Richter 10

by Arthur C. Clarke

  Crane leaned his head back against the wall, the wail of sirens a ubiquitous reminder of their location. Yesterday he would have been horrified by Sumi’s suggestion, but that was yesterday. Before today. Before he’d discovered there was still something inside of him that wasn’t hollowed out.

  “So, when would we set all this up?” he asked.

  “Kate’s hearing?”

  “No,” he said, smiling at her. “Our wedding.”

  FPF DETENTION BUILDING #73—DENVER, COLORADO

  13 MARCH 2046, 10:45 A.M.

  Crane sat with Sumi on a hard bench outside the hearing room in the drab, colorless jailhouse, listening to Joey Panatopolous, Mr. Panatopolous’ grown son, getting excited in his aural.

  “Crane… it’s working. Do you hear me? It’s working!”

  “The generators are up?”

  “Up and running! We are running entirely on thermal power as of right now. The turbines are singing, the heat is channeling through the domes. We no longer need solid fuels or focus. Charlestown is now energy self-sufficient.”

  “The moon is feeding us,” Crane said. “It’s working with us, not against. You’ve done a great job, Joey. Your Dad would have been proud.”

  “I wish he could have been up here to see it.”

  “Yeah… me, too. He’s the only other man besides you who I would have trusted with tapping the core.”

  “He was my teacher.”

  “I know. My regards to everyone in Charlestown.” He began to sign off, then added, “Make this a citywide holiday. We have attained our independence today. Let’s celebrate it every year.”

  “Done,” Joey said. “Talk to you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow it is.” Crane looked at his pad, then said, “Off,” the line clearing, the comlink shutting down.

  Sumi wrapped her arms around him. “Good news?”

  He smiled at the love in her eyes. “We have successfully tapped the core and are using its power.”

  “I never doubted you’d succeed.”

  “You’ve never doubted anything I’ve said,” he returned, leaning down and kissing her on the end of her nose. “That’s why I always wanted you to work for me.”

  “That’s because you haven’t been wrong yet,” she said.

  “Just once,” he returned, feeling even the happiness of Charlestown’s good news drain out of him. “And now maybe twice.”

  “Don’t torture yourself,” she said, pointing a finger in his face. “You’ll get yourself all upset. And you do know that you’re doing the right thing.”

  He frowned. “Am I, Sumi? I trusted him and he abused my trust on all levels.”

  She shrugged. “You took his girlfriend away and he got jealous.”

  “Don’t make it sound that crass and petty. It’s not—”

  “You’re the one who’s reduced it to the level of who hurt whom.” She hugged him quickly, then cradled his face between her palms. “Crane, I love you, but you’re bullheaded and blind when you want to be. You preach tolerance, politeness, but you do the same thing everyone else does—you try and build some cumulative tally of pain and loss, then compete to see who got hurt more. You can’t base your relationship with the world on that.”

  “Sumi, I—”

  She put her finger over his lips. “Listen to me: No one is asking you to forgive Newcombe. Your pain scorecard is your own business. But, my God, Crane, that man’s been in solitary confinement for seventeen and a half years. What I’m asking you to do is realize that justice has been done and say so, then talk about the Dan Newcombe you knew before.”

  “He was a hell of a scientist.”

  She smiled at him. “Then tell them that. That’s all. Be bigger than your feelings. Tell the truth.”

  Crane nodded, enjoying her hug. He wondered how it was going inside right now. Burt was giving testimony. Others, mestizos, were walking up and down the hallway, waiting. From time to time they’d glance nervously at Crane, then look away when he’d catch them watching.

  It was so odd to see them, supporters, he supposed. They all desperately wanted Newcombe freed—but why? They were too young to know the man or care about him as a person. It was something else they wanted from him, something more fundamental.

  He realized it was unity they were after, a closed nurturing circle of beliefs and ideas, a well from which to drink. It’s what everyone wanted, really. It was what Charlestown was all about. And Newcombe was their elder statesman, just as Crane was Charlestown’s. The faucet through which the ideas poured.

