"You
lied! You lied for years!" Danforth blustered.
Professor Keel sighed inwardly - the girl was smart. Smart enough to bypass Miskatonic Universities security, and get into the closed archives. Smart enough to know this was now a lot bigger than just showing off to her hacker mates, down the student bar.
But, for all that, barely more than girl, and very ignorant of just what she’d stumbled onto.
"Miss... miss Danforth..." Keel hesitated. But who would believe a wild tale from a student? "Yes, all right. We've lied. The ‘Bill Dyer’ space probe made it to the comet’s surface. It sent back images, of what it found there. I need to know, for your safety... how much did you see, other than what you downloaded?"
Stephanie Danforth made a sickly attempt at a grin. "Hey, why don't we talk about money instead?"
Keel looked meaningfully at Roberts the 'security guard' who'd arrived from homeland security that morning, flashing his ID in her face like a talisman. An unexpected, intrusion: Homeland security had already agreed to let her deal with the matter unofficially - afterputting a bug in her elderly laptop. Alex from IT had found when she’d cracked the screen yesterday.
To her relief ‘Roberts’shrugged, and left the office, quietly closing the door behind him.
Keel switched on her desk fan– the fan was Alex’s masterpiece: It jammed almost every commonly used frequency, as well as being audibly loud enough to ensure some privacy from a listener at the door. It had cost her quite a bit.
"And what do you think you have, hmm? Images, of a statue - that looks like a human squid, for Christ sake - on the surface of a comet, from a spaceprobe the world believes failed. Good luck convincing the president. And I should sayhad, because every scrap of electronic memory you own has been wiped."
"I've still got copies!" Danforth shouted.
Keel winced at the clumsy lie– homeland security, and her own private detective, had been over the students apartment and belongings with a fine tooth comb.
Stephanie Danforth ploughed on "People will -"
"Have to listen, because you've got truth on your side?" Keel let a bit more steel bleed into her voice. Examined the girls face carefully before continuing, more quietly: "Listen carefully, because you’ll never hear this from another living soul: Those statues have been found on Earth. Statues that predate the human race. Representations of something called ‘Cthulu’.And it has attracted cults. People who wouldn’t hesitate to harm you to, get at what we found"
Danforth went white. “That’s.. that’s..”
“As ridiculous as finding a statue of a hideous alien on a comet?” Keel snapped. “Do you really think that we’d hide something that momentous, if there weren’t more to it? You need to grow up fast missy, you’re a long bloody way down the rabbit hole to be naïve.”
The girl was quiet, for a handful of heart beats. The she said: "Tell me something? That icon, half buried in comet ice. Does it give you nightmares? Because I’ve seen it at least a few nights a week ever since…. ”
Keel ignored the question, and kept her hands out of sight, so Stephanie Danforth couldn’t see she was trembling.“OK,” she said aloud, “the deal is this: You tell me what else you saw, and how you got past our security. I'll do what I can to protect you.”
The girl seemed to be staring into space. “Who knows,” she continued, “ you prove we can trust you, and you might even get a PhD position out of this."
**
Stephanie Danforth, third year computing student, spilled: She explained how she’d had a friend, with access to the archives, install a program she’d written. Then, after a long silence, and a moment of head down nail examining, she produced a thumbnail sized flash drive out of her tight bob of hair.
Professor Keel sighed inwardly - the girl was smart. Smart enough to bypass Miskatonic Universities security, and get into the closed archives. Smart enough to know this was now a lot bigger than just showing off to her hacker mates, down the student bar.
But, for all that, barely more than girl, and very ignorant of just what she’d stumbled onto.
"Miss... miss Danforth..." Keel hesitated. But who would believe a wild tale from a student? "Yes, all right. We've lied. The ‘Bill Dyer’ space probe made it to the comet’s surface. It sent back images, of what it found there. I need to know, for your safety... how much did you see, other than what you downloaded?"
Stephanie Danforth made a sickly attempt at a grin. "Hey, why don't we talk about money instead?"
Keel looked meaningfully at Roberts the 'security guard' who'd arrived from homeland security that morning, flashing his ID in her face like a talisman. An unexpected, intrusion: Homeland security had already agreed to let her deal with the matter unofficially - afterputting a bug in her elderly laptop. Alex from IT had found when she’d cracked the screen yesterday.
To her relief ‘Roberts’shrugged, and left the office, quietly closing the door behind him.
