by Scott Mackay
Then the jet screamed by overhead, coming in from behind the hospital, the nose appearing, then the wings, then the tail, so close he saw each individual rivet. Was it coming in for an emergency landing? Where did the pilot think he was going to land? The jet skimmed the roofs of the medical buildings across the street. Everyone on the street looked up as the aircraft continued southward under the bizarre turquoise sky, none of its landing gear deployed. How did the pilot expect to land without wheels?
The jet slammed into Patterson Park. Its fuselage bent so that there was a kink in it, like a partially broken cigar. It was a big jet, of the airbus variety. The aircraft plowed through the trees, thrusting them aside. A huge tear opened in the new kink, passenger seats became detached, and the force of the crash flung people from the aircraft through this tear with a ferocity that made nausea rise in his throat. A moment later he felt the shock wave against the hospital. The aircraft skidded to a stop, its jet fuel got loose, and a moment later flames engulfed all of Patterson Park.
Ten kilometers in the distance, another plane came down. He squinted through the turquoise duskiness. From this far, the aircraft was nothing more than a small cross in the sky. As it careened in a slow and steady arc downward, its left wingtip nicked a roof, and it somersaulted like a ninja star through a residential neighborhood before disintegrating into a fireball farther west. Again he thought that none of this seemed right. Was he hallucinating? Being shown something by the Builders? Was this some kind of threat? Something that might at last prompt him to have a more cooperative attitude toward Jeffrey Ochoa?
A third plane, this one of the regional commuter variety, came down in front of him and skidded along Jefferson, the pavement shearing its underside as the friction threw up sparks.
He moved from the window as if in a daze, stunned by everything he had just seen, and horribly shocked that so many people seemed to have lost their lives outside in multiple plane crashes. Yet he still didn’t trust it. Was it a mirage? A figment of his sylvan fissure? It was all so bizarre. He looked up at the television. The screen was still a cascade of color. Through the tiny speaker he heard the oddest . . . music. And he recognized it, the same music from aboard his military evac spacecraft, with the odd two-to-one rhythm, and a sound not unlike a half dozen pianos playing all at once. The music moved him. Momentarily brought tears to his eyes. Was sad. But also strangely hopeful. The song seemed to be about life. As well as death.
He hobbled on his cane, opened the door, and peered outside.
The military police who guarded his special section were at the far end of the corridor, looking out the window at all the chaos outside. For the first time since his arrival he actually felt like a free citizen. Some nurses and doctors stood around the unit station looking at computer screens, which had the same fuzzy pattern as his television, while others were rushing to help in the chaos outside. He wasn’t sure what had happened, but was now fairly convinced, what with that music coming from the television, that it was indeed the Builders. Other patients farther down the wing beyond his special section, the majority of them much older, stood at their doors. He continued down the hall. At the unit station all the nurses and doctors continued to cluster around the three computers. On the nearest, he got a better look at the same cascade of color. He felt invisible. No one was paying any attention to him. The guards were still at the window with their backs turned. Then the nurse, Malka, spotted him.
At first the small blond woman’s face was blank with fear. Two seconds later, her manner changed. She came around the side of the unit station and gripped his arm.
‘‘Dr. Conrad, all patients are to remain in their rooms. Especially you. You know you’re a special case. You know that extremely elaborate arrangements have been made for you through the surgeon general’s office.’’
He didn’t bother asking her what was going on, because he already had a good idea. And he didn’t want to let on that he was getting his facility for speech back, because his apparent muteness was the only thing keeping Dr. Ochoa from filling him full of interrogation drugs. He turned around and shuffled back to his room. Malka quickly abandoned him, too concerned with what was happening at the unit station to bother with him long.
He kept going the other way, past his room, all the way to the opposite bank of elevators. He looked at the indicator lights. All three elevators were going up and down, up and down, none of them stopping at any of the floors.
The vent above was malfunctioning, blasting hot air, even though it was July.
He continued past the elevators to the common room. It was empty. One of the vending machines dispensed one chocolate bar after another— something seemed to be wrong with its internal computer.
