Moonstruck. Part 17

Blackie stirred at the soft sounds of Swelk's approaching tread. The kitten stretched languorously, rubbing one eye with a forepaw. She tipped onto twos, using her lame limb to scoop up the yawning kitten. The kitten burrowed herself into the complicated three-way juncture between the limb's extremities and broke into a loud purr. That gentle rumble, pressed against the deformity that so defined Swelk, was ineffably soothing.

If only the humans' distrust could be so readily overcome.

* * * Cooler heads prevailed and declared a recess. While most of the summiteers attacked the breakfast buffet, Britt and President Robeson disappeared into the estate's richly paneled, high-ceilinged library. When they reappeared, the President had an index card in his hand. After a final glance at his notes, Robeson cleared his throat.

"The president," and Robeson nodded at Chernykov, "made a comment earlier that we did not pursue. That remark was something like, 'Can we ask them to go home?' It was an idea expressed in the heat of debate, and perhaps we did not give Dmitri Pyetrovich's observation the attention it deserved.

"We are all outraged at the deaths the aliens have caused. Having said that, revenge is seldom a wise basis for policy. Our prevailing interest, I submit, is the avoidance of future losses . . . most particularly prevention of a nuclear war. Our scientific folks," and he saluted Sergei and Kyle with a gla.s.s of ice water, "have done us a great service. It is time to focus our minds on 'the man behind the curtain.' May not these Krulirim illusionists, like the great and terrible Wizard of Oz, bow to reality? They have been found out!"

Explaining the simile to the Russians took longer than the whole speech. As that got sorted out, Kyle marveled anew at watching a master politician at work. Crediting Chernykov with wisdom for what had been biting sarcasm . . . what a slick way to let the Russian gracefully distance himself from suicidal attack plans. Not for the first time, Kyle wished he had absorbed a fraction of the people skills to which Was.h.i.+ngton had exposed him.

"I apologize, Mr. President, for my unfamiliar reference. Your mastery of English and of our culture are such that I sometimes forget where you are from." Robeson removed his gla.s.ses, peered through them at a window, then wiped them vigorously with his handkerchief. (A premeditated moment of quiet, Kyle suspected, for the Russian to take in the flattery.) "The point, I hope, remains valid. We have known for months the aliens' purpose: incitement to nuclear war. For all that time, if I may be allowed another theatrical figure of speech, we have been afraid not to be seen playing our parts. The aliens, we told ourselves, want to destroy us. The owners of that awe-inspiring mother s.h.i.+p could certainly obliterate us if we did not cooperate. Our best theory for the curious indirection of the obvious alien hostility was fastidiousness: their consciences would be cleaner if, in the end, we blew ourselves up.

"But things have changed. Our understanding has changed, thanks to a courageous Krul from whom we now know what is truly going on, thanks to rigorous scientific research to verify what Swelk has told us. There is only the one s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p that flits from country to country, stirring up trouble. They incite us to self-destruction not from any intent to work indirectly, but because only self-destruction serves their purposes.

"So I return to the Dmitri Pyetrovich's insightful question." Robeson, who had been pacing, halted across the table from Chernykov. "If they are told their cinematic goal will not, and cannot, be achieved, may they not simply go home?"

The atmosphere in the conference room, all morning so gloomy and foreboding, suddenly changed. As only Nixon could have gone to China, only this American president could propose accepting their losses from the aliens and moving on.

Despite exhaustion, jet lag, and incredible pressures, Robeson cut an imposing figure. Kyle could not help but recall his amazing biography. Marine captain and decorated Vietnam vet. Crusading state's attorney, fearlessly pursuing organized-crime families in New Jersey. Trustbuster in the Department of Justice. Two-term senator with a pa.s.sion for national-security policy. Still early in his first term as President, making headway fulfilling a campaign promise of military reform.

Yes, it was a speech that only Robeson could have made, and he had done so masterfully. Aw, c.r.a.p! thought Kyle. Here we go again. * * * For fear of eavesdropping, all personal electronics had been left outside the conference room. Deprived of his PalmPilot and Net access, Kyle couldn't hope to get the quotation exactly right-and it was probably by Anonymous, anyway. The essence of the line, in any event, was crystal clear. "Every complex problem has a solution that is simple, obvious . . . and wrong."

