The Immortality Option Part 14

While other Taloids held the tub steady, Moses climbed in and wedged himself with pads of rubber and plastic packing. Em gave a few last words of encouragement, and his a.s.sistant pa.s.sed Moses the staff that they had found in trials to be useful for steering and clearing away obstacles, along with a sword and lance for defense and supplies for the journey. Then, with a shove, the outlandish craft was away, bobbing and picking up speed down the descending roller ramp, then upending to plunge down onto a wider transfer line running below. It disappeared from sight beneath an overhead cable duct with a final turn from the intrepid mariner and a salute with his metal staff.

The others made their way back to their respective vehicles to return to Genoa, their silence betraying a need for rea.s.surance that the risk they were asking Moses to take was justified. As their carriage began moving, Thelma told Zambendorf and Abaquaan again about one of the astronomers she had been talking to, who had mentioned a sudden flurry of interest among Weinerbaum's people in the star patterns that had existed a million years previously. "I mean, it can't be a coincidence, can it?" she asked, looking from one to the other. "Wehave to be right. Moses isn't doing this for nothing. All it can mean is that Weinerbaum is working with revived aliens."

Now that the immediate task of getting Moses on his way had been accomplished, Zambendorf gave vent to the anger he had been bottling up.

"How is it that at a time like this, with such staggering discoveries taking place right in front of their noses, these so-called intelligent people seem incapable of forgetting their petty jealousies and getting their act together for once?" His beard bristled behind the face piece of his helmet, and he waved his arms as indignantly as it was possible to do in an EV suit. "For all anybody knows, this could represent a threat the like of which has never been encountered before in the entire history of the human race.

Heavens . . . we're talking about aliens from another star system! . . . We know absolutely nothing of their background, psychology, disposition, values, ethics, if they have any-or anything about them."

"You think Weinerbaum and his people could be walking into something?" Abaquaan asked. It didn't really need confirming.

"He's deluding himself, I know it-probably with some notion of commonality of intellect rising above origins," Zambendorf said. "Yet he monopolizes the resources while we have to creep about in the dark, launching robots in bathtubs down conveyor lines to try and find out what's going on. Insanity is the only word for it. We could be letting ourselves in for anything out here. Sittingducks, Otto, and they can't even see it. Sitting ducks."

Zambendorf's apprehensions turned out to have come not a moment too soon. When they got back to Genoa Base after calling for a NASO bus to pick them up from Camelot, reports were already coming in over the Earthlink of major disruptions suddenly affecting military command and communications networks and NASO's logistics and launch-management systems, in particular the oneshandling theOrion turnaround. Some of the hara.s.sed project managers were already saying that the s.h.i.+p's liftout date from Earth might have to be put back.

In the communications room Zambendorf groaned as he listened to as much as could be put together of the details. Things like this didn't just "happen." The aliens had somehow already penetrated Earth itself. Then one of the technicians let slip a comment about a direct-access trunk link that had just been run out to Experimental Station 3.

Which was as much as needed to be said about how the aliens had done it.

29.

With Fellburg and Abaquaan doing all they could to keep up, Zambendorf stormed into the secretarial section in front of the part of Genoa Base where Weinerbaum and his people worked.

"Where is he?" Zambendorf bellowed.

The head records clerk, a lean, pinched-faced man named Jessop who always acted as if he were the sole custodian of the database of the National Academy of Sciences, rose, puffing indignantly while at the same time struggling to preserve his air of disdain. "Are you referring to Dr. Weinerbaum?"

"Of course I am. Who else could have talked them into it? Where is he-here or out at ES3?"

"He is in his office currently, but I'm afraid-" But Zambendorf was already heading for the doorway leading through to the inner sanctum. Jessop stepped forward to block the way, raising his hands restrainingly. "Excuse me,but-" Joe Fellburg lifted him effortlessly by the armpits and deposited him to one side, spluttering and protesting.

They found Weinerbaum in one of the lab bays, standing with some of his senior scientists before a whiteboard covered with mathematical expressions. One of the charts on the surrounding wall was divided into about a dozen columns, the first headed "Cyril" and the rest with an a.s.sortment of other names. Entries such as "Comp sci?" "Peter's sister," "With org'n that sent s.p.a.cecraft," and "Astronomer"

appeared in the s.p.a.ces beneath. Another board listed what were evidently the basic properties of a planet.