The television in the corner showed the same abstract wash of light. He approached the screen. Within the kaleidoscope of spectra, he saw symbols, the same ones he had seen during his encounter with the Moon tower.
And oddly, they now made a mind-bending mathematical sense to him, as if the seeds of understanding planted when he was inside Alpha Vehicle, and perhaps by the energy cells on his trip back to Earth, had at last begun to bear fruit.
He went back to his room and saw the same symbols on his own TV.
He watched them for a long time.
Dr. Ochoa came a few hours later, and under his coppery mustache, Cam saw that his lips were set. Outside, sirens still blared from time to time. A few more jets had crashed in the vicinity. A steady stream of ambulances came and went from Johns Hopkins. Ochoa didn’t look too pleased. He came right up to Cam’s bed and peered at his patient with unrelenting scrutiny.
‘‘Did you know?’’
With no context, Cam wasn’t exactly sure what the doctor was talking about, but he could fairly guess that he was referring to the widespread catastrophe that was unfolding outside.
‘‘Was there no way you could have warned us?’’ pressed the doctor. He squared his shoulders, lifted his head, and looked out the window. ‘‘The president had some uncomfortable questions for me. And I kept telling him that you’re having a hard time speaking, and reminded him of what we’re seeing on your scan, that unidentified shadow near your sylvan fissure. I explained to him that the chemical thumbprint of this shadow is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before, and that we have to proceed cautiously because we’re dealing with an unknown entity. But of course the Oval Office wants results and they expect me to get them. You’ve regained movement. You can walk. I don’t know why you can’t talk.’’ He motioned out the window. ‘‘I don’t know why you can’t help us.’’
Cam lifted his hand and pointed to his mouth, then shook his head. ‘‘Talk . . . bit.’’
Ochoa contemplated him for several seconds. ‘‘They did this. You know they did. I might as well start by telling you that. Greenhow, before it was disabled, detected a wave emanating from the Moon, and was able to pinpoint the source of that wave— before the system went down, that is—to Crater Cavalet. Then twenty-three energy cells broke orbit and headed for Earth. It all happened a few moments after Dr. Tennant sent her information packet to NGC4945. We’re still trying to sort it all out, whether it was a deliberately aggressive act on the part of Alpha Vehicle, or if, as you so like to characterize things, it was inadvertent. But the upshot of it is, we’ve had a worldwide computer crash. Systems are off-line everywhere. Jets are falling from the sky. Stocks markets have lost billions. Troops have mobilized everywhere. One of the worst consequences was the Eas Tanura oil refinery in Saudi Arabia. It went up in flames due to a computerized pressure malfunction. PRNC missiles have armed themselves in their silos, and three of them have detonated onsite. Over ten thousand aircraft have gone down. Elevator accidents have happened all over the world. And again, we’re baffled by the enemy’s intent. What do they want? Have they told you?’’
Cam was horrified by all the havoc Ochoa was describing, and he was particularly disturbed by the plane crashes, and by all the innocent people who must have died
in them. But what also unsettled him was Ochoa’s apparent rush to judgment, and the way he characterized the Builders as the enemy even though he didn’t have any reasonable answer about what had happened.
Cam pointed to his mouth again. ‘‘Not . . . enemy.’’ Because it was becoming increasingly clear to him, through the new receptivity he was gaining, that the Builders viewed humanity neither as enemy nor friend, but simply as something that wasn’t part of the overall equation under which they operated.
In a rueful tone, Ochoa said, ‘‘I wish I could believe you, Dr. Conrad. But hundreds of thousands of people have lost their lives in this worldwide crash. And I’m sorry to say that we’ve lost contact with the Moon. We know you have a growing fondness for Dr. Weeks, and it’s our sincere wish that she’s okay.’’
Cam felt a stab of worry. As much as he believed everything was inadvertent on the part of the Builders, he would certainly hold them responsible if their action led to the loss of Lesha’s life.
‘‘Have they talked to you at all again?’’ asked Ochoa, his voice pinched, concerned. ‘‘Have they given you any more glimpses?’’
Cam fought the strange knee-jerk impulse to protect the Builders, and at last was able to tell Ochoa the truth. ‘‘Symbols.’’