  “Please tell me you haven’t testified yet,” came Kate Masters’ voice from down the hall. “Tell me I haven’t missed it.”

  Masters never so much walked as swept into a room. She was even able to make the drab hallway hers as she glided up to them, wearing diaphanous chiffon, not looking a day older than she had twenty years ago.

  “Hello, hello,” she said, kissing Crane on the cheek. “How’s the happy couple?”

  Sumi jumped up and hugged her. “We go next,” she said. “I’m glad you made it.”

  “Made it? This is the biggest thing I’ve ever put together.” Masters sat beside them, leaning out so she could speak with both. “Believe me, if this doesn’t go today, you may as well pack up your stuff and move to another country, cause things are getting rough out there. We’re looking at military and militia buildup on both sides of the border with New Cairo. This whole country could go.”

  “I’ve heard worse notions,” Crane said.

  “What’s with you?” Masters asked him.

  “He’s just grumpy, that’s all,” Sumi said. “He’s still having a problem with T-A-L-I-B.”

  “I can spell, dammit,” Crane said. “And we’re calling him Newcombe, remember?”

  Masters put her hand on his arm. “You’re not going to turn into a headjob on me, are you?”

  “Leave me alone, Kate.”

  “I will not. You have a responsibility to go in there and settle this issue before things get out of hand.”

  “Why? Why is it my responsibility?”

  “You already know the answer to that,” Masters said coldly, standing. “I’ll see you inside.” She stalked toward the hearing room.

  “Now you’ve got her all upset.” Sumi made a clucking noise of disapproval.

  “Do you ever do anything but negotiate?”

  “No. It’s my best skill.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Crane said, smiling. “Last night you showed me a few tricks.”

  “Stop,” she whispered, slapping his shoulder. “Someone might hear you.”

  The hearing room door swung open again, Burt Hill walking out, shoulders slumped, head down. Hill had agreed to testify from the start, and Crane, for his part, had refused to influence him in any way. The two had never discussed what they felt, what they would say.

  “Are you all right?” Crane asked as Sumi said, “What happened?”

  “I’m a damned fool, that’s what.”

  Crane grabbed his arm. “Burt….”

  “I was gonna burn him,” Hill said. “I was gonna burn him to the ground. Hell, I ain’t been half a man since he shot me. But… but I walked in that door….” Burt looked confused, hurt even.

  “What happened?” Sumi said loudly. “Burt, if—”

  Crane stopped her with a raised hand. He turned and nodded. It was coming.

  “I walked in there,” Hill said again, “and I… I saw him. Oh, God, it tore my heart out. It was Doc Dan, but it was… it was—oh, my.” He put a hand to his chest. “I’ve got to sit down.”

  The man collapsed onto the bench, staring at nothing, shaking his head. He took deep breaths.

  The door swung open and a veiled woman stuck her head into the hallway. “Lewis Crane,” she said, then motioned him in when he waved to her.

  “Will you be all right out here?” Sumi asked.

  Burt mumbled a “yes,” and Sumi and Crane entered the hearing room hand in hand.
/>   As many as fifty people stood in one end of the room. There was no seating. The crowd was a mixture of aging camheads and citizens of New Cairo. Camming was rapidly turning into a pastime for the middle-aged, chip technology far enough advanced that the younger generation found a raison d’etre within the confines of their own skulls. The tech kids who’d been raised on nothing but the pad were at the forefront of the giant Plug-in.

  Crane recognized Khadijah in the crowd of people wearing colorful robes, her stance straight and tall, fire in her eyes. On either side of her stood two young adults, Newcombe’s children, he supposed. Little Charlie flashed unbidden through his mind. He didn’t see Martin Aziz in the gallery. Intriguing.

  At the other end, the room was bisected by a yellow line over which no one crossed. There was a desk there, a simple gunmetal-gray plastic desk. A man in a dark suit sat behind it. He wore a red-and-white-checked ghutra on his head, the fashion of the clerical class. Behind him stood a Chinese, probably a representative of YOU-LI Corp. Beside the desk was a chair bolted to the floor.

