Obsolete Theorem Read online

  “Those look like letters of the alphabet,” Lincoln said. “How did they get there?”

  “We were hoping you could tell us,” Chandler replied. “I think you’ll be quite interested to read the entire message. Allow me to change the lighting.” He tapped his tablet again, and a yellowish light seemed to shine on the bone, making the etchings much clearer. There were three lines of characters, with the first line extending almost the entire length of the femur.

  LINCOLN WOODHOUSE. COME TO HERE AND NOW. ENTIRE CIVILIZATION AT RISK.

  41.632903, -1.847435

  417,949,518.6 HOURS BEFORE NOON 1/1/2050

  “Mr. Woodhouse? You okay?”

  Lincoln blinked. “What the hell’s going on?”

  “Again, we were hoping you’d tell us. Look at this.” Chandler displayed another image, this time of the dig site. He manipulated the model, zooming in on the drone. He continued zooming to an area of the drone’s shell to one side of the main camera lens. He zoomed even further, until finally some tiny letters and numbers scratched into the shell surface came into view. “It’s the exact same message, character for character,” Chandler said. “You need to understand we’ve ruled out the possibility this is a hoax. The message was scratched into that Neanderthal femur and the drone over 47,000 years ago. We’re guessing 418 million hours before noon of January 1st, 2050. If you care to know, that’s—”

  “I know what it is! It’s 417,780,948 hours before now. In other words, it’s 47,659 years, 89 days, and 18 hours before you interrupted my run today. I also know those are GPS coordinates with decimal minutes.”

  The room fell silent for a moment.

  Chandler cleared his throat and said, “You have a rather impressive mind, Lincoln. So, I’m sure you’ve already deduced there is zero chance this is some kind of elaborate practical joke. Which leads you to the conclusion, no matter how improbable it may seem, that this message is real.”

  Fuchs, the NSA guy, added, “If it’s real, why is your name on it, who is telling you to go to that specific time and place, and why in the hell does it say entire civilization at risk?”

  3

  Ripple

  47,659 years ago - Zaragoza Province of Spain

  Skyra turned to run then hesitated when she saw her friend take off flying toward the approaching bolup men. “Ripple, no—they will kill you!”

  The creature picked up speed, apparently planning to ram itself into another of the men. Skyra could see this wasn’t going to work. The bolups’ body movements indicated that this time they were going to be ready.

  Ripple flew directly at the nearest man. With determination on his face, the man braced his legs and raised his khul, preparing to step aside and swing it.

  “No!” Skyra screamed.

  Still several breaths from the man, Ripple dropped to the ground and tumbled end over end, coming to a stop almost within the man’s striking range. Its legs shot out from its belly. It righted itself and began running back toward Skyra. “My flight reserves are depleted,” the creature said as it neared her. “We must run.”

  The men were now running down the hill again.

  With the comforting heft of her new khul in her hand, Skyra turned and ran with her companion. Together they reached the forest-lined river ahead of the men, but the scrubby trees offered little cover in which to hide, especially with the humans following so closely.

  She slowed and almost stopped beside one of the trees. “I have to fight. The bolups do not weaken. They will run until I have no strength.”

  Ripple fell in behind her and pushed its shell against her thigh, coaxing her to pick up speed. “Skyra, if you wish to save Veenah, you must escape. They will kill you if you stop and fight.” The creature bumped her thigh again. “Please accelerate.”

  Skyra growled, but she sped up. Instead of turning to run parallel to the river, she charged head on into the knee-deep water. Several steps in, she stumbled and fell on her face.

  “Get up,” Ripple said as her head came back to the surface. The creature was standing in the water beside her, its red lights flashing rapidly.

  She glanced over her shoulder. The men were close, but Ripple was right—there were too many for her to fight. She got to her feet and sloshed toward the far bank.

  “If you’ll recall,” said Ripple, “the tall arrangement of rock outcrops and hoodoos we observed this morning was riddled with crevices. That is our destination. It is just over a kilometer away.”

