Echoes of an Alien Sky (32 page)

"Uh? Hum. . . . Okay."

"However, there's more. Look at the header. At first we had no idea what the reference to 'Simulator' might mean. Now this is speculative, I agree, but consider a further possibility. We've just agreed that whoever the group of Terrans were who set up Providence, they would have gone to great lengths to keep it a secret and conceal its location. They wouldn't surround it with lights and navigation beacons. But obviously the pilots ferrying in the supplies would have to be able to find it." He turned his head to look with the others toward the screen. "I think that's maybe what we have here. Notice it says 'Testing.' These could be notes made in the course of developing a simulator program for finding Providence." The others, clearly attracted by the argument, were already searching the screen for more clues.

"Where's this Gulf that it talks about?" Acilla Jyt, the linguist, asked. "The Persian Gulf, maybe? It figured prominently in much of what was going on around that time. Half of Terran politics and wars seemed to hinge around it."

"Unlikely," Lewen said. "As you say, it was a permanent war zone. Nobody would choose an area like that for something this crucial and secrecy-sensitive. It would be in friendly territory. Terminus was built by the Western powers. I'd look on the other side of the planet—the Americas."

"That's what we thought too," Casselo agreed. He had already been through this remotely with Kyal and Yorim.

"The most obvious gulf in that region is the one they called the Gulf of Mexico," Kyal said. "As yet we haven't found anything connecting Providence with it. But it seems promising all the same. La Paz is a Mexican place name."

"This is on the right track," Sherven interjected. "The kind of thing we need to be looking for."

"Actually, La Paz would be more accurately described as Spanish,"Acilla Jyt cautioned. She didn't seem to have any suggestion at that stage as to how the fact might be material.

Chown looked at the screen again for a few seconds, then to Sherven, and finally along at Kyal. "I might be able to contribute something right now," he offered. "Large parts of the southern American continent were Spanish speaking, I believe."

"That's correct," Jyt said.

"The city of La Paz was the capital of the country they called Bolivia. Moreover, it was close to a Lake called Titicaca, which was at the highest altitude of any lake anywhere. Come to that, I'm fairly sure it still is—but I'd need to check."

"The High Lake," Sherven read from the screen.

"Yes. You see, it ties in," Chown said.

Casselo brought something up on his phone and consulted it for a moment. "Let's have a look, then," he said, entering a code. A map of the region came up on another of the wall screens. He entered more commands, and La Paz and Lake Titicaca appeared, annotated in red.

"So where's the Gulf?" Yorim asked, looking over it. The most conspicuous inlets that might have qualified were all on the eastern seaboard, whereas the places Chown had indicated were over on the opposite side of the continent.

"There's only that coastal indent about halfway up," Chowm admitted. "It would be around the border between the countries of Chile and Peru. That could have been it, maybe. I've never come across it as being called a gulf. But that's something that needs to be looked into, obviously."

The meeting finally broke up on a note of optimism. While groups were still continuing to debate some of the issues, Sherven steered Kyal over to one side. "You know, you really are more of a generalist, just like your father," he said. "I like your ways of thinking and working. How would you feel about the idea of taking charge of this whole question? It's going to need a somebody at the middle of it who can talk to all the specialists and coordinate their inputs. You seem to have a flair for it. I can see this Providence issue becoming central to a lot of what we have going on at present."

It sounded attractive. Kyal was already intrigued by the Providence riddle in any case. "Do you mean in parallel with the Triagon work?" he asked.

"I'd say that's pretty well completed," Sherven replied. "As far as the essentials go, anyway. Others can work out the details. I was thinking we could set you up here for a while, aboard
Explorer 6
." His eyes had a faint, mischievous light.

"I could almost answer that now," Kyal said. "Do I take it you'd be talking about including Yorim Zeestran too?"

"Oh, I'm sure that could be accommodated," Sherven assured him. "Perhaps we can discuss it over lunch. Are you joining us? We've got a table reserved in the Patagonia."

