Hennessy. The word came from one of those open and unmoving maws, like an echo from deep within a cave. But which? Hennessy, said another. And soon, they were all saying it, pressing closer and closer to him, and there was nothing that he could do to stop them. And then their fingers were sliding under his skin, threading through his bones, insinuating their way into him.
“Hennessy!” someone was yelling. “Hennessy!”
Something was grabbing him, shaking him. Hands. Someone was screaming, Hennessy realized, and then he realized that that somebody was him.
He lashed out and scrambled backward, out of the grip of whatever it was, until he struck a wall. It was only then that he was able to stop screaming and consider where he was. A normal room, in the DredgerCorp complex, in Chicxulub. There was his bed. It was his room. It was okay. He was back in the real world.
There was a man bent over near the bed. An ordinary-looking man wearing glasses.
“Jesus,” said the man. He was covering his nose. Blood was dripping through his fingers and onto the floor. “What did you do that for?”
Behind him, Hennessy saw, were two larger men. They looked like they might be brothers, or even twins. He’d seen all three lurking around at various times within the complex, but never was quite sure what they did.
“You want us to rough him up a bit?” said one of the larger men.
“Soften him up a little?” said the other, and smacked his fist into his palm.
“You know we can’t do that,” said the man with the glasses. “We’re just supposed to fetch him.”
“I’m sorry,” said Hennessy to the man with the glasses, confused by what they were saying. “I was having a bad dream.”
“Bad dreams seem to be going around lately. It must have been one hell of a bad one,” said the man with the glasses. He tilted his head back and moved his hand away. The bleeding seemed to have mostly stopped. He gave an experimental sniff.
“What are you doing here?” Hennessy asked.
“We were sent to get you,” said the man with the glasses. “Get dressed.”
Maybe I’m still dreaming, thought Hennessy. “Get me? For what?” he asked.
“You’re needed elsewhere. Just get dressed and come on. Or do you want me to let Tim and Tom work out some of their nervous energy on you?”
They took him down to the dock, Tim and Tom to either side of him, the man with the glasses leading the way. There was a large speedboat there, Dantec already inside it, seemingly at ease, sitting straight-backed, his arms crossed. Unlike him, Dantec didn’t have an escort. One of the vaguely military men from the freighter was standing with one foot on the dock, the other on the deck, ready to cast off.
“Where are you taking us?” Hennessy asked the man with the glasses.
He was still rubbing the bridge of his nose. “We were told to bring you to the boat. That’s all I know.”
“Get on,” said Tim, behind him.
“Or do you want us to put you on?” asked Tom.
Hennessy scrambled aboard, sat down next to Dantec. The soldier cast off, pushed away from the dock, and scrambled into the pilot’s seat. A moment later the engine was screaming and they were tearing across the dark water.
“Do you know what’s going on?” Hennessy asked Dantec over the roar.
Dantec gave him a hard, dead look. “We’ve been activated,” he said.
Activated? wondered Hennessy. What does that mean?
· · ·
With the wind and the spray of the water, Hennessy was soon freezing. His teeth were chattering by the time they arrived at the freighter. They climbed out and up the ladder to find Tanner waiting for them on deck.
“You made good time,” said Tanner to the motorboat pilot. “Well done, son.”
“Thank you, sir,” the man said.
Tanner turned to Hennessy and Dantec. “Well,” he said, “I bet you two are wondering what the hell is going on. Come onto the bridge and we’ll talk.”
After Tanner had finished explaining, Hennessy felt there was something wrong. Sure, he was excited to go down to the center of the crater, excited to find out what was there and see where it was from. It could, as Tanner said, be amazing, maybe even the first signs of intelligent extraterrestrial life. But maybe it was nothing, just an anomaly. He had to try not to get too excited.
Plus, something just didn’t add up. Certainly DredgerCorp wasn’t the only one to have detected the object. And even if they were, didn’t they have an obligation to report it? Didn’t they have to go through proper channels, consult with the Mexican government? Shouldn’t it be a joint project, something that DredgerCorp was in on but which the government controlled, instead of a hurried and sudden operation in the dead of night?
