Robert J.Sawyer - Illegal Alien

Illegal Alien

by Robert J. Sawyer

For Justice, though she's painted blind, is to the weaker side inclined. —

SAMUEL BUTLER (1612-1680)

*1*

The Navy lieutenant poked his close-cropped head into the aircraft carrier's

wardroom. "It's going to be another two hours, gentlemen. You should

really get some sleep."

Francis Nobilio, a short man of fifty with wavy hair mixed evenly between

brown and gray, was sitting in a vinyl-upholstered metal chair. He was

wearing a two-piece dark-blue business suit and a pale blue shirt. His tie

was undone and hung loosely around his neck. "What's the latest?" he said.

"As expected, sir, a Russian sub will beat us to the location. And a Brazilian

cruise ship has changed course to have a look-see."

"A cruise ship!" said Frank, throwing his arms up in exas-peration. He

turned to Clete, who was leaning back in a sim-ilar chair, giant

tennis-shoed feet up on the table in front of him.

Clete lifted his narrow shoulders and grinned broadly. 'Sounds like a big ol'

party, don't it?" he said, his voice rich with that famous Tennessee

accent—Dana Carvey did a dev-astating Cletus Calhoun.

"Can't we cordon off the area?" said Frank to the Navy man.

The lieutenant shrugged. "It's in the middle of the Atlantic,

sir—international waters. The cruise ship has as much right to be there as

anyone else."

"The Love Boat meets Lost in Space," muttered Frank. He looked up at the

Navy man. "All right. Thanks."

The lieutenant left, doing a neat step over the raised lip at the bottom of

the door.

"They must be aquatic," said Frank, looking at Clete.

"Mebbe," said Clete. "Mebbe not. We ain't aquatic, and we used to land our

ships at sea. This very aircraft carrier picked up an Apollo com-mand

module once, didn't it?"

"My point exactly," said Frank. "We used to land our ships at sea, because

that was easier than landing them on land, and—"

"I thought it was because we launched out over the ocean from Ca-naveral,

so—"

"The Shuttle goes up from Canaveral; we bring it down on land. If you've

got the technology, you come down on land—if that's where you live; the

Russians came down on land from day one."

Clete was shaking his head. "I think you're missing the obvious, Frankie.

What was it that boy said a moment ago? 'International waters.' I think

they've been watching long enough to figger it'd be a peck o' trouble landin'

in any particular country. Only place on Earth you can land that ain't

nobody's turf is in the ocean."

"Oh, come on. I doubt they've been able to decipher our radio or TV, and--"

"Don't need to do none o' that," said Clete. He was forty years old, thin,

gangly, jug-eared, and redheaded—not quite Ichabod Crane, but close. "You

can deduce it from first principles. Earth's got seven conti-nents; that

implies regional evolution, and that implies territorial conflict once the

technology reaches a level that lets you travel freely between the

continents."

Frank blew out air, conceding the point. He looked at his watch for the third

time in the last few minutes. "Damn, I wish we could get there faster. This

is—"

"Hang on a minute, Frankie," said Clete. He used one of his long arms to

aim the remote at the seventeen-inch color TV mounted on the wall,

turning off the mute. The aircraft carrier was picking up CNN's satellite

feed.

"...more now on that story," said white-haired Lou Waters. "Civilian and

military observers worldwide were stunned late yesterday when what was

at first taken to be a giant meteor skimmed through Earth's atmo-sphere

over Brazil." Waters's face was replaced with grainy amateur video of

something streaking through a cloudless blue sky. "But the object flew right

around the Earth well inside our atmosphere, and soon almost every public

and private telescope and radar dish on the planet was trained on it. Even

the U.S. government has now conceded that the object is, in all likelihood,

a spacecraft—and not one of ours. Karen Hunt has more. Karen?"

The picture changed to show a pretty African-American woman, standing

outside the Griffith Park Observatory. "Lou, for decades human beings have

wondered if we are alone in the universe. Well, now we know. Although the

U.S. and Russian military aircraft that flew over the splashdown site earlier

today failed to make public the videos they shot, a Moroccan Airlines 747

en route to Brasilia passed directly over the area about three hours ago.

That plane has now safely landed, and we've obtained this exclusive

footage, taken by passenger Juan Rubenstein with his home-video

equipment."

