David's Sling (2 page)

Only a couple of Honduran troops remained, hunched in silent fear behind trees and rocks. Suddenly another explosion sounded and half the enemy force fell to the ground. The other half dived for cover. They started shooting in several different directions, though no targets were visible. The gunfire achieved a syncopated rhythm, and continued for a time. One by one, however, the enemy troops twitched as if kicked, then stopped firing.

When just a few enemy troops remained, a long, camouflaged blur leaped out of the brush. "Kurt McKenna?" Mayfield asked. Nell just nodded.

A scuffle followed, then shooting, and Kurt spun down, struck. One of the two surviving opponents lifted his pistol, but McKenna rolled again, and the enemy with the gun went down.

The computer enhancement zoomed in on this struggle between the last two men—the one with the pale blue eyes and the other with . . . the other one also had pale blue eyesl

"Who is that?" demanded.

"That's the Russian who organized this little party. Didn't you know? You authorized classifying this skirmish, so that no one would find out about the Russian involvement."

"Oh my God." Mayfield had classified it because it was too embarrassing, not because of any Russian involvement. Perhaps he should have read the report after all.

"To my knowledge, this is the first time Americans and Soviets have met in combat in this decade."

It wasn't a fair fight—Kurt had lost the use of one arm when he was shot earlier. Yet a few seconds later, he was the only one left standing.

Nell shut off the tape. Her voice changed from analytical to commanding. "Jim, we can't sign any more treaties like this last one."

Mayfield shuddered. But he couldn't let Nell Carson, or even some incident in Central America, interfere with the main task. The next election was only a year and a half away. He leaned back in his chair. "Don't worry, Nell. Everything's under control."

For just a moment, Nell's shoulders sagged. Then she straightened and headed for the door. "I'm counting on it," she said, leaving as abruptly as she had arrived.

After a long moment, President Mayfield turned back to the Secretary and spoke quietly. Each relaxed into a smile. Earl popped another mint in his mouth, and Mayfield accepted one as well. The celebration continued.

They reached the glory of the mountain's peak. Hilan reveled in the view; his joy seemed too great for a single person—it bordered on reverence.

Below, sunlight chased itself up glacier-white slopes. The streaks of brilliance followed his own path, up from the clouds that clung low to the mountain's side. Above, a single white wisp of cloud traced across deep blue skies. The blue had a sharpness that comes of air too thin to fill a man's lungs.

Earth lay across the horizon, beyond a pillowecl carpet of clouds. Only the grandest features revealed themselves at this distance. The planet did not seem small, yet it seemed conquerable, as this mountain had been. Hilan realized with hope that indeed mankind had penetrated the most dangemus places the planet offered. Yet he despaired, remembering that now the descendants of those explorers were themselves the greatest remaining threat.

Hilan had changed in the years since his service in Nigeria. He had changed most during a trip there several years later. Starvation no longer occurred frequently enough to cause a global reaction, but it continued; malnutrition hid in every shadow. The population had grown. Hilan realized that for every ten children he had saved, eleven would now die. Yes, Hilan and the others had held famine at bay for a moment. But they had not changed the culture that made famine possible. In some final analysis, his had ended in failure.

His friends had rejected his analysis. He had tried to reject it as well, but he could not.

He had entered politics, believing that better solutions to the problems of mankind would require the accurate application of power. He did not yet know how to apply that power. Probably no one did. But for the moment, he would work to consolidate the power, in preparation for the day when he, or someone, learned how to use it.

Jan led him down the slopes to a shallow depression. Short ridges ringed it on three sides, protecting them from a bitter wind as they made camp. She borrowed his swiss army knife to slice open their freeze-dried food pouches, then started pacing between the packs and the stove to prepare dinner. Her cheeks glowed with an energy that struck Hilan again as somehow too fierce, too burning for a healthy woman. "Believe me, it's much easier going down," she promised him. "If this hadn't been such a great campsite, we could have gone all the way down the mountain today with no problem."

Hilan groaned softly and lay on his sleeping bag. Only his eyes moved, watching Jan pace.

