“And can’t we try using the beacon to interfere with this somehow?”
Heinz shook his head. “The beacon is no longer of any use. We’re still monitoring it, but the arrival of RP One has effectively made it irrelevant. Besides, RP One has probably been in direct contact with Origin since it arrived, so we can’t exactly fool the system into thinking it isn’t here, which is the only thing I could imagine might have worked.”
Before Richelle could respond Mitch came running down the gangway of RP One.
“What is it?” Heinz asked.
“You guys need to see this.”
They followed Mitch onto the bridge where Watkins and Naoko were huddled around one of the terminals and deep in conversation. Watkins had a thick notebook in front of him, both open pages covered in a seemingly random mix of English and Saishan text.
“Go on,” Mitch said, “tell them what you just told me.”
Watkins picked up the notebook and turned the page over. “Where would you like me to start?”
“With the good news,” Richelle said without hesitation. “Assuming there is any.”
“There isn’t,” Watkins said. “The message that interrupted the system was an advance notification for the arrival of the first supply drop.”
“Supply drop?”
“Well,” Watkins said. “It stands to argue that the crew of RP One would have been here for a reason. And they would have needed supplies, obviously. Don’t forget, if they had arrived when they were supposed to they would have found a far less civilized place than this.”
“I think that’s debatable,” Mitch said.
Richelle ignored this remark. “And why now? RP One has been here for over a year.”
“Practicality,” Watkins said. “It’s arriving now because Jupiter is in what is called opposition, meaning it’s directly behind us from the viewpoint of the sun, and so as close to the Earth as it can be. If you look at the date RP One arrived, you’ll see it was 384 days ago, which is six days short of the last time the planets were aligned in the same way. The system is basically saying that this is the optimal time to make the drop.”
Richelle looked at Heinz, who shrugged to indicate this was all news to him.
“Can we call it off?” Richelle asked.
“Possibly,” Watkins said. “Now that we know where the interface is, we can at least try.”
“Then what are we waiting for?”
“
If
we want to,” Mitch put in.
Richelle gave Mitch an annoyed look. “Yes, Mitch, I heard what he said, and we
do
want to. In fact, I’d be grateful if you’d call it off now so I can start sleeping again.”
“Tell her the rest,” Mitch said.
Watkins studied his notes for a moment. “According to the schematics in the system, the container, if you like, is only about forty feet in circumference and just over twelve feet high. It’s quite heavy, but nowhere near as heavy as RP One, and—”
“We could drop it on the island,” Mitch interrupted. “On the eastern tip. There’s more than enough suitable terrain. We could—”
“No way,” Richelle said.
Mitch’s face suddenly filled with color. He grabbed the notebook from Watkins and held it up. “Then what are we doing here? What’s all this
for
? We’ve spent over a year studying this ship to figure out where we go from here, and this is it.
This
is where we go. If not now, then when?”
Heinz tried to say something, but Mitch brushed him off. “I want to know. When will it be time to move on? In a year? In ten years? For all we know the brain on that ship is about to come to the very logical conclusion that we’re just a bunch of clueless imposters and decide to head for home. If that happens, this ship and everything you’ve spent the last twenty years building will become obsolete. What then? Send everyone home? Thank them for their time, ‘Thanks everyone, and remember, don’t talk about what happened here because as you can see,
nothing
happened. You’ve all been wasting your time, but we appreciate you coming all the same’. I don’t know about you guys, but I think we need to do what we can
while
we can.”
Everyone turned to look at Richelle, who was now staring back at Mitch with an identical expression of defiance.
“Alright,” Heinz said, “let’s all just take a moment to gather ourselves. I’m sure we can figure out—”
“He’s right,” Richelle said, but the tone of her words made the meaning seem the exact opposite.
Mitch dropped his eyes. “I
am
right.”
“Good for you,” Richelle said, looking around at the rest of them. “I take it you all agree?”
When no one responded she took a step back and motioned to the gangway. “Well? What are you waiting for? Go. Gather around your map—it’s clearly what you want to do. I’m obviously just holding things up.”
