Not Alone

by Falconer, Craig A.

  “Is your show tonight going ahead?” the ACN interviewer asked, his back to the camera.

  “It has to,” Billy said. Unlike Godfrey, Billy had too much class to seek to make the tragedy about himself; that much was clear from his pained expression. “I’ve received messages from ticket-holders who have taken two days off work and travelled 400 miles because this was their closest show. What happened at Hemshaw is a tragedy, but the world keeps spinning.”

  The interviewer didn’t push him on this reasonable response. “And what about the pictures of Hans Kloster and Dan McCarthy?” he asked instead, changing tack. “What can we read into their presence?”

  Kendrick’s expression hardened. “Nothing. Dan McCarthy has done nothing wrong, if that’s what you’re getting at. Everything he’s said has been true, as the video of him finding the folder proved. Jordan’s demented mind probably saw Kloster and Dan as prophets, since Kloster located the spheres in the first place and Dan rediscovered their existence. That’s all you can read from it. Nothing else.”

  “Prophets of doom?” the interviewer asked.

  Billy almost smiled for the first time in the interview. “There’s no doom. I hope we can all pull together to make sure these are the last lives lost to irrational fear, because the Kerguelen sphere is an olive branch, not a smallpox blanket.”

  The term “smallpox blanket” had been thrown around by some commentators who worried that the alien materials inside the sphere might contain harmful viruses or bacteria to which humans had no natural immunity. Hans Kloster’s long but eventually successful fight against a rare wasting disease was held up as a cautionary tale, since Kloster was the only person known to have handled the sphere and survived the war. But Dan and most others had no doubt that the sphere and the plaques within it would be treated with the utmost care once discovered, so such concerns didn’t permeate deeply into the general public mood.

  “I used to think that guy was crazy,” Clark said as Billy’s interview ended.

  “Me, too,” Emma said.

  Dan didn’t say anything. He shared Billy’s hope that no more lives would be lost to fear, but he didn’t share his confidence. With something like this happening merely because Disclosure seemed imminent, Dan hated to think what might happen when the big capital-D actually came true.

  Christopher Jordan was insane, for sure, but so were plenty of others. So were some of the religious sects with biological and chemical weapons that made Jordan’s guns look like children’s toys.

  Dan recalled his exchange with Joe Crabbe on Focus 20/20, when Crabbe had lambasted him for pursuing “truth for its own sake, consequences be damned.”

  For the first time, Dan was having second thoughts.

  SUNDAY

  D minus 24

  Municipal Hall

  Miramar, Argentina

  On the same steps from which he had addressed local journalists 48 hours earlier, Juan Silva, head of the Miramar regional Coast Guard, stood now before a much larger media contingent.

  On behalf of the national government, he expressed his condolences to the victims of the Hemshaw tragedy. The incident had been treated respectfully by Argentine networks and blamed entirely on Christopher Jordan. Unbeknownst to Dan, his own image and the faces of the fallen victims had been pixelated beyond recognition in the short snippets of footage shown in Argentina, which included only Jordan’s initial speech and his sign-off.

  Much of Saturday’s news coverage in Argentina, like elsewhere in the world, had focused somewhat on the incriminating audio of Richard Walker ordering the bugging and largely on the absolving video of Dan finding the Kerguelen folder.

  Juan Silva, broad-shouldered and stone-faced, then segued into the main order of business. To the audible dissatisfaction of the journalists below, Juan announced that an American naval vessel had encroached into the restricted zone overnight during “ostensibly routine manoeuvres.”

  While stressing that the vessel encroached only partially and only momentarily, Juan made it clear that a close eye would be kept on all foreign vessels near Argentine waters and within the restricted zone in particular.

  There was little more to report, Juan insisted, with formal searching still due to begin later in the day. “The sphere will be found,” he promised, “and it will be opened.”

  Some journalists applauded this closing remark, full of hope that their nation would indeed soon recover the world-famous Kerguelen sphere.

  The more astute and experienced journalists in attendance, however, were more appreciative of the nuance of the entire announcement. By making such a statement via a Coast Guard rather than a high-ranking military or government official, the Argentine government were calling the Americans out without recklessly escalating the situation. But by announcing the American encroachment publicly at all, they were also showing their refusal to be pushed around and their willingness to conduct their business openly in front of a world that was highly suspicious of the American government’s motives, now more so than ever.

  Out at the seafront a few miles east of the Municipal Hall, people were already gathering for another day of sea-watching. More had turned out on Saturday than Friday; rather than fading with time, local interest had increased further with Friday night’s double revelation. It was too early in the day to accurately predict Sunday’s final turnout, but Juan’s confirmation that the official search would begin shortly was almost certain to draw by far the largest crowd yet.

  Even at this early hour Miramar looked like a postcard-perfect version of itself in its heyday, with the beach already filling up and even more opportunistic salesman hawking their goods. One had particular success with his “Ahora Ahora Ahora” T-shirts, a direct and hugely popular twist on the “Now Now Now” version worn by so many passersby.

