The Hercules Text

by Jack McDevitt

  “We’ve got our sub back again,” Westbrook said. “What are you guys doing anyhow?”

  In fact, the submarine Westbrook referred to had been shadowing them since their arrival on station. The sub was the Novgorod, one of the older Tango diesels. The Soviets routinely followed intelligence research vessels and, in fact, could be expected to stay with them all the way back to Liverpool. But only the intelligence people knew the details of that; the division between the surveillance team and the shiphandling people was absolute. Even the ship’s captain had limited knowledge of the exact nature of Feldmann’s mission, though, of course, he could guess most of it.

  “What’s new about that?” asked Fine. “You’ve seen the sub before.”

  “I feel like I’m getting to know them personally.” He nodded across the other beam. In the bright moonlight, a couple of thousand yards out, the gray shark fin of a conning tower sliced through the calm water. It was turning in toward them while he watched, describing a wide arc.

  Feldmann’s bow lifted slightly, and Fine felt the surge of power in the bulkheads as the ship’s four GE turbines gathered steam. They began a sharp turn to port, away from the sub. Forward, he saw the captain emerge from his quarters and hurry up the ladder to the bridge.

  “Cat and mouse,” said Fine. “It happens sometimes.”

  The conning tower slid below the surface, leaving only a ripple.

  Fine went below. The spaces occupied by the intelligence group were located immediately behind the Combat Information Center. He punched the code into the serial lock, pushed the door open, and walked into a surprise.

  Usually, at the end of a watch, the atmosphere tended to become casual, but the half-dozen enlisted men in the listening post were hard at work over monitors and on-line secure circuits. The lieutenant whom Fine would relieve was conferring with his traffic analyst. “Rick,” he asked, looking round, “what’s going on up there?”

  “Tag with the Novgorod. The real question is what’s going on down here?”

  “The Soviets are putting everything they have into the water. Even the two Victors that’ve been in dock for the last month. Jesus, Rick, I’ve never seen anything like this.”

  They were his last words.

  The men on deck never saw the torpedo.

  At the Arena, the million-light-year-long radio signal was represented by a coterie of glowing winged dancers who floated across the theater’s center stage beneath a ringed world and a distant galaxy. In this version, the Althean signal was picked up on an old Zenith console receiver in a gas station in Tennessee. At first, of course, no one believed the broadcast. The sender spoke English in a sultry female voice, replied to questions, and made witty asides to the audience.

  “She has,” observed Leslie, “a more lively personality than our alien.”

  Things turned out satisfactorily, as they tend to in musicals.

  Harry was now reading regularly from the Althean binder, which Leslie kept supplied with fresh translations. She was getting better, but Harry still found most of it incomprehensible. On the evening they saw Signals, he came across a disquisition on the nature of aesthetics. But the only classes of objects considered were natural: sunsets and misted seas and flying beasts of undetermined type. (Yes, always the seas.) There was never a hint that the Altheans found any beauty in their own kind, either in their appearance or in the works of the mind.

  He wondered whether the authors of the Text would have attributed any such quality to their own effort.

  And if there was a single overriding image from the binder that he could not drive from his mind, it was that of the dark shores slipping silently past.

  MONITOR

  SOVIETS CLAIM SPY SHIP INSIDE TERRITORIAL WATERS

  Refused to Heed Warning? Hurley Blasts “Piracy”

  COAST GUARD SEIZES RUSSIAN TRAWLER OFF HATTERAS

  Deny Retaliation for Feldmann Attack

  SIX ALABAMA RESIDENTS ON FELDMANN

  Freeman Conducts Memorial Service in Chattanooga

  ANGRY MOB SURROUNDS TAIMANOV IN NEW YORK

  Soviets Charge Police Slow to Respond;

  8 Injured Outside U.N.

  THEATER ROUNDTABLE

  by

  Everett Greenly

  THE SIGNALS ARE MIXED. Signals, which opened last week at the Arena, has a lot of good music, some energetic dance routines, a fine cast, and good direction. Unfortunately, it’s not enough to save a script that gets mired almost immediately in sacrificing substance for cheap laughs. We’ve come to expect more from Adele Roberts, who, last season…

