Contact - Carl Sagan [164]
Two days later, a severe winter storm struck, and all traffic into the Machine facility, even by four- wheel-drive vehicles, was interrupted. Some radio and all television links were severed; apparently a microwave relay tower had been blown down. During most of the new interrogations, the only communication with the outside world was by telephone. And just conceivably, Ellie thought, by dodecahedron. She was tempted to steal herself onboard and spin up the benzels. She enjoyed elaborating on this fantasy. But in fact there was no way to know whether the Machine would ever work again, at least from this side of the tunnel. He had said it would not. She allowed herself to think of the seashore again. And him. Whatever happened next, a wound deep within her was being healed. She could feel the scar tissue knitting. It had been the most expensive psychotherapy in the history of the world. And that's saying a lot, she thought.
Debriefings were given to Xi and Sukhavati by representatives of their nations. Although Nigeria played no significant role in Message acquisition or Machine construction, Eda acquiesced readily enough to a long interview with Nigerian officials. But it was perfunctory compared with the interrogations administered to them by project personnel. Vaygay and Ellie underwent still more elaborate debriefings by the high-level teams brought from the Soviet Union and the United States for this specific purpose. At first these American and Soviet interrogations excluded foreign nationals, but after complaints were carried through the World Machine Consortium, the U.S. and the S.U. relented, and the sessions were again internationalized.
Kitz was in charge of her debriefing, and considering what short notice he must have been given, he had arrived surprisingly well prepared. Valerian and der Heer put in an occasional good word for her, and every now and then asked a searching question. But it was Kitz's show.
He told her he was approaching her story skeptically but constructively, in what he hoped was the best scientific tradition. He trusted she would not mistake the directness of his questions for some personal animus. He held her only in the greatest respect. He, in turn, would not permit his judgment to be clouded by the fact that he had been against the Machine Project from the beginning. She decided to let this pathetic deception pass unchallenged, and began her story. At first he listened closely, asked occasional questions of detail, and apologized when he interrupted. By the second day no such courtesies were in evidence.
"So the Nigerian is visited by his wife, the Indian by her dead husband, the Russian by his cute granddaughter, the Chinese by some Mongol warlord-"
"Qin was not a Mongol-"
"-and you, for crissake, you get visited by your dearly departed father, who tells you that he and his friends have been busy rebuilding the universe, for crissake. `Our Father Who art in Heaven…'? This is straight religion. This is straight cultural anthropology. This is straight Sigmund Freud. Don't you see that? Not only do you claim your own father came back from the dead, you actually expect us to believe that he made the universe-"
"You're distorting what-"
"Come off it, Arroway. Don't insult our intelligence. You don't present us with a shred of evidence, and you expect us to believe the biggest cock-and-bull story of all time? You know better than that. You're a smart lady. How could you figure to get away with it?"
She protested. Valerian protested also; this kind of interrogation, he said, was a waste of time.