Page 5 (1/2)

DAY 3: TANGIER

June 15,1979

1Ground Truth

PETER ELLIOT HAD KNOWN AMY SINCE INFANCY He prided hih he had only known her in a laboratory setting Now, as she was faced with new situations, her behavior surprised him

Elliot had anticipated Amy would be terrified of the takeoff, and had prepared a syringe with Thoralen tranquilizer But sedation proved unnecessary Amy watched Jensen and Levine buckle their seat belts, and she iard the procedure as an ah her eyes widened when she heard the full s around her did not seem disturbed, and A her eyebrows and sighing at the tedium of it all

Once airborne, however, Amy looked out theand immediately panicked She released her seat belt and scurried back and forth across the passenger co people aside in whiround? Outside, the ground was black and indistinct Where ground? Elliot shot her with Thoralen and then began groo at her hair

In the wild, pri one another, re behavior was iroup&039;s social doroomed each other, and hat frequency And, like back rubs for people, groo effect Within h to notice that the others were drinking, and she proreen drop drink" - her terarette She was allowed this on special occasions such as departarette

But the excitement proved tooout theand signing Nice picture to herself when she voized abjectly, Aht, A the back of her head Soon afterward, signing Amy sleep now, she twisted the blankets into a nest on the floor and went to sleep, snoring loudly through her broad nostrils Lying next to her, Elliot thought, how do other gorillas get to sleep with this racket?

Elliot had his own reaction to the journey When he had first met Karen Ross, he assumed she was an academic like himself But this enormous airplane filled with computerized equipested that Earth Resources Technology had powerful resources behind it, perhaps even a hed "We&039;re anized to be round of the ERTS interest in Virunga Like the Project Aend of the Lost City of Zinj But she had drawn very different conclusions fro the last three hundred years, there had been several attelish adventurer, led an expedition of two hundred into the Congo; it was never heard froain In 1744, a Dutch expedition went in; in 1804, another British party led by a Scottish aristocrat, Sir Ja as far as the Rawana bend of the Ubangi River He sent an advance party farther south, but it never returned

In 1872, Stanley passed near the Virunga region but did not enter it; in 1899, a Ger more than half its party A privately financed Italian expedition disappeared entirely in 1911 There had been no more recent searches for the Lost City of Zinj

"So no one has ever found it," Elliot said

Ross shook her head "I think several expeditions found the city," she said "But nobody ever got back out again"

Such an outcome was not necessarily mysterious The early days of African exploration were incredibly hazardous Even carefully ed expeditions lost half of their party orsickness, and blackwater fever faced rivers teeles with leopards and suspicious, cannibalistic natives And, for all its luxuriant growth, the rain forest provided little edible food; a nuan," Ross said to Elliot, "with the idea that the city existed, after all Assu it existed, where would I find it?"

The Lost City of Zinj was associated with diamond mines, and dia the Great Rift Valley - an enorical fault thirty miles wide, which sliced vertically up the eastern third of the continent for a distance of fifteen hundred e that its existence was not recognized until the 1890s, when a geologist naory noticed that the cliff walls thirty miles apart were composed of the same rocks In modern terms the Great Rift was actually an abortive attempt to forun splitting off from the rest of the African land o; for some reason, it had stopped before the break was complete

On a map the Great Rift depression was marked by two features: a series of thin vertical lakes - Malawi, Tanganyika, Kivu, Mobutu - and a series of volcanoes, including the only active volcanoes in Africa at Virunga Three volcanoes in the Virunga chain were active: Mukenko, Mubuti, and Kanagarawi They rose 11,000 - 15,000 feet above the Rift Valley to the east, and the Congo Basin to the west Thus Virunga seeood place to look for diaround truth

"What&039;s ground truth?" Peter asked

"At ERTS, we deal raphs, aerial run-bys, radar side scans We carry es, but there&039;s no substitute for ground truth, the experience of a tea out what&039;s there I started with the preliold They found diamonds as well" She punched buttons on the console, and the screen i pinpoints of light

"This shows the placer deposit locations in streaa You see the deposits for back to the volcanoes The obvious conclusion is that diaa volcanoes, and washed down the streams to their present locations"

"So you sent in a party to look for the source?"

