“Yes,” replied Hak, “but you saw the deepviews they took of you; there was no serious damage done.”
“But I almost drowned, too.”
“That’s certainly true.”
“So…so maybe my brain was injured. Anoxia, and all that…”
“You think you’re hallucinating?” asked Hak.
“Well,” said Ponter, lifting his right arm, and gesturing at the bizarre room around him, “how else to explain all this?”
Hak was silent for a moment. “If you are hallucinating,” the Companion said, “then my telling you that you are not could just be part of that hallucination. So there’s really no point in me trying to disabuse you of that notion, is there?”
Ponter lay back down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, which was devoid of timepieces and artwork.
“You really should try to get some sleep,” said Hak. “Maybe things will make more sense in the morning.”
Ponter nodded slightly. “White noise,” he said. Hak complied, playing a soft, soothing hiss through the cochlear implants, but still it seemed to Ponter to be a long time before he fell asleep.
Chapter Nine
DAY TWO
SATURDAY, AUGUST 3
148/118/25
Adikor Huld couldn’t take being inside the house. Everything there reminded him of poor, vanished Ponter. Ponter’s favorite chair, his datapad, the sculptures Ponter had selected—everything. And so he’d gone out back, to sit on the deck, to stare sadly at the countryside. Pabo came out and looked at Adikor for a time; Pabo had been Ponter’s dog—he’d had her long before Adikor and Ponter had begun living together. Adikor would keep her—if only so the house would not be so lonely. Pabo went back inside. She’d be going to the front door, Adikor knew, looking out there to see if Ponter were returning. She’d trekked back and forth, looking through both doors, ever since Adikor had come home yesterday. Adikor had never returned from work without Ponter before; poor Pabo was baffled and clearly very sad.
Adikor was hugely sad, too. He’d been crying off and on for most of the morning. Not blubbering, not wailing—just crying, sometimes even unaware of it himself until a fat drop splashed down onto his arm or hand.
Rescue teams had searched exhaustively in the mine, but they’d found no sign of Ponter. They’d used portable equipment to scan for his Companion, but had been unable to detect its transmissions. Humans and dogs had passed through drift after drift, trying to catch the odor of a man who might be unconscious, lying hidden from view.
But there was nothing. Ponter had vanished utterly and completely, without a trace.
Adikor shifted his weight in his chair. The chair was made of pine boards with a back that flared out and arms that had wide, flat rests on which a drinking tube could easily be balanced. There was no doubt the chair was useful. Its maker—Adikor forgot the woman’s name, but it was branded on the back of the chair—doubtless felt she contributed sufficiently to society. People needed furniture; Adikor had a table and two cabinets made by the same carpenter.
But what would Adikor’s contribution be, now that Ponter was gone? Ponter had been the brilliant one of the pair; Adikor recognized that and had accepted it. But how would he contribute now, without Ponter, dear, dear Ponter?
The quantum-computing work was dead, as far as Adikor could see. With Ponter gone, it couldn’t go on. Others—there was that female group across the ocean in Evsoy, and another male one on the west coast of this continent—would continue work along related lines. He wished them luck, he supposed, but although he would read their reports with interest, part of him would always regret that it was not Ponter and him making the breakthroughs.
Aspens and birches formed a shady canopy around the deck, and white trilliums bloomed at the trees’ mossy bases. A chipmunk scurried by, and Adikor could hear a woodpecker tapping away at a trunk. He breathed deeply, inhaling pollens and the smells of mulch and soil.
There was a sound of something moving; occasionally, a large animal would wander this close to a home during the day, and—
Suddenly, Pabo came tearing out of the back door. She’d detected the arrival, too. Adikor flared his nostrils. It was a person—a man—coming.
Could it be—?
Pabo let out a plaintive whimper. The man came into view.
Not Ponter. Of course not.
Adikor’s heart hurt. Pabo made her way back into the house, back to the front, to continue her vigil.
