The combination of free interaction through the intercom and separate confinement seemed to undermine the camaraderie Edward thought was typical of prison camp inmates. They were not being abused. They had nothing really solid to fight against. Their confinement, until now at least, had not been senseless. Consequently, they were not “drawing together” as Edward thought they might. Then again, he had never before been held in long-term detention. Maybe his expectations were simply naive.

“We are preparing papers that you will sign, promising not to speak of these last few days—”

“I won’t sign anything like that,” Minelli said. “There aren’t any best-sellers if I sign that. No agents, no Hollywood.”

“Please,” Phan said patiently.

“What about Australia?” Edward asked. “Are you talking with them?”

“Conferences begin today in Washington,” Phan said.

“Why the wait? Why didn’t everybody start talking weeks ago?”

Phan did not answer. “Personally, I hope all is made public soon,” he said.

Edward tried to control a building anger. “Why can’t we get together? Take us out of here and put us in a BOQ or something.”

“Barbecue?” Minelli snorted.

“Bachelor officer’s quarters,” Edward explained, his lower lip trembling. He was beginning to cry. He checked that response immediately, putting on an air of indignant rationality. “Really. This is hell. We feel like we’re in jail.”

“Worse. We can’t make zip guns or knives,” Minelli said. “Bottom of the world, Ma!”

Phan regarded Minelli with an expression between irritation and concern. “That is all I have to tell you now. Please do not worry. I am sure you will be compensated. In the meantime, we have new infodisks.”

“Goody,” Minelli said. As Phan turned away, he shouted, “Wait! I’m not feeling well. Really. Something’s wrong.”

“What is it?” Phan asked, gesturing to a watch supervisor behind him.

“In my head. Tell them, Reslaw.”

“Minelli’s been disturbed recently,” Reslaw said slowly. “I’m not doing too well, myself. He doesn’t sound good. He’s different.”

“I’m different,” Minelli concurred. Then he began to weep. “Goddammit, just put us back out where the rocks are. Let us go in our truck. I’ll sign anything. Really. Please.”

Phan glanced at them all, then turned and left abruptly. The curtains hummed back into place. Edward’s drawer opened and he removed a newspaper and the new packet of infodisks. Hungrily, he read yesterday morning’s headline.

“Christ,” he muttered. “They know about the President. Stella!” He punched her number on the intercom. “Stella, they know the President came out here!”

“I’m reading,” she said.

“Do you think your mother got through?”

“I don’t know, really.”

“We can hope,” Edward said.

Minelli was still weeping.

20

Hicks lay back against a pillow in the Lincoln Bedroom, a foot-high stack of reports on the round draped night-stand beside him, a small glass-globed lamp glowing softly above the reports. The late Empire-period pendulum clock on the marble mantelpiece ticked softly, steadily. The large, high-ceilinged room looked haunted, in a cozy sort of way; haunted by history, by association. This had been Abraham Lincoln’s Cabinet room originally; here he had signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

He shook his head. “I’m crazy,” he said. “I’m not here. I’m imagining all of it.” For a moment, he hoped desperately that was true; that he was dreaming in the hotel room at the Inter-Continental, and that he would soon be promoting his novel for six minutes or less on another radio show, before another young announcer…

On the other hand, what was so undesirable about being in the White House in Washington, D.C., personally chosen by the President of the United States to advise him on the biggest event in human history? “The man doesn’t listen,” he murmured.

Hicks picked up the topmost report on the stack, a thick sheaf of photocopied papers on the Death Valley site, the Guest, and all that was known about the Great Victoria Desert site.

The Guest’s interim autopsy report was third in the stack. Using a talent acquired across years of research, he skimmed the first two papers quickly, stopping only for essential details. The reports, not unexpectedly, were “safe” — hedged through and through with ambiguous language, craftily defused theories, prompt second-guessing. Only the autopsy report showed promise of being substantive.

Colonel Tuan Anh Phan, a man Hicks would like to meet, was clear and to the point. The Guest’s physiology was unlike that of any living thing on Earth. Phan could not conceive of an environment that would evolve such a physiology. There were structures that reminded him, again and again, of “engineering shortcuts,” totally unlike the more intricate, randomly evolved structures terrestrial biology exhibited. His conclusion was not hedged in the least:

“The Guest’s body does not appear to be in the same biological category as Earth life forms. Some of its features are contrary to reasonable expectations. The only explanation I can offer for this is that the Guest is an artificial being, perhaps the product of centuries of genetic manipulation combined with complex bioelectronics. Since these abilities are far beyond us, any suppositions I might make as to the actual functions of the Guest’s organs must be considered unreliable, perhaps misleading.”

A chemical analysis of the Guest’s tissues followed. There was no cell structure per se in any of the tissues; rather, each area or organ in the Guest’s body appeared to have a separate metabolism, which cooperated with, but was not part of, other areas or organs. There was no central waste-disposal system. Wastes appeared to build up without relief in tissues. Phan thought this might have been the cause of death. “Perhaps nutrients unavailable in an Earth environment triggered processes below the level of detail our investigation can uncover. Perhaps the Guest, in its native environment, was attached to a complex life-support system that purged its body of waste products. Perhaps the Guest was ill and certain body functions were inactive.”

Buried in a footnote: “The Guest does not appear to have been designed for a long life span.” The footnote was signed by Harold Feinman, who had not attended the final parts of the autopsy. There was no further elaboration.

Despite the report’s clarity, Something was being left unsaid. Feinman, at least, seemed to be hinting that the Guest was not what it appeared…

In the bottom report of the stack was an Australian booklet, prepared with obvious haste and considerable deletions. This booklet began with a synopsis of statements made by the mechanical visitors that had emerged from the Great Victoria Desert rock.

Hicks rubbed his eyes. The light was poor for reading. He had leafed through this booklet once already: Yet he needed to feel completely prepared for the next morning, when he accompanied the President into the Oval Office to meet with the Australian representatives.

“The comprehensibility of the mechanical beings’ statements to our investigators is astonishing. Their command of English appears to be perfect. They answer questions promptly and without obfuscation.”

Hicks studied the glossy color photographs inserted into the booklet. The Australian government had just two days before provided a set of these photographs along with video disks to every news organization in the world; the images of the three silvery, gourd-shaped robots hovering near a wood-posted razor-wire fence, of the great smooth water-worn red rock, of the exit hole, were in every civilized household in the world by now.

“The robots, by their every word, convey a sense of goodwill and benevolent concern. They wish to help the inhabitants of the Earth to ‘fulfill your potential, to come together in harmony and exercise your rights as potential citizens of a galaxy-wide exchange.’”