The Peace War (10 page)

They were easy to frighten nonetheless. This Air Force general couldn't be a full-fledged member of the group. The NMAF manned a few hot-air balloons and dreamed of
the good old days. The closest they ever got to modern aircraft was a courtesy flight on
an Authority plane. He was here to say things their government wanted said but did not
have the courage to spit out directly.

The old officer finally ran down, and sat down. Hamilton gathered his papers and
moved to the podium. He looked mildly across at the New Mexico officials and let the
silence lengthen to significance.

It was probably a mistake to come here in person. Talking to national governments was
normally done by officers two levels below him in the Peace Authority. Appearing in
person could easily give these people an idea of the true importance of the incident.
Nevertheless, he had wanted to see these men close up. There was an outside chance they
were involved in the menace to the Peace he had discovered the last few months.

Finally he began. "Thank you, General, uh, Halberstamm. We understand your anxiety,
but wish to emphasize the Peace Authority's long-standing promise. No nuclear weapon
has exploded in nearly fifty years and none exploded yesterday in Greater Tucson."

The general spluttered. "Sir! The radiation! The blast! How can you say-"

Avery raised his hand and smiled for silence. There was a sense of noblesse oblige and
faint menace in the action. "In a moment, General. Bear with me. It is true: There was an
explosion and some radiation. But I assure you no one besides the Authority has nuclear
weapons. If there were, we would deal with them by methods you all know.

"In fact, if you consult your records, you will find that the center of the blast area
coincides with the site of a ten-meter confinement sphere generated — " he pretended to
consult his notes" — 5 July 1997."

He saw various degrees of shock, but no questions broke the silence. He wondered how
surprised they really were. From the beginning, he'd known there was no point in trying
to cover up the source of the blast. Old Alex Schelling, the President's science adviser,
would have put two and two together correctly.

I know that several of you have studied the open literature on confinement,"
and you,
Schelling, have spent a good many thousand cautious man-hours out in the Sandia ruins,
trying to duplicate the effect,
"but a review is in order.

"Confinement spheres-bobbles are not so much force fields as they are partitions,
separating the in and outside of their surfaces into distinct universes. Gravity alone can
penetrate. The Tucson bobble was originally generated around an ICBM over the arctic.
It fell to earth near its target, the missile fields at Tucson. The hell bomb inside exploded
harmlessly, in the universe on the far side of the bobble's surface.

"As you know, it takes the enormous energy output of the Authority's generator in
Livermore to create even the smallest confinement sphere. In fact, that is why the Peace
Authority has banned all energy-intensive usages, to safeguard this secret of keeping the
Peace. But once established, you know that a bobble is stable and requires no further
inputs to maintain itself."

"Lasting forever," put in old Schelling. It was not quite a question.

"That's what we all thought, sir. But nothing lasts forever. Even black holes undergo
quantum decay. Even normal matter must eventually do so, though on a time-scale
beyond imagination. A decay analysis has not been done for confinement spheres until
quite recently." He nodded to an assistant who passed three heavy manuscripts across the
table to the NM officials. Schelling scarcely concealed his eagerness as he flipped past
the Peace Authority Secret seal — the highest classification a government official ever
saw-and began reading.

"So, gentlemen, it appears that — like all things-bobbles do decay. The time constant
depends on the sphere's radius and the mass enclosed. The Tucson blast was a tragic,
fluke accident."

"And you're telling us that every time one of the damn things goes, it's going to make a
bang as bad as the bombs you're supposed to be protecting us from?"

Avery permitted himself to glare at the general. "No, I am not. I thought my
description of the Tucson incident was clear: There was an exploded nuclear weapon
inside that confinement."

"Fifty years ago, Mr. Avery, fifty years ago."

Hamilton stepped back from the podium. "Mr. Halberstamm, can you imagine what it's
like inside a ten-meter bobble? Nothing comes in or goes out. If you explode a nuke in
such a place, there is nowhere to cool off. In a matter of milliseconds, thermodynamic
equilibrium is reached, but at a temperature of several million degrees. The innocent
seeming bobble, buried in Tucson all these decades, contained the heart of a fireball.
When the bobble decayed, the explosion was finally released."

