Analog SFF, March 2010
Author: Dell Magazine Authors
Date: 0101-01-01 00:00:00+00:00
Description: Science Fiction. 72565 words long.

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Cover image courtesy NASA

Cover design by Victoria Green

CONTENTS

Reader's Department: EDITORIAL: THE TWISTED ART by Stanley Schmidt

Novella: OF ONE MIND by Shane Tourtellotte

Science Fact: ISOTOPY by Stephen L. Gillett, Ph.D.

Short Story: ENCOUNTER IN A YELLOW WOOD by Bud Sparhawk

Short Story: LOCKED IN by Brad Aiken

Reader's Department: THE ALTERNATE VIEW: THE NICE WAY TO MAKE A SOLAR SYSTEM by John G. Cramer

Reader's Department: IN TIMES TO COME

Department: BIOLOG: CHRISTOPHER L. BENNETT by Richard A. Lovett

Probability Zero: TEN THOUSAND MONKEYS by Tocho Ligon

Short Story: DR. SKENNER'S SPECIAL ANIMALS by by David A. Simons

Novelette: THE HUB OF THE MATTER by Christopher L. Bennett

Novelette: NARROW WORLD by Carl Frederick

Reader's Department: THE REFERENCE LIBRARY by Don Sakers

Reader's Department: BRASS TACKS

Reader's Department: UPCOMING EVENTS by Anthony Lewis

* * * *
Vol. CXXX No. 3 March 2010
Stanley Schmidt Editor
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Reader's Department: EDITORIAL: THE TWISTED ART by Stanley Schmidt

As I watch the debate over proposed health care reforms, both in Congress and among people of all sorts throughout the country, I marvel again at how easily something as elegant and potentially useful as the American political system can be turned into a dysfunctional travesty of itself. And it's easier than ever now, thanks to relatively new technologies that, like any powerful tool, can do either a lot of good or a lot of harm, depending on how they're used.

What we have in my example is a health care system that many (likely most) agree has serious shortcomings, and an attempt to replace it with, or modify it into, something better. I must emphasize that this is only an example that happens to be current as I write this (in August 2009). My purpose is not [despite the misguided accusations I will surely get despite this explicit disclaimer] to advocate for the Obama health plan, any variant or counterproposal advanced by any member of either party, or the status quo. That question may be moot by the time you read this, anyway. By then, quite likely, something will have been decided—after prolonged and heated debates having astoundingly little to do with the actual content of any of the competing proposals. My fear is that it will have been decided for reasons having far more to do with lies, distortions, and simple misconceptions than with anything that anybody on any side of a controversy actually said.

So I emphasize again that my topic is not what kind of a health care system we should have, but the process by which our country is trying to decide on one, and the ways many of us are shooting ourselves (and each other) in the foot by abusing that process. That question will surely not be moot by the time you read this—because we have a long history of making similar mistakes, and will probably continue to do so in a wide variety of areas.

But we can now make them far more efficiently, and with farther-reaching consequences, than ever before. And efficiency is not a virtue when what you're doing would be better not done at all.

In principle, the system is supposed to work like this. Somebody makes a proposal, spelling out in detail what it would provide and how its proponents think it would work. Others read the provisions and try to think of things that might go wrong and how the proposal might be improved. They question specific points and make counterproposals. After some back-and-forth, everybody comes to a reasonable semblance of agreement on a compromise that everybody can accept. Naturally the process will take time, because there will be many points of view and both reason and diplomacy will be required to achieve a meeting of minds. But with patience and diligence, it should be possible.

In practice, it seems to work like this. Somebody (on “either” side*) makes a proposal and others attack it for a wide variety of reasons having little to do with what it actually says. Some simply don't read carefully or think logically, so they really believe their farfetched misinterpretations—e.g., that a provision for encouraging doctors to discuss end-of-life care with their patients implies the creation of “death panels” or the institution of euthanasia. Some are politicians in one party who simply can't bear to be seen endorsing something put forth by the other party, so they look for ways to attack it simply because it came from the other party. If they can't find a logical objection to what the proposal actually says, they invent lies about what it says, designed to provoke knee-jerk opposition. That's regrettably easy to do, because legislative proposals are typically written in such dense legalese, and accrete so much legislative moss, that hardly anybody can actually read the whole actual text even if they want to. So even wildly extravagant lies may spread rapidly and be unquestioningly accepted as truth, because few will bother to check them.

Such behaviors are not, of course, limited to any one side of a controversy. Just as opponents of a proposal will lie about what it says to make people fear it, proponents will put the best spin they can on its provisions, sometimes to the point of misleading and putting something over on potential supporters. So anyone being asked for support must be wary of all sides in the discussion.

Furthermore, not all the rumormongers are politicians who will do anything to win points for their party and make the opposition look bad. Some aren't politicians at all, but ordinary citizens who read with an all-too-common sloppiness. They read a sentence that says one thing, form a hazy impression of what it sort-of says, and leap to the conclusion that it means something wildly different from what it actually says. Or perhaps they're happy with what they have and are so afraid of losing it that they deliberately invent distortions of any proposed change, to try to make sure it will face so much opposition that it has no hope of success. Major changes are hardly ever promoted by those content with the status quo (and there are always some). They already have theirs, and they're most interested in making sure they keep it, regardless of what happens to anybody else.

Similarly, but on the other side of the coin, those who don't have much under the current system (of health care or anything else) may be so desperately eager to get some that they seize on any proposal that offers them hope. They invest themselves in unrealistically high expectations, refusing to think about possible problems or glitches in how the tempting proposal might really play out if adopted.

Hardly anybody, on “either” side, ever shows much real interest in listening carefully to what the other side is saying, trying to figure out what the actual implications are likely to be, and working toward a solution that will be the best possible for the system as a whole (which means most of the people who live in it).

None of this is new; people have always tended to act like this (though I suspect there's more interest in actively trying to make democracy work among people who can remember not having it than among those who've always had it and take it for granted). What is new is that it's now far easier than ever before for a small-minded hot-head who goes off half-cocked to have too much influence, too fast, on too many others. In the past, such people have typically had limited impact because they could only spread their views by such means as letters to the editors of newspapers, or the small number of handbills they could afford to print and distribute. Now, the internet and associated technologies that keep spinning off around it can spread information very cheaply, very far, very fast (the current buzzword is “virally"). And it matters not one whit whether that information consists of facts that everybody needs, or blatant lies calculated to mislead millions. Both are out there, and there's no easy way to tell which is which.

But wouldn't it be refreshing if that system could be used to spread the idea—the deep-seated belief—that it's worthwhile to actually listen (critically) to what everybody in a discussion is saying, think about what it means, how it might work out in reality, and how it might be improved, and so work gradually toward a solution that might be good for practically everybody? If we can learn to do that, we might occasionally come up with solutions that are actually beneficial in a widespread and long-term way.

And if we can't—we'll just keep digging deeper holes for ourselves.

Copyright © 2010 Stanley Schmidt

* * * *

* I put “either” in quotes because it implies that there are only two sides, which is seldom true.

* * * *

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Analog Science Fiction and Fact (Astounding), Vol. CXXX, No. 3, March 2010. ISSN 1059-2113, USPS 488-910, GST#123054108. Published monthly except for combined January/February and July/August double issues by Dell Magazines, a division of Crosstown Publications. One-year subscription $55.90 in the United States and possessions, in all other countries $65.90 (GST included in Canada), payable in advance in U.S. funds. First copy of new subscription will be mailed within eight weeks of receipt of order. When reporting change of address allow 6 to 8 weeks and give new address as well as the old address as it appears on the last label. Periodical postage paid at Norwalk, CT and additional mailing offices. Canadian postage paid at Montreal, Quebec, Canada Post International Publications Mail, Product Sales Agreement No. 40012460. (c) 2009 by Dell Magazines, a division of Crosstown Publications, all rights reserved. Dell is a trademark registered in the U.S. Patent Office. Protection secured under the Universal Copyright Convention. Reproduction or use of editorial or pictorial content in any manner without express permission is prohibited. All stories in this magazine are fiction. No actual persons are designated by name or character. Any similarity is coincidental. All submissions must be accompanied by a stamped self-addressed envelope, the publisher assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts or artwork.

[Back to Table of Contents]

Novella: OF ONE MIND by Shane Tourtellotte

Consensus makes it easier to get things done, but how much is it worth?

I

The truck slowed to a stop. Sign or light, it didn't matter. Lucinda crept to the back gate and peered out. She didn't see any pedestrians or other vehicles. This was her chance.

She clambered out of the truck bed and onto the road. With only a fast precautionary glance for side traffic, she crouched down and half ran, half crawled to the roadside ditch. She kept down until the truck drove away, peeked, then hunkered back down as a few cars passed.

Lucinda climbed out of the ditch, trying to brush mud spots off her legs. She looked back at the compound, a couple thousand feet down the road. There was no obvious activity, no sign of alert or of a search party forming. She was lucky things were still in such flux there, security still not locked back down.

She found herself at a four-way intersection. The compound was south; the truck had driven off north. The country looked empty west, while east showed habitation, the outskirts of the large town a couple miles off.

It's easier to hide in a multitude, Lucinda told herself, and started walking east in the gathering twilight.

A car came driving toward her. She felt exposed before its driver. Her clothes were, if anything, a little too good for walking the shoulder of a road. She ignored the twisting in her stomach, acting inconspicuous until the car was well past her.

Then she picked up her pace.

* * * *

When Dr. Lucinda Peale began her work on the neurological rehabilitation of violent criminals seven years ago, she hadn't imagined it would lead to her teaching neural overlay techniques in the depths of a government bunker. She was not so surprised to find that she was a fairly good teacher. It was more of a revelation that she could get through these classes without surrendering to the urge to run from the room.

"Neurotransmitter cascades produced by the overlay can spill beyond the areas intended to be impressed with the new neural pattern. When programming the overlay sequence, it's wise to create a buffer area a few neurons deep. Here, you would have the stimulator actually reinforce the pre-existing pattern of neurotransmitter release and uptake within the neurons. That will block any unintended spread."

As her scientist pupils took notes, Lucinda displayed images from magnetoencephalograms of a brain as illustration. The subject's name was expunged, but Lucinda knew him quite well. Mohsen Abdi had been part of the nuclear terrorist plot that had destroyed Washington. When she was brought here to help uncover the terrorists, she had helped overlay the remorselessly monstrous portions of his frontal cortex with patterns from a more placid and moral brain. Thus treated, Mohsen became eager, indeed desperate, to give up his co-conspirators.

Lewis Burleigh, the treasury secretary until Washington's incineration made him president, leaped on the practical possibilities of overlay. He began the crash program to expand drastically the number of scientists trained in the procedure. Lucinda had joined his program, though after seeing the scope of what Burleigh intended to do, it came with the greatest reluctance, and coercion.

"Of course, when altering something as complex and interconnected as the human brain, the least effect is the best. That's why it's so important to segregate areas of the brain unrelated to the overlay from areas being altered. It's why, when planning your overlay, you should avoid as many redundancies as you can, the same way a computer programmer does when writing code. By concentrating your—yes, Ms. Madsen?"

The young woman lowered her hand. “Isn't this being too fastidious, Dr. Peale? Don't we risk being less effective if we try too hard to limit the overlay's scope?"

Lucinda felt a prickle of affront, having a grad student talk back this way. She didn't mind a good scholarly give and take, but this felt different. She looked at Madsen, while sensing the other eyes on her. “Any good surgeon wants to cut as little tissue as possible, especially healthy tissue. The same principle applies here. The guidance descends from the Hippocratic Oath itself: first, do no harm."

"How is that relevant here?” Madsen said. “You have a diseased brain, just another kind of organ. The more of its diseased cognition you replace with a healthy one, the better."

Lucinda felt like her ribcage was squeezing her. “It isn't the whole brain that's diseased."

"If the brain is an interconnected whole, why not?"

As Lucinda gathered herself to reply, she grew aware of the student behind Madsen. Dr. Garritty was much closer to her age, and a very attentive student. Right now, his attention was all on her, his dark eyes peering deeply, measuring her, gauging her reactions and responses. It felt disturbing, but maybe she was being paranoid. This place bred that.

"Years of work and hundreds of cases have shown otherwise, Ms. Madsen. I can confirm that from experience both professional and personal. Now—"

"Begging your pardon,” Madsen said, “but the supplemental materials for this course are skeptical of that."

Lucinda smiled bleakly. “I'm not involved with producing those.” She didn't have full control over their education. She wondered whether even someone Burleigh fully trusted would.

