Echoes of an Alien Sky (30 page)

"You look like one of the natives, resurrected," he told Uzef. "You'll end up settling here. I'd bet on it."

"One could do worse," Uzef said. He turned to lead the way back toward the camp. "How long has it been now? Two months? Three?"

"I'm really not sure. I've lost track too. Are we getting old, Uzef? Or us it just the work keeping us busy?"

"Well, you don't look any older, so it must be the work. They say it keeps us young, anyway. Did you have a good flight down?"

"Smooth all the way. Great views of the mountains. There's the man I'd recommend if you decide to get your own chopper added to the unit." Quarles gestured at the pilot. "Knows how to handle one. Someone told me once that flying a chopper is like being on top of a slippery invisible ball, and the thing is trying to slide off one way or another all the time. The job is to keep it there. Well, this fellow has the trick. Is that right?" he asked the pilot.

"It's like everything else, I guess. Just takes a bit of practice."

"Would you like to stop off at the camp first?" Uzef asked. "Cool off with a beer, maybe? Or we can go straight on up."

Quarles drew in a lungful of the air. "Oh, let's go straight on up and see it. I was just thinking to myself how invigorating it is here. No wonder you're looking so fit, out in it all the time. The beer will go down better afterward."

"That's because I don't get chauffeured around in helicopters all the time," Uzef gibed. He looked across at the pilot. "They live too soft a life, you see—these people up at Regional Base." The pilot grinned.

"Well, I don't know so much about that," Quarles said. "You should try coming out and spending some time at the place we've been working in. A mile deep and over twenty across. The Terrans called it the Grand Canyon."

"Yes, I've seen some of the reports. An arc discharge gouge that long. Amazing."

"Running up and down there for a week or two will get you into shape, I can tell you."

"How are things going otherwise up north?" Uzef asked. "Are you finding anything interesting these days?"

"Not so much in the major cities," Quarles replied. "Most of them were targeted in the final war and pretty totally devastated. That Altian that we met, Xervon, he told me they estimated that the Los Angles area alone was hit by at least forty nuclear bombs."

"Vizek!"

"The smaller towns are better when it comes to yielding anything useful. Some of the space bases were farther north too. But I'm not sure what they've been finding there. That's more for the archeologists and archeotechnlogists than geologists." Quarles gave Uzef a nudge. "You might be needing some of them up here if this is what you think, eh?"

"Well, let's see what you make of it first, anyway."

They came over a rise of sand and rocks. Quarles halted to take in a general impression before going closer. The peak stood on the far side of a depression that bore the vaguely discernible lines of a dried-up creek bed meandering along its center. It had been taken as a natural part of the ridge and attracted little attention from aerial survey photographs. And then, a couple of weeks, Uzef's team had arrived in the area on a ground exploration tour of the coast.

The mounds of sand piled along the base of the peak below a hollowed-out amphitheater showed where the slide had occurred. It had uncovered part of a flat, sloping surface that didn't look natural at all. Further digging and clearing on the south and west faces had established the general form and revealed that it had a layered and ribbed structure.

Uzef tilted his hat forward to shield the glare from the sun and gestured with an arm. "You can see the general lines there, and there. . . . And that digging up there is where we've located the summit. I don't think there's any doubt that it's a pyramid."

Quarles stared, taking it in for a while. "I think you might have a first here, Uzef," he said at last. "None of the ones found so far in the Americas has been this far north. I'm fairly sure that goes for the ones across the eastern ocean on the main land mass too."

Uzef shook his head. "This is much more recent than any of those, Amingas," he said. "From what we've been able to make out, it seems to have had an electrical function." He took off his hat and mopped his forehead with a bright red handkerchief that he took from the pocket of his bush shirt. "You know, if the Terrans had possessed that kind of technology, and I had to guess, I would have said it's a spacecraft discharge attractor."

