Omega к-4

by Джек Макдевитт

  “We’ve plenty of time.”

  “Okay, Digger.” She grinned. “Seeing how you affect the other females around here, though, maybe I should rethink this.”

  THE AVATAR IDEA was not entirely without merit. Provided it was possible to produce one that could deliver the message and clear out. Here’s the deal and no questions asked.

  “But how would you do that?”

  “You suggested we could use divine intervention.”

  “Can you arrange it?”

  “I have an idea, Watson,” he said, doing his best Oxford accent. “We’d need some projectors, though. A lot of projectors.”

  “Tell me what you have in mind.”

  “Bill, let’s see some Goompahs.”

  “Any in particular?”

  “Yes. A female. Macao would be good. Give us a picture of Macao.”

  She blinked on. It was Macao as she’d looked during the slosh at Brackel. Bright yellow blouse with fluffy sleeves. Green leggings and animal-hide boots. And the medallion on the purple ribbon.

  “Okay. Bill, have her say something.”

  Macao smiled at him. “Challa, Digger,” she said, in a perfect imitation of Kellie’s voice. “You are a little zhoka, aren’t you?”

  He grinned. “The lip sync is okay. Not perfect, but okay.”

  “It wouldn’t fool anybody. Unless you give her a fan and have her hold it in front of her mouth. To get it right, I need to have a little warning in advance what she’s going to say.”

  “I don’t get it,” said Kellie. “If we’re agreed the real Macao probably couldn’t accomplish anything, what can her avatar do?”

  “We need to make some adjustments. Then, maybe, quite a lot.”

  ARCHIVE

  From the Goompah Recordings

  (Tyree of Roka at a slosh in Brackel)

  (Translated by Ginko Amagawa)

  Strange things are happening. There have been reports of zhokas on the highways, and of voices speaking in an unknown tongue in empty places. And a huge hole has opened in our skies and grows larger every night. Those of you who know me know that I have always believed that everything has a rational explanation. That the world is governed by immutable law and not by the whims of spirits and demons.

  There are some who argue that these are all portents of approaching catastrophe. Let me say first that I cannot offer explanations for these events. But I have not yet become so desperate that I’ve started believing there is such a thing as a portent. It may be that the demons on the highway are figments of overheated imaginations. That the voices in the night are really nothing more than the wind. And that the hole in the sky, which has begun to look like a cloud, will prove to be a new kind of storm. But that like any other storm, it will blow for a while, and then it will exhaust itself, and the sun will rise in the morning.

  Meantime, I’ll remind you that if catastrophe of a previously unknown nature is indeed on the way, that there is nothing to be done about it. Except enjoy the time we have left with family and friends. But this is extremely unlikely. We have a tendency to assume the worst, to give way to fear whenever something we do not understand presents itself.

  Since no plausible action can be taken against demons, disembodied voices, or the thing in the sky, I suggest that we put it all aside, that we refuse to allow these phenomena to upset our daily routine. That we in no case give way to panic.

  Now that we all recognize that I don’t know what’s going on any more than you do, we’ll open the floor for comments or questions.

  — September 19

  chapter 31

  On board the Hawksbill.

  Saturday, September 20.

  THEY GOT LUCKY. The search for the al-Jahani could have taken as long as a week. Establishing a position when one was adrift in interstellar space was less than a precise science. Furthermore, hyperlight signals did not lend themselves to tracking. So a searcher was dependent on radio transmissions, which were desperately slow. Julie could only guarantee that she would put the Hawksbill reasonably close to the damaged ship. And, when Marge asked how she defined reasonably, she admitted she was talking about 80 billion kilometers or so.

  Julie had expected to spend a minimum of two days in a fruitless search, then be directed to forget it and go on without Collingdale. But in fact they came out of hyperspace within range of the al-Jahani’s radio signals. Julie got her fix and jumped a second time. They emerged within a few hours of the stricken ship.

