He had just tightened the flange bolts and was starting to reconnect the sensors, when a shadow darkened the open doorway of the shop. Solomon looked up as a figure that he hadn't heard approaching entered and stopped to look around casually. The man had dark hair, styled into a crest, that should have been showing some graying for his age—probably rejuvenated—and the kind of even, golden tan that you got in the classier gyms and spas—not blotchy from spending too long outside under the raw Martian sky. He was dressed in a dark suit that fluoresced silver ripples where it creased, and a gray turtleneck shirt. "Hi, kid," he greeted.
Solomon used a rag to wipe the worst of the grease from his hands and straightened up. "Can I help you?"
"So how's it going?"
The friendly approach, eh? Solomon maintained a neutral air, keeping his options open. "You mean the tractor? Nowhere till I'm done fixing it."
The man grunted approvingly. "Quick thinker. Got humor, too. You could go a long way."
"I plan to . . . when I'm ready. So what are you, some kind of headhunter? I didn't know they went looking for auto mechs. Something must have happened in this business lately that nobody told me about."
"Sorry, it's not your turn today. But yeah, I guess you could say we're sort of headhunting. Three days ago, a guy that we'd very much like to talk to was out at Wuhan in a car that came from this place. Kind of tall, wavy brown hair, lean, fit-looking . . . Also has a dog—kind of big, black with some light brown around the face. I was wondering if you'd seen him around, like when he was here to pick up the car. It's a business thing. Anything you've got would be worth something."
Whoever these people were, or why they were looking for the man with the dog, the message came through clearly that it was they who asked the questions. Solomon thought back, then shook his head. "Wish I could help. What kind of a car?"
"Kodiak, dark color—blue or black. The car had this place's name in chrome on the trunk."
"Yes, I know the car. It was rented out four or five days back. But it must have been my day off or something. I wasn't here when it went out." Solomon shook his head and shrugged. "That's all I can tell you."
The man seemed to accept it as a matter of routine. He produced a wallet from inside his jacket and extracted a calling card. His hands were strong but well manicured, with several rings that glittered expensively. The card bore the name Lee Mullen, described as a "Financial Expediter," along with a mail drop and net code. While Solomon was studying it, a twenty slid across on top. He hesitated, then took the bill and tucked it in his shirt pocket. "Everybody could use a little extra, huh?" Mullen said. "If you remember anything else, or if he shows up again, I'd appreciate a call. Like I said, it'll be worth your while."
"If I hear anything, you've got it."
"You could go a long way, kid," the man said again. Then he turned, and sauntered back toward the office.
4
In the center compartment immediately behind the driving cab of the Juggernaut, now in the final phase of being fitted out at Stony Flats, Kieran checked the pincer-shaped sutures that he had clamped along the gash on the back of Harry Quong's hand after cleaning it, then sprayed a fast-setting coagulant along the wound. Both would dry up and flake off when the healing was complete. Harry was the vehicle and equipment technician included in Walter Trevany's expedition out to Tharsis. He had hit his hand on a heat exchanger cooling fin when his foot slipped on a greasy stepping plate. Mahom had found Trevany the part he needed. The Juggernaut would be leaving first thing next morning.
"Is that comfortable?" Kieran asked. "I'll put a pad over to protect it while it's soft. After two days you won't need it."
"It feels fine, Doc." Harry watched as Kieran selected what he needed from the medical box opened on the table. "Is that what we're supposed to call you? Walter said you were a quick fix when Pierre had to drop out. Something about being a military medic once?"
"Not even that, to be honest, Harry," Kieran answered. "Back in my impetuous days of youth, I did a few years with an SAF regiment. It was part of the cross-training you got." Spaceborne Assault Forces were a breed of combat soldier that specialized in defending and penetrating all manner of vessels and structures in the face of problems peculiar to the space environment; also in making rapid descents and deployments from orbit. The term referred to a category of military competence rather than describing the armed services of any particular political or other entity. SAF units were formed by governments, commercial enterprises, and other organizations, and recruited by mercenary forces available for hire to anybody striving to enforce claims, seize opportunities, or simply protect themselves in the salmagundi of rivalries and alliances scattered across the Solar System.
Harry looked impressed. "Who were you with?"
"Oh, for the most part, a conglomerate effort in one of the Belt sectors that was organized against claim jumpers. Then some merc strikes to take out launch bases being set up on Ganymede. I'm not sure we were the good guys in that one, though. So these days I just work for me."
"Why did you do it?" Harry asked.
"To prove I was a tough kid, of course. That's when they know they've got you."
"In my book, that makes you all the more useful to have along. I hear this place can have its wild moments."
Kieran secured the edges of the pad with adhesive tape and looked up. "There. Try not to wave it about too much." As he began tidying up, he asked, out of curiosity, "What kind of biological research was Pierre involved in, that made him drop out?"
"Oh, nano stuff—pieces of molecules that come together inside body cells."
"What for?"
