The Forge of God

by Greg Bear

  "The aliens are doing a good job of that, certainly."

  "Right." McClennan stood again.

  "What are you going to do?"

  The ex-national security advisor stared blankly at the window. His look reminded Hicks of the expression on Mrs. Crockerman's face. Bleak, close to despair, beyond tears.

  "I'll work in the background to save his ass," McClennan said. "So will Rotterjack. Damn us all, we're dedicated to that man." He raised his fist. "By the time we're done, that son of a bitch Ormandy won't know what happened. He is going to be one dead albatross."

  28

  With three hours until his flight to Las Vegas, Arthur decided there would be time to take a taxi to Harry's house in the Cheviot Hills.

  The cab took him up the San Diego Freeway and through a brightly decorated but impoverished Los Angeles barrio.

  "D'ya hear what the President said, man?" the driver asked, glancing over the seat at Arthur.

  "Yes," Arthur said.

  "Isn't that something, what he said? Scared the piss out of me. Wonder how much of it is true, or whether, you know, he's gone off his nut."

  "I don't know," Arthur replied. He felt strangely exhilarated. Everything was coming into focus now. He could actually see the problem laid out before him as if on a road map. His weariness and resignation had vanished. Now he was enriched by a deep, convicted fury, his distance and objectivity scorched away. The air through the cab window was sweet and intoxicating.

  Lieutenant Colonel Albert Rogers finished listening to the recording of the broadcast and sat in the back of the trailer for several minutes, numb. He felt betrayed. What the President had said could not possibly be true. The men at the Furnace had not yet heard the speech, but there was no way he was going to keep it from them. How could he soften it for them?

  "The bastard's surrendered," he murmured. "He's just left us here."

  Rogers stood in the rear door of the trailer and looked at the cinder cone, dark and nondescript in the full morning light. "I can take a nuke right up inside that son of a bitch," he said quietly. "I can carry it in and stand over it until it goes off."

  Not without the President's authority.

  Actually, that wasn't entirely true.

  But the President wouldn't actually stop them from making an attempt to defend themselves . . . would he? He hadn't said as much. He had simply stated that he thought it unlikely . . . what were his words? Rogers returned to the TV monitor and ran the tape back. ". . . The time has come for us all to pray fervently for salvation, in whatever form it might come, whether we can expect it or not ..."

  What did that mean?

  And who would give Rogers his orders, the proper orders, now?

  "He's feeling weak today. The trip to Washington didn't help him any," Ithaca said, leading Arthur to the bedroom. Harry lay back on thick white pillows, eyes closed. He looked worse than when they had parted a week ago. His facial flesh was sallow and blotchy. His breathing was regular, but when he opened his eyes, they seemed washed out, unenthusiastic. He smiled at Arthur and grasped his hand firmly.

  "I'm going to resign," Harry said.

  Arthur started to protest, but Harry waved it off. "Not because of that speech. I'm not going to be much use. I'm still fighting, but . . . It's getting worse very fast. I'm on a short rope. I can't leave town anymore, and I'm going to be in a hospital all the time by next week. You don't need that kind of grief now."

  "I need you, Harry," Arthur said.

  "Yeah. God knows I'm sorry. I'd much rather be up and about. You have a tough fight now, Arthur. What are you going to do?"

  Arthur shook his head slowly. "McClennan and Rotterjack have resigned. The President hasn't given any orders to the task force."

  "He wouldn't dare disband the group now."

  "No, he'll keep us together, but I doubt he'll let us do anything. I talked to Hicks a few hours ago, and from what he says, Crockerman's even gone a step beyond Ormandy. Apocalypse. Get your papers in order. Here comes the auditor."

  "He can't be all that ..." Harry shook his head. "Can he?"

  "I haven't talked to him since we went into the Oval Office together. Now comes the media sideshow. We are going to be roasted alive over a slow fire. Since I have no specific orders, I'm going to check into the Furnace, and then go back to Oregon for a few days. Hide out."

  "What about the people in detention? Why are we holding them? They're healthy."

  "They're certainly no security risk," Arthur agreed.

  "We have the authority to let them go, don't we?"

