Infinity Beach (41 page)

“Get upstairs!”

The lighting changed abruptly, as if a curtain had passed
in front of a lamp. And something that looked like an oversized dragonfly appeared from behind the ship and glided out of the picture.

Kile screamed for Yoshi to look out, and then Kim heard more shouts, but nothing from Yoshi. Someone heavy—Tripley, it must have been—ran across the floor and pounded up the staircase. There were more cries, some now coming from Kane, and she heard a sickening crunch, the sound of flesh impacting and bones breaking.

Yoshi.

Now the heavy steps came back downstairs. Kim understood that Yoshi had fallen or been pushed off the stairway, that Tripley was trying to do something for her, and then he was swearing he would kill the bastards—those were his words—and he hurried back up the stairs and out of the laboratory.

The
Valiant
remained untouched on the table until the record stopped.

A new image appeared: Markis Kane in a black, loose-fitting shirt. The date advanced to August 11, 575. More than two years later.

Lines had appeared in his face, and for several seconds he merely stared out of the screen. Kim thought he appeared unsure of himself. Not at all the Kane she’d come to know.

“I have no way of knowing,” he said, “who will hear this account of the
Hunter
, and of the destruction of Severin Village. We are all culpable, everyone who was on the mission. For the sake of the others, and perhaps for my own reputation, I would have preferred these events continue as they have, one unremarked, the other unexplained. But I must assume that the listener knows enough that the rest should be made clear.

“Let me admit at the outset that the primary responsibility for the disaster that overtook Severin Village on April 3, 573, is mine. I consented against my better judgment to the seizure of the celestial vessel. I suggested and executed the tactic for bringing it aboard ship, an act which resulted di
rectly in the death of Emily Brandywine. I further failed to dissuade Kile Tripley in his intention to bring the vessel to Greenway, even though I knew there was a potential for precisely the kind of disaster that occurred. That I have not stepped forward and acknowledged these facts has been dishonorable. I hope, before the truth emerges, as it surely must, I will be safely dead, beyond the grip of public opprobrium, or of any but divine justice.

“There was no indication of life aboard the celestial at any time after we had taken it onboard. We assumed that Kile’s attack on the vessel had killed whatever had been inside. We had mixed emotions about that. It was not the way one wants first contact to occur. But they had, after all, taken Emily’s life.

“Kile’s intention was to keep the discovery secret for a time, and to bring in a few discreet researchers. He planned to use one of several laboratories available to the Foundation, for the purpose of dissecting the artifact and retrieving its secrets. But the problem was that the laboratories were all located in heavily populated areas.

“We did not know how the vessel was powered. But we thought it wise to assume it used the only fuel we knew of that made entry into transdimensional space possible: antimatter. That presented us with a unique problem. If they did indeed use antimatter, there was always the possibility of a breach in the containment system. Should that happen, should its power reach so low a level that it could not maintain the magnetic bottle, the vessel would explode, and take us and a sizable portion of the neighborhood with it. Consequently we needed a lab in a remote location.

“I should add parenthetically that we felt we had time, since every test we had run indicated that power was flowing through the ship, and that maintenance systems did seem to be stable. Of course, as the event showed, much of this was guesswork.

“To reduce the danger, Kile decided that the Foundation would sponsor a lab on Shimmer, where an accident could harm no one except volunteer technicians. A hypercomm
message was sent before we left Alnitak, directing that work be started immediately. Nevertheless, it would be several months before the facility could be ready.

“In my own defense, I should point out that I argued throughout that the artifact be left in orbit around one of the Jovians in the Helian system, where there could be no danger to anyone. But it was too much to ask of Kile, who was anxious to get to a place where they would have the capability to inspect the find. At the very least, he maintained, the bodies of the crew had to be examined as quickly as possible.

“Kile elected to take it to his summer home in Severin. It was a compromise choice, with less potential for disaster than there would have been in, say, Terminal City or Marathon. At the time, it seemed not unreasonable.

“I believed the chances for a catastrophe were slight, though what evidence I based that on I cannot now conceive. We thought, given a few days, we could determine the nature of the fuel and the state of any containment system. Unfortunately, we were not given a few days.

