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Aaron ran hard at the base of the steep hill that rose up to the entrance of Berkeley University, widening his stride as though he had just begun his daily run, showing no ill effects from the eight miles he had already completed. Aaron was not a jogger, he was a runner. He enjoyed re-discovering the experience of long distance running. He had completed many marathons in recent years but he never really competed, never pushed himself. He missed his early training runs: the coolness of the morning air and the sounds it made rushing past his ears; the pounding on his heels, feet and ankles; his lungs and heart working in tandem; the exhilaration at the final corner and the euphoria experienced for the next two hours from the slow release of endorphins throughout his body.
For the first few weeks after returning to America he enjoyed telling his friends about Australia and how his company pensioned him off at twenty-six: he was retired. But thoughts of retirement were wearing thin, he gave serious thought to what he was going to do with his life. Should he travel, go back to college, teach, write?
The only thing he knew he was going to do for certain this year was run in the San Francisco marathon once more. His training times were good: he was running five minute ten second miles. And although his daily training runs were only eight to ten miles, it was so effortless. Two weeks ago in a full hit-out with three other runners, he was one minute short of the magical fifty minute barrier for ten miles: Olympic class. With so many free days on his hands, Aaron was making a serious comeback. For the first time he really thought he had a chance of winning the event.
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On the day of the marathon race, surrounded by other competitors Aaron pushed his way onto one of the official buses for runners parked in front of the downtown Marriot Hotel. Once seated they were soon headed for the Golden Gate Bridge to the starting line of the marathon to join with thousands of other runners congregating there.
It was a cool Sunday morning - exactly fifty degrees Fahrenheit - in the middle of July. A whitish, dense fog concealed the northern part of the bridge where the starting line had been marked.
The night before, Aaron and Lee had gone to the Near East Carbo Dinner Restaurant where runners joined in pre-race festivities. The idea was for Aaron to load up on pasta: all marathon runners need a huge carbohydrate intake the day prior to a race. Lee made jokes about Aaron's comeback but at the same time she fiercely supported him. Dashing about in her car she would place drinks at his three planned drink stations and meet him at the finish line.
At the starting line the officials grouped the runners into their estimated finishing time bands. Aaron was a registered athlete and his club made sure he started nearer the front with the better runners. Even so he was on the eleventh line behind the more favoured Ethiopians, Koreans, Japanese, Mexicans, Australians and Moroccans. A wall of perhaps two hundred elite runners from all over the world were between him and the open road up front.
Sentry-like, a man stepped forward wearing a red blazer and white pants, holding a silvery pistol in his hand. Suddenly there was confusion, shouting, shoving and elbowing among the athletes as the man in the blazer called for their attention through a hand-held loud hailer. The starter was well practised: he went through the familiar starting sequence quickly in deference to the swelling masses of runners in front of him and, pulling down on the trigger, got them on their way with no mishaps. The whole thing happened so fast that several runners near Aaron didn't realise the race had begun and literally sprang into action losing two or three paces to him at the off.
The hair on Aaron's neck bristled when he heard the roar behind him as men and women bellowed their acceptance of the challenge; the yelling like the involuntary nervous screams men release prior to battle. For the initial hundred metres he ran scared, sprinting, weaving his way insanely past masses of runners. When he slowed his stride and established a rhythm, he realised they were running up a grade that led onto the crown of the bridge. Aaron knew the single most important feature of marathon running was to establish a pace that enabled you to complete the course. He turned his head looking for well known runners that he knew were contesting this year's race. He focussed on the gold singlet of Reid, the Australian, who was fifty metres ahead. Aaron manoeuvred to his right so he could follow directly behind him. It was a tactic he had used before: the theory was that as runners fell off the pace the champions left a distinct wake of runners behind them, much like a boat does at sea. They also maintained an impeccably even pace. Aaron felt the benefit of that wake early as he passed several more runners at the crown of the massive, crimson coloured bridge.
On the down slope he was elated at a minor victory: he had successfully reeled Reid in, he was only forty or so metres ahead. But did that mean he was going out too fast? Patience, he thought, and slowed his tread to match the speed of the Australian. His nose smarted from the cold morning air as he drew back hard, his eyes too felt its chilliness and began watering, momentarily blurring his vision.
Still on the bridge, but with no water beneath them, the runners ran the curve that took them in an easterly direction. Aaron heard the Kenyans speaking to each other as they linked up for the first time since the start. Of course he couldn't understand what was being said but he took comfort from their camaraderie. Aaron was a lone runner. Even though he was a member of one of the largest athletic clubs in the world he was not a good joiner. The larger the crowd the more withdrawn he became, often groups would reach a size that would rend him silent. He had analysed this and set it down to his shyness.
At school Aaron was teased because he was perceived as an uncaring rich kid. He knew his shyness had been interpreted as snobbery. How could he ever know how the poor felt? His family were loaded. He lived in the largest house of any kid in the school and vacationed with his family in St Moritz, the Bahamas and Tahiti, and travelled to many other exotic locations several times each year. He and his family had a lifestyle which was the envy of almost everyone he'd met.
