Footprints of Thunder (34 page)

“Why don’t you tell us what you know so far, and maybe we can help a bit,” Bill suggested.

“There’s a dozen programs here but they seem to be of three types.” Phil pulled down menus with the mouse, then three columns filled the screen. The first column was labeled DATE, the second was labeled PLACE, and the third EVENT. The first entry was July
22,
1879; London; frog fall. The second entry was August 19, 1881; Kiev, Ukraine; woman burns. The third entry was March 2, 1882; St. Augustine, Florida; ice fall. Terry scanned the list. These were the kinds of events Kenny’s books and files were filled with.

“There’s five hundred and twenty-two entries on this list. There’s three other lists too. One of the lists isn’t in any kind of order. It’s kind of a hodgepodge of things like Sasquatch and yeti sightings, UFO reports, junk like that. Most of it’s garbage except the report about a prehistoric fish caught off the coast of South America. I saw a picture of that fish so I know it’s true.”

Terry understood. He’d never have believed the I-5 mountain either, if he hadn’t seen it in person.

“Some of this stuff is pretty old. I found a file labeled with Zorastrus’s name. It’s got the really old stuff in it.”

Bill and Terry exchanged glances. The name Zorastrus kept coming up.

The screen now filled with programming commands.

“This is the second kind of stuff. He’s got several versions of this program. You can see what he was trying to do. Most of this stuff is just display instructions—commands to read his data array, complete some calculations, and display the output. The important part is here.” Phil scrolled the program until his finger came to rest at a particular spot. “This is where his formula starts.”

“Formula for what?” Bill asked.

“I ain’t no mathematician,” Phil protested, but then he yielded. “It looks like he’s trying to fit a curve to three sets of variable data. Okay, it’s like this. Let’s say I draw a line on a piece of paper through points A, B, and C. Then I want to know where that line will be if I add an inch to A, an inch to B, and an inch to C. That’s what he had the computer doing. He wasn’t using inches though, and he wasn’t always adding the same amount to each reference point, and sometimes he subtracts.”

“If he wasn’t using inches what was he using?” Bill asked.

“The only one I’ve figured out is this one.” Phil reached up and tapped the third column. “It looks like it varies between 1 and 200,366. One set ranges from 1 to 366 and the other from between 1 and 200. It works something like an odometer. Once this column reaches either 365 of 366 it rolls over a number in the next column.”

“It’s counting days and years?”

“Yeah, it even corrects for leap year.”

“Umm…” Bill began. “That makes sense. Kenny thinks these events in the past have something to do with what’s happened. What’s the third kind of stuff?”

“Graphics. Here, watch this,” Phil opened another file using the mouse. “This is still a piece of crap, but it’s the best thing this bozo programmed.” The screen was split with a line marking off one third of the screen. The larger portion had two small circles, one in each upper corner of the screen. Phil punched a key and the two circles slowly expanded. When they met the screen froze and the letter A appeared at the point of contact. Another letter A appeared in the left-hand column with three sets of figures. Phil punched another key and the circles expanded again. As soon as the circles finished crossing each other the screen froze again. This time two more letters appeared, a B and a C, marking the two new contact points between the circles. There were now three sets of three figures in the left-hand column. Terry noticed that the A figures had changed. Another key punch and the circles began to expand again. Terry watched the A, B, and C columns of figures change as the circles expanded. When they reached the edge of the screen the program stopped.

“That’s it?” Bill asked. “That’s all it does?”

“I told you it was a piece of crap. Part of this stuff is dates again.” Phil pointed to the columns of figures on the left side of the screen, “Hard to tell though because he ran all the numbers together, course I could fix it in a jiff.”

“No, Phil. What about the rest of the numbers? Counting the dates, it’s really four sets of numbers. I haven’t figured out the other three yet. Here, look at this one.” More work with the mouse and another set of commands filled the screen. “This one’s a little different.”

Punching more keys, Phil called up another program. It was like the other program but instead of two expanding circles, these began to pulse, repeatedly sending out expanding waves. As one circle expanded, another circle formed within it, chasing the first circle to the edge of the screen. When the expanding circles nearly reached each other, the image switched to show smaller multiple circles expanding within each other.

