“He’s demolishing that thing,” whispered one of the technicians in the room. “Crushing a statue with his bare hands.”
Tremelo gave Marie a last little squeeze. “You okay, now?” He felt her head nod, and heard the happy little gurgle. “Better get me the President, Marie. I can see we’re going to need him to grant some people political asylum, too. Before those idiots at the INS get it into their heads to pull a raid.”
The image on the TV switched to an outside view, from a different camera. Two giant winged snakes—dragons?—were being fed by a line of hotel employees bearing platters. A huge sphinx was practically mobbed with tourists, tossing the monster candy bars when they failed to answer its riddles properly.
“Quick, Marie!” hissed Tremelo. “The President’ll have to invoke the Endangered Species Act, too.”
Marie was watching the screen now. Her little gurgle of happiness turned into a riotous laugh.
“Yeah—but which species is being endangered?”
* * *
After she left, Tremelo shook his head. “Damned if I know. Oh, brave new world, that hath such people in it.”
One of Miggy’s assistants was staring at him. “What’re we going to do, Professor?” He pointed at the TV screen, which was now filled again with the face of Jerry Lukacs, resuming his lecture. “If that guy’s right, we can’t touch that damned pyramid.”
Tremelo shrugged. “Do about it? Get us all on a priority flight to Nellis Air Force Base, for starters. We can talk about it on our way to Las Vegas.”
He burst into laughter himself, now. “What the hell? We’ll live with it, I imagine. Just another illegal alien, that’s all.”
Miggy grinned at the TV, which was now showing an image of the Krim pyramid. “No, that’s politically incorrect! Let’s call it the undocumented interstellar probe. Frustrated because it can’t find a job.”
Acknowledgements
First and foremost this book owes its existence to my wife, Barbara—proofreader, idea test-pilot and authorial panic tolerator extraordinaire. Between her, Kathy Holton, proofreader of infinite patience, and Eric, whose idea all of this was in the first place, they guided my vague and wandering steps through this mythological mazurka. . . . As usual, Eric and I worked closely and argued mightily about this book. The erudite bits are Eric’s. The weird and silly bits are mine.
For her sin of choosing to take her honours in classical Latin and Greek, my sister Helen was endlessly plagued about everything from mythology to pronunciation. And on the rare occasions my odd questions were too bizarre for her or she’d managed to sneak away from a telephone, there was Pam (Pogo) Poggiani, the Baen author’s fantastic reference system.
My thanks to Judith Lasker and Ron Kohut for their wine help, and Judith for the photographs of Las Vegas, which inspired the final solution and scene.
I must also thank Fred Geisler, Andy Mendes, Buz Ozburn, John Ringo and Mike Spehar for their attempts to explain the U.S. military to me. I’m still confused, alas. The errors remain mine, the accuracy theirs. Mike, an expert on the subject, provided us with a draft of the HASTY RECEIVER EXECUTE ORDER which appears in Chapter 14.
Eric has also asked me to acknowledge several institutions which figure in the novel, for their cooperation. The characters who appear in the novel are all fictitious, of course, but the depiction of the physical setting is as accurate as we could make it. We especially want to thank:
The Oriental Institute, particularly Tim Cashion and Emily Napolitano, respectively the Director of Development and the Membership Coordinator. Tim gave Eric a guided tour of the Institute, and suggested the air handler room as the logical place for Lamont Jackson to begin his part of the story. The Oriental Institute’s Museum, for those not familiar with it, is one of the world’s great museums for the art and archaeology of the ancient Near East. The gigantic Assyrian Bull, before which Jerry Lukacs and Lamont meet in Part I, is worth the price of admission alone. And, over the years, Eric has purchased for his wife Lucille any number of fine items of jewelry from the Institute’s excellent gift shop, the Suq.
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