‘‘Symbols?’’ Ochoa leaned closer. ‘‘What kind of symbols?’’
He tried to speak, but the words simply wouldn’t come, so Ochoa tried to fill it in as best he could. ‘‘They’ve shown you symbols.’’ Cam nodded. ‘‘Written symbols?’’ Cam shook his head, lifted his hand, raised one finger, two fingers, three fingers, counting. ‘‘Numbers?’’ ventured Ochoa. Cam nodded. ‘‘Mathematical symbols?’’ Another nod. Ochoa thought this through. ‘‘We’re trying to figure out why they’ve chosen you, and if you’re telling me they’ve shown you mathematical symbols, who better to understand them? You’re one of the country’s preeminent mathematicians and theoretical scientists.’’ Ochoa thought some more. ‘‘Where did they show you these symbols?’’
Cam motioned to the corner of the room.
Ochoa looked. ‘‘The television?’’
Cam nodded.
‘‘Can you remember any of them? Did any of them make sense to you?’’
He shook his head.
‘‘But you knew they were mathematical.’’
Cam felt his new intuitive sense and receptivity again. He nodded.
Ochoa considered. ‘‘I really don’t want to give you chemicals if I don’t have to, particularly because we’re dealing with some unknown thumbprints in your brain. The main thing is to get you speaking again so you can communicate with us, and I think the best approach to that is to bring in a speech therapist. Johns Hopkins offers the best speech therapists in the country. In fact, they pretty well have the best of everything, which is why we’ve chosen to put you here as a special inpatient. Starting tomorrow, we’re going to get you into some speech sessions.’’
After the speech therapist, Rhona Lindsay—a young woman with as much cheerfulness as any one man could reasonably be expected to take—had him go through various vowel sounds until his jaw ached, she at last felt the time was again ripe to try him with a sentence, even though the most perplexing thing happened whenever he tried to speak in a complete sentence. All the while he looked at her computer screen, which was now showing its regular icons. He missed the cascading colors. And the symbols. He thought of Pittman, the Moon, then Lesha, and worry invaded his soul. The Moon had lost its voice.
‘‘Let’s use a simple phrase now, and I want you to try to pronounce it as crisply as you can.’’ She gave him a grin. ‘‘And in English. ‘Father, I’d like to know more about our family.’ ’’
He got ready to say the phrase, but the same thing happened again—it came out in Latin. ‘‘Pater, velim cognoscere plura de familia nostra.’’
Why was this happening?
Rhona shook her head and smiled. ‘‘Try not to worry about it. The mind is a funny thing. And in your case, we really don’t know what’s going on anyway. My own hypothesis is that your academic studies are obviously surfacing. You did take Latin, didn’t you?’’
He nodded.
‘‘And the academic transcripts we now have say you were at the top of your class.’’
He nodded again. But university Latin was over twenty years ago, and he had forgotten most of it. So why was it surfacing now? All this about his sylvan fissure was really starting to worry him. He couldn’t get the simplest phrases of English out, but Latin came easily. Were the Builders, when they finally decided to say something comprehensible to him, going to speak Latin?
‘‘It’s all right. Let’s try another. ‘I have flowers in my garden.’ ’’
He was momentarily homesick for his house in Navasota, Texas, and hoped his house-help, Connie and Fernando, were making sure his flowers had plenty of water.
He tried the phrase. ‘‘Απoτελέσµατα αυαζητήσεως.’’
Rhona’s eyes widened. ‘‘What was that?’’
His worry intensified into perplexed alarm. ‘‘I think . . . Greek.’’
‘‘You know Greek?’’
He had the sensation that the floor was shifting beneath him. ‘‘No.’’
‘‘None at all?’’
‘‘The . . . usual . . . scientific . . .’’
That’s all he could get out in English.
After the session, back in his room, he brooded on the Greek for a long time.
Dr. Ochoa came an hour later, and was coolly practical, even though Cam could tell he was professionally excited. He tested Cam on several phrases, Rhona sitting by, and now, mercy of mercies, he often got them out in English. But sometimes they came out in Latin and sometimes in Greek. And a number of times he said them in French, Spanish, and Cantonese, languages he didn’t know at all. He was afraid. But also elated.