The image was coarse, but it clearly showed a large object shaped like a

shield or a broad arrowhead floating atop gray water. The object seemed

capable of changing colors—one moment it was red; the next, orange; then

yellow. It cycled through the hues of the rainbow, over and over again, but

with a considerable period of pure black between being violet and red.

Cut to a dour, middle-aged man with an unkempt beard. The title "ARNOLD

HAMMERMILL, PH.D., SCRIPPS INSTITUTE," appeared beneath him. "It's

difficult to gauge the size of the spaceship," said Hammermill, "given we

don't know the precise altitude of the plane or the zoom setting used at

the time the video was taken, but judging by the height of the waves, and

taking into account today's maritime forecast for that part of the Atlantic,

I'd say the ship is between ten and fifteen meters long."

A graphic appeared, showing the vessel to be about half the size of a Space

Shuttle orbiter. The reporter's voice, over this: "The United States aircraft

carrier Kitty Hawk is on its way now to the splashdown site. Earlier today,

the president's science advisor, Francis Nobilio" (black-and-white still of

Frank, a few years out of date, showing his hair as mostly brown) "and

astronomer Cletus Calhoun, best known as the host of PBS's popular Great

Balls of Fire! astronomy series" (silent clip of Clete at the rim of Arizona's

Barringer crater) "were flown by military jet to the Kitty Hawk, and are now

on their way to rendezvous with the alien ship. The Kitty Hawk should reach

its destination in just over one hundred minutes from now. Bobbie and

Lou?"

Back to CNN Center in Atlanta and a two-shot of Lou Waters and Bobbie

Battista. "Thanks, Karen," said Battista. "Before Dr. Calhoun left the U.S.,

our science correspondent Miles O'Brien managed to interview him and

University of Toronto exobiology professor Packwood Smathers about what

this all means. Let's have another look at that tape."

The image changed to show O'Brien in front of two giant wall mon-itors.

The one on the left was labeled TORONTO and showed Smathers; the one

on the right was labeled LOS ANGELES and showed Clete.

"Dr. Smathers, Dr. Calhoun, thanks for joining us on such short notice," said

O'Brien. "Well, it looks like the incredible has happened, doesn't it? An

alien spaceship has apparently landed in the middle of the Atlantic. Dr.

Smathers, what can we expect to see when this ship opens up?"

Smathers had a square head, thick white hair, and a neatly trimmed white

beard. He was wearing a brown sports jacket with leather patches on the

elbows—the quintessential professorial look. "Well, of course, we first have

to suspect that this ship is unmanned—that it's a probe, like the Viking

landers, rather than carrying a crew, and—"

"Look at the size of the thing," said Clete, interrupting. "Pete's sake,

Woody, ain't no need for the thing to be that big, 'less it's got somebody

aboard. 'Sides, it looks like it's got windows, and—"

"Dr. Calhoun is famous for jumping to conclusions," said Smathers sharply.

O'Brien was grinning from ear to ear—he evidently hadn't ex-pected to get

an impromptu Siskel and Ebert of science. "But, as I was about to say, if

there are alien beings aboard, then I expect them to be at least vaguely

familiar in body plan, and—"

"You're hedging now, Woody," said Clete. "Couple years ago, I heard you

give a talk arguing that the humanoid body plan would be adopted by purty

near any form of intelligent life, and—"

Smathers was growing red in the face. "Well, yes, I did say that then,

but--"

"But now that we're actually goin' to meet aliens," said Clete, clearly

enjoying himself, "you ain't so sure no more."

"Well," said Smathers, "the human body plan might indeed represent an

ideal for an intelligent lifeform. Start with the sense organs: two eyes are

much better than one, since two give stereoscopic vision—but a third eye

adds hardly any value over two. Two ears likewise give stereophonic

hearing, and they'll obviously be on opposite sides of the body, to give the

best possible separation. You can go right down the human body from head

to toe, and make a case why each part of it is ideal. When that spaceship

opens up, yes, I'll stand by my contention that we'll prob-ably see

humanoids inside."

The Clete on the TV set looked positively pained. The one sitting next to

Frank aboard the Kitty Hawk shook his head. "Peckerwood Smathers," he

said under his breath.

