Lincoln Child - Deep Storm

"Mind if I sit down?" he asked.

For a minute, McPherson remained glued to the grainy video feed. Then he pulled himself away. "Please." He paused, glancing from Crane to Ping and back again. "You're all packed?"

Hui nodded. "It didn't take long."

"You'll be processed at Administration. Once the exit interviews are completed, a car will take you to the airport." Then McPherson reached into his desk. Crane assumed that yet more forms requiring their signatures would be forthcoming. But instead the man drew out two small black leather cases and handed them formally across the desk. "There's just one more thing."

Crane watched as Hui opened hers. Her eyes went wide, and she caught her breath.

He turned to his own case. Inside was an official commendation, signed not only by half a dozen of the highest-ranking admirals in the Navy but also by the president himself.

"I'm not sure I understand," he said.

"What's there to understand, Dr. Crane? You and Dr. Ping determined the true nature of the anomaly. You kept your heads when others didn't. You helped save the lives of-at the very least-one hundred and twelve people. For that, this government will be eternally in your debt."

Crane closed the lid. "This is what you wanted to see us about?"

McPherson nodded. "Yes. And to say good-bye." He stood up, shook their hands in turn. "They're waiting for you in Administration." And he sat down, returning his gaze to the monitor.

Hui rose, headed for the cubicle exit. Then she turned to wait for Crane. He rose slowly, his gaze moving from McPherson to the monitor. He could just make out the image of Korolis, hunched over the Marble's viewscreen; Flyte working the robotic arm. McPherson had the volume low, but Crane could nevertheless make out the old man's birdlike voice: " It's a weapons dump, the fruit of some intergalactic arms race…"

"Let it go," Crane said quietly.

McPherson stirred, glanced over at him. "Sorry?"

"I said, let it go. It's over."

McPherson returned his gaze to the monitor. He did not reply.

"It's a tragedy, but it's over now. There's no need to worry about others accessing the site. No foreign government can approach the dig interface; it's too heavily irradiated."

Still McPherson did not reply. He seemed to be struggling with some inner conflict.

"I can guess what's eating at you," Crane said gently. "It's the thought of a weapons dump like that, something capable of such extreme destruction, buried within our own planet. It bothers me, too. But I remind myself that whoever entombed those devices also has the power to protect them-to make sure they are never tampered with. Korolis found that out the hard way: the video you're watching proves it."

McPherson stirred again, seemed to come to a private decision. He glanced over at Crane once more. "That's not what's bothering me."

"Then what is?"

McPherson gestured at the screen. "You heard Flyte. It's a weapons dump, he said. A burial spot, off-limits, never to be broached again."

"Yes."

McPherson reached for the keyboard, typed in a command. The video rewound, characters moving furiously backward across the screen. With another command, he restarted the playback. Crane listened to the taped conversation: "…two black holes in very tight orbit around each other…at a furious rate…one matter, one antimatter…if the force that held them in orbit was removed, the resulting explosion would destroy the solar system…"

McPherson stopped the playback. He plucked a tissue from a box on his desk, wiped his eyes. "We have dumping grounds for our old nuclear weapons, too," he said in a low voice.

"Like Ocotillo Mountain. Asher was researching the site. That's how we-"

"But you see, Dr. Crane," McPherson interrupted, "here's what keeps me up at night. Before we dump our old weapons, we disarm them ."

Crane stared silently at McPherson for a moment, processing what he'd just said.

"You don't think-" Hui began. Then she fell silent.

"What's buried down there, beneath the Moho?" McPherson asked. "Oh, yes. Thousands of devices. Active devices. Unimaginable weapons, black holes locked together in rapid orbits. To de-arm the weapon, you'd simply decouple each pair so they could never touch. Right?" He leaned across his desk. "So if this is just a dumping ground, why wasn't that done ?"

"Because-" Crane found that his mouth had suddenly gone dry. "Because they haven't been decommissioned."

McPherson nodded very slowly, "Maybe I'm wrong. But I don't think it's a dump."

"You think it's an active storage facility," Crane said slowly.

"Hidden away on a useless planet," McPherson replied. "Until…" He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't need to.

Slowly, Crane and Ping walked through the echoing hangar. They passed the wreckage that had once been the Facility, heading for the security exit in the far wall. As they walked, Crane found his mind drawn irresistibly to the eyewitness account left behind six hundred years before by Jón Albarn, the Danish fisherman: A hole appeared in the heavens. And through that hole shewed a giant Eye, wreathed in white flame…

They navigated the security exit and stepped out onto the tarmac, into pitiless light. The sun was a ball of fire in a field of perfect cerulean. And as Crane glanced up toward the sky, he wondered if he would ever be able to look at it in quite the same way again.