"Anyway,” she continued, “if you need practical rationales, aside from not destroying aspects of a person's personality that aren't pernicious, aside from the added difficulty of integrating the new patterns, there are the simple needs of interrogation. If you expect a patient to talk once he's treated, you don't want to have overwritten the knowledge you were hoping to learn."

A new hand went up, and its owner didn't wait to be called. “That's a valid concern within its sphere,” Dr. Page said, “but it's only a subset of our mission. We're looking at a bigger picture, the broader problem of extremism. People we'll be treating won't all have been participants in violent conspiracies. Different standards will apply."

"We understand the work you've done, and are doing,” Madsen said, “but you need to see beyond that, and consider what we'll be doing."

Lucinda tugged at a lock of her hair, then caught herself. That nervous habit was growing on her down here. “It seems some of you have done a thorough job of considering it already.” She tried to focus on getting the class on track again, but her eyes kept drifting back toward Dr. Garritty, still gazing right at her, jotting down notes as fast as if she were still lecturing.

* * * *

"When were you recruited into the terrorist cell?"

The interviewer was one of many they had cycling through the position here. Lucinda hadn't seen one handle more than two interrogations. The detainee was shackled at wrists and ankles, and had his head and upper body obscured within the magnetoencephalographic scanner. Microphones inside amplified his answers, both for the interviewer and for Lucinda and her colleague in the monitoring booth. He gave a glib denial of any involvement, one that a casual glance at the scans of his frontal lobe exposed as falsehood.

This was the part of her existence under Mount Weather that Lucinda could bear, and even feel was worthwhile. This person, apparently a moneyman, had aided those who destroyed Washington. She felt no sympathy for him, since he felt none for others. The point of the overlay she was helping prepare was to make him someone who would care about those he had killed. That motive had started her down this road years back.

"How soon after you joined the cell did you know they meant to set off a nuclear weapon?"

As for the other prisoners being brought into the Mount, the ones not connected to Black Friday, Lucinda never saw them. She knew about them by intimation and inference, from the talk she overheard from other scientists and technicians. Insofar as doing this work freed someone for that work, she was abetting them. That took some of the satisfaction out of her endeavors.

"Once you knew what they meant to do, how many they meant to kill, were you ever tempted to stop their plans, or at least disassociate yourself from them?"

Lucinda paid closer attention to the brain scans now. The prefrontal cortex showed a classic pattern of underactivity, the dulling of moral awareness that let him shrug off the horrors he had helped to inflict. “Reading any cingulate cortex stimulation?” she asked.

Dr. Edwin O'Doul shifted one of his displays. “Slight increase in activity,” he said dully. “Nothing extraordinary."

So reflecting on his deeds didn't give him any particular pleasure. Maybe that feeling had faded in the eleven weeks since the attack. Whatever the cause, it meant a little less work for Lucinda, another small reason to be glad.

The feed from the scanning room skipped. The interviewer's position jumped, and the colors in the MEG scans shifted abruptly. Lucinda knew what this meant by now: they were getting prerecorded data, edited to omit material somebody thought too sensitive for their level of security clearance, or perhaps their personal and political reliability. The latter probably reflected on her more than O'Doul. She ignored the cut, and the second one a few minutes later, and kept working on the data they did receive.

Once the session recording ended, they had a good idea of what pathways in his brain needed to be overwritten. Finding a good matching pattern in the template banks was now their goal. Those banks had expanded under Burleigh's oversight, with plenty of new people getting scanned. Those people were all approved by Burleigh: old political allies he had brought in to reconstruct the government, members of his security forces, some of the scientists and technicians flooding in who clicked with him. Basically anyone Burleigh found harmonious with him could be part of the template cache, including Burleigh himself. Lucinda's pattern had been in the banks once, but of course it was gone now.

It had begun this way, Lucinda recalled. The California legislature was ready to smother their research in its infancy, until she had the idea of taking the legislators’ brain patterns as templates. It gave them a sense of control, of ownership, over the program. President Burleigh had to feel the same way. Lucinda had repented of her expedient compromise years before, but the price for it kept growing.

She pulled up the standard pattern comparison routines they used and began adding elements to adjust for the particular brain of the detainee. She asked O'Doul for information and opinion a couple times and got terse answers. He never asked her for help, even though he was making his own additions.

"You've been very quiet today,” Lucinda said.

"Not really."

That didn't convince her. “You know you can talk to me, Edwin,” she said. They had been thrown together here on that day, working on the very first perpetrator brought in. That counted for something to Lucinda.

"Yes, yes. Let's get this work done, make some difference while we can."

Lucinda turned over his words for a moment, until her heart dropped. His daughter Lauren had been a med student at Georgetown when the nuke went off. She had stayed in Washington to help the flood of injured. She had made some difference—while the radiation from the salted bomb did its work. She had been badly ill the last two months. That must have ended.

She gently laid a hand on his shoulder, but felt him stiffen at the consolation. She had tried to empathize with him before, but losing colleagues and losing family were in different universes to him. Lifting her hand, she said, “Talk with your friends, please."

O'Doul made a soft grunt. “These three templates look like our best options."

Lucinda looked back at the screens. “Yes, I think so."

She let the other subject lie. If he wouldn't confide in her, that was his right. If he wanted to bury himself in work to assuage his grief, if he made himself a cog in Burleigh's machine, Lucinda was in the wrong position to condemn him.

* * * *

The canteen was a far cry from the personal attention Lucinda had gotten under the Mount her first few days there. She had been one of a very small number then, and the scale of the work had grown to be something close to industrial. No more dinner on a trolley, and no individual room and bath. Then again, no locked door with a guard outside. The security was a bit more out of her face, though no one could misapprehend that it wasn't there.

She served herself from a long table of dishes, bowls, and plates, backed by cooks replacing anything that ran low. Quality was somewhere between a good cafeteria and a low-end hotel buffet, and she had to avoid supplementing quality with quantity. With eating as one of the few leisure activities down there, getting fat could be easy. She had seen it happening to several people already.

The seating area was muted, quieter than one would expect for the scores of people there. Lucinda looked around for the emptiest table she could find. She hadn't fitted in with any of the groups that came together early on, especially since she had that suspicious “escort” the first few weeks. After that, she had been accustomed to isolation.

She passed close to O'Doul, who didn't turn to see her. He was talking softly to other members of his old Johns Hopkins research team. That gladdened her. Apparently he was getting the support he needed from them, even if she might have felt better if she could have given it.

Her students had two tables close together, and she slipped by them quickly. She got only a few glances from some of them, and that same long look from Dr. Garritty. When she found a nearly empty table, she made sure to sit facing away from him.

Lucinda ate without savoring, even though it dimly registered that the broccoli salad was quite good. She pulled out printouts of two medical papers and got to reading them, underscoring and making marginal notes when she wasn't taking bites of dinner.

"There you are!"

Lucinda knew the voice, but was stunned when she saw the face looking down upon her. “Nancy?” she gasped. “Dr. LaPierre? When did you—"

"Just yesterday.” LaPierre took the seat opposite Lucinda. “It's been a while, Lucinda."

The affable tone made Lucinda squirm. They were not friends, certainly not after that last day. “But, but you refused to come here. How did they bring you in?"

"I volunteered.” A self-effacing smile shone from her dark face. “What can I say? I was wrong. I thought the government would be using overlay, using us, to justify attacks. Instead, from all I saw from the outside since January 19th, they've been digging to expose the roots of the evil."

LaPierre was right, partly. America hadn't launched military reprisals beyond its borders, even though from the early interrogations Lucinda had assisted, two countries seemed tied to the plot. And Burleigh was chasing down individuals connected to the attack, in America and in a few obliging nations. He was also going after violent, or potentially violent, extremists at home.

Burleigh's definitions of “potentially” and “extremist,” though, were expansive. She had seen him expound on his vision of ridding the world of the personalities who would commit such atrocities, across the world, but in America first and foremost, as a grand example. He seemed to have a lot of people in mind.

"So when they came asking again,” LaPierre continued, “I was glad to agree. I probably should have sought them out before then. It would have been, well, a betrayal to the friends we lost not to join the work."

Lucinda felt a pang. She wouldn't have called all three colleagues who had been testifying to Congress that day friends, but that didn't soften the pain of losing them. A fourth, Sam Jeong, had gotten killed in “disturbances” that brewed up on Berkeley's campus after the bombing, and that had been worse, in its way. “That's what I thought,” Lucinda said, “when I joined."

"I remember that,” LaPierre said, briefly sour. “I'm still sad at all the time I lost. If that NSA agent who scooped us up and flew us out hadn't been so belligerent, insisting we do everything today so we could go kill people tomorrow, I might have made a different decision. Lord, I hope he's not running around here, giving that talk to people."

Morris Hope hadn't been nearly as unthinking as LaPierre recounted, but that no longer mattered. “You don't have to worry about him anymore, Nancy. He's been fixed."

"Been what?"

"It's a slang term that's cropped up here,” Lucinda said, looking into her salad bowl. “Came from something President Burleigh said, according to my students. Someone was questioning him about whether we were breaking prisoners with torture to roll up the conspirators. ‘We're not breaking anyone,’ he said—"

"'We're fixing them,'” LaPierre said. “I watched that press conference. That was when I started changing my mind about matters.” She smiled. “So what's-his-name got overlaid."

Lucinda just nodded. He had recoiled from her the one time she'd seen him, two weeks after the bombing. He was plainly ashamed to see her, to recall what he had said on that day, and slinked away. That tough but thoughtful man was gone. Even if they had another chance meeting, she'd never really see him again.

She probably wouldn't ever see Kate Barber again either. Her colleague had been scooped up along with herself and Nancy by Agent Hope the day Washington died. Kate had refused to be part of Burleigh's project, a stand Lucinda hadn't had the courage to make, and was interned in some unnamed place. How interesting that Nancy showed no interest in her fate.

"Good,” LaPierre said. “We've got millions of yahoos in this country calling for blood, but now it's one less.” She took an encompassing look at where she was. “Or maybe more."

Lucinda had reached her limit. Luckily, her tray was almost empty, so her retreat wouldn't look blatant. “Well, I guess we'll be crossing paths now and again.” She started getting up.

"Oh, more than that, Lucinda. I'm going to be your supervisor, starting next week."

Lucinda nearly dropped the tray. “After just getting here?"

"I was surprised too,” LaPierre said, her smile widening, “but someone above pulled a few strings. Of course, I'm trying to get Julio from our team here, too, but they don't have so much need for low-level assistants here. Of course, Sam wouldn't come even if I asked."

This time, Lucinda slammed down her tray. “It's vile of you to joke about the dead that way,” she hissed, and turned away.

"Dead? Didn't you know?"

Lucinda stopped three paces from the table, dozens of eyes on her. She walked back, only so she wouldn't have to speak up and draw more attention. “Know what?"

"Sam survived. It was touch and go, and he's still in physical therapy. Still in a terrible mood last time I visited him, three weeks ago. So scornful, so bitter.” She tipped her head. “I think he blames you for something. Has he told you what?"

"I've never heard from him. I—I never knew.” So why hadn't she heard?

* * * *

The women's dormitory was already half-filled. Lucinda crossed it, swerving around yellow partitions and through half-blocked walkways, to get to the information officer's booth. She lifted up the ID hung around her neck so the woman could scan it. “Picking up,” Lucinda told her.

The officer checked her terminal. “You have three messages. Two internal, one external."

Lucinda put her pocket-comp into the officer's outstretched hand. The woman plugged a secure fiber-link into it, uploaded the messages, and handed it back. “Thank you,” Lucinda said automatically.

She weaved through the dormitory again, back to her semiprivate bunk. It had been a long time since she had had a private room here, and most of the women here had never had that equivocal privilege. She sat down on her cot, dialed up the first message on her comp, and found the rumors about things getting worse confirmed.

Emergency elections for the new Senate would happen in a few days. The new Senators would be coming to Mount Weather directly, naturally taking up prime living quarters. Those bumped would be coming down to the dorms. Things would be getting more crowded. It was bad news, but small change to Lucinda.

The second internal message urged anyone who felt traumatized or conflicted to seek confidential assistance at a certain office. This had an ominous sound to Lucinda. However she might feel, she wouldn't be going there.

She opened the external message and sat up straighter. It was a letter from Josh.

Calling Joshua Muntz a “special friend” sounded like a mealy-mouthed euphemism, but it was the closest Lucinda could come to describing their relationship. They were more than friends, but not lovers by the common definition. Josh's past, which he had undergone an overlay to escape, left him uncomfortable in taking that final step. Lucinda respected that, and him.

She dove into his letter, hoping it might have some news about Sam. All she found, though, were commonplaces.

