He paused, looking around again, aggressively, as if waiting for someone to challenge him.
“Please do explain,” said Glinn, encouragingly.
“The Baobab grows in deep salt water, in the complete absence of light. That’s evidently its natural environment. Sonar is about the only way to ‘see’ in that environment, and so, to avoid predators, it evolved to be invisible to sonar. Obviously, its home planet was a deep watery world, perhaps an ocean covered in miles of ice, like Europa or Callisto. That also explains the two-hertz sound it produces—it’s pinging its surroundings, so to speak.”
He sat down abruptly. Gideon found himself startled, indeed astonished, at the clear logic of the analysis.
Prothero’s observations were greeted with a burst of murmuring that filled the room. “Thank you,” said Glinn after a moment. As the room died again into silence, Alex Lispenard raised her hand.
“Alex?”
“Two things struck me. First, the complete absence of sea life in the vicinity. In the benthic zone you don’t typically see a lot of life, but this area is dead.”
“What sea life would you normally expect to find?” asked Glinn.
“A few scavengers—hagfish, crabs, and such, which feed on carcasses that sink from the upper regions. You’d also see detritivores, which feed on decomposing animals and plants and also gobble up feces sinking from above. And epifauna and infauna would live on and in the seafloor itself. But I saw no evidence of any of these at the site.”
“Any speculation why not?”
“On land, there’s a phenomenon called allelopathy. Some trees and plants reduce competition around themselves by releasing chemicals into the soil that harm other plants or stop the germination of seeds. We may be seeing that here.”
“And the other thing that struck you?”
“The human corpses. Beyond what I assume to be damage caused by the initial explosion, they show almost no signs of decomposition that I could see.”
“Any theory as to why?” Glinn asked.
“At that depth and pressure, organic remains begin to dissolve even if they’re not attacked by microorganisms. I have no idea why they’re so well preserved.”
This generated a long discussion. Glinn managed it, giving everyone a chance to speculate and ask questions. When the half hour was over, he gently closed the conversation. “I’d like to conclude by pointing out something that has undoubtedly occurred to many of you already.” He stood and began to pace the stage, slowly.
“Dr. Prothero, it seems, has put a name to this organism—the Baobab—and I endorse it. The Baobab is currently quiescent. It went silent, so to speak, after an initial burst of activity and hyperactive growth following its ‘sprouting.’ I privately hoped we might have found it dead. But these images suggest it is very much alive…and healthy. It seems certain that at some point it will ‘fruit’ and produce seeds. We already know what these seeds look like, because the so-called meteorite was one of them—and we planted it. The seed weighed twenty-five thousand tons, was virtually indestructible, and was composed of a material many times denser than any known element on earth. Obviously, it evolved for the rigors of interstellar travel. It is a seed designed for Panspermia, but not the normal Panspermia of spores envisioned by exobiologists: drifting in space or hidden in meteorites. This is Panspermia with a vengeance. Terminator Panspermia.”
There was a nervous titter from the audience.
“Which brings me to my point: once the Baobab produces seeds, how will they be dispersed into outer space?”
He let that hang in the air.
“Think about it a moment. Each seed weighs twenty-five thousand tons. There seems to be no way for them to escape the gravitational field of any planet they land on. And yet they do escape. So I ask again: what is the dispersal mechanism for these seeds?”
Another silence.
“I suggest that there can be only one mode of dispersal, only one way for these incredibly heavy seeds to be released back into outer space and go adrift—to find fertile new oceans in which to sprout and grow. No doubt you can guess what that mode is, as well.”
He took another turn, almost like a television evangelist, and faced the audience again. “Once you understand that, you understand what it means for the fate of the earth—and why we cannot fail.”
After the meeting had adjourned, and as Gideon was getting ready to go, Alex Lispenard approached him. “Gideon?”
He turned.
“Look. I want to apologize for arguing with you earlier, escalating the discussion, taking it to Glinn.”
“Forget it,” he said. “It was my fault. You’re the DSV chief. I just felt—”
She touched his arm. “No need to explain. I understand now. What you did, going down there alone—on your second dive, no less—took real guts. And you kept your cool amid a nasty shock.”
“Well, as you said, anyone can drive a DSV. And Garza yanked me up before I did anything stupid.”
“When I was in mission control and that gigantic thing appeared on the screen, I was really taken aback. For a moment, I was damned glad it was you down there, and not me.”
“It’s just a tree.”
She shook her head. “I wouldn’t make any assumptions about what it is. None at all.”
13
GIDEON HAD NEVER seen so many stars in his life.
After dinner, he’d retired to his cabin to unwind in solitude. But the events of the day, the unsettling descent and even more traumatic ascent in the DSV, and the revelations and speculations of the briefing session that followed, had affected him deeply. He couldn’t seem to shake the feeling of the cramped submersible, or the sight of the monolithic, cliff-like flank of the Baobab as he had ascended beside it. Even his big stateroom felt claustrophobic. And so he’d come up on deck. He wanted to feel the infinite space of the heavens above him as he brooded.
Standing at the railing, a gentle spring breeze ruffling his hair, he stared southward. The lights from the ship provided just enough illumination to outline the nearest icebergs, which towered out of the black water like ruined castles, broken spires reaching toward the sky. The sea was a black sheet, reflecting the stars and the bergs, creating a surreal mirror of the dark world above.
“Hello, there.”
He turned. “You like to sneak up on me.”
“It’s almost as much fun as tying your shoelaces together.” Alex joined him at the rail, leaning her elbows on it, gazing out. “This is what I love most,” she said. “Being right here, out in the great ocean like this, far from land. Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?”
“I admit it’s magical. But I still prefer the mountains.”
He could just catch the scent of her freshly washed hair, and he felt the same hopeless attraction wash over him. Part of him wished there were no Alex Lispenard on board to torment his dreams and disturb his peace of mind, but mostly he was glad of her presence and friendship—even if she did beat him relentlessly in backgammon. “That observation you made—about the bodies not decomposing—was really disturbing.”
“At that depth and pressure, salt water is like a mild acid. It goes to work on organic remains right away. You may recall that no human remains were found with the Titanic—not even bones. While most of that was done by scavengers and tubeworms, the seawater and pressure sure helped it along.”