"So, are you happy you came along? I am." Jan turned away in a fit of coughing. When she turned back, the flush of her cheeks had faded. She handed him back his knife.

Holding it, Hilan remembered his earlier desperate thoughts to save Jan if he could not make it. "When I stepped into that crevasse, I almost killed you. I wonder whether it makes sense to rope people together—whether it wouldn't be smarter to sacrifice the one who falls to guarantee that
someone
survives."

"Nonsense. Falls like that remind us why we wear ropes and why we make everyone on the climbing team interdependent in the first place. I'm just glad we responded effectively to the crisis."

"Did we?" Hilan stared at the rips in his gloves, cut during his climb up the rope. "You know, I was so tired before we even reached that crevasse that I hardly noticed the fall." Thinking about it, he was there again. "It was really strange, just staring down at the rocks that would kill me." His eyes unfocused. "I didn't react correctly at all."

Jan laughed. "Hilan, you had the
perfect
reaction—no reaction at all. I wouldn't worry about it."

Hilan grunted. "You're probably right. I'll miss the switchback over and over, each time reinforcing the lesson that I learned. In fact, I'll learn the lesson far better than if I'd simply gotten scared when I fell. It'll make a great reinforced revelation. Sounds like a good example for you to teach at your beloved Institute."

"Yes," Jan said softly, "an excellent example."

Hilan exhaled. The air rushed from his lungs with the easy freedom that reminded him how high up they were. He had never thought of breathing as an effort, or of the friction of the air upon his throat; now, in their absence, he knew them.

"Jan." His muscles still hung in limp exhaustion, but his thoughts raced. "Thank you for bringing me here. In my role at home, I've welded myself so deeply to my senatorial image that sometimes I wonder whether I'm still here, or whether I'm only an image. New I know."

"I thought you'd like my mountain." She coughed. Hilan studied her for a moment. Her flush from the climb had faded. Now she seemed pale—as much too pale as she had earlier seemed too flush. "I have a favor to ask of you."

He sighed. "You know how to exploit even a moment's weakness. What do you want me to do—help you save the world?"

Jan gave him an expression of surprised pleasure that would have fit well on an American in the Orient who rounded a corner and ran headlong into an old high school chum.

That reaction pleased Hilan immensely. Jan did not understand him as well as he understood her.

Even among his old friends, Hilan had been surprised by how rare and how out of place the people who personally sought ways to save the world were. Even Hilan's wife did not understand this fixation of his on the problems of huge scale—questions of famine, of economic collapse, of nuclear war. Jan, like himself, was one of those very few who thought in such terms on a daily basis.

But Jan was an even rarer breed of human being than those who sought answers to the big questions—she had found some answers.

She had not yet solved any of the
big
problems, but she had begun to heal at least one medium-size one—she had synthesized a therapy that could usually cure the most common American addiction: cigarette smoking.

Jan continued. "I don't know whether the favor I'm asking you will help save the world or not. Perhaps it will. I wish I knew." Another cough punctuated the sentence. "What I want you to do is talk with Nathan about the Sling."

"The Sling?"

"Yes. It's E military research projeqt."

Despite the exhaustion, and the stitfness of his skin from cold and exposure, Hilan managed to grimace. "God, I hate the military." Again, the air left his lungs too fast. "I wish we didn't need it."

Jan smothered a laugh. "Our mammoth military-industrial complex isn't very American, is it? You know, the first act of the American government after the Revolutionary War was to disband its standing army. They sold the navy's ships. America's forces were reduced to 80 men, none above the rank of captain."

She stretched out on the sleeping bag beside him. "Even today you can see the strength of the anti-military roots of our country. How else could America engage in fierce public debates over permission for advisers to carry sidearms? Even at the heights of our military adventurism, an astute observer can see that it's unnatural for us: we do it so badly. We make better businessmen than soldiers."

Hilan had never thought of it in quite this light before. "Yet America wound up as the principal adversary of the most powerful military force in human history." He thought about the absurdity of the situation. "How did we get ourselves into this position?" He shook his head. "Even more important, how have we managed to pull it off for such along time?"