They shuffled past her in silence. Heinz stopped, considered saying something, then didn’t and kept going.
When they were gone Richelle stood there for a moment, her eyes closed, taking long, deep breaths. When she felt a little calmer she walked to the command seat and sat down. On the screen in front of her, Gandalf—the name had actually stuck—was tracking the Beixiang as it neared the Indian coast on the Arabian Sea. She studied the controls at the end of the right armrest and tentatively placed her thumb over the small round ball in the center, the way she had seen Mitch do it a hundred times before. When she pressed gently down the view began to zoom down in direct proportion to the amount of pressure she applied. Fascinated, she pushed down harder and the view began to zoom out again until she was looking at an image of the earth floating through space. Out of curiosity more than anything else she moved her thumb to the left. Instead of stopping as the earth moved out of view the picture kept rotating until she was looking not down at the planet’s surface, but up at the stars. When the moon suddenly appeared in one corner of the screen she allowed it to move into the center, then zoomed in again. She had expected the magnification to end at some point, but it didn’t. When she finally lifted her thumb off the ball and the picture stopped moving in she was looking at a crater surrounded by a scattering of rocks, all covered in a fine light gray powder.
“Pretty crazy, isn’t it?”
Richelle turned to see Mitch standing at the top of the gangway.
“It’s incredible,” Richelle said. “I’d just hate to see it fall into the wrong hands. I know you think I’m being overcautious, Mitch. But it’s my responsibility to make sure what we have here is safe. All it takes is one person seeing something they shouldn’t. We have no way of protecting Aurora or this ship if that happens.”
“It’s not going to.”
“Really? How can you be so sure?”
He crossed his arms. “Because we’re going to figure out how to do it right.”
Richelle stepped down from the seat. “If something else comes falling out of the sky the way this thing did we may not have the luxury of figuring
anything
out. Watkins said it would be a lot smaller than RP One, but he didn’t say it would be any less obvious. I can still remember the night this thing arrived. Most of us thought the world was coming to an end. Frankly, it’s a miracle we got away with it. The difference this time is that we can’t move the island the way we moved the Pandora.”
“Whatever happens will happen no matter when we do it,” Mitch said. “If you want my opinion, I don’t think this will be anything like RP One.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Optimism,” Mitch said with a grin. “It’s my big weakness. When I want something badly enough I refuse to entertain the possibility that anything can go wrong.”
Richelle laughed. “And how’s that working out for you?”
“So far, pretty damn well.”
Richelle regarded him for a moment. “Have I ever told you I’m glad you ended up here, Mitch? It may not seem like it, but it’s true.”
“Well, not in so many words,” he replied. “But I pretty much figured that’s how you felt.”
Richelle laughed again. “Really? You’ve got me all figured out, have you?”
Mitch seemed to hesitate for a moment. “Enough to know there are some things you hold back that you shouldn’t.”
The smile on her face was gone. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” Mitch said. “Forget I said it.”
“I don’t think I will, actually. I’d like to know what it is you think I’m holding back.”
Mitch looked down at his feet. “Promise you won’t get mad?”
“No.”
“I just meant that—you know—I noticed how upset you were when—”
“When what?”
“When Francis got hurt.”
Richelle looked at him, stunned. “And you think that’s because I’ve what, got feelings for him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Let me guess,” Richelle said. “You think because I don’t hang around the bar at Amity on Friday nights I must be lonely and insecure, is that it? And of course Francis, being the all-around bad ass, was always going to come along and sweep poor little Richelle off her feet. Is that what you think?”
“Look,” Mitch shrugged. “Forget it. It was stupid.”
“You know, Mitch, you really should stick to computers and leave my personal life to me.”
“Fine,” Mitch said. “I will.”
“Good.”
Mitch turned and left. When he was gone the anger she felt quickly gave way to a look of sheepish embarrassment.
