Scale, p.12
Scale, page 12
Sam glanced around at the cavernous space they were crossing; a lone Scale One officer stood by a doorway, lost in thought like a monumental sculpture barely brought to life. But he couldn’t blame the slower scales for anything; Chu and her colleagues would be perfectly capable of blazing through their work while he was still brooding about the encounter. Had he really expected to be briefed on the steps they would be taking to investigate G8’s activities? Was he hurt that they hadn’t invited him to debate the political motives of a possible insurrection about which he had no direct knowledge, or to discuss the finer points of building a fusion bomb?
He thanked Lieutenant Chu, and they parted in the lobby. He’d done all he could; he’d given her every pertinent fact in his possession, but there’d never really been any prospect of him learning what the outcome would be, let alone having a chance to advocate for one result or another.
As he made his way back to the city, he took some comfort in having delayed whatever action his disclosures had set in motion until Cara was safely clear of the whole mess. If G8’s submariners came to harm, that would sadden him, but it would not be on his conscience. When they’d chosen to join the whole strange endeavor, they must have understood the risks they were facing.
And for what, exactly? Sam wasn’t sure if he would ever find out the purpose of the structure on the riverbed, but if he did, it wouldn’t be naval intelligence who told him.
Chapter 22
Sam found a phone booth and called Idris’s school. The administrator he spoke to made his disapproval of impromptu family holidays during term very clear, but Sam wasn’t about to smooth things over by inventing a dying relative or other emergency. Lying to Idris about the trip was bad enough, but if he started telling different lies to different people that would be sure to end badly.
There was no sign of Noor and Idris outside the museum, so Sam bought a ticket and went in to look for them. The first wing he entered contained a diorama illustrating the origin of the scales, but it really just recounted the same folk tale of mysteriously smaller offspring that Sam had heard from his parents; there was nothing in the accompanying text about the eight kinds of leptons. Even in Wendale, some people were far behind the times.
The second wing was dedicated to the Age of Rootlife, and it contained some impressive fossils – or plaster reconstructions – of portions of ancient animals whose forelegs alone would have stretched up to the ceiling. A hundred million years ago, only bacteria and fungi had managed to migrate into the smaller scales, and the land and sea alike were ruled by these huge, diffuse creatures. Sam gazed at the models of fearsome lizards striding through fern-encrusted jungles, unaware that their descendants would be facing competitors to whom their mighty claws would feel as threatening as marshmallows.
He found his family in the next wing, perusing a display on continental drift. “All the countries were joined up once, with no ocean between them,” Idris informed him, pointing to one of a sequence of globes that illustrated different stages of the ceaseless rearrangement.
“That would have made some trips easier,” Sam replied. “Are you hungry?”
“Yes.”
In the café, after they’d ordered, Noor asked Sam, “How did it go?”
“They listened, and they didn’t dismiss what I told them. But they made it clear that whatever they do to follow up will be none of my business.”
“Can we go home now?” Idris pleaded.
“We’ll see,” Sam replied. If there was some kind of raid on G8, it would surely make the news, but he had no idea how long it might take for the navy to act. “You don’t want to leave without seeing the ocean.”
“I don’t care about the ocean,” Idris declared disdainfully.
“I bet they have a good library here,” Noor suggested. “They’ll have a lot of books you’ve never seen.”
Sam paid for the meal, trying not to wince at the cost. His fee from Jessica Leon would last a while, but it wouldn’t be practical to take on new cases here, so if their stay stretched on too long it might be prudent to find a cheaper hotel.
As they left the café, Noor took his hand and offered him a reassuring smile. He had no reason to think they were in permanent exile; G8 would soon face the scrutiny it deserved, and under pressure, the management would have far more urgent priorities than lashing out at him.
Noor began unfolding her copy of the tourist map. “So, shall we look for the library?”
Idris said, “My stomach hurts.”
Something bright caught Sam’s eye. He turned to the east and saw a dazzling glow, rising up from the horizon.
“What is that?” Noor asked, imploringly, as if it were in his power to take back the answer he’d already planted in her mind. Sam didn’t reply; he gazed into the source until the radiance became too painful and he had to look away, fighting the unspeakable conclusion blossoming in his own imagination.
The light was coming from the direction of Mauburg. But if G8 had built the weapon Yukio feared, what could they hope to gain by using it? Was this some kind of pre-emptive demonstration, to cow the world with their might before they’d even made their first demands?
Let it be out in the desert, he pleaded. Just for show. Not in the city. Surely they could not have attacked one district without risking damage to them all, and even if the riverbed offered a haven, they could not have evacuated all of D7 there without the whole city knowing about it.
The light was growing stronger, and rising higher. The street was lit up like day now, but the stark shadows cast by this new sun refused to stay still. Idris broke free of Sam’s grip and reeled around, staring up at the sky in fearless delight. Should they be sheltering? Sam crouched down and tried to grab him, but he squirmed free.
“Look!” Idris urged him. “It’s coming over us!”
When the sound began it was like a thunderclap, but it just kept booming, refusing to subside. Sam dropped to his knees and threw his body over his son. What had he done? He’d broken his promise, and now he’d killed them all.
