But if the robot could bring back something—anything! A manufactured object, perhaps, or …
Different parts of the chamber were selectively revealed as people moved about, briefly opening up views of what was behind them. It was a barrel-shaped cavern, maybe fifteen times as tall as a person, and hewn directly out of the rock.
“They certainly are a varied lot, aren’t they?” Jasmel said. “There seem to be several different skin tones—and look at that female, there! She has orange hair—just like an orangutan!”
“One of them is running away,” said Dern, pointing.
“So he is,” said Adikor. “I wonder where he’s going?”
“Ponter! Ponter!”
Ponter Boddit looked up. He was sitting at a table in the dining hall at Laurentian, with two people from the university’s physics department, who were helping him over lunch to work out an itinerary for a tour of physical-science installations worldwide including CERN, the Vatican Observatory, Fermilab, and Japan’s Super-Kamiokande, the world’s other major neutrino detector, which had recently been damaged in an accident of it’s own. A hundred or so summer students were staring at the Neanderthal from a short distance away, in obvious fascination.
“Ponter!” Mary Vaughan shouted again, her voice ragged. She almost collapsed against the table as she came up to it. “Come quickly!”
Ponter started to get up. So did the two physicists. “What is it?” asked one of them.
Mary ignored the man. “Run!” she gasped at Ponter. “Run!”
Ponter began to run. Mary grabbed his hand and began running as well. She was still panting for breath; she’d already run all the way from the genetics lab, over in the Science One building, where she’d received the call from SNO.
“What is happening?” asked Ponter.
“A portal!” she said. “A device—some sort of robot or something—has come through. And the portal’s still open!”
“Where?” said Ponter.
“Down in the neutrino observatory.” She moved her hand to the center of her chest, which was heaving up and down. Ponter, Mary knew, could easily outpace her. Still running, she fumbled open her small purse and fished out her car keys, offering them to him.
Ponter shook his head slightly. For a second, Mary thought he was saying, Not without you. But it was surely more basic than that: Ponter Boddit had never driven a car in his life. They continued to run, Mary trying to keep up with him, but his stride was longer, and he’d only just started running, and—
He looked at her, and it was obvious that he also sensed the dilemma: there was no point in beating Mary to the parking lot, since there was nothing he could do there until she arrived.
He stopped running, and she did, too, looking at him with concern.
“May I?” said Ponter.
Mary had no idea what he meant, but she nodded. He reached out with his massive arms and scooped her up from the ground. Mary draped her arms around his thick neck, and Ponter began to run, his legs pounding like pistons against the tiled floor. Mary could feel his muscles surging as he barreled along. Students and faculty stopped and stared at the spectacle.
They came to the bowling alley, and Ponter put all his strength into running, surging forward, the sound of his massive footfalls thundering in the glass-walled corridor. Farther and farther, past the kiosks, past the Tim Hortons, and—
A student was coming through a door from outside. His mouth went wide, but he held the glass door open for Ponter and Mary as they surged into the daylight.
Mary’s perspective was to the rear, and she saw divots flying up in Ponter’s wake. She squeezed tighter, holding on. Ponter knew her car well enough; he’d have no trouble spotting the red Neon in the tiny lot—one of the advantages of a small university. He continued to run, and Mary heard and felt the change of terrain as he bounded off the grass onto the asphalt of the parking lot.
After a dozen meters, he slowed and swung Mary to the ground. She was dizzy from the wild ride, but managed to quickly cover the short remaining distance to her car, her electronic key out, the doors clicking open.
Mary scrambled into the driver’s seat, and Ponter got into the passenger’s seat. She put the key into the ignition, and flattened the accelerator to the floor, and off they shot down the road, leaving Laurentian behind. Soon they were out of Sudbury, heading for the Creighton Mine. Mary usually didn’t speed—not that there was much opportunity to in Toronto’s gridlock—but she was doing 120 km/h along the country roads.
Finally, they came to the mine site, racing past the big Inco sign, through the security gate, and careening down the winding roads to the large building that housed the lift leading down to the mine, Mary skidded the car to a halt, sending a spray of gravel into the air, and Ponter and she both hurried out.
Now, though, there was no further need for Ponter to wait for Mary—and time was still of the essence. Who knew how long the portal would stay open; indeed, who knew if it even still was open? Ponter looked at her, then surged forward and grabbed her in a hug. “Thank you,” he said. “Thank you for everything.”
Mary squeezed him back hard—hard for her, as hard as she could, but presumably nothing like what a Neanderthal woman could have done.
And then she released him.
And he ran off toward the elevator building.
Chapter 44
Adikor, Jasmel, and Dern continued to stare at the monitor, at the scene taking place a few armspans—and an infinity—away.
“They’re so fragile-looking,” said Jasmel, frowning. “Their arms are like sticks.”
“Not that one,” said Dern, pointing. “She must be pregnant.”
Adikor squinted at the screen. “That’s not a woman,” he said. “It’s a man.”
“With a belly like that?” said Dern, incredulously. “And I thought I was fat! Just how much do these Gliksins eat?”
Adikor shrugged. He didn’t want to spend time talking; he just wanted to look, to try to soak it all in. Another form of humanity! And a technologically advanced one, at that. It was incredible. He’d love to compare notes with them on physics, on biology, and—
Biology.
Yes, that’s what he needed! The robot had been touched by several Gliksins now. Surely some of their cells had rubbed off onto its frame; surely some of their DNA could be recovered from it. That would be proof that Adjudicator Sard would have to accept! Gliksin DNA: proof that the world shown on the screen was real. But—
There was no guarantee that the portal would stay open much longer, or that it could ever be reopened again. But at least he would be exonerated, and Dab and Kelon would be spared mutilation.
“Reel the robot back in,” Adikor said.
Dern looked at him. “What? Why?”
“There’s probably some Gliksin DNA on it now. We don’t want to lose that if the portal closes.”
Dern nodded. Adikor watched him walk across the room, take hold of the fiber-optic cable, and give it a gentle tug. Adikor turned back to the square monitor. The Gliksin nearest the robot—a brown-skinned specimen, probably a male—looked startled as the robot jerked upward.
Dern gave another tug. The brown Gliksin was looking back over his shoulder now, presumably at another person. He shouted something, then he nodded as somebody shouted back at him. He then grabbed onto the bottom of the robot’s rising frame, now dangling most of the man’s height off the ground.
Another male Gliksin ran into the field of view. This one was shorter, with lighter skin—as light as Adikor’s own—but his eyes were … strange: dark, and half-hidden under unusual lids.