Jack McDevitt - Coming Home

“Chase, I—”

“Good-bye, Khaled.” I disconnected again. He didn’t call back.

And I tossed and turned the rest of the night.

On the eleventh, I checked with operations. The Vistula had arrived in the solar system, but it was out near the orbit of Mars. “Figure two days,” they said. We took advantage of the time we had to travel to Egypt. Alex could never get enough of the pyramids. We landed at Balakat, a few kilometers from the Great Pyramid of Giza, climbed into a bus with forty other tourists, and headed out.

As customary, Alex had done his homework. “I cannot imagine how a primitive society could have put this thing together,” he said, as we stood gaping at it. “Some of the individual blocks weigh up to eighty tons and were brought in from Aswan, which was more than eight hundred kilometers away.

“The thing consists of five and a half million tons of limestone, as well as some granite. The slaves were working in a desert. How could they possibly, with no technology, have hauled even one eighty-ton block of limestone across eight hundred kilometers under a blazing sun?”

“What are you suggesting?”

“I don’t know. One fairly common theory is that it was done by aliens.”

“The Mutes?”

“Who else is there?” He laughed. “But I can’t imagine Selotta or Kassel hauling those things around. Can you?”

They’d ridden with us a few years earlier on a tour of Atlantis. “They have antigravity,” I said.

“Let me put it a different way: Can you imagine either of them showing any interest in arranging blocks of limestone on a desert floor?”

We also visited the Palawi Temple, on the edge of the Libyan Desert. It’s six thousand years old, and the civilization that built it is long gone. But its most fascinating aspect is that tourists who went there three thousand years ago inscribed their names and dates on its walls. The practice was stopped in the last millennium, but the names are still there, now carefully preserved and part of the history of the place.

We had just come out and were climbing back into the tour bus, grateful to be in the cool air again, when we got word that the Vistula had docked. “Do you want to call him?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “Let’s let him take the initiative.”

Fifteen minutes later, the bus lifted off and started back toward Almahdi. The call came in midway during the flight. “Alex? This is Lawrence.”

“Hello, Lawrence. How was your ride in?”

“Long. You haven’t talked to any more reporters, I hope?”

“No. You asked me to hold off, so I did.”

“Good. We need to get together.”

“Okay. We’re in Almahdi.”

“Where?”

“Egypt.”

“You have Chase with you?”

“Yes, she’s right here.”

“Okay. I was going to suggest you come up here. And please bring her with you.”

“Are you on Galileo?”

“Yes. That way we can go directly to Larissa.”

“You know where it is, Lawrence?”

“Not exactly. But I have its number.”

“From Tokata?”

“Yes.”

“KL-4561?”

“No. I got the real one. And I want to apologize for that. Heli was just trying to protect Garnett.”

“Protect him from what?”

“I’d rather not discuss this over the link. Why don’t you come up here, so we can talk it over and get everything settled?”

“Lawrence, so we’re clear: We’ve been running around working on this matter for the better part of three months. We got dumped into the Atlantic and were led to believe our lives were in danger. Your associate sent us on a bogus run to the asteroid belt. And now you want us to go up to the space station and you’ll explain everything. Is that right?”

“I understand you’re not happy, Alex. And believe me, I’m sorry about how this has played out. I’ll make it up to you if you’ll allow me.”

“Why don’t you start by giving me the Larissa designator? Then we’ll pick you up, and we can talk on the way.”

Southwick hesitated. “No,” he said. “I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“I’ll explain to you when you get here. But first I have to have your word that you’ll never say a word about this. Nor will Chase.”

Alex looked at me. Glanced down at the desert moving slowly past. “I can’t do that,” he said. “I’m not good at conspiracies.”

“This is not a conspiracy, Alex.”

“I wouldn’t know what else to call it.”

“Nevertheless, I must have your word.”

“You want me to promise to say nothing before you reveal what you’re hiding?”

“That’s correct. I’m sorry, but I have to insist.”

“Then you might as well get on the next flight, Lawrence, and ride back to Rimway.”

“Alex, I have no choice.”

“Neither do I.”

We could hear him breathing on the other end. “I’ll tell you this much,” he said. “Your plan to make public what you know, and unleash a bunch of treasure hunters will gain absolutely nothing. The odds of their finding anything are virtually nonexistent—”

“I wouldn’t agree with that.”

“No. You probably wouldn’t. But there are a lot of asteroids out there.”

“Not that many big ones.”

“Okay. Let me take it a step further. If you do succeed in getting a swarm of people to go out and do the search for you, and if one of them is able to find Larissa, I can assure you it will do nobody any good.” He hesitated. “Look. Don’t do this. If, when you find out what has happened, you can conclude that no crime has been committed, and no one has been injured, all I’m asking is that you will agree to say nothing.”

“Why don’t you just tell me what you have, and we can go from there?”

“I can’t do that, Alex. Not like this.”

“Then I’m sorry. I guess we’re just going to have to stay at odds. Lawrence, I think you made the flight for nothing.” Alex clicked off, and he sat staring out the window.

It took maybe twenty minutes before the link sounded again. “All right,” he said. “I’ve checked into the Galileo Hotel. When you get here, we’ll talk it out.”

Southwick came down and met us in the bar. The relaxed, no-problem manner was gone. There was tension in his eyes, and his face was pale. “Glad to see you, Alex,” he said, barely able to get the words out. He eased himself into a chair and sent a weak smile across the table. “Hello, Chase. I guess this has been a long haul for you guys.”

“You could say that,” said Alex.

Piano music drifted through the room. A lazy, quiet rhythm from another era. “I’m sorry. I wish there’d been another way.”

Alex lifted his glass, tasted the drink, and put it back down. “Why don’t you tell us what’s going on?”

Southwick’s eyes closed briefly. A waiter arrived, and he ordered something. I don’t recall what it was, except that he asked for it straight . Then he glanced around to see if anyone was close enough to overhear us. “I’m sorry about the problems. I’d have avoided it all if I could have.”

“I’m sure you would,” said Alex, with a level tone.