Larry Niven - Footfall

Everyone in the Oval Office was shouting. Jenny stared at the screen, not quite comprehending what she’d seen.

“Major Crichton!”

The President! “Sir!”

“Please call Admiral Carrell. You people, make room for her, please. Jack, help her get over here.”

“Yes, sir.” Jack Clybourne shouldered through the crowd, then helped her get to the President’s desk. Coffey was still seated. His face was ashen. Jeanne Coffey sat beside him, her eyes staring at the blank TV screen.

“I don’t think we need the newspeople here just at the moment,” the President said. “Or the staff. Or the Cabinet, except for Dr. Hart and Mr. Griffin—”

State and Defense. Yes, we’ll need them. Hap Aylesworth stayed also. Jenny almost giggled. The political advisor. Political implications of war with the aliens — how would this affect the next election?

There were three telephones on the stand behind the President’s desk. Jenny lifted the black one and punched in numbers before she realized there was no dial tone. “Dead,” she said. The President looked at her uncomprehendingly. “Should I use this one?” she asked. The [sic — should be “she”] indicated the red telephone.

“Yes.”

There was no dial tone on that one either, but the Air Force officer on duty in the White House basement came on. “Yes, sir?”

“Priority,” Jenny said. “HQ NORAD.”

“Right. Wait one, there’s something coming in — they’re calling you. Here you are.”

“Mr. President?” a familiar voice said.

“Major Crichton, Admiral. The President is here.” She held out the telephone.

His calm is going. Mrs. Coffey looks horrible, and—

“What happened, Admiral?”

The Secret Service had managed to clear nearly everyone out of the room. Jack Clybourne stood uncertainly at the door.

The President touched a button. Admiral Carrell’s voice filled the mom.

“—little left. We have no operational satellites. Just before we lost the last observation satellite, it reported a number of rocket plumes in the Soviet Union.”

The President looked up and caught the eye of the Secretary of State. “Arthur, get down to the hot line and find out!”

“Right.” Dr. Hart ran to the door.

Secretary of Defense Ted Griffin went pale. “If the crazy bastards have launched at us, we’ve got to get our birds up before theirs hit!”

“We can’t just shoot!” the President shouted. “We don’t know they’ve attacked us. We have to talk to them—”

“I doubt that you can get through,” Admiral Carrell said. “I took the liberty of trying. Mr. President, it appears that a large nuclear device has been detonated in the very high stratosphere, far too high to do any harm to ground installations — except for the pulse effect, which has severely damaged our communications capabilities. especially on the East Coast.”

“We must get through — Admiral, do you believe the Soviets are attacking us?”

“Sir, I don’t know. Certainly the aliens have attacked our space installations—” Admiral Carrell’s voice broke off suddenly.

“Admiral!”

There was a long silence. “Mr. President, I have reports of ground damage. Hoover Dam has been destroyed by a large explosion.”

“A nuclear weapon?”

“Sir, I don’t know what else it could be. A moment …” There was another silence.

“God damn!” Ted Griffin shouted. “They did it, the crazy Russian bastards did it!”

The Admiral’s voice came on faintly. “One of my advisors says it could have been what he calls a kinetic energy weapon. Not nuclear. It could not have been a Soviet rocket, they couldn’t have reached here in time.” Another pause. “I’m getting more reports. Alaska. Colorado. Mississippi — Mr. President, we are being bombarded. Some of the attacks are coming from space. May I have permission to fight back?”

David Coffey looked at his wife. She shuddered. “Fight who?” the President demanded.

“The aliens,” Admiral Carrell said.

“Not the Soviets?”

“Not yet.”

“Ted?” David Coffey asked.

“Sir?” The Secretary of Defense looked ten years older.

“Is there any way I can authorize Carrell to fight a space battle without giving him the capability to launch against the Soviet Union?”

“No.”

“I see. Jeanne, what do you think?”

“I think you’re the President, David.”

Jenny held her breath.

“You don’t have any choice,” Hap Aylesworth said. “What, you’ll let them attack our country without fighting back?”

“Thank you,” Coffey said quietly. “Admiral, is Colonel Feinstein there?’

“Yes, sir. Colonel—”

Another voice came on. “Yes, Mr. President.”

“Colonel, I authorize you to open the code container and deliver the contents to Admiral Thorwald Carrell. The authentication phrase is ‘pigeons on the grass, alas.’ You will receive confirmation from the Secretary of Defense and the National Security Council duty officer. Ted—”

“Yes, sir.” Ted Griffin took the phone, almost dropped it, and read from a card he’d taken from his wallet. Then he turned to Jenny. “Major—”

“Major Crichton here,” Jenny said. “I confirm that I personally have heard the President order the codes released to Admiral Carrell. My authentication code is Tango. X-ray. Alfa. Four. Seven. Niner. Four.” And that’s done. Lord, I never—

“Admiral,” the President said. “You will not launch against the Soviet Union until we have absolute confirmation that they have attacked us. I don’t believe they’re involved in this, and Earth has troubles enough without a nuclear war. Is this understood?”

“Yes, sir. Mr. President, I suggest you come here as quickly as you can. Major Crichton, assist the President, and stay with him as long as you’re needed. I’ll put Colonel Hartley on now.”

Something rang in his head.

Harry Reddington woke, and thrashed, and slapped the top of his alarm clock: the pause, to give him another ten minutes sleep. The ringing went on. The room was pitch dark, and it wasn’t the clock ringing, it was the telephone. Harry picked up the receiver. His voice was musical, sarcastically so. “Hellooo …”

A breathy voice said, “Harry? Go outside and look.”

“Ruby? It’s late, Ruby. I’ve got to get up early tomorrow.”

There was party music in the background, and a woman’s voice raised in laughing protest. Ruby’s voice was bathetically mournful, She must be ripped; at a late party she was bound to be. “Harry, I went outside for a hit. You know Julia and Gwen, they don’t like anyone smoking anything in there. They don’t like tobacco any better than pot—”

“Ruby!”

“I went out and it’s, it’s … It looks so real, Harry! Go out and look at the sky. It’s the end of the world.”

Harry hung up.

He rolled off the Dawsons’ water bed and searched for his clothes.

He’d stayed up too late anyway. It would have been a good night to get drunk with friends, but word of honor on record. He’d come home and had a few drinks as consolation for being alone while interstellar ambassadors made first contact with humanity. The clock said 2:10, and he’d been up past midnight watching the news. There hadn’t been any; whatever the Soviets were learning, they hadn’t been telling. Eventually he went to bed. Now—

His eyes felt gritty. The cane was leaning against the bedstead. He gave up on finding a jacket; he wouldn’t be out long. He unlocked the back door and stumbled out onto the Dawsons’ lawn.

Ruby had been using marijuana, and spreading the word of it like any missionary, since the mid-sixties. She worked as a clerk in the head shop next to the Honda salesroom. What had Harry outside in a coolish California May night was this reflection: a doper might see things that aren’t there, but she might see things that are.