  “Use words I know!” Skyra said. She stepped from the water onto one of the rocks lining the shore.

  Something slammed into her shoulder. The object’s force spun her body to the side and knocked her onto the rocks. Pain overtook her thoughts.

  “You must get up.”

  Skyra heard Ripple’s words, but she couldn’t respond. She wasn’t even sure where she was.

  “Skyra, get up.”

  She blinked. Her face was in the dirt and gravel. She lifted her head and saw a red stain where her forehead had been.

  “Pick up your weapon.”

  Her weapon? There it was, beside her. Strangely, there was now a second khul on the ground beside it. She tried to reach for the nearest khul but then cried out in pain. Her arm wouldn’t move.

  “Use your other hand. You only have a few seconds. Pick it up.”

  She let out a growl, grabbed the khul with her good hand, and got to her feet. She spun around in time to see the nearest man stepping from the water. He had no weapon—the stinking bolup had thrown his khul at her.

  Skyra preferred to hunt and fight with her other hand, but that arm now hung uselessly at her side. Her only chance was to use the skill she often wished she didn’t have. She braced her feet on the rocks and studied the man’s face. He hesitated, glancing down at Ripple then turning back to Skyra. He could see that she was hurt, which emboldened him, but he had also seen her and Ripple kill his tribemates. His expression showed his intention to stand back and wait for the other men to arrive.

  Two more were just entering the river.

  Skyra couldn’t wait even one more breath. She stepped toward him.

  The man’s eyes widened slightly. He was about to take a step to the side, to give himself more distance without stepping back into the water.

  Skyra started to raise her khul.

  “Di-kha-yalen,” Ripple said.

  Skyra didn’t understand the language, but Ripple’s words drew the man’s attention. She took another step and swung her khul upward, driving the stone blade into his chin. His head flew back, yanking his body with it, and he toppled into the water.

  Skyra turned and ran. Her ruined arm flopped back and forth with every step, feeling as if it were being ripped from her body. She ignored the pain and ran with all the strength the lion and rhino had relinquished to her. She was aware of Ripple running with her, guiding her, but the pain and effort didn’t allow her to speak. She couldn’t even turn to check on her pursuers. She just kept running.

  “This way. The rocks are near.”

  For a moment, Skyra wondered how Ripple could continue talking and running without gasping for breath. In fact, she realized she had never heard the creature breathing. Then her thoughts turned to Veenah’s face, beaten and stained. The bolup men would use her up, and, if she lived through that, they would wait until she gave birth and then probably kill her. Or they would do it all over again before finally killing her. If Veenah died, Skyra wanted to die too. She couldn’t sleep without Veenah—the two birthmates had always slept together in a tangle of arms and legs and furs. Like Skyra, Veenah could sense what other nandups were about to do, and sometimes what they were going to say. Some of their tribemates had argued that the sisters should be killed and eaten, to spread their skills throughout the rest of the tribe. Veenah and Skyra had therefore lived in fear, but they’d always had each other—until the bolup men had taken Veenah away.

  “Our destination is near. Keep running.”

  Skyra co
uld see the rocks now, boulders jumbled together and piled high. She remembered what she had thought of the place earlier that day—it looked as if all the woolly mammoths of the world had come to this place and shoved the boulders together into a tall heap. Perhaps the mammoths had wished to climb to the sky and walk upon the clouds.

  “Only a hundred meters, Skyra. We will hide in the crevices, and there you will be safe.”

  Ripple still spoke without panting, while Skyra couldn’t breathe. Her chest heaved, over and over, but it seemed she wasn’t getting the air she needed. Her shoulder was ruined—she knew that by the way her arm was swinging, her dead hand hitting her belly and then her back. Her jagged shoulder bones were grinding against each other so loudly she could hear them. Or maybe the sound was her mouth trying to suck in more air.

  As they approached the hill of boulders, Ripple said, “Follow me. You are now going to have to climb.”

