Voyagers I

by Ben Bova

  “Or?” Borodinski asked.

  “Or we will blow the alien out of the sky with a hydrogen bomb missile, if necessary.”

  Borodinski felt a shock wave go through him.

  The General Secretary’s face was grave. “That is the one thing that the scientists don’t understand. This alien intruder might be hostile. We must be prepared to defend ourselves.”

  “But…it’s only one little ship.”

  “No, comrade.” The General Secretary shook his head. “It is only the first ship.”

  “Where?” Markov asked, blinking.

  “Kwajalein,” said Maria. “It’s an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, they told me.”

  “We’re being sent there? Why?” Markov glanced around the familiar surroundings of their living room: the bookcases, the comfortable chairs, the old brass reading lamp that he had rescued from his mother’s house, the sturdy tree just outside the window.

  “First, they send me to the research center out in the middle of the wilderness and now…where did you say it is?”

  “Kwajalein,” Maria repeated firmly. She was still in her uniform, but she held two big paper bags of groceries in her arms. She hadn’t even bothered to put them down before telling her husband the news.

  “No,” Markov protested, his head buzzing. He groped for one of the chairs and sank into it, leaving his wife standing there with the groceries. “I can’t go there. I’m not a traveler, Maria Kirtchatovska, you must make them understand that. I want to stay here, at home…”

  “Ha,” she said. It was not a laugh.

  He looked up at her.

  Stamping the snow off her boots as she walked, Maria headed for the kitchen.

  “You want to stay home,” she mimicked in a high, singsong voice. “You didn’t stay home last night. You weren’t even here when I left for the office this morning.”

  “I wasn’t on a tropical island, either,” he called after her.

  “Where were you?”

  “In my office. Working late. I slept on the couch there, rather than walking all the way back here through the snow. The buses stop running after midnight, you know.”

  “Sleeping on your couch,” Maria groused, from the kitchen. “With whom?”

  “With a volume of Armenian folk tales that I must translate before the end of the semester!” he snapped. “Your superiors demand weeks of my time, but they don’t hire anyone to do my work for me.”

  She came to the kitchen doorway, a small sack of onions in her hands. “You were with some slut all night. I phoned your office when I got home.”

  Markov made himself smile at her. “Really, Maria, you can’t trap me that easily. I was in the office all night. You did not phone.”

  She stared at him for a long moment.

  “I was really there, Maria,” he said. “Alone.”

  “You expect me to believe you?”

  “Of course. Have I ever lied to you, my dear?”

  Her face contorted into a frustration that went beyond words. She disappeared back into the kitchen. Markov could hear pantry doors opening, canned goods banging onto the shelves.

  She’ll break something, he thought.

  With a sigh, he got up from the chair and went to the kitchen.

  “Kwajalein?” he asked.

  She was on tiptoe, shoving jars of pickled beets into the cabinet over the gas range. Over her shoulder, she grunted, “Kwajalein. Yes.”

  “Here, let me.” He squeezed past her in the narrow space between the range and the refrigerator, and took a pair of cans to put away on the topmost shelves.

  “Not those!” Maria snatched the cans from him. “They go here.”

  He watched her put them where she wanted them, then accepted two other cans from her and stacked them neatly on the highest shelf, asking:

  “Why do I have to go to Kwajalein? Why can’t I stay here at home?”

  “Bulacheff specifically asked for you. The Academy is sending an elite team of scientists to join the Americans in studying the alien spaceship.”

  “Is Bulacheff going too?”

  “No.”

  “I thought not.”

  “But you are.”

  Markov leaned his lanky frame against the pantry doors. “But I have nothing to contribute to their studies! Haven’t we been through all this once already?”

  “The American astronaut, Stoner, will be there.”

  “Ah. My correspondent.”

  “Exactly. He knows you, by reputation. That is why Bulacheff picked you to join the others.”

  “I should never have written that book,” Markov muttered.