Kyal smiled apologetically. "If you don't mind, Director, I'll duck out this time. I, ah, have some personal matters that have been waiting long enough. Yorim can stand in for me, if that's acceptable. You can take my answer as affirmative."

Sherven didn't argue. "Very well, then. We'll see you back here later, I trust? Now that we seem to have made some headway, I'd like to get someone along from the news service to put a public bulletin out about it. Would you mind saying a few words?"

"I'd be happy too, of course."

"And you're sure about the offer I just mentioned? If so, I might mention that as well. Would that be in order?"

Kyal had heard that while Sherven sometimes took a while to make his mind up about things, once he did, he could move amazingly quickly. Lorili's transfer up to
Explorer 6
seemed to be an instance. He could see no reason to change his mind. "If Yorim feels the same way, then by all means go ahead," he replied.

Sherven turned to someone else who wanted his attention, and Kyal took the opportunity to detach himself. He went through to the outer office where Emitte was usually stationed, but it was empty. Taking advantage of the privacy, he took out his phone and called Lorili.

"You made it!" she exclaimed, looking delighted.

"Yes. And I'm free at last. Sorry I couldn't call sooner, when we arrived. They rushed us straight through to the meeting."

"I guessed it was something like that. How did it go?"

"Just fine. Meet me for lunch and I'll tell you all about it."

"The general cafeteria would be good," Lorili said. "You know where it is?"

"Not really. I've only just got here. The last time I was on
E6
, my feet hardly had time to touch the decks."

"Where are you?"

"Sherven's office in the Directorate. That's where the meeting was."

"Okay. Then this is what you do. . . ."

Kyal had never felt any true sense of closeness in the few years that he had been married. It only really dawned on him in later years that he was supposed to have. The example had been there for him in the shape of his own parents, sure enough. But it was one of those things that he'd found himself forced to admit later in life that preoccupations with science, his work, and other things had prevented him from seeing it.

Once, long ago, when he had been traveling in another part of Ulange and stayed overnight in a hotel, he remembered observing an elderly couple in the dining room at breakfast. The way they talked and seemed to know each other's thoughts had left an impression on him of two people who had shared a life of contentment together, and who probably couldn't have imagined its being any other way. He had envied the completeness that he sensed in their existence. He had never felt that kind of closeness, even potentially, in the few relationships that had followed his marriage. But in a strange way, even after knowing her for such a short time, he was already feeling that way toward Lorili. And the even more exhilarating was his sensing that it was mutual: a feeling of easily and naturally "belonging" with someone. He hadn't realized until he headed for the cafeteria how much he had been looking forward to seeing her again since the day of his rushed departure from Rhombus with Yorim.

She arrived looking as striking as ever with her long black hair contrasting against the light tone of her skin, but still wearing a white lab coat which in her hurry she had neglected to take off. Kyal came forward, smiling, from where he had been standing waiting near the door. They started to hug, and then both turned it into a kiss on the same impulse. The cafeteria was self-serve. After chattering about nothing in particular, and mildly inanely, while they collected dishes and loaded a tray, they settled down at a side table by a rail overlooking the Central Concourse in
Explorer 6
's main superstructure.

"I hope you feel suitably honored," Kyal told her. "You know, I turned down a lunch on Sherven in the Patagonia for this."

"Oh, I'm mortified! Then I'll have to try all the harder to make it worth it, won't I?" "I don't think you'll need to strain yourself on that account. So how's the new lab going here? Are you getting everything set up okay?"

"It's going well. We inherited some good people who were there before."

"And Mirine?"

"She's fine. I left her in a sterile room, thawing out corpses and cutting incisions."

Kyal made a face. "Sounds wet an messy. I'll stick to watts and amps."

They fell silent while they sampled the cafeteria's offerings of the day. Kyal had decided to try a deep-fried Terran fish. It was quite good. "How's the salad?" he inquired.

"Tasty. And welcome—the first I've eaten today. . . . So, tell me about Sherven's meeting."