Reid was thirty metres in front of Aaron as they ran the slope of Doyle Drive down into The Presidio. Reid kicked it up a gear and Aaron did too. Well away from the bridge the real business of racing between the elite runners had begun. Passing the curved building of the Palace of Fine Arts the leading batch proceeded toward North Beach. Aaron knew he shouldn't be feeling this good and settled his stomach and relaxed into the Reid rhythm. To estimate how far he lagged behind Reid, Aaron watched as the gold Australian singlet passed a light pole and counted each second before he reached the same point. One, one thousand; two, one thousand; three, one thousand; four, one thousand: four seconds. There were still fifty or so runners between them and Reid had about twenty more in front of him.
Nearing Fisherman's Wharf, Aaron remembered this was where his dad used to bring him as a small child. Usually on Sundays they would ride the crowded cable car down the steep hill to the waterfront where they would have lunch. He could order anything he wanted, his dad said, and he promised he wouldn't tell his mum. A double serving of ice cream was the most daring he ever got - ice cream for main course and ice cream for desert.
He drank from the special bottle that Lee had left for him at the next drink station and ran some of it over his thighs to cool them down. The huge digital clock on the official lead vehicle ticked over from fifty-nine, fifty-nine to exactly one hour. Aaron thought it incredible, they had been running for one whole hour, and it seemed like ten minutes.
Reid's wake was dramatic, runners continued to spill to either side but Aaron maintained his rhythm. He counted two, one thousand: he was getting closer to the Aussie. The field thinned dramatically as they tackled the steep rise to Chinatown. Soon Aaron found himself in the leading twenty with Reid leading the way to the Haight-Ashbury district. The crowds that lined the streets were screaming as his group came up to them. He looked around and could only see the fancied international runners; he was the sole American. It was then he realised that the partisan Californian crowds were screaming for him!
He felt like a teenager on a jog with his rock idols.
Aaron's first experience with drugs - marijuana - was at a Rolling Stones concert at Candlestick Park. Since then he ran the gamut: marijuana, hash, coke, LSD, smack, crack, speed, ecstasy and phenobarbitolepentethylene. He had loaded up on Phen' over the past five months. He took high doses of screening agents, tepolenon and deoethylmide so the outcome of his urine tests would be okay. The Athletic Union testing technology lagged ten years behind that available to athletes who had money to pay clever drug designers - for Aaron it cost thirty-five dollars a day. In his present physical state Aaron could easily ignore his one hundred and ninety-two heart rate, there was no pain, no fatigue.
Reid raised his leg rate and immediately put a gap between himself and the next runner, the wake trickled past Aaron. He had become the next runner. Now there were just the two of them as they headed west for the Pacific Ocean.
Entering Golden Gate Park, Aaron remembered that this was where he and Lee came for car-dates. He met Lee while he was going out with Patricia, he continued to date them both right up until he married Lee - when Patricia finally refused to see him. Lee never suspected any of this. Patricia went to live in London where Aaron met up with her again enroute to Saudi Arabia; he had met her quite by accident, in a wine bar. The fire was once more ignited.
Aaron ran abreast of the great Australian as they turned for home, the finish being inside the Kazar Stadium at the eastern end of the Park. The dark haired Aussie looked across at Aaron and his step faltered, his legs were giving way. With three miles to go Aaron found himself leader of the San Francisco marathon!
He never thought of himself as a cheat. Even when he tampered with the Namarrkon data he didn't believe he was doing anything wrong. His calculations weren't out by that much, there was still a massive iron deposit in the ground at that site. Exactly how much would soon be known.
Aaron was well clear of his competitors, he had left a wake of his own and Reid had spilled into it.
As he leaned into the last gentle corner before the entrance to the stadium Aaron clearly saw a vision of a Wandjina superimposed over the pulsing scene in front of him. Inside the stadium, at that precise moment a Wandjina pulsed into Lee's vision as she waited in the crowd for her husband near the finish line.
As he continued to run Aaron could see everything with abnormal clarity. At the same time, he heard eerie, high-pitched squeals. Everything slowed as in a dream or a movie - then there was no sound.
The Wandjina continued to flash in and out of Lee's vision in brilliant colours and the screeching inside her head gave her heart palpitations. She panicked thinking she was dying or going insane.
Aaron fell heavily and awkwardly onto the pavement and struck his head. Spectators, strangers out of the crowd came to his aid; soon after paramedics pushed and shouted a pathway through to reach him.
'Relax, stay calm and breath deeply,' one man said as he produced an oxygen mask.
Aaron's eyes were open and to him the crowd appeared to be a deranged mob intent on killing him. He watched Reid run by him and distinctly heard him speak.
'Jesus!' he had said, Jesus.
At that moment a flashing Wandjina filled Aaron's vision once more but now it would not go away. Physically and mentally broken, Aaron slumped forward heavily and into unconsciousness.