Douglas Preston - Impact

After a few minutes, the outline of the Marea loomed up. He raised his oars and listened intently. Closer to the island, he could now hear their disembodied voices more distinctly, excited talk, the unmistakable sounds of digging, the clank of a shovel and the ring of a pick on stone. He pulled up to the stern of the Marea , tied off the dinghy, hauled in his pack, and hopped aboard.

Standing in the wheel house, Worth made an effort to get his breathing under control, stop the trembling of his hands. That meth was really fucking him up, making him jumpy. After this he'd be set for life and then he'd quit. He wouldn't need it anymore. He could hear his heart banging away, feel the blood rushing through his ears. A bottle of Jim Beam stood on the console in the wheel house, and he seized it, taking a good swig, then another. Slowly he came down.

Keeping his mind focused, he checked the battery switch and made sure it was off. Pulling the portable toolbox out of his pack, he took out a screwdriver and unscrewed the electrical panel, setting it aside. A mass of wires greeted his eyes, all neatly color coded and bundled.

He knew exactly what he had to do.

30

By three o'clock that afternoon, Mark Corso was starting to breathe easier. When he'd arrived in his office that morning, the day after the disastrous staff meeting, he was relieved to find no pink slip on his desk. All day he had worked like crazy on the SHARAD data and now it was done. And very well done, he had to say so himself: the charts and everything neatly organized, bound, pouched, and slipcased, the images crisp and clear, cleaned of noise, and digitally processed.

There had been no nasty visit from Derkweiler, no warning memo or call. He hadn't even seen the man. He had made a mistake with the periodicity but he was sure he'd made no mistake with the gamma ray data. It was real, he knew it was real, and just maybe Chaudry would think about it and realize it was worth investigating.

Mark Corso tucked the package under his arm, swallowed hard, and set off down the hall toward Derkweiler's office. A quick knock, a "come in," and he eased open the door with trepidation. There was Derkweiler, sitting behind his desk, incipient sweat moons under his arms. "So it's you, Corso."

"I've got the SHARAD data," Corso said, with as much cool dignity as he could muster. He patted the folder under his arm and swallowed hard, speaking the lines he'd rehearsed to himself earlier. "I want to apologize for yesterday's presentation. I got carried away by the gamma ray data. I can assure you it won't happen again."

Derkweiler was looking at him. Not exactly staring, but looking steadily, his eyes rimmed in red. He looked like he'd been up all night.

"Mr. Corso. . . . Well, I'm sorry to have to say this to you." Derkweiler sighed, placed his hands on the desk. "Yesterday, I did the paperwork to . . . terminate your employment here. I'm very sorry."

Thunderstruck, Corso could find no response.

"We're a quasi-government bureaucracy and it takes a while for a termination to work its way through the system. I regret you've had to wait. But I think we both know this isn't going to work out." His gaze remained on Corso, steady and cool.

"But Dr. Chaudry . . .?"

"Dr. Chaudry and I are in full agreement on this."

Again, Corso tried to swallow. Physically, he couldn't seem to get himself going. He was like the tin woodsman, all frozen up.

"Well," said Derkweiler, giving the table a final pat. "That's all. You've got until the end of the day. I'm terribly sorry but I think it'll be for the best."

"But . . . do you still want the SHARAD data?" Corso said, before realizing just how inane he sounded.

A look of irritation crossed Derkweiler's features as he reached out and took the folder. "I guess you didn't hear what I said at the meeting: that I'd prepare the SHARAD data myself. I was up all night doing it." He extended his arm over the wastebasket and dropped the folder in. "I don't need it or want it now."

Corso felt himself flushing deeply at the gratuitous gesture. Derkweiler continued staring at him. "Is there something else, or are we done here?"

Corso turned stiffly and walked out.

"Please shut the door behind you."

Corso shut the door and stood in the hall, trembling. His shock and disbelief turned to a feeling of physical sickness, and then to anger. This was wrong. This was unjust. Throwing his work in the wastebasket . . . That was unwarranted. He couldn't let this happen.

He turned back and opened the door--and caught Derkweiler in the act of bending over the wastebasket, fishing his packet out of the trash.

That did it. Corso found his mouth opening, words coming up almost as if someone else were saying them. "You . . . you fat-ass piece of shit."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me." Who was speaking here? What was he even saying? Corso had never been so angry in his life.

Derkweiler reddened and let the folder drop back into the trash, and then he leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head, exposing the full extent of his underarm wetness. "Going out with a bang, I see. Anything else you want to add?"

"In fact, there is. I'm amazed to find you here at NPF at all, let alone in a supervisory position. You are mediocrity incarnate. You and Chaudry both. I handed you evidence that something dangerous, possibly catastrophic, might be occurring on or near Mars. It's staring you in the face and you don't see it. You're no different from the Inquisition that convicted Galileo."

"Ah, so now you're Galileo?" A cold hard smile creased Derkweiler's face, suddenly disappearing. "Well, Corso, now that you've vented, please go straight to your office and remain there. You've got fifteen minutes to clear out your desk. At that time, security will escort you from the premises. Understood?"

He swiveled his chair around and turned his fat back to Corso and began typing on his computer keyboard.

Fifteen minutes later Corso was heading out the front lobby of NPF, escorted by two security guards. He carried a small cardboard box of his meager possessions: his framed diplomas from Brown and MIT, a geode paperweight, and a picture of his mother.

As he stepped into the hot sunlight, walking into a sea of shining cars in the gigantic parking lot, Mark Corso had a revelation. He halted, almost dropping his box. He recalled a small, seemingly insignificant fact: Deimos, one of the tiny moons of Mars, orbited the planet every thirty hours. That explained the periodicity anomaly.

The gamma ray source was not on Mars-- it was on Deimos .

31

The fog turned to a drizzle as Abbey feverishly cleared rocks from the crater, prying them out with a pick and tossing them over the rim. The meteorite had punched through about a foot of soil into the bedrock below, spewing out dirt and leaving behind a fractured mass of stones and mud. She was surprised at how small the crater was, only about three feet deep and five feet wide. The rain was now drizzling steadily and the bottom of the crater was turning into a churned-up mess, a pool of muck mingled with broken rocks.

Abbey pried out a particularly large fragment and rolled it up to the crater's rim, Jackie grabbing it and dragging it out.

"There are a lot of damn rocks in here," said Jackie. "How're we going to know which is the meteorite?"

"Believe me, you'll know. It's made of metal--nickel iron."

"What if it's too heavy to lift?"

Abbey pried another rock out of the bottom, hefted it, dumped it over the rim. "We'll figure out something. The paper said it was a hundred pounds."

"The paper said that it might be as small as a hundred pounds."

"The bigger the better." Abbey cleared some smaller rocks and tossed out a few shovelfuls of viscous mud. As they worked, the drizzle became a steady rain. Even with her slicker she was soon soaked. Cold mud kept slopping over the tops of her boots until her feet were slushing and sucking with every movement.