You haven't lived until the presidents of two nuclear powers scowl at you. But having done so, could

you then live long?Britt, with characteristic poise, asked only, "What's on your mind, Kyle?"Here goes. "It's possible the Krulirim will go home if we ask. Before their arrival they had no reason to wish Earth ill. That said, there's a small voice whispering in my ear."

He'd just seen a politician at work, flattering Chernykov. "One of my flaws, I freely admit, is the tendency to view everything through the lenses of science and logic. In my early attempts to influence government policy, when you first brought me to Was.h.i.+ngton, I relied too rigorously on logic. I also crashed and burned far more often than I succeeded. A very wise man"-okay, Britt, recognize yourself here!-"eventually got through to me. I now occasionally know enough to ask, 'Can the other guy afford

to live with my logic?' What worries me at this moment is how unclear it is that the Krulirim can afford to just leave.

"To be brief, I wonder . . . will Swelk's former s.h.i.+pmates accept the risk that what they attempted here

will remain secret? Is that a gamble they can afford to take?"

Doubts were appearing on faces around the table, including, he was relieved to see, on the faces of both presidents.

"I'm trying to imagine how the conspirators may see their situation. Must they not be asking themselves,

Will we ever be held to account for our actions? What if another Krulchukor s.h.i.+p were to discover

Earth? If humanity refuses to obliterate itself, how soon until Earth's stars.h.i.+ps are visiting our worlds?"What if humans and other Krulirim do meet? Our aliens killed the crew of the Atlantis. They've presumably killed all the people they kidnapped, before their splashy public arrival, to better understand us. They're responsible for yet more deaths, beginning with the submarine catastrophe. We have film of their s.h.i.+p at sites across our planet. We have by now millions of the orbs and a wrecked lifeboat from their s.h.i.+p: technology whose origin they can't refute. In short, the plotters can hardly deny trying to stampede us to self-genocide."

"Even if we do nuke each other, some records may survive." Britt spoke with his eyes shut, deep in

thought. "And survivors may still speak with future visitors. And that means . . ."

" . . . And that means," completed Kyle, "there's a very real risk-whether we blow ourselves up or not-that the ETs planned all along to utterly obliterate humanity before leaving our solar system."

"Depend on it, sir," Samuel Johnson is said to have remarked, "when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully." The summiteers outside Ankara, eye-to-eye with the extinction of humanity, found their attention wholly focused. That convergence gave birth, at last, to a terrifying plan possessed of but a single virtue-no one saw any reason why the plan was necessarilydoomed to failure.

Which wasn't to say a failure wasn't likely.

Attempting to destroy the stars.h.i.+p was too risky. Ignoring the stars.h.i.+p and hoping it would depart in peace was likewise too risky. And that left . . . capture.

Commandos would strike the next time the stars.h.i.+p visited a Russian or an American city.

CHAPTER 25.

"I think I misjudged you." Ryan Bauer, a water tumbler full of ice and amber liquid in his hand, flung himself into the captain's chair across from Kyle. "In a fingernails-across-the-blackboard sort of way, you're all right."

The borrowed private jet, most specifically not designated Air Force One, was plushly carpeted and richly appointed. There were no flight attendants aboard, in the interests of the trip's secrecy, but the Cessna's pantry came stocked for major partying. With the summit over, and serious attack-planning impossible until they got home, the pa.s.sengers were taking advantage. "You'll turn my head, General. Or is it the bourbon speaking?"

"Scotch." Ice cubes tinkled as Bauer downed a healthy swig. "But in a good cause."

"Okay." Kyle had no idea where this was going.

"You're all right," the flyer repeated. "You have a good head on your shoulders and an insane

willingness to speak your mind."

"So what good cause does the Scotch support?"

"My willingness to step onto a plane." Laughing, he nabbed a jumbo shrimp from Kyle's plate. "Not

what you expected, was it."

"Most pilots actually like airplanes."

"It's not that." Bauer leaned forward conspiratorially. "You understand these things. I'll gladly fly after

the Tea Party."

Tea Party was the code name for the as-yet unscheduled a.s.sault on the stars.h.i.+p. What Kyle failed to grasp was what he supposedly understood. "Excuse me?"

