Timothy Zahn - Manta's Gift

"I see," Liadof said, her voice sounding like she was trying to grind the words into powder between her teeth. "So you signed a phony name. It's still your signature."

Faraday shrugged. "I held the pen rather awkwardly. It might or might not be close enough."

"Your fingerprints are on the paper."

"I never picked it up."

"Your sweat, then," she persisted. "DNA analysis."

"I never even touched it," Faraday told her. "I held it down with shirtsleeved elbow. Sol/Guard issue shirt, by the way—there are millions of them around the System. And I rested my hand on the edge of the desk, not the paper. There's absolutely nothing there to link me to that document."

Liadof's breath, Faraday noted, was coming rather heavily. "And you think this was all I had against you?" she asked, waving the paper.

"Maybe not," Faraday said. "But without that paper, you don't have enough to beat me. Not now. If you choose to fight, you're going to lose."

He paused. "The alternative is to settle this quietly, right here and now," he added. "And it's still not too late for you to get the credit and glory for getting humanity out of the Solar System."

Her eyes narrowed as she studied him. "Are you telling me," she said slowly, "that you don't want it yourself?"

"Not at all," Faraday confirmed. "I've already told you what I want."

"Really." She smiled tightly. "Not even if all that credit and glory translates to more political power in my pocket? Power which I could easily turn around and use against you?"

Faraday gestured toward Hesse. "Mr. Hesse told me you never seek revenge for its own sake," he said. "I'm willing to take the chance."

Slowly, almost unwillingly, Liadof stepped back to her chair. "All right, Colonel," she said, laying the paper down on the table. "I'm listening."

We're almost to the end of Level Seven," Milligan reported, alternating his attention between three different monitors. "Pressure's scaling as predicted; no problems."

"What about the tether?" Faraday asked, his thoughts flashing back to that resonance humming noise his Skydiver's tether had picked up on that fateful ride. "Is it handling the winds okay?"

"The wind is definitely picking up," Milligan said. "But so far the tether seems to be handling it just fine."

"What about the tether ship?" Faraday asked.

"They report everything running green," McCollum said, pressing the earphone tightly against the side of her head. "We're getting an annoying wind-hiss, though."

"Tell them to get used to it," Faraday advised. "It'll probably get worse before it gets better."

"Right." McCollum began speaking softly into her mike.

"Coming up on Level Eight," Milligan said.

"A shame we didn't think to get a monitor down to you, Manta," Sprenkle called. "You'd have been able to see what your Garden of Eden looks like."

The Contact Room rumbled with tonals. "That's all right," the translation came. "I fully intend to live long enough to see it in person. Besides, your vision is so much poorer than ours. I doubt your machine would give me much of a look."

Sprenkle smiled. "Touche."

Beside Faraday, Liadof stirred. "Which brings up another question," she said. "What makes you think we're going to be able to see anything that deep, either? Those cameras only go down to deep ultraviolet."

"Yes, but they also go the other direction into the infrared," Faraday reminded her. "If there really is a mass of dead bodies down there, they should be absorbing high-energy radiation from Jupiter's core and reemitting it at lower frequencies. At least some of that should come out as infrared."

"I hope so," Liadof said. "Otherwise, this whole exercise will be a complete waste of time and—"

"Turbulence!" Milligan barked. "Massive turbulence, hitting the probe."

"How bad?" Faraday snapped, jumping up from his chair and stepping behind Milligan. The inertial readings, he noted uneasily, were going crazy.

"Bad enough," Milligan said grimly. "The thing's being knocked around like a Ping-Pong ball."

"Manta, do you copy?" Faraday called. "We've hit a layer of turbulence. Do your people know anything about that?"

"I don't know," Manta said. "I've never heard anyone speak of it."

"How about Latranesto?" Beach suggested. "He might know something."

"He went down to Level Six to watch the probe's descent," Manta said. "I'll ask him when he gets back up here."

"Assuming we still have a probe by then," Liadof ground out.

"It'll make it," Milligan assured her. "As long as the tether doesn't break, the probe should hold together."

"Tether ship status?" Faraday asked.

"They're getting bounced a little, but they're holding position," McCollum reported. "The winch mechanism seems to be holding up all right."

"Tell them to keep a close eye on it," Faraday ordered. "I just hope there aren't too many more of these layers down here."

"I think we'll find there's at least one more," Beach said. "Probably at the bottom of Level Eight."

"What makes you say that?" Faraday asked, frowning.

"Remember what Manta said back when he first resurfaced?" Beach reminded him. "He mentioned a special speaking layer of Level Eight."

"Of course," Milligan said suddenly. "Put a turbulence layer on either side of Level Eight, and you've got yourself a huge sonic waveguide. Just like a fiber optic cable, only for sound instead of light: The message bounces back and forth between the layers as it propagates down the mostly calm area in the middle."

"Which is how the Wise can call all around the planet but no one above them can listen in,"

McCollum said, nodding. "I've been wondering about that."

"Clever," Sprenkle remarked. "And it makes perfect sense that the Wise would keep that fact as secret as possible. All social power structures depend to one degree or another on good communication."

"If you don't mind, Dr. Sprenkle, let's save the sociology lecture for later," Liadof said tartly. "We have something a little more urgent on our plate right now."

"Urgent, perhaps, but nothing we can do anything about," Faraday pointed out. "At this point the probe's pretty much on its own."

"Unless we haul it out of there," Liadof retorted. "Is there something wrong with simply getting it out of there before it tears itself apart?"

"Actually, there's not much point in doing that," Sprenkle said. "From the wind pattern readings, I'd say it's already well past the halfway mark."

"And it's holding together?" Faraday asked.

"We're still getting transmissions along the tether," Milligan said with a shrug.

"There," Sprenkle said, pointing to one of the displays. "Look—it's through."

He was right, Faraday saw: The inertial indicators were settling down. "Confirmed," Milligan said.

"We're back to steady westerlies again."

He looked over his shoulder at Faraday. "Do you want me to hold it here while the diagnostics check it over?"

"No, keep it moving," Faraday said. "The diagnostics can run just as well on the fly as they can stationary. Let's just hope the lower layer isn't as bad as this one."

"And hope it's the last," Liadof added. "I don't suppose you know anything about that, either, Mr.

Raimey?"

Manta's tonals began rumbling through the speakers. "I don't know anything about what lies below Level Eight," the translation came.

"Of course not," Liadof said, half under her breath. "You don't know anything useful, do you?"

There was just the slightest pause. "I'm sorry my knowledge is not up to your standards," Manta said. "Colonel Faraday, can you tell me when you'll be sending the weapon down?"

"Give us a break, Manta," Faraday protested. "We don't even know how deep it's going to have to go yet."