Maybourne glanced over his shoulder. “You were followed?”
“No, but I wanted to take precautions. General Hammond is worried about something.”
Maybourne turned back to the screen. Old grainy footage of Native Americans was playing now, their feathered headdresses incongruous with their weskits and collarless shirts. “Well, of course he is,” said Maybourne. “His precious SG-1 is missing.”
Makepeace narrowed his eyes. At no point during their phone conversation earlier had he mentioned that. “You know about that?”
“I know about a lot of things.”
A thought struck Makepeace then, unpleasant but all too credible. “And just how much do you know about this, Maybourne?”
Maybourne paused and inclined his head towards Makepeace again. “Is that what you think me capable of, Colonel? Striking against our own people?”
“I think you’re probably capable of a lot more than I’d consider reasonable.”
“Tell me, Makepeace, how’s the view from that moral high ground? Because last I checked your hands aren’t exactly squeaky clean.”
Makepeace clenched his jaw. “There’s a line —”
“Which you cross repeatedly.”
Makepeace said nothing. It was hard to defend the indefensible.
“For the record,” continued Maybourne, “no, I had nothing to do with what happened to SG-1. Interested parties have been watching O’Neill and it wouldn’t be wise to have him disappear. That said…” He trailed off, as if considering his next words.
“What?” demanded Makepeace.
“It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if the good colonel and his team were to, let’s say, take a little longer to return.”
“What the hell are you talking about, Maybourne?” His BS and double talk were starting to get on Makepeace’s last nerve. At least with men like George Hammond you knew where you were; he was as slippery as a fresh caught catfish. And his comments about Jack O’Neill didn’t sit well with Makepeace one little bit.
“I hear the Asgard are threatening to remove the Earth from the Protected Planets Treaty.”
Makepeace started forward in his seat, his eyes flicking to the gym bag on the floor. “You’re not serious.”
“I’m perfectly serious,” replied Maybourne. It was hard to read his expression, dark as it was in the theater, with only the side of his face visible. He seemed unconcerned.
“Because of what we’re doing?”
Maybourne snorted a laugh. “Of course, because of what we’re doing. You don’t get to steal from your neighbors and not have them build higher fences.”
“Then we need to stop.”
That prompted Maybourne to turn in his seat and fix Makepeace with a stare. “You really have no idea, do you, Robert? We don’t stop. We never stop. They can’t beat us this way.”
“We’re not at war with them, Maybourne,” hissed Makepeace.
“Aren’t we?” the colonel asked, his tone mildly amused. He turned and settled back in his seat, watching the images of red rocks towering amid the pinyon pine that flickered on the screen. “You’re a native Coloradan, aren’t you, Colonel? How well do you know this park?”
Makepeace frowned at the tangent. It was getting late and he hadn’t been prepared for the curveball Maybourne had thrown. He wanted answers, but he also just wanted to go home. “Pretty well. My old man used to bring us climbing here.”
“And I bet you had a swell time. There’re all kinds of regulations now of course. Rules to stop you climbing where you want, that just take the fun out of the whole thing. You know the big rock just north of here? The one they call the Tower of Babel?”
Makepeace knew it, but he said nothing. Maybourne continued anyway. “It’s named for the tower that humanity, speaking a single, united language, decided to build to try and reach heaven. ‘And the Lord, who came down to see the city and the tower which the children of men built, said, Behold, the people is one, and nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. So the Lord scattered them from there over all the Earth.’”
“I didn’t come here for Bible study.”
“You asked me a question, Colonel, now let me ask this of you: do you think we speak a single language now, Makepeace? Is humanity united?” Maybourne didn’t wait for him to answer. “No, Robert, it’s not. We’re scattered, and none of us speak the same language. Looking to the skies for salvation won’t help our cause. The only thing the skies will bring us is a shiny ha’tak ready to rain destruction over all the lands. People like the Tollan don’t give a damn about our planet; they don’t care what happens to the people living here, the small people like your friend Trish out there. No one is going to save us but ourselves. So, we don’t stop. We keep going. We do more. SG-1 might come back, or they might not. But regardless, when the Asgard and their buddies decide that we’re no longer worth the risk, the Pentagon will realize that it’s time we looked to our own backyard for help. And by that time people like you and I will have made sure that we’ve got the might to take care of ourselves.”