* * * *

Your parents have finally settled into your house. Good idea to move them up here, out of their apartment. There was a glitch with your direct deposit, but we fixed it, so their finances are set. I think they've come to like me, even with my past.

Ben isn't whining at night anymore. I have a neighbor, Andrea, who's done some dog training. She knew a trick, and Ben's feeling better now. I still wish he could have stayed over at your house, but allergies are allergies. And I know he misses you, Luci. Me too.

My job's going fine...

* * * *

Her eyes began to skip. It was unfair to expect eloquence of him, but she couldn't help some impatience.

* * * *

I still don't really understand what you're doing there, Luci, and why you've stayed with it so long. It doesn't seem quite like you, or at least the way I thought of you. You ought to come back here, to your university. I know one or two folks there who would be glad to see you again.

* * * *

She read that section again. Was he trying to say something between the lines? Hinting about Sam? She well knew that outgoing mail was censored, and suspected that incoming material was too. Might Josh know that and be dodging around it? She couldn't know and she couldn't ask.

She read Josh's last lines, but nothing there gave her any succor. She powered down the pocket-comp. She was no nearer the answers to her questions—and she felt no nearer to Josh, either. Or anyone.

She nearly turned it back on, to write to him, or to her parents. Instead, she slid it under her cot. Maybe she could write when she didn't feel eyes looming so close over her shoulders.

Lucinda drew the translucent partition, and started changing for bed. She might read a while—or might just go straight to sleep. That was her only sure refuge these days.

* * * *

II

A roadside diner was ahead, its parking lot half full. Lucinda scrutinized its near side and front as she walked, but didn't find one. On the far side, though, she hit pay dirt: a single old-fashioned pay phone.

She looked through her change purse again. She hadn't needed cash the last eight months, and a good thing too: she wasn't carrying any when she was scooped up.

That was almost literally true. She had a dollar coin, two quarters, and a few nickels and pennies. It might be enough, though.

She reached the phone and read its front plate. Local Calls: $1.50 (3 min) Long-Distance: $2.50 (2 min)

Lucinda cursed her luck. No local call could help her. She checked the change slot, then stalked away. She wandered around the lot, trying to think of a new plan, her eyes on the dirt and scattered gravel underfoot, just in case.

And her luck turned. She caught a glint of dull brass, reached down, and found a dollar coin in the dust. She started racing back to the phone, checking her momentum when she saw people walking out of the diner.

She put in the two dollars and two quarters, and heard the click interrupt the dial tone. She hoped she remembered his cell phone number correctly and punched it in.

* * * *

It probably had no official name, but everyone called it the Memorial Room. Dozens of photographs hung on the oak-paneled walls, framed images of the White House, the Capitol Building, the Washington Monument, the Supreme Court Building, the Mall, all those places that had been destroyed. Even landmarks that still stood, like the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, had their places, though with perhaps less black crepe adorning the frames.

Lucinda didn't see most of the images any longer. The conference room was familiar enough that everything there receded into the background. She quickly found the placard with her name and sat down, managing not to groan when she found Dr. LaPierre's name next to hers.

Other people filed in over a few minutes. LaPierre sat down briskly, a bit surprised to find Lucinda there. O'Doul walked in with a colleague whose thin, patchy hair showed he'd been one of the Johns Hopkins doctors who rushed into Washington that day. To Lucinda's regret, they sat far from her. So did Ms. Madsen and Dr. Garritty, two of her freshly graduated students making a foreboding appearance.

When Donna Laskey, nominal chief of the overlay program, arrived, she took a seat one down from the unoccupied head of the table. Lucinda knew what this meant and got ready to rise. A moment later, everyone stood as President Lewis Burleigh entered the room.

He looked better than the first time Lucinda had met him. His suit was perfect, his sparse gray hair well groomed, and some of the pallor had gone from his face. Ten guards, four in civilian suits, six in Army uniform, spread across the room.

Burleigh went to his seat, then past it. “Curtis,” he said, reaching for Dr. Garritty's hand, “glad to see you."

"Likewise, Lew—uh, Mr. President,” said Garritty, and Lucinda's stomach went into freefall. All those looks from him finally came into focus.

"Sorry to be keeping you at the Mount for now,” said Burleigh, “but I own I'll make it easier on you. Oh, sit down, everyone."

They all did. Even though the president had appointed Laskey to supervise overlay matters, he still sat in on the majority of these weekly meetings. The program was his creation, his tool. Even as Laskey opened the meeting with a mass of technical items, she did it as a subordinate.

Lucinda took her minimal part in proceedings, giving the information requested of her and no more. She had made cautious proposals at the first few meetings, recommending they leave a light footprint, both in numbers of overlay patients and breadth of alterations made to their brains. Those meetings taught her not to waste her time, or to expose her dissent, however guardedly. The others obliged her by noticing her as little as possible.

New business eventually came up, and Burleigh took the reins. “Everyone probably knows by now that the special House elections are done,” he said, an unwitting smile showing he approved of the results. “They'll be joining the Senate here in a few days, and that's going to stretch lodgings here pretty thin. Some people are going to be doubling up on their bedding. ‘Hot-cots,’ they call them: sleeping in shifts."

He named nobody, but Lucinda was sure she'd be getting the short end. Living under the Mount had bred pessimism, mostly because it was so often correct. She began winding a stray wisp of hair around her finger.

"Fortunately, that will be temporary,” Burleigh continued, “because in several weeks we'll be opening up our first auxiliary location for the overlay program and transferring part of your operations over to it. It's still a secure location, of course, but it will be more comfortable, with room to grow."

Appreciative murmurs trickled across the room. Lucinda felt briefly better herself, until she saw the implication of how big this undertaking was becoming.

"For those who'll be moving, the restrictions you've had to live with here will be noticeably loosened.” The sounds of gratitude were stronger this time. Lucinda let herself smile on their behalf. “For those remaining here, we'll be able to ease the restrictions for some of you as well. For others, well, some issues will finally have to be resolved."

Burleigh's eyes were right on her. To other observers, it was a casual glance, without hostility, without plain intent. Lucinda knew better.

"From the beginning, we've needed every single expert we could gather here, to perform the therapies, refine techniques, and train a new cohort so we can expand our capabilities closer to what's needed long-term. Now that those new specialists are ready—” Burleigh gave a nod toward Garritty and Madsen. “—we can undo that necessary compromise.

"In purging the evils of extremism and violence from our country, we must be vigilant not only about whose brain templates are used, but about who does the work. This undertaking is about finding and fixing people who are dangers to the survival of humankind. Letting such people have shelter here, in positions of power over the work itself, is an intolerable contradiction. I own the responsibility for letting it go this far, but that's over.

"Every member of the overlay project will be undergoing MEG scans to check for destructive, intolerant, primitive mindsets that make them unfit for work here. There will be only a few exceptions, where the subject is known to be beyond suspicion.” Burleigh gave another of his looks to Dr. Garritty, who smiled back. “Everyone else, though, must undergo it, if only to alleviate any suspicion."

Lucinda knew she was finished here, and it brought a strange relief. Her powerlessness here would be over. Outside, she might have a better chance to affect matters, to join with others to fight Burleigh, somehow. And she could let all the pain flow out, heedless of whether some guard or camera spied her.

O'Doul put his hand up. “Mr. President, what becomes of someone who fails this test? Is he just sent home?” he wondered, a tone of hopefulness peeking through.

"Out of the question,” Burleigh said. “We'd have to detain any such individual—or in certain cases adjust him, or her."

Burleigh's rough words were like a door slamming in Lucinda's head. She barely heard someone else ask, “Could you define ‘certain,’ sir?"

"Simply a judgment call on how threatening to our safety that person is.” His eyes were right back on her, the veil cast aside from his intent. “Or if that person has enough enlightenment to own up to the truth and request a therapeutic overlay, no indefinite detention would be necessary.” The president smiled, so reasonably. “Donna, you have the schedule and question checklists, right?"

"Right here, Mr. President.” Laskey produced them from an attaché.

"Thank you,” Burleigh said, taking the schedule. “Torrance, O'Doul, Murcia. Yes, that's good, but we need to start with you, Ms. Peale."

Those few who hadn't noticed his meaningful looks turned to Lucinda. She held herself steady and, matching his brashness, said, “Fine. When?"

"Oh, now. Curt, are you checked out on the Penn State lie-detection methodology?"

Dr. Garritty looked positively eager. “Yes, sir. I did some extra studying the last month. The Penn State method's always interested me."

"Excellent. This meeting's all but over, so take one of Director Laskey's checklists, get Peale to a scanning room, and do the job.” He looked almost disinterestedly back at Lucinda. “This is a formality, of course. I'm sure there's no reason to doubt the result."

Two of the soldiers had moved to flank Lucinda. She stood, summoning up the last of her brazenness. “I don't see why there would be, Mr. President."

* * * *

The cart drove through narrow streets toward the medical complex. Added lamps on the cavern ceiling had alleviated Mount Weather's permanent twilight, but Lucinda saw only darkness.

Her head had been buzzing since she left the Memorial Room, as she struggled to find some escape from her predicament. The soldiers close by, even in the cart, made flight hopeless, even if she had known how to get out of the Mount. As for fooling the brain scans, that was impossible. They detected signs of prevarication within the mind even before a subject could speak. Only pathological liars wouldn't be caught by the Penn State method, and readings in other areas gave that condition away. Refusing to answer would only confirm the president's conclusion by different means.

What was left? Feigning illness to avoid the session? Transparent and ignominious. Pleading to Dr. Garritty for mercy? Pointless and ignominious. She had one option remaining, and it felt better to her with every passing moment.

The cart stopped, and her escorts saw her out of the vehicle. Garritty led the way inside. A few people in the corridors stared as the procession passed them. Lucinda saw them, and kept her head high. She hoped they would remember that.

An examination room awaited them, the same one usually reserved for people connected to the Washington attack. “Help her into the bed, please,” Garritty asked the guards. As they strapped her down, he worked on the computer, presumably calling up the Penn State protocols. Lucinda winced when her keepers cinched the bonds too snugly, but said nothing. Once finished, one of the guards stepped out of the room. The other took position by the shut door at something like parade rest.

Garritty touched a button, and Lucinda began sliding into the scanning tube. “Actually,” she heard him say over the hum of the sliding bed, “could you stand watch outside, Corporal? I'll get a cleaner scan with fewer people diverting the subject's attention. I'll call if I need you."

Lucinda was inside the tube now, but she could hear the door, the footsteps, and the door. That left only Dr. Garritty's shufflings and her own breath. She waited.

"Please state your name,” she heard over the speaker installed in the interior of the scanner. Truth scans didn't really need this calibration, but it did provide a little useful precision.

"Lucinda Dolores Peale,” she said. Other questions came. “Forty-six. Nogales, Arizona. UCLA, undergrad through doctorate.” It didn't shift her composure. She was ready for the real questions.

She heard more shuffling and tapping at a keyboard. “Dr. Peale, do you harbor any moral or ethical doubts about the work you, and others, are doing here?"

"No, Dr. Garritty, no doubts whatsoever.” She took a deep breath. “I am quite certain that this project is a perversion of everything I hoped neural overlay would be."

"What—umm, wait a minute."

Lucinda didn't wait. This felt too good. “Not only is this the apotheosis of government power-grabbing—something I'd almost expect under the circumstances—but it's the biggest bait-and-switch I've ever witnessed. Burleigh is using the cover of investigating Black Friday to conduct an assault on an entirely different group. I remember a time when you people didn't approve of that."

"Dr. Peale, we need to stop for a moment."

She heard his confusion and almost laughed. “No, I don't think so. I need to voice my beliefs before I'm brainwashed out of them. Treating dissent as a mental illness has its precedents, you know. The Soviet Union comes to mind. So does Orwell: you can't escape thinking about him here."

The bed began sliding out of the scanner. “Then think about him quietly,” Garritty hissed.

"What, you don't like hearing that you're everything you've ever accused your political opponents of being and more?” Her voice started rising. “You mean that, in the words of the famous actor, you can't handle the truth?"

Hands reached inside, clamping over her mouth. “I'm fine with the truth, Lucinda,” said Garritty, his face now becoming visible. “I had just expected you to lie. Now I have to start all over."

Before she could absorb this, someone knocked at the door. “Doctor?"

Garritty turned. “No problems here, Corporal."

"All right."

Garritty sighed with a shudder Lucinda could feel through the hands he still had over her mouth. “I was planning on falsifying the readings,” he whispered, “letting you pass this little inquisition, so I could have someone inside here to work with. If you'll go along, I can still do that."

He must have taken her look of disbelief as a plea to speak, because he lifted his hands. “You mean ... you're not ...?"