“Healthy day,” said Adikor to the man now coming up on the deck. It was no one he’d ever seen before: a stocky fellow, with reddish hair. He wore a loose-fitting dark blue shirt and a gray pant.
“Is your name Adikor Huld, and do you reside here in Saldak Rim?”
“Yes to the former,” said Adikor, “and obviously to the latter.”
The man held up his left arm, with the inside of his wrist facing Adikor; he clearly wanted to transfer something to Adikor’s Companion.
Adikor nodded and pulled a control bud on his Companion. He watched the little screen on his unit flash as it received data. He expected it to be a letter of introduction: this perhaps was a relative visiting the area, or maybe a tradesperson looking for work, transferring his credentials. Adikor could erase the information easily enough if it were of no interest.
“Adikor Huld,” said the man, “it is my duty to inform you that Daklar Bolbay, acting as tabant of the minor children Jasmel Ket and Megameg Bek, is accusing you of the murder of their father, Ponter Boddit.”
“What?” said Adikor, looking up. “You’re joking.”
“No, I’m not.”
“But Daklar is—was—Klast’s woman-mate. She’s known me for ages.”
“Nonetheless,” said the man. “Please show me your wrist so that I can confirm that the appropriate documents have been transferred.”
Adikor, stunned, did just that. The man merely glanced at the display—it said “Bolbay charging Huld, transfer complete”—then he looked back at Adikor. “There will be a dooslarm basadlarm”—an old phrase that literally meant “asking small before asking large”—“to determine if you should face a full tribunal for this crime.”
“There’s been no crime!” said Adikor, fury growing within him. “Ponter is missing. He may be dead—I grant you that—but if so, it was an accident.”
The man ignored him. “You are free to choose any one person to speak on your behalf. The dooslarm basadlarm has been scheduled for tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow!” Adikor felt his fist clenching. “That’s ridiculous!”
“Justice postponed is no justice at all,” said the man as he walked away.
Chapter Ten
Mary needed coffee. She rolled out of her single bed, made her way to the kitchen, and set the coffeemaker to its task. She then stepped into the living room and pushed the play button on her answering machine, an old, reliable silver-and-black Panasonic that made loud clunkings when it started and stopped rewinding its tape.
“Four new messages,” announced the cold, emotionless male voice, and then they began to play.
“Howdy, Sis, it’s Christine. I just have to tell you about this new guy I’m seeing—I met him at work. Yeah, I know, I know, you always say never get involved with anyone at the office, but, really, he is so cute, and so nice, and so funny. Honest to God, Sis, he’s a real find!”
A real find, thought Mary. Good grief, another real find.
The mechanical voice again: “Friday, 9:04 P.M.” That was just after six Sacramento time; Christine must have called as soon as she’d gotten home from the office.
“Hey, Mary, it’s Rose. Haven’t seen you for ages. Let’s do lunch, eh? Don’t they have a Blueberry Hill up at York? I’ll come up there, and we’ll go—they closed the one near me. Anyway, I guess you’re out right now—hope you’re having a great time, whatever you’re doing. Give me a call.”
The machine’s voice: “Friday, 9:33 P.M.”
Christ, thought Mary. Go
od Christ. That would have been precisely when…when…
She closed her eyes.
And then the next message played: “Professor Vaughan?” said a voice with a Jamaican accent. “Is this the home of Professor Mary Vaughan, the geneticist? I’m sorry if it isn’t—and I hate to be calling so late; I tried the York campus, on the off chance that you were still there, but only got your voice mail. I had directory assistance give me the numbers for every M. Vaughan in Richmond Hill—that’s where an article I found about you on the Web said you live.” Mary’s outgoing message said only, “This is Mary,” but the caller had presumably been buoyed by that. “Anyway—God, I hope I don’t get cut off here—look, my name is Reuben Montego, and I’m an M.D.; the camp doctor up at Inco’s Creighton Mine in Sudbury. I don’t know if you’ve seen the news reports on this yet, but we’ve found a…” He paused, and Mary wondered why; he’d been burbling to this point. “Well, look, if you haven’t seen the reports, let’s just say we’ve found what we believe to be a Neanderthal specimen in, ah, remarkable condition.”