"Yes" She pointed to the screen "But don&039;t be deceived by what you see here This satellite ile Most of it has never been seen by white men It&039;s hard terrain, with visibility limited to a few meters in any direction An expedition could search that area for years, passing within two hundredto see it So I needed to narrow the search sector I decided to see if I could find the city"

"Find the city? From satellite pictures?"

"Yes," she said "And I found it"

The rain forests of the world had traditionally frustrated rele trees spread an i whatever lay beneath In aerial or satellite pictures, the Congo rain forest appeared as a vast, undulating carpet of featureless and e features, rivers fifty or a hundred feet wide, were hidden beneath this leafy canopy, invisible from the air

So it seemed unlikely she would find any evidence for a lost city in aerial photographs But Ross had a different idea: she would utilize the very vegetation that obscured her vision of the ground -

The study of vegetation was coe underwent seasonal changes But the equatorial rain forest was unchanging: winter or sue remained the same Ross turned her attention to another aspect, the differences in vegetation albedo

Albedo was technically defined as the ratio of electroy incident upon it In terms of the visible spectrum, it was a h albedo, since water reflected ht, and therefore had a low albedo Starting in 1977, ERTS developed co very fine distinctions

Ross asked herself the question: If there was a lost city, what signature etation? There was an obvious answer: late secondary jungle

The untouched or virgin rain forest was called priht of when they thought of rain forests: huge hardwood trees, any and teak and ebony, and underneath a lower layer of ferns and palle was dark and forbidding, but actually easy to le was cleared by rowth took over The do trees, ba vines, which formed a dense and impenetrable barrier

But Ross was not concerned about any aspect of the jungle except its albedo Because the secondary plants were different, secondary jungle had a different albedo froe: unlike the hardwood trees of prile, which lived hundreds of years, the softwoods of secondary jungle lived only twenty years or so Thus as tile was replaced by another forle, and later by still another forenerally found - such as the banks of large rivers, where innumerable human settlements had been cleared and abandoned - Ross confirmed that the ERTS computers could, indeed, measure the necessary small differences in reflectivity

She then instructed the ERTS scanners to search for albedo differences of 03 or less, with a unit signature size of a hundred meters or less, across the fifty thousand square kiloa volcanoes This job would occupy a tearaphic analysts for thirty-one years The coraphs in under nine hours

And found her city

In May, 1979, Ross had a cole pattern laid out in a georees north of the equator, longitude 3 degrees, on the western slopes of the active volcano Mukenko The cole at five hundred to eight hundred years

"So you sent an expedition in?" Elliot said

Ross nodded "Three weeks ago, led by a South African naer The expedition confirmed the placer diain, and found the ruins of the city,,

"And then what happened?" Elliot asked

He ran the videotape a second ties of the ca Several dead bodies with crushed skulls were visible As they watched, a shadow moved over the dead bodies, and the ca shadow Elliot agreed that it looked like the shadow of a gorilla, but he insisted, "Gorillas couldn&039;t do this Gorillas are peaceful, vegetarian animals"

They watched as the tape ran to the end And then they reviewed her final coe, which clearly showed the head of a round truth," Ross said

Elliot was not so sure He reran the last three seconds of videotape a final ti, leaving a ghostly trail, but so with it He couldn&039;t quite identify what Certainly this was atypical gorilla behavior, but there was so else -

He pushed the freeze-frae The face and the fur were both gray: unquestionably gray

"Can we increase contrast?" he asked Ross "This ie is washed out"

"I don&039;t know," Ross said, touching the controls "I think this is a pretty good iray," he said "Gorillas are e is correct for video"

Elliot was sure this creature was too light to be aa new race of aniray in color, aggressive in behavior, discovered in the eastern Congo

He had come on this expedition to verify Aht - but now the stakes were suddenly orilla?"

"There are ways to test it," he said He stared at the screen, frowning, as the plane fleard in the night

2B-8 Proble the phone in his shoulder and rolling over to look at his bedside clock It was 3 AM

"Go to the zoo," Elliot repeated His voice sounded garbled, as if co from?"