  “You are an internationally recognized expert in extraterrestrial languages…”

  “Which is to say, nothing,” he said.

  “And you will be a part of the Soviet team of scientists that is going to Kwajalein to work with the Americans in studying this alien visitor.”

  Markov shook his head sadly. “All I want, Maria, is to remain here in Moscow. At home. With you.”

  She eyed him suspiciously. “On that score, you can rest comfortably. I will be going to Kwajalein with you.”

  “You’re going!” He felt shocked.

  “Of course. You are far too important to be allowed outside the Soviet Union unprotected.”

  “Oh, come now, Maria,” he said, “are your superiors so frightened that I might defect to the West? I’m not a flighty ballet dancer, you know.”

  “It’s for your own safety.”

  “Of course.”

  “Of course!” she snapped. “Don’t you think I care about your safety?”

  He patted his shirt pockets, searching for a pack of cigarettes. “I think you care about the trouble it would make for you if I defected.”

  “And all you care about is finding some young slut to pursue!”

  He stood up straight. “Maria Kirtchatovska, I told you that I was alone in my office last night.”

  “Yes, you told me.”

  He pushed past her and went back to the living room. The cigarettes were on the table beside his favorite chair.

  “But you didn’t tell me,” Maria said, following him like a determined bulldog, “that your little cow-eyed student from the research center has followed you back to Moscow.”

  “What? Who are you talking about?”

  “That Vlasov bitch…the one you were sleeping with at the research center.”

  “Sonya?” Markov felt torn between joy and dread. “She’s in Moscow?”

  “Look at you!” Maria snarled. “You’re having an erection already!”

  He shook his head. “Maria, you don’t understand. She means nothing to me. She’s only a child. An overactive child.”

  “Who’ll pull her pants down anytime you ask her to,” Maria said.

  Sighing, Markov said, “Maria Kirtchatovska, you know me too well. I can’t resist. She throws herself at me. She’s lively, and rather good-looking.”

  And young, Maria added silently. She swung her gaze to the mirror on the wall across the room. She looked at herself: a small, heavy woman with a complexion like bread dough and the face of a potato. In her imagination she pictured her husband with the buxom young beauty she had seen in his bed.

  “You won’t have to resist her,” Maria said, her voice low, venomous. “She’ll never be at the university again. She’s on her way to a factory in the Ukraine, where she will study tractor repair.”

  Markov’s mouth sagged open. “What have you…?”

  “And you’re going to Kwajalein, with me,” Maria said.

  His face turned red. “Woman, you go too far!” he roared, lurching toward her, hand upraised to strike.

  But Maria held her ground. “You’re too late to do anything about it,” she said. “It’s already done. And you’re not going to be out of my sight for a minute, from now on.”

  Markov stood there, flushed, perspiration trickling down his neck and into his collar.

  “You
just…sent her away? Ruined her chance for a career in astronomy? Just like that?”

  Maria said nothing. She turned and walked slowly back to the kitchen, leaving Markov standing there in the middle of the living room, realizing for the first time the power that his wife held in her hands.

  * * *

  MARSHALL ISLANDS are the easternmost group of islands in Micronesia (q.v.) and the eastern district of the United States Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. Two of the atolls, Kwajalein and Eniwetok, were the scenes of heavy fighting during World War II. Later Bikini and Eniwetok became centres for atomic bomb experiments…The islands extend roughly from latitude 3° to 15° N. and from longitude 161° to 172° E. Their land area is 61 sq. mi. and the lagoon area is about 4500 sq. mi. A reef-enclosed lagoon 70 mi. long with an area of 840 sq. mi. makes Kwajalein the largest atoll in the world…

  Encyclopedia Brittanica

  1965 Edition

  * * *

  CHAPTER 19

  Keith Stoner sat in the hot, high sun and squinted out across the white sand beach. From here the atoll looked like a classic tropic paradise: graceful palms swaying in the sea breeze; breakers frosting white against the distant reef; the incredibly blue-green lagoon, calm and inviting; crystalline sky dotted with happy puffs of fat cumulus clouds riding the trade wind.

