“No, I’m just curious.”
“It’s not jiggerton. It’s gigaton, without any r. You got a dictionary?”
Axel gestured. “On the shelf. Next to the Bible.”
Lute got it and opened to the Gs. “G—Giga. Here we are. Giga—one billion—ten to the ninth power. So a five-gigaton asteroid is a five-billion-ton rock—we’re talking a rock that’s miles thick—clipping along at maybe twenty or thirty thousand miles an hour. That’s way faster than a bullet.” He returned the dictionary to the shelf. “It’d drive more than this house down to hell,” he added. “More than Blaine County or Montana. If it hit here, it’d pulverize North America and wreck the whole damn planet. Like an aught-six soft-point hitting a punkin.”
“Is there such a thing? As a five-billion-ton asteroid?”
“You bet. Various of them.”
Axel said nothing for a minute, just sat looking at the stove. “You know,” he said at last, “the way the world’s getting, God might take a notion to do just that. Show us who’s boss.”
Lute’s smile was lopsided. “Five gigatons would wipe us out so quick, it’d be a waste of time. We’d be dead before we knew it hit us.” Again he laughed. “There’s satellites watch all the big asteroids that might hit us someday. Give us plenty of warning, so we can all convert to Catholic—confess our sins and be saved. Although there’s some of us with so many sins, we might run out of time.” He laughed again. “Can you imagine the lines of people waiting to confess? And the priests would be all tied up confessing to each other what they did to the altar boys.”
Axel shook his head. “Lute, I can’t always tell when you’re kidding.”
“That’s all right. Neither can I.”
“How old is it they say the Earth is?”
“Four billion years, they say. That’s four thousand million.”
“Huh! And it’s still here. I won’t spend much time worrying about it then.” Axel put his glasses back on and picked up his book.
Lute watched him for a minute. Carl and Axel, he thought, two old farts so soured on the world, they’d hire someone killed for no more reason than somebody else said he was the messiah.
He shook his head, both amused and fond, and turned to his own book, failing to wonder about somebody who’d kill someone for them.
4
The questioner asked what the point is of all this living, dying, and being reborn, and the lessons learned in the process. In other words, why, ultimately, was the Earth School created? And why did we choose to matriculate in it? I don’t know the answers to those questions. Much about the Tao—God, if you will—is beyond human comprehension.
First Human Forum speech by
Ngunda Aran, at the National Press Club
in Washington, D.C.
On their first morning at the Cote, all four Shoreffs ate breakfast at their own table in the dining hall. Then Ben left to report at the finance office and meet his new boss, while Lee walked to school with her daughters. Susan Klein was Becca’s teacher. Lee stayed awhile to observe, and left encouraged. She couldn’t dismiss the possibility of cult indoctrination, but at least the classroom was well-equipped, and the people seemed rational and competent.
She’d discovered that her new home had utilitarian tableware and linens, adequate till her own arrived. But while everything seemed clean, she went from school to the commissary, and bought cleaning supplies. The rest of the morning she spent doing laundry and dishes, washing down kitchen surfaces, and writing a list of groceries and supplies for the commissary to pick up for her.
As Lee cleaned already clean shelves, and put things away, she wondered why the Cote was so large. What sort of operation was this that took so many people to operate? Why was it located in the middle of nowhere? And who had paid for it?
All those things, she supposed, would start to clarify during her orientation that afternoon.
* * *
The girls arrived home at twelve, and walked with their mother to the dining hall to eat lunch with Ben. Again the food was excellent. The main course was a vegetable-pasta casserole, and fried chicken. There was also sandwich material, salad makings, a limited fruit buffet, cider, and hot water for one’s choice of instant hot drinks. After lunch, the girls walked themselves back to school, about which they’d spent much of lunchtime chattering.