There was an uneasy stirring among the Strategic Studies Committee as those worthies
considered the thousands of bobbles that littered North America. Geraldo Alvarez, a
presidential confidant of such power that he had no formal position whatsoever, raised
his hand and asked diffidently, "How frequently does the Authority expect this to
happen?"

"Dr. Schelling can describe the statistics in detail, but in principle the decay is exactly
like that of other quantum processes: We can only speak of what will happen to large
numbers of objects. We could go for a century or two and not have a single incident. On
the other hand, it is conceivable that three or four might decay in a single year. But even
for the smallest bobbles, we estimate a time constant of decay greater than ten million
years."

"So they go off like atoms with a given half-life, rather than chicken eggs hatching all
at once?"

"Exactly, sir. A good analogy. And in one regard, I can be more specific and
encouraging: Most bobbles do not contain nuclear explosions. And large bobbles-even if
they contain 'fossil' explosions — will be harmless. For instance, we estimate the
equilibrium temperature produced by a nuke inside the Vandenberg or Langley bobbles
to be less than one hundred degrees. There would be some property damage
around the
perimeter, but nothing like in Tucson.

"And now, gentlemen, I'm going to give our side of the meeting over to Liaison
Officers Rankin and Nakamura." He nodded at his third-level people.
"
In particular, you
must decide
with them how much public attention to give this incident. "
And it
better not
be much
.'
"I must fly to
Los Angeles. Aztlán detected the explosion, and they deserve an
explanation, too."

He gestured his top Albuquerque man, the usual Peace rep to the highest levels of the
Republic, to leave with him. They walked out, ignoring the tightened lips and red faces
across the table. It was necessary to keep these people in their place, and one of the best
ways of doing that was to emphasize that New Mexico was just one fish among many.

Minutes later they were out of the nondescript building and on the street. Fortunately,
there were no reporters. The NM press was under fair control; besides, the existence of
the Strategic Studies Committee was itself a secret.

He and Brent, the chief liaison officer here, climbed into the limo, and the horses
pulled them into the afternoon traffic. Since Avery's visit was unofficial, he used local
vehicles, and there was no escort; he had an excellent view. The layout was similar to
that of the capitol of the old United States, if you could ignore the bare mountains that
jaggedly edged the sky. He could see at least a dozen other vehicles on the wide
boulevard. Albuquerque was almost as busy and cosmopolitan as an Authority enclave.
But that made sense: The Republic of New Mexico was one of the most powerful and
populous nations on Earth.

He glanced at Brent. "Are we clean?"

The younger man looked briefly puzzled, then said, "Yessir. We went over the limo
with those new procedures."

"Okay. I want to take the detail reports with me, but summarize. Are Schelling and
Alvarez and company as innocently surprised as they claim?"

"I'd stake the Peace on it, sir." From the look on Brent's face, the fellow understood that
was exactly what he was doing. "They don't have anything like the equipment you
warned us of. You've always supported a strong counter-intel department here. We
haven't let you down; we'd know if they were anywhere near being a threat."

"Hmm." The assessment agreed with Avery's every intuition. The Republic
government would do whatever they could get away with. But that was why he'd kept
watch on them all these years: He knew they didn't have the tech power to be behind
what he was seeing.

He sat back in the padded leather seat. So Schelling was "innocent." Well then, would
he buy the story Avery was peddling? Was it really a story at all? Every word Hamilton
spoke in that meeting was the absolute truth, reviewed and rereviewed by the science
teams at Livermore... But the whole truth it was not. The NM officials did not know
about the ten-meter bobble burst in Central Asia. The theory could explain that incident,
too, but who could believe that two decays would happen within a year after fifty years
of stability?