Nostreny said that Jenyn had been called away in connection with some business that needed attending to up on
Explorer 6
. He hadn't volunteered any more, and since it was really none of his business, Elundi hadn't asked. But it had been very sudden and was certainly very strange. The bad feelings between them over the Lornod affair had been about to boil over after simmering all morning; then Jenyn had received a call on the internal line, got up and left without a word, and not been seen since. Elundi learned later from the receptionist at the front desk that he had left with a visitor. The receptionist's description left little doubt that the visitor had been Derlen. But when Elundi called Derlen to find out what was going on, she had been evasive, said she couldn't meet him, and she hadn't returned his further calls since. Compounding the mystery, Tyarla didn't seem to be available either.

Elundi could only conclude that Tyarla had indeed gone to the provosts, and that she and Jenyn were now involved in some kind of investigation or whatever other procedures had been initiated up on
Explorer 6
as a consequence. He could only attribute the abrupt change in Derlen's behavior to her having formed some kind of involvement with Jenyn that she hadn't told him about. If it pointed to a more fickle and less stable and reliable side to her than he had, in his fond enthusiasm, imagined, he would rather find out about it now than after an inordinate investment of time, wherewithal, and emotional energy, he told himself philosophically. But she was a great dancer nonetheless.

Iwon was unable to provided any further information other than that Lorili's request for a transfer to
Explorer 6
had gone through surprisingly quickly. Not only was she already there, but her assistant, Mirine, who had gone with her from Rhombus, had just joined her after a detour via Luna. They were setting up to work with some Terran corpses discovered on Farside, and Mirine had gone there to arrange their shipment to
Explorer 6
. In the process, she had brought news of a new theory that was causing considerable excitement there. Iwon wasn't really clear why himself, but apparently Lorili and Mirine referred to it jokingly as Mirine's theory. The essence of it was that the "Providence" code word that everyone had been expressing so much interest in was now thought to refer not to some destination that the Terrans had been migrating to, but a repository somewhere down on Earth. Shortly afterward, a memo came down through the official channels asking Linguistics to make a special compilation of any recent findings and references pertaining to "Providence," for a scientific meeting that was being organized up on
Explorer 6
.

As well as going through his own files, Elundi took it upon himself to check also for any items that Jenyn might have been working on at the time of his sudden disappearance. He came across the piece that he himself had passed over to Jenyn concerning the engineering inspector who had flown from Santa Cruz to perform post-delivery tests and been back in the Bay area by evening. It had been flagged for inclusion on a report but not processed. If Providence had been on Earth, the reference to "post-delivery tests" perhaps carried even more significance than had been evident then, Elundi noted with interest. In any case, the item clearly warranted action. He attached it to the others that he had collected and forwarded the package to Kyal Reen, which was the name specified on the departmental memorandum.

"I've come across a fascinating snippet that I wanted to share," Emur Frazin said on the screen in Sherven's office aboard
Explorer 6
. "Terran astronomy seems to have originated as a science of ordered, predictable phenomena at around the time of the Greek Thales—the middle of the seventh century 600 B.C. What it could mean is that the Solar System before then was too chaotic for them to put together a coherent picture. So that would be when its catastrophic period ended, and it settled into its present stable condition. It fits nicely with our other findings."

"Hm." Sherven sat back in his chair and stared at the image distantly, while Frazin waited. At length he pronounced, "Very interesting. Let me think some more about it."

"It might help explain the dichotomy of their hyper-materialistic science and irrational religions," Frazin said. "It was an over-reaction. After the period of chaos and terror, when nothing was safe or certain, here was the first indication of stability and predictability in the heavens. Obviously a gift from the deities. The relief and security that it brought were so profound that they sought to impose it on all that made up the world around them, for all time."

"From one extreme to the other," Sherven commented. "It sounds like Terrans, doesn't it?"

"Yes," Frazin agreed. "It became a dogma that they adopted as part of their reaction against dogma, and seemed oblivious of the contradiction."

"Well, as I said, interesting. It might be a good point to bring up at the meeting to hear Reen and Zeestran's new ideas about Providence. I take it you'll be there?"

"Absolutely. I like the sound of it. It would answer a lot of questions."