"I'm not on Lew's side, if that's what you mean. He may trust me, but—well, it's a long story. So, are you with me, or were you looking forward to going out in a blaze?"

Lucinda almost got mad, until she realized that she had been enjoying her Joan of Arc performance. Now she had another alternative—if she could trust Dr. Garritty. This seemed too great a stroke of luck, but on the flip side, she couldn't see what stringing her along this way could gain Burleigh and company.

And she hadn't had a friend within two thousand miles for a long time.

"If we're going to do this,” Lucinda said, “we'll need it to be plausible. Burleigh won't believe I'm four-square on his side, no matter what your scans say. I've got a cover story in mind to explain away my antagonism. Just follow my lead with the questions."

"All right.” He didn't sound sure, but didn't question her further. He took a step away, then turned back. “The president really mistrusts you that much?"

"Yes, and I almost consider it an honor."

His mouth slowly turned upward, and his face seemed to shed years. “My kind of gal.” He was still smiling as he slid Lucinda back inside the scanner.

* * * *

She heard nothing the rest of the day. She couldn't read anything into that, but it made the waiting no easier. When she lay down on her cot that evening, she wondered whether somebody would arrive in the middle of the night to take her away. She fell asleep eventually, waiting.

The next day passed twice as slowly. She had a new partner in O'Doul's place and never thought to wonder whether his absence was temporary or permanent. She worked on autopilot, worry always roiling in the back of her mind. She never gave a thought to the two men whose brains she analyzed: her mind was more on whether she should have written her parents last night, when it might have been her last chance. Eventually she comforted herself: if she was going to be fixed, they probably wouldn't let her say anything to the outside before they came for her.

Lucinda went without lunch, and by dinnertime still had no appetite. She went to the canteen because she knew she needed food even if she didn't want it. A couple of people seemed surprised to see her. She found this darkly humorous: had they expected her to disappear that quickly? And why shouldn't they have?

She sat at the table next to the Johns Hopkins group and noticed that O'Doul wasn't there. She began thinking about him, as she worked at whatever chicken dish was on her plate.

"I think he wanted it. Ed wanted them to take him away."

Lucinda perked up, but didn't turn. That was Dr. Rory Singer, a colleague of O'Doul she had met a few times, who sounded like he was in mourning.

"He was feeling so hopeless and couldn't talk about it. It was grief, of course—” Singer's voice dropped. “—but there was a strain of hatred, too. A need for vengeance he just couldn't master."

"That's just intolerable,” Dr. Mara Bournazian said.

"Of course, of course. He had to know that, but he couldn't rid himself of it. That's why he gave himself over: so they could make him better."

"Well. That was the right choice then. I'm glad he was that wise. So how do we adjust our schedule so—"

Lucinda didn't listen anymore. She fought down nausea, while one hand twitched, wanted to clutch at her hair. Edwin was gone. Even if he returned to duty, it wouldn't be the same man. It was as though he had committed suicide. In a sense, perhaps he had.

She forced down more food, until her stomach would take nothing else. She tried to look casual as she disposed of the remnants and left, but they had to see it, the horror and pity and disgust emanating in waves from her. She walked toward her dormitory as fast as she dared.

Someone swung around in his tracks, aiming for her. Lucinda seized up inside, as her feet kept carrying her. The figure came up right beside her, and she relaxed only a little to see it was Garritty.

"You're clear, Lucinda,” he said softly. “The president accepted the result, though I can't say he trusts you yet."

Her viscera unwound a quarter turn. “All right."

"He'll still wants someone keeping an eye on you, and I think I persuaded him to make me that someone."

"All right."

Garritty took a quick look at her. “Okay. I'll contact you later, when you're feeling safer.” He began to peel away, then swerved back. “I'll try to match your resourcefulness, Lucinda.” He turned and was gone in an instant.

She kept going a few hundred feet before she dared to sigh. A twinge of shame came upon her for driving him off, but her relief was greater. In a day or two, she could absorb this. Not now.

She resumed course for her dormitory. Maybe it was time to write Josh again, even if she hadn't gotten a response to her most recent letter. Maybe some of her relief would show through the self-censorship and make things better between them.

Then she remembered her new bunkmate. She would still be on her first shift of sleeping for another half hour at least. Lucinda couldn't write at her bunk without risking making a fresh enemy, the last thing she needed, and she had no illusion that the common area wasn't watched.

Lucinda slowed, then turned away. She'd go look at that miserable little fountain running in the center of the compound and write there. For a half hour at least.

* * * *

"Oh, Dr. Peale?"

Lucinda stopped halfway to her bunk space. The information officer usually didn't call for someone. Part of her thought it might be Dr. Garritty, getting in touch after three days of nothing. The rest of her tightened up in a grimly familiar way as she walked to the booth.

"You have one internal message,” the officer said, “and a pass.” He wore a smirk he probably didn't know he was making.

Lucinda passed him her pocket-comp to upload the message. When she got it back, there was a scan-card placed across its screen. “Um, where is this pass for?"

"I believe the message says that, ma'am. Yes, Doctor?"

She stepped aside for someone else using the booth and called up the new message.

* * * *

Lucinda,

It was good to see you again a few nights back. It was better to find you might be interested. If you like, we could talk about that tonight, in my quarters. A map's attached.

There's no pressure. If you don't want to come, you don't have to. If you just want to talk, we'll do that. If you want to do more—we can do that too.

Curt

* * * *

She wasn't looking at the information officer, but she could feel his look, his leer. She walked to her bunk, not looking back, and read the note again. Anger began to coalesce inside her like ice, before a moment of dispassion melted it. His plan had worked, after all.

Lucinda wasted a few minutes sitting on her cot, still warm from its other occupant, before gathering herself up to go. The information officer watched her pass with a vulgar satisfaction. She ignored it, telling herself it was for the best, as she scrolled up the map on her pocket-comp.

The directions led her onto familiar ground: she had been billeted here when she first arrived, when she was a needed and respected visitor. A soldier at a guard post took her card and scanned it. “Up one flight,” he said, handing it back, “and second on the left. Pass your card over the scanner by the door once you're there."

She reached the door and waved the card. A chime sounded inside. She waited, trying not to stare at the guard standing watch down the hall. The doorknob rattled, and then there stood Curtis Garritty, his hair mussed and his shirt looking like he had just rebuttoned it.

"Dr. Peale,” he said, smiling. “So glad to see you. Won't you come in?"

She stepped inside, recognizing the layout immediately, feeling strangely at home. She dropped herself into a chair before Garritty could close the door.

"I guess my subterfuge worked.” He read Lucinda's eyes right away. “I know, I'm sorry. Creativity failed me, so I went for plausibility. The fiction that we're lovers will let you come here at least every couple of days without talk.” He caught himself and turned a bit red. “Well, without suspicion."

Lucinda found herself nodding. “I understand. I'm not skilled at subterfuge either. Except maybe the solo kind."

His look showed understanding. “Anyway, we can talk freely now. Just keep it low, in case the walls are thin.” He had walked over to a mini-fridge before seeing Lucinda's face. “What?"

Lucinda's eyes darted around the room. “What if you're bugged?” she said, barely more than mouthing it. “My information officer read your note, or acted like it. Couldn't they—?"

Garritty glanced up at the ceiling. “In that case, we're doomed anyway.” He took two cans out of the mini-fridge. “But Lew said I'd get VIP treatment here, and I'm guessing that includes my being spared close surveillance, even if you still get the business."

He sat on the bed near Lucinda's chair and offered her one of the beer cans. She took it before realizing what it was, then looked at it funny. “Oh, I'm sorry,” Garritty said. “Do you drink?"

"Not really.” She popped it open and took a long drink. “But there are exceptions.” Garritty grinned. “Such as when talking to someone who knows the President of the United States as ‘Lew.’”

Garritty blushed again. “I'll give you the short version. Lewis Burleigh was two years ahead of me when I enrolled at Northwestern. He stayed there for business school, so we were together my full four years before I went for my M.D. We were good friends then, and if that diminished on my side, it never really did on his. When he began bringing in people he could trust for his grand project, I was on his short list. It was already becoming pretty clear that you didn't say ‘no’ to him without paying for it, so I chickened out and said ‘yes.’”

"I know how that feels."

Garritty took his first sip. “I guess you do. I had heard about you, how early you were part of the program, but I didn't know the details until our pas de deux in the exam room. I am sorry about the colleagues you lost in Washington, even Dr. Petrusky."

"Thanks.” The cover story she had concocted for the president involved her battles in office politics, and other kinds, with Pavel Petrusky. He had wanted overlay technology used in ways very similar to how Burleigh was using them now, and Burleigh had explicitly cited Pavel's influence on his decision. Lucinda played that as her motivation for resisting the president then, and resenting him afterward. Bitterness over petty politics seemed something Burleigh would find wholly plausible, from experience. She had been right.

Thinking about Pavel got her thinking about the outside world again. “Would you be able to get messages out? Without being opened or censored? I have a couple colleagues back at Berkeley who could help us. Don't laugh. Not everyone at Berkeley is like that. And there are things I'd want to tell my parents, my friends.” She stopped short of speaking Josh's name.

"I think that might be impossible. Security's looser for me, but not lax. I'll try testing the bounds, though."

"Please.” She took a good look at him, something she'd never done before. He was close to her age, his black hair dashed with gray, his eyes a dark, shadowed brown. He had a cleft dividing the point of his jaw, what she had called a “chin-butt” back when she was young and the future was nothing to fear.

"Dr. Garr—” She shook her head at herself. “What should I call you? Curt? Curtis?"

"The president calls me Curtis,” he said, “so why don't you call me Curt?"

"I'll do that. And I'm Lucinda: Luci never caught on with me.” She took another swallow of beer. “You've got a better connection to the outside world. Could you tell me some news?"

"Don't you get news in here?"

"There's the official daily digest. Might as well be Pravda. I could solicit gossip, but I'm not quite in the social mainstream here."

"I suppose you aren't.” He took a sip, and rubbed his mouth. “Well, the country's still in crisis mode, and the government's taking advantage. They have the media pretty well tamed, accepting censorship over any information that might aid America's enemies."

"The terrorists?"

"Them, and ... others. A few papers and stations didn't play ball. Their licenses have been, ahem, suspended. Plenty of websites aren't playing ball, either, and they're tougher to suppress, especially the smaller ones. Their hosts are getting pressured, and a lot of ‘volunteers,’ a sort of hacker militia, are taking down sites that don't toe the line."

Lucinda shook her head. “Hard to accept that people would go along with that."

"They're going along with a lot of new restrictions. Commercial airline flights were only permitted again six weeks ago and you need a pass."

"Let me guess. You have to undergo a brain screening to qualify, to show you aren't an extremist."

"Not everyone,” Curt said, “but most. They even did that with the new Congress, if you can believe it. Burleigh found a few members he couldn't abide and told the rest to refuse to seat them."

"I'd heard that. The Congresspeople are down here: I couldn't avoid picking up that gossip.” Lucinda sloshed her beer can. There wasn't much left. “Curt, what does the public know about the attack, the people behind it?"

"Oh, a few names, but Burleigh tries to keep them secret, now that they've been made responsible members of society again. As for anyone behind them—” Curt gave Lucinda a pointed look. “Do you know something about them?"

"Well, yes.” She laid out what she had heard those first couple of days after the attack, from the perpetrators she had scanned and overlaid. She named the countries: Iran and China. “I wouldn't call it ironclad, and China wasn't as clear, but it was pretty persuasive."

"And Lew knew about this."

Lucinda nodded. “I can't imagine he wouldn't."

Garritty looked ill for a moment, and set his beer aside. “Because the government has been laying out a lot of insinuations. Nothing outright, but enough to let people draw conclusions. They've been implying things about a band of hard right-wingers—"

"Oh, God."

"—who would've been glad to see the seat of evil government destroyed, and to exploit it to start a great purge, in America and abroad, fueled by the hate."

"Are people believing that?"

Curt's smile was pained. “I'm sure at least some people do. And contrary points of view have had a tough time getting through. Of course, those who don't believe it are getting really outraged—which makes it easier to go after them as hate-mongers and discredit anyone connected to them."

Lucinda's head bowed. The worst of it was how little surprise she felt at Burleigh's doings. “I guess the candidates have to tread a fine line."

"The ones that are left. Burleigh's got his nomination bagged. He all but ordered his two challengers to drop out, as a show of national unity and of respect to the late President Davis."

"The one they were running against in the first place. No doubt, they obeyed."

"No doubt. A few of the Republicans did too, but they didn't have a chance in the first place. That race isn't settled. Three are still running, and it could easily go to the convention."