"We&039;re somewhere over the Atlantic now," Elliot said "On our way to Africa"

"Is everything all right?"

"Everything is fine," Elliot said "But I want you to go to the zoo first thing in the et them in movement That&039;s very i"

"I&039;d better write this down," Sea for the Project Amy staff, and he was accustoht "What discriminant function?"

"While you&039;re at it, run any filorillas, wild or in zoos or whatever TheAnd for a baseline, you&039;d better use chi we have on chih the function"

"What function?" Sea to write," Elliot said "I want a ery"

"You nition function?" Seanition functions for A around the clock Sea-hly inventive

"However you structure it," Elliot said "I just want a function that&039;ll discriorillas fro function"

"Are you kidding?" Sea field of pattern-recognition corams, so-called B-8 problems were the most difficult; whole tea to teach computers the difference between "B" and "8&039; &039; - precisely because the difference was so obvious But as obvious to the human eye was not obvious to the computer scanner The scanner had to be told, and the specific instructions turned out to be far more difficult than anyone anticipated, particularly for handwritten characters

Now Elliot wanted a prograorillas and chi, "Why? It&039;s pretty obvious A gorilla is a gorilla, and a chimp is a chimp"

"Just do it," Elliot said

"Can I use size?" On the basis of size alone, gorillas and chiuished But visual functions could not deter instruth of the recording lens

"No, you can&039;t use size," Elliot said "Elehed "Thanks a lot What resolution?"

"I need ninety-five-percent confidence linment, to be based on less than three seconds of black-and-white scan iery"

Seamans frowned Obviously, Elliot had three seconds of videotape iorilla or not Elliot had seen enough gorillas over the years to know the difference: gorillas and chimps were utterly different animals in size, appearance, ent oceanicsuch discriram that could be devised Yet Elliot apparently did not trust his eye What was he thinking of?

"I&039;ll try," Sea to take a while You don&039;t write that kind of prograht, Tom," Elliot said "I&039;ll call you back in twenty-four hours"

3 Inside the Coffin

IN ONE CORNER OF THE 747 LIVING MODULE WAS A sound-baffled fiberglass booth, with a hinged hood and a small CRT screen; it was called "the coffin" because of the claustrophobic feeling that ca inside it As the airplane crossed the mid-Atlantic, Ross stepped inside the coffin She had a last look at Elliot and A playing "submarine chase" on the computer console, as she lowered the hood

Ross was tired, but she did not expect to getas she thought the expedition would last Within fourteen days - 336 hours - Ross&039;s team would either have beaten the Euro-Japanese consortiua hts would be lost forever

The race was already under way, and Karen Ross did not intend to lose it

She punched Houston coordinates, including her own sender designation, and waited while the scranal delay of five seconds at both ends, because both she and Houston would be sending in coded burst translowed: TRAVIS

She typed back: R OS S She picked up the telephone receiver

"It&039;s a bitch," Travis said, although it was not Travis&039;s voice, but a conal, without expression

"Tell ," Travis&039;s surrogate voice said "Details," Ross said, and waited for the five-second delay She could i her own coe in speech patterns; as ordinarily conveyed by phrasing and emphasis had to be made explicit

"They know you&039;re on your way," Travis&039;s voice whined "They are pushing their own schedule The Ger a feeding in a ood news"

"And the bad news?"

"The Congo has gone to hell in the last ten hours," Travis said "We have a nasty GPU"

"Print," she said

On the screen, she saw printed GEOPOLITICAL UPDATE, followed by a dense paragraph It read:

ZAIRE EMBASSY WASHINGTON STATES EASTERN BORDERS VIA RWANDA CLOSED / NO EXPLANATION / PRESUMPTION 101 AMIN TROOPS FLEEING TANZANIAN