"That's hooey, Woody," said the TV Calhoun. "Ain't nothin' opti-mized about

our form—y'all only get optimization when you've got an ultimate design

goal in mind, and there wasn't one. Evolution takes advantage of what's

handy, that's all. You know, five hundred million years ago, durin' the

Cambrian explosion, dozens o' different body plans appeared

simultaneously in the fossil record. The one that gave rise to us—the

ancestor of modern vertebrates—weren't no better than any of the others;

it was just plum lucky, is all. If a different one had survived, nothin' on this

planet would look the way it does today. No, I bet there's some critter

inside unlike anything we've ever seen before."

"Clearly we have some differing points of view here," said O'Brien. "But--"

"Well, that's the whole point, ain't it?" said Clete. "For decades, guys like

Woody been getting grants to think about alien life. It was all a good game

till today. It wasn't real science—you could never test a one of their

propositions. But now, today, it all goes from being a theoretical science to

an empirical one. Gonna be pretty embarrassing if everything they've been

saying turns out to be wrong."

"Now, hang on, Clete," said Smathers. "I'm at least willing to put my cards

on the table, and—"

"Well, if you want to hear my—what? Crying out loud, hon, can't you see

I'm on TV?"

A muffled female voice, off camera; Frank recognized it as Clete's secretary,

Bonnie: "Clete, it's the White House."

"White House?" He looked directly into the camera and lifted his red

eyebrows. The shot widened, showing more of Clete's cluttered study.

Bonnie crossed into the frame, holding a cordless phone. Clete took it from

her. "Calhoun here. What—Frankie! How good to—no, no. Sure, yeah, I can

do that. Sure, sure. I'll be ready. Bye." Clete put down the phone and

looked into the camera again. "I gotta go, Miles—sorry 'bout this. They're

sending a car for me. I'm off to rendezvous with the alien ship." He

undipped his microphone and moved out of the shot.

Cut back to O'Brien. "Well, obviously we've lost Dr. Calhoun. We'll continue

our conversation with Dr. Smathers. Doctor, can you—"

Clete hit the remote, and the TV went dead.

*2*

There was indeed a Russian submarine present by the time the U.S.S. Kitty

Hawk reached the splashdown site, and the Bra-zilian cruise ship was

visible on the horizon, coming closer. The Kitty Hawk held station one

kilometer from the alien ship, the hull of which was still flashing through

the colors of the rainbow. The Russian sub was slightly farther away on the

op-posite side.

The alien ship seemed to be about two-thirds submerged in the water, but

it was bobbing enough that intermittently most of its upper surface was

visible. Frank, Clete, and a young Navy pilot boarded one of the Kitty Hawk'

s SH-60F Seahawk heli-copters and took off from the aircraft carrier for a

flight over the vessel.

"It sure is streamlined," shouted Clete, over the noise of the chopper's

rotor.

Frank nodded. "It must be just a landing craft," he shouted back. Since the

ship had first been spotted entering Earth's atmosphere, NORAD had been

scanning the heavens, looking for any sign of the mothership. Meanwhile,

Canaveral was read-ying Atlantis for flight. No American or Russian Shuttle

was currently in orbit; Atlantis was the next one scheduled to fly, but it

wasn't supposed to go up for another eighteen days.

The alien ship's hull seemed to be one continuous piece. It had neither the

riveted metal plates that made up the Kitty Hawk's exterior nor the ceramic

tiles that covered a Space Shuttle. There were four mirrored surfaces that

might have been windows across the pointed end of the shield, and there

was something in grayish green that might have been writing going down

one side of the upper hull, but it was difficult to make out, especially with

the background constantly changing color.

"I bet they see into the infrared," shouted Clete. "It's probably still changin'

colors while it seems to be black before turning red, but we just can't see

it."

"Perhaps," said Frank, "but—"

"Look at that!" shouted the chopper's pilot.

A narrow cylinder was rising out of the center of the spaceship's hull. At its

apex was a bright yellow light that was winking on and off. Blink, pause,

blink-blink, pause, blink-blink-blink.

"Counting," said Clete.

But the next sequence was five blinks, not four, and the one after that was

seven blinks. And then the sequence started cycling over and over again:

one, two, three, five, seven; one, two, three, five, seven.

"Prime numbers!" said Frank. He shouted at the pilot, "Does this copter

have a searchlight?"

The man shook his head.