He gave a summary of their half of the race, but Lucinda began tuning it out. It didn't seem to matter. Curt soon picked up on her mood.

"Lucinda, the president's going to be defeated. The American people won't stomach all of this forever. When they turn, when the facts get through to them, Burleigh's going to be blown away."

Lucinda tried to feel cheered, but it was like the wind trying to lift a leaden kite. “I used to believe that, back when I agreed to work here rather than be locked away. The last four months here, seeing things, doing things—that hope's fled."

"Of course!” Lucinda suddenly found him near, gripping her shoulders with strong hands. “Who wouldn't despair here, with no connection to the outside world? But things are different from the pinhole view you get here. Will you try to believe that?” Her breath hitched, as she felt her skin tingle under his hands. He soon backed away, sensing he had crossed a boundary. “Please?"

"Yes. Yes, I'll try.” She saw his relief. “So what can we do here to work against Burleigh?"

Curt sat back down. “We'll have to think that over. It's not something to decide in haste. For now, though, the best thing you can do is to keep doing what they expect of you. Don't give anything away. As for me ... I'll do what I can to get us out of here. Both of us, into one of the new facilities, someplace less oppressive where we might have more room to act."

Lucinda thought, drinking the last of her beer to give her time. “If it were only doing what I've been doing, I could stand it. If they start making me do worse things ... I've borne a lot, but I can't handle much more. There are lines I cannot cross—and they're close."

Curt reached for her again, this time gently clasping her hand. “I'll do my best,” he said. “And I'm sure you'll do yours."

* * * *

"Watch the orbitofrontal activity, Lucinda. We might get something there."

"Yes.” Lucinda did as Nancy LaPierre bid. She noted the lowered activity there: it came of the subject in the scanner talking in a fast, loud stream of consciousness to drown out his interrogator.

There were no questions about the terror attack this time. The technician in the scanning room was asking the fettered man about his associates in rural Michigan: whether they were stockpiling guns or explosives; whether they maintained hate websites; who in the family was part of his plots. None of those questions had gotten an answer.

Lucinda kept up her monitoring work by rote, not letting herself think. Soon, the questioner gave up. He rolled up the subject's trouser leg and jabbed in a syringe, drawing a scream. It was some specialized sedative they had been using here for a few months. The patient would become passive but still alert. Scans would no longer be cluttered, and they could read his innermost reactions to questions or suggestions or mere words. They would get their answers.

"Unbelievable,” Nancy said, “how scary some people are. Depressing, sometimes. But knowing our thought reforms can make a difference makes it worthwhile. Don't you think?"

The words “thought reform” echoed in Lucinda's head. “It's why I got into this field,” she replied, not actually lying.

Nancy smiled. “I know, and I'm glad you're here."

Lucinda made herself nod. She turned back to her work, while her mind turned back to a few nights before, the end of that first evening with Curt.

"This was a tool for good once. A weapon against violence, against the fear that creates—and now it's being used to create so much fear."

She didn't tell him how so much of that fear was hers, but she probably hadn't needed to.

The subject's shouts had faded to a fervid murmur. Lucinda strained to catch some of his words.

"...restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths..."

Whoever this man was, he was terrified. Suddenly, whatever he had or hadn't really done, there was a bond between him and Lucinda.

"...of the valley of death, I will ... I will fear no..."

His voice gave out. The drug had taken hold.

"Good,” Nancy said. “Now we can get some work done."

* * * *

III

He picked up on the third ring. “Hello?"

"Josh? Josh, it's Lucinda."

"Luci! Oh, Luci, it's great to hear your voice. Things must finally be getting straightened out, if they let you use a phone."

"No. Josh, they're not. It's starting all over again. Listen, I don't have much time. I need help. I'm out of money, and—"

"Hold on.” Josh spoke to someone off the line. Lucinda couldn't make either one out. “Okay, that new facility you're in, in Ohio, right, a couple miles outside—"

"I'm not in the facility. I broke out. I'm maybe a mile west of the city proper, at—” She craned her neck and read off the diner's name. “I don't know the street, but—"

"That's okay, that's great. Hang on there, say fifteen minutes. It's gonna be all right.” The line clicked and static whispered.

"Josh? Josh!?"

* * * *

Lucinda listened to Donna Laskey running down her agenda, with waning attention. It was the weekly meeting in the Memorial Room. The president had been called away by some unexpected political activity, and Laskey held the chair. Nancy LaPierre was sitting next to Lucinda, as always. Curt was several seats down, not looking his best.

Nothing noteworthy was being said, and Lucinda felt the urge to let Laskey's drone put her to sleep. She did drift away for a second, before something in Laskey's tone roused her.

"...our international students, coming in to be instructed in our overlay techniques. This is a vital part of our initiative in carrying our mental reforms across the globe. Dr. LaPierre, I'm sorry, but I'll have to borrow your assistant part-time, for some more teaching."

Laskey had barely referred to Lucinda by her name in two months. She was usually “Dr. LaPierre's assistant.” Lucinda absorbed the news, keeping her face unmoved.

"I understand,” LaPierre said. “We all have to play our parts. How soon?"

"Our honored colleagues from China will arrive in a week and a half. Will that be enough time for you to adapt your lesson plan, Dr. Peale?"

"I...” Lucinda concentrated, searching for some way out of this. “I hope you're aware, Ms. Laskey, that I don't speak a word of Mandarin."

"Our guests speak excellent English, Doctor."

"And ... I hate to speak against myself, but I never thought I was that good a teacher."

"Your students have disagreed. Several of them praised you quite highly, including Dr. Garritty here."

Lucinda shot him a shocked look, but he wasn't facing her way.

"Dr. LaPierre is also well satisfied with your work, which I suppose she now has reason to regret reporting.” She laughed, half the room following her. “So you're our pick, Doctor."

Lucinda had her guard back up by now. “All right. Let me see a schedule, and I'll get to work."

Laskey slid a few sheets down the walnut table for others to pass down to Lucinda. “Other groups are going to our satellite facilities, but I'll inform everyone here when new students are coming to the Mount. Now, next on the agenda..."

"How could you do that to me, Curt? The Chinese?"

Curt winced under Lucinda's words, even though she was keeping her voice down to guard against eavesdroppers on his quarters. “I wasn't trying to angle you toward any specific assignment, Lucinda, much less this one. I was telling people the truth, and maybe a bit more, to put you in good odor."

"All right. I understand that, and I'm sorry. But the Chinese? They're responsible—not the students coming in, at least I hope—but for Burleigh to treat them as friends, make them part of his plans? It's—” She caught herself on the edge of a shriek. “It's monstrous."

"I know.” Curt sat on the edge of his bed, shoulders caving in. “I'd say he must know something exculpatory about China, but I don't really believe that. And bringing them under the Mount? The super top-secret hideaway?” His head drooped. “But why should I be surprised?"

Lucinda regarded him, then sat by him on the bed. “Okay, enough about me. What's got you in a funk? You've been looking miserable since this morning."

"You haven't heard? Oh, right. You ought to read the news digests, even if they are slanted."

"I'll do that, if you tell me what's wrong."

Curt huffed out a breath. “The government raided the Republican National Committee yesterday. FBI, DHS, the whole shebang."

"On what grounds?” Lucinda said.

"All of them. Hate-mongering, sedition, treason. Same thing, really, with different names. I guess Gandy's acceptance speech was a mite strong for Lew."

"Oh, God.” Lucinda clutched at her hair, twisting a strand. “What did they do to her?"

"She is, last I heard, a fugitive from justice. She's probably gone to ground in her home state.” He walked over to the mini-fridge. “Beer?"

"No. If I started, I wouldn't want to stop."

"I'll cut you off before it gets bad, promise.” He held out the can, but Lucinda snubbed it. With a shrug, Curt put it back inside. “Needless to say, the president is working to strike the Party of Hate from the ballot. Even if he can't manage that, the accusation's enough to ruin them, for this election or longer.” He opened his hands to Lucinda. “You were right, my dear. We are stuck with President Burleigh."

"Of all the things to be right about.” Lucinda found her way to a chair. “So there's no point to delaying anymore. We have to settle on a plan, or maybe more than one, and start acting."

Curt sat on the bed's edge. “I'm not sure anything we do will help much."

"Curt, we've procrastinated for two months, hoping the problem would solve itself. We don't have the luxury of that self-delusion anymore."

"Okay, okay,” he whispered, gesturing for her to keep her voice low. “But the problem is pretty intractable. We have to find a way to perform overlays that still preserves the personality traits we're supposed to be effacing, and do it in a way that fools follow-up scans."

They started reviewing the ideas they had produced over two months. A few, like hypnosis, were simply silly. Hypnosis required the will of the subject, so it couldn't hold up in patients whose wills had verifiably been altered. Other ideas, like producing nested neural nets, sounded good only until one got past the name. They had no idea how to hide one neural network inside another, or how it could be concealed from scans and still have any effect on behavior.

Transferring the trait of pathological lying could let a subject slip through a truth scan: the Penn State method couldn't pick up lying in a brain that thought, in the moment, it was speaking the truth. Regular MEG scans, though, could spot the new pathology. “And talk about the cure being worse than the disease,” Lucinda added, capping their rejection of that plan.

One intriguing notion was implanting subliminal suggestions or commands via overlay. Having a “fixed” patient denounce his rehabilitation once on the outside had real potential. The doctors’ problem was that programming something so precise would require using one specific template, and it would be hard to justify many uses of it. That, and the uncertainty of the work slipping past the screening scans, made them shelve the idea.

They were left with two plausible options. The first was to perform light overlays. The patterns imposed would hold up during confirmation scans, but the new neural pathways would depotentiate over time, allowing the old pattern to reemerge. This was a great idea, if it would actually work.

"All the research done on overlays,” Lucinda said, “has been with the intent of making changes permanent. Our earliest experiments on dogs gathered some data on how much re-potentiation is required for permanent changes. I can reconstruct that, and make educated guesses about where the fuzzy line would be with humans, but I can't imagine I could gather any confirming data here until we started doing it this way. We'd be taking guesses."

"And the fuzzy line won't be the same for every single neuron,” Curt added. “A patient might end up with two patterns jumbled together in the overlaid areas, leaving him a mental mess.” He groaned. “But even that might suffice for our purposes. Enough of him reemerges to lead him to denounce what was done to him, while his rough mental condition brings discredit to overlaying itself. I think it's our best option."

"No, our best option is reoverlaying subjects on the outside with their original patterns, but you keep telling me how dangerous that is."

"I'm sorry, Lucinda. Being the president's friend hasn't stopped them from monitoring my mail. I'm convinced of it. There's no way I could upload a file high in the gigabyte range to anyone without having it looked over, and I can't imagine they'd let me send a flash drive out of the Mount."

"But—” But her frustration didn't change the facts.

"Besides which, I'm not sure there's a trans-cranial magnetic stimulator left in America that's not under the government's control. That means there'd be nowhere to reconstruct our subjects’ personalities. If I knew more ... but that's not a question I can ask anyone outside without the monitors red-flagging me."

"All right.” Her head, hanging toward the floor, nodded. “Keep looking for a loophole, but unless we find one, the light overlays are our best option. I'll start working on finding the right potentiation threshold.” She looked up. “You know, the pattern-smuggling idea would have a better chance if one of us could get outside the Mount."

"I know,” Curt grumbled, “but I can't swing it yet. The authorities are pretty stiff-necked."

Again, frustration hit Lucinda. “I guess Lew doesn't trust his friends that much after all. They still get their mail censored, and they can't transfer somewhere where they can breathe."

"I can transfer!” Curt caught himself, too late. “I'm sorry. Lucinda, forget that."

But Lucinda was already on her feet. “Curt, don't be some gallant knight. Leave me behind if you have to, but get out."

"No!” He took her by the wrists. “I remember how hopeless you were here, without any kind of support. I couldn't do that. We're going together, or not at all. Got that?"

His eyes were intent on her, intent and yet pained. Lucinda had heard Curt talk sometimes about his two teenage children from a failed marriage, how frustrating it was not to see them, to be close by in a scary world. He was hurting, but still he was adamant.

"All right, Curt. It's your call. For my part, I will try to—no, I will behave myself around my new students. No one will have reason to give me any black marks. I hope that's enough."

Curt's grip slipped down to her hands. “I know how difficult this is for you, Lucinda, I honestly do. Just remember, you aren't alone. You're never alone."

Lucinda took her time walking back to the dorm. She was taking another long step, teaching those Chinese scientists. It was another one of those things she couldn't have borne to do, at the start. It was terrible how accustomed to things you became in time.

