by Morgan Rice
He went off to organize it, and Kevin could feel his excitement building.
“They’re actually going to open it,” he said with a grin. That was so cool.
“And we get to be a part of it,” Dr. Levin said.
“Will they need Kevin to be a part of the press conference?” Kevin’s mother asked.
“Probably,” Dr. Levin said. “He deserves to be, don’t you think?”
Kevin’s mother nodded. “He does. After all this, he does.”
***
The press room was a big conference room, obviously designed to hold large numbers of people. Even so, it felt cramped as Kevin entered it, so packed with reporters and researchers that it was almost impossible to squeeze through them all. A screen had been set up on the far wall, showing a white-walled laboratory, in which the capsule sat on a metal table, flanked by a trio of researchers. They wore white plastic suits that Kevin guessed were to stop them contaminating the capsule. They wore face masks too, and goggles.
At the front of the conference room, there was a long table with a variety of serious-looking men and women sitting behind it. Kevin recognized some of them from their expedition, and General Marquez was at the center of them all. Kevin, Dr. Levin, and Professor Brewster went up to join them.
“Thank you for coming, everyone,” Professor Brewster said. “As you probably know by now, we have recently returned from a scientific expedition into Colombia’s rainforest. During that expedition, we located the object that you can see.”
“What is it?” one reporter called out.
“Where did it come from?” another demanded.
Professor Brewster paused before he answered that. Kevin wondered what it must be like for him, having to say something that sounded impossible, even as he knew that it was true.
“We have reason to believe that this rock is a capsule sent by an alien civilization,” Professor Brewster said.
Gasps came from around the room, and all of the reporters started to ask questions at once. Professor Brewster raised his hands for silence.
“You will be aware by now that NASA has been receiving communications from an alien civilization,” he said. “These have been decoded by Kevin McKenzie, and based on them, we were able to locate this… object.”
He gestured to Kevin, and almost instantly, Kevin found himself blinded by the flashes of dozens of cameras.
“With the cooperation of the Colombian government, and an international team of scientists,” Professor Brewster went on, “we recovered the object and brought it here.”
He made it sound as if it had all been a lot more peaceful than it was, but Kevin guessed that was the story that they all wanted to tell, of working together and helping one another. It didn’t seem like a bad story, if it encouraged people to actually do it next time.
“We are going to perform preliminary tests on the object,” Professor Brewster said. “And, subject to the results, of course, we will open the capsule in line with the messages we have received.”
Again, a buzz of excitement ran through the room. One certainly ran through Kevin. All this talking was frustrating now. He wanted to get to the point where they actually opened up the capsule and saw what was inside. He tried to imagine what would be in there, but the truth was that it was impossible to imagine. There could be anything from information coded on a hidden supercomputer to vials of living material… anything.
“Kevin,” one of the reporters shouted. “What do you think all this will mean? Will you keep getting messages? What impact do you think it will have on humanity?”
“I don’t know,” Kevin answered. “I guess… I guess I’d like this to be kind of a new start for people. If we know that there are aliens out there, I guess we’ll have to think about who we are.”
There would be so many changes in the world, and the saddest part of it was that he probably wouldn’t be there to see most of them. Even that thought couldn’t push aside the excitement. He wanted to see what was inside the rock. He thought just about everyone did, by then.
“If there are no more questions,” Professor Brewster said, “we will commence the process of testing.”
He signaled to the scientists on the screen, who started to work with devices Kevin didn’t know the names of. Kevin found himself holding his breath while they did it.
“X ray seems inconclusive,” one of the scientists said. “It might be solid, but it’s hard to tell what a normal result should look like for an object like this.”
“Spectrometry suggests a composition consistent with a beyond Earth origin,” another said. “Similar to several meteorite compositions on our database.”
Kevin felt his hopes rise with that, while another ripple of noise went around the room. It seemed that the reporters there wanted to find out what was inside the capsule just as much as he did. Or almost as much, at least. Kevin couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to know as much as he did then.
“Given our preliminary data,” Professor Brewster asked the scientists on the screen, “is there any reason why we should not attempt to open the object?”
To Kevin, he sounded like he was trying to sound as calm and authoritative as possible. Kevin mostly just wished that they’d hurry up. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could sit there, waiting for them to do the one thing that they all knew they wanted to do.
“There are no obvious dangers,” the scientist on the other end of the video link said. “The structure of the rock appears sufficient to survive the process, and the appropriate safety precautions are in place.”
It sounded like a very long-winded way of saying that they could do it, to Kevin, but the main thing was that they were saying it.
“Very well,” Professor Brewster said. “Begin cutting into the object.”
He nodded to the scientists on the screen, and they went over to the rock, clamping it in place so that they could work on it. One came back with an electric saw that looked too big for one person to hold. It looked like the kind of thing that could cut through concrete or metal with ease.