Like chicken eggs hatching all at once.
That was the image Alvarez had used. The
science team was certain it was simple, half-life decay, but they hadn't seen the big
picture, the evidence that had been trickling in for better than a year.
Like eggs hatching
... When it comes to survival, the rules of evidence become an art, and Avery felt with
dread certainty that someone, somewhere, had figured how to cancel bobbles.

The bandits' rifle fire lit the trees. There came another volley and another. Wili heard
Jeremy move, as if getting ready to jump up and return fire. He realized the Russians
must be shooting at themselves. The reflection that had fooled him had taken them in,
too. What would happen when they realized it was only a bobble that faced them? A
bobble and one rifle in the hands of an incompetent marksman?

The gunfire came to a ragged stop. "Now, Jeremy!" Naismith said. The larger boy
jumped into the open and swung his weapon wildly across the ravine. He fired the whole
clip. The rifle stuttered in an irregular way, as though on the verge of jamming. Its
muzzle flash lit the ravine. The enemy was invisible, except for one fellow vaguely seen
against the light-colored rock at the side of the cleft. That one had bad luck: He was
almost lifted off his feet by the impact of bullet on chest, and slammed back against the
rock.

Cries of pain rose from all along the ravine. How had Jeremy done it? Even one hit was
fantastic luck. And Jeremy Kaladze was the fellow who in daylight could miss the broad
side of a barn.

Jeremy slammed down beside him. "Did I g-get them all?" There was an edge of horror
in his voice. But he slipped another clip into his sawed-off weapon.

There was no return fire. But wait. The bandit lying by the outcrop — he was up and
running! The hit should have left him dead or crawling. Through the bushes below, he
could hear the others picking themselves up and running for the far end of the ravine.
One by one, they appeared in silhouette, still running.

Jeremy rose to his knees, but Naismith pulled him down.

"You're right, son. There's something strange with them. Let's not press our luck."

They lay for a long time in the ringing silence, till at last the animal sounds resumed
and the starlight seemed bright. There was no sign of humans inside of five hundred
meters.

Projections?
Jeremy wondered aloud. Zombies? Wili thought silently to himself. But
they could be neither. They had been hit; they had gone down. Then they had gotten up
and run in a panic — and that was unlike the zombies of Ndelante legend. Naismith had no
speculations he was willing to share.

It was raining again by the time their rescuers arrived.

Only 9 o'clock on an April morning and already the air was a hot, humid 30 degrees.
Thunderheads hung high on the arch of the Dome. It would rain in the afternoon. Wili
Wachendon and Jeremy Sergeivich Kaladze walked down the wide, graveled road that
led from the main farmhouse toward outbuildings by the Dome. They made a strange
sight: One boy near two meters tall, white and lanky; the other short, thin, and black,
apparently subadolescent. But Wili was beginning to realize that there were similarities,
too. It turned out they were the same age — fifteen. And the other boy was sharp, though
not in the same class as Wili. He had never tried to intimidate with his size. If anything,
he seemed slightly in awe of Wili (if that were possible in one as rambunctious and
outspoken as Jeremy Sergeivich).

"The Colonel says," Jeremy and the others never called Old Kaladze "grandfather,"
though there seemed to be no fear in their attitude, and a lot of affection, "the Colonel
says the farm is being watched, has been since the three of us got here."

"Oh? The bandits?"

"Don't know. We can't afford the equipment Dr. Naismith can buy — those micro-cameras and such.
But we have a telescope and twenty-four-hour camera on top of the barn.
The processor attached to it detected several flashes from the trees," he swept his
hand toward the ridgeline where the rain forest came down almost to the farm's banana
plants, "that are probably reflections from old-style optics."

Wili shivered in the warm sunlight. There were lots of people here compared to
Naismith's mansion in the wilderness, but it was not a properly fortified site: There were
no walls, watchtowers, observation balloons. There were many very young children, and
most of the adults were over fifty. That was a typical age distribution, but one unsuitable
for defense. Wili wondered what secret resources the Kaladzes might have.