“Get off me!” Idris protested. Sam squeezed him more tightly, waiting for his own clothes to burst into flames, hoping the sheer bulk of his adult frame would amount to some kind of shield.
He huddled, shivering, braced for the heat that would lacerate his flesh, blood pounding in his ears and a red light swimming in the dark behind his eyes.
But the heat never came. After a few seconds, Noor touched his shoulder. “It’s all right,” she said. “It’s going out across the ocean.”
Sam let out a deranged sob and clambered unsteadily to his feet. The light was receding to the west, shrinking and growing dimmer. He looked around at the street; no buildings were damaged, and no one appeared harmed in any way. Some of the onlookers seemed rattled, but others were beaming happily, as if they’d just witnessed nothing more than a charming pyrotechnic display. “It must have been a meteor!” one man announced confidently.
Sam watched the projectile retreating, expecting the bomb it carried to ignite over the water now – far enough away to spare Wendale, but close enough to shock them all into submission. But the pinprick of light simply faded from view.
“What was it?” Idris asked. “Is it going to come back?”
“I don’t know,” Sam replied.
Noor said, “There’s a radio in our room.”
As they headed to the hotel, they passed people gathered on the street, talking and gesticulating, unable to agree on what had just happened. Sam read the atmosphere as anxious and bewildered, without yet tipping into panic. None of this would make the slightest sense to anyone who didn’t know what he knew – but then, it didn’t entirely make sense to him either.
The question as to whether he’d prompted this threatening display by G8 swirled around in his skull. Had Chu been so shocked by the report’s implications that she’d ordered some action in Mauburg immediately, and this was the response? Or was there an informant in the naval base, who’d tipped off G8 that their time was almost up? But if G8 had had a few more days without scrutiny, what exactly would they have done differently? Refined their rocket’s navigation system, and had a better chance of obliterating Wendale?
Back in their room, Noor switched on the radio; she didn’t need to go hunting across the stations to bring up a newsreader describing “a luminous object moving at great speed over the city, for which we’re yet to hear a satisfactory explanation.”
“Tell us something we don’t know,” she muttered.
“I want to see it again!” Idris declared.
Sam sat down on the bed; he felt like he’d been beaten all over. He was torn between an urge to make the gravity of the situation clear to Idris, and letting him enjoy the innocent pleasure of the spectacle – unless and until the time came when they knew they were in danger from a repeat performance.
But if there was any chance of another attempted strike, shouldn’t they head for the train station now, before everyone in Wendale was clamoring for a ticket?
He jumped to his feet. “Okay, I think it’s time to go home.”
“What if they target the railway line?” Noor replied quietly.
Sam sank back onto the bed. If G8 really were intent on killing civilians, that was no more unthinkable than targeting the city itself. So what could they do? Hire a car and drive north, along the coast? Set out on foot across the countryside? How far away would they need to be, to be safe?
The newsreader said, “We’ve just received a statement from Mauburg, from the District Seven Council there. They have declared their plans to seek independence from the nation’s authorities, and create a new alliance of Scale Seven people.
“The Council has also claimed that the object seen traveling over Mauburg and Wendale was a rocket launched from the desert east of Mauburg, with the aim of placing the first artificial satellite into orbit around the Earth. But as yet we have received no independent confirmation of this, and we are awaiting the advice of astronomers as to whether that could be a genuine explanation for the phenomenon that many of us witnessed, and if so, whether the launch did in fact achieve its stated goal.”
Chapter 23
The Town Hall was already crowded when Loretta and Dahlia squeezed their way in.
“We should have stayed home and listened on the radio,” Dahlia complained, as they fought to maintain their place behind the last row of seats. “The way this is going, it will be a miracle if the floor doesn’t crack.”
“I don’t care if we end up knee deep in rubble,” Loretta replied. “I want to be able to tell my grandchildren that I was there on the spot when the coup was dismantled.”
The Mayor, Claudia Beech, took to the stage; half a dozen other Councilors lined up behind her. “Looks like no one from G8 is showing their face,” Loretta observed disdainfully. “Just their puppets.”
“Be fair,” Dahlia protested. “For all we know, she’s the puppeteer.”
“Welcome,” Beech began, before turning up the volume on the public address system and trying again. The audience wasn’t intentionally drowning her out, but they needed a good feedback squeal piercing their eardrums to remind them why they were here, rather than just arguing with their friends in a café.
“Welcome!” the Mayor repeated. “The Council of District Seven, Mauburg, has called this meeting to discuss the historical proposition that we will be putting to a vote tomorrow morning.” Loretta gritted her teeth; the blitheness of it was infuriating. The Council had no legal power to secede, and asking voters for their opinion on the matter wouldn’t change that. If they’d merely decided to run a poll to gauge the level of support for the idea, she wouldn’t have objected, and a strong enough result might even have given them some leverage in negotiations with the national government. But framing the vote as if it could somehow settle the matter within a day or so was both absurd and alarming.