  "We're still ranked just below the President. I'll call Fulton." He still held Harry's hand. He hadn't let it go since sitting on the bed. "You've got to win this one, Harry."

  "Feeling mortal yourself, huh?" Harry's face was serious. "You know, even Ithaca . . . She cries openly sometimes now. We cried together last night after she drove me back from the tests."

  "Nobody's giving up on you," Arthur said with surprising vehemence. "If your damned doctors can't . . . we'll find other doctors. I need you"

  "I feel like a real shit, letting you down," Harry said.

  "You know that's a—"

  "I mean it. I am very sick now. I don't feel it yet, but in a week or two they'll start other treatments, and I'll be a wreck. I won't be able to think straight. So let me tell you now. We have to start fighting back."

  "Fighting the Furnace, the Rock?"

  "They've got us confused. They've accomplished that much . . . whoever they are. Blowing up their emissaries. Jesus! What a masterstroke. Giving us two stories, then making both seem like lies. And we've been a real good audience. It's time to do what we can."

  "What is that?"

  "You haven't been thinking about it?"

  "All right," Arthur admitted. "I have."

  "You have to reestablish your channels of communication with the President. Encourage McClennan and Rotterjack to stay on. If that's out of the question—"

  "Too late now."

  "—Then talk to Schwartz. He knows damn well what the public reaction is going to be. Americans won't accept this easily."

  "I'd hate to see the polls as to how many people believe anything is happening."

  "Leadership," Harry said, his voice husky. "He has to assert his leadership. And we have to fight back."

  Arthur nodded abstractedly.

  "Killing Cook. Remember?"

  Arthur shook his head. "Only if they're not omnipotent."

  "If they are, why would they try to confuse us?" Harry asked, his face darkening. He gripped Arthur's hand more tightly. There was a time when Harry's grip could have ground knuckles. Now it was a steady, insistent pressure; no more. "They have to believe we can hurt them somehow."

  Arthur nodded. Another conclusion had occurred to him, however, and it frightened him. He could hardly put it into words, and he certainly would not reveal it to Harry now. Poke a stick in the ants' nest, he thought. Watch them scurry around. Learn about them. Then stomp the nest.

  "Have you thought about what will happen to me if you don't pull through?" Arthur asked.

  "You'll invite Ithaca up to Oregon, get her settled up there. Introduce her to friends. Find somebody promising who needs a good woman. Marry her off."

  "Christ," Arthur said, crying now.

  "See," Harry said, tears running down his own cheeks. "You really care."

  "You bastard."

  Harry rolled his head aside and pulled up a pillow cover to wipe his eyes. "I've never been jealous of you. I could go for years without seeing you, because I knew you'd be there. But Ithaca. He'd better be a damned good fellow, the one you introduce her to. If anybody's going to lie between her thighs but me, I’d better like him a hell of a lot."

  "Stop this."

  "All right. I'm tired. Can you stay around for dinner? I'm still able to eat. I won't be able to keep it down much after next week. The old-fashioned treatments."

  Arthur told him he had to catch a plane s
hortly. Dinner was out of the question.

  "Give me a call tomorrow, then," Harry said. "Keep me informed."

  "You bet."

  "And talk some more with Hicks. He could replace me.

  Arthur shook his head at the whole idea.

  "I don't want you to get the impression I've been pinned to the mat by this," Harry said. "I've been thinking crazy thoughts for days now. I'm going to write them down soon."

  "Crazy thoughts?" Arthur asked.

  "Putting it all in perspective. The aliens, my cancer, the Earth, everything."

  "That's a tall order."

  "You bet. Keeps my mind off the rest of this nonsense." He thumped his chest and abdomen with his hand. "Might even be useful, sometime ..."

  "I'd like to hear it," Arthur said.

  Harry nodded. "You will. But not now. It still hasn't jelled."

  29

  November 15

  The blue and white taxi roared and jerked along the winding road up the slope of the hill with frightful speed and efficiency. Samshow sat rigid in the back, leaning this way and that against the curves, wondering if he should have accepted the invitation when there was so much work to be done. Outside, night jungle rushed by, relieved by lighted entrances to private roads and ghostly houses floating out above the hillside. Below, visible occasionally through the trees, lay the bright spilled jewel box of Honolulu.

