Emma had told him it would probably take time, but Sky kept thinking about Terry Drafts poking a laser into its shell. The record showed that once you did that, things happened pretty quickly. But some parts of the object might be more vulnerable than others.
Sky was beginning to amuse himself thinking how the Academy might say okay, it’s obviously not going to work, go back in and retrieve the unit when it went, erupted in a white flash.
ARCHIVE
No one denies that the effort to find a way to dispose of the omega clouds is of value. But they do not constitute a clear and present danger. They are in fact so remote a hazard that it remains difficult to understand why so many continue to get exercised over the issue. At a time when millions go hungry, when repairing environmental damage is exhausting vast sums of money, when the world population steams ahead, we can ill afford to waste our resources on a threat that remains so far over the horizon that we cannot even imagine what the planet will look like when it arrives. The Council and the Prime Minister need to set their priorities, and live with them despite the shifting political winds.
— Moscow International
April 5
chapter 14
Arlington.
Monday, April 4.
ASQUITH NEVER REALLY looked happy, except when VIP visitors were present. This morning, which was rainy, gloomy, and somehow tentative, was momentarily devoid of VIPs. The commissioner was making the kinds of faces that suggested he was tired of hearing about problems that didn’t go away. “So we know the hedgehogs—can’t we get a better name for them, Hutch? — are bombs. Tell me about the one that’s going to pass close to us. Tony’s going to be over this afternoon, and I need some answers. What happens if it goes off?”
Tony was the ultimate VIP: the NAU’s funding liaison with the Academy.
“You don’t have to worry about it, Michael. It’s as far away as the cloud is. It can’t hurt us.”
“Then why are we worried about it?”
“We aren’t worried in the sense that it can do any damage to us. Not at its current range. Maybe in a few centuries.”
“Then why do we care about it?”
“Because we don’t know its purpose.”
“So we’re talking a purely academic issue? Nobody’s at risk?”
“No.”
He’d gotten up when she came into the room. Now he eased himself back into his chair. “Thank God for that,” he said. He motioned her to a chair. “Why would anybody be putting bombs out there?”
“We think they’re triggers.”
“Triggers. Bombs. We’re arguing terminology.” He rolled his eyes. “What do they trigger?”
“The clouds.”
“What’s that? How do you mean? The clouds blow up?”
“We don’t really know yet, Michael. But I think it’s something like that. I think you get a special kind of explosion.”
“How many kinds of explosions are there?”
She sat down and tried to get the conversation onto a level at which she could handle it. “The reason they’re important,” she said, “is that if these things turn out to be what they seem to be, they may give us a way to get rid of the clouds.”
“By blowing them up.”
“Yes. Maybe. We don’t know.” She felt good this morning. Had in fact felt pretty good for the last few days. “We need to find out.”
“So what precisely do you propose?
“We need to run a test.”
He nodded. “Do it.”
“Okay.”
“But not with the cloud.” The local one.
“We won’t go near it.”
“Good.” He took a deep breath. “I’d be grateful if it worked.”
“As would I, Michael.”
“I guess you’ve noticed the Goompahs have been getting popular.” His tone suggested that was a problem.
Of course she’d noticed. Everywhere she looked there were Goompah dolls, Goompah games, Goompah bedding. People loved them. Kids especially loved them. “Why is that bad news?” she asked innocently. But she knew the reason.
“There’s a growing body of opinion that the government hasn’t done enough to help them.”
“I’m sorry to hear it.”
“They’d like to keep the media away. In case things go badly.”
“They being the president and the Council.”
He nodded. Who else? “They’re afraid there’ll be graphic pictures of Goompahs getting killed in large numbers.”
“Too bad they’re not insects.”
He didn’t pick up the sarcasm. “Anything but these terminally cute rollover critters.”
“The media say they’ll be there.”
He made a sound in his throat that resembled a gargle going awry. “I know. But there’s no way to stop them. If our little experiment works out, though, the problem will be solved.” He looked happy. As if the sun had come out in the office. “Make it happen, Hutch.”
“Wait a minute,” she said. “Michael, I think we’ve had a communication breakdown. Even if it works, we aren’t going to be able to use the technique to help the Goompahs.”
Shock and dismay. “Why not? I thought that was the whole point.”
“The whole point is to get control of the clouds. To forge a weapon.” She tried to sound reassuring. “I’m sorry I misled you. But the cloud at Lookout is too close.”
“How do you mean?”
“If we get the result we expect, we’re going to learn how to destroy the damned things. But we expect a very big bang. Trigger the cloud at Lookout, and you’d fry them all.”
“How can you know that before you’ve run the test?”
“Because I’m pretty sure I’ve seen other clouds explode. I know what kind of energy they put out.”
And suddenly he understood. “The tewks.”
“Yes.” She’d put it all in the reports, but it was becoming clear he didn’t read the reports.
“All right,” he said. He was still disappointed and he let her see it. “Let me know how it turns out.”
“Okay.” She started to get up, but he waved her back down. Not finished with you yet.
“Listen, Hutch. I’ve gone along with everything you’ve wanted to do. We sent out Collingdale and his people. We sent out the kite. And we’re sending meals, for God’s sake. We’ll be broke for three years after this. Now you owe me something.
“We’ve gotten some help from the Council on this. So we need to play ball with them. I’m going to tell Tony we’ll go all out to save the poor bastards. That’s what they want, by the way. Save them. Divert the goddam cloud. If you can’t blow it up, make your kite work. Make it happen.
“If you don’t, if the cloud hammers them, we’ll all be in the soup.”
Hutch kept her voice level. “Michael,” she said, “we’ve had thirty years to figure out how to do something about the omegas. The Council felt safe because the danger seemed so far away. It didn’t occur to them that political fallout might come from a different direction. I personally don’t care if they all get voted out. But we are trying to save the Goompahs. We were trying to do it before it became politically popular.”
She was at the door, on her way out, when he called her back. “You’re right, Hutch,” he said. “I know that. Everybody knows it. Which is why the Academy will look so good if we can pull these fat little guys out of the fire.”
“Right,” she said, and let it drop.
ARCHIVE
“Senator, we’ve all seen the pictures of the cloud at Moonlight. Is there anything at all we can do for the Goompahs?”
“Janet, we are moving heaven and earth to help. Unfortunately, we haven’t yet learned how to turn these things aside. The first shipload of supplies will be leaving day after tomorrow. We’re doing everything we can.”