Kathleen Goonan: Crescent City Rhapsody

Zeb constantly monitored and taped radio transmissions from their West Virginia telescope, using a vacuum tube amplifier he built in high school, still perfectly good.

He was pleased that his computer system was still working, but of course it had the best shielding he could afford. He called up the profile of the last few hours of radio broadcasting. That was one advantage of vacuum tubes—they were unaffected by radiation.

He converted that information to a simple time chart; printed it out. He took books from his long table and piled them on the floor to make room to unfold the antenna printout, which he checked against the time chart. Same pattern.

Except that it was reversed. During the times that the little blackouts occurred, his pens had recorded. They had stopped during the brief intervals broadcasting worked.

Something had happened. He saw here evidence of a pattern that would have been washed out by a solar flare.

This was no solar flare. That much was certain. And there had probably been no nuclear explosions.

An intelligent source had created this pattern. There was no way it could happen at random. No way in hell. He could think of two possibilities: humans, which was the more reasonable. Or some interstellar source.

Maybe someone—or something—was communicating with them at last. Or at least communicating in their general direction. The idea of aliens had never excited him much, though; they seemed to him a pulp pipe dream. He was much more interested in the mechanics of time, space, stars, and planets. The information he had here would be fodder for the alien-seekers, certainly. But of course there was another explanation. There had to be.

He was startled awake by the ringing phone and realized that he was stiff and cold. He’d fallen asleep in the chair. The fire was out.

“Phone,” he said. Then: “Hi.”

Sally’s voice issued from the screen, but not her picture. He had picture capability, but few others did. Her voice was pitched higher than usual and she spoke rapidly.

“Thank God you re all right, Zeb! They just got the phones working again. Most of ours are ruined, though. I’ve been so worried!”

“Calm down,” Zeb said. “Is everything okay there?”

Her deep, shaky breath was audible. “Yes. Yes, we’re fine. The power was off for about six hours, but it came back on this morning and I put the turkey in the oven. I hope it doesn’t go out again.” She paused. “Are you still coming?”

“What time is it?” he asked groggily.

She sighed. “I guess you were up all night. That’s no good for you. You need to keep on an even keel. It’s noon. I’m a nervous wreck. Maybe we should stick together. The stores have been ransacked, but I’ve got lots of canned goods.”

“Why don’t you and John and the kids come down here?”

“Down there ?”

“This is the best place to be if there’s a problem, Sally. I’ve got heat, the woods are full of deer and wild turkeys…”

“I was thinking you should stay here ,” she said rather grumpily.

They were silent for a moment.

Zeb shifted in his chair and a spasm shot through his back. “I’ll be there in about two hours. Then we can decide what to do. Okay? And I’ll bring the dogs in case I have to stay—”

“The dogs ? They shed all over everything.”

“Brad will be very happy.” Brad was ten and wanted collies of his own, much to his mother’s dismay. “See you soon, okay?”

He got his stuff together quickly. He looked at the printouts for a moment, then packed them up too. They contained valuable information. In fact, they probably had rare information. Most radio telescopes, heavily computer-dependent, would have been knocked out by the pulse. Apparently a lot of satellites had been knocked out. Except maybe those in the Earth’s shadow, depending on what the source had been. But then they wouldn’t have this information either. As he picked up the box, he wavered. He didn’t really know what conditions were like out there.

Still, it might be best to take them. He looked around and grabbed a Virginia Tech tote bag. He slipped the printouts inside.

He was starting to walk out the door when he remembered Craig. He went back and wrote a message that would be sent whenever traffic allowed, kids made a dipole antenna, pretty interesting footage, strange conclusions, talk to you tonight. He was pleased when the message zipped off.

Both dogs fit in the cab with him. Pleiades got up as close as possible to the window, crowding the dash, staring forward, his brown eye on Zeb’s side, his blue eye on the window side. Zephyr cowered on the floor, preferring to pretend that she was not zooming down the road faster than she could possibly run. He stuffed the printouts under the seat.

He made it to the interstate, then realized he had forgotten his medicine again. “Damn!” he said and smacked the steering wheel with his hand. The dogs looked at him.

He decided to keep going. He was halfway there. There were some old pills in Sal’s medicine cabinet; they were probably still good.

The road was crowded, considering that many vehicles depending on computerized components might well be incapacitated. The pulse’s effects must have varied quite a bit. Both the north and south lanes were bumper-to-bumper, moving steadily but slowly. Emergency flashers lined the road every few miles where wrecked vehicles were being cleared away.

The trees and hills coming toward him assumed a strange, graceful rhythm, entering him in a cadence like music.

The distance between inner and outer dissolved. He was the trees, the traffic, Ironto Mountain, the green exit sign. He was the data; he even had it memorized; he realized, there in his photographic memory, the silences and signals blazing in a strange ratio. Like a message; a signal. Sure, it would happen again. If the ratio of signal to silence held. But not soon. Maybe in another month. If he thought about it, he could work out the exact dates. He was positive.

Damn. Damn. No one knew. Well, a few people probably knew, but not many. And he didn’t really know anything either. He wished he had stayed home so he could mull things over with Craig. His excitement began to grow.

The trees, the cars, the gray sky. Flowing. Drawing him along. Glowing with a lovely light. He sighed. Only twenty more miles. Then he would have to forsake this beauty, this utter, piercing harmony. He would have to take his pill. The doors to the infinite, when they opened, let in such a bright light. It would be nice if it was always this way. But he knew that after a long, trackless time of perfection, which was usually seventy-two hours more or less in the dull, time-bound world, it would all turn to shit.

The sky drifted toward him, in warping skeins of wind-driven flakes. Traffic slowed further. He pushed Pleiades aside and opened the glove compartment, keeping his eyes on the road. He rummaged around until he felt his little recorder. Good. He took it out, clicked it on, started to talk. When he was like this, he had to write, usually equations. Or talk. Talking was the next best thing.

The smell of Thanksgiving dinner filled Sal’s house. The dogs pushed their way inside, and Brad screamed in delight and embraced them, ignoring Zeb. John and Sally and Annie hugged him. There was a fire in the fireplace. It was all one thing: perfection unparsed. What Terri had wanted, maybe, with him. He stared into Sal’s eyes and smiled. A big smile.

She looked at him suspiciously, her long blond hair escaping from her ponytail, her apron spattered. “You need a pill, Zeb.”

He nodded, smiling. “I guess.” Amazing how bright everything was in here; how buzzing with sound and energy.

“Hey, Zeb!” John, his brother-in-law, shook Zeb’s hand vigorously. “Hell of a day for the TV to go bonkers. I was looking forward to the Purdue game.” He rubbed his large bald head ruefully and his ruddy face creased with a half-worried smile.