  Sand had told him there would be interesting people at the party. He had gone on ahead two hours before. The Glomar Discoverer had put in at Pearl Harbor that morning, and the invitation from Gina Fusetti had come by telephone at ten o'clock. Mrs. Fusetti, wife of University of Hawaii physics professor Nathan Fusetti, was known across the Pacific for her parties. "We can't turn this one down," Sand had said. "We need a few hours' rest, anyway."

  Samshow had reluctantly agreed.

  Fingers faltering through a palm full of dollar bills and change, he paid and tipped the driver and stepped back quickly to avoid a spray of gravel from the rear wheels. Then he turned and looked at a broad, split-level pseudo-Japanese house draped with hundreds of electric folding paper lanterns, its stone walkway flanked by carved lava tikis with candle-burning eyes.

  Even from where he stood, he could hear people talking—but no loud music, for which he was profoundly grateful.

  A tall young woman opened the door at his knock and smiled brightly. "Mom!" she called out. "Here's another. Who are you?"

  "Walt Samshow," he said. "Who are you?"

  "Tanya Fusetti. My parents . . . you know. I'm here with my boyfriend."

  "You must be Doctor Samshow!" Gina Fusetti stalked intently through the archway leading to the sunken dining room, rubbing her hands and smiling gleefully. In her late sixties, hair gone completely white, she regarded Samshow with smiling, squint-eyed worship, ushering him inside, equipping him with a beer (Asahi) and a paper plate of hors d'oeuvres (teriyaki tuna and raw vegetables). "We're very pleased to have so distinguished an author and scientist with us," Mrs. Fusetti said, smiling her thousand-watt smile. "Mr. Sand is in a back room with some friends ... He told us you'd be here."

  Sand came through a side door. "Walt, glad you've finally come. Something extraordinary—"

  "Ah, there he is!" She nodded at both of them, still smiling. "Such a pleasure to have men capable of saying something when they talk!" Another arriving guest drew her away. As she departed, she gave him an ushering wave of both hands—party, enjoy.

  "She's pretty extraordinary," Samshow said.

  "Acts like that with everybody. She's a charmer."

  "You've been to her parties before?"

  "I dated her older daughter once."

  "You never told me that."

  Sand shook his head and grinned. "Do you know Jeremy Kemp? He says he knows you."

  "We shared a cabin years ago, I think—some expedition ... no, it was during a seminar at Woods Hole. Kemp. Geophysicist, earthquakes, isn't he?"

  "Right." Sand pushed him forward. "We all have to talk. This is a real coincidence, his being here, our being here. And I sort of broke our rules. I brought up our sighting."

  "Oh?"

  "We've already sent our data to La Jolla," Sand said, by way of an excuse.

  Samshow was not completely mollified. Sand opened the door to a back bedroom. Kemp and two other men sat on chairs and on the bed's Polynesian print coverlet, beers and cocktails in hand. "Walt! Very good to see you again." Kemp stood, shifted his cocktail, and shook Samshow's hand firmly. Introductions were made and Samshow stood in a corner while Sand encouraged Kemp to explain his own scientific problem.

  "I'm in resources discovery for Asian Thermal, an energy consortium in Taiwan and Korea. We're keeping track of Chinese oil, for Beijing—it's official—and we're trying to chart the whole southwestern Pacific all the way south to the Philippines. Partly we chart through seismic events and analysis of the wave propagation through the deep crust. Now this is at least as proprietary as what you've told me . . . Understood?" He glanced conspiratorially at the door. Sand closed it and latched it.

  "My group has listening stations in the Philippines and the Aleutians. We're also tapped in to the U.S. Geological Survey Earthquake Information Center in Colorado and the Large-Aperture Seismic Array in Montana. We have an anomalous seismic event. We think it's a bad reading or a screwed interpretation. But maybe not. It's from the vicinity of the Ramapo Deep. We got it on the night of November first, Eastern Pacific Time."

  "The night of our skyfall," Samshow said.

  "Right. We place the time at about eight-twenty P.M. Right?"

  "That's our time, within ten minutes," Sand acknowledged.

