by Alton Gansky
“You will stand down, now!”
It was Sanders. Henry was still aware enough to recognize the voice.
“It’s his fault,” Nash shouted.
Sanders bellowed, “I gave you an order. Do you read me, mister? You will stand down now, or you will be spending the rest of your career in a military prison.”
Henry struggled to his feet. His head was starting to clear. Zeisler was still in Nash’s grasp. Sanders stood to Nash’s side, one hand holding the man’s arm so he couldn’t swing again.
“Stop yelling,” Cynthia shouted. “Everyone is yelling. Stop it. I can’t hear myself think.”
“I’m going to make him pay for his stupidity,” Nash roared.
There wasn’t much time to think. Nash was acting like McDermott before he ran off. Nash was not himself. Who he was, Henry would have to figure out later. In a quick motion, Nash freed his arm from Sanders’s grasp. He pulled back his fist and paused just long enough to smile at Zeisler.
Henry charged. The last thing he wanted was a fistfight with a man trained to kill with his bare hands, a man who was no longer rational. The best way to end a fight was not to let it begin. Henry dropped a shoulder and plowed into Nash, his shoulder catching the man square in the gut. He heard the air rush from Nash’s lungs. Henry kept pushing with his legs while grabbing Nash’s thighs with his hands. With his legs hindered, and Henry driving forward, Nash fell to the ground, landing hard. Henry landed on him.
Releasing Nash’s legs just before the two men hit the floor, Henry scrambled for purchase. The shock of the impact left Nash stunned. Henry sat on Nash’s chest, pinning the man’s arms beneath his legs. Henry’s mind still spun, and his eyes wouldn’t focus, but he held his spot.
“Let me go, Sachs,” Nash ordered.
“I don’t think so. I’m still reeling from the last punch.”
“Zeisler had it coming. You got in the way.”
“Yeah, I did. I may have to rethink that move.” Henry rubbed the back of his head. A knot was rising behind his left ear. He stared at Nash’s right hand. A purple botch covered the back of the hand and a knuckle was broken, but Nash showed no pain.
Sanders leaned over Nash. “Have you lost your senses, man? You have lost control. You come to order. Is that clear, mister?”
“I’ll be fine just as soon as I rip Zeisler’s head from his shoulders,” Nash spat.
“Why? What did I do? Oh, my head,” Zeisler moaned.
“Listen to me, Nash,” Henry said. “Look at me.”
Nash kept his eyes cut toward Zeisler.
Henry took Nash’s jaw in his hand and straightened his head. “I said, look at me.”
At last Nash did.
“McDermott.”
“What about him?” Nash still struggled beneath Henry. “Get off me, or I’ll give you some of what’s coming to that pencil-neck Zeisler.”
“You’re not giving anyone anything,” Henry said. “Think about McDermott.”
“Where is he?”
“You don’t remember?”
“He should be helping me,” Nash said.
Grant groaned. “This is incredible. What are we going to do with him now?”
Henry waved him off and focused on Nash. “He’s dead. McDermott is dead. Remember?”
“Dead?”
“You carried his body back to this house. McDermott went nuts and ran away. We went after him. Can you remember that?”
“I don’t know what kind of game—”
“He thought he was in Vietnam. We heard gunfire. We found his body. It looked like he had been shot—”
“But he wasn’t,” Nash interrupted. “He . . . he . . .”
“We think that he believed he was shot. That he believed it enough that it killed him.” Henry lowered his voice. “Nash, do you remember what McDermott did before he ran off?”
“No . . . I don’t remember any . . .” Nash paused. His brow furrowed. “He was terrified. Yeah, that’s it. He lost his composure and freaked out.”
“That’s what you’ve been doing, except you’re feeling anger instead of fear.”
Nash’s expression changed as if someone had thrown a switch. “I—I think I’m in control now.”
“Don’t let him up. He’ll come after me again.” Zeisler paused. “Hey, my headache is gone.”
