The reporter Lee Shan scanned the ruins of the site through an opaque oval eyepiece attached to a sleek white headset, its flattened band encircling his bald head and anchored to a second around his neck. An equipment pannier floated quietly nearby on suspensors.
‘Very nice, Doctor Cameron, very atmospheric, so what we would like to do is take lots of shots of the ruins – and some of you at work, obviously, especially at the sacrificial altar, then we embed simz of those Uvolos, but that’ll be done Earthside, before tiercast…’
Greg stared at the reporter, Lee Shan, with a mixture of annoyance and intent curiosity, wondering who was speaking, the man or the AI implant. He then pointed to the grey stone bowl to which the reporter had been drawn.
‘They’re called the Uvovo, and that is not a sacrificial altar—’
‘I see, I see, so do you know what it is, Doctor?’
‘Mr Lee,’ he said carefully, ‘the Uvovo abandoned these ruins thousands of years ago, after which this entire promontory was covered with jungle. Where we are standing was the roof and this bowl was most probably used for ritual fires, perhaps even cooking.’
‘So you’re not completely certain what it is?’
‘The Uvovo have affirmed that blood sacrifice never played any part in their culture.’
‘A useful testimony, I am sure, Doctor, but after several millennia how can they be sure?’
Lee Shan smiled. In the background his aircams darted around just above head height, scanning everything in sight and unintentionally providing great amusement for the Uvovo scholars. The reporter’s small, neat smile, however, served only to aggravate Greg beyond the already strained limits of his courtesy. He knew that he should ignore the man’s arrogance, but the situation was like a door through which he could not help but walk.
He matched the reporter’s smile with one of his own.
‘You know, Mr Lee, perhaps you’ve got a point. Perhaps we’re not being imaginative enough in our hypotheses. How about this – we could suggest that the ancient Uvovo sacrificed criminals and prisoners to, let’s say, giant alligator creatures from the sea, and that these blood-soaked ceremonies took place at night because the alligator-things only came up to the beach after dark. It may be that those sea-borne predators who failed to consume any of the sacrificial carrion were themselves killed and eaten by the Uvovo ancestors…’
‘Doctor, do you have any proof for any of this?’
‘Not a scrap but it’s such fun, don’t you think? And – and to demonstrate these hypotheses I might be able to persuade our Uvovo scholars to dress up in furs and ritual paint then hold a re-enactment for you and the cameras after nightfall, complete with torches, drums and barefoot dancing. Perhaps some of my Norj and Dansk colleagues might come in horned helmets and I’ll wear my kilt. What d’ye say?’
There was an awestruck silence, and the sense of breaths being held by the Uvovo scholars and Rus researchers, who had all paused to stare at the confrontation. Anger smouldered in the reporter’s eyes, but his voice remained level and unhurried.
‘I do not take kindly to those who impede my pursuit of the facts, Doctor.’
‘Well, perhaps you made the mistake of ignoring the facts you didn’t like and making up ones that you did.’ He lowered his voice. ‘You also made the mistake of thinking that we’re all gullible yokels eager for your godlike wisdom. Or perhaps you were badly advised – I understand that these personal AIs aren’t quite infallible.’
Lee Shan’s gaze was all icy calm.
‘So I am to be shown the way out?’
‘Sadly no, Mr Lee, since you undoubtedly have written permission from the Institute to be here, which means that you are at liberty to record whatever you please. However, I insist that you do not interfere with any excavation or exposed relics, nor interrupt any of my staff while engaged in their work. As for background detail, you have a copy of the site’s tourist dossier – I suggest that you read it.’
For a moment Lee Shan said nothing, then gave an acquiescing bow of the head and turned away to his pannier. Greg breathed in deeply and hurried back to the small hut where he had been categorising finds before the reporter’s arrival. He knew that his treatment of the man had gone beyond rebuke into public humiliation, which a media celebrity like Lee Shan was not likely to forgive or forget. And yet it had been so satisfying, a guilty pleasure.