  CANCER CLAIMS 17-YEAR-OLD ATHLETE

  Mesa (Tribune News Service)—Brad Conroy, the young track star who, six months ago, seemed headed for the Olympics, died this morning of a rare and virulent form of leukemia…

  800 DEAD IN MISSILE ATTACK ON PASSENGER JET

  Arab Terrorists Demand Massive Prisoner Release “Or Ground-to-Air Assaults Will Continue”

  WSG&E MAY GO CHAPTER 11

  …The giant utility, whose stock lost 70 percent of its value during the March slide, is still in deep trouble. A projected new issue offering, which was to have helped meet long-term obligations due this month, had to be canceled. WSG&E is now seeking extensions from several worried creditors…

  RANDALL DENOUNCES RUSSIANS IN SENATE

  Arms Appropriations Bill Gets New Life

  17

  ADMIRAL JACOB MELROSE had gotten himself into a mortgage he couldn’t handle. He’d bought a modest estate in Fairfax County, using his life’s savings and the proceeds from some shrewd investments in a midwestern paper company to produce a substantial down payment. But it wasn’t working out, and he was going to have to sell. Tonight, knowing what was happening in the Atlantic, all he could think was that it probably didn’t really matter.

  He was in the White House Situation Room with eighteen very quiet men and women. The President was the last to enter. He closed the door behind him, exchanged worried glances with Max Gold, the secretary of state, and nodded to Melrose. The admiral pursed his lips, looked down at his boss, Rob Dailey, chief of naval operations, and took his position at the lectern.

  “Mr. President,” he said, “ladies and gentlemen. You’re aware of the sinking of the Feldmann on Tuesday night. You should also be aware that the ship was attacked during a general deployment of Soviet missile subs. Damned near everything the U.S.S.R. has is now at sea, headed toward precisely the stations we would expect if they were planning to initiate hostilities. Refitting and extensive maintenance programs for their combat aircraft have been curtailed. The number of Blackjacks they now have in the shop is a little more than a quarter the total we would expect to find. Missile launching sites have gone to an advanced state of readiness, and the Soviet army has been trying to move unobtrusively into forward positions along the West German frontier.” Melrose stepped away from the lectern and stared down at men and women whose features were familiar to the vast majority of Americans. Rich, powerful, and, for the most part, talented. They watched him now, fearful, hoping for the reassurance he was usually able to offer. But not tonight, he thought. And maybe never again. “I have to tell you,” he continued, “that all indications suggest the Soviet Union is about to launch a full-scale attack on the United States.”

  The President had known in general terms what was coming. The others had arrived only with the knowledge that Melrose appeared exclusively in times of perceived crisis. Harbison from Defense whitened so sharply that the admiral thought he was becoming ill. Mrs. Klinefelder from NSC drove a fingernail through her palm. There was also some profanity; but for the most part the President’s people waited patiently for the details.

  “Maybe it’s an exercise,” offered Al Snyder, the special assistant for foreign affairs.

  “Diplomatic traffic is heavy,” said Melrose. “Their merchant ships are being called home. Tactical aircraft are being moved to forward bases—”

  “For God’s sake!” Clive Melb
ourn, the President’s chief of staff, was hunched into a tight knot. “I thought we could read most of their diplomatic codes. Don’t we know what they’re saying?”

  “Yes,” replied the admiral. “We understand most low-level diplomatic and army systems. They give us information about personnel changes, maintenance requirements, that sort of thing. But they don’t have much to say about policy.”

  “Mel.” Patrick Maloney had been studiously jotting notes. “What else might they be doing? I mean, what other possibilities are there that might explain their actions?”

  Melrose studied the small group of men and women and concluded that most of them were genuinely frightened. That was good. “Mr. Maloney,” he said, “if you were on a dark street, and someone with a club was coming your way, I’m not sure there’d be a constructive purpose in looking for more than one explanation.”

  “When?” asked the President. “When will they attack?” His voice was hoarse.