  In fact she didn’t see the point of all the hassle. The Hawksbill couldn’t accommodate the linguists; couldn’t even take on Frank Bergen, who was to have ridden shotgun with the decoys. Only Collingdale would be making the rest of the flight, and she didn’t see why he was needed.

  Collingdale hadn’t taken the time to explain it to her, and he was in charge, so she said nothing. Not even to Marge and Whit. Although they weren’t above wondering why they were going to so much trouble for somebody who was just going to Lookout to watch.

  “Well,” said Marge, “don’t anybody take this the wrong way, but it will be nice to see a fresh face on board.”

  Julie got blankets and pillows out of her supplies and tried to make her storage room into a sleeping accommodation. There was no bed; Collingdale would have to make do on the deck.

  At 1942 hours they picked up the al-Jahani in their telescopes, and three hours later they slipped alongside. Marge and Whit had both asked whether they could take some time to go aboard the other ship, just to say hello. Look around someplace different. Marge had an old friend aboard the al-Jahani. Julie would also have liked to get away from the narrow living space of the Hawksbill for a few hours, so she’d proposed it to Collingdale.

  “Don’t have time,” he said over the link. “We need to get going forthwith.” Forthwith. She didn’t know anybody else who talked like that.

  “My passengers could stand the break,” she’d said. “They’ve been cooped up in here for six months.”

  “Wish we could. But every hour puts that thing closer to Lookout. It’s just impossible.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Sorry,” he added.

  Marge settled for saying hello to her friend, the planetologist Melinda Park, by commlink. But she wasn’t happy, and Julie thought that Collingdale might be in for a long ride.

  He was on his way through the airlock within thirty seconds after the green lights went on. “Thank God,” he told Julie. “It’s been a nightmare.” And he added more apologies. “But there’s just too much at stake.”

  “It’s okay,” she said. “But you’re leaving Bergen. Who’s going out with the decoys?”

  “I am,” he said.

  There was a quick exchange with the al-Jahani’s captain. Were there any injuries? Did she have sufficient supplies to last until the relief vessel came? Could Julie provide any assistance?

  “We’re fine,” said Alexandra. And it might have been Julie’s imagination, but she sensed an unspoken now.

  Collingdale stood behind her, looking at the time, suggesting that they really should get moving, assuring her everything was satisfactory on the other ship.

  Eight minutes after they’d arrived, the Hawksbill edged away, fired its thrusters, and began to accelerate toward jump status.

  Julie had expected to feel apologetic about the storeroom quarters she was giving him, but as things turned out she felt a degree of satisfaction showing him the blankets on the deck and the two cramped washrooms.

  COLLINGDALE WAS SO pleased to be aboard a functioning ship, on his way to Lookout, that he didn’t really care about spartan conditions. During acceleration, he belted in on the couch in the equipment locker, the only one they had available.

  He watched the al-Jahani diminish with distance, and he felt a tinge of regret for Judy and Nick and Ginko and the others, who had worked so hard and accomplished so much. He thought about calling Judy, delivering a final farewell, but he’d done that before leaving. Any more along those lin
es would be maudlin.

  What he had to do now was to see that the cloud got sidetracked, so that what had happened to Judy’s team wouldn’t matter in the long run.

  He waited in his harness, looking around the bare-bones room, grateful that he was moving again. He closed his eyes and tried to relax, but he kept seeing the omega that had swept down on Moonlight. And he wished he had a bomb big enough to blow the damned thing to hell.

  That was the problem with Hutch’s decoy idea. It was good, and it might work. But it only deflected the cloud. It didn’t kill it. That was what Collingdale wanted. Go to the next step and kill it.

  After forty minutes’ acceleration they still had not jumped. Every flight he’d ever been on had been able to do it in thirty minutes or so. He called the bridge to ask.

