Jack McDevitt - Ancient Shores

Arky was adamant: “Nobody else goes across into this wilderness world until we’re sure it’s safe.”

April was ready to explode. “Damn it, Arky. We’ll never be sure it’s safe . Not absolutely.”

“Then maybe we ought to write everything off. Take the best price we can get for the Roundhouse and let somebody else worry about the lawsuits.”

“ What lawsuits?”

“The lawsuits that will be filed as soon as one of your pie-in-the-sky academics gets eaten.”

“Nobody’s going to get eaten.”

“How do you know that? Can you guarantee it?”

“Of course I can’t.”

“Then maybe we better think about it.” He took a deep breath. “We need to ask ourselves whether we really want all these people blundering around over there.”

“They aren’t blundering.” April took a moment to steady her voice. “These are trained people. Anyhow, we can’t keep all this to ourselves. We have to let as many people get a look at it as we can.”

“Then let me ask you again: What happens if one of them gets killed?”

“There are no large predators,” she said.

“You haven’t seen any large predators, April. There’s a world of difference. How about diseases? Any exotic bugs?”

“If there are, it’s too late. Max and I have been there and back.”

“I know.” Arky looked sternly at her. “I didn’t care much for that, either. Look, until now this has been a shoot-from-the-hip operation. It’s time we got a handle on things. Before we get burned. First off, I want you and Max to get full physicals. Complete workups. Meantime, we’re going to stop the tours until Adam certifies it’s safe. Okay? I don’t want anyone going over there until that happens. Not even you .”

“Arky,” she protested, “we can’t just lock the door and tell people it’s unsafe.”

“We just did,” he said.

Adam put together his team. They included Jack Swiftfoot, Andrea Hawk, John Little Ghost, and two more April did not know. He parceled out M—15’s, grenades, and pistols. “You look as if you expect to run into dinosaurs,” she said.

He shrugged. “Better safe than sorry.” He signaled his people onto the grid, pressed the arrow icon, and joined them. “See you tonight,” he told April. He was slipping an ammunition clip onto his belt when they began to fade.

Max walked in carrying a couple of yellow balloons and his minicam. “I wouldn’t mind,” April told him, “but this sets a bad precedent. What do we have to do now? Send a SWAT team in before we can look at any of these other places?”

“Assuming there are other places,” said Max. “I don’t know. But I’m not sure it’s a bad idea.”

She grumbled but said nothing.

“Do you think,” Max asked, “whoever built the system is still out there somewhere?”

Her eyes lost their focus. “It’s been ten thousand years,” she said. “That’s a long time.”

“Maybe not for these people.”

“Maybe not. But the Roundhouse was abandoned a long time ago. And there’s no evidence of recent usage in Eden, either. What does that tell you?”

Through the wraparound window, Max could see tourists taking pictures. “I wonder where the network ends,” he said.

Her eyes brightened. “I’m looking forward to finding out.”

The outside door opened. They heard footsteps in the passageway, and Arky Redfern appeared. He waved, peeled off his jacket, and laid it on the back of a chair. “There’s some talk,” he said, “of making you two honorary tribal members.”

“I’d like that,” said April.

The only other person Max could think of who had been so honored by a tribe was Sam Houston. Not bad company. “Me too,” he said.

“So what’s next?” asked Arky, gazing pointedly at the balloons.

“We want to see what else we have.”

The balloons sported the legend Fort Moxie and a picture of the Roundhouse. Two long strings dangled from each. Max, enjoying center stage, pulled over two chairs and set them on either side of the grid, outside the perimeter. He tied one of the balloons to the chairs so that the balloon itself floated directly over the grid.

“What are you trying to do?” Arky asked.

“We don’t want to clog the system,” said April. “If we send a chair and nobody moves it off the receiving grid, that’s the ball game. We lose that channel. We need to send something that won’t stay put.”

Arky nodded. “Good,” he said.

“Ready?” asked April, who was now standing beside the icons.

Max focused on the balloon and started the videotape. “Running,” he said.

April pressed the rings icon.

Max counted twenty-three seconds and watched the balloon disappear. Two severed pieces of string, one on either side of the grid, dropped to the floor.

“I’ve got a question,” said Arky. “What happens if somebody isn’t all the way on when the thing activates? Does half of you get left here?”

April looked like a kid caught with her hand in the cookie jar. “That’s a good question, counselor,” she said.

They repeated the process with the final icon, the G clef, and returned to the control module to see the results.

The rings had implied, to Max, an artificial environment. Here, at last, they might come face to face with someone.

And perhaps they would. There was a secondary exposure, a ghost in the photo. The ghost was a wall with a window. The wall was plain, and suggested perhaps a vessel or military installation. The window was long, longer than the image. And it seemed to be night on the other side.

“Indoors, I think,” said April.

Arky was sitting on the work table. He leaned forward, trying to see more clearly. “How do we respond if someone’s there?” he asked.

“Say hello and smile,” said Max.

The lawyer frowned. “I think we need to be serious about this. Listen, this station, terminal, whatever, has been out of business for a long time. But it doesn’t mean the entire system is down. We need to decide how we’re going to respond if someone shows up.” He looked reluctant to continue. “For example, should we be armed?”

April shook her head slowly. “Seems to me,” she said, “the last thing we’d want to do is start a fight with whoever put this thing together.”

“He’s right, though,” said Max. “We should be careful.”

Arky slipped into a chair. “Why don’t we take a look at the other one?”

The G clef. Max let the videotape run ahead to the second sequence.

Again they watched the balloon fade. This time the background image appeared to be a carpeted room. The walls might have been paneled, but they were bare. No furniture was visible. “Light coming from somewhere,” said April.

“What do you think?” asked Max.

“It might be just another Roundhouse.”

April was ready to go. “Only one way to find out.”

Max hesitated. “I think we should leave it alone,” he said. “If someone really is over there, we are going to screw it up. Let’s use that committee of yours to figure out how to do this stuff.”

“That’s six days away,” said April. “The more information we can get for them, the better able they’ll be to do their work. Anyway, what kind of experts would you want for a project like this? I mean, it’s not as if anyone has any experience.”

“I can see where this is leading,” said Max.