"So many of us seem to think. Very well, we'll see you there, then. Was there anything else at this stage?"

"No, I just thought you'd like to hear about Thales. It fitted right in with what you were saying the other day. Good day for now."

Sherven carried on thinking to himself after Frazin had cleared down. While the rigidity of Terran science that Frazin had referred to, rooted solidly in intellectualism, materialism and naturalism, might have been effective—indeed, maybe necessary—for eliminating the flights of fancy and self-delusion to which the Terran mind seemed to have been peculiarly prone, it resulted in a system that by Venusian standards was narrow and restricted. Although the general Venusian system of acquiring knowledge included the methods of induction and experiment that the Terran essentially confined themselves to, it also embraced facets of philosophy, tradition, and what Terrans would have regarded as "metaphysics" as respectable sources to draw on—or at least, sources not to be dismissed out of hand. From the Terran scientific extremist way of viewing things, Venusians would have been regarded as more tolerant toward the "intuitive" and "spiritual"—aspects of existence that were not only dismissed as unreliable by many Terrans, even prominent ones, but denied any reality. No doubt, that went a long way toward explaining their attempts to construct a materialist explanation for life. Well, if Lorili Hilivar thought she could find anything that argued for such a case, he'd certainly be willing to listen. But it didn't seem to Sherven to be a good way to bet.

The call tone of from desk panel interrupted. "Provost Marshal Huiano from Rhombus," Emitte's voice said.

"Yes, of course. Put him through." Huiano's features appeared on the screen that had framed Frazin's. "Not necessary," Sherven said before Huiano could voice formalities. "What can I do?"

"It's concerning Jenyn Thorgan."

"Oh, yes." Sherven felt a twinge of discomfort. He had intended getting on with the business as soon as Thorgan and the Yiag girl were brought up from the surface, but all these other developments had distracted him from taking it any further. "Is he complaining? I can't honestly say I'd blame him. We have been somewhat tardy over this."

"More a case of defiance and not a little ill-concealed anger," Huiano replied. "The provost captain up on
Explorer
is asking when we'll get something moving. He's having a hard time of it. Thorgan is demanding to know who is saying what about him, and where the evidence is. I've talked to him and explained that this isn't a trial but simply an inquiry that we'd rather not turn into a public spectacle. But that just makes things worse. He insists he should be under no restriction and allowed to move freely about. I just wanted to check with you first, Director."

Sherven pulled a glum face. "Well, as I said, after all the fuss, we have been a bit slow over the whole thing, haven't we? What's your opinion on it?"

"He hasn't been charged with anything, and technically he is not under arrest."

"What do the regulations say?"

"Nothing that really anticipates this kind of situation. They're open to interpretation."

"Hm." Sherven rubbed his chin. "I don't see any reason not to comply, really. Do you? Refusing would serve no purpose except get us some bad press in the long run. Let's go along with it but make sure he knows that he will be expected to present himself at the appointed time."

"I agree," Huiano said. "We've got better things to do that be guarding people."

Sherven snorted. " In any case, it's not as if he can get lost in many places up here, is it? Just make sure that his name can't get on any boarding lists for flights out."

"Right away," Huiano promised. He looked relieved. "It will make things pleasantly quieter for my people up there for a while, too."

On disembarking from Luna, Kyal and Yorim were taken straight from the docking ports to Sherven's office in the Directorate, which was where the meeting, was being held. Around a dozen of the mission's scientific figures were assembled in the conference space adjoining the windowed area where Sherven had his desk, when Emitte ushered the two arrivals in. They included Sherven and Casselo; Lorili's departmental head, Garki Nostreny, who had come up from Rhombus to represent the microbiologists; and Emur Frazin. Kyal sat at one end of the long table, facing Sherven at the other. Yorim took the empty seat across a corner. Frazin, whom they had last seen aboard the
Melther Jorg
at the end of the voyage out from Venus, raised his balding head with its short beard from some papers that he was arranging, and nodded at them cheerfully.