Mary shook her head. There were no Neanderthal fossils from anywhere in North America; the guy must have some old Native Canadian material…
“Anyway, I did a Web search on ‘Neanderthal’ and ‘DNA,’ and your name kept coming up. Can you—”
Beep. The guy had indeed exceeded the maximum message length.
“Friday, 10:20 P.M.,” reported the robotic voice.
“Damn, I hate these things,” said Dr. Montego, coming on again. “Look, what I was saying was, we’d really like you to authenticate what we’ve got here. Give me a call—anytime, day or night, on my cell phone at…”
She didn’t have time for this. Not today, not anytime soon. Still, Neanderthals weren’t her only interest; if it was a well-preserved ancient Native bone, that would be intriguing, too—but the preservation would have to be remarkable indeed for the DNA to have not deteriorated, and—
Sudbury. That was in Northern Ontario. Could they have—?
That would be fabulous. Another ice man, frozen solid, maybe found buried deep in a mine.
But, sweet Jesus, she didn’t want to think about that right now; she didn’t want to think about anything.
Mary went back into the kitchen and filled a mug with the now-ready coffee, which she poured a little chocolate milk into from a half-liter carton—she didn’t know anyone else who did that, and she had given up trying to get it in restaurants. She then returned to the living room and put on the TV, a fourteen-inch set that normally didn’t get much use; Mary preferred to curl up with a John Grisham novel, or, occasionally, a Harlequin romance, when she was home in the evenings.
She used the remote to select CablePulse 24, a twenty-four-hour news channel that devoted only part of its screen to the newscast; the right-hand side showed weather and financial information, and the bottom flashed headlines from The National Post. Mary wanted to see what today’s high would be, and if it was going to finally rain, taking some of the awful humidity out of the air, and—
“—the destruction of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory yesterday,” said the Skunk Woman; Mary could never remember her name, but she had an incongruous white streak in her otherwise dark hair. “Few details are yet known, but the facility, buried more than two kilometers underground, apparently suffered a major accident at about 3:30 P.M. No one was hurt, but the 73-million-dollar lab is currently shut down. The detector, which made headlines around the world last year by solving the so-called Solar Neutrino Problem, probes the mysteries of the universe. It opened with great fanfare in 1998, with a visit by renowned physicist Stephen Hawking.” File footage of Hawking in his wheelchair going down a mineshaft elevator ran behind the Skunk Woman’s words.
“And speaking of mysteries, there are claims from a hospital in Sudbury that a living Neanderthal was found inside the mine. We have a report from Don Wright. Don?”
Mary watched, absolutely stunned, as a Native Canadian journalist gave a brief report. The guy they were showing on screen did indeed have browridges, and—
—God, the skull, glimpsed briefly in an x-ray that someone was holding up against a window…
It did look Neanderthal, but…
But how could that be? How could that possibly be? For Pete’s sake, the guy was clearly not a wild man, and he had a funky haircut. Mary watched CablePulse 24 often enough; she knew they weren’t above occasionally airing stories that amounted to little more than thinly disguised promos for current movies, but…
But Mary subscribed to the hominid listserv; there was enough idle chatter on it that there was no way she could have failed to have heard if a movie about Neanderthals was going to be made here in Ontario.
Sudbury…She’d never been to Sudbury, and—
And, Christ, yes, it would do her some good to just get the hell away for a while. She pushed the backward-review button on her phone’s caller-ID display; a number with a 705 area code was the first to appear. She hit the dial button, and settled back into her Morticia seat, a high-backed wicker chair that was her favorite. After three rings, the voice she’d already heard answered. “Montego.”
“Dr. Montego, this is Mary Vaughan.”