  And then he saw Newcombe. Shackled to the wall. The man’s hair was bright white, his long beard also snow white. He was wan and emaciated, his eyes dark, empty. Four G surrounded him, as if he could possibly escape, their new black exos and menacing faceplates making them look like storybook monsters, trolls from under the bridge. Crane realized then that the G had lost a lot of personnel at the Imperial Valley Massacre, as it was now called, and probably felt as if they, too, had a personal stake in the hearing.

  “Dr.… Crane?” the man at the desk said, using a stylus as a pointer as he read directly from a screen on his desk.

  “I’m Crane.”

  “Step forward.”

  Crane complied, moving to stand before the desk, ready to be sworn in.

  “Are you a consumer?” the man asked.

  Crane nearly laughed. “Well, of course I am. Everyone is.”

  “Excellent,” the man said, nodding judiciously. “Please take a seat.”

  Crane sat. The man slid a pressure pad toward him on the desk. “This is the standard agreement,” he said, “stating that you came here of your own free will and that LOK-M-TITE Security Service, Inc., owns all intellectual property rights connected with this hearing and that you will not be reimbursed for this appearance. If you accept the agreement, press your thumb to the pad.”

  Crane did, then sat back. He turned to look at Newcombe again. It was hard to hate the pitiful, all-but-broken, man who was chained like an animal. Their gazes met. Held. He saw sorrow in those sunken eyes, but he saw something else, too. Despite the horror Newcombe’s life had become, his eyes still held pride.

  Crane looked at Sumi. She was nodding to him, but seemed worried, nervous.

  “The floor is yours, Dr. Crane,” the nameless man behind the desk said.

  Crane cleared his throat, having no idea of what he was going to say. His feelings were in turmoil. He opened his mouth and just let it out. “My wife… er, excuse me, Madame President Emeritus, reminded me before I came in here that all I had to do was tell the truth,” he said. “The question is: Whose truth? My truth? Or is there a greater truth beyond mine? I’m a man of science, like Dr. Newcombe was. We became men of science because we hate the burden of subjectivity. I’ve always tried to gear myself to the higher truth of science, the knowledge; but I fail. If you want to know my truth, I will tell you that I hate that man over there. I still can’t believe he violated me in so many ways. He took my dreams.”

  He shook his head. “That’s my subjective truth. But what’s my analytic truth? My analytic truth is that this is a man I once loved very much who made a mistake that led to tragic consequences. His mistake was that he traded gods, science for Allah, and hence, traded goals without knowing it. He is as much a manufactured product of his religion as I am of mine, and as much a victim of it. But this is not about victims. Everybody’s a victim. That’s what Kate Masters prompted me to remember. Before it’s done, we all lose everyone and everything that was ever important to us, and then we lose ourselves. We’ve got to get beyond our own victimhood and take the long view, the view to what we leave behind and what follows us.”

  He felt his voice rising on its own, realizing that this wasn’t about Newcombe, and Sumi already understood it. This was about Charlestown and the true art of community. “It’s so easy to justify committing violence and inflicting pain. It’s always the first, and most natural reaction. I must ask myself, what is the right thing to do?” Crane looked squarely at the man behind the desk. “May I ask the prisoner some questions?”

  The bureaucrat nodded.

  Crane stood and walked to Newcombe, the man’s face wrinkling into a posture of near amusement. “Have you paid society’s debt for the crimes you committed?”

  “The bill plus change,” Newcombe said immediately, imperious. Crane smiled when he realized the man’s body was broken but not his mind. He sounded sharp.

  “Did you intend to kill anyone when you went to the Imperial Valley Project that night?”

  “No.”

  “Are you remorseful for what occurred?”

  “I am remorseful for the loss of life. I always have been. That’s not the way.”

  “I agree. Are you a violent man by nature?”

  “I’m a scientist.”