"Beam weapons." Bauer expropriated another shrimp. "The lasers on the moon use visible-light

frequencies, so that we can see the hologram. They took out the Atlantis and that Proton with microwave frequencies. The early-warning birds are being fried with X-rays. Why X-rays, do you suppose?""Because the atmosphere blocks X-rays. If the aliens had used microwaves, like they did with the Atlantis, we and the Russians would have had a better chance to see what was really going on, instead of automatically blaming each other for the saticide. Some of those downward-stabbing microwaves could have been detected on the ground. We don't have beam weapons in s.p.a.ce, and neither do the Russians . . . as far as we know, anyway."

"Saticide. I like that. Hafta suggest it to someone at the Pentagon." Bauer admired the spectacular alpine scenery rus.h.i.+ng by far below. "Swelk's ugly friends have lasers that are far too tunable for my liking.

Now, whenever I'm flying, I feel like a sitting duck."

Tunable lasers. Microwave beams tuned to an excitation energy for liquid hydrogen had exploded the fuel tank of the Atlantis. X-rays from the same alien satellites continued to destroy Earth's satellites. The leisurely pace at which Earth's satellites were targeted had been a mystery. Since Swelk's defection, Kyle had come to believe it was plot-related. Film plot, that was. Rualf, no friend of Swelk's, presumably wanted his bugs to capture plenty of suspenseful scenes in the build-up to Armageddon.

"Kyle, buddy. Are you with me?"

Tunable lasers. How separated were the excitation frequencies of liquid hydrogen and jet fuel? They were surely much closer together than microwaves and X-rays. "Sadly, Ryan, I am with you . . . but maybe you're not worried enough. Why limit your misgivings to attacks on the jet fuel in planes? What about petroleum pipelines? Natural-gas storage tanks? h.e.l.l, what about ordinary everyday gasoline?"

"Yeah, you're all right." Bauer downed another healthy swig of scotch. "Planning for Tea Party just got a whole bunch more complicated."

"How so?"

"Because," said Bauer, "you may be right. We and the Russians had better plan to attack all the alien satellites at the same time commandos storm the s.h.i.+p on the ground."

* * * The F'thk amba.s.sador trotted briskly up the ramp into the gaping airlock. As was his custom, H'ffl was the last of the delegation to come aboard. He stood in the airlock, gazing serenely over six hundred thousand smiling Pakistanis, until the outer door thumped shut.

Ridiculous two-sided creatures.

"Helmet, clear. Unit, off." The effect of Rualf's first command was to give him a view of the cargo bay.

The robot through whose cameras he had been seeing remained in the airlock. His second command put the robot itself into its idle mode. Stiff from spending much of an Earth day inside the teleoperations gear, he cautiously disengaged his limbs from its delicate controls. With a squeal of delight, he freed his sensor stalks from the restrictive helmet. All around him, members of the troupe were extracting

themselves from their own equipment. They all moved like Rualf felt: clumsy and stiff from long confinement.

It was night s.h.i.+ft by s.h.i.+p's time, and he strode grandly through the mostly empty corridors to the

officers' mess. Control of a F'thk required precise motions of the digits; flexing and stretching and

moving boldly felt wonderful.

His mood was far from the euphoria the strutting suggested. The humans, in a display of sly animal cunning, continued in their stubborn refusal to destroy themselves. The Pakistani junta, the true subjects of this visit, were not progressing toward an attack on India with nearly the speed Rualf would have liked. At least the generals had rounded up a good crowd of extras.

How long until the captain's still good-natured rumblings of impatience turned serious? How long until the captain insisted on a return to civilization? Or could Grelben, his s.h.i.+p heavily mortgaged even before the interstellar detour, afford to go home without his cut of this film?

"No rest for the wicked," he announced to no one in particular. It was an Earth expression learned from one of the first freaks they had abducted The expression amused Rualf greatly. The freak, of course, was long beyond amus.e.m.e.nt. He changed direction on impulse, deferring his snack to go instead to the bridge.

"How was . . . Islamabad?" asked Grelben. The question was a courtesy; his attention was mostly on a

maintenance console.

"Fine, Captain. Very interesting." Rualf reared onto twos to thoughtfully flex the digits of his third extremity. "Could I have a word with you in private?"

"Take over," Grelben told a junior officer. "I want a report by s.h.i.+ft's end on the status of the environmental system. To Rualf he added, "Come to my cabin."

They walked in silence to the captain's quarters. Inside, Rualf admired the hologram of a Salt Sea