  "Okay. Not an earthquake per se. Not a fault slide. More like a nuclear detonation—and yet, not. We get a PcP—reflection off the outer core—in Beijing and reflections from the P260P and P400P in Colorado, then we get P-prime-P-prime waves at the LASA in Montana. Not only that, but we get persistence in the high-frequency P-waves. No Love or Rayleigh surface waves, just body waves. No immediate shear waves. Just compression waves and lots of really unusual microseisms, like something burrowing. Right in the Ramapo Deep. What could that be?"

  Sand grinned like a small boy, mischievous. "Something that weighs perhaps a hundred million tons."

  "Right," Kemp said, mirroring his grin. "So let's talk crazy. Anything that masses in at ten to the eighth metric tons, strikes the ocean like a mountain. But all you get is a minor squall. So it didn't transfer much of its energy. Very small profile. Just shot right through, lost a tiny, tiny percentage of its velocity to the water, maybe some heat as well. Something less than a meter wide."

  "That's ridiculous," Samshow said.

  "Not at all. A plug of superdense matter, probably a black hole. Hitting the ocean nearby, falling to the bottom of the Ramapo Deep, voilà! Burrowing."

  "Incredible," Sand said, shaking his head, still grinning.

  "All right. We both have anomalies. My people have a nuclear event profile that isn't, and you have a jag." Kemp lifted his drink. "Here's to shared mysteries."

  Sand had his electronic notebook out and was busy entering figures. "A black hole that size would be a strong source of gamma rays, right?"

  "I don't know," Kemp said.

  Sand shrugged his shoulders. "But it's so dense and so small it falls directly to the center of the Earth. Actually, it bypasses the center because of Coriolis, and bounds up the other side. There's very little effective drag. It's just like passing through thin air."

  Kemp nodded.

  "When it reaches the core, it's traveling about ten kilometers per second. Can you imagine the shock wave coming off that thing? The whole Earth would ring like a bell—your microseisms. The heat released would be incredible. I don't know how to calculate that . . . We need somebody conversant in fluid dynamics. Its period— the time it takes to 'orbit' in its closed loop around the center of the Earth—would be about eighty, ninety minutes."

  "Wouldn't whatever sound
it makes get lost in background noise?" Samshow asked, feeling years out of date.

  "Oh, we're hearing it, all right," Kemp said. "Chattering like an imp. Can I borrow your notebook?"

  Somewhat reluctantly, Sand handed it to him. Kemp figured for a moment. "If we assume no frictional effects, it would come right up out of the antipodes of its entry point. But I don't know whether there would be drag— it's sucking in matter and releasing some of it as gamma rays, creating a plasma, or maybe it's . . . Hell, I don't know. Let's assume the core has very little drag effect on it. Maybe it doesn't break the surface ..."

  "But the shock wave does," Sand said.

  "Right. So we'd have tremendous effects in . . ." Kemp's brow furrowed.

  "South Atlantic Ocean," Samshow said. "Thirty south and forty west. About eleven hundred nautical miles east of Brazil, somewhere along the latitude of Pôrto Alegre."

  "Very good," Kemp said, his smile fixed now. "Some seismic events there, and then, it swings back to Ramapo eighty or ninety minutes later. And again and again, until its motion is damped by whatever drag it feels and it rests right in the center of the Earth. Do you realize what a black hole could do at the center of the Earth?"

  Samshow, suddenly troubled, stood and walked through an open sliding glass door to the veranda. He looked deep into the night jungle behind Mrs. Fusetti's house, quiet except for the noise of the party and the whirring of insects. "How in hell would something like this get to the Earth? Wouldn't our radar spot it, our satellites?"

  "I don't know," Kemp said.

  "There's definitely some correlation, Walt," Sand said. "Our gravimeters were working perfectly." He joined Samshow on the veranda.

  "The party's full of talk about the President's announcement," Kemp said, standing in the open doorway. "What I've been thinking ..."

  Sand's eyes widened. "Oh, Jesus," he said. "I hadn't even ..."

  "So?" Samshow asked.

  "Maybe it's not just a fantasy," Kemp said. "You have a jag we can't trace, a meteor strike you can't explain, and we have compression waves we can't explain. And the President has aliens."