Kyal related the morning's events, not forgetting to mention that Mirine had received due credit for her inspiration. Lorili hadn't known that Nostreny was up from Rhombus to attend. She hoped he would stop by before he returned. Kyal said that Nostreny had told him he would. He summarized the case for Providence having been somewhere on Earth and described the reactions. Lorili followed attentively, clearly finding it fascinating. In conclusion, Kyal went through the points that had led Chown to propose a location for Providence on the western side of southern America.

"I'd be curious to see the translations that you're getting these things from," Lorili said when he had finished.

Kyal shrugged. "Sure. There's no reason why you shouldn't. I'll send you a set of copies."

"Would you? Thanks so much." She ate in silence for a while and then cocked her head as a new thought struck her. "There are old pyramids there, aren't there—in the southern part of the Americas?"

"Are there? I hadn't heard about them."

"All overgrown in jungles and places like that. Could they be anything like the one that you and Yorim looked at near Triagon?"

"I don't know. I'll have to look into it," Kyal said. After a pause, he added, "I wouldn't have thought so, though. They were probably from the older civilizations that existed there before the Europeans and Late Americans. So if I had to guess, I'd say they were probably more something like the ones Yorim was at in Africa."

Lorili reflected for a moment, then dismissed it with a shrug. "Maybe," she said.

Kyal looked at her curiously while he ate. "You didn't waste much time moving," he commented finally. "Or Nostreny didn't, or Sherven. Whoever. . . . I take it that the business with Jenyn had a lot to do with it. What's the latest in that regard?" Lorili had kept him generally abreast of things in their communications but not gone into a lot of detail.

"You remember the person I told you about, who works with Jenyn in Linguistics: Elundi Kasseg?"

"Right. The guy who's concerned about all this Gaster Lornod stuff. "

"He's a friend of Iwon's. That was how he got in touch. Jenyn had mentioned my name. They took me to see the girl who started the business."

"Tyarla . . . Yig or something, wasn't it?"

"Yiag. It seems that she's mixed up with Jenyn. He put her up to the whole thing. It was just like I've seen before, all over again. . . ." Lorili pulled a face as if she were experiencing a bad taste and shook her head. "Can we go into this some other time, Kyal? It's too good a day to start bringing it all up."

"Of course." Kyal glanced at the clock display above the cafeteria door. "I'm going to have to cut it short and get back soon anyway," he said. "Let's celebrate with a nice dinner tonight—in the Patagonia. I'll pick you up at your lab. How would that be?"

"It sounds just great. I ought to be getting back to give Mirine a hand too. We're in Room C-23 down in Molecular Bio labs. It's a bit complicated to give directions to."

"Don't even try. I don't know
E6
well enough yet for them to mean anything anyway. I'll find it."

"You can take your time," Lorili said. We'll probably be working late. There's a lot to do."

"Just as well," Kyal said. "I don't think those people up in Sherven's office will be going their own ways in a hurry either, now that he's collected them together. So it probably suits both of us." He looked at her mischievously for a second or so. "But before we go, I suppose I should give you the good news."

"What's that?"

"I was talking to Sherven just now, after the meeting ended. He wants us—Yorim and me—to take a new position coordinating the Providence work that I was talking about. It would mean we'll be based here, on
E6
. How about that?"

Lorili stopped with the drink that she had been about to finish poised in mid air, and stared at him. "Here? You're going to be moving here?"

Kyal nodded. "I thought you'd like it."

"And you've been sitting there all this time since we sat down, holding out? That's mean."

"Okay, you've found out. I have a dark side."

"But it can't be final yet if you've only just talked to him. When should we know for sure? Any idea?"

"Well, maybe you're not the only one around here who can move fast. Sherven's putting out a public news bulletin this afternoon on the new Providence theory. He might make some mention of it then."

"That soon?"

"If Yorim is agreeable. They're supposed to be talking about it right now, over lunch."

"I couldn't imagine you and Yorim splitting up," Lorili said. She thought about it for a moment longer and shook her head. "There won't be any problem with Yorim. He's easy-going enough. If it meant going to Mars as this person you were telling me about at the meeting was saying, Yorim would just shrug and go along with it."