It took about fifteen minutes and a fresh cup of kaffe, but eventually he settled back into the familiar rhythm of his work, sorting, image-tabbing and storing. Before him was a shallow box full of cloth sample bags containing shards of pottery and other vessels removed from a recently discovered midden in the northern corner of the Giant’s Shoulder site. Similar finds had been made ever since the colonists began building or tilling the land along the coast. Whatever the location, unearthed pottery fragments showed a fondness for bulbous, organic shapes fabulously adorned with flora and fauna. But those found on Giant’s Shoulder were more plainly decorated with curious symbols like raindrops or stylised flames, usually drawn around small bumps and nubs in the glazed surface. Oddly, most Uvovo Greg spoke to expressed uncertainty about their meaning, claiming that such symbols were not used on Nivyesta, under the spreading canopies of Segrana.
So now the scholars and researchers had found a new source of remains, either a pile of discards or a store that had been wrecked in the cataclysm event that struck Darien ten millennia ago. Greg was just starting on the last bag of finds when there was a knock at the door. A glance at the clock on the shelf made him realise how long he had been working, and out loud he said, ‘Come in.’
The door opened and a middle-aged man in an Earthsphere olive-and-maroon uniform entered.
‘Doctor Cameron?’
‘Indeed I am, and you must be Sub-Lieutenant Lavelle,’ he said, rising to shake hands. ‘Good to know that the Heracles can do without its junior officers – we must be living in a state of impeccable safety and security!’
‘Certainly feels that way, sir,’ said the officer with a smile. Then he saw what Greg was working on. ‘If you’re busy I can come back another time.’
‘Just now is fine, Mr Lavelle,’ he said. ‘Since our exchange of messages yesterday, I’ve been looking forward to showing a real xeno-specialist round the place. I’m almost finished here anyway, so if you would follow me…’
‘Please, call me Marcus.’
‘Okay, you be Marcus and I’ll be Greg,’ he said as they stepped outside.
Despite his composed air, Greg was truly excited at being able to show off the site to a visitor from Earth. The vee and the papers were full of profiles of non-Human races, although the focus had settled on upright bipeds like the Sendruka, the Henkaya and the Gomedra. He was eager to find out how the temple site and other Uvovo remains rated in the Human experience of other worlds and civilisations.
Briskly, he led the xeno-specialist Lavelle across the flagstoned centre of the excavation, explaining on the way that this was the roof of a large central structure and that in all probability an ancient Uvovo complex lay directly beneath their feet.
‘Houses, rooms, galleries, outbuildings,’ Greg said. ‘Who knows what might be down there, carved out of the rock? All we have to do is dig out ten thousand years’ worth of compacted biomass soil and countless root networks. Just think of all the spades we’ll go through.’
They came to a halt before a tall wooden scaffolding lashed here and there to a sheer stone wall covered with relief carvings. The action of rainwater and plant growth over the centuries had left veinlike grooves in the stone as well as cracked and blank areas, but what remained was breathtaking. An intricate intertwining of images, trees, creatures and the Uvovo themselves filled the lower part of the wall, while above the carven jungle, hanging amid a starry sky, were several geometric shapes from which spine- and hook-like objects rained down. Yet from the jungle mass thin shafts lanced upwards, spearing through some of the invaders which were depicted in pieces. Greg pointed out the details as they climbed the scaffold.
‘War in the heavens, Marcus,’ he said. ‘Uvovo legend calls it the War of the Long Night, an epic struggle between two groups of transcendent beings, the Dreamless, cold and pitiless, and the benevolent, compassionate Ghost Gods on whose side the Uvovo, or rather their protector Segrana, fought. Which is how their sagas tell it.’
Lavelle nodded. ‘Segrana, the living forest – is it true that they believe it to be a conscious entity?’
‘Yes, they do. Segrana is part of the web of life, opposed to an antilife principle occasionally referred to as the Unmaker… did you access the university files as I suggested?’
‘Yes, I did – your notes on the Uvovo sites are quite extensive but I managed to pick up the main points before leaving for Darien.’
‘I see,’ Greg said, feeling slightly nonplussed. ‘Well, I’ll spare you the basic spiel then… oh, you know about Ferguson’s maps of Nivyesta and the first shuttle missions?’