"Something to do with remote-controlling metabolic chemistry. You'd need to talk to Dennis and Jean when we get to Troy. They know more about it. Pierre was a friend of theirs." "Troy" was the name that Hamil had given to the base camp at Tharsis. Dennis Curry and Jean Graas, together as a couple by the sound of things, were geologists with the group that had remained at Troy with Hamil while Juanita and Harry came back to Lowell to meet Trevany and the others from Earth, and collect the Juggernaut. Harry examined the finished dressing on his hand and seemed satisfied. "So what should we call you?"
"Why not just `Kieran'?" Kieran suggested. "I also go by `Knight'—from the initials."
Harry considered the options. "Is it okay if I stick with `Doc' anyway?"
"It's fine by me—but you know it pushes one of Rudi's buttons."
"I know. That's why I like it."
Rudi Magelsberg was the group's scientific technician. He had greeted Trevany's announcement of the new addition to the team with reservations regarding Kieran's suitability for the job, although without going as far as open criticism. Kieran interpreted Harry's stance as a way of telling him that he had one solid supporter on board at least.
Feet sounded on the metal steps below the outer door of the side lock. It opened to admit Trevany, wearing a khaki bush shirt and tan jeans streaked and stained from the previous few days' work. He came through the open inner door and glanced at Harry's hand while Kieran stood up and moved to the galley sink to wash his hands. "I'm glad we didn't waste any time. You're earning your keep already," Trevany commented.
"I'll try not to lose anybody," Kieran promised.
"This guy's okay," Harry told Trevany. "It's not as if we're scheduling any transplants or heart surgery."
"How does the hand feel?" Trevany asked.
"Pretty good."
"Will you be able to work with it, do you think?"
"Sure, no problem."
"First Pierre, now this already. And we haven't even left yet." Trevany shook his head. "Don't tell me there's a jinx or something on this expedition."
"I didn't think scientists believed in jinxes," Kieran said, reaching for a towel.
"I didn't, once. Now I've seen too many strange things to scoff at anything. Who was it who said that a man can't begin to learn that which he thinks he already knows?"
"Epictetu
s, I think, wasn't it?"
"Hm. I do believe you're right." Trevany looked mildly surprised.
"Well, I've got a few things left to do," Harry said, getting up. "Thanks for patching me up, Doc . . . er, Knight. Let's hope that's about the worst you have to do, eh? Glad to have you aboard." He left the way Trevany had entered, closing the outer door behind him. The sounds of objects rattling and being put into drawers and closets came from the lab section behind the bunk area to the rear, where Juanita Anavarez, Trevany's Peruvian scientific partner, was inventorying instruments and equipment.
Kieran put the items he had been using back in the medical box. "So, Walter," he said as he closed and fastened the lid, "what's it all about? The expedition. I'm going to know in a matter of days anyway, and you've no idea what the curiosity is doing to my tranquility."
Trevany lowered himself onto one of the end seats and eased back to rest himself, his hands braced on the table. "Do you remember when you first came out here—when you were looking for leads on that woman, Elaine Corley? You were curious about Earth's ancient Technolithic culture."
"Right," Kieran said over his shoulder as he pushed the box back into its stowage space above the bench seat. "Whether their disappearance was connected with whatever happened on Mars."
"They're called that because of the huge stone edifices they built in places like the Middle East, northern India, Central and South America—with a technical skill that was lost. The constructions were all works of the same, or very closely related, people."
"So it wasn't the pharaohs who built the pyramids?" Kieran said. It wasn't the first time he'd heard the suggestion. "There was an old song that said it was the Irish, but I never really believed it." He sat down, interested now, at the other end of the table, facing Trevany.
"Oh, the pharaohs built some," Trevany replied. "The Sahure Pyramid, for example, dates from the Fifth Dynasty around 2450 B.C. It's a dilapidated ruin, with little to tell it apart from a mound of desert rubble—nothing like the Giza complex, built from blocks weighing tens, hundreds of tons in some cases, cut and laid with machine precision. You see what it means? The later Egyptians tried to copy structures that they found, which went back to far earlier than the Dynastic Period. But they didn't know how. The knowledge was gone."
"It's what a lot of the books still say, though, isn't it?" Kieran said.
"Ah, the tyranny of nineteenth-century English Egyptologists, reaching down through time." Trevany showed his teeth. "The Giza pyramids are supposedly from the Fourth Dynasty—the big one was allegedly put up by Khufu—Cheops—around 2550. Do you really think standards could have declined that much in so short a time?"
"Sounds pretty drastic, all right," Kieran agreed. "So why do you say `allegedly'? What are the reasons for believing it wasn't?"
"The whole case rests on one piece of evidence. You can judge for yourself how solid it is. Want to hear the story?"
Kieran made himself comfortable. "Sure, I never turn down a story."
"The Victorians figured life as a progression from primitive beginnings through steady improvement all the way to the ultimate expression of excellence in the form of eminent Victorians—which was obviously the purpose of the exercise," Trevany said. "That meant there couldn't have been any advanced cultures earlier—and especially not if they weren't white. Ergo, these structures we're talking about must have been built during the Dynastic Period."
"Even though the technology was obviously from a different time?"