INVASION UGANDA INTO EASTERN ZAIRE / CONSEQUENT DISRUPTION / BUT FACTS DIFFER / LOCAL TRIBES {KIGANI} ON RAMPAGE / REPORTED ATROCITIES AND CANNIBALISM ETC / FOREST - DWELLING PYGMIES UNRELIABLE / KILLING ALL VISITORS CONGO RAIN FOREST / ZAIRE GOVERNMENT DIS?PATCHED GENERAL MUGURU (AKA BUTCHER OF STAN - LEYVILLE) / PUT DOWN KIGANI REBELLION &039;AT ALL COSTS&039; / SITUATION HIGHLY UNSTABLE / ONLY LEGAL ENTRY INTO ZAIRE NOW WEST THROUGH KINSHASA / YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN / ACQUISITION WHITE HUNTER

MUNRO NOW PARAMOUNT IMPORTANCE WHATEVER COST / KEEP HIM FROM CONSORTIUM WILL PAY ANYTHING / YOUR SITUATION EXTREME DANGER / MUST HAVE MUNRO TO SURVIVE /

She stared at the screen It was the worst possible news She said, "Have you got a time course?"

EURO - JAPANESE CONSORTIUM NOW COMPRISES MORIKAWA (JAPAN) / GERLICH (GERMANY) / VOORSTER (AMSTERDAM) / UNFORTUNATELY HAVE RESOLVED

DIFFERENCES NOW IN COMPLETE ACCORD / MONITORING US CANNOT ANTICIPATE SECURE TRANSMISSIONS ANYTIME HENCEFORTH / ANTICIPATE ELECTRONIC

COUNTERMEASURES AND WARFARE TACTICS IN PURSUIT OF TWO - B GOAL / THEY WILL ENTER CONGO (RELIABLE SOURCE) WITHIN 48 HOURS NOW SEEKING MUNRO /

"When will they reach Tangier?" she asked

"In six hours You?"

"Seven hours And Munro?"

"We don&039;t know about Munro," Travis said "Can you booby hie the booby now If Munro doesn&039;t see things our way, I promise you it&039;ll be seventy-two hours before he&039;s allowed out of the country"

"What&039;ve you got?" Travis asked

"Czech subuns Found on the premises, with his prints on them, carefully applied That should do it"

"That should do it," Travis agreed "What about your passengers?" He was referring to Elliot and A"

"Keep it that way," Travis said, and hung up

4 Feeding Time

"IT&039;S FEEDING TIME," TRAVIS CALLED CHEERFULLY "Who&039;s at the trough?"

"We&039;ve got five tap dancers on Beta dataline," Rogers said Rogers was the electronic surveillance expert, the bug catcher

"Anybody we know?"

"Know thehtly annoyed "Beta line is our main cross-trunk line in-house, so whoever wants to tap in to our systeetBeta anye - taxes and payroll, that stuff"

"We have to arrange a feed," Travis said A feedfalse data out over a tapped line, to be picked up It was a delicate operation "You have the consortium on the line?"

"Sure What do you want to feed theers nodded,his brow He was a portly ood do you want it?"

"Daood," Travis said "You won&039;t fool the Japanese with static"

"You don&039;t want to give them the actual co-ords?"

"God, no But I want them reasonably close Say, within two hundred kiloers said

"Coded?" Travis said

&039;Of course "

"You have a code they can break in twelve to fifteen hours?"

Rogers nodded "We&039;ve got a dilly Looks like hell, but then when you work it, it pops out Got an internal weakness in concealed lettering frequency At the other end, looks like we made a mistake, but it&039;s very breakable"

"It can&039;t be too easy," Travis warned

"Oh, no, they&039;ll earn their yen They&039;ll never suspect a feed We ran it past the ar us a lesson Never kneas a setup"

"Okay," Travis said, "put the data out, and let&039;s feed theive theht hours or ure out that we&039;ve screwed theers said, and hewould soon begin, and he hoped it would protect his teaet to the dianatures

THE SOFT MURMUR OF VOICES WOKE HIM

"How unequivocal is that signature?"

"Pretty dao, and it&039;s not even epicentered"

"That&039;s cloud cover?"

"No, that&039;s not cloud cover, it&039;s too black That&039;s ejecta fronature"

"Hell"

Elliot opened his eyes to see dawn breaking as a thin red line against blue-black through the s of the passenger co, San Francisco ti Sealanced down at Amy, curled up in her nest of blankets on the floor Amy snored loudly The other bunks were unoccupied