The Visitors (v1.0)

4. WASHINGTON, D.C

It had been a rough day. The press, at the early afternoon briefing, had been out for blood. Principally, the questions had had to do with the movement by the Native American Association for the return to the federated tribes of the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Montana Bighorn region, although there had been considerable sniping about the energy situation, centered on the administration's proposal to develop a southwestern desert solar energy system and its advocacy of substantial funds for research into a cryogenic transmission system. The press had stormed out considerably indignant at his unsatisfactory answers, but, David Porter told himself, that was not unusual. For the past several months, the press, in general, had been either enraged or disgusted at him. Any day now, he felt sure, there would be a move by some factions of the media to get him canned.

A hush hung over the pressroom office, scarcely broken by the teletype machines ranged against the wall, chuckling among themselves as they continued to spew out the doings of the world. Marcia Langley, his assistant, was gathering up and putting away, getting ready to leave for the day. The telephone console on Marcia's desk was quiet; for the first time in the day no lights were blinking, signaling incoming calls. This was the ~aim of the news-gathering period. The last afternoon editions had gone to press, the morning editions were being readied for the presses.

Shadows were beginning to creep into the room. Porter put out a hand and turned on his desk lamp. The light revealed the clutter of papers. Looking at them, he groaned. The clock on the wall said it was almost 5:30. He bad promised to pick up Alice at 7:30 and that left him little time to get through with his paperwork. There was a new eating place out in Maryland that some of Alice's friends had been recommending, with Alice mentioning it off and on for the past several weeks. Tonight, they planned to go there. He relaxed in his chair and thought about Alice Davenport. Her old man, the senator, and Porter had never gotten along too well, but, so far, the old man had raised no objection to their seeing one another. Which, Porter thought, was rather decent of the old buzzard. Despite her parentage, however, Alice was all right. She was a lot of fun, bright and cheerful, well-informed, a good conversationalist. Except that, at times, she had the unfortunate tendency to engage in long and partisan discussion of her currently favorite social enthusiasm. Right at the moment, it was the Indian claim to the Black Hills and the Bighorn, which she passionately believed should be returned to the federated tribes. A few months earlier, it had been the blacks of South Africa. Which all came, Porter told himself dourly, from too good an education in exactly the wrong disciplines. She didn't always talk about these things and tonight perhaps she wouldn't. In the last few months, they had spent some happy times together, for Alice, when she left off her crusader togs, was a good companion.

It wouldn't take more than half an hour or so, he estimated, if he really applied himself, to get his desk at least haphazardly cleared off. That would give him time to get home, get showered and shaved, and change his clothes. For once, he promised himself, he'd pick Alice up on time. But, first, he needed a cup of coffee.

He rose and started across the room.

"Do you know," he asked Marcia, "if there's any coffee left out in the lounge?"

"There should be," she told him. "There might be some sandwiches left but they will be stale."

He grumbled at her. "All I need is a cup of coffee."

He was halfway across the room when one of the teletype machines came to sudden, insane life. A bell rang loudly and insistently, clamoring for attention.

He turned about and went swiftly back across the room. It was Associated Press, he saw. He came up to the machine, grasped each side of it with his hands. The printer, blurring across the paper, was typing a string of bulletins.

Then: BULLETIN — LARGE OBJECT REPORTED TO HAVE FALLEN FROM THE SKY IN MINNESOTA.

The machine stopped, the printer quivering.

"What is it?" Marcia asked, standing at his shoulder.

"I don't know," said Porter. "Perhaps a meteorite."

He said to the machine, "Come on. Come on. Tell us what it

is.

The telephone on his desk shrilled at them.

Marcia took a step or two and picked it up.

"All right, Grace," she said. "I'll tell him."

The teletype came to life: WHAT MAY BE OUR FIRST VISITOP.

PROM OUTER SPACE LANDED TODAY NEAR THE TOWN OF LONE PINE IN NORTHERN MINNESOTA.

At his elbow, Marcia said, "That was Grace on the line. The President wants to see you.

Porter nodded and turned away from the machine. Bells on other machines began to ring, but he walked away, heading for the door and going the few steps down the corridor.

As he came into the outer office, Grace nodded at the door. "You're to go right in," she said.

"What is it, Grace?"

"I don't really know. He's talking to the army chief of staff. Something about a new satellite that has been discovered."

Porter strode across the office, knocked on the inner door, then turned the knob and went in.

President Herbert Tame was hanging up the phone. He motioned Porter to a chair.

