Footfall

by Larry Niven

  "Did you have more to tell?"

  "Yes. One time we have foolish entertainment given by television. Imaginary fithp from another star come to Winterhome, rob oceans of water for their own planet. No sense. Why not go to Saturn, the ringed gas giant for water, where it is already frozen to be moved with ease, where are no human fithp to shoot back?

  "The tale sounds foolish enough, but—"

  "Traveler Fithp are no smarter. Message Bearer is fithp home for eight-squared years or more. Supplied again at Saturn. Could last forever. Why you need to smash Winterhome?"

  "That is in my thuktun, not yours. Do you know or guess who killed my Advisor?"

  "Many fithp, not one. No fi' does things alone."

  This insight was hardly worth the mentioning, save for one thing. The Herdmaster had asked around. Dissidents, warriors returned from Winterhome, mated and unmated females, juveniles: nobody knew anything. It seemed impossible . . . and even Dawson thought so. "You speak well. More?"

  The human's shoulders moved. "Not fufisthengalssthp, for Fathisteh-tulk must have been of that fithp. Not human, for he wanted to leave Winterhome unhurt. Did he offend Fistarteh-thuktun? Do fithp kill for what they believe?"

  "We do. Why do you suspect Fistarteh-thuktun?"

  "I do not. The warmakers, they killed the Herdmaster's Advisor. Are they many? Can you choose one who is nearest to becoming rogue? Smashing Winterhome is a rogue's act. You must have many possible rogues."

  The Herdmaster bristled. His urge was to kill the creature on the spot . . . yet he had never even considered the priest. "You have thought this through in detail. Why?"

  "We love puzzles like this." Dawson reverted to English, "Detective stories. I have read many. Tell me all you know of the Advisor's death. It may be I can help."

  "Another time. Raztupisp-minz, you should not have concealed the Advisor's activities. Did it never strike you that they might have caused his death?"

  "No, Herdmaster. How could they?"

  Pastempeh-keph splayed his digits. "I can't know that yet. Tell Dawson what to say to his fithp on Winterhome. Afterward I will send you to Winterhome. The African fithp must have one who understands human behavior, and the Breaker fithp must learn more."

  Raztupisp-minz gasped, covered his scalp, and said nothing. The Herdmaster turned away. He would never have sent the leaders of the Breaker team into action except as punishment, and the Breaker knew it. Yet he was probably the best choice . . .

  In a few 64-breaths there would be spin. The Herdmaster's family mudroom would be available again.

  * * *

  Jenny had never seen the President look so tired. He wore a faded flowered robe, and his feet were thrust into slippers without socks. He took the cup of coffee Jack Clybourne brought without thanking him, and listened impassively as Jenny and Admiral Carrell delivered their report.

  "In South Africa," the President said. "Dr. Curtis was right, then. How do we know?"

  "The cable through Dakar is still working," Admiral Carrell said. "We have reports from their government in Pretoria. I wouldn't count on that lasting. Understand, Mr. President, we know very little."

  "Is there anything we can do?" the President asked.

  Carrell nodded to Jenny.

  "We can't think of anything, sir. We could try to send ships, but—"

  "But they still have lasers and flying crowbars," President Coffey said. "Tell me, Major, is there anything to oppose them?"

  "South African Commandos," Jenny said. "Their National Guard."

  "Don't they have a regular army?"

  "Yes, sir. They've always had the largest army on the continent. Most of it was on the seacoast."

  David Coffey ran both hands through his thinning hair, then carefully smoothed it down. "We can assume they destroyed the rest from orbit. What else?"

  "Sir, there is — or at least there was, when we still had communications — a Soviet army about three thousand miles north of their landing zone, but we don't even know if they've heard about the invasion."

  And when we call Moscow, nobody answers. We can't count on the Russians.

  The President nodded wearily. "They'll see something weird happening in the sky. Can you get a message to them?"

  "I don't know. Or if they'd believe anything we said."

  "Try, Admiral. So. There's nothing we have that can drive them out?"

  Admiral Carrell shrugged. "Nothing I know of. We have a few missile subs. We could order them to attack — except that we can not know the precise areas to strike, and we can be certain they have placed their laser battle stations to protect their troops."

