Deep Fathom (Page 120)
It wasn’t just him! Jack stepped forward to view the wonder better. As he did so, the tall bearded man crashed to his knees, a look of rapture on his face. He was staring right at Jack.
“I think they can see me, too!” he said, astounded.
“Who are they?”
Jack stopped and raised an arm. All around the ghostly clearing, men and women fell in postures of worship and prostration. “They’re your ancients. The ones you’ve been looking for all these years. We’re seeing back into their world through some strange warp. And they’re in turn seeing into ours.”
The kneeling man, some sort of leader or shaman, called loudly. Though the words were unintelligible, he was clearly pleading.
Jack had an idea. “Karen, are we still patched through to the Fathom?”
“Yes.”
“Can you feed what this man is saying up to Gabriel? Can he translate?”
“I’ll try.”
There was a long pause. Jack gazed around in amazement.
Finally, a familiarly tinny voice, scratchy with distance, spoke in his ear.
“I will attempt to translate…but I have only begun to attach phonetics to the ancient language.”
“Do your best, Gabriel.”
Charlie spoke up. “You’ll have to hurry. We’re escalating to the peak pulse frequency in thirty-two seconds.”
The man at Jack’s feet continued to speak. Gabriel’s translation overlapped. “Our need is great, spirit of the pillar, oh god of the sun. What message do you bring us that the land shakes and cracks with fire?”
For the first time Jack noticed the ground was trembling underfoot. At that moment, he realized not only where he was, but when!
He stood at the dawn of this continent’s devastation.
Jack also grasped his own role here. He remembered the platinum diary’s story: The god of light stepped from his pillar….
Outfitted in his armored suit, basked by brilliance, he was that god.
Knowing his duty, Jack stepped forward and raised both arms. “Flee!” he yelled as Gabriel translated, his words echoing out to those gathered. “A time of darkness is upon you! A time of hardship! The waters of the sea will claim your homelands and drown them away. You must be prepared!”
Jack saw the shocked look on the other’s face. The man had understood.
Charlie yelled through the speakers. “Get ready for the final pulse!”
The view of the lost continent began to flicker.
Hurrying, Jack stepped forward. “Build great ships!” he ordered. “Gather your flocks and fill the ships’ bellies with food from the fields! Save your people!”
The shaman bowed his head. “Your humble servant, Horon-ko, hears and will obey.”
A shocked gasp arose from the radio. “Horon-ko,” Karen said. “The one who wrote the diary…the bones in the coffin.”
Jack nodded, staring down at the man. Their shared stories had come full circle. As he stood, the images sank back into the mirrored reflections.
“Here it comes!” Charlie screamed.
Jack braced, tense, waiting for the coming explosion.
But it never arrived—instead, the brightness simply blinked away like a candle snuffed.
Jack straightened. After the intense light, the midnight seas were especially dark. The glow from the base’s portholes appeared anemic and wan.
Karen yelled, fear in her voice. “Jack!”
“I’m still here.”
She sighed with relief, then Charlie interrupted. “What about the pillar?”
Jack spun with his thrusters, thumbing on his suit’s lamps. His lights spread far in the darkness.
Nothing.
The crystal pillar was gone. All that remained were bits and chunks scattered across the dark seabed floor, glowing in his beams like a sprinkle of stars. He moved forward, stepping among the shining constellations.
“Jack?” Charlie whispered.
“We did it. The pillar’s destroyed.”
Charlie whooped with joy.
Jack frowned. Charlie’s happiness was hard to share. The world was saved, but what about them? “The tactical nuclear strike?” Jack asked. “Spangler’s revenge. When’s it due to hit?”
“I wouldn’t worry about that, mon.”
Deep Fathom
Charlie sat in the pilothouse, radio pressed to his lips. “Jack, you missed the eclipse the last time. You might want to get back up here so you don’t miss it a second time.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Charlie grinned at Jack’s consternation. He couldn’t resist stringing his captain along. His heart was too full of amazement and joy. He stood and stared out the wide window. The others were all gathered on deck, pointing up.
In the clear sky, a black sun shone down, casting the ocean in platinum.
Charlie checked his wristwatch. A little after twelve o’clock. He glanced back at the sun. It was low in the sky, too low.
Shaking his head in wonder, Charlie glanced to the satellite navigation system. Its clock and date were constantly updated with a feed from a dozen satellites in geosynchronous orbit. He stared at the digital time and date stamp. He had confirmed the anomalous results with the local weather band, too.
Tuesday, July 24
01:45 P.M.
“Goddamn it, Charlie, what are you talking about?”
Charlie sighed, letting Jack off the hook. “We ran into a little anomaly, Jack. Like I said before, I’m no expert on this new science of ‘dark energy.’ ”
“Yeah, so? What happened?”
“Well, when we bombarded the pillar, the dark energy behaved as I had hoped—radiating straight back out, rather than down. But it had a side effect I hadn’t anticipated.”
“What?”
“Rather than stirring up the magma, the dark energy spike triggered a massive global time flux, resetting the Earth’s battery to the moment when the dark matter had last been excited. Back to the solar storm two weeks ago. Back to the day of the eclipse.”
Jack’s voice was incredulous. “What the hell are you saying? That we’ve traveled back in time?”
“Not us, the world. Except for our local pocket here, the rest of the planet slipped back sixteen days.”
Neptune base
In the docking bay of the research station, Karen helped Jack out of his bulky suit. She had listened in on the geologist’s conversation with Jack.
A global time flux.
It was too wild to comprehend right now. All her mind could grasp was that they had survived. The pillar was gone. The world was safe. The mysteries of Einsteinian anomalies, dark matter, and dark energy would have to wait.