CHAPTER 35
“Because I want to look at them myself,” Penny said. “That’s why.”
“We’ve had experts pore over these bottom scans,” Chiffrey said, “and it takes training to really understand what you see. Captain had a long go at them. Not a single feature of interest down there. Boresville. Nothing.”
“Nothing can be something,” she said, having learned that from spending years alone in the deep woods. “So, they’re where?”
“Okay, if you insist, the printouts are rolled up in the media lab. On top of the file cabinet.” He called after her as she went out the hatchway, “Won’t find a thing!”
After four straight hours she was beginning to accept he was right, when all at once she saw it. It was there all the time, staring right at her. She checked the other charts, and they fit together. Perfectly.
“Okay, now let him laugh,” she said out loud to no one but herself.
She looked at her watch, grabbed the charts, and dashed out.
One of the charts under her arm was flapping as she ran, and it dropped to the deck as she came around a bulkhead to almost run into Chiffrey.
“Whoa,” Chiffrey said, “You nearly made me road kill.”
His arm darted out like an eel and snatched the chart before it could blow away.
“I found something,” she said pointing to a section of the scan that at first had seemed to be only the quiet lines indicating a flat and featureless bottom.
“Excuse me, but I don’t see anything.”
“Here! Right in front of your cute little nose! See this little hop in the lines?”
“That’s just noise, static. You see those sometimes.”
“And here it is again on this scan. By themselves, yeah, they seem to be just noise, but if you put a few together they start to describe an arc.”
“As in Noah’s?”
“Circle! Part of a circle! You’re not that stupid. See, here on this one? And here it is again.”
As she unwound the fluttering rolls, they rattled in the wind like signal flags.
“Ah, okay, I see those two, and yes, there’s a third, perhaps. But I’m not sure—”
“Look! Right here. These three are eighteen kilometers away from this one. And again, it’s a section of a circle—an arc. And this time, it’s curving in a way that connects it to these two, following the same curve. See?
“Back toward the one on this next scan. Hmm, yeah.”
Penny nodded, several times. “The pattern holds true on every scan I checked, for a little over half of a circle. Forty-two points all on the same curve! And it’s a geometrically perfect arc. Can’t be a coincidence. They didn’t scan the area that would have contained the rest of it.” She rattled the papers a little under Chiffrey’s nose. “I thought you said they did a thorough job?”
“They did. The sections you’re looking at are on the edge of where we searched, twenty kilometers away from the event, as far as anyone could tell. Had to stop somewhere.” He started to laugh and shook his head. “You can’t see what you’re not looking for. Brilliant work, Penny.”
After carefully scrutinizing all the sheets for a while, Chiffrey looked up and said, “I’d like to see it all put together, but I got a feeling you’re right. There is something here. You know, sugar, I can get you a damn interesting job after this.”
She shook her head. “Not the time for headhunting, Lieutenant.”
“Later, then. And you say they all line up this way?”
“I laid out as many as I could in the chart room. On every one that covers an area where there should be an arc, there is one, if you look. Examining one at a time, you don’t see it.”
“I’m going to contact the people who did the scanning runs and have them check the area where the circle sections are missing. We’ll recheck the ones they’ve already done as well, as a test.”
“The circle’s center is a good ten kilometers from the original Honey Pot sighting. They could have gotten the location wrong.”
“I doubt it. The Honey Pot had an up-to-date satellite navigation system, and it kept an automatic log of their location. Safety feature. We arrived at an exact fix by comparing their camcorder’s time signature with their navigation clock. It’s accurate to within a few meters. So this makes the circle about, ah—”
“Twenty-three kilometers in diameter,” Penny said, “maybe a little more. That’s assuming the pattern continues, but my bet is that it does. Any idea what could cause a pattern like this?”
“No,” Chiffrey said, “but hopefully someone will. I’d still like to see what they come up with when they scan the missing section. That would clinch it. But I’m wondering if it isn’t…hmm…”
“Some kind of interference field, right? Maybe similar to what messed up your radar? And we would all like to know what’s in the center. Not thinking of ditching your new partners now, are you?”
“Why would I? You’re our ace in the hole. The important thing is that we finally know where we’re going.”
“Not really.”
“I just meant a destination, not an answer, but truth to tell, got a feeling there’ll be good fishing ahead. Let’s talk to the Captain.”
Far From The Sea We Know Page 35