  “Yes,” Crane said. “And a very good one, sir,” he added for the benefit of Mr. No Name.

  “Thank you,” Newcombe said. “You’re not bad yourself.”

  “Do you consider yourself civilized, Dr. Newcombe?”

  “The name is Talib, and yes, I consider myself civilized.”

  “Even after spending nearly a third of your life in jail?”

  “I’ve already answered your question.”

  Crane moved within inches of his face. “Do you accept responsibility for the death of my wife and my son?”

  “No,” Newcombe said, and his voice caught slightly. “The death of your wife and son was my punishment for everything else I’d done.”

  Crane backed away from him, a hand to his mouth. He’d been so caught up in his own pain and loss he’d never considered that Dan’s love for Lanie could have been as great as his own.

  He looked at the man, really looked at him, and saw a mirror of his own soul, his own feelings. They saw it in each other, Newcombe nodding acknowledgment of a great truth. Crane reeled, staggering back several paces.

  There was a commotion in the gallery. Khadijah was pushing her way through the spectators to get out of the room. She was followed quickly by his children.

  Crane swallowed hard and faced Newcombe again, the feelings charging through him, pulsing like pressure waves. “I think,” he said quietly, “that I can be man enough to set you free without forgiving you, and that you can achieve freedom without asking my forgiveness. And I think that’s what’s called civilization.”

  He turned and looked at Sumi. Tears were running down her cheeks.

  He looked at the bureaucrat at the desk. “Sir,” he said, in almost a whisper, “I believe we have come to a crossroads in society. Two great nations are grinding against each other, tearing at each other like the strike-slip fault that is ripping California apart. Mr. N… Talib is the pressure point on the plate, the bumper, that is keeping both societies from moving forward. Everything compresses on this point and if the pressure isn’t relieved, the fault will rupture completely, destroying much for no reason.”

  Crane looked down at the floor. “I’ve hated earthquakes all my life because of what they took from me and I’ve hated Mr. Talib for the same reason. What a stupid… stupid fool I’ve been.” He stared out at the gallery. “Hatred, I’ve realized, accomplishes nothing positive. It is only destructive. It is the active agency of fear. What does it get us? What good does it do us? I implore you to set this man free, no matter how much you may hate or fear him. Ease the pressure on the fault for the good of all. Talib is no danger to anyone, surely you can see that. He’
s merely a man who made a mistake, and that is all. Let him go home, and we’ll all put this behind us.”

  He walked immediately out the door without looking at Newcombe. The pain was still there, but more than anyone, he had always known that life was pain.

  In the hallway he shared a look with Newcombe’s wife, the woman hating him despite his positive testimony. Khadijah seemed a person of deep and abiding anger. Too bad. She turned abruptly and moved into the protective circle of the mestizos in the hall.

  He sat down beside Burt, the man taking one look at him and nodding. “You didn’t burn him either, did you?” Crane shook his head. “We’re both a couple of old fools, that’s what.”

  “Ah, what the hell,” Crane said, letting his head fall back against the beige metal wall. “Life goes on. You can’t live for hatred, not really live.”

  The door swung open, and Sumi came out, a huge smile on her face. “You did it!” she said, hurrying to him to throw her arms around him.

  Within a second, people exploded through the doorway, cheering, a confused Newcombe being swept along on a tide of love and support. Neither man looked directly at the other. Crane’s gut clenched when he saw the royal treatment Newcombe was getting, but it didn’t clench as much as it would have yesterday.

  And that was called progress.

  Chapter 22: Richter Ten

  THE FOUNDATION

  3 JUNE 2058, AROUND NOON

  Crane could pinpoint the time when he had known his life was over: the spring of 2055. One day he’d started going through storage cubes, dragging out all the testimonials and awards and service medals he’d received in over half a century of trying to slay the beast within. He’d framed the most significant honors and hung them on the walls of his office at the Foundation until there wasn’t any more wall space. And he’d looked at them, reflecting. It was then he knew he was living in the past, not the future. It was then that he began planning for today.