Authors: Jack McDonald Burnett
Glenn Bowman was often in a position to counter Conn’s positive spin on the same feed, soon after her appearance. It almost felt like he was following her around. After a couple of weeks of this, Bowman discovered that Dyna-Tech had bargained with the Pelorians to give them positive public relations. Armed with the knowledge that there was a formal agreement—to him, a literal deal with the devil—Bowman began to denounce Conn and the company directly and vigorously. The world knew that Dyna-Tech was giving the Pelorians use of their space station, but an agreement to “spread alien propaganda” was of a different stripe.
Persisting said he remained pleased with Conn’s efforts, independent of Bowman’s counterpoint, but he also did arrange via e-mail a meeting at Dyna-Tech’s northern California headquarters for February 15, to discuss ongoing strategy. Conn felt compelled to ask if she would be meeting with an avatar or a Pelorian in the flesh. If the latter, she needed to line up the appropriate friendly media to cover the arrival and departure. It was to be an avatar, Persisting said.
The world, especially its firefighters, bomb disposal units, and those responsible for power line maintenance and installation, was still waiting for the first avatars created by and controlled by humans. The technology had been teased, and snippets trickled out, but the full-blown instructions had not yet been provided. At least the full pressure field tech was in Dyna-Tech hands—the company was exploiting that tech while the world waited for full avatar instructions. Conn directed her people to work with some urgency, before the government really got down to regulating pressure fields.
Conn was much more interested in fifth-dimensional travel. Reverse-engineering the Pelorian computers was proving immensely difficult. She had teams building a spacecraft up at Gasoline Alley to the specs given her by Persisting, and if worse came to worst, she could simply install one of the other four computers on it and take off for another star system. But it was only prudent to know how it worked first, and to be able to fix it if it broke.
The fifteenth came, and Audrey Hepburn was shown into Conn’s office.
Fortunately, she wasn’t dressed like she’d stepped out of
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
. It was obvious that the Pelorians had studied Audrey in multiple movies and mastered her look rather than pegging her as one of her characters. She carried a tan coat, and wore a smart white and gray blouse and skirt combination like many women wore professionally in the present. Also from the fashion of the present was a silky red, white, purple, and yellow cravat, striking against the monochrome of the rest of the outfit and easily drawing the eye. It was an outfit Conn might have worn to work—in fact, she was monochrome that day, but without neckwear.
“Hello, Persisting,” Conn said in English. “It’s a little disconcerting to be talking to Audrey Hepburn.” Persisting replied that the recent shift in public opinion demonstrated why recognizable avatars might be an advantage over generic-looking ones.
“Where are you? From how far away can you control these things?” Conn asked.
“Using satellites, I can control this
thing
from the other side of the world, in Siberia, or from orbit.”
“You use our satellites?”
“Not at all.”
“You have satellites in orbit around Earth?”
“And the moon, yes.”
“How did you find room up there?”
“It is rather crowded, isn’t it? You need a better strategy for disposing of what you call
space junk
. In any event, our satellites in orbit around Earth are farther from the surface than yours generally are.”
Conn wondered what else they had up there. You wouldn’t find it unless you knew where to look—but she wouldn’t have been surprised if Basalite technology included a
Star Trek
–like cloaking device. “I’m working on a proposal to provide space junk-removal services to NASA and the ESA. I’m hopeful I can lower my bid because I will be able to use pressure fields instead of suits.”
“Very best of luck.”
“Thank you.” Conn appraised Audrey. “Where are you now?”
“At present, I am in a shuttlecraft approaching the moon.”
“There’s no lag. Shouldn’t there be a lag?”
“You have everything you need to begin manipulating fifth-dimensional space to achieve apparent faster-than-light communications.”
Conn was delighted to hear it. She sensed that the fifth-dimensional tech would have wide-ranging applicability, including in communications, and it was good—and profitable—to be right. “I’m looking forward to it.”
Persisting got down to business. “We are happy with the effort you have been making. Since ‘the sighting,’ as your feeds call it, public opinion has been a concern. You have gone to lengths to address that concern. We are delighted with you as a vendor.”
“That’s very kind of you to say.”