“Professor Vaughan! Thank you for calling back. We’ve got…”
“Dr. Montego, look—you have no idea how…how…swamped I am right now. If this is a joke, or—”
“It’s no joke, Professor, but we don’t want to take Ponter anywhere yet. Can you come up here to Sudbury?”
“You’re absolutely sure you’ve got something real?”
“I don’t know; that’s what we want you to tell us. Look, we’re also trying to reach Norman Thierry at UCLA, but it’s not even 8:00 A.M. there yet, and—”
Jesus, she didn’t want Thierry to get this; if this was for real—although, God, how could it be?—it would be absolutely huge.
“Why do you need me to come up there?” asked Mary.
“I want you to take the DNA specimens directly; I want there to be no question about their authenticity or where they came from.”
“It would take—God, I don’t know, maybe four hours to drive to Sudbury from here.”
“Don’t worry about that,” said Montego. “We’ve had a corporate jet standing by at Pearson since last night, in case you did call. Grab a cab, get over to the airport, and we can have you up here before noon. Don’t worry; Inco will reimburse all your expenses.”
Mary looked around her apartment, with its white bookcases and wicker furniture, her collection of Royal Doulton figurines, the framed Renoir prints. She could drop by York University to pick up the appropriate primers, but…
No. No, she didn’t want to go back there. Not yet, not today—maybe not until September, when she had to start teaching again.
But she would need the primers. And it was day now, and she could park over in Lot DD, approaching the Farquharson Building from a completely different direction, not going anywhere near where…
Where…
She closed her eyes. “I’ll have to go by York to get some things, but…yes, all right, I’ll do it.”
Chapter Eleven
It was twenty-four days until Two would next become One, that fabulous four-day holiday Adikor Huld so looked forward to each month. But, despite propriety, he certainly couldn’t wait until then to talk with the person he hoped would speak on his behalf at the dooslarm basadlarm. He could have called her with voice communication, but so much was lost when only words, without gestures or pheromones, were exchanged. No, this was going to be very delicate; it clearly merited a trip into the Center.
Adikor used his Companion to call for a travel cube and driver. The community had over three thousand cars; he shouldn’t have to wait long for one to come and get him.
His Companion spoke to him. “You know it’s Last Five, don’t you?”
Gristle! He’d forgotten that. The effect would be in full swing. He’d only twice before gone into the Center during Last Five;
he’d known men who had never done it, and he had teased them, saying he’d barely gotten out with his life.
Still, it was probably a wise precaution to slip into the pool again before going in, to cut down on his own pheromones. He went and did precisely that.
Once done, he dried off with a cord, then dressed in a dark brown shirt and a light brown pant. No sooner had he finished than the travel cube settled to the ground outside the house. Pabo, still looking for Ponter, ran out to see who had arrived. Adikor walked out more slowly.
The cube was the latest version, mostly transparent, with two ground-effect motors underneath and chairs at each of its corners, one of which was occupied by the driver. Adikor got in, folding himself against the heavily padded saddle-seat next to the driver.
“You’re going into the Center?” said the driver, a 143 with a bald stripe running back over his head, where his part had widened.
“Yes.”
“You know it’s Last Five?”
“I do.”
The driver chuckled. “Well, I won’t be waiting around for you.”
“I know,” said Adikor. “Let’s go.”
The driver nodded and operated the controls. The cube had good sound-deadening; Adikor could barely hear the fans. He settled in for the ride. They passed a couple of other cubes, both of which had male passengers. Adikor thought that drivers probably felt quite useful; he himself had never operated a travel cube, but maybe that was a job he’d enjoy…
“What’s your contribution?” asked the driver in an easy tone, making conversation.
Adikor continued to look out the cube’s walls at the scenery going by. “I’m a physicist.”
“Here?” said the driver, sounding incredulous.
“We have a facility down in one of the mineshafts.”
“Oh, yeah,” replied the driver. “I’ve heard about that. Fancy computers, right?”