“We had no difficulty getting the artifact past the customs people. Yoshi walked it through, describing it as a toy for a nephew. She gave it a modest value, and was told it fell within her exemption.

“We took the artifact to Kile’s home, where it turned out that the equipment he had available for analysis was considerably less than he’d implied. We had to go out looking for almost everything we needed. The result was that we wasted the little time we had. For example, we needed a full day simply to locate a Vanover sensor, which would allow us to look into the interior.

“I’m not altogether certain of some specifics regarding the events of April 3, because I was upstairs when I first realized there was a problem. Kile and Yoshi were down in the lab and they started screaming. I ran for the stairs and saw Yoshi coming up. She was scared out of her wits.

“Then I saw that an
entity
very much like a living cloud had apparently emerged from the ship. It immediately attacked Yoshi. When Kile and I went to her rescue, it released
her, and she fell off the staircase, struck her head, and must have been dead when Kile reached her. Meanwhile, the entity came after me. It delivered an electrical shock, which left me temporarily stunned. As I went down, I thought I saw a small vehicle, a tiny lander if you will, glide past me in the creature’s wake. It was hard to be certain, because I was a bit shaken up. Furthermore I’d sliced an arm as I fell and had got blood in my eyes. In any event,
something
blew a hole in a window, and the cloud and the lander, if that’s indeed what it was, disappeared into the night.

“At about the same time Kile must have seen he could do nothing for Yoshi. He stormed upstairs, and asked me where the intruders had gone.

“I pointed to the window, and without another word he raced after them. I tried to dissuade him, and hurried outside just in time to see him lifting off the pad. I called after him not to go, but he persisted.

“I raised him on his commlink. He told me he was tracking the celestials, that he had them on his screen, and that he intended to make sure of them this time. Then he told me he would call me when it was over, and he signed off. I made repeated efforts to contact him after that, but he didn’t respond.

“I went back to see if I could do anything for Yoshi. But she was dead. A few minutes later, I heard the blast that blew the side out of Mount Hope. The house shook and the lights dimmed and went out. When I went outside, debris was still raining down on the town.

“Fires burned everywhere. There were screams in the wreckage.

“And God help me I knew it had been the fuel cells, that the celestials had somehow transferred them to the lander, and that Kile and I were responsible.

“I did what I could to help. Emergency teams from Eagle Point and elsewhere came in quickly. I tried again to raise Kile, but I never heard from him again.

“At the time I believed people would know who had done it. How could they not know? We were just back, the explosion had been triggered by antimatter, Kile was almost cer
tainly dead in the blast. We had another crew member missing, and a third dead in the village. Clearly we had been up to something.

“Nevertheless I could not face public humiliation, and I did what I could to keep these events from coming to the attention of the authorities. It seemed to me two things needed to be accomplished.

“The first was to dispose of Yoshi’s body, so that it would not be found at the scene of the disaster and, when she was identified, raise even more questions. I wrapped it in plastic, weighted it, and put her in the river, above the dam, in the deepest part.

“Second, I had to remove the starship. I’d decided to bury it in the mountains, and then try to ride out the storm of suspicion which I knew would rise, and which indeed
did
rise, after the event. But when I got back to Kile’s villa, to my horror his mother had arrived and taken charge of things. I had no immediate opportunity to retrieve the microship, so I left it, hoping that no one would recognize it for what it was. Several days later, when I visited her, she was talking about sending it to her grandson.

“The thing that attacked Yoshi is still loose in the mountains. People come back with stories, and it has become something of a local celebrity, although fortunately very few take it seriously. And they are written off as lunatics.

“I have felt some sympathy for the creature, lost and alone in a strange world. I do not believe it meant to injure Yoshi, but only wished to clear the way for the escape vehicle. I’ve even gone looking for it on occasion. If it’s there, and if it recognizes me, it stays away.

