Jack McDevitt - Ancient Shores

Prairie Industries is a conglomerate specializing primarily in the manufacture of agricultural equipment.

Larry King special on TNT, April 1. Guest: Dmitri Polkaevich, winner of the Pulitzer prize for Iron Dreams , a definitive history of the USSR. Topic: the new Russian revolution. (Suggested by then-current fears that a right-wing Russian coup was imminent.)

King:You don’t feel, then, that a resurgence of nationalism is likely?

Polkaevich:The world is changing very rapidly, Larry. No, it is true there are those in Russia who would give us their own peculiar brand of fascism, if they could. Just as there are those who would return to Lenin. But the tide of history is running against them all.

King:Well, I’m happy to hear it. If I may ask before we go to the phones, where is the tide of history taking us?

Polkaevich:Predicting the future is a dangerous enterprise.

King:Yes. But you just implied—

Polkaevich:That some tendencies are evident. Larry, you have of course been following the events along the Canadian border?

King:The Roundhouse? ( Smiles ) I wouldn’t know how to get away from them. In fact, we’ll be doing a show from there next week.

Polkaevich:The bridge to the stars is a Rubicon.

King:For Russian politicians?

Polkaevich:Oh, yes. And for the Armenians. And the Chinese. Larry, I no longer think of myself as a Muscovite. Or even as a Russian. No. You and I are citizens of Earth. The era of national borders, of governments that divide us with their petty squabbles, is passing into history.

King:Governments are becoming obsolete?

Polkaevich:Individual governments, yes. I think we will soon see a world body. Unfortunately, the transition period will be a dangerous time. People tend to disparage their governments, but they will fight to the death to keep them. And there is good reason for their fears. If a world government becomes oppressive, where does one flee? Although now perhaps we have an answer to that problem. ( Chuckles )

King:Dmitri, your comment that you no longer think of yourself as a Russian intrigues me. I wonder if you can elaborate a little more on that.

Polkaevich:Larry, we know now we are not alone. There are others out there somewhere, and they are quite near. This knowledge will cause us to draw together.

FBI/CONFIDENTIAL

TO: Intel IV

FROM: SAC, Morton, ID

SUBJECT: Initial Report/SIR27

New right-wing hate group is forming in this area in an effort to seize the entrance to the off-world site at Johnson’s Ridge, ND. They are designing a charter calling for occupation of the new world, followed by a quick drive for statehood.

Attachment A lists active insiders. Almost everyone associated with the governing board of this organization is on file. Attachment B contains press releases and public pronouncements by John Fielder, spokesman for the group, and Abner Wright, its founder. You will note their concern with getting the Roundhouse out of the hands of foreigners (they seem to be referring to the Sioux) and their stated willingness to use force. Will advise as situation develops.

TO: Director, Customs Management Center,

Chicago, IL

FROM: Area Port Director, Fort Moxie, ND

SUBJECT: Roundhouse, Status of

As you are aware, people are entering and exiting the country through a “transdimensional door” on Johnson’s Ridge. Please advise whether Johnson’s Ridge should be considered a port, for customs purposes. Of course, no one is bringing back commercial merchandise, at least to our knowledge. But there are fish and game requirements and other laws that would come into play.

If instructed to establish an entry area, please note that the action will require additional personnel.

Project Forty’s ratings had gone through the roof. As a consequence, criticism of Old-Time Bill also soared.

Bill’s enemies were the mainstream press, liberal politicians, and left-leaning churches, which is to say all the various forces that were conniving in the moral collapse of the American people. They accused him of every conceivable crime but concentrated particularly on fraud and hypocrisy. They charged that he used religion to solicit donations, that he was a theological con artist, that he probably didn’t even believe in God.

None of this, strictly speaking, was true. To deal with the last first, Bill didn’t think seriously enough about theology to worry about details, but he sincerely believed that, as he often preached, everyone had a direct line into God’s study. Don’t hesitate to use the phone, he said; say what you really mean, and God will never put you on hold.

He sincerely believed in his own uprightness, because he gave hope to the despairing, meaning to those who had lost direction, and a sense of belonging to the unloved. To all who came to him, who wandered the various Sinais of their lives in keeping with the spirit of the Volunteers, he offered redemption, an easing of pain, and a celestial compass.

Oh, yes, Bill was a believer. God stood by Bill’s side when the choir was singing and the pipes were playing and people sobbed out their sins and promised to amend their lives.

And he most certainly did not do it for money.

The money was nice; he never denied that. But he thought of it as a corollary benefit for doing what was right, for walking the path of the Lord, for living by the Book. His real motivation would have been found in the exhilaration of standing before audiences in English-speaking countries around the world and feeling their response to God’s truth. He loved to draw them into the power of the Word, to hold their emotions in his hands, and, with his soaring rhetoric, to loosen the chains that bound them, not to an earthly existence, but to prosaic lives.

Bill understood the romance implicit in the tales of a desert God who had loved his people and who had eventually faced the Roman cross for all who had ever drawn breath. Yes! That was what people understood and what they loved. And they loved him because he had made himself part of the message.

His second Fort Moxie broadcast took place during the last snow storm of the season. Ordinarily, Bill didn’t get to see much snow, and it inspired him. While the flakes drifted against the windows, he understood God’s love for Adam in spite of his disobedience. And he felt his people’s hearts beat with his.

“But Adam has gone back into the Garden.”

“Amen,” cried the Volunteers.

“O Lord, we need your strong arm.”

“Alleluia!”

“Give us a sign. Show the faithless You stand by our side!”

He urged his listeners to write to their representatives. “Demand that we withdraw. For we are deaf to His word.” Tears appeared in his eyes. The wind began to build. Bill felt the Presence. “Show them your strength, God of Abraham,” he said. “I ask it in your Son’s name.”

The chorus, on cue, burst into “Rock of Ages.” The room shook and people sobbed and the wind wrapped itself around the building. Amanda Dexter, who could always be counted on to go to pieces at the climax of a good service, shrieked her undying gratitude to her Creator and collapsed in a quivering heap.

They rolled through several choruses while the wind played with the windows. Bill felt something open in his soul, and the power of the Angel of the Almighty entered into him. He knew once again the sheer exuberance of bringing people to the Lord. He flowed into the Angel and became one with it, directing the storm, watching the snow submerge the harsh angles of roof and shutter and drainpipe, enshrouding the building, burying it, removing its harsh lines.