Keel switched on her desk fan– the fan was Alex’s masterpiece: It jammed almost every commonly used frequency, as well as being audibly loud enough to ensure some privacy from a listener at the door. It had cost her quite a bit.
"And what do you think you have, hmm? Images, of a statue - that looks like a human squid, for Christ sake - on the surface of a comet, from a spaceprobe the world believes failed. Good luck convincing the president. And I should sayhad, because every scrap of electronic memory you own has been wiped."
"I've still got copies!" Danforth shouted.
Keel winced at the clumsy lie– homeland security, and her own private detective, had been over the students apartment and belongings with a fine tooth comb.
Stephanie Danforth ploughed on "People will -"
"Have to listen, because you've got truth on your side?" Keel let a bit more steel bleed into her voice. Examined the girls face carefully before continuing, more quietly: "Listen carefully, because you’ll never hear this from another living soul: Those statues have been found on Earth. Statues that predate the human race. Representations of something called ‘Cthulu’.And it has attracted cults. People who wouldn’t hesitate to harm you to, get at what we found"
Danforth went white. “That’s.. that’s..”
“As ridiculous as finding a statue of a hideous alien on a comet?” Keel snapped. “Do you really think that we’d hide something that momentous, if there weren’t more to it? You need to grow up fast missy, you’re a long bloody way down the rabbit hole to be naïve.”
The girl was quiet, for a handful of heart beats. The she said: "Tell me something? That icon, half buried in comet ice. Does it give you nightmares? Because I’ve seen it at least a few nights a week ever since…. ”
Keel ignored the question, and kept her hands out of sight, so Stephanie Danforth couldn’t see she was trembling.“OK,” she said aloud, “the deal is this: You tell me what else you saw, and how you got past our security. I'll do what I can to protect you.”
The girl seemed to be staring into space. “Who knows,” she continued, “ you prove we can trust you, and you might even get a PhD position out of this."
**
Stephanie Danforth, third year computing student, spilled: She explained how she’d had a friend, with access to the archives, install a program she’d written. Then, after a long silence, and a moment of head down nail examining, she produced a thumbnail sized flash drive out of her tight bob of hair.
It was Keels turn to have her jaw
drop – if the girl could hide things from homeland security she had one hell of
a career ahead.
Stephanie spoke, barely above a
whisper. “I didn’t have time to look around in the archive files, I just
downloaded the first thing that looked cool. That’s the last copy – it’s all on
there, the landing on the comet, the.. the obelisk, the markings. The…statue. “
Keel fingered the scratched, grey
pen drive. She was tempted to ask how the girl had hidden it, not sure she
wanted to hear another clumsy lie.
“Can.. can I go?” Stephanie
asked.
“What.. yes. Go back to you’re
classes, and say nothing. And, as long as this is the last copy, I think I can convince everyone this was just a
prank gone bad. Go back to your course, say nothing – to anyone– and you shouldn’t need to worry. But one word and you’ll
find yourself being moved to Alaska. Not a joke” She ran her fingers over the
drive again. The scratches felt a little like letters:
C – T – U – L – U.
Keels pulse barely had time to jump,
before the girl leaned over, smiling, and slapped a transparent patch onto her
upper arm. The world turned by ninety degrees, and she was on the floor,
shaking uncontrollably. Her arms and legs felt like lead. A pounding pain began
to building her temples, and chest. She managed to get one hand into her pocket
beneath her, and squeeze the emergency medical alarm. Did the girl know she had
an arrhythmia? The world began to grey and narrow. Dimly she was aware of
Stephanie – Stephanie with such promise –leaning over her, and tearing the
patch away.
“Shhhh…” the girl told her
gently. “You’re luckier than most of those…people ... out there will be, when he rises out of the depths”
A masculine voice came dimly from
the doorway. Roberts the ‘security guard’. “Did we get what we needed?”
“Yes – they think they’ve got all
the copies. You should’ve seen the old sows face when I produced this”
Stephanie brandished the flash drive.
“That’s a nice trick she’s got
with the fan.”
“Yeah, when we can we’ll have to
grab it, get Martin to make up a co -.”
Keel thought she heard a sudden
burst of shouting from outside. But it was all fading. Someone was turning her
over …why? Couldn’t remember. What was she was doing on the floor? She just
needed to sleep, to get away from the throbbing heada…
Image courtesy of wikimedia commons.
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