"For decades, we succeeded as a superpower by holding the ultimate club. We succeeded because we had more, and better, nuclear weapons." She shook her head. "But that doesn't work anymore. How could we convince a cold-eyed political pragmatist like Sipyagin that America would use nuclear arms, knowing that the Soviets would destroy us in turn? The nuclear threat served us well for a long time, but its time has come to an end. No one believes we can use it anymore."

Hilan on his bag, trying to burrow into it. The chilled air made the goose down warmth precious. "It's impossible for anyone to believe that we'd use nukes as long as Mayfield is the decision maker. Some people have trouble believing he can use a letter opener, much less a nuke." Hilan tried to say it without passion. President Mayfield was a member of his own party, after all.

Jan nodded. "You know, both the Soviets and the Americans go through cycles of confrontational behavior. You might think the greatest danger looms whon both countries reach the peak of their aggression cycles at the same time. But that's not true. The greatest danger occurs when the cycles go out of phase—when the United States reaches one of its lowest lows and the Soviet Union reaches one of its highest highs."

The cold of the glacial air reached Hilan's heart. "And we've come to that moment in the cycle."

Jan didn't answer.

"So what's the Sling Project?

Jan laughed at the compound of despair and hope in his voice. "We make better businessmen than soldiers. We must fight, then, as businessmen."

Hilan tried to snort, but it took too much "A division of businessmen wouldn't last very long against a division of soldiers."

"No, of course not. We'd still need soldiers. But we can do with a lot fewer soldiers than some countries because we have another strength: we have crossed the threshold one form of society to another. Our oppouents live in the Industrial Age. We stand on the brink of the Information Age. We must build an Information Age system to defend ourselves."

"And just how do we that?"

Jan smiled at his limp form. "You look so exhausted—and so curious at the same time. I think I'll leave you in this state and let Nathan tell you the rest of the stoyy."

Hilan groaned. "Very well. When would you like to introduce us?"

Jan closed her eyes. "That may not work," she said. She coughed again, and this time it racked her whole body. Blood spattered the soft snow, a dark obscenity in the evening sunlight. "Dammit," she muttered, "I better at least get off the mountain."

Hilan rose unsteadily to his knees. "What's wrong? What's happening?"

"I'm really sorry, Hilan. The climb down may be harder than I'd hoped.

"What!?"

Jan rose to her feet and put her hands on his shoulders. "Hilan, you're a born crusader. In some ways you remind me of Nathan." She looked away for a moment. "But I haven't always marched to a crusader's rhythm. I was quite content as a chain-smoking psychotherapist, until three years ago. Then I had
my
reinforced revelation." She coughed again. "I found out I had lung cancer."

Hilan had met Jan just a year ago, through another of his rare crusader friends, who had just discovered the Institute. He'd wondered briefly about her past, about why she molded the Institute into a national resource that did all the things it was famous for—from seminars on mass media, to job matching, to weapon systems development—but he hadn't thought about it enough. Now it was obvious.

"The chemotherapy they have these days is quite terrific. They can keep you alive and active, even while the cancer is eating you up inside. Then the end comes quite suddenly." She closed her eyes. "Leslie and Nathan both insisted I shouldn't challenge the mountain this last time. I guess they were right."

Hilan stared with helpless horror.

"We'll find a hospital in the morning. Better get some sleep—we'll start early."

The ache deep within his bones allowed him no other response. He slept, but his sleep roiled with odd images: images of Soviets, and cigarettes, and nuclear missiles. Woven through them all were images of a man, dangling in a crevasse, with only the strength of the rope and the taut determination of his partner's straining muscles to save him.

SNAP. In games of ball and racket, such as tennis, the racket must cease to be a separate external object. It must become one with the player—an extension of his arm. The arm and the eye must also meld through the mediation of the mind. And though the mind controls this connection, it too must submerge its separateness, its awareness of self, into the union. Only the racket connected directly to the eye plays outstanding tennis.