No, they were definitely up to no good, and in a way that might have serious consequences. Maybe he was a little naïve, maybe in the past he’d sometimes looked the other way when things were questionable, but he wasn’t that naïve. He knew that if anything went wrong, it wouldn’t be either Tanner or DredgerCorp that got stuck with the blame, but he and Dantec. DredgerCorp would cut them loose without a second thought.
He looked over to Dantec, who turned and met his gaze. He seemed as cool as ever, his gaze dead, his eyes predatory. He doesn’t care, Hennessy realized. He’ll do whatever he’s asked. So Hennessy took a deep breath and turned to Tanner.
“Why at night?” he asked.
“Why not?” said Tanner. “The F/Seven has lights. You’d have to use them anyway once you got far enough down, and would definitely have to use them once you started digging.”
“I don’t think that’s what he’s asking,” said Dantec coolly.
“No?” said Tanner. “What’s he asking, then?”
“If it’s legal.”
“Is that right?” said Tanner, turning to Hennessy. “Is that what you’re asking?”
Hennessy hesitated a moment, then nodded. “It just seems a little odd to me,” he said. “Isn’t all this, this whole crater, owned by Mexico? Wouldn’t it have been leased by a local retrieval organization? And what’s going on with the crew of this freighter? Are they military or not? If they are, why aren’t they wearing uniforms? Whose side are they on? If they’re not, then what the hell is going on?”
“You don’t need to think about that,” said Tanner. “I’m handling all the details. There’s no reason for you to worry.”
“But we’re the ones who will bear the brunt of it if things go wrong,” said Hennessy.
Tanner didn’t say anything.
“Aren’t I right?” asked Hennessy, appealing to Dantec. “Shouldn’t we be worried? Don’t you have a problem with this?”
Dantec said nothing.
Hennessy turned back to Tanner. “Shouldn’t I be worried?” he asked.
Tanner said, “I’ve already given you an answer.”
Hennessy sighed.
“Look,” said Tanner. “Don’t you want to be in on this? It could be extremely important, but that’s not to say there aren’t some risks. You have to decide for yourself, Hennessy. If you don’t want to go, you don’t have to go, but you have to decide right now.”
Hennessy hesitated a long time. Whatever this was, legal or not, it was big, important. He couldn’t trust Tanner, but then again, he couldn’t really trust anybody at DredgerCorp. He’d known that when he signed on. But he’d always managed to avoid getting into scrapes before. Whether what they were doing was legal or not, he told himself, he could make sure that his part in it was legal. Besides, if things got too bad, he could walk later. He’d go along with them, but he wouldn’t trust Tanner as far as he could throw him.
He finally nodded.
“Good,” said Tanner. “Off you go, then, the both of you.”
14
He’d never been inside the bathyscaphe at night before. The fluorescent lighting, with darkness all around, struck him at once as harsh and dirty, like the office of a deranged dentist. It cast both his fa
ce and Dantec’s in stark relief.
They strapped into their seats, Hennessy at the controls and in front, Dantec just behind and to his right, beside the ballast release. The hoist lifted them up and over the water. They hung there swaying for a moment and then, suddenly, were released.
They crashed into the water, and the darkness became even more total. Dantec flicked on the exterior lights, which dimmed the lights inside. Hennessy checked the controls. He put in his earpiece and adjusted the microphone so it wasn’t scraping against the side of his cheek. He ran the F/7 briefly forward and backward, turned on the drill, and watched it swirl. He checked the sonar signal. He checked the fathometer and had Dantec verify the porthole seals. Everything seemed to be in order.
“This is Plotkin,” Hennessy said, speaking his code name into the mic. “Are you there, dropship? Are you reading me?”
Tanner’s voice crackled to life in his ears. The man was there on the holoscreen as well, his image crisp, well defined. “Hearing and seeing you loud and clear,” Tanner said. “Everything a go?”
