Deception Point

  "Six more feet! Keep it steady!"

  The group around the scaffolding fell into a rapt silence, like onlookers at a seance awaiting the appearance of some divine specter-everyone straining for the first glimpse.

  Then Rachel saw it.

  Emerging from the thinning layer of ice, the hazy form of the meteorite began to show itself. The shadow was oblong and dark, blurry at first, but getting clearer every moment as it melted its way upward.

  "Tighter!" a technician yelled. The men tightened the winches, and the scaffolding creaked.

  "Five more feet! Keep the tension even!"

  Rachel could now see the ice above the stone beginning to bulge upward like a pregnant beast about to give birth. Atop the hump, surrounding the laser's point of entry, a small circle of surface ice began to give way, melting, dissolving into a widening hole.

  "Cervix is dilated!" someone shouted. "Nine hundred centimeters!"

  A tense laughter broke the silence.

  "Okay, kill the laser!"

  Someone threw a switch, and the beam disappeared.

  And then it happened.

  Like the fiery arrival of some paleolithic god, the huge rock broke the surface with a hiss of steam. Through the swirling fog, the hulking shape rose out of the ice. The men manning the winches strained harder until finally the entire stone broke free of the frozen restraints and swung, hot and dripping, over an open shaft of simmering water.

  Rachel felt mesmerized.

  Dangling there on its cables, dripping wet, the meteorite's rugged surface glistened in the fluorescent lights, charred and rippled with the appearance of an enormous petrified prune. The rock was smooth and rounded on one end, this section apparently blasted away by friction as it streaked through the atmosphere.

  Looking at the charred fusion crust, Rachel could almost see the meteor rocketing earthward in a furious ball of flames. Incredibly, that was centuries ago. Now, the captured beast hung there on its cables, water dripping from its body.

  The hunt was over.

  Not until this moment had the drama of this event truly struck Rachel. The object hanging before her was from another world, millions of miles away. And trapped within it was evidence-no, proof-that man was not alone in the universe.

  The euphoria of the moment seemed to grip everyone at the same instant, and the crowd broke into spontaneous hoots and applause. Even the administrator seemed caught up in it. He clapped his men and women on the back, congratulating them. Looking on, Rachel felt a sudden joy for NASA. They'd had some tough luck in the past. Finally things were changing. They deserved this moment.

  The gaping hole in the ice now looked like a small swimming pool in the middle of the habisphere. The surface of the two-hundred-foot-deep pool of melted water sloshed for a while against the icy walls of the shaft and then finally grew calm. The waterline in the shaft was a good four feet beneath the glacier's surface, the discrepancy caused by both the removal of the meteorite's mass and ice's property of shrinking as it melts.

  Norah Mangor immediately set up SHABA pylons all around the hole. Although the hole was clearly visible, any curious soul who ventured too close and accidentally slipped in would be in dire jeopardy. The walls of the shaft were solid ice, with no footholds, and climbing out unassisted would be impossible.

  Lawrence Ekstrom came padding across the ice toward them. He moved directly to Norah Mangor and shook her hand firmly. "Well done, Dr. Mangor."

  "I'll expect lots of praise in print," Norah replied.

  "You'll get it." The administrator turned now to Rachel. He looked happier, relieved. "So, Ms. Sexton, is the professional skeptic convinced?"

  Rachel couldn't help but smile. "Stunned is more like it."

  "Good. Then follow me."

  Rachel followed the administrator across the habisphere to a large metal box that resembled an industrial shipping container. The box was painted with military camouflage patterns and stenciled letters: P-S-C.

  "You'll call the President from in here," Ekstrom said.

  Portable Secure Comm, Rachel thought. These mobile communications booths were standard battlefield installations, although Rachel had never expected to see one used as part of a peacetime NASA mission. Then again, Administrator Ekstrom's background was the Pentagon, so he certainly had access to toys like this. From the stern faces on the two armed guards watching over the PSC, Rachel got the distinct impression that contact with the outside world was made only with express consent from Administrator Ekstrom.

  Looks like I'm not the only one who is off-the-grid.

  Ekstrom spoke briefly with one of the guards outside the trailer and then returned to Rachel. "Good luck," he said. Then he left.