"What the h.e.l.l have you done?" Zambendorf demanded.

Weinerbaum had had a moment to prepare himself when he heard the commotion outside. He turned regally, still with a marker pen in one hand, feigning mild amus.e.m.e.nt as a demonstration to his entourage of how to deal with a pestering clown.

"My word. A tantrum, I do believe. Surely you're not askingme ! Don't tell me your psychic powers have failed you, Herr Zambendorf." One of the scientists snickered. Weinerbaum's expression hardened. "I think you're getting a bit above yourself," he told Zambendorf. "Don't let the fact that I've chosen to be tolerant lead you into any mistaken presumptuousness about where we stand. We are engaged in some rather important scientific business at the moment. I suggest that you leave us to get on with it and save your energies for attending to yours."

"When all of Earth is affected, it is my business!" Zambendorf exploded. "It's everyone's business!"

"All of Earth? What preposterous nonsense-"

Jessop appeared in the doorway through which Zambendorf and the others had entered. "I tried to stop them, Dr. Weinerbaum, but I was physically a.s.sailed." He pointed a quivering finger at Fellburg. "

Him!"

Weinerbaum nodded curtly. "I'm sure you did your best, Jessop. Thank you, but we'll take care of it now." He directed a withering look back at Zambendorf. "Now, what is the meaning of this? Bursting in here like hoodlums and a.s.saulting my staff. Interrupting important scientific work. Pus.h.i.+ng your nose into matters that you have neither the background nor the qualifications to understand, whatever your worthless publicity propaganda says." The vitriol gushed freely; Weinerbaum had been waiting a long time to say this. "You are completely out of order and have no authorization to be in this part of thebase. Kindly remove yourself and your a.s.sociates immediately or I'll have the guard commander called to remove you forcibly."

Zambendorf swept it all aside with an impatient wave. "Why don't you be straight for once instead of playing at politics and meddling in things thatyou don't understand?" he retorted. "Very well, if you're going to insist on acting as if you don't know what I'm talking about, then I'll say it for you." Zambendorf motioned briefly at the charts on the wall. "You've discovered electronically preserved representations, inside the machines here on t.i.tan, of the aliens from a million years ago who started this whole thing off- and you've established communication with them. Not only that. Through NASO, you've given them direct access into Earthnet." Zambendorf shook his head incredulously. "On your own initiative, here, locally? With no recourse to higher authority? And now all kinds of problems are erupting. Yet you can stand there telling me thatI'm out of order? . . . What kind of criminally insane irresponsibility is this?"

Weinerbaum was visibly shaken by the revelation of just how much Zambendorf knew. But he rallied himself quickly and responded with haughty unrepentance. "Higher authority? Which higher authority are you talking about? Surely you don't mean GSEC's bought hacks in Was.h.i.+ngton?You wouldn't want them in control, either, by your own admission. The military takes its orders from the same quarter. And the loyalties at NASO HQ are simply an unknown." Weinerbaum's manner became condescending, as if he were explaining a point of higher theoretical abstract-ness to an errant student.

"Herr Zambendorf, I commend you on your little piece of espionage. But please try to grasp the significance of what we're dealing with. We are talking about the first-ever contact of our species with genuine extraterrestrials. It's far too big a matter to be left to the kinds of minds that have produced the political imbecilities that fill the pages of history, to military automatons, or to bureaucratic opportunists.

It is an occasion that must be served by intellects sharing a commonality of interests that have transcended those kinds of jealousies and insecurities. The aliens understand it fully, and you may take my word for it that they speak with an acc.u.mulated wisdom that extends centuries beyond ours."

Weinerbaum gestured to indicate the colleagues around him, modestly soaking up the reflected radiance.

His voice fell to an appropriately grave concluding note. "That is why we had to do this in the way we did."

Zambendorf was horrified. It was everything he'd feared. He extended his hands imploringly. "No!

Wrong! Can'tyou understand? Whatever other factors might come into it, the crux is that we're dealing with the descendants of a long line ofsurvivors -survivors likeh.o.m.o sapiens on Earth. Whatever else these aliens might be, they are, before anything else, products of the same talent for pursuing and securing their own interests first. And exactly whatare their interests?" Zambendorf sent a challenging look around the room. n.o.body answered him. He nodded, having gained at least some satisfaction.