"That was Whiteside," he said. "He's got a hair up his ass. Seems some of our tracking stations have sighted something new in orbit. According to the general, something so big it scares you. Not one of ours, he says. Most unlikely, too, to be Soviet. Too big for either of us to put up. Neither of us have the booster power to put up anything as big as the trackers spotted. Whiteside's all upset.

"Something out of space?" asked Porter.

"Whiteside didn't say that. But it was what he was thinking. You could tell he was. He was about to come unstuck. He'll be coming over as soon as he can get here."

"Something fell, or landed, I don't know which, in northern Minnesota," said Porter. "It was just beginning to come in on the teletype when you phoned."

"You think the two of them could be tied up?"

"I don't know. It's too early to know what came down in Minnesota. I just caught part of a bulletin. It might be no more than a big meteorite. Anyhow, apparently, something came down out of the sky."

"Jesus, Dave, we have plenty of trouble without something like this happening," said the President.

Porter nodded. "I quite agree, sir."

"How was today's briefing?"

"They roughed me up. Mostly the Black Hills and the energy Situation."

"You doing all right?"

"Sir, I'm doing what I'm paid to do. I am earning my wages.

"Yes," said the President. "I suppose you are. It ain't easy, though."

A knock came on the door, which opened a ways, Grace sticking in her head. "Marcia gave me this," she said, waving a sheet of paper ripped from the teletype.

"Give it to me," said the President. She walked across the room and handed it to him. Quickly he read it and pushed it across the desk to Porter.

"It makes no sense," he complained. "A big black box, it says, sitting on a bridge. A meteorite wouldn't be a black box, would it?"

"Hardly," said Porter. "A meteorite would come in with a hell of a rush. It would dig a monstrous crater."

"So would anything else," said the President. "Anything that fell out of the sky. A decaying satellite

"That is my understanding," said Porter. "They'd come in fast and dig a crater. If they were big, that is."

"This one sounds like it is big."

The two men faced one another across the desk, staring at one another.

"Do you suppose." the President started to say, then stopped in mid-sentence.

The intercom on the President's desk purred and he flipped up the toggle. "What is it, Grace?" he asked.

"It's General Whiteside, sir."

"O.K.," he said. "Put him on."

He lifted the phone and said, out of the side of his mouth, to Porter, "He's heard about the Minnesota business." He spoke into the phone and then sat listening. From where he sat, Porter could catch the buzz and hum of the torrent of words the man at the other end of the line was pouring into the phone.

Finally, the President said, "All right, then. Let's keep our shirts on. Let me know when you have anything more.

He hung up and turned to Porter. "He's buying it," he said. "Someone in the National Guard phoned him from Minnesota. Says the thing came down and landed, that it didn't crash, that it is still there, that it is the size of a good-sized building, all black, like a big box."

"Strange," said Porter. "Everyone is calling it a big box."

"Dave," asked the President, "what do we do if it should turn out to be a visitor out of space?"

"We play it by ear," said Porter. "We handle it as it comes. We don't go running scared."

"We have to get some facts awful fast."

"That's right. The news wires will give us some of them. We ought to send out an investigating team, fast as we can. Get hold of the FBI in Minneapolis."

"The area should be secured," said the President. "We can't have the public piling in, interfering."

He lifted the toggle. "Grace," he said, "get me the governor out in St. Paul."

He looked at Porter. "What I'm afraid of is panic."

Porter glanced at his watch. "The first evening news programs will be hitting TV in another hour or less. Even now, they'll be flashing bulletins. The news will spread fast. I imagine my phones are ringing now. Asking White House reaction, for Christ's sake. They probably know more about it than we do."

"Is Marcia still out there?"

"She was getting ready to leave, but not now. With this, she'll stay on. The woman's a pro."

"We may need some sort of statement."

"Not yet," said Porter. "Not too fast. No shooting ~from the hip. We've got to know more about it.

"Something to give the people," said the President. "Some assurance that we are doing what we can."

"They won't start wondering for a while what we are doing. They'll be all agog over the news itself."

"Maybe a briefing."

"Perhaps," Porter said. "If there is enough to go on before the night is over. No one knows about this new object in orbit, I take it. Only Whiteside and the two of us—and, of course, the trackers. But they won't say anything."

"It'll leak out," said the President. "Given a little time, everything leaks out."

"I'd rather we be the ones to tell them," said Porter. "We don't want to give the impression of any cover-up. That's what the UFO believers have been saying all these years, that the UFO information has been covered up.

"I agree with you," the President said. "Maybe you better call a briefing. Go out and start the ball rolling. Then come back in again. I may have people with me, but barge in when you're ready. There should be more information by that time."