  A guard rapped on the trailer door, and it opened from within. A technician emerged and motioned for Rachel to enter. She followed him in.

  The inside of the PSC was dark and stuffy. In the bluish glow of the lone computer monitor, Rachel could make out racks of telephone gear, radios, and satellite telecommunications devices. She already felt claustrophobic. The air inside was bitter, like a basement in winter.

  "Sit here, please, Ms. Sexton." The technician produced a rolling stool and positioned Rachel in front of a flat-screen monitor. He arranged a microphone in front of her and placed a bulky pair of AKG headphones on her head. Checking a logbook of encryption passwords, the technician typed a long series of keys on a nearby device. A timer materialized on the screen in front of Rachel.

  00:60 SECONDS

  The technician gave a satisfied nod as the timer began to count down. "One minute until connection." He turned and left, slamming the door behind him. Rachel could hear the bolt lock outside.

  Great.

  As she waited in the dark, watching the sixty-second clock slowly count down, she realized that this was the first moment of privacy she'd had since early that morning. She'd woken up today without the slightest inkling of what lay ahead. Extraterrestrial life. As of today, the most popular modern myth of all time was no longer a myth.

  Rachel was just now starting to sense how truly devastating this meteorite would be to her father's campaign. Although NASA funding had no business being on a political par with abortion rights, welfare, and health care, her father had made it an issue. Now it was going to blow up in his face.

  Within hours, Americans would feel the thrill of a NASA triumph all over again. There would be teary-eyed dreamers. Slack-jawed scientists. Children's imaginations running free. Issues of dollars and cents would fade away as petty, overshadowed by this monumental moment. The President would emerge like a phoenix, transforming himself into a hero, while in the midst of the celebration, the businesslike senator would suddenly appear small-minded, a penny-pinching Scrooge with no American sense of adventure.

  The computer beeped, and Rachel glanced up.

  00:05 SECONDS

  The screen in front of her flickered suddenly, and a blurry image of the White House seal materialized on-screen. After a moment, the image dissolved into the face of President Herney.

  "Hello, Rachel," he said, a mischievous glint in his eye. "I trust you've had an interesting afternoon?"

  29

  The office of Senator Sedgewick Sexton was located in the Philip A. Hart Senate Office Building on C Street to the northeast of the Capitol. The building was a neo-modern grid of white rectangles that critics claimed looked more like a prison than an office building. Many who worked there felt the same.

  On the third floor, Gabrielle Ashe's long legs paced briskly back and forth in front of her computer terminal. On the screen was a new e-mail message. She was not sure what to make of it.

  The first two lines read:

  SEDGEWICK WAS IMPRESSIVE ON CNN.

  I HAVE MORE INFORMATION FOR YOU.

  Gabrielle had been receiving messages like this for the last couple of weeks. The return address was bogus, although she'd been able to track it to a "whitehouse.gov" domain. It seemed her mysterious informant was a White H
ouse insider, and whoever it was had become Gabrielle's source for all kinds of valuable political information recently, including the news of a covert meeting between the NASA administrator and the President.

  Gabrielle had been leery of the e-mails at first, but when she checked out the tips, she was amazed to find the information consistently accurate and helpful-classified information on NASA overexpenditures, costly upcoming missions, data showing that NASA's search for extraterrestrial life was grossly overfunded and pathetically unproductive, even internal opinion polls warning that NASA was the issue turning voters away from the President.

  To enhance her perceived value to the senator, Gabrielle had not informed him she was receiving unsolicited e-mail help from inside the White House. Instead, she simply passed the information to him as coming from "one of her sources." Sexton was always appreciative and seemed to know better than to ask who her source was. She could tell he suspected Gabrielle was doing sexual favors. Troublingly, it didn't seem to bother him in the least.

  Gabrielle stopped pacing and looked again at the newly arrived message. The connotations of all the e-mails were clear: Someone inside the White House wanted Senator Sexton to win this election and was helping him do it by aiding his attack against NASA.

  But who? And why?

  A rat from a sinking ship, Gabrielle decided. In Washington it was not at all uncommon for a White House employee, fearing his President was about to be ousted from office, to offer quiet favors to the apparent successor in hopes of securing power or another position after the changeover. It seemed someone smelled Sexton victory and was buying stock early.

