Майкл Крайтон - The Andromeda Evolution

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The Tunnel

MAJOR PENG WU EXPIRED AT UTC 18:58:06, APPROXIMATELY a half mile into the anomaly, infected by an aerosolized variety of the AS-3 microparticle. Nidhi Vedala was shedding silent tears at the bottom of the hatchway ladder. But a spark of anger was also growing in her chest.

Vedala could still see Peng Wu’s final moments in her mind’s eye—the woman’s smooth, unperturbed face etched by a latticework of infinitely fine metallic hexagons. Peng’s agonized shriek had sent a shudder of revulsion and grief through Vedala. Now, she focused on the cold steel of the ladder biting into her hip and tried to slow her breathing.

The glare of her headlamp was bright in the claustrophobic shaft. She was dismayed to see the beam swallowed almost totally by the relentlessly uniform material of the anomaly. Around her, she saw the faces of Stone, Odhiambo, and the boy Tupa, all staring in concern.

Their unmasked fear reminded Vedala abruptly that she was still the leader of this expedition—and that their mission was far from over. In many ways, she thought, the true mission had only just begun. A confident, if weary, authority returned to her voice.

“Okay,” she said. “Let’s regroup.”

“Peng?” asked Stone. “Is there any chance she—”

He stopped when he saw Vedala’s face. Instead of saying more, he reached over and gave her shoulder a squeeze.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

The group stood close together in the mouth of another unlit tunnel. Like the previous tunnel, this one also appeared to slice a straight line into the darkness. The only difference was that this corridor was half as large, only six feet tall and as wide as a typical hallway. The glassy walls seemed to press in on them. The tunnel was altogether featureless, save for a round metallic conduit pipe running along one side, transmitting electricity to something deeper inside.

The one remaining canary had not detected airborne toxins, and the field team had their respirators around their necks, speaking in whispers by the drone’s guttering light. Odhiambo passed out MREs, which they each chewed mechanically as they conversed. Tupa ate a granola bar and listened intently to the translations provided by the drone. Vedala had noted that the boy was absentmindedly holding Stone’s hand. It looked as though the contact was comforting to both the man and the child.

“Peng said the Andromeda Strain has been found throughout the solar system, but the results were covered up,” said Vedala. “First of all, could that even be true?”

Odhiambo’s hand went to his chin.

“I believe so. There have been only a handful of successful sample-return missions: the moon, a comet called Wild 2, and the Itokawa asteroid. Every other nonterrestrial sample came from naturally occurring meteorites.”

“Don’t forget the upper-atmosphere missions that started all this fifty years ago,” added Stone.

“And the Scoop missions, of course,” said Odhiambo. “But access to so few samples is tightly controlled. It would be possible to suppress knowledge of the discovery of Andromeda in moon regolith, for instance. And if nonreturn probes were instrumented to look for it, the presence of Andromeda could easily be hidden during the data transfer process.”

“In other words, you believe her,” said Vedala.

“Of course I do,” said Odhiambo. “These were her final words, and they were costly. She was in a great deal of pain.”

“Then the Andromeda Strain satisfies the Messenger Theory,” concluded Stone. “It has spread everywhere, waiting for life to emerge. Meaning there must be an intelligence behind it.”

“Based on the Piedmont incident, likely a hostile intelligence,” said Vedala.

“No wonder Peng was panicked,” said Odhiambo. “With that knowledge, it was clear we were walking into extreme danger. A hostile alien structure.”

“She kept her secret until it was too late,” said Stone.

“She tried to warn us. I should have listened,” said Vedala. “We could have been more careful.”

“There are more immediate issues,” said Stone. “Kline is trying to kill us, and we’re buried a kilometer deep inside the Andromeda Strain.”

“She’s up there and we’re down here,” added Vedala, her jaw clenched. “Kline wants us dead, and we’re going to figure out why. For now, we only have one direction to go.”

Odhiambo was quiet for a long time before his eyes went back to the metal conduit running along the floor.

“I do not believe the location of this structure is an accident. It is perfectly equatorial, like the debris path of the Tiangong-1. But it is also located precisely at the mouth of a river that can provide hydroelectric power.”

“So you think the crash of the Tiangong-1 . . .”

“It was a deliberate obfuscation, a red herring, so to speak, provided by Sophie Kline to mask her true goals. For some reason, I believe she needed the ISS to be moved into an orbit over this area, and the Heavenly Palace hypothesis provided a way to make that happen.”

“Could that be true? Could Kline have really planned and built the entire anomaly from the ground up?” asked Vedala.

“As you said, the structure likely started as a speck of self-replicating material. Once she programmed its growth pattern, it would have been as simple as planting a seed in the dirt,” responded Odhiambo. “The rest could have been orchestrated using personal wealth and connections with private industry. She is one person I would never underestimate.”

“And yet we have no idea how much of this is on purpose, and how much is just a terrible mistake,” said Vedala.

“We know that she doesn’t want us here,” said Stone. “She surely knew the sertanistas would notice the anomaly, but they wouldn’t have the resources or knowledge to investigate properly. Wildfire protocol was only triggered when Eternal Vigilance detected outgassed particles matching the Piedmont incident. And that only happened due to an accidental turbine explosion. I think Kline’s true goal was to work here for a while in isolation, letting the anomaly grow in the deep jungle.”

“So these infections were not part of her plan,” said Vedala. “But whatever she’s doing or trying to do . . . it’s spinning out of her control. If this structure keeps spreading—or if some nation decides to drop a bomb on it—the AS-3 particle could end up consuming the entire world.”

“The infamous Scenario F,” mused Stone. “Total planetary extinction.”

The Kenyan xenogeologist placed a hand flat against the wall, then pulled it away. His palm was glistening with condensation. “This tunnel has taken us under the lake. Whatever is using this electricity . . . it’s hidden beneath the water.”

With that knowledge, a palpable burden seemed to close in on the team. Stone could imagine the weight of hundreds of tons of water pressing down, squeezing itself into the tiny droplets emerging from the gray-green walls.

Standing on his tippy toes, Tupa whispered to the hovering canary. The device rotated to watch him, and the boy made a quick gesture. In response, the drone rose to head height and oriented to James Stone.

In its robotic voice, the canary translated, “We go now.”

Glancing up the chute to the hatchway in alarm, Vedala was relieved to see that the seals were holding. None of the infected smoke had come in. She smelled only damp air and the metallic odor of the anomaly.

“We go now,” said Tupa in halting English. The boy gestured and whispered at the drone once more, with urgency.

“There is a roaring,” translated the canary.

“A roaring?” questioned Vedala, but Odhiambo hushed her. He closed his eyes, face aimed at the ceiling.