  “They’ll be watching us for some indication that we know what’s going on. They undoubtedly believe we do. But they don’t know for sure. I would guess that if they see any move on our part to upgrade readiness, they would be severely tempted to launch immediately.”

  The air was still and tight. Gold lit a cigarette. Santanna from the CIA leaned back comfortably and crossed his legs. (Nothing ever flustered the director.)

  Hurley got to his feet. He’d had time, a couple of hours, to get ready for this, but he was still having trouble controlling his voice. “If things continue as they are,” he asked, “when will they reach their point of maximum advantage?”

  “The subs will be on station in about seventy-two hours. After that…” He shrugged.

  The President turned to Armand Sachs, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “How high can we go without alerting the Soviets?” he asked.

  “That’s hard to say, Mr. President—”

  “It’s easy to say!” Melrose broke in. “Any step you take will be seen in Moscow. Their communications intelligence and their satellites are too good for us to have any realistic chance of deceiving them.”

  Sachs glared at the admiral. “I don’t think it matters,” he said. “In fact, the worst thing we could do is to hide our knowledge of what’s going on. If we go to Yellow, they will sure as hell not try anything. They have no chance whatever of surviving unless they can achieve complete surprise. And the bastards know it!”

  “Mel,” Hurley asked, “why did they attack the Feldmann?”

  “I haven’t got a clue, Mr. President. I know the secretary of state spoke with the Soviet ambassador yesterday. If I may ask, what was his story this time?”

  Gold never lifted his eyes from the table. “The Russians claim the Feldmann was spying, and that it intruded into their coastal waters.”

  “That’s a goddam lie,” said Melrose. “They were a good fifty miles outside the limit. Matter of fact, the equipment’s not as effective if we get in too close.”

  “In any case,” said Gold, “that’s their story. But I don’t think I understand the President’s question. They sank the Feldmann to conceal their deployment, didn’t they? Am I missing something?”

  The admiral walked to the lectern at one end of the long room and pushed a button. A wall map of the Soviet Union lit up. “Calloway is posted off Vlad, and Huntington is down here at Camranh Bay. Neither ship was approached. But there were major sorties from those two sites as well. There’s no point in attacking only one ship.”

  “Moreover,” added the President, “they allowed Feldmann almost three hours of observation time before attacking her.

  They had to know it was too late.”

  “Yet they blasted the ship,” said Maloney. “Maybe frustration?”

  “I’ve had a lot of experience with the Soviets,” Gold said in his somewhat bloated manner. “It’s not hard to visualize a local commander taking advantage of a chance to ingratiate himself with his superiors.”

  Melrose weighed the suggestions. “Possibly a knee-jerk reaction,” he said. “That could be. But we know the commander at Murmansk pretty well. He would be unlikely to show initiative or to risk getting into trouble. I don’t know. Maybe we’re playing mind games. Or maybe we did get the sub commander mad. But that’s hard to buy, too. Soviet officers just don’t behave that way. That is, they do not act without specific orders.”

  “What,” asked the President, “has been the effect of the attack?”

  Patrick Maloney scratched himself and examined his knuckles. “Nothing.” he said. “It’s a pure blunder. All it really accomplishes is to warn us.”

  “Yes,” said Hurley. “It serves as an effective punctuation mark. I don’t think they were at all interested in trying to hide what they were doing. I wonder whether they weren’t trying to be sure they had our attention.”

  “Why?” asked Melrose.

  “I have an appointment this evening with Taimanov,” said Hurley. “Maybe we’ll get some answers then.”

  Harry was surprised to find Hakluyt waiting in his office when he returned from a late afternoon seminar on motivation. “I need help,” he said, after Harry’d hung up his jacket and dropped wearily into a chair. “I want to break into one of Gambini’s filing cabinets.”

  “The one with the DNA stuff? Cy, I can’t do that for you.”

  “Why not? Harry, Ed Gambini’s a fanatic. He’s got solutions locked up in there that researchers have been trying to find for sixty, seventy years. Listen, the crazy bastard told me he’d destroy everything if I made any effort to get it away from him. Does that sound rational to you?”

