“Sir!” a soldier shouted, “We may have an intruder in Californian airspace, flying low north of Pendleton. Nothing on radar.”
“The sneaky bastards. While we watch the Kola build-up they send Stealths on ahead from the Urals,” said Hooper. “We’re out of time as of now.”
“The Carl Vincent,” the President shouted, “on the blower, NOW.”
“Sir,” the corporal whooped, “I’ve been trying to tell you. We lost her twenty seconds ago. All I’m getting is static.” The speaker on the table crackled into life. There was a voice, hidden under layers of static, distorted beyond the possibility of decipherment.
“Does anyone understand this?” Grant shouted.
“It’s the asteroid,” Bellarmine said in exasperation. “It’s hit. Don’t you see we have to hit back?”
“Sir!” a soldier shouted, “NORAD say another eighty Backfires have taken off from Kola.” He pointed to a television screen.
There was a tiny strip of runway, and a desolate snowy landscape, and a clutter of buildings. Little black moths were gliding along the runway or strung out in black moving silhouettes against the snow. Grant said, “Oh please God, not that.”
Hooper said, “What does it take, Sam? The blast is on the way in now!”
The black girl waved and pointed. “Mister President, we have the picture from Goddard. On the screen.”
“Sergeant, Hooper and Bellarmine are under arrest. Anyone who reaches for the red phone is to be shot. No warnings, just shoot.”
“Yes sir.” The picture was a shimmering, irresolute haze.
“What the futz is this?” Grant snapped. “Has it hit or not?”
“They’re doing a maximum entropy, sir.”
“A what?”
“They’re trying to sharpen it up.”
“Wallis, what gives with Xochicalco?”
“The channels are full of static, sir. We’re getting nothing.”
“Mister President,” said Hooper, “whatever the legalities of our action, we’ll be scattered to the winds any time now. Whatever your reasons for inaction, you can’t hold off any longer. America is under attack now. Get our missiles away now. We only have seconds.”
“Mister President, I beg you on my knees, launch!” Bellarmine implored.
“So it’s hit?”
“Sir,” said a man in naval uniform, “it could just have grazed the upper atmosphere. That would give us EMP but no impact.”
“Where’s the frigging Kremlin?”
Wallis said, “Sir, every damn channel to the Kremlin seems to be out. We’re going to try a straight commercial phone line.”
“Why isn’t Goddard delivering?”
“Sir, they say the picture needs to be processed.”
“How long, woman?” the President shouted at the top of his voice.
She shrank visibly and spoke quickly into the phone. “Five minutes, sir.”
“Five what?” Grant yelled, and the girl crumpled, tears welling up.
Wallis said, “Sir, if you want an effective response you’re down to maybe a minute, maybe less.”
“Get them away, Grant!” Hooper bellowed, his fist raised. He half-rose from his chair, as if he was about to lunge for the telephone. The marine, a look of pure terror on his face, raised his rifle towards the General. Hooper lurched back and smashed his fist repeatedly on the table.
The President raised his arms like an old-fashioned preacher. The room fell silent. Someone next door began to recite an ancient prayer, in a calm Southern accent:
Our Father which art in Heaven…
He picks his way over the cables and stares at the video camera following him. It stares back indifferently. He stands at the flag, hanging by the door. The black girl next to him is sobbing quietly. He puts his hand on her shoulder. The flag begins to blur and to his surprise Grant realizes that he too is weeping.
He looks around, unashamed, the tears trickling down his chin. He is no longer in a command post deep under the ground: he is in a wax museum. And somehow the museum is also a sea, an ocean of faces stretching around the globe, faces born and unborn, all awaiting the decision of this one man, this country boy from Wyoming. Insects crawl under his skin. They have tearing forceps for jaws. A crab in his stomach is tearing its way out, devouring his intestines as it does. Acid trickles down his throat, burning his gullet. The dull pain in his chest has long since grown to a tight grip.
Of course it’s obvious. Has been all along.
A voice whispers, “Mister President, we have maybe thirty to sixty seconds before the blast hits us.”
“Hell of a decision for a Wyoming ploughboy, Nathan.”
The voice whispers again, “Sir, we need your word.”
“I don’t know how we got into this state — maybe it’s beyond human control. Maybe the world goes in cycles and it’s my luck to be in the hot seat when the time comes to crash out. You didn’t need your rebellion, Mister, I was getting around to my planet of ashes. So goodbye, my children, and hail to the mutants.”
Deliver us from the Evil One…
“Wallis, get on with it. Hooper, proceed with Grand Slam. Mitchell, fire your Tridents.” The soldiers quickly move to terminal screens and begin to speak into telephones. Grant reaches out for the red phone. Wallis breaks open a sealed envelope.
For Thine is the Kingdom…
Someone, a woman, says nervously, “Mister President, it’s the British Prime Minister.” Her voice is lost in the immensity.
The Power and the Glory…
“Can’t someone stop this?” another woman asks. “I have children.”
Forever. Amen.
Wallis sits down at a desk, near the back of the protected room. A camera swivels round to follow him. He starts to read numbers into a telephone, one at a time, in a clear, decisive voice. The President picks up a red phone, and the camera quickly swings back towards him. But Grant’s vision is blurred, and his hand is shaking. He tries to talk but words won’t come. Bellarmine’s eyes are staring, willing the President on. Hallam stands in the midst of it, hand over his eyes like a child keeping out some fearful monster. Hooper’s jaw is clenched to the point where he can hardly speak.
An ancient telex machine, a comedy thing, a museum piece amongst the Silicon Valley technology, bursts into life, chattering. “Oh sweet Jesus oh sweet Jesus. Sir, it’s President Zhirinovsky.”
Simultaneously, the British Prime Minister’s voice comes over the speaker, as clearly as if he is calling from the next room. “Ah, good morning, Mister President. Have I called at a bad moment?”
Sonora Desert
The meteor comes in high over the Sonora desert, trailing a long, luminous wake and throwing moving shadows on the ground far below. Near the end of its flight it flares up, splits in two and then it is gone from the star-laden sky.
“Did you see that?” Judy asked, appearing from around the porch of the house.
“A sporadic, I think,” said Webb. “There are no showers at this time of year.” In the starlight, Webb could just make out that she was wearing the same crocheted shawl he had seen her in at Oaxtepec, and the same crocheted bikini; and she had the same elegant bodywork. She was carefully carrying two tumblers filled to the brim with a liquid which seemed to glow orange-red. She handed him a drink and sat cross-legged on a rug laid out next to the tub. To Webb she looked like a satisfied Buddha.
He shifted his leg. The hospital nurse had finally removed the swathes of bandage. Judy had left her Pontiac Firebird for him with a map and he had gurgled the big psychedelic car along the I-10 through Tucson and then along Gates Pass before turning north into a narrow road cutting through the Saguaro National Park. The six-inch gash in his thigh still ached from the journey, but the warm water of the big whirlpool tub was beginning to ease the pain. Big Saguaro cacti stood around them in dark outline, like silent sentinels, or triffids.