The War of Immensities Read Online Free PDF Page B

god-damned mutual epicentre!”
    “There wasn’t,
Harley. All systems agree. The thermals and seismos and shifters
all indicate the same locations on both systems that were operating
at the time.”
    “Ridiculous!”
    “Tell that to
the fucking geosystem.”
    “It is the
Governing Board of the Earth Science Academy that I’m going to have
to tell it to, Jami, and they’ll laugh me out of the place. They’ll
strip my professorship and reassign me to Junior High if I try to
put this over them. And what about the prelims?”
    “No preliminary
warning whatsoever.”
    “Jami, might I
remind you that there has never been a volcanic incident in all
recorded history where there weren’t substantial pre-eruption
indicators.”
    “There has now.
The monitoring equipment was all in fine condition and firmly
recorded that there was no indication of oncoming activity
whatsoever.”
    “Then the
equipment must be faulty!”
    “Glen is going
over it. Of course, it’s all knocked around a bit by the percussion
but half of it is undamaged...”
    “Pity it all
didn’t get blown away and...”
    “...and me with
it?”
    “No, I need you
despite your obvious shortcomings as a researcher. You drag your
ass back here, now!”
    “It’ll take me
days to fly to Boston.”
    “Now, young
lady! We have to get this gibberish into a condition that will
allow our colleagues to read it without mirthful convulsions.”
    “There’s too
much to do...”
    “Glen can
handle it. You.. get.. here.. now!”
    “If you say
so.”
    There was,
finally, a pause. When Thyssen spoke again, his tone had softened
considerably. “You were actually in the building when this went
down, Jami?”
    “I was right
here.”
    “Rather an
epiphany, I should think.”
    “It was that
all right. I should imagine that if the plane to Boston falls out
of the sky, I’ll know what to expect when it hits the ground.”
    “An enviable
experience you know.”
    “Not nearly as
bad as one of your tirades, Harley.”
    This was as
close as Harley Thyssen ever got to expressing concern, for anyone,
ever. Jami felt honoured, and decided to push her luck.
    “There was
something else.”
    “There couldn’t
be.”
    “Something that
even I, for all my apparent naivety, didn’t dare put in the
report.”
    “Do you have
any idea how close I am to a coronary infarction at this
moment?”
    “Not as close
as I was, if I read the physiology correctly.”
    “Meaning?”
    “Something else
happened. It’s hard to describe. But it was just an instant before
the eruption. There was a sensation, like a shock wave or
something. I almost passed out. My whole body seemed to... I don’t
know. It was as if I exploded internally. I recovered immediately.
There was nausea and a minor state of shock, but whatever it was
passed through me in an instant and was gone. And it was after that
the instrumentation became active.”
    “After... after
what?”
    “I don’t know.
What I described. Some sort of shock wave that the instruments
couldn’t record hit me first. Then it started.”
    “More
gibberish, Jami.”
    “But even I
knew I couldn’t put something like that in the report.”
    “All right,
maybe you’re not as naive as I thought. Get on the plane.”
    “It all really
happened, Harley.”
    “Sure. What you
are saying, in reality, is that some sort of mysterious
physiological episode distorted your perceptions and impaired your
judgment, and thereby we have all these improbable results. How
does that sound?”
    “Like bullshit,
Harley.”
    “But it is a
reasonable explanation, provided, of course, that you are able to
offer proof that this mysterious force exists.”
    “I’m not using
it as an excuse.”
    “No, but I
will, to explain your insanity, if I have to. Time’s wasting. Go
catch a plane.”
    “See you in a
day or two, Harley.”

*

    The nurses had
allowed two middle-aged people into the ICU ward where they stood
looking down at the girl within the