Kevin half-expected it to bounce off the surface of the rock in spite of that. He thought that an alien capsule tough enough to make it all the way from the Trappist 1 system should be tough enough to stand up to a saw.
The saw bit into it, though, sparks and dust flying as it chewed through the rock.
“We’re getting some resistance,” one of the researchers said. “We might have to switch to a heavier blade.”
They kept going, first making an incision around the rock as if expecting it to fall open like an Easter egg the moment they did so, then plowing into it with the saw when that didn’t happen. They kept going until dust almost filled the screen, only clearing slowly, showing two halves of the capsule split neatly.
Kevin stared at that image, and he guessed that everyone else there and around the world was staring in that moment, trying to make sense of it. He looked at it until his eyes hurt, trying to pick out the details that would tell him what the aliens had sent to them. What was inside the capsule? What had been so important that they’d sent it light years away, to a completely different world?
He stared at it in hope first, then in disbelief.
What he was seeing simply didn’t make sense.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Around the room, Kevin could hear the murmuring of the scientists and the reporters as they started to realize the same thing Kevin did.
The inside of the “capsule” was just a solid, rocky surface. There was no hollow, no sign of any advanced technology. The rock that the scientists had just cut through was…
…well, it was a rock.
Instantly, there was uproar, as a hundred reporters shouted questions simultaneously. On the screen, the scientists were looking just as shocked, standing there as if they didn’t know what to do next.
“How would you like us to proceed, Professor Brewster?” one asked. “Professor Brewster?”
He didn’t answer. Fr
om what Kevin could see, he was too busy standing there red-faced, not knowing how to respond.
“Professor Brewster, what’s going on?” a journalist called out above the others.
“Is this some kind of joke?” another managed to shout.
“Why is this rock empty?” a third yelled.
Kevin could see Professor Brewster looking around as if there were someone who might have all the answers for him. He looked so embarrassed in that moment that Kevin actually felt sorry for him.
“I… I don’t…” Professor Brewster said. He shook his head. “I’m sorry, but there has been some kind of mistake…”
***
Kevin had never been as disappointed as he felt on the flight back to San Francisco with the others. They were going to head back to the institute, because they had equipment to take back, and because Professor Brewster had said something about wanting to do a proper debrief there. Right then, though, a part of Kevin just wanted to run home and hide.
He sat there, hoping for the sensation that would come before a signal, hoping that there would be some kind of answer, an explanation, but there was nothing. There hadn’t been for so long now it was hard to remember that the signals had been real, that they hadn’t just been a figment of his imagination. He huddled in on himself, not sure what to think, or what to do right then.
Perhaps it was the headphones, but no one bothered him there. His mother sat beside him on the plane. Everyone else seemed to keep their distance, even people like Phil, Ted, and Dr. Levin, as if someone had warned them against getting too close, telling them that it would hurt them now by association with Kevin’s failure.
It was his. He’d been the one to decode all the signals. He’d been the one to lead them to South America, and then to the spot where the meteorite lay in the small lake. Something had gone wrong somewhere, and Kevin couldn’t help feeling that he’d been the one to get it wrong.
“Don’t blame yourself,” his mother insisted, obviously guessing what Kevin was thinking about. “You couldn’t know it would turn out like this. Maybe we should all have been more careful about going along with it.”
That sounded as though his mother was blaming herself for ever taking Kevin to SETI in the first place. Maybe she was thinking that she should have been firmer about it.
“I don’t know what went wrong, Mom,” Kevin said. “I mean, I heard the signals. And we found the capsule right where they said it would be.”
“We found something,” his mother corrected him gently. “Maybe we were all so eager to find it that we assumed we knew what it would be. We all got ourselves convinced.”
Except that it had been Kevin who had convinced them, because he’d been the one hearing the signals. They were real. They’d come through the institute’s listening equipment. Everyone had heard them. If so, why hadn’t the capsule been where it should be?
“What will happen to the capsule now?” Kevin asked.
“I don’t know,” his mother said. “I think I saw them loading it onto the plane. I guess no one cares who owns it now that it’s just a rock. That doesn’t matter right now, though. The important thing is that we get you back safely.”
Something about the way she said that told Kevin that his mother was worried about being able to do it. She sounded as though she was expecting trouble, and Kevin couldn’t understand why.
He understood once they landed, though, stepping down from the plane and then out into the arrival lounge. Almost as soon as they did, a wall of voices hit him, camera flashes going off everywhere.
“Why did you do it, Kevin?” one reporter called out.
“Tell us all that it’s not a hoax!” a man near the back shouted.
“We believed in you!”
There were reporters there, but there were other people too, some with placards, some just shouting. None of them looked happy to see Kevin there. They mobbed around the scientists, pressing in as they started to unload their gear. The meteorite was in amongst it somewhere. Now that there was no sign of aliens, no one cared if they took it back to the NASA facility.
“Is it right that the public pays for all this when you are going off to Colombia to chase rocks?” one reporter called out. “Don’t you think that this is a waste of money that could be spent on schools or the military?”