The Mayor had everyone’s attention now; her words landed against a backdrop of almost perfect silence. “Why do we need to break away from Stedland?” she asked. “I’ve always held our fellow citizens of every scale in high esteem, and nothing will change the affection I feel for them. But this country was formed more than two centuries ago, by people who could never have anticipated the changes that the future would bring. And least of all did they envision the quandary we now face. Through the efforts of researchers right here in this district, we have developed the means to produce a range of artificial materials at Scale Seven, granting manufactured objects a strength and durability commensurate with the needs of their users. What’s more, we will soon be able to provide energy for transport and industry that will match and exceed the power required to make full use of these astonishing materials. We are, finally, on the verge of creating buildings and machines that belong entirely to our own scale, that possess the same toughness and speed as we do. And with the aid of these inventions, we are even preparing to travel beyond the Earth itself. Already, we’ve placed a satellite into orbit: an artificial moon named Friendship moving perpetually above the atmosphere. And for almost three weeks we have maintained a habitat at the bottom of the Mauburg River, testing the life support systems we will need to survive in cities on the moon and Mars.”
Loretta was tempted to shout, “And as a place to warehouse your hostages!” But she had no proof that Cara had been held there, and there was nothing to be gained from an interjection that no one in the audience would have the slightest reason to take seriously.
“Surely we can share these innovations with our neighbors?” Beech continued. “How selfish would it be to hoard them for our scale alone? The fact is, the inventors of this technology have no desire to do anything of the kind. In due course, the details of every one of their discoveries will be published, for the benefit of the entire world.
“The question, rather, is whether we will be free to reap the benefits, at a pace and a scale that will allow us to make the most of this opportunity. If we remain encumbered by the need to bring the whole nation along with us, side by side for every step of the journey, just how quickly will the politicians and bureaucrats of the larger scales allow us to move? It’s no exaggeration to say that everyone in this room could die, waiting for their assent. What’s a year, to Scale One? A lifetime to you or me is just the duration of one of their planning committees.
“Imagine circumnavigating the planet in less than a day. Imagine the tallest buildings filled with people of any scale, the fastest vehicles transporting us, the most efficient factories meeting our needs, the most astonishing new machines at our service. Imagine setting foot on the moon, and visiting the deepest parts of the ocean. If we continue to be ruled by decision makers whose glacial pace befits the way of life of the slowest of their constituents, then these plans might finally come to fruition in our great-grandchildren’s lifetime. But if we take responsibility for our own actions, not only could you and I witness every one of these achievements, but our descendants, standing on these foundations, will reach wonders we can barely dream of.
“That’s the choice you need to make, when you vote in the morning. Will you welcome the future that’s on offer to you right now – or will you wait for other people to think it over and decide what’s good for you, sixty-four times more slowly than you can do that for yourself?”
Beech stepped back from the microphone. There was a smattering of applause and a few enthusiastic cheers, but then a clamoring from people wanting to ask questions.
The Mayor pointed to one of the journalists at the front of the hall.
“Mandy Sayles, Tribune science reporter,” the woman introduced herself. “All the astronomers I’ve spoken to were puzzled that the satellite was launched to the west, not the east. It could have picked up some extra speed for free, from the Earth’s rotation, but you chose to send it flying over Wendale instead. Can you explain that decision?”
“That’s a technical issue,” Beech replied. “I’m not a scientist.”
“Can we speak to the scientists who chose the trajectory?” Sayles persisted.
“I believe they’ll be discussing their work at some point in the future, but they’re not here with us right now.”
Sayles was incredulous. “You’re asking us to form a new country to ensure that no one stands in the way of these innovators, but we’re not going to get a chance to talk to them ourselves before the vote?”
Beech said, “My understanding is that it was a safety issue; the path over the ocean was less risky if anything went wrong.”
“Then why not launch nearer to the coast? Why fly over Wendale at all? Wasn’t it a matter of trying to intimidate people – showing them you could hit the naval base, if you wanted to?”
“Absolutely not.” Beech turned to another journalist. “Your question, please.”
“Raymond Wu, Mauburg Sentinel. We’ve seen a rocket fly into space over our heads, and its orbit has been confirmed by observatories across the planet. But are we meant to just take your word for all the rest – these new materials and power sources?”
“Not at all,” Beech replied. “We’re hoping to set up an exhibition in the next hour or so, where the public can view some of the key inventions.”
“But why is that only happening now? Couldn’t it have been done much earlier, giving people more time to discuss the issues?”
“Perhaps starting with the rocket was too theatrical,” Beech conceded. “But we’re all new to this, so you’ll have to forgive us if we don’t get every detail right.”
“Detail?” Loretta muttered. “Something forced their hand, and made them launch the whole campaign at short notice.”
“Maybe Cara went to the police, after all?” Dahlia suggested. “Either that, or Jake or Sam couldn’t keep their mouths shut.”
If that was the case, Loretta didn’t blame them; no one was obliged to shield G8 from scrutiny, whatever they’d promised for the sake of getting Cara free. If she’d handled things differently herself, she might have got everyone involved in the kidnapping locked up before they could pull this stunt.