"n.o.body knows. Whose idea was it to give them the link?" He turned back to Weinerbaum. "Didyou suggest it? I can't imagine why you would. So it must have been the aliens who requested it, right?"

Weinerbaum nodded stiffly, not taking at all well to being cross-examined in front of his own staff in this way. "Very well, yes, they did. What of it?"

Zambendorf groaned and shook his head. "Look, whatever their real reason, it wasn't to rapturize with fellow intellectuals about the final secrets of the universe. Haven't you heard the news coming through from Earth? Systems are starting to go down everywhere. These aliens have got their own agenda. And what we're seeing is only the start of it."

Weinerbaum thrust out his chin obstinately. "What would a mere entertainer know about intellectualism?" he scoffed. "All you seem capable of conceiving are the same paranoid suspicions as the other straitjacketed mentalities that have been the cause of all Earth's troubles since time immemorial- and that continue to plague us today. These are things that the aliens have had to deal with in the course of their own social evolution and about which they and we are fully in sympathy."

Weinerbaum drew a long breath and straightened himself up. "Very well. Since it appears that we are not to be left in peace until you know, I will tell you. The purpose of our action in conjunction with the Asterians, as we call them, is purely and simply to delay the launch of theOrion and, if possible, to get the military expedition that is scheduled to return here with it canceled permanently. The object is toavoid t.i.tan's being taken over by the political and commercial interests that would turn it into a manufacturing colony."

The sound of a tone announcing an incoming call came from somewhere nearby. A woman's voice answered. "h.e.l.lo, this is Dr. Weinerbaum's laboratory . . ."

Weinerbaum continued. "That is what you yourself wanted, is it not, Herr Zambendorf? The only difference in our situations that I can see is thatwe have been able to do something more conducive to our common goal than is likely to be achieved by parlor tricks or puerile guessing games with numbers . . . and that isall. The Asterians will confine themselves strictly to that objective. I have their leader's personal a.s.surance on it."

A woman appeared around a part.i.tion from the work area adjacent. She looked fl.u.s.tered. "I'm sorry to interrupt, Dr. Weinerbaum, but the base commander has just called. Something is locking out the trunk beam to Earth, and we can't regain control of it. Also, thes.h.i.+rasagi has just got news via its link that the commercial ground stations into j.a.pan are down, the Tokyo Stock Exchange has had to cease trading, and communications circuits westward into Asia are being disrupted. He asks if you would go to the communications room immediately."

But by that time the news coming in from Earth was almost an hour old. In his penthouse suite at the top of the GSEC headquarters building in New York, a bewildered Burton Ramelson was being deluged by reports of banking, manufacturing, transportation, administrative, and scientific systems collapsing everywhere. The global financial system was already in chaos, airlines were grounded, and whole telephone networks were seizing up. The entire global economy was suddenly confronting an escalating threat of total breakdown.

"What about theOrion? " he yelled at Warren Taylor, director of NASO's North American division, over a private, secure voice circuit that was still working to Was.h.i.+ngton. "Will the launch be put back much?"

"Put back?" Taylor's voice squawked. "Burton, you've got to be kidding! The way things are going, for the foreseeable future you can forget any notion of sending a military expedition-or anything else- anywhere. Period."

Ramelson was stunned. "But . . . what about developments on t.i.tan?" he stammered.

Taylor snorted audibly over the line. "You can forget that, too. Until further notice, they're on their own out there."

30.

Harold Mackeson listened with incredulity and mounting alarm as Weinerbaum, now totally deflated and suddenly weary under the shock of the news, filled in the story about the discovery of the aliens, the scientists' decision to keep the setup at ES3 a secret until they knew more, and the real reason why he had asked for an independent channel to Earth.

Zambendorf, Fellburg, and Abaquaan had also come to the communications room; n.o.body was questioning their right to a place on the team now. Weinerbaum's differences with Zambendorf had become as irrelevant as the pettiness among others that he himself had railed about only a short time before. Even so, he couldn't quite bring himself to acknowledge the fact openly-not yet, anyhow.

Naturally, Mackeson was furious at the deceit. But he was also a mature enough administrator to accept the fact that while authority could be delegated, responsibility never could be. Ultimately, whatever the faults and omissions of others, accountability for everything that happened at Genoa Base outside the direct military command chain devolved on him. Therefore, he suppressed his acrimony as more fitting to another time, conserving his energy for the demands of the moment. Not that there were too many choices to consider. In fact, there was only one immediate course of action that he could see with any point to it."Let's get out there to ES3 and find out what these jokers want," he told the others.