“The lost crew of the microship, in spite of everything, has my respect. They killed two, and possibly three, of our people. Yet they must have known an explosion was imminent, and they took the fuel with them anyway. Did they do it for some incomprehensible reason? Or did they recognize they were in a populated area and sacrificed themselves in an effort to save creatures for whom they should have had no concern and no sympathy?”

The three great stars in Orion rose out of the sea at about nine o’clock. Kim sat on her deck, watching them. Next door, they were celebrating a birthday with loud music and rockets. When the noise subsided and the lights eventually went out, she was still there.

“And
you
thought Tripley’s grandmother put the body in the river.” Matt’s eyes contained a rare twinkle.

“I couldn’t imagine who else might have done it. I never even thought of Kane.”

“Do you think Tora knows?”

“She knows.” They were on the sundeck at Kim’s home. It was a trifle cool but the day was pleasant and the sound of the surf soothing.

“I wonder what the customs people will say when they find out somebody smuggled a starship past them.” His eyes closed. “So what are you going to do now? You can’t really sit on something like this.”

“What do you suggest?”

“Turn it over to Woodbridge.”

“Then what?”

“Then nothing. We’re out of it at that point.”

“Matt—”

“Look, Kim, I understand how you feel. The reputations of Kane and Tripley are hanging out there. People think they’re killers. But they’re the ones who mismanaged everything. You have an agreement with Woodbridge and he’s ab
solutely right. We’re just going to have to swallow this as best we can.”

She stared out to sea. “Matt, we aren’t talking reputations anymore. Or politics. Think about what happened out there. At Alnitak.”

“They blundered.”

“Yes, they did. They encountered a vehicle from another civilization, and they
hijacked
it.”

“I know.”

“One of the most important events in human history. We need to find a way to set things right.”

“Are we talking about the
celestials
?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

“Kim, how in heaven can we do that? It’s
done
.
Fini
. Too late.”

“Maybe not. We could try mounting another mission. Go back to Alnitak and try again to talk to them.”

“
That’s
good. Wasn’t it you the other day who was calling them murderous sons of bitches? Who wanted to kill them all? Wasn’t it you who stirred up Woodbridge? Warned him that we shouldn’t let anybody
near
the little bastards? I think that’s quoted correctly.”

“Matt—”

“—Who encouraged him to cancel Beacon? Which project, by the way, the director was proud of? And which your colleagues had been working on for
years
?”

“Matt, I was wrong. Think about what happened. The crew of the
Valiant
sacrificed themselves to save members of a species that had kidnapped and marooned them. Why do you think they did that?”

“I don’t know. Maybe they weren’t very bright.”

“I think they’re worth getting to know.”

A couple of joggers were passing. They waved, and Kim and Flexner waved back. “Flip-flop,” he said. “Are these things dangerous or not?”

“Of course they’re dangerous. But think how the
Hunter
incident must have looked to them. Look, we know that the
Valiant
had a hyperspace capability. That would also mean
they’d have hypercomm. If they were in trouble, as apparently they were, they’d already sent out a call for help. What would they have done when the
Hunter
arrived? Another message, right? ‘My God, you ought to see this huge son of a bitch that just showed up.’”

“Okay.”

“And what do they say next?”

“‘They’re trying to grab us.’”

“Exactly. The transmission probably gets cut off in the middle. That’s why Solly and I found an unfriendly welcome when we arrived in the neighborhood. Ask yourself how
we’
d react if a giant ship grabbed one of ours. No wonder they wanted to know our address.” She listened to him breathe and wondered why he was so fearful. Why was there no one like Solly in the upper levels of the organization?

Flexner shook his head. “It’s too late to repair the damage now. I mean, how can you do it? It looks as if it’s a shoot-first situation out there. And we can’t even talk to them.”

“Sure we can.”

“Oh yeah. Two-four-six-eight. That’s good.”

“Matt, we’ve got to talk with something other than language. Something they’ll understand.”

He got up, walked to the end of the deck, and looked out at the sea. “What would you suggest?”

“The
Valiant
. I think we go back and do a gesture.”

“Meaning—?”