  All we need is a wahine in a grass skirt, he said to himself.

  But when he turned around and looked inward from the beach, he saw that the modern world had lain its unmistakable hand on Kwajalein. Squat gray cinder block buildings stood scant yards from the beach in a clearing that had been bulldozed where once there had been palms and plums and even an island variety of pine tree.

  Further along the narrow flat island was the airstrip, garages and maintenance buildings, machine shops clanging in the hot sunshine, jeeps and trucks buzzing along the only road—a crushed coral track that led from the docks at the northern end of the island to the living compound at the south.

  Above it all loomed the radio telescope antennas, six of them, a half-dozen huge dishes of metal and mesh that all pointed toward one invisible spot in the sky: the approaching spacecraft.

  “Beachcombing?”

  Stoner turned to see Jo Camerata walking toward him, shoeless in the sand, wearing cutoff jeans that showed her long legs well and a skimpy halter top. She was already tanned to a deep olive brown.

  In the few days since they had arrived on the island, Stoner had managed to avoid her. But you knew you’d have to see her sooner or later, he told himself.

  “Sort of,” he answered guardedly.

  She smiled. “You’re dressed for it, all right.”

  He was in an old pair of jogging shorts and a light shirt that hung loosely, unbuttoned, its sleeves rolled up above the elbow. The Navy’s repeated warnings about infection and jungle rot had convinced Stoner that he’d keep his socks and shoes on at all times.

  “How are you?” he asked.

  For a moment she didn’t reply. Then, “Do you really want to know, Keith?”

  He saw something unfathomable in those deep eyes of hers. “Big Mac treating you well?” he asked.

  Her mouth went tight.

  “You’re sleeping with him now,” Stoner said flatly. “Everybody knows it.”

  Nodding slowly, she said, “He treats me better than you did.”

  “Than I did?” He felt genuine surprise. “What’d I ever do to you?”

  “Nothing. Not a damned thing,” Jo said, her eyes blazing now. “You treated me like Kleenex: use it and throw it away.”

  “That’s not fair, goddammit!”

  “But it’s true, Keith.”

  “So you just walked off and attached yourself to McDermott. Got yourself a better deal.”

  “You’re damned right I did. And I got a better deal for you, too.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She started to reply, but instead turned her back to him. He grabbed her by the shoulder and spun her around to face him.

  “What’re you talking about?” he demanded. “What better deal?”

  He had thought she was crying, but she was dry-eyed, in full control of herself.

  “What better deal?” Jo repeated. “I left you alone so you could devote all your attention to your work. To your pictures of Jupiter and your computer runs. That’s all you ever wanted, wasn’t it? A few sanitary conveniences and no personal ties to bother you.”

  He took a staggering step backward, away from her. “Jesus Christ, you sound like Doris.”

  “Doris? Your ex-wife?”

  He nodded.

  Jo’s shoulders slumped. The fire disappeared from her eyes.

  “I didn’t walk out on you, Keith,” she said softly. “I was never part of your life. You never let me be part of you.”

  He turned away from her, scanned the horizon and the breakers along the reef, pulling his emotions back under control. Leave her alone, he told himself. She’s too young to get involved with you; you’re in no position to get involved with her.

  “Look, Jo,” he said, facing her again, “this is a damned small island and we’re going to see each other every day, just about. Let’s just call a truce and forget about what’s already happened. Okay?”

  “Sure,” she said, her voice strained. “Water under the bridge and all that.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay,” Jo said, lifting her chin to stand as tall as she could. “I was just taking a walk around the beach, to see what the place looks like. See you.”

  She strode off, leaving him standing there alone. With a shrug, Stoner started walking up the beach in the opposite direction.

  Only after several minutes had passed, and she had looked over her shoulder three times to make certain he wasn’t anywhere in sight, did Jo allow herself to cry.