“He adjusted for scale, it’s the same circles,” Phil added.

The circles continued to expand, but one by one the inner circles overtook the outer circles and merged until only two circles remained. Then the image froze. Terry looked over at the numbers on the left.

“Phil, what’s the date count?”

“You have an idea, Terry?” Bill asked.

“Remember our idea about Hiroshima and the bomb? Maybe these circles start with the bomb?”

Terry and Bill looked at Phil expectantly, but he just shook his head.

“Counts wrong. If we subtract the count from yesterday then we miss Hiroshima by seventeen years … still… that’s an interesting idea.”

Phil drifted inward, reminding Terry of Kenny’s drift into a catatonic state. But Bill urged Phil on. “These other numbers, do they have something to do with the frog falls, avalanches, and other events on Kenny’s list?”

Phil seemed reluctant to come back from wherever he was.

“You’re thinking latitude and longitude, aren’t you? That’s what I was working on when you got here. There’s too many numbers, though.” Phil looked lost in thought again. “All right, maybe you guys can help me—I think I’m getting it. Colonel, I need some more data.”

Bill agreed to get him whatever he needed.

“Hot damn,” Phil laughed, “some of it’s classified.”

Modern communication systems are made up of radio, television, phone, and computer networks. To keep this system functioning, there must be transmission and reception facilities, copper cables, fiber optic lines, broadcast towers, dish antennae, translators, boosters, switching stations, and satellites. Lose a part of this system, and backup systems automatically come on-line. Lose the backup systems and computers will automatically reroute signals. Lose those routes and the system fails.

Like everything else about the effect, the losses were uneven. Some satellites were lost, and others lost their ground communication facilities. Other ground stations reestablished contact where possible.
Underground transmission lines were left intact, as were transatlantic and transpacific cables. Cities untouched by the effect kept local phone, TV, and radio, and some long-distance, while those in or near cities sliced by the effect were hardest hit. Some lost everything, others kept some local radio or TV. Military bases were similar but reestablished satellite communication sooner, then commandeered civilian lines, further snarling civilian communication.

As a result some sat riveted to TVs witnessing the bizarre unfold before them, while others only heard rumors and half truths. Still others in rural pockets continued their lives completely unaware of the drama unfolding across the face of the planet.

Nick Paulson’s encounter with the masturbator left him wary of any more of Elizabeth’s prognosticators. Additional psychics, religious fanatics, and nuts were still being rounded up, but Nick delegated the interviewing to the CIA. Instead, Nick combed the PresNet.

Nick used the directory to get a rough map of which parts of the network were lost. The northeastern part of the country was mostly off-line, although a terminal at the University of Delaware and one in New Hampshire were listed. The Chicago area was well represented as were the states surrounding Illinois. The southeast was another near-total loss. There was nothing from Georgia, Mississippi, and Louisiana, and precious little from the rest of the South. There were three terminals listed from Florida State University but none from the University of Miami. There were few advisors in the far West except for California, but functioning terminals were listed in Houston, Galveston, Reno, Cheyenne, and several in the Southern California basin. Only Seattle was represented in the northwest, with terminals at the University of Washington and Boeing. Nothing was showing for Alaska, Puerto Rico, or Guam. Three stations were listed as on-line in Hawaii. After his survey Nick estimated only a third of the network was still functioning.

The reports on PresNet described the kinds of impossible topographical changes Nick heard described on the radio. One posted message was from a scientist named Robert Cory in Houston, who was bounced off the highway when his car was hit by a pressure wave. Back on the road, he rounded a curve to find a red hot lava field. Fires were spreading along the highway. Another report came from a Mavis Farnsworth in Minneapolis, who described a loud whooshing sound in the middle of the night, and opened her drapes to find herself staring at a jungle. The network was filled with these kinds of reports, but Nick was frustrated with them. They were too descriptive and not analytical. The PresNet advisors were acting like tourists, not scientists.

