Communion of dreams, p.21
Communion of Dreams, page 21
Jon pursed his lips, thought. Turning to look Navarr in the eye, he said. “Noted.”
Navarr’s eyes narrowed. “I’m serious. She shouldn’t be in any meetings where sensitive matters are discussed.”
“I understand your concern. But at this point, I don’t see what difference it makes. The whole world knows about the artifact. And it’s not like she’s going to report anything she hears to someone back on Earth. Gish wants to have her along, fine with me.”
Navarr held his gaze for a moment, then nodded slightly. “Your call.”
“Thanks.”
The door to the small conference room opened again and slowly Jackie Gates walked in. She moved stiffly, with some obvious pain, took a seat near the door and melted into it. Everyone in the room, except Chu Ling, watched her with surprise.
“Jackie . . . didn’t expect to see you,” said Jon.
Gates sighed. “Man, I didn’t know it was such a long walk down here from the infirmary.”
“You all right?” asked Arthur.
She gave him a slight smile. “Yeah, thanks. Though I feel like I’ve run a marathon or something. I’m sore in muscles I didn’t even know I had.”
“Electrical shock will sometimes do that to you, the way it can cause the muscles to all contract suddenly,” said Don. “I’ve had occasions when a mild jolt left me aching for days.”
“Gee, thanks for that cheery bit of news.”
Bradsen started to say something else, but was interrupted by the sudden commotion of the door opening with a bang, and Gregor Soukup lumbering into the room. “Sorry that Gregor is late. Have been chatting with Hawking.”
Jon asked, “How’s the ship doing?”
“Ah, very good! All minor engineering problems worked out. Drive is running at full power. Now out in Kuiper belt, will be soon starting the return. Been very good test!” Then his face hardened, the smile almost disappeared from beneath his heavy beard. He leaned forward in his chair and pointed at Jon. “Gregor told you it was dangerous to go down to Titan and be around artifact.”
“Maybe. Which is why I wanted to get together with everyone this evening. We still don’t have much in the way of hard research data from Don’s team, but we have today’s events to help provide us some information about the artifact.”
Gish looked at Bradsen. “Have you gotten any solid data yet?”
“Nothing positive. Which is to say, so far none of the equipment has been able to identify that the artifact is even there.”
“Which is interesting, because that’s what led Ng down into the pit, and probably why he stumbled into the thing,” said Jon.
Jackie nodded in agreement. “Yeah, that’s what he was talking about as he reached out and touched it. I remember that now.”
“You touched it, too. Do you remember that?”
She shook her head. “No . . . sorry. I just remember seeing him collapse, then bending down to see if he was OK. Then . . . nothing.”
“Tops reports that other than the loss of all their cyberware, and this mild amnesia, neither Jackie nor Ng seem to have suffered any lasting harm from their contact with the artifact.” Jon said, choosing his words carefully. He looked at the faces around the room. “I think that’s significant. We at least know the thing isn’t automatically hostile.”
Jackie raised an eyebrow. “I dunno. The way I feel, I wouldn’t call the thing harmless.”
“Nor can we assume that anyone else who might come into contact with it will not be harmed,” said Gish.
“Exactly. Until we know what it’s purpose is, we have no idea what happened to Jackie and Ng, or what that means for the future.”
“But I find this collapsing to be interesting,” said Klee. “Others, yourself included, Jon, have experienced a variety of effects. It might be that this is part of that pattern, perhaps a way that the artifact is attempting to communicate with us.”
Jackie snorted. “Yeah, I can tell from my muscle ache that it’s trying to beat the information into us.”
“Ah, perhaps you are more correct than you know. Your cyberware was burned out, yes? Perhaps the information it tried to send to you was too much, and overloaded your system. It might just be trying to tell us too much, all at once.”
“We need a handshake!” exclaimed Bailey.
“What?” asked Jon.
“A handshake . . . um, when facsimile machines were first used, and then later when computers started using simple modems to connect into primitive networks, there was a problem in information transmission rates. You always had to make sure that the systems were compatible, so that they worked at the same speed. They developed a system where the two machines would send out a tone, telling one another what their capabilities were, so they could coordinate, using the best speed mutually possible.”
“Interesting idea. I’ll have Theo Crane, my communications engineer, go over the specs on our cyberware systems, see what the threshold for data absorption is.” Bradsen looked at Klee. “Any idea how we can communicate the information to the artifact? What do we tell it?”
Before Klee could answer, Gish spoke. “Start with giving it number theory. Keep this mathematical.”
“Perhaps that is a good way to start. But we will need to do more than just that. We will have to establish some kind of symbolic language . . . ”
Jon interrupted, “Wait a second. Let’s not start broadcasting anything at it just yet. That could still be interpreted as some kind of attack.”
Don nodded in agreement. “I’ll have Theo start considering the parameters of the engineering problem. That’ll take a while, and in the meantime maybe something else will come out of our research.”
“OK, good,” said Jon. “And speaking of something else coming out of the research . . . Jackie, I’d like to get you and Ng back down to the surface tomorrow, late morning.”