  “Big ship, David,” she said. “It takes a while.” Her tone was mildly hostile. He tried to remember if he’d said or done anything to offend her. Probably upset that she didn’t get a chance to visit. But time was too valuable. The hour that they squandered now might make all the difference. “Okay,” he said. “I didn’t know.”

  He did know that if she tried to make the jump before the Hazeltines were ready, the Hawksbill would go boom. “Take your time,” he said.

  HE WAS PLEASED to be on the ship that housed the decoys, that would actually be used to frustrate the omega. He spent hours on the bridge, explained to Julie that he’d commanded a superluminal at the beginning of his career, and wanted to know everything. He talked at length with Bill, was allowed to sit in the captain’s chair, enjoyed calling up status reports, running maintenance routines, putting the AI through his paces.

  Julie, pleased that he showed such interest, showed him through the ship. Here were the comm circuits; there was life support; here’s the power mode complex. They toured the engine room, the shuttle launch area in the lower cargo bay, and main storage, where the antigrav generator was located.

  He wasn’t sure why he was so interested in the ship. He hadn’t particularly cared about the al-Jahani. It must have been because he knew this would be the vessel. Bergen was out of the game now, and Collingdale would be taking the Hawksbill into battle.

  It made him feel young again. As if all the world waited for him to show up and set things right. “Julie,” he said, “tell me about the jump engines. Has the technology improved?”

  “I doubt it,” she said. “I don’t think anything basic has changed in thirty years.”

  HE HADN’T HEARD from Mary in two weeks, other than a short expression of her regret that the mission had broken down. It wasn’t short, actually. She’d gone on for ten minutes. Everything was fine at home. Some of her new students had little sense and no ethics. “They’re studying law for all the wrong reasons.”

  He’d begun to wonder whether he should let her go. God knew when he’d get home, and it seemed unreasonable to keep her waiting all that time. His deepest fear, even more than losing her, was that she would come to resent him.

  On the other hand, where would she find somebody else like David Collingdale? It was a private joke he told himself. But there was some truth to it.

  Avery Whitlock’s Notebooks

  The mood on the ship has changed. It may be a momentary thing, but I doubt it.

  David Collingdale seems to be decent enough. He speaks kindly to everyone, and he apologized to us all for the delay involved in rescuing him from the al-Jahani. Still, we were quieter this evening than we have been at any time on the flight. The chemistry has changed in some subtle, or maybe not-so-subtle, way. The easy camaraderie of the past months is gone, as abruptly as though it had never existed. We are formal now, and tentative, watchful of what we say. And though it seems logical to conclude that with the passage of time the former atmosphere will return, I do not think it will happen.

  — September 18

  chapter 32

  Arlington, Virginia.

  Tuesday, September 23.

  SHE HATED THE chime that came in the middle of the night. Priscilla Hutchins was not a hands-on manager. Her technique was to frame the objectives, provide the resources, find the right people to get the job done, and stay out of the way. That meant that when a call came in at 3:00 A.M., whether it was personal or professional, it was inevitably bad news.

  She picked up the link and held it to her ear. Tor rolled over and looked at the time.

  “Hutch.” It was Debbie Willis, the Academy watch officer. “The engines went.”

  Damn. After the first incident back in June she’d been half-expecting it. But there’d been nothing she could do. Everything was just too far away. “Anybody hurt?” she asked.

  “No. They’re all okay.” She thought she heard a cry from Maureen’s room, but when she listened there was only silence.

  “Okay,” she said. “Julie and Digger have been informed?”

  “Yes. We have a transmission from Alexandra. You want me to relay it?”

  “Does it say she can effect repairs and get to Lookout before the cloud does?”

  “I haven’t looked at it. But Broadside reports they’re unable to proceed with the mission.”

  “Help on the way?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Deb. Forward the stuff from Alex.”

  Tor was watching her. “The al-Jahani?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry, babe.”

  “Me too.”

  She heard the sound again. Maureen having a bad dream, maybe.