“We are interested in hearing from you what new things we should do going forward to regain and maintain our good standing with the public. The man who has been nipping at your heels, Bowman, is a concern. He undoes your good work almost as soon as you’ve finished.”
“I genuinely don’t think he does,” Conn said. “The man thinks the moon is an artificial creation of the devil. People know him for what he is. He gets air time because nobody sane wants to go after you.”
“Be that as it may. I am interested in your ideas how to improve the public’s perception of us. Perhaps we could do a press conference or event that would get our avatars out in front of people, just like our state visits.”
“Hmm. With Bowman’s commercials, painting your twentieth-century avatars as creepy, that might do more harm than good.”
“Perhaps with more generic avatars, then.”
“I don’t think that eliminates the creepy factor in the public’s mind, at least not yet. Once avatars are in use by humans on Earth, they’ll come around to you again.” Conn was subtly trying to find out when the avatar tech would be completely available.
“We would rather not wait.”
“I understand,” Conn said. “How about a tour of what you’re doing on the moon? Part of the problem is that we still haven’t been able to see any of that.”
“I’m afraid that wouldn’t be a good idea,” Audrey Hepburn said.
“Why not?” Conn, like everybody else, wondered if they were intentionally hiding something. “If you’re doing something people might get the wrong idea about, I need to know what it is. There will be orbital and even ground probes sent to the moon this year. They’ll see.”
“At the present time, it’s not a good idea. Down the line, I don’t foresee a problem.”
“Then why don’t we do a walkthrough of your life in Siberia? Show people how you live, that you’re not just some wizards behind a curtain.”
“I don’t understand that reference.”
“It’s not important. Something like that could humanize you. Wow, that sentence was the best use of the word
humanize
ever.”
“Are you sure seeing us as we are in our temporary homes is going to improve our standing with the public?”
“As part of a comprehensive campaign, yes, I am. You’ll get people who are freaked out, that’s inevitable. But Bowman’s ads are ruining your avatars for you, and you can’t hide forever—that’s how someone recorded the
sighting
in the first place.”
“It sounds like you know what you’re doing,” Persisting said. “And as I say, we have been pleased with your efforts so far.”
“Thank you. I keep my end of bargains.”
How about your avatars, now?
“Let’s try what you suggest.”
“Great. Credit where it’s due: my outside PR woman, Mandy Jarvis, came up with the idea. Considering how remote you guys are, I doubt I would have come up with it on my own.”
“Thank her for us.”
“Will do. We’ll make detailed arrangements via e-mail. Or will you be comfortable using v-mail soon?”
“Let’s stick to e-mail for now.”
Shortly after the meeting, Conn told Mandy about the plan, passed along Persisting’s thanks, and asked her to make appropriate arrangements. Mandy was all too happy to have her idea taken up.
“This will be memorable,” Mandy said to Conn. A little strangely, Conn felt, but she couldn’t put her finger on why.
March, 2035
The Pelorians were not actually in Siberia at all, other than under the most expansive, historical definition of the term. They occupied Wrangel Island, a more than four-thousand-square-kilometer outpost some six hundred fifty kilometers northwest of the Bering Strait, between the East Siberian Sea and the Chukchi Sea in the Arctic Circle. This caused no small amount of controversy, as most of the island was a Russian
Zapovednik
, a strict nature reserve, and also a World Heritage Site. It was almost totally without human presence for that reason, and for its inaccessibility.
Most of the controversy originated outside Russia. The Russian president’s internal popularity was at an all-time high after exchanging the right to occupy the remote, unused island for technology that would purportedly boost Russia’s global influence.
Conn and the
NewsAmerica
crew, who were set to shoot the documentary about the Pelorians, were in a puddle-jumper of a plane descending into Mys Shmidta Airport, on the mainland one hundred twenty miles south of the island. There, they would meet a Russian customs officer and a documentary crew for a Russian feed. Once paperwork was in order, Conn, Mandy Jarvis, and the two crews would board a Pelorian shuttlecraft to complete their journey.