“Return the
Valiant.
Tell them we’re sorry and leave it to them to figure out what the words mean. The important thing is the gesture. So we stand out there, give them a clear shot at us, show them we trust them, and return their ship.”

“Sounds like a formula for getting killed.”

“Maybe,” she said. “But people who’ll sacrifice themselves for strangers—” A couple of kids playing tag ran giggling through the yard and past the Institute flyer. Kim watched them for a minute.

“Let me think it over,” said Flexner. “We can make a judgment on that more easily after we’ve had a good look at the thing. After we have a better idea what their technology
looks like.” He gazed at her uncertainly. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I don’t think we can risk doing the lab work, Matt.”

His face hardened. “Why not?”

“Because it’ll get out. I don’t believe we’re capable of keeping the secret. Once it’s out, we’ll lose the ship and that’ll be the end.”

“We can keep it quiet,” he insisted. “I’ve been careful about the people we’re bringing in.” He sounded frightened.

“No. We’re only going to have one chance to do this right.”

“Kim, it really doesn’t matter what you and I think. Woodbridge would never allow it.”

“I agree. So we don’t tell him.”

“No.” He shook his head. “We can’t do this.”

Come on, Matt, show some guts for once.
“Then you can forget about the
Valiant
. It’ll stay where it is.”

“Kim, I wish you’d be reasonable.”

She pressed her advantage: “We’ll have to move on this before word gets out that we
have
a celestial. We’ll have to plan the rendezvous in such a way that nothing would be at risk except the ship and crew. Strip the data banks so there’s no way to trace them back here, even in a worst-case scenario. Give everybody poison, if you want.”

“Kim, you’re putting me in a terrible position.”

“I know.” She looked at him. “Make it happen, Matt.”

“Phil will never allow it.”

“Don’t tell him, either.”

“
What?
How can I not tell
Phil
?”

“Matt, this time
you
have to make the call.”

He got up, took out his remote, and started the flyer. “I’ll let you know,” he said.

She watched the aircraft lift into the sky, retrieved the Kane disk, relabeled it
ACCOUNTING
, and left it on the coffee table. In plain sight. Then she sat quietly for a few minutes watching the tide come in. “Shep, give me Solly.”

“I disapprove, Kim. Your state of mind precludes—”

“Shep—”

She heard the electronic whine. It took longer than usual this time. But Solly appeared, wearing diving gear. He frowned, said something uncomplimentary about Shepard, removed his fins and converter, sat down on a virtual bench, and looked at Kim.
“Hi, babe,”
he said.

“Hello, Solly.” Her strength ebbed out of her. “I wish we could do it again.”

“Do what?”
he asked.

“Dive,” she said. “Dive deep.”

He nodded.

She listened to the sea. “I miss you, Solly.”

“I know. You’ll just have to give it time. There’ll be others.”

“Please don’t—”

“Sorry.”
And after a moment:
“I shouldn’t stay.”

“That’s Shepard talking.”

“No. It’s me.”
He gazed for a long moment into her eyes. The room seemed very quiet.
“I have a suggestion.”

“Okay?”

“I don’t want you to take offense.”

She knew what was coming. “I won’t, Solly.”

“It would be best if you let me be. For a while anyhow, until you’ve got things back together.”

She stared at him. His image got blurry. “Solly, I can’t stand it, not having you here.”

“I know.”

“You don’t. You never went through anything like this.”

“Kim, you were the best part of my life. And I wouldn’t trade the voyage to Alnitak for anything. The price was worth it.”

He grew indistinct and faded gradually, very unlike Shep’s usual exit technique. When he was gone she got up, started for the bedroom, but paused at the foot of the stairs. “Shep?”

“Yes, Kim?”

“How did
you
know what happened on the
Hammersmith
?”

The AI didn’t answer.

Two days later Matt called to tell her they were moving ahead with the Alnitak mission and that he was optimistic. She asked whether there was anything she could do.

“Just stay out of trouble,” he said.