"Get us back to the aircraft carrier as fast as possible. Hurry!"

The pilot nodded and took the chopper through a wide, banking turn.

Frank looked over at the Russian sub. It was already returning the signal:

the first five prime numbers in sequence, cycling repeatedly.

The pilot was wearing a radio headset. Frank shouted at him. "Get the Kitty

Hawk to use its searchlights. Tell it to blink out a reply at the ship. The

first five prime numbers, over and over."

The pilot relayed the message. It seemed to take forever—with Frank

fidgeting through each second—but eventually a large searchlight just

below the carrier's radar antenna started flashing out the sequence.

The yellow beacon sticking up from the lander went dark.

"Could we have said the wrong thing?" asked Clete.

The Seahawk touched down on the flight deck. As the rotor was twirling

down, Frank got out, the wind from the blades whipping his hair. Clete

followed a moment later. Hunching over, they hustled away from the

chopper. The captain, a bald-headed black man of about fifty, was waiting

for them just inside the base of the conning tower. "The Russians are still

signaling the same thing, too," he said.

Frank frowned, thinking. Why had the aliens shut up? They'd replied exactly

as the aliens had, showing that humans understood prime num-bers, and—

No. All they'd shown is that humans can parrot things back at them. "Try

continuing the sequence," said Frank.

Clete nodded, immediately seeing it as well. "They gave us the first five

primes; give 'em the next five."

The captain nodded and lifted a small intercom handset off the wall, pulling

it close to him. "Signaling room—continue the sequence. Give them the

next five prime numbers."

"Sir, yes sir," said a staticky voice, "but, ah, sir, what are the next five?"

The captain looked at Frank, eyebrows lifted. Frank made a disgusted

frown. Clete rolled his eyes. "Eleven, thirteen, seventeen, nineteen, and

twenty-three," Frank said.

The captain repeated the numbers into the microphone. "Sir, yes sir," said

the seaman's voice.

"We better get up there," said Clete.

Frank nodded. "How do we get from here to where the controls for the

searchlight are?"

"Come with me," said the captain. He led them to a circular metal stairwell

and took them up to the radio room. As they entered, Frank saw the

seaman who had been operating the light. He was a young white fellow,

maybe nineteen, with a half centimeter of blond hair. "The aliens have

started flashing again," he said.

"What was the sequence?" said Clete.

"They repeated back all ten prime numbers," the seaman said.

A wide grin spread across Frank's face. "Contact."

The captain was looking out the window. "The Russian sub is sig-naling the

ten numbers, too."

Frank pointed. "And here comes that damned cruise ship."

The yellow beacon started flashing again. One. Four. Nine. And then so

many flashes that Frank lost track.

"It's gotta be squares," said Clete. "One squared; two squared; three

squared; four squared."

"Give them five-squared as a response," said Frank, looking at the young

fellow. "That's twenty-five."

The seaman started clicking the trigger button for the searchlight as he

counted out loud.

"God," said Clete, pointing out the window. "God."

The alien craft was lifting out of the ocean. It rose about twenty meters

above the waves, water streaming off it. Its hull had stopped changing

colors; it was now a uniform dark green. There seemed to be four jets of

some sort positioned on its underbelly. They churned up the ocean surface

beneath. The ship started moving slowly horizontally. It flew in the

direction of the Russian submarine, but stopped just short of the vessel,

apparently to prevent its jet exhaust from blasting down on the sub. The

lander then flew over to near the cruise ship. With binoculars, Frank could

see people on its deck taking photographs and home videos. Then the

spaceship changed direction and headed toward the Kitty Hawk. It stopped

about five meters off the projecting bow of the flight deck, and just

hovered there.

"What's it doing?" shouted Frank.

Clete shrugged.

But the seaman spoke up. "Sir, I believe it's waiting for permission to land,

sir."

Frank looked at the young man. Perhaps he'd dismissed him too quickly.

"I believe the boy is right, Frankie," said Clete. "They know this is an

aircraft carrier. They've seen our helicopter take off and land from it, and

they can probably tell just by looking at the planes out on the flight deck

what they are —they're clearly designed according to aerodynamic

principles."

"By all means they can land," said Frank. "But how do we tell them that?"

"Well, if the question is obvious, the answer must be, too," said Clete.