At least she had Curt as an ally—even if it was obvious how much more he wanted to be.

It did tempt her. He was the only support she had here, and it seemed the same for him. It would be easy to grasp all the comfort they could have for themselves, but she wasn't ready to take that long step.

Besides, in her worst moments, she doubted him. He had restrained her from precipitate action for two months and now was telling her their more ambitious plans had to give way to incremental actions. Could he really be Burleigh's pawn, reining in her resistance, keeping her working for their interests as long as they could contrive it?

But that was lunacy. Far easier to scoop her into custody than to play such a game. Paranoia was becoming a habit down here. No, Curt was a friend. And only that.

Back at the dorm, she asked for her messages. “One internal,” the information officer said. She tried not to look deflated as she had it uploaded.

Josh hadn't written her in almost three weeks now, even with two of her letters intervening. His questions about her work had grown complaining, almost selfish. Maybe it was how he veiled his other concerns in a way that would pass censorship—or maybe she was overthinking things.

Her parents were still writing and hadn't mentioned anything odd about Josh. Who knew what was going on?

She went off to a corner of the dorm and read her new message. It was the daily news summary. Recalling Curt's chiding of her ignorance, she began reading it. She could only take a few pages before the content, and the tone, soured her.

She switched modes on her pocket-comp and started composing a letter to Josh. Half a paragraph in, she stopped, deleted, and started afresh to her parents. She couldn't confront Josh directly with the questions she had, but maybe others could get at it roundabout. And if she was avoiding painful matters, she had gotten a lot of experience in that lately.

* * * *

Lucinda managed to enter the classroom without being sick and got through her first lesson without bolting. The strange part, she thought later, was how quickly she took a liking to her nine students, despite what they represented.

They ranged from their mid twenties to their mid fifties. They all seemed smart, attentive, and receptive, which was no real surprise. They asked her good questions, in good English, which was maybe a bit more of a surprise. She had been restraining the complexity of her language for their benefit and by the end of the lesson had repented. For a fleeting moment, she even felt a hint of her old enthusiasm for the science, a muted echo of its potential for good. That didn't last, but her fears about not being able to bear up didn't either.

A few weeks into the course, one of her students asked to stay behind after class. This caused a stir with the soldiers escorting them, but it got sorted out. One of them stayed behind, waiting just outside the classroom, while the other two herded their charges to wherever they went after class.

Wei Lifang had questions about the finer points of tuning the transcranial magnetic stimulator for deep work within the brain. Lucinda had meant to cover this in the next lesson, but gave Dr. Wei some early pointers. Wei thanked her, but did not turn to leave.

"Dr. Peale. I do not mean to give offense, but ... do you enjoy teaching this class?"

It might be a dangerous question, but Wei seemed too reticent to be an agent provocateur. Still, Lucinda was cautious. “I do. I've enjoyed having you as pupils. However, I did resist the assignment at first. I didn't think I was the best teacher you could have."

"Oh, you have been very good, Dr. Peale,” said Wei, with a beautiful, almost musical British accent. “I hope our teachers are doing as well with your colleagues."

"Your teachers?” Lucinda kept herself under control, but she didn't have to feign the curiosity. “I hadn't heard about this.” That made Wei wary. “So much work goes on down here, we don't get to hear of everything being done."

"Oh, yes. I know how that happens,” Wei said, amused. “But it is a good exchange. You teach us the advanced overlay techniques, and we teach you our advanced work in—how is the word—neurotheology."

Lucinda didn't flinch. “Oh. Is it your fellow students teaching us, or others? Or is it you?"

"No, not me. Two of the students, and a few others."

"I see. I know a little about neurotheology. What are they teaching, or do you know?"

"I know some of it.” Wei laid out the neurology, which Lucinda knew in large part. Religious experience and response had a seat within the brain, similar to those of vision or language. It lay largely in the temporal lobe, extending to the parietal lobe and amygdala, with tendrils stretching into the brain in individual patterns. Some wag had dubbed it “the God module” a quarter-century back, and the name had stuck.

"But you do not need to alter all of it to have profound effects,” Wei said, warming to the subject. “In a compact area, you can manipulate the religious impulse, turn it in more productive directions, toward more, what is the word, appropriate figures."

"You mean worldly figures,” Lucinda prompted.

"Yes. It is true, you see, to the tenets of Kong Zi—you Westerners call him Confucius.” Lucinda nodded to keep her going. “Leaders possess the mandate of heaven, to take responsibility for peace, order, well-being. Virtuous and wise leaders deserve obedience. So this way, religious sentiment is appropriate for a great leader."

"I hadn't known this,” Lucinda said, “about Confucius."

"It is an ancient truth we are rediscovering,” said Wei. “The West is only beginning to learn it more recently. You see,” she said chuckling, “you are the teacher, but now you are learning things from your student."

Lucinda smiled back. “Learning from students happens all the time."

* * * *

She hurried to Curt's rooms, slowing herself only enough not to appear suspicious to the guards who scanned her now semipermanent pass. She had gotten over worrying about their prurient thoughts, but running to see her supposed lover would set off even their alarm bells. She activated his doorbell with her passcard and was mildly surprised to find Curt there.

"Lucinda? It's kinda early—"

She pushed her way inside, waved at him to shut the door, and collapsed into her familiar chair. “Remember how we thought we'd seen the worst from President Burleigh? Well, it just got worse. Much, much worse."

She spilled what she had learned from Wei Lifang to an evolution of shocked faces from Curt. “And I couldn't say anything for four hours, all through my shift in the monitoring room. I swear I almost threw up in there. Had to tell Nancy I was catching a flu bug. At least that made her keep her distance."

Curt shuffled zombielike toward the fridge, but his feet stopped, and he stared at a wall. “Can the president be serious?"

"Why not? Why is this any more unthinkable?” Lucinda ran a hand into her hair.

"So anyone in his clutches becomes what? Idolaters of the state? Worshipers in the cult of Burleigh? God, Rousseau wrote about this: combining the state and the divine, to be worshiped as one. And now Burleigh's doing it."

"And how long before it isn't just enemies he forces this on?” She twisted her finger, wrapping it in hair. “There's no end to it. The country stands by, and one by one—"

"Lucinda, please.” Curt had her hand and was unwinding it gently. “I know you're nervous, but that just sets me on edge.” The lock of hair fell loose. “Besides, you'll pull out all your hair if you get any more anxious."

He patted her hand and paced away. Lucinda glanced at her hand and began thinking.

"I'd heard some rumors: people voluntarily getting overlays to prove their loyalty. Even some loose talk about a personal loyalty overlay, but I never imagined such egotism from Lew."

"Ego,” Lucinda echoed, too soft for Curt to hear.

"Shows how little I really knew him. Anyway, our hand's forced. We start our sabotage campaign now, with lightened overlays. The data you've gotten me should be adequate. I can perform them. It'd be easier with you on my team, but I think I can cover my tracks well enough.” He groaned. “It isn't much, but it'll give the president a little less of what he wants."

"Wait. Maybe that's not right."

"What?” Curt stopped pacing. “You mean go for broke, try to smuggle out original patterns and—"

"No, no. Maybe we need to give the president too much of what he wants."

"Huh? Lucinda, what do you—"

She chopped her hand through the air. “Give me a moment, please.” She thought intently, pulling together all the strands. Curt said nothing, leaning against a wall and waiting.

Lucinda finally looked up. “Curt, answer me honestly, because I could be wrong. Does President Burleigh have a certain verbal tic about using the word ‘own’ to mean ‘internalize’ or ‘acknowledge,’ especially about responsibility?"

"Oh, yes. He's been doing that since college. I hear it in his speeches now, when I actually listen."

"Then it's something people on the outside would pick up on?"

"If they've heard him talk, sure. And he has been talking a lot."

A tiny warning sounded deep in Lucinda's mind. The immediacy of her coalescing plan, though, overwhelmed it.

"Early in our human tests,” Lucinda said, “we found that behaviors from the person providing the neural template could inadvertently be mapped onto the overlay subject. A physical tic from a template donor, rubbing at the chin, appeared in subjects who had not exhibited it before."

"Yes, I know that happens. Less now that scans are more precise. But I think I see where you're going."

"Right. What if we could reproduce such a behavior deliberately? What if we could impress Burleigh's verbal tic on our patients? Once they're released to the outside, would people pick up on it, make the connection? Would they be revolted by the prospect of infinite copies of Burleigh being cranked out?"

"I think they would,” said Curt, warming to the idea. “There have been plenty of interviews of people who have been ‘fixed,’ ‘reformed,’ whatever. Lew's using it as propaganda of sorts: the sinners repentant. Yes,” he said, pumping a fist, “this will work."

"If we can get a good template. He's already on file, but we weren't looking for any verbal tic then. And we certainly can't just copy his Wernicke's area wholesale into someone."

"That means a fresh scan,” Curt said, “and something triggering his use of ‘own.’ Problem is, would he be willing to be scanned again?"

"You mean, would a man hoping to impose worship of himself and his government on the populace be willing to have parts of his own mind impressed directly on people more often?” She barked a laugh “Curt, this should be the easiest part of the plan. Just pitch it to him right: your vision should be more widely represented, a deeper scan would make your template more widely applicable, blah blah blah."

"Okay, Lucinda, I'll do that. But I'm telling him it's your idea."

"What?"

"For two reasons. One, it's true. Two, it'll put you in good with him, and that means we have a better chance of springing you from here."

"Since you put it that way, okay. Tell him, oh, that I heard about what was happening with his political enemies, and I decided to act."

Curt smirked. “That has a certain dual edge to it."

"Exactly. The best way to lie to someone is by wrapping it up in the truth.” She sighed. “I think I might take a beer now."

"Sure thing.” He fetched two and handed her one. “You do know, Lucinda, I hadn't expected us to try to beat Burleigh by altering minds more instead of less."

Lucinda shuddered. That faint warning had just become a klaxon. “I know. I'm taking another long step down a road ... but no, we have to do this. It's our best shot; maybe our only one."

"I agree completely,” Curt said. “And for what it's worth, I'll be doing the overlays. It's my overt act, not yours."

"That's ... well, it's something. Thanks."

"No problem. Here's to success.” He touched unopened beer cans with her. “Now drink up. You could use it."

* * * *

Lucinda and Curt prepared the equipment in the scanning room. Two Secret Service agents watched over their shoulders, while a third swept the room for any conceivable threat. The doctors made no protest. The more secure the president felt here, the better.

The third agent finished and left, with no indication whether she was satisfied or not. The others remained, silently observing. Lucinda felt no fear, only a quiet suspense. If Curt's face meant anything, he didn't even feel the suspense.

A moment later, agents and soldiers squeezed through the door, with President Burleigh two steps behind their phalanx. Curt automatically stood, and Lucinda followed a split-second behind. Burleigh's eyes fell on both of them, and Lucinda felt the first tiny kink in her stomach.

"Everything set up for me, Curtis?"

"Just a couple last things to do, Mr. President. I can finish those while you're getting into the machine. You can take off the coat and tie, if you like. Lucinda, I'll handle it here. Head up to the monitoring booth."

"In a moment, doctor.” She shrugged off Curt's surprise, and walked as close to Burleigh as his guards would allow. “Mr. President ... I owe you an explanation."

Burleigh's eyes grew guarded. “About what, Dr. Peale?"

"About how our relationship started off. I think you've heard part of it: that you were taking the side of my old adversary in office politics, and I resented it. That's completely true, but it isn't the entire story."

Curt whispered her name, but Burleigh gave a sharp “Go on."

"Well. It may be a character flaw of mine, but I hate being strong-armed, coerced, no matter by whom, no matter for what reason. Even if there are legitimate and urgent reasons for it, when someone pushes me, I get my dander up and I push back. That's what I did to you the day we first met. Regardless of how right you were, I was pushing back.

"I wanted you to know that I did things wrong that day, and regret it ... and that I see things differently now. I see you differently now, especially after what certain people tried to do against you and your program. You've proven yourself to be ... an American Pericles.” Her eyes wavered. “I only hope you'll accept my apology."

"Of course,” Burleigh puffed out. He reached for Lucinda's hand. She kept her grip soft, letting his firm pump dominate her. “And may I say, you're showing an uncommon maturity. I'm glad I was wrong about you, Dr. Peale."

"Thank you, sir,” she breathed, and took back her hand. She passed close to Curt. “I'll be in the monitoring room, doctor."

She made it to the monitoring booth without her serene visage cracking. Once inside, where she could be sure of some camera being on her, she kept herself looking professional. She switched on the live feed from the scanning room. President Burleigh was being secured onto the bed for the MEG scanner. He had his coat and tie off, and his collar open.