“I think you can let him up now,” Sanders said. “He seems to have come to his senses.”
“Not just yet,” Henry replied. “Sanders, I take it you know how to unload the M16. I’d feel better if it couldn’t be fired. Can you pull the clip?”
“I can do better than that.” Sanders picked up the automatic weapon, pulled the clip, then began dismantling the weapon, first clearing the chamber, removing the sling, and separating the upper and lower receivers. Until Nash had pushed McDermott’s weapon in Henry’s hand, he had never held an M16, but he had read that they were subject to jamming, and soldiers often had to field strip the weapon and reassemble it before it would fire again. The news carried stories of soldiers shot dead while holding the pieces of their M16 in their hands.
“Take this, Mr. Grant.” Sanders tossed a slotted, cylindrical part across the few feet that separated them.
“What’s this?” Grant asked.
“It’s the carrier assembly,” Sanders replied. “Dr. Zeisler, this is for you.” He tossed another oily part. Zeisler caught it.
In a few moments the weapon was dismantled, and each person had one small part in their possession.
“I don’t understand,” Cynthia said. “Why give us the parts?”
Henry knew. “Because the weapon has to be reassembled to be fired. If we each have a key part, then it can’t be assembled without everyone’s consent or someone to overpower all of us. Possible, but not likely.”
“I think you can let me up now,” Nash said.
Henry studied him for a moment, then looked at Sanders.
“He sounds like the old Nash to me.”
“No, it might be a trick,” Zeisler said.
Henry rose from Nash’s chest and rubbed the back of his head. Nash sat up, crossed his legs, and worked his hand. He grimaced with each movement.
“I take it I hit something hard.”
“Yeah,” Henry said. “Something real hard.”
Zeisler backed away from Nash. “You were aiming for something soft—my face.”
“Tell us what happened,” Henry said. “What set you off?”
Nash shook his head. He looked like a dog that had just been beat. “I don’t know. I was watching Dr. Zeisler in that ring thing and feeling pretty put out about having to wait because of him. Then the lights came, the walls went transparent, the outside began to change, and I just kept getting angrier and angrier. Then you pulled him out and things stopped. I looked for the door and . . . it wasn’t there.”
“It’s still not there,” Grant said.
Henry walked to the wall where the door had been and ran his hand along the surface. It was clean, smooth, and gave no indication that a door had ever been present. He returned to the center of the room. “What happened to you, Victor? One moment you seemed on top of things, then you lost it.”
“I thought I was controlling things. I learned that I could make the walls clear with just a word, then you asked me to change the landscape. I thought of some of the places I had been. Then, wham, everything went nuts. My head began to throb. The pain was hideous. I was waiting for a cerebral hemorrhage.” He rubbed his temples again. “Then you pulled me from the ring. Next thing I know, Nash is trying to tear my head off.”
Henry was at a loss. He knew it wasn’t a dream, but it felt worse than any nightmare he had ever experienced.
“It’s an interface,” Cynthia said.
“A what?” Grant asked.
“We’re entering the computer age,” she replied. “There’s a lot of talk about human-computer interface—that is, how information is exchanged between a user and a computer. Right now
information is loaded into memory by punch cards or magnetic tape. But it’s not enough to have a machine do calculations; you have to be able to tell it what you want. The talk around the campus is that a typewriter keyboard is the way to go, or perhaps some kind of pointing device. The goal is to make computers easy to access. There’s talk that people will be able to buy computers for the home, like we buy electronic calculators today.”
“That will be the day,” Grant said, amused. “I wouldn’t bet your life’s savings on that happening.”
“She’s right,” Zeisler said. “But I don’t know what that has to do with this.”
“Think,” Cynthia urged. “You said, ‘exterior,’ and the walls changed. You thought about places you had been, and the landscape changed. It’s the perfect interface. Instead of typing out instructions on a punch card and feeding it into the computer, this thing reads it from your mind.”
“You’re saying that pile of sand is some kind of computer?” Grant asked.