Right about then, Conn wished they could have taken the shuttle all the way from Anchorage. The puddle jumper had taken them on two six-hundred-kilometer segments of the long journey already. Conn didn’t know if she would ever stop vibrating.
As they descended, she wriggled back into her heavy coat and put her gloves on. Across the aisle, Mandy put her winter coat on, too.
“No gloves?” Conn asked.
“They’re in my pocket,” Mandy replied. “I’ll put them on when we get outside.”
It amused and disoriented Conn that she had started acting more motherly toward people since Peo died. She, all of twenty-four years old, telling a forty-year-old woman how to take care of herself.
Bringing along the Russian crew was the price Conn paid for access to Russian territory. She managed to get a customs officer at Mys Shmidta out of the Russians, too, which allowed them to avoid flying into Irkutsk first (so she was told) and then making the thousands of kilometers-long journey to Wrangel Island from there.
They made a bumpy landing, and Conn could breathe again. It always felt (and sounded) like they were landing in a lawnmower, not an airplane.
Outside, the Pelorian shuttlecraft loomed. It was wedge-shaped, sleek, as tall as their airplane and about twice as long. Most anything would look good compared to the puddle jumper, but the shuttle was intimidatingly advanced-looking.
An avatar stood waiting for them to clear the tarmac. Next to him, a group that was presumably the Russian documentary crew and the customs officer shuffled their feet in the cold and kept wary sidelong eyes on the avatar. If the documentary crew was going to be so anxious in the presence of one alien, and an avatar who looked like Muhammad Ali at that, how were they going to film Pelorians as they really were?
It was warm, for February: the ambient temperature was twenty-five degrees Fahrenheit, and the wind made it feel like ten. Conn pulled her hood up over her head as far as it would go. The airfield smelled like engine oil and asphalt.
Conn, Mandy, and the four members of their film crew approached the avatar and the Russians. The customs officer greeted them, in heavily accented English. The Russian documentary crew, as it happened, did not have any English speakers. Nobody in Conn’s group spoke Russian. None of Conn’s concern.
She said hello to Muhammad Ali. He told her in Basalese that he didn’t speak English, either. Conn asked him to speak simply, because she wasn’t fluent in his language. He gestured toward the shuttle, and said that his fellow avatar was making the craft ready for takeoff.
“What did he say?” Mandy asked. Conn told her. “There’s two pilots?”
Mandy found herself in front of Ali, and said, “Pleased to meet you.” The avatar took Mandy’s proffered hand and shook. Mandy added her other hand and made a strong, two-handed grip. Ali looked at Mandy’s hands strangely, then at his own. Conn introduced the members of the film crew.
“His name is Honestly. Or, that’s as close as I can get to the right English word,” Conn said.
Presently, the second avatar came down the steps of the shuttlecraft. This one was Marie Curie. She was a wiry, silver-haired woman with a round face, a mole on her cheek, and a look that said she would brook no nonsense. She was dressed in a monochrome blouse/slacks combination with a colorful cravat.
As she approached, Honestly turned her way and began introducing her to the assembled. All at once, his knees buckled, and he collapsed like his strings had been cut. Marie Curie came jogging over and knelt to examine her fellow avatar. Conn’s hand was to her mouth. “What happened?”
The avatar rose and regarded Conn. “You are Conn Garrow,” she said in English. “I am, I think...Excelling. Excelling is the closest English word. Perhaps Surmounting.” The avatar looked at Mandy, who was wide-eyed, and then said to Conn, “You brought that woman here.”
“I did—wait. What did I do?” Conn said, confused.
“That woman employs with—wait. Works for
.
That woman works for the man named Glenn Bowman.”
Conn was alarmed and confused. “She’s—” She looked at Mandy, whose eyes were still wide. “She works for a PR company in Sausalito.”
“She conspires against you,” Excelling said. “She conspires against my people.”
Conn gawped at Mandy. “Mandy, is this true?”
Mandy reddened. “You believe her, after just meeting her? You’ve known me for three years!”
“She wishes us ill,” Excelling said.
Conn was recovering herself. “Excelling, even if that’s true—she won’t do you any harm. We have a diversity of opinion, especially where I come from, in America. I pay Mandy for her public relations services—”