Lavelle nodded and took out a small flat grey unit and patted it. ‘I went over a summary of the colony’s history on my way down. You followed a very interesting path to get where you are today.’
Greg laughed. ‘You mean we were a capricious, squabbling rabble!’
‘Well, divergent and competitive,’ Lavelle said with a half-smile.
‘Wouldn’t you say that Earth’s history since the Swarm War has been at least as interesting?’ Greg said. ‘Explorers on other colony worlds must have uncovered the remains of vanished civilisations as well as discovering existing ones.’
‘There are more historical parallels than you might think,’ Lavelle said. ‘About sixty years ago we and some of our allies joined the Sendruka Hegemony in their interdiction against the Jesme Aggregation because one of their planet-clans was supporting insurgents within Brolturan territory. Anyway, almost half of the Human colonies were so opposed to it that they resigned from the Earthplus Council, cut off all ties with the home-world, and started calling themselves the Vox Humana League. When the campaign ended a few years later, some ties were restored but certain embargoes – on weapons for example – remain in force to this day.’
Greg nodded. ‘We’ve had our schisms as well. During the New Town Secession, the Scots, Rus and Norj allies formed armed camps against one another which caused a lot of bitterness considering all the intermarriage and cross-community links.’
‘Yes, and the bitterness still affects policy decisions decades later. The Vox Humana rebels continue to defy Earthsphere sovereignty and refuse to play their part in the Security Net, while malcontents on Earth and other worlds launch public attacks on our coalition with the Hegemony. But the fact is that it’s a dangerous galaxy out there and we have to stand by our true friends in the face of the threat to our shared values. Anti-Sendrukans I’ve got no time for.’
Shared values? Greg thought. It seemed like a strange declaration to make, one he would normally have latched on to and probed until its meaning became clearer. But he decided to say nothing and let the man talk.
‘As for remains of vanished cultures, some colony worlds have reported quite a few finds – habitable planets near the ancient centres and flows of galactic civilisation usually provide some evidence of previous occupation. As soon as major discoveries are made, however, the sites are supposed to be opened up for inspection by the Grand Commission for Antiquities unless a commission signatory files an objection. In the case of Darien, four have done so – four, which is almost unheard of. Earthsphere was first to file under rights of sovereignty and duty of care towards the Uvovo; the Brolturans then filed their objections with the Commission, claiming that the Darien system lies within a tract of space promised to them by their god, Voloasku, as explicitly written in the Omgur, their divine scripture…’
‘Voloasku? So who’s Voloasti? – I heard that mentioned by someone.’
‘That’s the supreme being of the Hegemony’s orthodox creed,’ Lavelle said. ‘Also supported by their version of the Omgur which, for some reason, hasn’t led to similar claims.’
‘You cannot be serious,’ Greg said, laughing.
‘I’m afraid I am,’ Lavelle said. ‘The third to object was the Second Spiral Sage of Buranj, who claimed that your temple’s position on a jutting promontory exactly matches the description of the tomb of the divine Father-Sage Arksasbe. He also insists that the defiling presence of non-believers ceases immediately.’
Greg stared at him for an astonished moment, then leaned forward to gaze out at the worn walls and columns, the Uvovo scholars working in a stepped trench near the northern barrier and the Rus researchers, who were patiently sifting dirt removed from the test ditches over to the south. Then he looked back at Lavelle, smiling.
‘Unfortunately, Marcus, it doesn’t look as though these non-believers are likely to drop what they are doing. And in fact, I think that my own non-devoutness has actually deepened since learning of the esteemed Second Spiral Sage’s decree… by the way, is there a First Spiral Sage?’
‘Oh yes, but he’s far too devout to be sullied by temporal matters.’
‘But of course. So who filed the fourth objection?’
‘The Hegemony. They argued that the Grand Commission of Antiquities cannot carry out its work until the conflicting claims of sovereignty and title have been resolved. Accordingly, all four objectors have appointed adjudicators and the first hearings will take place soon.’ Lavelle grinned. ‘The whole process could take two or three years!’