“No, I’m saying the ring is the interface to the computer.” She stared at the others. “We may be standing in the computer.”
“Why did Victor have so much trouble controlling it?” Grant asked.
“Because it wasn’t designed for him or anyone like him,” Cynthia said. “No offense, Victor, but it may take a bigger brain than yours to control that thing.”
“All we need is a brain big enough to get us out of here,” Nash said. “Why is the door gone?”
“I can only guess,” Cynthia said. “Maybe it wants us to stay.”
“For how long?” Sanders asked.
“There’s no way to know,” she replied. “Maybe forever.”
Chapter26
1974
“All right, people,” Sanders said. “We brought you down here to figure some of this out. We wanted to know how the base was built and by whom. We chose you because you represent the best in your fields. Well, now the mission has changed. You’re going to have to use those fine minds of yours to get us out of here. I’m open to ideas.”
“First,” Henry said, “I think we need to defuse the greatest danger we face—ourselves.”
“How do you mean?” Sanders asked.
“McDermott was frightened, and that fear crescendoed until he lost control. I think he reverted back to other fears he had faced. In his case, Vietnam. Nash became peeved at Victor, who he blamed for holding things up. His anger grew until he lost control. The environment seems to change based on elevated emotions or memories. If Cynthia is right, and the ring or this whole room is some sort of computer interface, then we have to be very careful what we think.”
“Avoid extremes, you mean,” Sanders said.
“Yes,” Henry replied. “Victor was enjoying the experience until the device took over.”
Sanders nodded. “Agreed. First order of business: keeping our emotions in check.”
“The question is,” Henry continued, “is the door gone, or do we just think it’s gone?”
“Of course it’s gone,” Grant said. “You examined the wall yourself.”
“At this point, I don’t trust my own senses.” Henry walked back to the wall. “We’ve seen things change in a heartbeat.”
“How do we know what is real and what isn’t?” Nash asked.
“I’m not sure we can know. But I’ve noticed one thing: The things we’ve seen are always lacking something. For example, when Nash and I were tracking McDermott, we were immersed in an Asian jungle, in Vietnam, but we noticed that it wasn’t quite right. I saw a monkey, but it made no sound. And although we didn’t make the connection then, I realize now that it should have been hot, but it wasn’t. The humidity should have been higher, but it remained the same as it was when the terrain was desert. There’s a big difference in humidity from the desert to the jungle.”
“It’s real, all right,” Zeisler said. “No way are we imagining this. However, our imaginations are driving it. Well, most of it. I doubt any of us imagined that creature.”
“How would that work?” Henry asked. “I don’t know how big this place is, but it’s big. How can such change take place?”
“Terraforming,” Grant said.
“Terraforming?” Sanders asked.
“Since I was a kid, I’ve had an interest in astronomy. Back in 1961, Carl Sagan coined the term terraforming, meaning ‘to alter the terrain.’ He suggested that bacteria could be sent to Venus. If the right bacteria were sent, it would thrive in the hot noxious atmosphere of the planet, releasing oxygen. Over time—a lot of time—the whole planet could be altered so that humans could live on it. I’m not sure he still believes that, but it was an interesting idea. Arthur C. Clarke has suggested that Mars is a better choice.”
“Okay,” Henry said, “I’ll buy that term. But we’re not talking about slow change. We’re talking about dramatic alterations that happen in seconds.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Zeisler interjected. “Here’s a question: What do concrete, chicken soup, and Life magazine all have in common?”
“Do we need the parlor games?” Nash snapped, then raised his hands. “I’m fine with it.”
Henry smiled. He doubted that any of them had ever had to be so aware of their own emotions or had to exercise such control. “Go ahead.”
Zeisler eyed Nash, then continued. “They’re all made up of atoms. Everything we see is constructed of those basic building blocks. Atoms link to form molecules, and molecules link to make everything else. Everything is made from a compilation of things too tiny to be seen with the most powerful microscopes. We’ve all had basic chemistry and know that there is a fixed number of elements that occur naturally: hydrogen, oxygen, iron, gold, and many more. They can’t be broken down by any chemical reaction. They’re basic.”