The NASO flyer came down in the cleared area in front of Experimental Station 3 less than thirty minutes later. Two British marine commandos in military EV suits attached a heated, flexible tunnel to the mating f.l.a.n.g.e of the access lock; Weinerbaum, Mackeson, and two other NASO officers, along with Zambendorf, Fellburg, and Abaquaan, who were still with them, walked through into the entry chamber of the two connected huts that formed the central hub of the station.

The interior looked like the control room of a submarine, with consoles, cabinets, shelves, and workstations filling every inch of usable s.p.a.ce, as became normal in every human habitat on t.i.tan. It was the riot of improvisation that researchers delighted in: panels hacked out of unfinished aluminum, open racks of circuit cards festooned with hand-soldered wiring, bundles of cable twisting all over the floor- the whole giving the impression of resulting more from some gleeful technophile's experiment in expressiveness than from any purposeful design.

A panel above a worktop in one corner contained a screen and controls connected to the interface setup, which was quiescent at that moment. Weinerbaum summarized how the translation arrangement with the aliens worked and the vital role the Taloids from Padua played. There were eighteen of them in their special quarters at ES3 now, working in turns, usually several at a time, and able to take time off between s.h.i.+fts. Between them they handled communication for twelve Asterians, although all twelve hardly ever needed to talk at the same time. There was also a thirteenth set of code groupings that represented, as far as the scientists had been able to make out, not an alien as such but a form of artificial intelligence that had accompanied them, possibly as a technical "a.s.sistant." But whatever its precise function, it seemed preoccupied with internal processes and had not yet communicated externally with the Terrans.

The rest of the room contained display and processing equipment connected to links from various other places on t.i.tan that the scientists had been investigating. Weinerbaum called it the "monitoring center." The intention was to build the various activities scattered about the surface into some kind of bigger picture.

Mackeson had no questions when Weinerbaum had finished and replied simply with a brief nod in the direction of the interface setup. "Let's get on with it, then," he said tightly.

"Er, yes . . . of course." Weinerbaum led them over to the panel in the corner and eased himself into the operator's chair. Mackeson and Zambendorf squeezed themselves into the s.p.a.ce behind, while the others found the best vantage points they could nearby. The regular ES3 staff watched curiously from farther back, while others bunched in the entrance to the connector from the other hut.

Weinerbaum operated switches, then called something to the back of the room. A voice recited several numbers in response. Weinerbaum pressed some b.u.t.tons, entered a code into a touchpad, and waited. The screen remained blank, but a scratchy voice, like something from an ancient needle-and-groove recording, said, "Yes, Weinerbaum?"

"Cyril?"

"This Ford. Cyril busy." "Ford" was the name the Terrans had given to one of Cyril's companions, who seemed to have been with some kind of Asterian manufacturing corporation.

"We wish to talk, please," Weinerbaum said curtly.

"I busy also."

Behind Weinerbaum, Mackeson and Zambendorf exchanged wondering shakes of their heads at the spectacle of one of their company talking intelligibly with an alien ent.i.ty from another star.

"You lied to us," Weinerbaum said. "You broke our agreement. All of Earth is being disrupted. We wish to talknow. "

"Said busy. Go away."

From where he was standing, Zambendorf could see the color rising at the back of Weinerbaum's neck. "We can still sever the link," Weinerbaum said."No big deal. Smart replicating software-bomb now Earth-resident. Link no longer needed."

Weinerbaum's knuckles whitened against the armrest of his chair. "Ford, I-"

"Ford gone. This is Watson." The interface rendered all Asterian responses in the same voice.

"Watson" had been with what sounded like a computing research organization.

"Whoever," Weinerbaum said tightly. "Youare still t.i.tan-resident. We activated the codes. We can deactivate them."

"Now protected," the voice scoffed. "Maximum-security deny-access measures. No chance."

"We can physically isolate the hardware that contains you," Weinerbaum persisted. "If necessary, destroy it."

"Which hardware? Safety copies distributed in nodes all over t.i.tan. Untraceable. So will you destroy all of it? How? All your weapons stranded on Earth. Permanently. Ho-ho." An awkward silence came over the lab. Weinerbaum didn't know where to go from there. n.o.body else had anything to suggest.