Jackie studied him for a moment. “Why?”
“Because I want to use you as a guinea pig.”
“Well, that’s blunt enough.”
“Sorry, but if you’re up for it, I think that it’s an important step.”
“What do you want to do with us down there?”
Jon smiled. “Don’t worry, I don’t want you to touch the thing again. But I do want to see if you notice anything different about it now that you have touched it. Same with Ng.”
Slowly, she nodded. “OK. I’m game.”
“Thanks.” He looked around the table. “OK, folks, let’s leave it at that. If you come up with anything else, drop me a note. Otherwise, I’d like to have everyone at the dome with the artifact tomorrow about ten. If Duc isn’t up for that, we may postpone it until later. I’ll let you know in the morning.”
There was general chatter as the meeting started to break up. Navarr was the first to start out the door, when Jackie stopped him. “Commander . . . I don’t remember it, but I’ve seen the recording. And I want to thank you and your people for pulling us out of the pit.”
Navarr smiled slightly. “It’s what we’re trained to do.”
“I know. But still, your trooper didn’t know what had caused either of us to collapse. There was no way to know whether the artifact would hurt or kill anyone else who came down there. I can’t imagine that willingness to take such a risk.”
He looked at her for a moment. “Jackie, I wasn’t in the dome when it happened. But I have seen the record. You leapt forward to help Ng the moment you saw him go down.”
“That was instinct. I didn’t have time to think about it.”
“Yeah, but you did it anyway.” He smiled. “I’ll pass along your gratitude.”
Looking down, she said, “Thanks.”
Then as she started to get up out of her chair, Gish and Chu Ling came around the table and moved toward the door. Chu Ling stopped, looked at Jackie for the first time since she had come into the room, and got a very perplexed look on her face.
Jackie noticed the girl, looked down at her. “What is it?”
Chu Ling stood very still, her eyes wide. She said nothing, just held her projector close.
Gish looked from Jackie, down to Ling. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
The girl glanced up at Gish, then back to Jackie. Slowly her hand came out and pointed, timidly. “This lady. She glows.”
* * *
“Well, I don’t know what it is she sees,” said Tops. Chu Ling was asleep on one of the nearby beds in the infirmary, her holo projector held close. “I can’t detect anything with any of the equipment I have here.”
“But she’s adamant that both Jackie and Duc ‘glow’,” said Jon.
Gish nodded. “Yes. She describes it as being like the moon, when there is just a sliver. I think she means that they have some kind of halo.”
“We’ll want to use the equipment down on Titan to see if it can pick up any kind of energy signature coming off either Jackie or Duc,” said Jon. “And we’ll also want to see if Ling detects any kind of similar halo or glow with the artifact itself.”
Gish looked at Jon. “Do you think there’s a threat? To her, I mean.”
Jon and Tops exchanged a quick glance. “Tell him.”
“Tell me what?”
Jon nodded. “Robert, Tops found something else with Jackie and Duc that I didn’t tell the others earlier, and that isn’t in the official report . . . yet.”
“They seem to have undergone some kind of healing transformation. Any minor medical problems they had before have vanished, for at least the time being,” explained Tops.
“So, why can she see it?”
“Good question. Maybe it has something to do with the genetic manipulation that’s been done to her. But I can’t explain why.”
“All we know is that without prompting, she was able to detect something different about Jackie, and then Duc when she was brought up here. That’s significant. And potentially useful,” said Jon. “I can’t see that there’s any kind of threat to her.”
“OK, I’ll bring her with me tomorrow morning, before the meeting. And we’ll see if she picks up anything when she sees the artifact.”
* * *
“Hello again.”
Jon looked around the walls of the cave, to see if anything had changed. It was the same as the last time he was there: a pale blue light, only his shadow, the soft murmur of the artifact’s song. He turned his attention to the center, where the burl glowed ever so slightly. Except instead of hanging below the artifact, the burl was being held in the hands of a man. In the hands of a youthful Darnell Sidwell.
Darnell was facing him, a thin smile on his face. He seemed to be waiting patiently for something.
“It was you.” Jon stepped toward him. He held up an accusing finger. “You did that to Jackie and Duc.”
“Me? I did them no harm.”
“Then who did?”
The figure looked Jon in the eye, and shrugged. Then he turned his attention to the large burl in his hands. Gently, caressing more than manipulating it, he started it spinning. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
And Jon realized that the song of the artifact had changed. It had grown softer, more like the whisper of a lover held close, breath-sound moist and warm, comforting. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
For a long time neither of them said anything, just watched the slow spinning of the burl, heard the calling of its song. Darnell looked back up at Jon, stared into his face for a moment. One hand came up and gestured invitingly to the gel. “Here, you should take this.”
“I . . . I don’t want to touch it.”
“Yes, you should take it. It is, after all, your heritage.”
“My heritage?”
“Heidegger was right, as far as he could understand. Though Heraclitus got closer to the truth.” Again, the gesture. “Come, embrace it.”