“Roger,” said Hennessy. Dantec confirmed.
“Proceed when ready, Plotkin,” said Tanner.
Hennessy stayed for a moment with his hands on the controls, then cut the vid link and dived.
Now it is just a matter of time, thought Hennessy, four or five hours. He leaned back and stretched. At first they went down slowly, then a little faster. He was careful to adjust. The air in the F/7 had grown thick and noticeably warmer. He had Dantec check the oxygen recirculator even though he knew it was just the climate system kicking in, that it was deathly cold outside.
There was, from time to time, the flash of a fish through their running lights, though as they descended farther and farther, this became more and more rare. Mostly it was just the two of them in the cramped vessel, breathing each other’s air, waiting, just waiting.
His head hurt. It seemed like it was always hurting these days. He turned slightly in his seat and cast a brief glance at Dantec, who was staring at him, with steady eyes.
“What is it?” asked Hennessy.
“What’s what?” asked Dantec.
Hennessy turned back. That guy’s enough to freak anyone out, he thought. It seemed to get even hotter. The air became even more oppressive and difficult to breathe.
Another hundred meters. He’d never considered how small it was inside the F/Seven. But now that they were descending and the instruments didn’t need much attention, that was all he could think about. He was sweating. It was really pouring off him, buckets of it. He felt as if he could drown in his own sweat.
He laughed.
“What?” asked Dantec.
He laughed again. He couldn’t help it; he knew it was absurd to think of drowning in your own sweat, but what if it happened? It was absurd, but all of this was absurd.
“Take a deep breath and get a hold of yourself,” said Dantec.
He knew Dantec was right. The last thing he wanted was to dissolve into hysteria here, in a craft hardly bigger than a winter coat, miles from help. No, he couldn’t do that, no. But then, there it came, another chuckle.
He heard Dantec’s seat belt click off and then suddenly the man was there beside him, leaning on the instrument panel, the bathyscaphe listing slightly for just a moment before correcting itself.
He chuckled again and Dantec reached out and clamped his hand around his throat. Suddenly he couldn’t breathe.
“Listen,” said Dantec. “We can do this two ways. We can do it with you alive or we can do it with you dead. It doesn’t matter to me which way we do it.”
He struggled, but Dantec was too strong. He had never felt anything like it, had never been so afraid. He was beginning to black out, red spots blotting out his vision. He kept gulping for air, but getting nothing.
Finally, when he was just on the verge of passing out, Dantec let go, gave him a long hard stare, and slowly returned to his seat as if nothing had happened. Hennessy sucked in air, panting, massaging his throat.
“All right now,” asked Dantec, his tone flat. Less a question than a command.
“Yes,” Hennessy said, and was surprised to find he did feel a little better, a little more in control of himself. Though his head now throbbed even worse than before.
Hennessy checked the controls. They were still on course. Had Dantec’s actions really been necessary? It was just a little giggle after all, nothing to get upset about. But Dantec had overreacted, had made a big thing of it. Someone could have gotten hurt. What had Tanner been thinking, confining Hennessy to this sinking coffin with a madman? Maybe Dantec was stronger, maybe Hennessy couldn’t do anything now, but let him get back on land and he’d know what to do. He’d file a formal complaint. He’d go to Tanner and tell him about Dantec’s behavior and demand the fellow’s dismissal. And if Tanner wasn’t willing to do anything, he’d go over his head. He’d keep filing complaints until he’d gone to the very top, to Lenny Small himself. Surely President Small was a reasonable man. And if even Mr. Small wouldn’t listen, then he’d show them all. He’d take a gun and he’d—
“A thousand meters,” said Dantec.
Hennessy started guiltily, the thoughts dissolving. “A thousand meters,” he repeated. He noticed a tremor in his own voice, but not too bad. Maybe Tanner wouldn’t notice. He put the vidlink through.
“Mothership,” he said. “Come in, mother.”
Tanner’s voice crackled in, weaker now. His image was present but less clear, eaten away at the edges.