  Like the persistent news crews who had barely left the Birchwood drive-in since the initial IDA leak, the people with their folding chairs lined up in the very front row along Miramar’s promenade wall had been present in their sought-after spots for a string of unbroken days and nights. Local café owners protected some of these spots during meal and bathroom breaks in exchange for their holders’ regular business. These front-row dwellers were the sea-watchers whose gut feelings had set in quickest.

  The rapid series of revelations during the week had seen hope turn to expectation, and Thursday’s post-letter air of excitement had since been consumed by an almost triumphant breeze of inevitability.

  Many of the children looking out to sea from atop their parents’ shoulders were too young to understand what was going on. Many of their parents held no pretence of knowing what might follow.

  One young father stepped fortuitously into the front row with a daughter of 4 or 5 years on his shoulders, invited forward by an elderly man who shifted his chair along to create the space. “Thank you, sir,” the young man said.

  The older man smiled warmly. “What is your name?” he asked the little girl.

  “Julia,” she said confidently.

  “Julia; a lovely name. I am Miguel.”

  “Hello, Miguel,” Julia said.

  “Fernando,” her father said, extending his hand.

  Miguel shook it. “A good name,” he smiled.

  “And a good day,” Fernando said, looking up at the sun.

  The old man joined him in surveying the sky. “Most certainly it is. I have been here for four days now, and this is the best of them.”

  “Why have you been here for four days?” Julia asked, in a similar tone to the one she had used to ask her father why they were coming back to the coast again after eight boring hours spent watching waves on Saturday.

  “Because there is a sphere in that ocean,” Miguel said gently, “and we are going to see it come out.”

  D minus 23

  Flight AEL-122

  Denver to Frankfurt

  Sunday morning and afternoon had been so hectic that Emma, typically a reluctant flier, felt relieved to finally settle in th
e comfort of her first-class seat for the flight to Europe.

  Huge traffic problems on the way to Denver caused most of the stress, with it looking likely for some time that they wouldn’t make it to the airport in time. They did — barely — only for relief to turn to frustration when their flight to Frankfurt was delayed for three hours.

  The first-class lounge at least gave Dan some privacy from the well-meaning but tiring tourists and businesspeople who begged him for photos and sometimes autographs. Emma assured him there would be no such delay in Frankfurt, where Timo Fiore was ready to meet them with his private jet for the final leg of their journey to his lakeside residence near Milan.

  Midway through the trying drive to Denver, Emma had endured an awkward twenty minutes in the car with Dan while Clark visited their father’s hospital to check in on him and give the staff new contact information since there would be no one at home for a week. Though Clark didn’t ask Dan if he wanted to go inside and Dan showed no sign of wishing to, Emma didn’t want to pry.

  Dan, alone in the back seat, cut himself off from the world by listening to something through his headphones and reading every word of the Milan guidebook Clark had bought for him the day before. He kept his headphones on when Clark returned to the car.

  Clark cracked his knuckles and grasped the wheel. “Okay,” he said to himself, setting off for Denver.

  “Does he know you’re going to Italy?” Emma asked.

  “My dad?”

  “Yeah.”

  Clark shook his head.

  “Does he know anything about the leak?”

  “He doesn’t know anything about anything,” Clark said. “He’s totally out of it.”

  “But Dan said he’s not in a coma.”

  “He’s not. He was, but he’s not. According to the doctors he was officially in a coma for eighteen days. Then they called it a vegetative state, and now he’s “minimally conscious”. Obviously they know what they’re talking about, but he doesn’t seem much different to me from last time I was home.”

  “When was that?”

  “Nine weeks ago. I’ve been doing three-month shifts in Iraq with three weeks at home in-between, but this is the second time in a row I’ve had to come back early.”

  “Why did you have to come home early last time?”

  “My dad,” Clark said, like he didn’t understand how Emma couldn’t work that out. “That time I was scared because we didn’t know if he’d make it, but this time I was just angry. Seriously… if I’d been sitting next to Dan when Richard Walker named him as the guy who made up a fake leak, I would have beaten the shit out of him. But by the time I got home I was more worried than angry, and then when he showed us that letter I realised that he actually had found something. Something real.”

  “Yeah,” Emma said. She didn’t know what else to say; this was already the most she’d ever gotten out of Clark.

  “But enough about me,” he said. As Emma prepared to answer whatever Clark was going to ask about her life, he instead reached out to turn the radio on. “Is that a banjo?” he asked, screwing up his face as the guy on the radio sang about old boots and stitches.

  “I think it’s a mandolin,” Emma said.

  Clark changed the station to live coverage of some sporting event Emma didn’t know or care about.

  When the radio cut to commercials, Emma couldn’t keep her thoughts to herself any longer. “How come no one talks about what happened to your dad?” she asked.

  Clark replied without blinking: “He doesn’t know how to process it.”

  “You mean Dan?”

  He nodded.