Phoenix, Arizona
Monday 11 June 2007
1710 MST
Mike Banner pulled into the driveway of the modest three-bedroom house on the Rancho Ventura estate shortly after five in the afternoon but made no move to get out of the car. He’d arrived back in Phoenix that morning and headed straight for the office, but there had been little point. Nothing, it seemed—not even the biggest drug bust in the city’s history—could take his mind off what had happened in DC.
Once the decision of whether or not he was willing to take a shot at a seat in the Senate—the idea still seemed like madness—had been made, Caroline had led him to a large conference room on the second floor where a team of no less than seven people had been waiting for them. Mike’s baptism of fire into the hectic world of politics had thus begun.
He was peppered with a seemingly endless barrage of questions ranging on everything from his family life and childhood to his views on gay rights; even his drinking habits were scrutinized. During a short recess, Mike had been whisked off into a side office by a young man who introduced himself as Sergio and subjected to a wardrobe fitting that bordered on harassment. This had been followed by a lunch in a small bistro around the corner at which no less than two serving congressmen and a senator had been present. One of the senators, an independent from the neighboring state of New Mexico and a member of the House Judiciary Committee, had invited Mike and his family to spend the following weekend on his ranch outside Santa Fe, presenting it as an “opportunity to talk strategy”. By the time the chaos died down, Mike felt as if the very earth itself had been pulled from beneath his feet. But all he felt now was trepidation.
Mike opened the door and stepped out onto the driveway. From the upstairs window he could hear Josh and his friends running around. Then the front door opened and Susan stepped onto the porch. “Hey, honey, you’re home early.”
Mike didn’t answer.
“Mike? Is everything alright?”
“Yeah, fine. Could you come down here for a minute?”
She was about to protest, then saw the look on his face and said, “Okay. Just let me take the chicken out of the oven.”
When she came back out she looked concerned. She walked up to him and put her hands on his face. “Honey, what is it?”
“I need to tell you something,” Mike said.
Susan immediately stiffened and took a step back, her eyes narrowing. “Tell me what?”
Mike took a deep breath and said, “What would you say if I told you I was thinking about leaving the Bureau?”
“Did something happen?”
“No,” Mike said. “Nothing. I’ve just been thinking. I mean, there are other things I could do.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine,” Mike said. “It’s been a long day.”
“Then why don’t you come inside and have some dinner. We’ll talk after Josh is in bed.”
“Alright,” Mike said.
He watched her walk back inside the house and cursed himself for not having the balls to just come out and say it.
By the time Josh was asleep and Susan came to bed Mike was already half asleep. He dozed off, telling himself tomorrow was another day. He would speak to her in the morning.
Nampo, North Korea
Tuesday 12 June 2007
1300 KST
The helicopter circled the port twice before setting down on the eastern end of the dock. The compound consisted of eight large warehouses, built in a row along the waterfront. At one end sat an apartment block, at the other, a round two-story glass structure with no obvious purpose. The buildings were surrounded by two parallel barbed-wire fences spaced about ten feet apart. A steady stream of guards patrolled the narrow border between them. Unlike the buildings outside the compound, these were all of modern construction, sleek and streamlined.
As soon as Rhee disembarked the helicopter took off again and headed out across the mouth of the Taedong River.
Yeon Pok, Project 38’s chief engineer, was there to greet him.
Short even by Korean standards, Pok was over seventy if he was a day. He sported a thick head of fine gray hair that sprouted in every direction, giving him the rather comical look of an Asian Albert Einstein. His glasses were so thick they made his eyes look at least twice their actual size. He offered Rhee no word of greeting, only nodded curtly and followed the general.
“How are things in Pyongyang?” Pok asked as they walked.
“Better than I expected,” Rhee told him. “It would seem most of our fears were ungrounded.”
“Perhaps they were. But it won’t do to become complacent.”
“I’m not complacent,” Rhee said.
“And the young prince?” Pok said, the sarcasm clear in his tone.
“He’ll be fine.”
“Let’s hope so. I take it you’ve secured his signature?”