People came forward, still shouting questions, and for a moment or two, Kevin found them pressing in on all sides. He lost sight of his mother in the crush, and then it was like he was drowning in the camera flashes, the questions coming so fast as to be almost deafening.
“Why did you lie, Kevin?”
“Was this just to get attention?”
“Was it all about your illness?”
Kevin kept his head down, not knowing what to say. He looked for a way through the mob, but everywhere he looked there were people looking at him with accusing expressions. Some grabbed for him; not the reporters, but they were happy enough to take pictures as the people with the signs did it.
“Fraud! Liar!”
Kevin huddled in further, and he felt as though at any minute he might fall to the ground under the weight of them all, pushed down by the sheer numbers of people around him. Another hand fastened onto him, but this one kept hold, pulling him through the crush. Kevin saw Ted there, pushing back anyone who got too close, his hand up to get in the way of the camera flashes.
“Keep moving!” he called out above the noise. “There’s a car waiting outside!”
Kevin did his best, not stopping as Ted carved a path through the reporters like someone pushing their way through deep snow. Kevin hurried to fit into that space before it closed up again, following as they fought their way forward, toward the airport’s main entrance.
“Out here!” Ted said, pointing to where a minivan stood waiting, Kevin’s mother and half a dozen scientists already inside. There was a brief moment of space there, and Kevin ran for the vehicle, jumping in beside his mother. She clung to him as if afraid that if she let go he would disappear. For once, Kevin didn’t complain.
Ted drove, fitting into a convoy of vehicles that felt as tense, in some ways, as the one through the rainforest had. Kevin saw cars drive up close, their windows rolling down to reveal more cameras, but Ted kept driving.
It seemed to take forever before they reached the NASA facility. The crowds that had surrounded it before were still there, but now they weren’t curious, they were angry. Kevin could hear them shouting as they drove in, and when Ted stopped in front of the doors to the institute, Kevin ran inside without hesitation. He didn’t even try to talk to them, to explain. He wasn’t sure that he had an explanation. Instead, Kevin just ran back to his room in the facility. He ignored his mother when she followed, sitting there hoping that somehow, some of it would make sense.
When it didn’t, he went to one of the recreation rooms and used a computer there to call the one person who might understand what was happening to him.
Luna looked worried when Kevin called, and Kevin could guess why.
“You saw the broadcast,” he said.
“I think everyone saw the broadcast,” Luna replied. “I don’t get it. I thought that there was supposed to be some special… I don’t know, alien stuff.”
“I thought so too,” Kevin said. “Now… I’m sure I got the signals right.”
“Don’t start that,” Luna said, in her firm voice. “Don’t start doubting all of this. I was there when you saw the numbers, remember? I know that this is real.”
It felt good to be believed, particularly by Luna. There was something reassuringly solid about Luna’s belief. It was the kind that people could have built on, unwavering and strong. Kevin needed that right then.
“You might not want to go back to your house right now,” Luna said. “You know how there have been reporters around it since this started?”
Kevin nodded.
“Well, now there are like twice as many, plus a bunch of other people who don’t look happy. It’s like a
mob or something.”
“It’s because I gave them a dream,” Kevin said. “And they think that I lied to them.”
“Well, they shouldn’t blame you,” Luna said. “I mean, I was watching that broadcast. That Professor Brewster himself said the rock was from outer space.”
That wasn’t enough, though, was it?
“I don’t think that will make things better,” Kevin said. “They’ll say it was just some random meteorite. There are plenty of those.”
In fact, he suspected that it would make things worse, because if there was one person who didn’t like being made to look stupid, it was…
“Kevin,” his mother called from the doorway. She was standing there with Phil. “You need to come with us. Professor Brewster wants to speak with you and me.”
Kevin swallowed, because that sounded far too much like when the principal wanted to talk to someone at school.
“Looks like I have to go,” Kevin said to Luna.
“Okay,” Luna replied. “Just remember, this isn’t your fault.”
Kevin tried to remember that as he made his way with his mother and Phil through the facility. Ordinarily the researcher might have joked around, but now he had a serious look, and barely said anything, just opening the doors ahead of them as he had to. When they got to Professor Brewster’s office, Phil didn’t say anything, just turned and left.
“What was that about?” Kevin asked his mother.
“I think a lot of people are hurt by how angry people are at them,” she said. “They all believed that they would find aliens and… they didn’t, Kevin.” She took his hand. “You’ve got to be prepared. I… I don’t think this will be good.”
They went into Professor Brewster’s office. He was waiting for them, sitting behind his desk, looking formal, even imposing. He didn’t say hello as they came in, just gestured for Kevin and his mother to sit down in two chairs in front of his desk.
“Kevin,” he said, “Ms. McKenzie, we need to talk.” He paused, looking at Kevin as if trying to see into him. “Kevin, I need to ask you, did you make all of this up?”