It was midafternoon. She’d just gotten home after completing a luncheon speaking engagement at the Seabright Literary Society. A heavy rain was pounding the island. At this time of year storms came in every day at a quarter to three. They moved as punctually as the trains. She was sprawled on the divan, listening to the weather, thinking about the
Valiant
, when Shep broke in.
“Kim,”
he said,
“Tora Kane would like to speak with you. She says it’s urgent.”

Kim looked around the room. It was not very tidy. “Put her through, Shep. Audio.” And after the click: “Hello, Tora. What can I do for you?”

“Kim, I’m at home. Can you come over? There’s something I want to show you.”

“Sure. What’s it about?”

“Not on an open circuit. I’ll tell you when you get here. Please hurry.”

So they were on a first-name basis now. Puzzled, Kim sent for a taxi. Ten minutes later she was in the air, headed north. Rain beat down on the aircraft and the wind gave her a rough ride. But the storm subsided as she came in sight of Tora’s villa. The flyer descended onto the pad and Kim got out, instructing the vehicle to wait. She splashed through puddles and climbed onto the porch.

“Can I help you?”
asked the house AI.

“Dr. Kane asked me to come by.”

“I’m sorry. Dr Kane is not at home.”

“That can’t be right. Are you sure?”

“She is not here. But I will be happy to relay a message to her, if you wish.”

Kim stared at the front door. The house stared back.

She used her commlink to find Kane’s number and then put through a call. It chimed twice.

“Kane.”

“Tora, this is Kim Brandywine.”

“Hello, Brandywine. What can I do for you?”

“I’m at your place. You asked me to come over.”

“You’re where?”

“At your place.”

“My place? I don’t know anything about it. Who’d you talk to?”

“Forget it,” she said. She switched to Shep’s circuit, but he didn’t answer.

Not good. She strode quickly to the taxi and ordered it back home.

Two hours later she walked into Matt’s office. He looked up from his desk, surprised to see her, startled at her appearance. “You okay?” he asked.

She closed the door behind her and sat down. “Somebody’s been at Shep.”

“Uh-oh. What did they get?”

“I think we can assume everything.”

“The Kane disk?”

“That too.”

He looked around the office as if suddenly wondering whether it was secure. “Why? Who would do it?”

“I can only think of one person.”

“Woodbridge?”

“Yep.”

“So what’s
everything
? Do they know what we talked about this morning?”

“There’s no way to be sure. Shep didn’t have any of it, but it’s possible somebody was listening.”

Matt nodded slowly. “So what did they get that they didn’t already have?”

“The
Valiant
.”

“They know where it
is
?”

“They know it exists.”

“That’s not so good.” He inhaled. Exhaled. Looked uncertain. “I was going to call you.”

“About—?”

“I’ve spoken with Dr. Agostino.”

“I thought we agreed we wouldn’t bring him in.”

“Come on, Kim. Be reasonable. He understands the situation and he’s willing to set up a contact team.”

“
He’s
probably why I got raided.”

“I don’t believe it. When’d it happen?”

“Around three.”

“I talked to him less than an hour ago.” It was almost five o’clock.

“All right,” she said. “Look, they’ll be coming after the
Valiant
. We need to get moving.”

“The plan was to leave next week. We thought
that
was pushing it.”

“Not good enough. We need to be on our way tomorrow.”

“That’s not practical.”

“Forget practical. We’d be better off clearing out tonight. Tell everybody we go tomorrow. Anybody who can’t be there, leave without.”

“You’ll need supplies, Kim. This kind of thing can’t be managed overnight.”

“This one has to be. Do it overnight or forget it.”

“I’ll do what I can,” he said. “We’ll be using the
McCollum
. It’s in port and ready to go. All we need is the people.”

“Then get them started. Have we got a pilot?”

“Ali Kassem. Do you know him?”

“Met him once or twice.” Solly had spoken well of him. That was good enough.

Matt called her at home late that evening. “We got a late request,” he said. “Can you talk to the Terminal City Business Association tomorrow?”

It was the signal. They would leave tomorrow night.

She complained that it was short notice, and he apolo
gized, said he’d originally planned to handle it himself, but something had come up, and he’d appreciate it.

“Okay,” she said. “But you owe me.”

And she went to bed happy.