  Ripple led her into a gap between two tall rock slabs. The upper end of the gap was blocked by a solid rock wall, but smaller boulders were piled on one side, offering a way to climb out of the gap to a higher level.

  Skyra stopped at the boulder pile and looked back. Through the gap’s opening she saw only gently rolling hills covered in sand and sparse brush. “I… do not… see the humans,” she said, trying to catch her breath.

  “They are coming.”

  “I do not see them!”

  “I can hear them. They are coming.”

  Skyra pulled up the side of her cape and looked at her shoulder for the first time. The damage was in the back, and all she could see was the top edge of a deep gash. The skin around it was red, slick with sweat, and hot to the touch. She couldn’t move her arm or any of her fingers. She glanced at the ground. A small blood puddle had formed beside her foot, and she could see more drops leading up to where she was standing.

  Ripple scrabbled over the rocks. At the height of Skyra’s head, the creature braced three of its legs and held the fourth out for her to grab. “You must climb.”

  Skyra let her cape fall back over her arm and stared at Ripple’s extended leg. She had lifted the creature before—when it had become stuck in a muddy river—and knew its body was far lighter than hers. If it didn’t brace itself properly on the rocks, she would simply pull it over on top of her.

  As if Ripple understood what she was thinking, it shifted away from her and repositioned its legs against the back sides of two boulders.

  She slipped her khul into the sling on her back and grabbed Ripple’s outstretched leg with her good hand. A clicking sound she had not heard before came from within the creature’s shell as it pulled her up. She got her feet onto the lowest of the boulders. Ripple then scuttled to a higher position and extended its leg again.

  “The humans are near, Skyra. Climb quickly.”

  Within a few more breaths, Skyra had climbed over the boulders and stepped onto a wide slab of rock. She followed Ripple up the rock’s gentle slope, leapt across a crevice to another slab of rock, and continued to another jumble of boulders they would have to climb. Ripple repeated the same process, helping her one step at a time until she was atop another angled slab of rock. After running to the upper end of this slab, they were faced with several directions they could go to climb higher.

  Skyra stopped and rested her good hand on her knee. While climbing, she had almost managed to ignore the pain, but now her shattered shoulder made it difficult to think. She looked over the low hills back the way they’d come. “I do not see the bolup men.”

  Ripple didn’t turn to look at the scene. “The humans are near. We must find a cave or crevice in which to hide.”

  “I don’t hear them, and I don’t smell them. Where are they?”

  Ripple remained silent for a few breaths. “I do not know where the humans are.”

  “You said you heard them.”

  “I did not hear them. I said that because I wanted you to move faster.”

  Skyra spun around and stared at her companion.

  Ripple remained motionless, although its ring of red lights pulsed once. “The men are most certainly following us, and you cannot fight them. You will not be safe until you find a place to hide.”

  “You said you heard them,” she repeated.

  “Yes, I did. Sometimes it is important to say things that are not true. It is called lying. I lied to you to save your life. Earlier I collided with that human—probably killing him—to save your life. Now I have lied to you to save your life.”

  A memory flooded Skyra’s mind. Screams. Horrid smells. A little girl’s face forcefully held over a cooking fire until her hair burned and her skin bubbled. The girl’s name was Vota, a tribemate Skyra had played with as a child. Vota had said something to her birthmother that was not true. Skyra was never told what Vota had said, but Skyra and Veenah and her other tribemates had to watch. It was what nandups did to other nandups who said words that were not true.

  “I do not want you to lie to me ever again,” Skyra said.

  Ripple’s red lights went completely dark. “I understand.”

  A distant voice drew Skyra’s attention. She turned and gazed out over the open ground beyond the hill of rocks. The bolup men were coming over the nearest rise. They were not running. Instead, they were moving slowly, looking at the ground, following Skyra’s and Ripple’s tracks, or perhaps following Skyra’s blood trail.