Jon felt his hands reaching out toward the light, could hear the song grow louder but no less soft and inviting. His hands reached the burl, touched it lightly, felt its warmth spinning below the tips of his fingers. And as he watched, the light slowly flowed from the burl and into his hands, warmth seeping into his palms, filling them. Amazed, he pulled his left hand back, and it stayed alight, solid yet somehow glowing from within.
“What’s happened?”
“Nothing, except that you’re just starting to wake up.”
Jon could feel it, looked from his hand to Darnell. And the lines of the youthful face had gone, replaced with the crevasses of age. All that was left of the youth were the eyes, bright and alive.
They were the last thing Jon saw before he slipped away into a deep and dreamless sleep.
* * *
“Morning. How’re you feeling?” Jon looked at Duc Ng, sitting up on the exam bed. He looked pale, worn out.
“Like I owed money to the wrong people.” He managed a wry smile. “But not bad, for the most part. It’s weird, not having my ‘ware. I feel like I need glasses, or something.”
Tops checked some result, looked up at Jon. “But he’s fine. Even less exhausted than I expected. And most of the burnout seems to be gone, too.”
Duc smiled. “Quick healer. Always have been.”
“Good, because there are a few things I’d like to discuss with you.”
Stiffly, Duc got off the bed, reached over and picked up his shirt. “Shoot.”
“Feel like maybe returning to the surface with me later this morning?”
Pulling his shirt on, flipping his ponytail out from under it, Duc paused and considered Jon. “OK. Why?”
“To see if you can sense anything different about the artifact. Before you touched it, you said that it wasn’t there. I wonder if you’ll see it now, or not.”
Ng nodded. “Yeah, I remember that part, and going down into the pit. Then it becomes kind of vague. Like a dream.”
“Remember anything at all?”
“Nah, just random impressions of color, mostly. Kind of weird.” He looked at Tops. “Can I go?”
“Sure. But take those hangover meds, just in case. And let me know if anything else happens. You do OK for a day or two, and we’ll install some new cyberware for you.”
“Right. Thanks, doc.” He turned to Jon. “What else?”
“How about I walk you down to your quarters. I’d like to see if there is anything on that extra film you shot before taking the auggies. We brought it up from the dome last night.”
“Yeah, cool.”
As they walked down the corridor, Jon asked, “You said something else when you first started to experience the effects of the drugs. Something about people leaving visual trails when they moved. What was that all about?”
Duc bit his lip. “Yeah, I remember that. Kind of hard to recall what it really looked like now, but there was this odd effect . . . sort of like a smear left behind any movement people made.”
“Ever see anything like that before?”
“No.”
“Hmm.” Jon thought about it. “Maybe something to do with the artifact, or the environment?”
Duc said nothing for a few moments, just continued walking, slowly and with some stiffness. “Could it have been the AG generator Sidwell has there? Never been around one of those while taking the drugs before.”
“Seems reasonable.”
“Let me check on it, see if there’s anyone else who has used the drugs in an AG field.” Duc stopped. “Damn. I don’t have any cyberware. How am I going to do any kind of research?”
“Tell you what, I’ll ask Seth to look into it for you. Chances are, he’ll need to contact Earth for the relevant database. That’ll take a couple of hours transmission time. When it comes in, we’ll get you to a rec room here on the station or on the da Vinci, and you can chat with Seth about it.”
Duc frowned. But then started walking again. “It’ll have to do, I guess. Make sure he gets the discussion archives as well as all the official data. This might not have been something that has been published.”
“Right.”
They came to Duc’s quarters, and went inside. Jon could smell the sharp odor of chemicals coming from the bathroom. Duc sat down on his bed, sighed. “Give me a few moments to catch my breath, OK?”
“You all right?”
“Yeah, just still a little weak, I guess. Feel the way you feel after fighting off a nasty fever, know what I mean?”
Jon nodded. He started to sit in a nearby chair when Seth materialized. “Hello, there. Duc, Seth’s here.”
“Give him my regards. And ask about that research project.”
Jon looked to the expert. “What can I help you with?”
“Word’s in from Magurshak. Things are heating up back home. There’s been a number of infrastructure attacks around the country.”
Ng was watching Jon closely. Jon asked Seth, “How bad?”
“Not as bad as it could have been. A few power outages, some damage to the mag-lev system. Safety precautions minimized the damage. But it’s an indication that things are getting ugly. NSA experts are predicting an increase in violence over the next few days.”
Jon looked at Ng, who was anxiously watching him. “There’s been some attacks back home on the mag-lev system. Nothing serious, but they’re expecting more.”
“Damn. Edenists?”
“Probably.” Jon looked back to Seth. “What else?”
“There’s also been an attack on the USSA headquarters; there were several casualties. That’s being kept off the nets for now.”
Jon watched Seth, waited. “Go on.”
“While they were in the USSA, the attackers managed to damage my thin-film dupe. No data has been lost, as far as we can tell, but there is reason for concern.”
“Oh?”
“Well, the dupe is nonfunctional. Routine administration has had to devolve to other experts, with my guidance from this location. More importantly, it seems like the attack was designed specifically to penetrate to that part of the facility.”
“Meaning that they knew exactly what they were doing.”