  The message currently on Gabrielle's screen made her nervous. It was like none other she had ever received. The first two lines didn't bother her so much. It was the last two:

  EAST APPOINTMENT GATE, 4:30 P.M.

  COME ALONE.

  Her informant had never before asked to meet in person. Even so, Gabrielle would have expected a more subtle location for a face-to-face meeting. East Appointment Gate? Only one East Appointment Gate existed in Washington, as far as she knew. Outside the White House? Is this some kind of joke?

  Gabrielle knew she could not respond via e-mail; her messages were always bounced back as undeliverable. Her correspondent's account was anonymous. Not surprising.

  Should I consult Sexton? She quickly decided against it. He was in a meeting. Besides, if she told him about this e-mail, she'd have to tell him about the others. She decided her informant's offer to meet in public in broad daylight must be to make Gabrielle feel safe. After all, this person had done nothing but help her for the last two weeks. He or she was obviously a friend.

  Reading the e-mail one last time, Gabrielle checked the clock. She had an hour.

  30

  The NASA administrator was feeling less edgy now that the meteorite was successfully out of the ice. Everything is falling into place, he told himself as he headed across the dome to the work area of Michael Tolland. Nothing can stop us now.

  "How's it coming?" Ekstrom asked, striding up behind the television scientist.

  Tolland glanced up from his computer, looking tired but enthusiastic. "Editing is almost done. I'm just overlaying some of the extraction footage your people shot. Should be done momentarily."

  "Good." The President had asked Ekstrom to upload Tolland's documentary to the White House as soon as possible.

  Although Ekstrom had been cynical about the President's desire to use Michael Tolland on this project, seeing the rough cuts of Tolland's documentary had changed Ekstrom's mind. The television star's spirited narrative, combined with his interviews of the civilian scientists, had been brilliantly fused into a thrilling and comprehensible fifteen minutes of scientific programming. Tolland had achieved effortlessly what NASA so often failed to do-describe a scientific discovery at the level of the average American intellect without being patronizing.

  "When you're done editing," Ekstrom said, "bring the finished product over to the press area. I'll have someone upload a digital copy to the White House."

  "Yes, sir." Tolland went back to work.

  Ekstrom moved on. When he arrived at the north wall, he was encouraged to find the habisphere's "press area" had come together nicely. A large blue carpet had been rolled out on the ice. Centered on the rug sat a long symposium table with several microphones, a NASA drape, and an enormous American flag as a backdrop. To complete the visual drama, the meteorite had been transported on a palette sled to its position of honor, directly in front of the symposium table.

  Ekstrom was pleased to see the mood in the press area was one of celebration. Much of his staff was now crowded around the meteorite, holding their hands out over its still-warm mass like campers around a campfire.

  Ekstrom decided that this was the moment. He walked over to several cardboard boxes sitting on the ice behind the press area. He'd had the boxes flown in from Greenland this morning.

  "Drinks are on me!" he yelled, handing out cans of beer to his cavorting staff.

  "Hey, boss!" someone yelled. "Thanks! It's even cold!"

  Ekstrom gave a rare smile. "I've been keeping it on ice."

  Everyone laughed.

  "Wait a minute!" someone else yelled, scowling good-naturedly at his can. "This stuff's Canadian! Where's your patriotism?"

  "We're on a budget, here, folks. Cheapest stuff I could find."

  More laughter.

  "Attention shoppers," one of the NASA television crew yelled into a megaphone. "We're about to switch to media lighting. You may experience temporary blindness."

  "And no kissing in the dark," someone yelled. "This is a family program!"

  Ekstrom chuckled, enjoying the raillery as his crew made final adjustments to the spotlights and accent lighting.

  "Switching to media lighting in five, four, three, two… "

  The dome's interior dimmed rapidly as the halogen lamps shut down. Within seconds, all the lights were off. An impenetrable darkness engulfed the dome.

  Someone let out a mock scream.

  "Who pinched my ass?" someone yelled, laughing.