  “I see them,” Ripple said, “and now I really do hear them. We must find a place to hide.”

  “Even if we hide, the men will find me. They will follow my blood.”

  Ripple said, “At this moment, a man I once knew would say, ‘Get the lead out, layabout.’ It is a reference to a heavy substance called lead, which if it were in your shoes or in your pockets, would certainly… well, never mind. It means, Skyra, that you need to stop finding excuses and get moving. Follow me.”

  Ripple headed into another sloping gap between rock slabs. At the upper end of the gap they climbed over another jumble of boulders then found themselves on a wide ledge about halfway up the rock hill.

  A shout came from below. Skyra turned. One of the men was pointing up at her. Then all the men began running to the hill’s base.

  “This way,” Ripple said, leading her along the rock ledge.

  The ledge became narrower as they followed it around the side of the hill. To the side of Skyra’s ruined arm was a drop-off, and to the side of her good arm was a sheer rock face. They continued until they came upon a gap in the rock face, an opportunity to finally get off the exposed ledge. A short distance into the gap, a pile of fallen boulders had formed a chest-high barrier. Skyra saw several dark openings beyond. Some were probably too small to allow entry, but two were plenty large enough.

  Ripple’s feet clacked against the pile of boulders as the creature climbed to the top. It then turned and extended a leg. “We are in luck, Skyra.”

  She grabbed the leg and started climbing. When they were both standing on the other side, she stopped and sniffed the air. “There is something here.”

  “Yes, I smell it. The men will smell it too. That is why we are in luck. I believe the smell is that of a cave bear. The men will be afraid to follow us here.”

  Skyra groaned. “Of course they will be afraid!”

  “I have considered this carefully. If we do actually encounter a cave bear, I feel reasonably confident that I can startle it and deter its proclivity for violence.”

  “Use words that I know.”

  “Sorry. If a bear is here, it will not kill us because I will scare it.”

  Skyra closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead with her good hand. She whispered, “Listen to me speak, woolly rhino and cave lion. I submit to you in return for your—”

  Voices interrupted her, and she opened her eyes. She couldn’t see them yet, but the men were near.

  “Follow me,” Ripple said, its voice just loud enough for her to hear. The creature led her to the first of the openings wide enough to
enter. It paused there for a few breaths then moved on to the second large opening. This one was accessible only by climbing yet another jumble of rocks. The musky stench of predator was stronger here. Ripple hesitated for only a breath then scampered up the rocks. It braced itself and extended a leg toward Skyra.

  Skyra was proud of her hunting skills. She had even participated in the killing of two cave bears. Now, though, her body was broken, she didn’t have a spear, and rather than entering this cave with her skilled tribemates, she only had a creature that was far better at talking than fighting. Her every instinct commanded her to back away.

  “I am not lying to you—the men are coming,” Ripple said softly. “Please.”

  She grasped the extended leg and stepped up. Soon she was crouched just within the mouth of the cave, staring into the darkness. The opening wasn’t tall enough for her to stand, but it was plenty wide enough for a cave bear to pass through. The stench was overwhelming here, and the floor was covered with brown hairs.

  Skyra heard scuffling behind her, and she turned to look. The bolup men were crawling over the rocks at the mouth of the gap. One of them was staring directly at her. It was too late to find another place to hide. She reached back, pulled her khul from her sling, and flipped it over to grasp its handle. The weapon would be useless against a cave bear, but holding it made her feel better.

  The fingers of her injured hand dragged against the rock floor as she stayed low and followed Ripple into the darkness. She glanced back. The first of the men had climbed the jumbled rocks and was peering into the cave. Skyra realized the men might simply decide to wait outside. If a bear was indeed in the cave, they would surely hear it kill her and Ripple. If they heard nothing, they would probably enter the cave to attack.

  Hiding here was a big mistake.

  Skyra froze, listening. Something large was shifting its weight in the blackness ahead. Instinctively, she rose up to run, striking her head on the cave ceiling.