  "It took everything we had — everything we and the Russians had — to burn them out of Kansas," the President said. "I guess it's obvious. We won't throw them out of South Africa."

  Jesus. Is he giving up?

  "So long as they control space they can do as they will, Admiral Carrell said. "Suppose we throw them out of Africa. There are millions of asteroids in the solar system. Perhaps the will drop the next one on Colorado Springs. Or perhaps they bring in a series of smaller ones to land in San Francisco Bay, Lake Michigan, Chesapeake Bay . . ."

  "Admiral, must we surrender?"

  Carrell snorted. "You're in command, Mr. President. I'm from Annapolis. For two years my table was just under the banner, 'Don't give up the ship.' Certainly I won't."

  "But—"

  "Archangel," Admiral Carrell said.

  Coffey snorted. "Do you really believe in a spacecraft powered by atomic bombs?"

  "It has to work," Carrell said.

  "You're saying that's our only hope."

  "I know of no other."

  "I see." The President looked thoughtful. "So everything depends on keeping secrets. If they learn, if they so much as get a hint that—" He frowned. "I've forgotten. Bellingham?"

  "Yes."

  "They blast Bellingham, and we're finished. All right. If that's our best hope, let's protect it. I want a personal progress report. Jenny."

  "Sir?"

  "Send Jenny, Admiral. Promote her and send her up there." He looked around the room and saw Jack Clybourne.

  "Jack?"

  "Yes, sir?"

  "You must feel useless here."

  "Yes, sir. Hell, most of the time the only person who's armed who can get within a mile of you is me."

  "You know security procedures. Go with Colonel Crichton and look into what they've set up at Bellingham." The President ruined his hair again. "I should put on a swimsuit and go talk to the Dreamer Fithp."

  Jenny thought, What?

  He grinned at her fleetingly. "The sci-fi writers, they cheer me up. They don't tell me horrible things aren't happening, I don't mean that. But it doesn't seem to bother them. They think bigger than that. Like an interstellar war is a great way to build up to the real story. And that tame snout of theirs — It helps to know that they will surrender if we can just hit them with something hard!"

  * * *

  Dawson appeared in the cell something more than an hour after the rest arrived. He was shaking. He looked about at several sets of more or less questioning eyes, and he said, "They want me to tell the Earth to surrender."

  The Russians' eyes met. Arvid grinned and Dmitri shrugged and Nikolai's expression went quite blank.

  "I won't do it," Wes Dawson said. "Vidkun Quisling, Pierre Laval, Benedict Arnold, I'd be remembered longer than any of them!"

  Dmitri asked, "Why would you consider it?"

  Wes flopped on his back on the padded aft wall. Looking at the featureless ceiling, he said, "There's a symbol. It looks like a fi' on its back. It means 'Don't bomb me.' People can paint it on greenhouses and hospitals and trucks carrying food . . . like a Red Cross. But if they use it wrong, it'll be rocks from the sky again."

  "If you do not speak, you cannot make food shipments safe?" Dmitri demanded.

  "Yeah. There was some other stuff. Threats, mostly. Another Foot." Wes shuddered. "I won't tell them th
at."

  "We have no evidence that they have other asteroids ready to drop," Arvid said.

  "They don't need them. There are plenty more where they got that one," Jeri said. "Or in the asteroid belt. It might take a few years, but they've got years. They've already spent, what . . .?"

  "Fifteen years just since they reached the solar system. Sure they can bring another, and another. But it's worse than that."

  Alice demanded, "What could be worse than another Foot?"

  "They'll go to the Moon," Wes said. "They don't need to to Saturn, or the asteroids! They've wiped us off the Moon. The gravity's low, and they can get as much Moon rock as they want."

  No. God, why? Jeri wanted to curl into a tiny ball. "Wes, what will you do?"

  "You tell me. I need help."

  And all the time they're listening, watching, while we talk about it.

  "Perhaps," Arvid said, "just perhaps it would be better if you make this speech. It would have to be carefully done. We could help you prepare." He looked significantly at Wes.