  Emma hesitated again before her next question. She looked at Clark, who was checking on the unusually silent Dan via the rearview mirror. “So what did happened?” she asked, eventually getting it out.

  “There was a crash,” Clark said. He inhaled sharply through his nose. “A bunch of asshole joyriders lost control of the car they’d stolen, mounted the pavement, and drove right into him. Massive injuries to his head and spine. There was a little kid on a bike who says my dad pushed her out of the car’s way and took the hit, but no one else saw it.”

  “She wouldn’t make that up,” Emma said.

  “I know, but it does kinda sound like one of those things people sometimes tell you to make you feel better. You know, the whole “he died a hero” type thing. Anyway, that was nine weeks ago. Nine weeks and two days.”

  “So he’s been on life support for nine weeks?” Emma asked. She didn’t know much about comas or minimal consciousness but still knew that nine weeks was a long time.

  Clark shook his head. “His heart and lungs work fine. The only physical help he really needs is a feeding tube. The doctors said he has a sleep cycle now. That was the main change since the last time I spoke to them.”

  “And what do they think about his chances of, you know…”

  “Everyone’s actually pretty positive now. At first I thought it might have been better if he hadn’t made it through the crash, because they were telling me he probably wouldn’t recover. I know that sounds bad, but I didn’t want the hope to kill Dan, too.”

  Emma didn’t say anything.

  “But then they started noticing progress. They told me that people with traumatic brain injuries can sometimes recover function after being vegetative for a year, so he’s already way ahead of that.”

  Emma didn’t push for what the doctors or Clark meant by “recover function.” He had told her enough for now.

  “Go on,” Clark suddenly said.

  “Go on what?”

  “Yes!” he yelled, knocking on the wheel four times with his knuckle and even taking Dan’s attention from his book.

  Emma heard the radio announcer say something about a touchdown. She looked at Clark smiling like he hadn’t just been talking about what he’d just been talking about.

  In a million years, she would never understand him.

  * * *

  Emma learned seconds before take-off that this was Dan’s first ever flight. The fact that he was intrigued and awed rather than scared helped settle her own nerves.

  Dan spoke confidently about how air travel had never been safer while Clark chimed in with his own observation that “the flying side of things” had been worked out a hundred years ago and that the real progress was being able to use the internet at 30,000 feet.

  As soon as the plane levelled out at its cruising altitude, Dan switched his earplugs for his headphones and told Emma and Clark that he was going to get some sleep. He had secured the window seat without argument, while Clark had insisted on the aisle for both the space to stretch his legs and the ability to make sure no “weirdos” could get too close to Emma or Dan.

  “Have you seen one of these things?” he asked Emma a little while later.

  Emma looked at the cover of the in-flight magazine in his hands and saw the main headline: “Say Hello To Funscreen!”

  “Those things are creepy,” she said.

  “Creepy? They’re great! I had one on my flight home and it got me a two-course meal and three beers, all free. At first I had to do the calibration thing to activate the movies and everything, but then it said that if I kept going and participated in a few tests I could get free stuff. It showed me trailers for new TV shows and movies so that the studios knew what worked and what didn’t. That’s what it said, anyway.”

  “That stuff wasn’t free,” Emma said. “It was your payment for taking part.”

  Clark shrugged. “Fine by me.”

  Emma asked to see the magazine then quickly read the article. It explained that from now on the entertainment features in economy class would require passengers to activate the Funscreen mounted to the seat in front. A simple graphic showed that the Funscreen would scan each passenger’s passport to confirm their age and sex, with the small print below stating that the system would then scan its extensive database for existing information on their interests as provided by Funscreen’s associat
ed partners. This enabled precisely targeted ads to play before and during in-flight entertainment content.

  Emma knew about the ad targeting, which had been Funscreen’s original function. She knew the company started out in the UK but suffered from a major backlash when William Godfrey’s predecessor trialled a scheme which made it compulsory for welfare claimants in certain areas to install a Funscreen in their home and view ad placements to “earn” their welfare payments. The Funscreen’s pinpoint eye-tracking cameras ensured that claimants couldn’t look away from their screen until permitted to do so, which understandably bred intense resentment and eventually led to organised non-participation.

  But from Clark’s comments, which were backed up by the article, it seemed to Emma that Funscreen had found a better and less controversial way to monetise their technology by essentially turning it into the ultimate tool for online focus groups. Just like ads could be perfectly targeted to individual consumers, movie studios and network commissioners could now get concrete data on how different demographics reacted to different shows. Such reactions were as concrete as could be; measured by eye movement, which pixels a viewer focused on for how long, when they laughed, and so on. It was the same tech she had read about before, more sensibly and less invasively applied.

  “Everything is free in first class anyway, though,” Clark said, fiddling with his standard entertainment console. “Right?”

  Emma nodded.

  “Sweet.”

  With Dan sleeping soundly, Emma leaned over him to look out of the window. She saw vast fields and few signs of life, like a map without writing.