The Smithsonian Objective by David Sakmyster Page B

dog-eared page,
ripped it free
and showed her the charcoal drawing:
    An image of her likeness,
standing at a podium before a rough outline of an audience. News
cameras. On a table sat a collection stones and urns with clear
Egyptian hieroglyphics.
    "What is this?" she asked,
just as the wind whipped the page out of her hands and sent it
soaring over the canyon's deep, shadowy abyss. She thought for a
moment, even as she saw the rope at her feet moving, the peg
shifting with the climber's weight as he ascended. "Wait. That
drawing – the one you sent me. It was exactly what just
happened."
    "So?"
    "So, you knew they'd be
here. Maybe you're Simcoe's man, or you're working with these thugs
and-"
    Xavier shook his head as he
put away the sketchbook and zipped up the pack. "The answer is much
less credible, and yet perfectly simple." He bent down, extended
the hang glider's wings and attached a harness to his
back.
    "What could be
simpler?"
    He grinned. "I can see the
future."
     
    * * *
     
    In the ensuing seconds,
Diana couldn't recall the actual events that led her to leap off
the six-thousand foot high ledge with a man she had only just met.
But something about his obvious belief in what he was saying led
her to strap herself in and wrap her arms around his chest just as
she heard the grunts of the soldier reaching the top.
    And then she was flying,
soaring out into thin air. As they launched themselves out over the
majestic gorge, the sublime beauty of this natural wonder worked
its magic and calmed her nerves. She relaxed her hold on his broad
chest, loosened her legs from his, then gasped as they made a turn
around the temple and angled down toward Cheops'
Pyramid.
    She thought she heard
gunshots behind her, along with a cry of frustration, but then they
were descending, weaving slowly left and right, swooping through
the rainbow of geologic strata along the canyon walls. Past
promontories and spurs, peaks and plateaus she had only dreamed of
climbing one day.
    "Where are we going?" Her
voice carried, echoing off the sandstone towers.
    "Marble Canyon," Xavier
said, turning his head. Somehow, his hat remained in place. "You
were duped, Diana. The map was a fake."
    "How could you possibly
know that? Oh wait – right, you're psychic."
    The glider caught an
updraft that took them past another towering mesa dotted with
sycamore brush and rebellious pines. "I knew it was a fake because
I've seen the actual entrance. I saw Kincaid, just as he found
it."
    Diana laughed. "Really?
What are you going to tell me now, that you're over a hundred years
old?"
    "Don't be silly. I said I
saw it, not that I was there." They rounded the mesa, coming close
enough to reach out and almost touch its crumbling shale façade.
"I'm what you would call a 'Remote Viewer'. I've always been able
to see things, glimpses of other times and places. Mostly in the
future, but sometimes, if I focus enough on the objective, I can
see into the past as well."
    "Okay, so you believe you
can whatever – remote-view things. Why all this? Why'd you send me
that package?"
    "Because I knew you'd come,
but not for anything so trivial as recognition or fame."
    Diana's lips, already
cracked, opened and the dry canyon air rushed in.
    "You're here, Diana
Montgomery, because of your father."
     
    * * *
     
    How the hell could he
possibly know about that?
    "You got your love of
climbing from him," Xavier said. "But after your mother died, you
drifted away. Hadn't seen your father in years until you found out
he was here, giving climbing tours. Two years ago, right after he
emailed you that he had something important to show you, something
you of all people would appreciate, he died from a
fall."
    Diana was speechless. She
still recalled the day after the funeral, the day she had come out
to the area north of the Phantom Ranch, to a slope where they had
found his body. She'd searched, but no one claimed to have been
along with him on the ascent, and no one saw a thing.
    It