"Give 'em the prime numbers again. Do it correctly, and that's 'yes.' Do it

incorrectly—say, one, two, three, five, eight—and that's 'no.' "

Frank nodded. "Signal the first five primes," he said.

The seaman looked at his captain for confirmation. The captain nod-ded,

and the seaman used his thumb to operate the light trigger. In the window,

Frank could see the alien ship moving over the flight deck.

The intercom whistled. The captain picked up the hand unit. "Raintree

here."

"Sir," said a husky voice, "the Russian sub has radioed us, asking that we

send a helicopter to bring three observers over here immediately, sir."

The captain looked at Frank, who frowned. "Christ, I don't want—"

Clete interrupted. "Now, Frankie, they chose international waters. You can't

really—"

"No, no, I suppose not. Okay, Captain."

"Take care of it, Mr. Coltrane," said the captain, and he replaced the hand

unit in its clip.

"I want video equipment set up on the flight deck," said Frank. "I want

everything recorded."

The captain nodded, and spoke into the intercom again.

"Let's get down there," said Clete.

Captain Raintree, Frank, and Clete went back down the circular stair-case

they'd gone up earlier, and emerged from the same door at the base of the

conning tower, exiting onto the flight deck. There wasn't much wind, and

the sky was mostly clear. The lander was still in the process of lowering

itself.

"Damn," said the captain.

"What's wrong?" asked Frank, over the roar of the lander's exhaust.

"It's setting down in the middle of the runway. No way we can launch a

fighter with it there."

Frank shrugged. "It's the biggest clear area."

In the distance, another Navy Seahawk was now hovering over the conning

tower of the Russian sub. A rope ladder had been lowered, and a man was

climbing up into the chopper.

Captain Raintree looked at Frank. "We do have recorded music, sir. We

could play the national anthem."

"Is there a United Nations anthem?" asked Frank.

"Not as far as I know, sir," said the captain.

"Anybody got the theme from Star Trek on tape?" said Clete.

The captain looked at him.

Clete shrugged. "Just a thought."

"I could assemble an honor guard," said the captain.

"With rifles?" said Frank. "Not on your life."

The lander came to rest. Frank could feel vibration in the deck plates

beneath his feet as it clanged against them.

"Shall we go have a look?" said Clete.

"Sir," said the captain, "the lander could be radioactive. I suggest you let

one of my people check it over with a Geiger counter first."

Frank nodded. The captain used the intercom again to give the order.

"Do you suppose they're going to come outside?" asked Clete.

Frank lifted his shoulders. "I don't know. They may be incapable of coming

outside—even if they have space suits, the gravity may be too high for

them to move around."

"Then why land on the Kitty Hawk at all?"

"Maybe they were just getting seasick being tossed on the ocean."

The helicopter was now leaving the Russian sub and heading back toward

the Kitty Hawk.

Clete pointed at the gray-green markings on the ship's dark green hull.

They were complex, consisting of a horizontal line with various spirals and

curves descending from it. No way to tell if the whole thing was one

character, or if it was meant to be a word, or just abstract art.

A sailor appeared next to the captain, holding a Geiger counter. The captain

nodded for him to proceed. The man looked nervous, but headed out across

the flight deck toward the lander.

"Captain," said Frank, "can you sail this ship to New York?"

"Want to take 'em to see Cats?" said Clete.

Frank frowned. "To the United Nations, of course."

The captain nodded. "Sure, we can go anywhere."

The helicopter landed. Two Russian men and a Russian woman

dis-embarked, along with the copter pilot. They came over to the American

captain.

"Sergei Korolov," said the Russian, a thickset man in his thirties. He

saluted. "I'm—first officer, you'd call it, on the Suvorov." He nodded to the

woman. "Our doctor, Valentina Danilova, and our radio officer, Piotr

Pushkin. Neither of them speaks English."

"Great," muttered Frank. "I'm Frank Nobilio, science advisor to the president

of the United States. This is Cletus Calhoun, astronomer, and Captain

Raintree."

"I point out," said Korolov, "that the lander only settled on your ship

recause it was not possible to settle on our submarine. But under

international salvage laws, the lander is clearly ours—we got to it first."

Frank sighed. "It's not our intention to steal the lander, Mr. Korolov. In fact,

I want to take it to the United Nations in New York."

Robert J.Sawyer - Illegal Alien

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