  Harry blew his nose, then put a eucalyptus lozenge in his mouth to try to get rid of a tickle in his throat.

  “What would you think of me, Carmichael, if I had a cure for your hay fever, and refused to give it to you?”

  Harry blew his nose again and smiled weakly.

  “And that’s only a runny nose, Harry. For God’s sake, suppose you had cancer!”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Show some guts.” Hakluyt hadn’t used that word in twenty years. “You’re the administrator of this place. You can get your hands on the key. Do it, and we’ll go over tonight, late, and get the stuff out.”

  Deep in Harry’s stomach, something ached. Was he getting an ulcer? Christ, why was it always up to him? These people around him—Gambini, Hakluyt, Wheeler, Leslie, Rimford—always seemed to know what was right. He’d seen no evidence of hesitation in any of them, save perhaps with Baines’s reluctance to destroy the Text. “No,” he said softly. “I can’t do that.”

  “Harry, please. It’s a security cabinet. I can’t get into it without your help.” Hakluyt extracted a black leather case from his pocket and held it out. “I can pay, Harry. I can pay with something you could never buy.”

  Harry looked suspiciously at Hakluyt, then at the case. Inside it, two vials, a bottle of alcohol, and a hypodermic needle lay on a red felt lining. “What is it?” he asked.

  “A young man’s eyes. I’m not sure what more.”

  Harry took a deep breath. “There are people whose eyes are much worse than mine. Give it to them.”

  “It wouldn’t work for them. It’s designed for you, Harry. You might as well use it; it’s no good to anyone else.”

  “How could that be?” Harry looked narrowly at the microbiologist. “You’re Adam Wallis!” he said. “The phony doctor.”

  “I needed a recent urinalysis, a blood analysis, a few other things. I apologize for that, but I wasn’t sure how you’d react.” He produced a cotton swab and saturated it with alcohol. “Roll up your sleeve, Harry,” he said.

  “You’re asking quite a lot in exchange for my being able to read the Post without my glasses. Cy, I think Ed Gambini is right! I think we’re talking about a time bomb, and I don’t want to be any part of turning it loose.”

  Hakluyt nodded. “Your sleeve, Harry. No obligation. I just want you to have a sense of what’s locked in that
cabinet. You have a son, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” Harry’s defenses went up.

  “His name’s Thomas.”

  “Yes.” Reluctantly, Harry bared his arm and felt the needle slide beneath the skin. “You’ll need a booster. Since I’m not licensed for this sort of work, I can’t arrange for anyone else to do it. I’ll come by your office Thursday afternoon.”

  “Why did you bring up Tommy?” Harry, sensing what was coming, had begun to perspire.

  “I understand the boy has diabetes.”

  “Yes.”

  “Harry, I can’t make any promises. Not at this stage. I know a little, but not enough. If I can get the disc away from Gambini, I might be able to do something.” The microbiologist rose from his chair like an avenging deity. “Get the cabinet open, Harry. For God’s sake, do it!”

  Taimanov refused the offer of a drink. “Mr. President,” he said, “I have been meeting with you and your predecessors for almost thirteen years. I must confess to a personal affinity for you: you are an honest man, insofar as persons in our profession are permitted to be honest. And I would like to believe that there is a bond of friendship between us.”

  Hurley, concealing his anger, acknowledged the compliment.

  “I must also say that, although many of these meetings have taken place under difficult circumstances, this is the first time I have spoken with a man in this office”—he paused and leveled a knife-edged gaze directly at the President—“under the imminent threat of war.”

  “Why?” asked Hurley. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Did I say you were honest?” asked Taimanov. “You are not being honest now. Tell me about your timetable for ORION.”

  “Six months to a year,” Hurley lied smoothly.

  “Mr. President, our sources indicate that it is quite close to going operational. Another shuttle flight, possibly two. And after that? We would be at your mercy, would we not?”

  “It’s a defensive weapon.”

  “So it is. And what would you say to us when you hold the gun to our heads and we are disarmed?”