Trevany waved a hand. "It doesn't matter. We're defending a dogma here. Did you think this was science or something? But they could never produce any actual evidence to prove it, which kind of embarrassed some people. According to the orthodox line, the pyramids were built as tombs, and only as tombs. Yet never once was a body or a mummy actually found in one—except for a few bones in the smaller Menkaure Pyramid that were later shown to be from the early Christian era. Intrusive burial of that kind was a fairly common practice. None of the burial treasures or artifacts that Egyptians reveled in, either. All completely bare. The official explanation has always attributed it to tomb robbers, at the latest around 2000 B.C. But again it was only an answer invented to fit the assumptions. And not a very credible one, really, when you take a hard look at it."
Trevany got up from the seat and selected a marker pen from the tray beneath a white board fixed to the wall above one end of the table—it seemed scientists became uncomfortable when they were not close to something to scribble on. He drew a triangle representing the cross section of a pyramid and then a passage descending from low on one face to a point deep in the bedrock below the center. While he was doing this, Juanita Anavarez came through from the lab at the rear holding a printed list in her hand, and stopped to listen. She was dark-skinned, with straight hair that she tried futilely to induce into waves, and large, brown, questioning eyes. Kieran had found her to be precise and businesslike in the way she went about her work.
Trevany went on, "The mystery begins in the ninth century A.D. A Muslim governor of Cairo organized a team of quarriers to tunnel into the north face of the Khufu Pyramid, telling them they'd find treasure."
"That's the big one, right?" Kieran said.
Trevany nodded, then added the letters DC to the passageway he had sketched. "As luck would have it, they joined up with the `descending corridor,' which had been known in Roman times but later forgotten. Their work dislodged a granite plug from the opening to another corridor ascending in the same general direction." He added this and denoted it with AC. "But there was a problem. The lower end was blocked by a series of solid granite plugs that had clearly been there since the time of construction, so they were forced to tunnel around to rejoin the ascending corridor higher up—through the softer limestone that the main structure was built from. But you see the point. They had to bypass an obstacle that had never before been breached! They continued up through a wider section called the Grand Gallery—which in itself presents enough engineering impossibilities—and reached the so-called King's Chamber, in the heart of the pyramid. They uncovered other corridors and chambers too, but the upshot was that they found absolutely nothing in them, apart from a granite coffer in the King's Chamber, which was later decided, on not very strong grounds, to be a sarcophagus." Trevany showed an empty hand. "So was the place emptied of all the treasures and things that were supposed to be there, as the Egyptologists claimed? But nobody had ever gotten past the granite plugs. Or was it more probable that it had been empty all along, since the time it was sealed?"
"Unless there was another way in," Kieran offered.
Trevany regarded him curiously for a second or two, as if weighing up something that might confuse the issue. "As a matter of fact, there was," he said finally. He drew in a narrow connection from a point farther down the descending corridor, rising to the base of the Grand Gallery, and labeled it WS. "It's called a well shaft for want of anything better—not discovered until the nineteenth century. It rises almost vertically a hundred-sixty feet through bedrock, and then more than twenty limestone courses of the pyramid itself. Yes, it's a bypass around the granite plugs. . . . But the upper end had been found before the connection to the descending corridor. It was choked with debris, sealed at the lower end, and only three feet across, with some awkward vertical sections. Is it really feasible that this could have been the way for getting out the treasures of Khufu, the greatest pharaoh of the magnificent Fourth Dynasty? Surely not things like the statues and shrines that were found filling the places that we know really were tombs—mostly in the Valley of the Kings. But nothing? None of the litter that robbers typically leave? Not a shard of a broken pot, not a scrap of cloth or a piece of a tool?" Trevany shook his head. "It's just not credible."
Figure 1
Juanita put in, "The Egyptians were lavish at decorating everything they did—with hieroglyphics, figures, inscriptions, ornamentation. But these structures are bare and built with precision. They suggest more, instr
uments or machines of some kind rather than monuments. It's incredibly difficult to get the face angles of a construction that big and massive sufficiently accurate for the apex to be over the center. But they did it exactly. The corners are square to within a few arc minutes. I could go on."
Kieran stared up at Trevany's drawing and reflected on what he had heard. "But you did say there's a piece of evidence that the orthodox case rests on," he said.
Trevany smiled thinly. "If you can call it that. In—" He looked at Juanita. "When did Davison find the first relieving chamber?"
"1765," she supplied.
Trevany turned back toward Kieran. "An Englishman. He found a chamber above the King's—apparently there to relieve and redirect stress from the overbearing structure. Again it was empty and bare."
"Advanced engineering," Juanita commented.
Trevany went on, "About seventy years later, another Englishman, Colonel Vyse, was ending a costly and fruitless archeological season, and getting a lot of flak from back home. He needed a major find to justify it all. And guess what."
Kieran smiled. "Don't tell me. Just too convenient?"
"You be the judge. He cut his way into four more relieving chambers above the one that Davison had found. . . . And there, and nowhere else in the entire Great Pyramid, were hieroglyphics claimed to be `quarry marks,' indicating Khufu to have been the builder. It was greeted as one of the greatest finds for years—exactly what the experts had been waiting for." Trevany gave Kieran a moment to think about it. "As you say, just too convenient, eh?"
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