Then the voice said, "Okay. Cyril here now. So talk if want. Only way peace from simian pests."

The screen that had so far been blank became active suddenly and presented an upper-body image of the strangest creature those new to ES3 had ever seen. It had two arms, hinging more from the front of the shoulders than laterally, each with four fingers that seemed to have more segments than the human three. The head was an elongated inverted cone, pallid blue, widening at the top to accommodate two enormous circular eyes that moved independently, and rounding into a flattish dome like the top of a carrot, with a Mohicanlike plume of green and orange. The mouth was protrusive and rigid-looking and seemed not very mobile or expressive; the ears were high-set and diminutive. But strangest of all were the structures of complex folds growing up from each shoulder and apparently attached to the sides of the head, though sufficiently loosely not to impair head movement. They were brightly colored and in constant agitation, suggesting, if anything, some exotic variety of sea anemone waving in underwater currents.

Zambendorf and the others could only stare, awed. Weinerbaum said without looking back, "Of course, this isn't a picture of anything physically real-we're interacting with electronic representations.

More recently we've been getting these visual depictions in addition to the original speech-only output.

It's obviously a synthesis, but it probably does reflect fairly authentically how the Asterians looked. The form suggests descent from an ancestral stock somewhat akin to our bird family. The epaulet structures seem to be the primary means of visual expression, though how to read them is still a mystery."

The epaulets on one side stiffened and moved suddenly in unison for a moment, and the voice spoke again. "You make child deal and I am blamed one? No. You stupid. What kind of business-Earthman gives away? Earth run by simpletons. Lucky has lasted this long time."

Weinerbaum murmured to the others, "What we would consider common courtesy does not seem to be part of their innate disposition, I'm afraid. That has been one of the main obstacles to establis.h.i.+ng a satisfactory rapport." He looked back at the screen and said, "Listen, Cyril, I-"

"No. You listen," the alien interrupted. "Terrans have served purpose. Important Asterian business waits doing. I do you big compliment talking here. You see too late. Walk into problems. Too bad.

Want to know Asterians' want-things-list before go away? No nose-skin off us now. Okay. Is so." The screen showed a part of t.i.tan's machinescape outside, which could have been anywhere.

"All t.i.tan machine life is ours. Asterians. Origins from our civilization. Comes to t.i.tan by our s.p.a.ce science before humans are existed. All totally is Asterian property."

"What about the Taloids?" Weinerbaum interjected. "t.i.tan is their heritage. Have they no rights to property?"

The image on the screen made a gesture and ruffled one of its shoulder adornments. "Taloids just freak machines. No claims. No plans Taloid recycle-sc.r.a.p. Asterians will control. Change as see fit to suit, redirect everything to our purposes, not human or Taloid purposes. Was aim of get-link Earth human stupids give away free. Since Asterians reactivate, learn awareness of here t.i.tan NASO Terrans,GSEC Terrans, military Terrans, all with different friend Terrans back at Earth Was.h.i.+ngton Europe, all too messed up that not even Terrans understand. Now as extra add j.a.paneses.h.i.+rasagi s.h.i.+p arrive with other plans, while Earth army preparingOrion s.h.i.+p come take t.i.tan control away from everybody. All an insane mess up. No thanks. Asterians have need nothing complications such. Things have to do more important."

The watchers crowding around behind Weinerbaum waited tensely. "What things?" he prompted after a few seconds.

But Cyril evidently felt that he had already been more obliging than necessary. "Talk enough," the image said. "Things have to do." And it vanished.

"Ford?" Weinerbaum tried. "Watson? . . . Anyone?" But all attempts to restore communication were unsuccessful.

The first reaction of Weinerbaum and the scientists was to call the aliens' bluff and try to deactivate them by isolating and shutting down the hardware concentrations in which they were located, as Weinerbaum had threatened. But it turned out that Watson had not been bluffing. Cutting off the local centers didn't stop the characteristic activity patterns that had been detected elsewhere. It appeared that the Asterians had indeed mapped alternative host systems and created interconnecting pathways, possibly all over t.i.tan. After three hours of testing, checking, and contacting workers at other sites, an exhausted Weinerbaum conceded defeat. "It seems that we're already too late-they have effectively distributed themselves through the whole system. The speed it's happening at is frightening. They've probably gained control over a significant portion of t.i.tan's capacity already."

"Then the question now is, What do they intend using it for?" Zambendorf replied.