Michael Crichton - State Of Fear

The island of Gareda looked like a big avocado immersed in the water, with jagged edges along the shore. "There is a mountain spine running along the center of the island," Sanjong said. "In places, it's three thousand feet high. The jungle in the interior of the island is very dense, essentially impenetrable, unless you follow the roads or one of the footpaths through the jungle. But we can't make our way cross country."

"So we take a road," Sarah said.

"Maybe," Sanjong said. "But the rebels are known to be in this area here" he circled the center of the island with his finger "and they have split up in two or possibly three groups. Their exact locations are not known. They have taken over this small village here, Pavutu, near the north coast. That seems to be their headquarters. And they presumably have roadblocks up, and probably patrols on the jungle paths."

"Then how do we get to Resolution Bay?"

Kenner said, "By helicopter, if we can. I've arranged for one, but this is not the most reliable part of the world. If we can't do that, we'll head out by car. See how far we can get. But at this point we just don't know how we're going to do it."

Evans said, "And when we get to Resolution Bay?"

"There are four new structures on the beach. We have to take them down and dismantle the machinery inside. Make them inoperable. We also have to find their submarine tender and dismantle the submarine."

"What submarine?" Sarah said.

"They leased a small two-man research sub. It's been in the region for the last two weeks."

"Doing what?"

"We're pretty sure we know now. The whole Solomon Island chain of more than nine hundred islands is located within a very active geological part of the world in terms of plate tectonics. The Solomons are a part of the world where plates crunch together. That's why they have many volcanoes there, and so many earthquakes. It's a very unstable region. The Pacific Plate collides and slides under the Oldowan Java Plateau. The result is the Solomon Trench, a huge undersea feature that curves in an arc all along the northern side of the island chain. It's very deep, between two thousand and six thousand feet. The trench is just north of Resolution Bay, too."

"So it's an active geological region with a deep trench," Evans said. "I still don't see the game."

"Lot of undersea volcanoes, lot of slope debris, and therefore the potential for landslides," Kenner said.

"Landslides." Evans rubbed his eyes. It was late.

"Undersea landslides," Kenner said.

Sarah said, "They're trying to cause an undersea landslide?"

"We think so. Somewhere along the slope of the Solomon Trench. Probably at the five-hundred- to one-thousand-foot depth."

Evans said, "And what would that do? An undersea landslide?"

Kenner said to Sanjong, "Show them the big map." Sanjong brought up a map of the entire Pacific basin, from Siberia to Chile, Australia to Alaska.

"Okay," Kenner said. "Now draw a straight line out from Resolution Bay and see where it takes you."

"California!"

"Right. In about eleven hours."

Evans frowned. "An undersea landslide amp;"

"Displaces an enormous volume of water very quickly. That is the most common way a tsunami is formed. Once propagated, the wave front will travel right across the Pacific at five hundred miles an hour."

"Holy shit," Evans said. "How big a wave are we talking?"

"Actually, it's a series, what's called a wave train. The undersea landslide in Alaska in 1952 generated a wave forty-seven feet high. But the height of this one is impossible to anticipate because wave height is a function of the shoreline it hits. In parts of California it could be up to sixty feet high. A six-story building."

"Oh boy," Sarah said.

"And how much time do we have before they do this?" Evans said.

"The conference runs two more days. The wave will take a day to cross the Pacific. So amp;"

"We have one day."

"At most, yes. One day to land, make our way to Resolution Bay, and stop them."

"Stop who?" Ted Bradley said, yawning and coming back toward them. "Je-sus! Do I have a headache or what! How about a little hair of the dog?" He paused, stared at the group, looking from face to face. "Hey, what's going on here? You guys look like I interrupted a funeral."

Three hours later, the sun came up and the plane began its descent. Now it was flying low, passing over green forested islands fringed in an unearthly pale blue. They saw few roads and few towns, mostly small villages.

Ted Bradley looked out the window. "Isn't it beautiful?" he said. "Truly unspoiled paradise. This is what is vanishing in our world."

Seated opposite him, Kenner said nothing. He, too, was staring out the window.

"Don't you think the problem," Bradley said, "is that we have lost contact with nature?"

"No," Kenner said. "I think the problem is I don't see many roads."

"Don't you think," Bradley said, "that's because it's the white man, not the natives, who wants to conquer nature, to beat it into submission?"

"No, I don't think that."

"I do," Bradley said. "I find that people who live closer to the earth, in their villages, surrounded by nature, that those people have a natural ecological sense and a feeling for the fitness of it all."

"Spent a lot of time in villages, Ted?" Kenner said.

"As a matter of fact, yes. I shot a picture in Zimbabwe and another one in Botswana. I know what I am talking about."

"Uh-huh. You stayed in villages all that time?"

"No, I stayed in hotels. I had to, for insurance. But I had a lot of experiences in villages. There is no question that village life is best and ecologically soundest. Frankly, I think everyone in the world should live that way. And certainly, we should not be encouraging village people to industrialize. That's the problem."

"I see. So you want to stay in a hotel, but you want everybody else to stay in a village."

"No, you're not hearing"

"Where do you live now, Ted?" Kenner said.

"Sherman Oaks."

"Is that a village?"

"No. Well, it's a sort of a village, I suppose you could say amp;But I have to be in LA for my work," Bradley said. "I don't have a choice."

"Ted, have you ever stayed in a Third-World village? Even for one night?"

Bradley shifted in his seat. "As I said before, I spent a lot of time in the villages while we were shooting. I know what I'm talking about."

"If village life is so great, why do you think people want to leave?"

"They shouldn't leave. That's my point."

"You know better than they do?" Kenner said.

Bradley paused, then blurted: "Well, frankly, if you must know, yes. I do know better. I have the benefit of education and broader experience. And I know firsthand the dangers of industrial society and how it is making the whole world sick. So, yes, I think I do know what is best for them. Certainly I know what is ecologically best for the planet."

"I have a problem," Kenner said, "with other people deciding what is in my best interest when they don't live where I do, when they don't know the local conditions or the local problems I face, when they don't even live in the same country as I do, but they still feelin some far-off Western city, at a desk in some glass skyscraper in Brussels or Berlin or New Yorkthey still feel that they know the solution to all my problems and how I should live my life. I have a problem with that."

"What's your problem?" Bradley said. "I mean, look: You don't seriously believe everybody on the planet should do whatever they want, do you? That would be terrible. These people need help and guidance."

"And you're the one to give it? To these people?'"

"Okay, so it's not politically correct to talk this way. But do you want all these people to have the same horrific, wasteful living standard that we do in America and, to a lesser extent, Europe?"