“Here, F/Seven,” said Tanner. “Still reading you.”
“One thousand meters,” he said. “Seals good, instruments good, no problems to report.”
“Very good,” said Tanner. “Proceed.”
They kept descending. It seemed even slower than before.
“Everything okay at your end?” Hennessy asked Dantec.
“Fine,” said Dantec. “And for you?”
Hennessy nodded. When he did, it felt like his brain was rubbing up against the walls of his skull, getting slightly bruised.
“Is the oxygen okay?” he asked.
“You just asked if everything was okay and I already told you it was,” said Dantec. “Everything included the oxygen.”
“Oh,” said Hennessy. “Right.”
He was silent for a while, watching the water illuminated by their running lights. Nothing alive anymore, or if there was, he wasn’t seeing it. Floating through a dark, undifferentiated world. It was like his dream, he suddenly realized, which struck him as a very bad thing.
“I have a headache,” he said, as much to hear the sound of a voice as anything else.
Dantec said nothing.
“Do you have a headache, too?” asked Hennessy.
“As a matter of fact, I do,” Dantec said, turning to him. “I’ve had a headache for days now.”
“So have I,” said Hennessy.
Dantec just nodded. “Stop talking,” he said.
Hennessy nodded back. He sat there, staring out at the blank expanse surrounding them and their craft, listening to the creaking of the hull as the pressure increased. There was something else, some other sound he was hearing. What was it? Almost nothing at all, but it was there still, wasn’t it? Just loud enough to hear but not loud enough to interpret. What could it be?
“Do you hear something?” he asked Dantec.
“I told you to stop talking,” the other said.
Did that mean he heard it or not? Why couldn’t he just answer the goddamned question? He’d put it civilly enough, hadn’t he?
“Please,” said Hennessy, “I just need to know if you hear—”
Dantec reached out and cuffed him on the side of the head.
He doesn’t hear it, a part of Hennessy’s mind told him. If he heard it, he’d be wondering about it, too. Which means that either it’s something close to me, near the instrument panel or—
But the or, when he identified it, was too terrible to contemplate
. So he bent forward, tilting his right ear toward the panel, bringing it close to each instrument, listening. He kept expecting Dantec to ask him what he was doing, but the man didn’t say anything. Maybe he wasn’t looking at him or maybe he just didn’t care. But, in any case, there was nothing. The noise was still there, but it didn’t grow any louder.
Which meant, he realized, that the sound was in his head.
As soon as he thought this, the noise became many noises, and these quickly became whispering voices. What were they saying? He was afraid he knew. He tried not to pay any attention, tried not to listen and—
“Two thousand meters,” said Dantec.
Yes, thought Hennessy, pay attention to that, to your job. Don’t think about the voices in your head, do your job. Pull yourself together, man, last thing you need is—
“Did you hear me, Hennessy?” Dantec asked.
“I heard you,” said Hennessy, shaking his head. “Two thousand meters. I’ll contact Tanner.”
He called up the link. There was Tanner, very pixilated now. “Two thousand meters,” said Hennessy.
There was a wait of about three seconds before Tanner replied. “Repeat that,” said Tanner, only it came out as a burst of static and then “—peat that.”
“Two thousand meters,” said Hennessy again, slower this time.
“Roger,” said Tanner, after the delay. “Proceed.”
· · ·
Another thousand meters, thought Hennessy. Maybe even a little less. They were more than halfway there. Once they were all the way down, he could occupy himself with running the drill. He’d have something to focus on. Everything would be okay. All he had to do was make it that much farther. Then they could bore down straight to the object as quickly as possible. They’d do as Tanner had asked and take a small sample of it and get back up to the surface immediately. And then—if whatever it was was worth taking—it would be out of his hands. He’d fly back to the North American sector, go back to his life, putting all this out of his mind. If Tanner and DredgerCorp wanted to put together a full crew and excavate the object completely before other organizations got wind of it, that was their business: he’d be long out of it, long gone. If he thought about it that way, things weren’t so bad.
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