She allowed herself a smile. He definitely was relaxed.

He slid inside, and Curt began asking baseline questions. Lucinda could work through this part blindfolded by now. Soon, Curt had the president talking about his policies against terror and hate, and the need to defeat opposition to his initiatives. Burleigh needed little prompting to speak at length.

Lucinda noticed something unusual and took a closer look. The prefrontal cortex was a patchwork, highly overaroused in places, underaroused in others. His sense of the morality of his actions was at once dulled and hyper-aware. She followed the exchange while checking records from some minutes back and finally saw the pattern. He was convinced of his own righteousness, and much less concerned about the effects he had on others.

Seen that way, she could scarcely be surprised.

Having primed his patient, Curt switched to having Burleigh reread passages from his speeches. Lucinda buckled down: here was the payoff.

Burleigh gave a good performance, and had no hesitation in giving a repetition, “just to be sure.” During his second excerpt, Lucinda thought she recognized a flash of activity, focusing into Wernicke's area and then out again. Was that “own?” Was that the shape of a single word in a man's brain? Fortunately, she didn't have to decide that now, by herself.

Curt soon wrapped up the session and made sure to lavish thanks on the president for consenting to assist them. “Of course, Curtis, of course,” Burleigh answered, as an agent helped him on with his coat. “How could I decline something so important?"

Like myself? Lucinda imagined him adding.

Once Curt had seen Burleigh out and shut down the equipment, he joined Lucinda in the monitoring room. They kept their conversation on the work of crafting the new template, work that would take them some time. Paring away the unnecessary pathways of neural activity was the easy part, the first chiseling of a granite block into a statue. Deciding what to include was the finer work—especially in one instance.

Curt waited a while before viewing the particular snippet Lucinda had saved for him. She noticed his attention, but kept to her end of the work, in case eyes were prying. Finally he spoke up. “Is this bit worth keeping?"

That was the code phrase they had settled on in his rooms. “I thought so,” she replied, acting casual. “Let's make sure."

It took only a few minutes to be sure, and into the template it went. They finished the rest briskly, but not in obvious haste, and uploaded the result to the template bank. They both sighed as one, then smiled as one.

"Will I see you later this evening?” Curt asked.

"Yes,” said Lucinda. “It'll be good to relax. See you then.” With that, they left the booth, their performances done.

Lucinda checked in at her dormitory's information center—no messages—then, finding her cot vacated early, lay down for half an hour to think. Next came dinner in the canteen: the salmon wasn't really good, and she didn't really mind. Then came a short walk along the dark streets of the Mount, before she turned herself toward a familiar building and fished out her passcard.

Curt met her at his door. She was already sitting on his bed when he eased the door shut. He walked up, quite calm and cool until the disbelief finally broke out all over his face. “Where did that come from?"

"You mean my buttering up the president? Did you like it?” She couldn't hold back a spreading grin.

"Like it! You—you should have told me—but no, I would have told you not to. And you totally sold him. How did you pull that?"

"I told you, the best way to deceive someone is with the truth.” Lucinda began ticking off her fingers. “I do hate being coerced. I do regret how I handled things that day, because I didn't either play along and act eager or just sock him in the nose.” Curt swallowed a laugh, and her grin widened. “I do see him differently now—much worse—and I sure did hope he'd accept my apology."

"But Pericles?” He sat down beside Lucinda. “Pericles? That was ludicrous flattery, except that he loved it. Did you just pluck that out of thin air?"

"Not at all. You'd know that better, if you had had my professor for Freshman Ancient History."

"Well, explain it to a lowly premed.” He headed to the fridge. “Something to drink?"

"No, thanks. Anyway, Pericles was the ruler, more or less, of ancient Athens. When Sparta declared war, Pericles came up with an unusual strategy. He wouldn't fight Sparta's army directly on land. They could march into Attica, burn all the crops, destroy the vines and olive trees, but the people would stay hunkered down behind Athens’ city walls. Pericles meant to convince Sparta of the futility of war, so that they would end it."

"Oh, Lord.” Curt came back with a bottle of water. “And Lew—the parallel, I see it."

"Exactly. Pericles would launch a few naval raids, but that was it. And somehow, Sparta didn't get the message. They kept despoiling the land, and the people kept hiding in Athens. A very crowded, unsanitary Athens. And the plague broke out."

"Ohhh.” Curt began quivering with silent laughter.

"The demos got sick of Pericles’ strategy and deposed him from his offices. And the next year, he caught the plague and died.” Curt had almost doubled up with mirth. “And after a quarter-century more of terrible warfare, Sparta crushed Athens."

Curt sobered up quickly. “Oh. Wow. I'm glad Lew's not much of a classicist."

"I don't think he'd even see through it if he were. Easier to believe the compliment."

Curt took her hands. “Well, it's the best veiled insult I've ever heard, or at least the best I've understood. You are an impressive woman, Lucinda Peale, and...” He stopped on the edge of something, hesitated, and stepped back. He let her hands go. “...and I'm glad you're on my side."

Lucinda had that same chance now: to step back from the edge. She hesitated ... and reached for Curt's hand.

"Isn't it time we simplified things?” she breathed.

Curt looked dazed. “Huh?"

She leaned over and kissed him. He wavered, then responded. She pulled away, letting him catch his breath.

"The best kind of deception,” she said, “is with the truth."

He digested her words, until dawn broke on his face. It only took her slightest nod for him to reach for her.

* * * *

IV

It was no use. Josh was gone. So were her resources.

What could he be planning? Was he sending someone? How would she recognize that someone as a friend? Why, why did he have to be so stupid?

She reproached herself the moment she thought that. It was unfair to Josh. But still, why couldn't he have listened?

Lucinda drifted around the parking lot, trying to look like she had a purpose other than loitering. At one point, she stopped near the entrance to read the front page of a newspaper inside a vending machine. But it was a local weekly: no national news, nothing of the upheaval.

The door opened near her. “—course it was them! They did it once before and got away with it. Why wouldn't they do it again, to Washington?"

Lucinda tried to look inconspicuous, again. “So what do we do?” the other man said.

"Nuke ‘em back!"

"But if China's really in on—"

"Hammer them too! We've got enough."

"You're nuts. They'll—whoa, look out."

Lucinda had pushed past them, not stopping until she reached the far side of the diner. She didn't want to think about this. America had to confront the terrible facts, but it was too much for her right now. She had to calm her breaths, wait out the minutes until—

She heard the rumble and flattened herself within a shadow along the wall. A truck roared past, heading toward the town. It looked Army. Her grace period was over.

She jogged down to the street, looked both ways, and dashed across. There was an intersecting street several hundred feet down: she'd turn onto that. Pairs of headlights flashed past her, driving out of town.

Then one pair quivered and steered right at her, horn blaring. Lucinda screamed and dove away.

* * * *

"Cluster forty-six complete. Moving to the final one."

Lucinda and Curt were almost done with the overlay, or more precisely, the TMS was. They had preprogrammed the transcranial magnetic stimulator before entering the operating theater, and were there mostly to supervise its progress. The finely focused EM fields it produced reached into the patient's brain, repotentiating his neural pathways, changing his mind.

He had been an Internet dissident before he arrived here. However he had gotten the story of the shootout that killed Governor Gandy, her husband, both sons, and at least four Federal agents, his posting and spreading it made his arrival in a place like this inevitable. It was some comfort to Lucinda that there were still such brave people in America, even as he departed their ranks.

The overlay was erasing his tendencies toward violence, mild as they were, and replacing his existing religious mindset with a new “module” in the temporal lobe. It was also adding something to Wernicke's area, on the pretext that his aggressive proclivities extended to use of violent language. That was Lucinda's special addition, the one she and Curt had now made dozens of times.

The program concluded, and an orderly wheeled the patient out. She and Curt shed their somewhat superfluous surgical gowns—the TMS didn't require the slightest incision—and walked out together. The filtered sunlight of an early October dusk beamed upon them through the corridor windows.

Officially, they were “somewhere in western Ohio,” at a new facility built up from an abandoned military base. The amenities were more stinting than at Mount Weather, but being able to see the sun compensated greatly. It might be through tinted glass and half of the buildings’ volume might still be underground, but the touch of warmth after seven chill months had reawakened something within Lucinda and given her hope.

They went down to the mess hall for an early dinner and briefly had a table to themselves. They filled a few moments with harmless, comfortable talk, before someone arrived to sit with them. Nancy LaPierre had been transferred with her and Curt, unfortunately, but Lucinda had never let her dismay show. “Hello, Nancy,” Lucinda said brightly. “What's the trouble?"

LaPierre shifted things around on her tray. “It's just ... disturbing things going on out there. There's a swell of irrational disapproval of the government, over our thought reform work. They're saying—you tell me. Are our outpatients sounding like clones of our president?"

"I don't know,” Lucinda said quickly. “I mean, I don't hear him speaking all that much. I'm usually busy with work, or other things."

"The president actually consulted me about this,” Curt said. “There's some similarity, but they're talking about the same things he is. There are only so many ways to make equivalent statements. I think it's a statistical coincidence."

"Maybe,” said Nancy, sounding unconvinced. “The country's reacting, though. It makes me glad the Secretary of State's undergoing an overlay, to prove its benignity.” Her eyes narrowed on Lucinda. “You disapprove?"

"I—well, yes. There's no therapeutic necessity to impinge on a healthy brain. It's bad medicine to intervene without need."

"Secretary Phelps sees a greater need,” Curt said. “Besides, I know Dr. Rawlins. She's very good. Nothing untoward will happen."

He laid a hand on Lucinda's shoulder, but she didn't really need the comforting. They both knew Dr. Rawlins was one of them. She had a copy of Burleigh's new brain template in her files off at her facility, and thanks to the messages Curt had slipped through to her, she knew how to use it.

Dinner ran its course, with more mundane subjects discussed. Curt and Lucinda parted at the door and went their separate ways. There wasn't the same clinging desperation here as under the Mount. They could give their relationship, now open, a bit of space.

Lucinda went down two floors, through one of the tunnels linking buildings in their facility and up a floor to her dorm. The same partitions were there on the same crowded floor, but she didn't have to share this cot with anyone, yet. She had room to herself, to read and to write.

Censorship remained in effect: she still needed to limit what she wrote. She was getting very used to that with Josh.

She still had told him nothing about Curt, save as one of her colleagues. There was no way she could explain it, make it sound right. Perhaps that was because it wasn't right—but she didn't let herself dwell on that.

Several mornings later, she was putting together a template with a newly arrived technician when she first heard the ruckus outside. The voices in the corridor stopped, but rose up a few minutes later, lasting longer. She and Henry ignored it long enough to finish the template, then emerged to find two guards down the hall talking excitedly.

"What was going on?” Lucinda asked, walking their way.

The larger of the two, a corporal, answered. “The Secretary of State just had his press conference, doctor. It was ... kind of a fiasco."

The smaller soldier plucked out an earpiece. “Phelps turned parrot,” he said, before getting elbowed by the corporal.

"What was he saying? Could I hear?"

"It's over now, ma'am. Sorry.” The corporal had regained his stony equipoise.

Lucinda left a flustered Henry to his own devices and started looking for Curt. After not finding him in a few obvious workplaces, she headed for his quarters, making sure she had her pass. Near the tunnel entrance, she passed a stunned Nancy LaPierre. Lucinda managed not to stare, but she noticed Nancy's head turning slowly to follow her as she passed.

Curt was in his room, and it was the first he had heard of the presser debacle. He had the privilege of a computer in his room, with hobbled Internet access that allowed download only, from approved sites. The first news site he checked didn't have the video; the second apparently had just taken it down. The third time was the charm.

They watched Secretary Phelps walk into the press room at the State Department and give his prepared opening statement. He then began taking questions. The first few were puffballs, set-ups to let him say more of what he wanted to. That didn't stop the wheels from coming off.

"No, nothing's been subtracted from my mind. It's been added. And it doesn't feel that strange at all. There's been little effort needed for me to own this new—uh, part of my mind."

Lucinda reached for Curt's hand, clasping it tight.

Having realized what had slipped out of his mouth, Phelps stumbled through his next couple of answers. Soon he regained his poise, straightened out—and swerved right back.

"My example is proof that it's not cruel punishment, but a benevolent therapy. For malefactors, it brings them to own their misdeeds, lets them start to repair the—"

Only by the reporters’ reactions did he realize he had done it again. He began stumbling anew. The journalists became eager to ask the next question. Their feeding-frenzy instincts began overcoming whatever support they had for Burleigh's actions. They didn't attack outright, but they all wanted to be the one whose question brought the next mistake.