Dr. Ochoa noticed his elation and asked him to explain.
‘‘It’s as if I’ve . . . let go.’’
He tried to further define his explanation, but the words wouldn’t come. Ochoa theorized. ‘‘I can’t help thinking that it’s more than a coincidence that you’re now speaking several of the languages included in Dr. Tennant’s expanded communications packet.’’
Cam went cold. This was the first he’d heard about any expanded communications packet. Expanded from his originally proposed prime number sequence? He tried to voice his protest but the words again wouldn’t come.
Ochoa continued. ‘‘Have you ever wondered why Alpha Vehicle landed on the Moon in the first place, Dr. Conrad? And why it landed in Shenandoah, only a kilometer away from Gettysburg? If it was going to make Crater Cavalet its final operational base, why didn’t it go there first?’’ He gave him a glance. ‘‘Because you were there. That they’ve modified your sylvan fissure proves they’ve marked you in some way, and their choice of Gettysburg for their moonfall confirms it. Then you told me about these mathematical symbols they’ve shown you. Now you’re speaking Greek. And Cantonese. And Spanish and French. Languages you don’t know.’’
Later, Dr. Ochoa performed another CAT scan, and it showed further increased activity in his sylvan fissure. When he was done, he said, ‘‘I think you should prepare yourself, Dr. Conrad. I think they’re getting ready to tell you something. And I think it’s going to be big. Something you’re going to have to let the Orbops team know about right away.’’
13
‘‘You have a visitor,’’ said Malka, the nurse, later that evening, when Ochoa had gone.
The nurse left, and in a moment he saw his old astronomer friend from the University of Hawaii, Dr. Nolan Pratt, peering in at him from the door. He was happy to see Nolan, with his perpetual tan, wearing a dark blue blazer, light blue shirt, and white sailor pants. Hadn’t seen him in a while. His glasses were new, had horn-rimmed frames. His hair was scrupulously blow-dried, perhaps to hide what appeared to be increasing baldness. Hadn’t seen him in . . . four years? That i
nterdisciplinary convention in Boston, yes, that was it, drinks in the bar, always the Bailey’s and Kahlua for Nolan, while Cam preferred a glass of Chardonnay.
Nolan came in, hooking his thumb back toward the corridor. ‘‘You have the whole wing to yourself. Nice. But those guards are something else.’’
Cam was surprised to see Nolan in Baltimore. ‘‘You’re . . . here.’’ And it indeed needed explanation, because why had Nolan come all the way from Hawaii, especially when flights were so difficult to get post-Worldwide Crash?
‘‘They flew me over,’’ said Nolan, and came over to his bed. ‘‘How are you feeling?’’
‘‘Getting better. Tire easily.’’ He pointed to his mouth. ‘‘Speech.’’
‘‘Dr. Ochoa was saying.’’
Cam motioned at the chair. ‘‘Sit.’’
Nolan sat, his eyes now preoccupied, and rubbed his hands together. He glanced out the window, then at Cam’s cane, and finally at the pitcher of water on Cam’s bedside table. ‘‘Have they talked to you today? Blunt and the others? I was at the Pentagon this morning.’’
‘‘Ochoa . . . that’s all.’’ He pointed at his mouth again. ‘‘For speech.’’
‘‘Ah. Right. Your speech.’’
‘‘It’s better than it was.’’
‘‘General Blunt’s an interesting man.’’
‘‘We haven’t . . . met.’’
‘‘No, he said you hadn’t.’’ Nolan leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees, and rubbed his right fist in his left palm. ‘‘I think they might be coming to see you. The whole lot of them. Blunt. Oren Fye. Brian Goldvogel. I thought I’d give you a heads-up.’’
‘‘Good . . . good . . .’’ Because he now felt desperate to participate.
‘‘I thought I’d come here first. To explain some of my more recent findings. Because Blunt may report them with a certain coloration.’’
‘‘You have new findings?’’