  “I’ll get it,” said Tor.

  “No.” She headed for the door. “It’s okay.”

  While she sat with Maureen she heard Tor leave the bedroom and go downstairs. Nights like this, when he knew things weren’t going well for her, he got restless. When the child was quiet, she followed and found him dozing in his chair, a book open on his lap, the lamp on behind him. She put the book on the coffee table, turned off the light, and settled onto the sofa. “Nothing you could do,” he said, without opening his eyes.

  “I could have held them up another week. Completed the routine maintenance. They’d’ve found the problem if I’d done that.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Didn’t have a week to spare. But at least they’d have gotten there.”

  He made a noise deep in his throat. “You’re second-guessing yourself,” he said. “If you’d gone that route, and they’d gotten there too late to intervene, you’d have been blaming yourself for that. Should have taken a chance and let them go a week earlier.”

  “Well,” she said, “maybe the kite’ll work.”

  IN THE MORNING she sent off messages to Collingdale, to Vadim at Broadside, and to Digger. Collingdale had informed her of his intention to continue his journey on the Hawksbill. She wished him luck and told him she knew he would do what he could. She instructed Vadim to give priority to whatever requests might come in from the other two. If Digger could see any way to get the Goompahs to high ground, he was to proceed and damn the consequences.

  WHEN SHE GOT to the Academy in the morning, there was a message from Broadside, informing her that Jack’s body would be coming back on the Winckelmann. The Academy had a formatted letter to be sent out on such occasions to next of kin, but it seemed cold, so she settled in to write her own.

  She left word with Asquith’s secretary that she wanted to see the commissioner when he came in. When he hadn’t appeared by ten, she called him on his link. He discouraged that sort of behavior. Emergencies only, he insisted. He didn’t like to feel tied to the Academy, enjoyed telling others that he ran a shop in which it didn’t matter whether his subordinates could talk to him or not. It was the mark of a good manager that decisions were made and action taken even when he couldn’t be reached.

  On the other hand, if he got blindsided by somebody on Capitol Hill, he’d complain for days about his staff not keeping him informed.

  “Yes?” he demanded irritably.

  “I don’t know whether you’ve heard y
et or not. The al-Jahani blew its engines. It’s adrift.”

  There was a long pause, and she heard him sigh. “Any casualties?”

  “No.”

  “Well, thank God for that, at least. Whose fault is it?”

  “I don’t know. Probably mine.”

  “How’d it happen?”

  “It just went. We took a chance, and it didn’t work out.”

  “Okay. Look, relax. We’ll get through this.”

  AN HOUR LATER Eric was at her door. “We’ve got serious problems,” he said. “How am I supposed to explain this?”

  Eric Samuels was an imposing man, tall, well dressed, with an articulated voice that one instinctively trusted. Until it became clear that he lived in a world of images and mirrors. Perception is everything, he was fond of saying. In a glorious sally a few weeks earlier he’d told a group of particle physicists that the underlying lesson to be learned from quantum theory was that reality and image were identical. “If we don’t see it,” he’d said, “it’s not there.”

  “Explain what?” she asked.

  “The al-Jahani. What the hell else would I be talking about?” He looked frantic.

  “Sit, Eric,” she said.

  He stayed on his feet. “What do I tell them?”

  “You have a press conference today?”

  “I do now.” Eric was good with the media when things were going well. And that was usually the case at the Academy. Most problems and setbacks could be buried because the general public simply wasn’t that interested in the work the Academy did. A recent study by UNN had shown that 50 percent of Americans had no idea whether Alpha Centauri was a planet, a star, a constellation, or a country in west Asia.

  But the public loved the Goompahs.

  She broke out the decanter and offered him a glass. Eric was a straight arrow whom she had never known to touch alcohol on the job. But this would be an exception. Yes. Please. “The commissioner insisted we issue a statement,” he said. “Get out ahead of the curve. Make ourselves available.”