  Stoner walked steadily up the beach, cursing himself for a fool but not knowing what else he could have done.

  He saw Jeff Thompson sitting on the sand, his back against the bole of a sturdy, slanting palm tree. Jeff scrambled to his feet as Stoner approached.

  “How do you like our tropical paradise?” Jeff asked, by way of greeting.

  “I was just thinking,” Stoner replied, burying his thoughts of Jo, “how many times I dreamed of coming to an island like this, when I was a kid.”

  “Well, here we are.”

  “Yeah. We sure are.” Stoner took a deep breath of salt air. “Your family decide to come with you?”

  “No,” Thompson said. “Gloria doesn’t want to pull the kids out of school. I agree with that. So I’m on my own for a couple of months.”

  “Maybe we’ll be back home before June.”

  “Fat chance.”

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “The Russian plane’s due in this afternoon.”

  “How many are they sending?”

  “About twenty, from what I hear. Where are they going to put everybody?”

  “Dorms. Houses. Trailers. We’ve got room for them, I think, unless they all want to stick together, by themselves.”

  “And there’s another couple of planeloads due in tomorrow,” Thompson added. “One from NATO and one from the UN that’s supposed to represent Third World scientists.”

  Scuffing at the sand under his shoes, Stoner grumbled, “This place isn’t a research station—it’s a damned political circus. Next thing you know they’ll be bringing in the Queen of England and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.”

  “Only on Sundays…”

  “ATTENTION. ATTENTION,” blared the island-spanning network of public address loudspeakers. Thompson and Stoner looked up at the horn set on the bole of the palm tree.

  “THE RUSSIAN DELEGATION IS NOW ESTIMATED TO ARRIVE AT SIXTEEN-THIRTY HOURS. ORIENTATION BRIEFING FOR THE RUSSIAN DELEGATION HAS BEEN RESCHEDULED TO TWENTY-ONE HUNDRED HOURS, AFTER THE EVENING MEAL.”

  The metallic, booming voice stopped as suddenly as it had started, making Stoner feel momentarily as if a ho
le had been left in the air around him. Then the breeze gusted and a gull screamed and the nearby palms sighed. The island went back to normal.

  “They’re late,” Thompson said.

  “They must be flying a Russian plane,” Stoner muttered, “with a dependable Soviet crew.”

  Markov studied the island intently as the plane circled at altitude.

  Maria was sitting on the aisle seat beside him, her hands clutching the armrests with white-knuckled anxiety. The flight had been far from restful. First, they had to circle a huge springtime storm over the Urals. Then they made an extra fueling stop near Lake Baykal—where they were coolly informed that one of the engines was malfunctioning and would have to be repaired or replaced.

  That did little to build one’s confidence for the long flight across the Pacific Ocean. Nor did the fact that they were kept locked inside the plane for six hours, with nothing to look at but the sight of Mongol mechanics peering puzzledly into the innards of the engine nacelle.

  But now at last they were circling over the tiny sliver of an island, with its black gouge of an airstrip, the way a dog circles his sleeping mat before finally settling down for a snooze.

  Markov paid scant attention to the glorious cloudscape that was turning the western horizon into a molten palette of reds and oranges. He studied the island.

  There wasn’t much to see. A cluster of buildings at one end. The airstrip. More buildings on the other side of the airstrip. A single road. Some radio telescope antennas.

  The other islands scattered along the oval-shaped coral reef seemed empty, abandoned. White beaches and lush green foliage. All of them tiny, barely a few city blocks long, Markov judged. The main island was bigger, but had been almost totally denuded of trees to make room for the buildings and the airstrip.

  He reached down under the seat for his satchel.

  “What are you doing?” Maria groused.

  “Looking for the binoculars.”

  “What do you expect to see? Dancing girls in grass skirts?”

  Markov sighed. He had given up that particular fantasy when the KGB briefing officer had informed them that the Americans had turned Kwajalein into a military base more than twenty years earlier.