  The blackness lasted only a moment before it was pierced by the intense glare of media spotlights. Everyone squinted. The transformation was now complete; the north quadrant of the NASA habisphere had become a television studio. The remainder of the dome now looked like a gaping barn at night. The only light in the other sections was the muted reflection of the media lights reflecting off the arched ceiling and throwing long shadows across the now deserted work stations.

  Ekstrom stepped back into the shadows, gratified to see his team carousing around the illuminated meteorite. He felt like a father at Christmas, watching his kids enjoy themselves around the tree.

  God knows they deserve it, Ekstrom thought, never suspecting what calamity lay ahead.

  31

  The weather was changing.

  Like a mournful harbinger of impending conflict, the katabatic wind let out a plaintive howl and gusted hard against the Delta Force's shelter. Delta-One finished battening down the storm coverings and went back inside to his two partners. They'd been through this before. It would soon pass.

  Delta-Two was staring at the live video feed from the microbot. "You better look at this," he said.

  Delta-One came over. The inside of the habisphere was in total darkness except for the bright lighting on the north side of the dome near the stage. The remainder of the habisphere appeared only as a dim outline. "It's nothing," he said. "They're just testing their television lighting for tonight."

  "The lighting's not the problem." Delta-Two pointed to the dark blob in the middle of the ice-the water-filled hole from which the meteorite had been extracted. "That's the problem."

  Delta-One looked at the hole. It was still surrounded by pylons, and the surface of the water appeared calm. "I don't see anything."

  "Look again." He maneuvered the joystick, spiraling the microbot down toward the surface of the hole.

 
; As Delta-One studied the darkened pool of melted water more closely, he saw something that caused him to recoil in shock. "What the…?"

  Delta-Three came over and looked. He too looked stunned. "My God. Is that the extraction pit? Is the water supposed to be doing that?"

  "No," Delta-One said. "It sure as hell isn't."

  32

  Although Rachel Sexton was currently sitting inside a large metal box situated three thousand miles from Washington, D.C., she felt the same pressure as if she'd been summoned to the White House. The videophone monitor before her displayed a crystal clear image of President Zach Herney seated in the White House communications room before the presidential seal. The digital audio connection was flawless, and with the exception of an almost imperceptible delay, the man could have been in the next room.

  Their conversation was upbeat and direct. The President seemed pleased, though not at all surprised, by Rachel's favorable assessment of NASA's find and of his choice to use Michael Tolland's captivating persona as a spokesman. The President's mood was good-natured and jocular.

  "As I'm sure you will agree," Herney said, his voice growing more serious now, "in a perfect world, the ramifications of this discovery would be purely scientific in nature." He paused, leaning forward, his face filling the screen. "Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world, and this NASA triumph is going to be a political football the moment I announce it."

  "Considering the conclusive proof and who you've recruited for endorsements, I can't imagine how the public or any of your opposition will be able to do anything other than accept this discovery as confirmed fact."

  Herney gave an almost sad chuckle. "My political opponents will believe what they see, Rachel. My concerns are that they won't like what they see."

  Rachel noted how careful the President was being not to mention her father. He spoke only in terms of "the opposition" or "political opponents." "And you think your opposition will cry conspiracy simply for political reasons?" she asked.

  "That is the nature of the game. All anyone needs to do is cast a faint doubt, saying that this discovery is some kind of political fraud concocted by NASA and the White House, and all of a sudden, I'm facing an inquiry. The newspapers forget NASA has found proof of extraterrestrial life, and the media starts focusing on uncovering evidence of a conspiracy. Sadly, any innuendo of conspiracy with respect to this discovery will be bad for science, bad for the White House, bad for NASA, and, quite frankly, bad for the country."

  "Which is why you postponed announcing until you had full confirmation and some reputable civilian endorsements."

  "My goal is to present this data in so incontrovertible a way that any cynicism is nipped in the bud. I want this discovery celebrated with the untainted dignity it deserves. NASA merits no less."

  Rachel's intuition was tingling now. What does he want from me?

  "Obviously," he continued, "you're in a unique position to help me. Your experience as an analyst as well as your obvious ties to my opponent give you enormous credibility with respect to this discovery."

  Rachel felt a growing disillusionment. He wants to use me… just like Pickering said he would!