“Your point, Dr. Zeisler?” Sanders asked.
“My point is that extremely small things make up bigger things. Think of the sand. We already know it isn’t really sand. It changes color, and we can reduce it to fine powder by rubbing it with our hands. What if those tiny particles are even smaller than we imagine? What if we had a way of controlling the microscopic bits so that they combined into whatever we wanted it to be?”
“What would you use to control the base element?” Cynthia inquired. “What force could be used to exert that kind of directed control?”
Zeisler shook his head. “I don’t know. Electromagnetism, microwaves, magic—we don’t know. Right now it doesn’t matter. My point is that a replica of almost anything could be made by reordering the tiny bits of stuff that make up the sand.”
“Replica?” Sanders asked.
“Of course,” Zeisler said. “Very little is real. The Joshua tree we examined wasn’t a real tree. Henry hit on it when he said something about a special moth being needed to pollinate the tree’s flowers. The house may look Victorian one moment but could reshape into the military tent we saw. Desert becomes jungle. None of it is real, but it is all real—if that makes any sense.”
“I just don’t see how that could work,” Grant said.
“So what?” Zeisler shot back. “The fact that we can’t explain it doesn’t negate the truth that is happening. We don’t know how the universe came into being, but it’s there. There’s a lot of biology we don’t understand, but it still works. Our understanding is secondary to the fact.”
“But we saw the moon in the sky and the sun,” Sanders said.
“So there are particles of whatever on the dome of the cavern. We know we’re underground, so the moon and sun are false.”
“The powder on the Joshua tree and the exterior of the house,” Henry said, “is the substance you’re talking about.”
“You’re right on, Henry. Imagine if you could control the atoms in the paint on your house to recombine to form new colors. You could change the color every day. Now imagine if your house was coated in something that could also change and hold a shape. Not only would you have a new paint job, you’d have a new exteri
or design.”
“And what does this have to do with the door?” Nash asked.
“If I’m right, the door frame is still there. It’s just filled in.”
“So we can dig our way out.” Grant looked cheerful for the first time since Henry returned.
“Sorry, Monte, but I doubt it,” Zeisler said. “First, it’s likely to be as hard as concrete, and even if we could chip away at it, it would just fill in again faster than we can remove it.”
“So you’ve said all that to say we’re stuck here?” Sanders said. “That we may not find the door again?”
Zeisler started to answer, then hesitated. He took a deep breath. “Worse. If it can fill in the doorway, it can fill in the entrance to the cavern. Folks, we’re not leaving until . . . ‘It’ . . . decides to let us go.”
“We left the pack outside,” Nash said.
“So?” Zeisler said.
“So, I gave the pack to Henry to carry while I carried McDermott’s body. The pack had our day’s provisions, including water.”
Grant rolled his eyes. “Oh, good. At least we won’t die of starvation; we’ll die of thirst first.”
“Have a little optimism, Mr. Grant,” Sanders said. “We’re not finished yet.”
Henry stood by the ring and gazed down into the mounds of sand it contained. Something was connecting in his mind. “This looks different.”
“What looks different?” Zeisler asked.
“This sand. The stuff I brought in earlier seemed . . . larger and a tad darker.”
“Come on, Henry,” Zeisler said with frustration, “we’ve been over this. The sand is composed of smaller elements. It might appear any size it wants.”
“I know, but I’ve been wondering why the sand I brought in decided to leave in such a hurry and why the powder I felt on the Joshua tree and the exterior of the house isn’t on the inside. Any ideas?”
“Not a clue.” Zeisler slumped to the floor, his back to the sloping wall.
“Anyone?” Henry asked but got no takers.
“I wonder if what’s in this pit is different than what is outside. Maybe they’re not supposed to mix.”