  "They want me to talk the human race into surrendering! They'll tell me what to say. If I say something else, they'll cut me off. What's the good of that?"

  Arvid glanced casually at the watching camera. "One must paraphrase."

  A long moment passed. Then Wes mused, "Of course, the fithp will need help with their phrasing. Their English isn't that good . . ."

  "But yours is."

  * * *

  The rest were asleep. Alice curled in a protective ball, one arm thrown across her face, the other reaching to clutch the wall rung. They had never been given blankets; they slept in the clothes they wore. Thuktun Flishithy had gone over to spin gravity, and Alice could feel an eccentricity, a wobble. Dmitri snored with a sound like complaint. Alice uncurled. The hell with it.

  Congressman Dawson slept a few feet from the rest, on his side, with his head pillowed on one arm. Alice watched him, Sleeping, he looked quite harmless. Yet he frowned in his sleep "Foot," he muttered. "Feet. Giant mee . . . meteoroid imp. ."

  Everybody in Menninger's had nightmares. It wasn't rare for Alice to wake in the middle of the night. Then she would watch and listen . . . and the others weren't any better off than she was. She used to wonder about that. If she'd spent any amount of time in a dorm, she thought, she would have known she wasn't unusual.

  And if she hadn't been sent to a girls' high school, she might have grown used to. . . persons of the male persuasion. She'd have known how to handle them, like other women did. If her parents— "Dinosaurs. Oh, God, like the dinosaurs . . ." Dawson said in a breathy moan. Alice had never seen a man whimper.

  Poor bastard. He could tell the world how to safeguard their food and hospitals, but what would they remember? Wes Dawson urging them to surrender to the horrors. Wes Dawson, traitor. Unfair! Learning what the horrors had planned, Wes Dawson had tried to tear the nose and eyelid off Teacher Takpusseh. He'd told Mrs. Woodward about it in Alice's hearing. Alice tried to picture that. It must have been a short fight.

  So safe, so harmless, asleep; but he was the only one who had fought back.

  Greatly daring, Alice reached out and touched Wes Dawson's wrist. Too little pressure would tickle him, too much would wake him.

  He stopped breathing, and so did Alice. Then, "I can kill them. They can die," Wes said. His face relaxed; his lips parted slightly and he was deep asleep.

  After a moment Alice curled up beside him.

  31

  MAXIMUM SECURITY

  Those who will give up essential liberty to secure a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

  —BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

  The helicopter settled onto the parking lot behind an odd gray building, granite base, brick towers at each corner. An elderly man waited with two others, all in tan uniforms. They held umbrellas against the drizzling rain. Jenny and Jack followed them inside.

  "I'm Ben Lafferty. Sheriff. This is Deputy Young and Deputy Hargman. Anything you want, just ask them."

  "Actually, we'd expected to see the military intelligence people," Jenny said.

  Lafferty screwed his face into an exaggerated squint and eyed Jenny's bright new silver oak leaf. "Well, Lieutenant Colonel, I'm a colonel in military intelligence myself. Matter of fact, I'm the senior one here." His grin faded, and his face lost all traces joviality. "This is my town, lady. The state of Washington never had much need for Washington, D.C., and Bellingham never got much out of the state. We had a nice little university town he until you federal people came."

  Jack Clybourne reached into his pocket. Jenny laid her hand on his arm. "I can sympathize, Sheriff," she said. "We're just doing our job."

  "And what's that? What the hell are you people building down in that harbor? And don't give me crap about greenhouses. Green houses don't need big iron things brought in hung under barges."

  "There is a war," Jack Clybourne said.

  "So they tell us."

  "Tell you! If you'd seen that crashed ship—" In a moment Jack Clybourne had calmed himself, but the sheriff had backed away a step. "I brought some films and I can get more. I believe I can persuade you that there's a war. We're losing it. We need all the cooperation we can get."

  "Yeah, sure you do." The sheriff glanced at his watch. "Okay. Hargman and Young will take care of you. I got to go." He left the office without looking back.

  "What was that all about?" Jack Clybourne asked.