Greg smiled uncertainly. ‘You seem very pleased about all of this, Marcus, and I don’t know why.’
‘Well, if the Commission’s inspectors had been empowered to oversee this site, you and your people would probably be prohibited from any excavation or artefact-handling, on grounds of inadequate training or the use of lo-tech instruments. But they haven’t, which means you can continue working here…’ He paused. ‘… and I can show you the location of the underground chambers and their hidden entrance.’
Greg’s thoughts jolted to a halt, and he stared at the man. ‘Wha… what did you say?’
Lavelle glanced out at the site then went on in quieter tones.
‘Greg, the cornerstone of field archaeology is determining where the treasure is before you begin digging. A researcher from, say, Planitia University would have the equipment to make any number of subsurface scans before breaking ground, but you don’t have that luxury. On the other hand, I have – I used Heracles’s sensor array to make focused scans of the interior of Giant’s Shoulder.’ From an inner pocket he took a folded sheaf of pages and gave them to Greg. ‘These are copies made yesterday and the day before – there’s not much fine detail but you can see the regular lines of the buried temple complex and beneath it…’
Greg stared at several views of Giant’s Shoulder, digital sweeps showing a vaguely block-shaped recess extending about 60 metres down into the promontory, just as he had speculated. And there, not far below, was something circular – glancing between pages, contrasting different views, it really did look like a chamber of some kind, circular, perhaps 80 metres across…
He peered closer, sorted through the images, comparing two in particular, one of which seemed to show a thready, fragmentary straight line leaving the mysterious chamber and pointing south, while the other had a similar line leading inwards from the southern face of Giant’s Shoulder, pointing north.
‘It is what it looks like,’ said Lavelle. ‘It’s an entrance-way and a passage of some kind.’
Greg stared at the images with a burning intensity, thinking about the sheer sides of Giant’s Shoulder, cracked and weathered rock faces veiled in tangles of vine and half-dead root. Only experienced climbers could safely traverse that kind of headwall, yet when he mentioned this to Lavelle he laughed and nodded.
‘Well, fortunately I am a qualified climber, so if you need my help…’
Greg looked up. ‘Is tomorrow too soon?’
‘Hmm, I’m rostered on tomorrow morning – how about in the afternoon?’
‘That would be… perfect. Marcus, forgive me for asking, but what do you have to gain out of this?’
Lavelle smiled thoughtfully, as if partly at his own thoughts. ‘I guess I could say it’s about fame and recognition – well, maybe that is part of it but mainly it’s the chance to explore an ancient hidden mystery never before seen by Humans, to be the first to see it and touch it! It’s the fourteen-year-old in me, I’m afraid.’
‘In that case, my fourteen-year-old salutes yours – perhaps we should start a club.’
Laughing, the two men descended the scaffold ladders, arranged for tomorrow, said farewells and parted, Lavelle heading for the zeplin station, Greg hurrying back to the cataloguing hut. On entering he noticed a message tag on his workstation’s screen, a black-and-yellow one signifying a locked priority, the kind that seldom contained good news. He keyed in his password, read it through, and groaned. Then reread it, just to be sure, and this time laughed drily. The message was from the office of V. Petrovich, the Director of the Darien Institute, informing Greg that tomorrow, at noon, High Monitor Kuros – and his extensive entourage – would be making a very official, very public visit to Giant’s Shoulder. Several hours prior to this, an officer from the Office of Guidance and the commander of the High Monitor’s bodyguard would arrive to inspect the site and ensure its security. Greg was to offer them complete cooperation and full access to all areas and to all personnel records. It ended with a pointed and direct instruction, essentially a prohibition on his ‘indulging in any commentary or verbal wordplay that could be construed as antagonistic or insulting’.
Greg smiled, shook his head. The director was an old sparring partner and knew just what he was capable of, a state of being not unlike that of the reporter, Lee Shan… who, he realised, would almost certainly be present tomorrow.
You wait and hope for a good audience to come along, he thought, then suddenly it’s there but you’re not allowed to perform.
Then he realised that he would have to postpone tomorrow’s exploration with Lavelle so, with a sigh, he sat down at his desk and began composing a short message.