L Modesitt - Empress of Eternity

"You think the Old Ones meant to doom everyone who followed them, unless any successors were bright enough to duplicate what they did? Or did they expect us to find the mysterious technology trove that no one has discovered in millions of years? That assumes it exists."

"Then why did they build the canal-the only indestructible canal on Earth?"

"Maybe that?s all they could do, and the effort wrecked their civilization."

"Or maybe the canal itself is the key. Perhaps it?s a bridge."

Duhyle laughed. "Don?t you think thousands of other scients have had the same idea over all the millennia? They must have tested every possible approach to determine if there is a key. If it even exists."

"Then I?ll have to find another way." Her curls glittered silver from root to end, if only for a moment.

"What do you want for dinner?" he asked.

"Whatever you?re cooking," she replied, straightening so that her eyes looked down on his. "How long will it be?"

"Tell me when you want it. Redgrass soup, and fowl with cream pasta and shrooms."

"Give me a stan and a half. I?m deep-linked to Vestalte, with a side link to Vaena."

He nodded, then watched as she reentered the ancient structure. It now held the most advanced technology that the Vanir had yet developed. His eyes returned to the canal and its deep waters.

Late into the fall evening Maertyn pored over the results of his latest observations and calculations in his "temporary" laboratory.

He?d hoped to have been able to report some significant progress to the Ministry of Science when he returned to Caelaarn, but all the measurements he?d taken and all the calculations he?d made had not proven as helpful as he would have hoped.

He studied the screen before him, and the energy/position/gradients displayed there. They confirmed that, in a real way, the canal and its walls were not built of any discrete material. From what he?d been able to determine, the entire canal was a unit, created/fused/bonded on a subatomic level.

He paused. That wasn?t necessarily so. Certainly, that finding was true for any part of the canal he had been able to study. But was it the same throughout-or did a thick layer of that adamantine material cover what lay within just to a depth that precluded any energy from reaching through such an outer layer?

Yet…from his instruments, the canal walls were a uniform width everywhere, thirty point seven one Caelaarnan yards. And there were only two structures protruding from it along its entire length, both identical in exterior shape-one at the eastern end and the other, where he was, at the western terminus. But the eastern structure remained sealed, with no evidence that it had ever been entered. For the canal and the structures to have endured at least half a million years, and possibly many times that, it would seem that it should be composed of the same material throughout. If that material were neutronium or of a similar nature, it would mass more than the entire Earth, and major gravitational irregularities would be more than obvious. In fact, the earth probably wouldn?t exist except as debris. But what if the canal?s gravitational effects happened to be shielded?

Maertyn knew of no way that was possible. He also knew of no way that the canal could exist. Which impossible possibility was more likely?

He smiled. Reality trumped theoretical science on any day of any year. Maarlyna?s presence was more than proof of that.

The other problem centered on the doors and ducts. No form of scanning or focused energy that he had been able to deploy revealed their presence or triggered their opening. Only a living human touch did that. He?d spent two full days running his hands over every part of every surface in the structure, both inside and outside, and while he?d discovered what appeared to be two lower-level storage closets or rooms that had not been discovered by previous researchers, as well as five unused ducts/conduits, no other doors, even in the "new" storage areas, responded to his fingers.

Then he?d tried the same method on the top of the canal walls, first between the western end of the structure and the ocean wall, then along the narrow space between the structure walls and the chest-high retaining walls, and finally for a good hundred yards to the east. He?d discovered nothing new. There well might be other entrances to spaces within the canal walls somewhere along its two-thousand-kay length, and, in fact, he had no doubts that such must exist, but who had the time or the manpower to feel every span of a structure that stood a hundred yards above the water and spanned a continent?

He took a deep breath before, useless as he suspected it to be, he slowly considered, yet once more, the numbers, facts, figures, and equations on the pale green screen.

He wasn?t even aware that he was no longer alone until a soft voice intruded.

"Maertyn? Will you be coming to bed soon? You?ve worked so late so many nights, and you do have a long journey ahead of you before long." Maarlyna stood in the archway that separated the largest main-floor chamber from the slightly smaller room that served as his workroom and laboratory.

"I?m sorry." He turned the swivel chair to face her, but did not stand. "I was just trying to see if I could make any sense out of the latest observations. I?d really like to be able to report something new. But the more measurements and observations I take, the more it?s clear that the midcontinent canal is perfectly uniform."

"Has anyone else taken that many measurements and observations?" Her smile was warm and indulgent, yet not critical.

"Not in our history. Perhaps the second dawn cultures did. There aren?t any records. In fact, there?s not much of anything left, except some large holes filled with ash, sand, and the detritus of millennia that is still faintly radioactive."

"There are fossilized remnants of the ancients, aren?t there? Is the canal that old? Or is it older yet?"

He smiled. "I?d judge so, but there?s no way to tell with great accuracy. I don?t know of any way to date the stone of the canal, and the stone and bedrock on and in which it rests doesn?t seem to follow crustal movements, or not in any way that we would think as probable. The rock and soil layers farther away from the canal itself suggest far more than a million years."

"Isn?t that new information? For the Ministry?"

"New? I don?t know. It tends to confirm past incomplete data." His smile was crooked.

"The Ministry is looking for somewhat more than that."

"You?ll find it. I know you will."

Maertyn was touched by her faith, uncertain as he was about whether he could live up to it. "That?s what I?m working toward." If he could only figure out how to discover a means by which he could discern more about the canal. The biologic sciences of the Unity weren?t suited to deal with the subatomic level physics, and the records of older civilizations were too fragmentary…and enigmatic.

She smiled. "I won?t keep you. I hope you won?t be too long."

With her smile, and the clinging gown she wore, Maertyn knew he wouldn?t be looking at his screens for much longer. "I need to save this format of the data to the backup system. Then I?ll join you."

Maarlyna turned.

Maertyn watched her move through the archway and out of sight, taking in the gentle sway of her hips, neither constrained nor exaggerated, but all of a piece with the woman that she was, then swung back to face the paired pale green screens. He had the unshakable feeling that the data revealed something…but he couldn?t put a finger-or his thoughts-on exactly what that might be.

He shook his head and initiated the backup sequence. He did wish that he had a cable interface to his own system in Caelaarn, or even a private comsat link, but the Ministry saw no reason to lay cable to the end of the canal, and he and his work didn?t have priority enough for a comsat link. Nor did he have the boost-antenna necessary, either.