Ancient Shores

Asquith’s eyes were glazed, and he died clutching the linebacker’s sleeve.

The body was placed in the back of the ambulance. After the vehicle drove away, Gibson came forward and identified himself. “I’ll have to ask you people to come with me.”

“Why?” asked the man with the beard. He was of about average height, and the cast of his features suggested a mild temper, but he confronted the marshal with barely suppressed rage. “So you can go on with your war?”

Gibson stared back. Nothing was easy anymore.

“Just arrest the whole bunch,” said Elizabeth, keeping her voice down.

“Who are you?” Gibson asked the man who had spoken. He had recognized two of the visitors but not this one.

“Stephen Jay Gould,” he said, raising his voice to be heard over the wind. The camera moved in, and the spotlight illuminated him for the national audience. “I don’t think we’re going to cooperate. If the government wants to kill anyone else, it’ll have to start with us.”

They were begi

“Gould,” Ben told the microphone, “is a paleontologist.”

The camera pa

“Charles Curran,” Ben said, holding the mike for him. “Theologian.”

Curran might have been preparing to discipline a disorderly child. “This is more than a dispute about property rights,” he said. “Johnson’s Ridge doesn’t belong to one government, or even to all governments. It belongs to everybody.” He looked directly into the camera. “Tonight, its protectors are under siege. To that degree, we are all under siege.”

“Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. Historian.”

Schlesinger’s brown eyes flashed behind hornrimmed glasses. Gibson had a sudden sense of the uselessness of his fire power.

“Scott Carpenter. Astronaut.”

Max’s copilot. Still looking capable of riding into orbit, he nodded to the invisible audience.

“Gregory Benford. Astrophysicist and novelist.”

Benford was of medium height, bearded, wearing an oversized hunting jacket that he’d probably borrowed. He scarcely looked at Gibson. Then he waved the chairman forward. Walker tentatively took his place in the line.

“James Walker. Leader of the Mini Wakan Oyaté. The People of the Spirit Lake.”

“Thank you,” Walker said, looking left and right.

“Harry Markowitz. Economist.”

Markowitz folded his arms in silent defiance.

“Richard Wilbur. Poet.”

Wilbur nodded, but his eyes were elsewhere, tracking the geometry between the artifact and the surrounding hills, as if the pattern were familiar, something he recognized.

“David Schramm. Astrophysicist.”

The linebacker. He was covered with Asquith’s blood.

“Stephen Hawking. Physicist.”

Like some of the others, Hawking did not look properly dressed for the weather, as if he had been snatched from doing something else, in a warmer climate, and thrust on a plane. His eyes measured Gibson coldly.

“Walter Schirra. Astronaut.”

Brown eyes, square jaw, medium size. Gibson knew Schirra, had read somewhere that he was one of the most gregarious and good-humored of the astronauts. But there was no sign of easy congeniality today.

“Ursula K. Le Guin. Novelist.”

She stood staring at the place where Asquith had fallen. She too was stained with his blood.

“And Carl Sagan. Astronomer.”

Like the others, Sagan seemed angry, frustrated, his signature optimism jolted by events. “Walter Asquith,” he said, “was also with us on this journey. Walter was a poet.”

“You know,” said Gibson, in a low, dangerous voice, “you people are not above the law.”

“Sometimes the law is stupid,” said Markowitz.

April Ca

Gibson was already formulating what he was going to say to his superiors.

33

Our song will enter

That distant land….

—Southern Paiute poem

They spent the evening camped on the other side of the port, along the shore of the u

Gould was not so sure. “Cities have a social utility, if only as places to get away from,” he suggested.

Max stood off to one side, intimidated, until April noticed and handed him a Coke, bringing him within the circle of friends. “I don’t know whether we thanked you,” she said. “None of this would have happened without you.”

Markowitz laughed and put an arm around him. “Yes, Max,” he said. “Like it or not, you got us here. Whatever happens from this point on, you are responsible.”

“The real question,” Sagan said later, when it had grown cool and they’d all moved close to the fire, “is, where do we go from here?”

“How do you mean?” asked April.

“I think he means,” said Wilbur, “that the government has a point. And I believe he’s right.”

“I agree,” said Schirra. “If we exploit the Roundhouse, we move completely outside human experience. For one thing, we’re going to have to have a whole new type of economy. Wouldn’t you say, Harry?”

Markowitz nodded. “Oh, yes,” he said. “But we can prepare for it. Adapt to it.” He smiled and pointed out to sea. “The future lies that way.”

“We,” said Hawking, speaking through his electronics, “have incurred a responsibility. After all, we took it upon ourselves to make a decision today. I don’t see how we can back away now.”

The air moved. The long shoreline curved beneath the stars.

“But there are risks,” said Walker.

Curran nodded. “The risks are proportionately high, as are the fears.” He gri

“We have nothing to fear,” said Schramm.

“Stephen is right,” Schlesinger said. “We’re looking at a new world. New worlds are always hard on old ideas.”

Benford opened a box of marshmallows, stuck one on the end of a stick, and put it over the flame. “Are we saying that we should lead the charge?”

“I think you have to,” said Max.

Several faces turned in his direction. They looked, he thought, not uncomfortable with the prospect. LeGuin poked at the fire. It crackled, and a cloud of sparks rose into the night. “It seems arrogant,” she said.

Schramm opened two beers and passed one to Benford. “Of course it is. But I think we might need a little arrogance here.”

“We might not be around to help,” said Curran. “I’m not sure yet, but I think we committed a federal offense out there last night.”

Sagan smiled. “I don’t think we need worry. Matt Taylor’s going to need all the help he can get.”

“Yeah,” said April. “I’d really like to help the President. He almost got us killed.”

“He was in a box,” said Schlesinger. “Right now everyone in the world may be in a box, and we’ve helped put them there.”

“I agree,” said Hawking. “And I think we should begin to consider how to get them out.”

Benford nodded. “For a start, we need some positive PR.”

“Precisely,” said the chairman, who had seen a demonstration that day of the power of public relations.

“Maybe a TV show,” said April. “Let people know what this place really is. What it can mean.”

“And what the risks are,” suggested Carpenter. “We need to be honest. Speaking of which—” He looked at Walker. “What about the Sioux? Are you willing to help?”