Nick sent an all-points message requesting direct analysis of any topographical changes the associates had access to. He also asked for continued reports on “unusual events,” but to look for common denominators. Nick hoped this would begin to focus the work of the network scientists. At first he had been tempted to ask for reports on dinosaurs or other prehistoric life-forms, but he knew if he suggested what to look for, that would limit the observations.

The phone beeped several times before Nick picked it up. A guard announced an insistent air force colonel named Conrad was at the gate with a psychologist, and a sergeant, claiming they had vital information. Nick remembered that the college kid from Elizabeth’s list was to be accompanied by a psychologist and a colonel. Frustrated by the lack of information on the PresNet, he agreed to see them but swore he’d personally castrate any of them that started masturbating.

That wasn’t necessary. The men were all-business. None of them was wearing a uniform, but the colonel’s military bearing and demeanor set him apart instantly. The other two seemed to wear rumpled casual clothes, although on closer inspection it appeared the taller man wore rumpled clothes, and the shorter Asian was a rumpled man in well-pressed clothes.

The colonel took charge and ordered Sergeant Yamamoto to set up their computer equipment. The sergeant, protesting, looked lustfully at Nick’s console, so Nick invited the sergeant to help himself. After brief introductions, the colonel said abruptly. “I think we know what’s happened.”

Nick’s hopes sank. The colonel was as confident as the psychics, and experience told Nick that no one that confident was ever right. His explanation made a good story though. A psychotic college student, hostages in a cave, the mountain in the middle of the freeway, and then the search of Kenny’s room.

As Bill described what they had collected, Terry handed examples of articles and showed sections of books to Nick. Dr. Paulson showed none of the skepticism Terry had expected.

“You think these events have something to do with what happened?” Nick asked.

“Kenny Randall certainly did and he worked out a model… Phil, you ready?” Colonel Conrad asked.

“Yeah, here we go. Remember though, this thing’s a piece of crap and I had nothing to do with the programming. The colonel here won’t even let me clean it up.” Phil shook his head and punched a key.

As they presented it, Nick’s own ideas were confirmed and expanded. Yet when they were finished he was left wanting to know more.

“There must be something else. Weren’t there equations or notes somewhere?”

Colonel Conrad described the rest of the materials and then named a Dr. Piltcher, a Dr. Coombs, and someone named Phat as colleagues of Kenny’s. He also spoke of a manuscript from a Babylonian prophet named Zorastrus, which wasn’t among Kenny’s things. Colonel Conrad’s people were already searching for Kenny’s friends, so Nick made a mental note to get a copy of the manuscript. It was a long shot, but no more impossible than what was happening in the streets. Nick asked a guard to bring the rest of Kenny Randall’s possessions. He was going to take this to the Security Council, and if he was going to convince them, he first needed to convince himself.

“Okay, let’s start with the computer programs. Show me everything,” he said.

Nick found out how efficient government could be when a young marine delivered a cardboard box containing the complete known works of Zorastrus, the Prophet of Babylon. There were copies in multiple languages. Selecting the English copies, they scanned them. Colonel Conrad found what they were looking for.

“Here, in this one called the Apocrypha of Zorastrus. He writes about things falling from the sky: water, fish, rocks, and a whole tree. There’s one about a strange animal appearing. He describes it as a huge beast that came walking on two legs and ate whole cattle.”

“Is this in the program?” Nick asked.

“I don’t think so,” Colonel Conrad said. “The dates on most of this stuff are too vague to work in the program. Here, let’s cheek it against the list.” While Phil, Terry, and Colonel Conrad worked with the program, Nick dug out a copy of the Zo-rastrus text in a German translation. Nick found Zorastrus had done more than just list the strange events, he had tried to explain them. His predictions were specific and described events much like they had experienced. Zorastrus believed the things that fell from the sky came from the past, and that they were the debris of a collision of eras. As Nick read, his respect for this prophet grew. Nick could find no specific predicted date, but it didn’t matter. There was plenty of proof the ancient seer had been right. Now if only Nick could convince the Security Council.