  Deputy Young looked thoughtful, then lowered his voice. "He has a point. We got along fine until all of a sudden they announced this big greenhouse project. Only it isn't a greenhouse, is it? I never heard of a greenhouse needing an astronaut general to run it."

  "Air Force," Jenny said. "He happens to be my brother-in-law."

  "That so? You still didn't tell me why we need the Air Force to raise groceries. Or why all the security stuff."

  "There is a reason."

  Deputy Hargman snorted. "Sure there is. One good enough to get this town and everybody in it killed by a meteor."

  "Not if they think it's a greenhouse," Jenny said. "They've never bombed a food storage place."

  "How will they know that's what this is?"

  "Maybe you take your chances," Jack said. "Just like the rest of the world. Look, one hint gets to the snouts that Bellingham has a secret, and—" He spread his hands.

  "No more Bellingham," Young said. "How would they find out?"

  "TV. More likely radio. Police radio. Even CB."

  "Jeez," Hargman said. "Look, just what is this secret we're protecting?"

  "What do you care?" Jack demanded.

  Jenny remembered the gray face of the President. "Hey, look, we're all on the same side, remember? What's important is not to let them get the idea there is any secret about Bellingham. Let's work on that."

  "Round up the CBs," Hargman muttered. "Won't be easy — hey, won't that make the snouts suspicious? No CB chatter here at all?"

  Jack's chin bobbed up and down. "We'll set up fakes. Lots of chatter, but it will be our people doing it. Thanks."

  "Sure," Deputy Young said. "But — dammit, I don't like not knowing what I'm protecting."

  "You don't want to know," Jenny said.

  * * *

  General Edmund Gillespie closed the door, and the sound of hammers and riveting guns died away. Jenny could still hear them but they no longer tore at her eardrums. The office was cluttered. Plans and blueprints covered every desk and table, and more hung on the walls.

  Jack Clybourne removed his ear protectors with a look of relief.

  "Max," General Gillespie said, "you remember my wife's kid sister. They promoted her. Lieutenant Colonel."

  A wide grin split Max Rohr's face. "Hey, Jenny. Good to see you. That's great."

  "And this is Jack Clybourne," Gillespie said. "Max is the chief construction foreman on this job. Max, Jenny and Jack are here as — let me put it right — as personal representatives of the President. They'll go back and
report to him."

  "Okay," Rohrs said. "I knew we were important—"

  "Max, you're all we have," Jenny blurted.

  "Yeah, I knew that."

  Gillespie waved them to chairs. "Drinks? We have a good local beer. I recommend it." He opened a refrigerator and produce several bottles. They had no labels, and the bottles were not a alike.

  "Sure," Jenny said.

  Jack frowned but accepted a bottle.

  "So how are we doing?" Jenny asked.

  "Not bad," Max Rohrs said. "Matter of fact, we're way ahead of schedule."

  "Why's that?"

  "Well, we got that nuclear sub hid out in the harbor. Plenty of electricity. And we've got every computer design system on the West Coast. That all helps. Mostly, though, it's just there's no paperwork," Max said. "No telephone lines to Washington. The engineers plan something, the computer people check it out, E and I agree, and it goes in, no conferences and change-approval meetings. We just do it."

  "It helps that everybody busts ass," Gillespie said.

  "That's for sure. We're here to get this done, not make money and take coffee breaks."

  It shows, too

  , Jenny thought. Max doesn't look as if he's had a night's sleep in a month, and Ed looks worse. "So, when can I report she'll fly?" Max looked thoughtful. "Supposed to take a year more, but I'll be surprised if we can't launch in nine months. Maybe sooner." He unrolled a sheath of drawings. "Look, the heavy work is the base plate. The barges bring that in pieces, and we have to put it together. Heavy work, but it's still just welding and riveting. Then there's the gun that puts the bombs behind the butt plate. If that fouls. . . well, we're putting in two separate TBGs."

  "What?"

  "Thrust bomb guns."

  "Oh. But there's all the electronics, and life support, and — don't I remember they needed nine months just to change toilets on the Shuttle?"

  "Sure, NASA style," Gillespie said. "We just install the damn thing. Of course it helps that we're not shaving off ounces. We've got plenty of lifting power."

  You sure do.