Dan Simmons - Phases of Gravity

'Dave told me,' says Baedecker.

'Did he tell you the names we've been considering?' she asks. 'No,' says Baedecker. 'I don't think so.'

'We both agreed that Richard is nice,' Diane says. 'Especially if you think so too.'

'Yes,' says Baedecker. 'I think so too.'

Baedecker drives south on County Road 218, past Mayville and Fossil, crossing the John Day River just past Clarno. The road to the ashram-ranch is wide and graveled, running north from the paved county road. Baedecker drives three miles along it, thinking about Scott. He remembers the drive back to Houston that Watergate summer so long ago, Baedecker wanting to talk more to his son, unable to, feeling — in spite of everything — that Scott also wanted to talk, to change things.

There is a roadblock where the road narrows between two ditches several feet deep. A blue, airport-type limousine is parked diagonally, blocking the road. To the left is a small building with a sloping roof, brown sides, and a single window. It is meant to be a guardhouse, but it makes Baedecker think of the covered school-bus stops that sit by the side of the road in Oregon. He stops and gets out of the Toyota. The puppy is sleeping in the backseat.

'Yessir, may we help you?' says one of the three men who emerge from the shack.

'I'd like to get by,' says Baedecker.

'Sorry, sir, no one beyond this point,' says the man. Two of the three are large and bearded, but the speaker is the larger of the two, at least six-two. He is in his early thirties, and wears a red shirt under his goosedown vest. There is a medallion on the outside of the vest, and Baedecker can see a photograph of the guru there.

'This is the road to the ashram, isn't it?' asks Baedecker.

'Yeah, but it's closed,' says the second man. He wears a dark plaid shirt and Baedecker notices a cheap security-service badge pinned to it.

'The ashram's closed?'

'The road's closed,' says the big man, and Baedecker hears the change in his tone. There will be no more 'sirs.'

'Now turn your vehicle around,' he says.

'I'm here to see my son,' says Baedecker. 'I talked to him yesterday on the phone. He's been sick, and I want to see him and talk awhile. I'll leave my car here if you want to drive me in.' The big man shakes his head and takes three steps forward and in that brief motion comprised of swagger and expectation, Baedecker knows that he will not be allowed to pass. He has never met the man, but he knows him well; he has seen his type in bars from San Diego to Djakarta. He has known several like him — far too many — in the Marines. For a while, as a young man, Baedecker had considered becoming him.

Baedecker glances at the third man — little more than a boy really — thin and pockmarked. He is wearing only a red cotton shirt and is shivering in the cold breeze coming out of the north.

'Nope,' says the big man and comes closer, too close for psychological comfort and knowing it. 'Turn it around, Pop.'

'I'd like to see my son,' says Baedecker. 'If you have a phone in there, let's call someone.' Baedecker makes a move to step around him, but the big man stops him with a thrust of three fingers, hard, in Baedecker's chest. 'I said turn it around,' he says. 'Back it up to that wide spot down there, and turn it around.' Baedecker feels something sharp and cold and familiar well up inside of him, but he stops and backs up two steps. The big man is all shoulders, chest, and arms, broad neck under a wild beard, but his belly is big and soft even under the vest. Baedecker glances down at his own stomach and shakes his head. 'Let's try it again,' Baedecker says. 'This road is still a county road, I asked in Condon. Now if you have a phone or radio, let's talk to somebody who can think and make grown-up decisions. If not, drive me into the ashram and we'll find someone.'

'Uh-uh,' says the big man and shows his teeth. The other one with a beard takes a step closer to his friend while the youngest one moves back into the doorway of the guardhouse. 'Move now , Pops,' says the big man. The same three fingers hit Baedecker's chest again. Baedecker takes another step back.

The man shows more teeth, pleased by Baedecker's retreat, steps forward again, and brings his whole palm forward in what will be a straight-armed shove. Baedecker goes with it, takes the offered arm, brings it around and back and up, not quite hard enough to break bone but quickly enough to let softer things rip inside. The big man yells and pulls, Baedecker steps with it, watching the second man, and lifts higher, only his right hand busy now, leaning on the big man a bit as the other goes cheek down onto the hood of the Toyota.

The man with the badge yells something as he moves in, both arms held out wide like a wrestler beginning a match. Baedecker hits him three times with his left hand, the first two blows fast and useless with no extension and little weight behind them, the third solid and satisfying, landing deep in the other's throat. The man backs away with both hands up to his neck, catches the heels of his cowboy boots in the gravel at the edge of the road, and sits down heavily in the deep ditch.

The big man is still puffing and sliding along the hood, kicking now and trying to get his arm back. Baedecker is sliding with him, ready to get both hands into play, when he sees the youngest man come out of the shack with a twelve-gauge pump shotgun.

Ten feet separate Baedecker and the boy. The kid is holding the weapon somewhere between port arms and the way Scott used to hold a tennis racket when he was little before Baedecker taught him better. Baedecker did not see the boy pump the first shell into the chamber, and he feels strongly that it was not done before the boy emerged from the shack. Baedecker hesitates a second, but already the cold, sharp-edged anger he had felt a second earlier is fading to be replaced by the hot flush of anger at himself. He spins the big man around and propels him back toward the boy hard enough that the man stumbles forward, forgets that his right arm will no longer work to break his fall, and goes face first into the gravel and mud at the feet of the boy with the gun.

The kid is shouting something, waving the shotgun like a magic wand, but Baedecker ignores him, gets back into the Toyota, backs it down the gravel road, turns it around where the road is wide enough, and drives back the way he came.

Baedecker had listened to the tape alone, in a small room at McChord Air Force Base. There was not much on it. The young controller's voice was professionally brisk, but there was the sharp edge of fear just under the surface. Dave's voice was in the mode that Baedecker had always thought of as his in-flight voice; speech lazy and unhurried, the Oklahoma accent out of his boyhood quite pronounced.

Six minutes before the crash. The controller: Ah, Roger that, Delta Eagle two-seven-niner, ah, engine shutdown. Do you wish to declare an emergency at this time? Over.

Dave: Negative that, Portland Center. I'll bring it back your way and we'll do some thinking about it before we mess up all the airline schedules. Over.

Two minutes before the crash. The controller: Ah, affirmative on clearance for runway three-seven, Delta Eagle two-seven-niner. Ah, are you . . . do you have confirmation that landing gear is operational at this time? Over.

Dave: Negative, Portland Center. No green light at this time, but no red light either. Over.

Controller: Roger, Delta Eagle two-seven-niner. Do you have procedure if you receive no down and locked indication? Over.

Dave: Affirmative on that, Portland Center.

Controller: Very good, Delta Eagle two-seven-niner. What is procedure? Over.

Dave: Procedure as follows, Portland. GYSAKYAG. Over.

Controller: Say again, please, Delta Eagle two-seven-niner. We did not copy that. Over.