12

He chose Dantec, an ex-military man from his own outfit he’d brought with him ten years back when he’d first signed on, someone whom he trusted implicitly and who, in addition, knew how to pilot just about anything. Dantec was good at thinking on his feet, very quick. He also had no compunctions about doing something questionable as long as Tanner was the one asking. But he’d also been known to be a little too quick to resort to violence if something went wrong. Something had happened to Dantec during the moon skirmishes, something that had left his eyes steady but flat, as if nobody was home inside. Tanner wasn’t sure what it was.

He’s not a bad guy, Tanner told himself the few times Dantec had done something that he found hard to accept, even with his own fairly lax morals. He just doesn’t see things the way I do. And then, as an afterthought, he would often find himself thinking, I’m not a bad guy either.

Tanner sighed. Bad guys or not, both he and Dantec would do what they felt, in their own way, they had to do.

He had to search a little for the other man, pulling him out of DredgerCorp’s North American headquarters. His name was Hennessy and he was a marine geologist, also with quite a bit of submarine experience. He was bald although still fairly young, mid-thirties. He was also well respected, and if he was already with DredgerCorp, that probably meant he wouldn’t object too strongly to something a hair outside the law. But the Colonel’s question about Altman was still nagging at him: If push came to shove and Hennessy realized the full extent of what they were doing, would he bend or break? No way to tell, Tanner thought, but thought he was more likely to go with the flow than to protest or try to stop them.

Tanner made arrangements through President Small, got Hennessy on the next flight south. By the time the man had reached Puerto Chicxulub, the F/7 had arrived, was waiting for them under a tarp on the deck of an unmarked freighter about fifteen miles away from the center of the crater. Though a rusty hulk on the outside, the freighter was retrofitted with state-of-the-art equipment inside. It was crewed by either military or ex-military—they didn’t wear regulation uniforms, but their training was clear from the tight economy of their movements, their meticulous haircuts, and the way they snapped to obey an order.

“Should we be careful what we say around the crew?” Tanner asked the Colonel over the vid linkup.

“You should be careful what you say around anybody,” said the Colonel, and then showed his teeth in a way that Tanner guessed might be a smile. Definitely a carnivore, Tanner thought. Then the Colonel’s lips slid over his teeth again and he said, “Don’t say more than you have to.”

The F/7 was a bathyscaphe. A prototype drilling model, something made to descend to great depths and then bore quickly down through solid rock. Hennessy responded to it like a kid waking up on Christmas morning to find a pony waiting downstairs. He went around the craft with Tanner and Dantec in tow, babbling about the combination of the titanium alloy drill and the molecular pulverizers meant to keep the path clear. Tanner and Dantec just pretended to humor him.

“Don’t tell me we’re going down into Chicxulub,” said Hennessy, excited. “I’ve always wanted to go there. What are we looking for?”

You’ll know soon enough, thought Tanner grimly. “Just a few dives,” he said as casually as possible. “Just something to run the F/7 through its paces. Routine.”

Over the next few days, Tanner had them do just that. They put the F/7 through its paces, first seeing how maneuverable it was gliding along the surface, then testing it in deeper waters. and then finally testing the drill and the pulverizers. It wasn’t the most maneuverable craft Hennessy had ever seen, but that wasn’t the point of a bathyscaphe: it had to be solid and able to withstand tremendous pressure when it dived deep. On the surface it bobbed drunkenly along, slowly tacking in the direction it wanted to go. Underwater it was better, more responsive. And it was best of all once they had it boring through mud and into rock. Even when the drill was on full and biting into hard rock, the craft was stable, hardly shaking at all. Rear thrusters kept it up against the rock, and the drill itself pulled them forward if the threading had anything to grab. Meanwhile the pulverizers turned the remaining rock into a fine gravel and forced it back to where it caught in the thrusters and kicked away or dissolved entirely. Hennessy claimed he’d never seen anything like it.

They took the F/7 down seven or eight times, test runs. At first, Dantec just watched what Hennessy did, listened to him talk, observed him. And then one day, suddenly, Dantec informed Hennessy that it was his turn.

“But this is a delicate piece of equipment,” cautioned Hennessy. “You need to have months and months of training before—”

“You’re making my headache worse. Move,” said Dantec. And Hennessy, turning away from the instrument panel and taking stock of his partner for perhaps the first time, seeing his dead expression and his steady eyes, did.

That night, just as he had sat down on the bed and begun to take his shoes off, Tanner heard a knock at the door.

“Come in,” he said, continuing to work on his laces until he saw a familiar pair of boots appear. He looked up. Why is it, he wondered, that Dantec always looks so predatory?

“It’s you,” he said to Dantec. “Everything coming along nicely?”

Dantec nodded. “I’ve figured it all out,” he said.

“You can pilot the thing if you need to?”

“After a moon lander, it’s a piece of cake,” said Dantec. “I won’t have any problems.”

“What about using the drill?”

Dantec shrugged. “Nothing too complicated to it,” he said. “I know how to drill a bore tunnel and can probably figure out how to make it do anything else we need. Hennessy is no longer essential. If he gets cold feet or something goes wrong, I can take over.”

“What do you mean if something goes wrong?” asked Tanner.

Dantec shrugged. “Just being prepared,” he said.

“If something does go wrong,” said Tanner slowly. “I prefer you don’t kill him.”

Dantec hesitated, then nodded. “Your preference is duly noted,” he said.

The next morning found Tanner speaking to an image of the Colonel on the vidscreen. “We’re ready,” he said. “Anytime you want we can move the ship over the center of the crater and drop the F/7. Both pilots are trained and comfortable with the vessel. Both are eager to leave.”

“Very good,” said the Colonel. He seemed again to be looking through Tanner, as if Tanner weren’t there. “Move the freighter into position tonight,” he said.

“Tonight?”

“Weigh anchor just before dusk. I want you in position by 2100 hours and ready to go by 2200. No need to tell your two pilots anything or do anything to make them suspect or get word back to someone if you’re wrong and they’re spies. Just wake them up and get them on board in time to drop the F/7 well before midnight.”

“Yes, sir,” said Tanner.

The Colonel reached out to disconnect the link, then stopped. “You look tired, Tanner,” he said. “Everything all right?”

“I’m fine, sir,” said Tanner. “Just a little headache. I’ve been having trouble sleeping. But nothing to worry about.”

“Tomorrow may be a historic moment,” the Colonel speculated.

“Yes,” said Tanner.

“What do you think is down there?”

Tanner had been wondering the same thing for days now. How could something seemingly man-made end up at the bottom of the crater, buried under miles of rock?

“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe it’s just a natural formation that somehow doesn’t seem natural. Or maybe it’s something man-made that’s been placed there God only knows how. Or maybe . . . ,” he said, but couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence. It was too big to get his mind around.

“Maybe what?” asked the Colonel.

Tanner shook his head to clear it, which just made the headache throb more. “I really don’t know, sir,” he said.

“I’ll tell you what you’re thinking since you’re not man enough to say it yourself,” said the Colonel. “You’re thinking, ‘Sure, it may be constructed, but not by us, not by humans.’”

Tanner didn’t say anything.

“Believe it or not, Tanner, it’s a genuine possibility. That’s what we’re hoping for. The first contact with intelligent life other than our own.”

It made Tanner dizzy to think about it, even scared him a little. If that was what it was, if that’s what happened, it could change everything. “With a little luck, we’ll know soon enough,” he said in as steady a voice as he could muster. “I’ll keep my fingers crossed, sir,” he added, and then cut the link.