level head. Yeah. Yeah, I believe her too. Okay, so what do we do about it?" This is crazy, Linda thought. Absolutely crazy. My kid sister discovers flying saucers. I don’t believe it. I will not believe it. Only . . . Only Jenny never pulled a practical joke in her life. She doesn’t drink, she doesn’t take drugs, and . . . Aliens? An alien ship approaching Earth?

  She saw that Edmund had put the phone down. "So now what?" she asked.

  "I don’t know. Hard to think. Have to let people know. Have to let the President know. I’m not sure how to do that."

  "Wes Dawson could do it," Linda said.

  "By God!" He looked at his watch. "After six in Washington. Wes might be up. I’ll wake him up. You got his home number handy?"

  * * *

  David Coffey had always thought of himself as a night person, but that wasn’t possible now. The President of the United States couldn’t sleep late. It just wasn’t done.

  He couldn’t even insist on being left alone for breakfast, although he tried. As he sat down on the terrace to enjoy the lovely spring day in Washington, the Chief of Staff said, "Wes Dawson. California—"

  "I know who he is."

  "Insists on joining you for breakfast."

  "Insists?"

  "He didn’t put it that way, but yes. Said he was calling in any favors he had coming. Vital, he said."

  David Coffey sighed. He felt the pressure of his belt. There was a cabinet meeting at eleven, and he’d hoped to get in a half hour swim before then. Tighten up the gut a bit. "Tell Congressman Dawson I’m flattered," he said, "And ask the housekeeper please to set another place at the table."

  Flying saucers. Spaceships. Silly, the President thought. The sort of stuff the midwestern papers ran when there wasn’t any other news. Fakery. Or insanity. Except that Wes Dawson wasn’t crazy, had never been crazy, and even though he was acting manic, he wasn’t crazy now.

  "Let me get this straight, Wes," Coffey said. "The astronomers have seen a spaceship approaching Earth. It will be here next month. You want to go meet it."

  "Yes, Mr. President."

  "Wes, do you know—scratch that. Of course you know how goofy this sounds. All right, assume it’s all true. Why you?"

  "Somebody has to," Dawson said. "And the fact that I used up all my favors to be the first to tell you about it ought to show I’m interested."

  "Yeah, I give, you that."

  "I’m on both Space and Foreign Relations. You ought to have somebody from the Congress when we go out to meet them."

  "Why go out to meet them at all?"

  "Because— it’s more fitting, sir," Dawson said. "Think about it. Mr. President, they came from a long way off. From another star—"

  "Sure about that?" the Chief of Staff asked. "Why not from another planet?"

  "Because we’ve seen all the likely planets close up, and there’s no place for a civilization," Dawson said patiently. "Anyway. Mr. President, they came from a long way off. Even so, they’ll, recognize that the first step is the hard one. We want to meet them in orbit, not wait for them to come here.

  "Let me try to put it in perspective," he said. "Would the history of the Pacific Islands have been different if the first time the Europeans encountered Hawaiians, the Polynesians had been well out at sea in oceangoing boats? Mightn’t they have been treated with more respect?"

  "I see," the President said. "You know, Wes, you just may be right. That’s assuming there’s anything to this."

  "If there is, do I get to go?" Dawson asked.

  David Coffey laughed. "We’ll see about that," he said. He turned to the Chief of Staff. "Jim, get hold of General Gillespie. Get him on a plane for Washington. And the Army captain who discovered this thing." He sighed. "And get it on the agenda for the cabinet meeting today. Let’s see what the Secretary of State has to say about welcoming the Men from Mars . . . "

  Wes Dawson walked back from the White House to his offices in the Rayburn Building. He didn’t really have time to do that, but it was a fine morning, and the walk would do him good, and he was too excited to work anyway.

  The President hadn’t said no!

  Wes strolled quickly through
the Federal Triangle and along Independence Avenue. He’d done that often, but he still tended to gawk at the great public buildings along the way. It was all there. Government granite, magnificent buildings in the old classic style, built to last back when America had craftsmen able to compete with the great builders of old Greece and Rome. And more than that, The Archives, with the original Constitution and Declaration of Independence to make you misty-eyed and silent and remind you that we’d done things even the Romans couldn’t, we’d invented a stable government of free citizens. Beyond that was the Smithsonian, old castle and new extension.

  The President hadn’t said no! I’m going to space! Only—only would President Coffey remember? It wasn’t an ironclad promise. No one had heard it but Jim Frantz. If the President forgot, the Chief of Staff would forget too, because Coffey might have had a reason to forget. Or . . . It’s too fine a morning to think that way. Coffey didn’t say no! I really could go to space!

  Ahead was the Space Museum, with its endless traffic, the only building in Washington that drew crowds during weekend blizzards. Wes wanted to look in. Just for a moment. There was work to do, and Carlotta would be waiting in the office to hear what happened in his meeting with the President, and he ought to hurry, but dammit. Across from the museum was NASA itself.

  Wes grinned from ear to ear, startling passersby who weren’t used to people looking happy. A couple of runners came past and returned the grin, although they couldn’t know what made him so cheerful.

  "I know a secret," he said aloud as he looked up toward the eighth-floor corner office of the Administrator, Have they told him by now? Maybe they’ll even have him at the Cabinet meeting.

  But I’m the one who told the President, and I’ve got my claim staked . . . And I’m the right man. I’ve been waiting for this day all my life. I’m in good shape—well, reasonably good. I’ll be in better. I’ll run every day—