Phelps blundered through several more questions before falling apart. “No,” he shot back to a questioner, “the president didn't coerce me, or any other volunteers. We own—uh, our own actions are under our control. Is it s-so hard to believe we'd be acting with honest motives, that we'd believe in something and o-o-o-oh, that's it!” He stormed from the podium, a bedlam of voices chasing him.

Lucinda convulsed with silent laughter, recovering just soon enough for Curt to kiss her. “We did it,” she gasped. “We've got a real chance—if they don't suppress this."

"I don't think they can,” Curt said. “They promoted it too much; too many people were watching. I think we've hit a tipping point—but we'll keep nudging them."

"Absolutely.” She kissed him again, then glanced past him toward the bed. “So, care to celebrate?"

He craned to see his watch. “Not when I'm due somewhere in fifteen minutes. Tonight, though..."

Lucinda grinned, but a stray thought melted it. “They're going to be suspicious now. They'll be looking for a cause."

"No doubt. Erica Rawlins is in serious trouble.” He looked at her. “You want to lay low?"

"I do—but I won't. It's the wrong time to hold back, no matter how scary things may get. I just hope—"

"I know. Me too.” Curt held her close, knowing she needed some of his strength that moment. She returned the embrace, in case he needed some strength too.

She left his quarters, got lunch at the mess, and went back to producing templates with Henry. A couple of hours into their newest one, her console flashed with an incoming call. She put on headphones and switched it on. “Hello?"

"Lucinda, it's Nancy. We have a new subject coming in for interrogation, and I need help. Monitoring Room 3. Can you come?"

"I'll be there.” She switched off. “Surprise break, Henry. I'm being called away. Save our progress and go relax. I'll call you when I'm free again."

She walked over to MR3, noting the soldier guarding the door. The prisoner must be important, to guard the monitoring room on his account. She entered, finding Nancy standing in wait for her. “Okay, who's our—” Only then did she see the screen showing live feed from the scanning room. It was dark.

The door shut behind Lucinda, and by some sense, she knew the guard was on this side of it.

"I should have known much earlier,” LaPierre said, her face simmering with hatred. “You were the first to stumble across the effect, five years ago, before I even joined the Berkeley team. Now you're using it to sabotage our work, to subvert the only hope humankind has to finally find peace."

"Nancy, what are you talking—"

LaPierre slapped her face, hard. "Traitor!"

Lucinda cradled her stinging cheek. So much for bluffing her way through.

"I thought you had changed,” LaPierre said. “I was so stupid. You're a bloody-minded reactionary, and you were never going to change.” An icy smile cut across her face. “Until now."

Lucinda turned to run, hoping somehow to get past the guard. He was already moving, stunner in hand.

* * * *

When she woke up, she was lying supine and shackled. Bright LED strip lights shone above her, partly shaded by the edge of the MEG scanner looming past her forehead. She heard indistinct voices, and the bed under her back slid her into the machine.

A speaker scratched with brief static. LaPierre's voice came through. “When did you first sabotage an overlay procedure?"

Lucinda thought back to the day Curt had her in the scanner. She had spoken without restraint then, because she had no one to protect. This was different. She filled her mind with miscellany: lists of nerves and cerebral structures, prime numbers, old poems. Soon, she didn't even hear what she was being asked.

LaPierre didn't tolerate that for long. A jab in Lucinda's leg brought a cry of pain. Within seconds, she felt the sedative doing its work. She remembered that one patient's terror: it echoed in her mind, doubling and redoubling her own fears. She didn't think to pray like he did, only to fight. And she did. For a while.

After that, she was adrift. LaPierre's words were rocks in a stream, sending her flowing one way or another in the current. She knew they were watching her innermost reactions to names, dates, numbers, extracting the truths she would not speak. She couldn't resist it. She couldn't even think of resisting.

She could do nothing as they drew her out of the scanner, strapped her onto a gurney, and took her by corridor, elevators, and tunnels into some deep place. When they laid her in the dark room, she sank into the cot like liquid finding its level. She couldn't even see the door as it thudded shut, and the locks snapped.

Once her will began trickling back, she looked around the room. It was small and bare, its heavy door pierced by a small head-high grille. She accepted dully that she was in a cell.

Half an hour later, she had enough energy to stand up, take a drink from the sink, and use the toilet. Then she dropped back onto the cot, drained.

She heard rough voices down the corridor. She thought she recognized Curt's baritone, and a fist gripped her heart. She began thinking of what she could do, but it was too painful, for there was nothing to do. She laid herself down, hoping a forgetful sleep would take her. And it did.

* * * *

Soldiers roused Lucinda out of what felt like a long sleep. Her muzzy mind noted they were retracing yesterday's path into the cellblock. By the time her fear returned, her guards had brought her back to the examination room.

She went back onto the bed, and back into restraints. A moment later, Nancy LaPierre loomed over her. “We got him, of course,” she said, with a curious edginess. “He confirmed what we assumed about Rawlins. By now, she's giving up her confederates. You've lost."

Lucinda believed her. So why had it sounded like a lie?

"Will you behave yourself for your base scan?” Lucinda asked.

That was the only reason she could have been brought here: to map out her brain so they could learn how to recreate it in their image. Briefly, the rising dread receded. “Not a chance,” Lucinda said.

A cruel smile curdled LaPierre's mouth. “I didn't think so.” The hypo went in again, but this time Lucinda didn't cry out. “Put her in."

The session was a repeat of yesterday, only the dosage seemed not as strong. She drifted through the quiet as the MEG read her brain in repose, but she could focus on the questions when LaPierre began asking them. What actions did she want taken against the destroyers of Washington? What did she think of President Burleigh? What did she think of a dozen political issues? Of Christians? Of Muslims? Of progressives? Of right-wingers? Of God? Her mind lay still through all of it, placidly betraying her.

By the time they dumped her back into her cell, the stupor was already fading. Someone had left a tray on the cot, with oatmeal and juice. So it was morning. She set it aside, but minutes later her appetite surfaced, and she quickly devoured breakfast.

There was a shuttered slot at the bottom of the door, one she hadn't noticed before. She left the tray there, out of an instinct for neatness that circumstances somehow didn't suppress. She washed up, then sat on her bunk, thinking.

Finding matches for her brain, creating a therapeutic template from them, and programming a TMS with the template would take several hours. That is, if they were careful and conscientious. They might instead slap together a crude, heavy overlay, not caring what they wiped out in imposing what they demanded of a virtuous mind.

And now true fear came, in great drowning waves.

Lucinda curled up tight on her cot, as though trying to hide from what was coming. She let time flow past unmarked, minutes running into hours. If she didn't count those seconds, she could pretend they weren't drawing her toward her fate.

She heard voices and sounds at intervals. At some point, her empty tray disappeared. At another, she thought briefly she could hear Curt. She thought of crying out to him, but an ache from yesterday's stunning dissuaded her. She listened, but did not hear him again.

Her door snicked again, and she saw a new tray slide inside. Hours had passed—meaning her overlay would be coming that much sooner. She stayed on the cot, having no stomach for her last meal.

There were footsteps, coming close. The door snicked and its handle jiggled. Lucinda uncurled from her fetal tuck, some deep part of her not wanting to be found that way at the end.

Voices down the corridor called out. The door handle jerked once and fell still. Footsteps ran away.

Lucinda let out a sobbing breath. By now, the suspense was as much torment as the horror to come. It was several minutes before she thought back, wondering whether that guard had locked the door again before leaving. Maybe, just maybe...

There were more shouts. Someone ran past, and now she could make him out. “Have them report here. Everyone who will respond! We need to hold the building...” He turned a corner, and his voice faded. She tried to puzzle out what was happening.

Then she heard the dull, distant thud. Then another. Then a long rattle of gunfire.

The yawning pit already in her stomach turned into a canyon. A fight was breaking out. No, a battle. She pulled her legs back up to her chest.

She detested violence, for itself and for the fear it created. This is what she had striven to fight with neural overlays. This is what President Burleigh told the world he was fighting. Now their mirror-image ambitions had brought it into being, here.

She closed her ears—tried not to hear the shouts down the hall, demanding to know what was happening—tried not to hear the spasms of gunfire, the concussive booms, and the screams that came not from fear, but from agony. She sank into a fugue of trauma, hoping the bloodshed would pass by her door like the last plague of Egypt.

The gunfire sputtered out. Sharp voices rose above thumping bootsteps. The cell door clanged and crashed open, sending the tray's contents flying. A soldier in heavy pack and with a big rifle filled the doorway. Lucinda screamed with all her built-up terror, but only a squeak came out.

"It's okay,” the big soldier said. “The cavalry's here."

* * * *

A semblance of order began to emerge over several hours. It took Lucinda that long to feel like her life was her own again.

First she was in a makeshift triage, helping army medics and some colleagues tend to the wounded from the battle. The numbers were not overwhelming, and thankfully she didn't recognize any of the casualties. Lucinda found it incongruously calming. She was helping to heal again.

Then she was being led back to her dorm for temporary safekeeping. Soldiers walked most of the hallways. A few of them, she knew as guards. They must have changed sides when there was finally another side to change to. She kept her eyes away from the bullet holes and smashed glass and the few smears of dark red.

Then she cooled her heels in a dorm about half full, listening and sometimes talking to colleagues. Some of them were relieved, some frightened. A good number of them weren't there at all. True believers, Lucinda guessed, now filling the cells in the deep basements. At least she hoped they had been captured, not cut down.

She felt a tiny pang of regret for Nancy, incarcerated, perhaps even in the cell Lucinda had occupied. Then she pinched it out like a candle flame.

A few hours later, two soldiers arrived to distribute rations, while another worked at the information booth. After ten minutes, he whistled for attention. “The censorship blocks are disabled at this terminal. You can now e-mail out freely—but one at a time!” His final shout barely slowed the rush to the booth.

Lucinda hung back, taking out her pocket-comp. By the time the line brought her to the front, she had a rambling letter to her parents ready to send. She didn't try to impose order on the jumbled mess of things she had kept bottled up for months, save to write that she loved them and hoped to see them soon.

Writing a shorter letter to Josh took longer. She had to explain her long sojourn in Burleigh's orbit, her inability to say what was happening, her recent alienation. Keeping things out of the letter took even more time. Maybe it was cowardice, but she hoped something would make it unnecessary.

A while later, as she sat on her bunk picking at rations, an officer arrived. “The buildings are now secure,” she announced. “We can't let you leave the base yet, but you're free to move around inside. We'll tell you more when we can."

She left and some of the women trickled after her. Lucinda joined them, eyes peeled. It didn't take very long to spy him, heading toward her dorm. “Curt!"

She had seen him twice briefly after they were freed, but got separated each time. Not now. She dashed over and threw her arms around him. In his arms, she felt the last tremor of fear from the last two days shiver her and depart.

"So what's happening here?” she asked him.

"Well, I e-mailed the kids, tried to explain what's going on. Hopefully later I—"

"No, about everything. Has Burleigh been deposed? Is it civil war? When can we leave?"

"To the last, not yet,” Curt said. “To the others, who knows? Looks like we'll be doing nothing for a while—except celebrating our success.” He moved closer for a kiss, but her expression stopped him. “Okay, that came out wrong."

"You're right, it did. So what? Let's go."

* * * *

In the time she didn't spend with Curt, Lucinda began pulling together the base scans of patients who had passed through the facility. No one had ever had an overlay reversed, and she could only speculate how successful any attempt would be. But it would have to do some good for those poor souls whose minds they—she—had altered against their will. Ethics compelled her to try.

She had most of the data organized within a couple days, ready to go. But there was nowhere to go yet.

News came in through the computers, their filters now removed. The Phelps fiasco had apparently triggered much of the armed forces to rise up against Burleigh. Mount Weather was under siege, its landlines cut and its transmissions jammed. In the rest of the country, Burleigh's subordinates were being rounded up or fleeing on their own.

Standard news sites were in a state of shock. Much of their news was coming from local reports, the many individual voices that had fallen silent the last eight months. Many of them were jubilant. Many of them sounded ugly. None of them said when anyone could leave this place.

Curt could get no good answers, either. “They keep stonewalling me,” he told Lucinda. “I wonder if they still think I'm Lew's close personal friend?"

"No, they can't. Things are just in flux. Half the soldiers here are filling space, with no idea what to do. Two days just isn't long enough to put a whole country back together."

"I guess not.” He smirked. “We'll have to give them three."

Near noon on that third day, Curt found Lucinda in the library room, collating brain scans. “We've got a visitor coming, and he wants to see us. Both of us."

"Who?"

"Governor Kendall. He's—I guess he's the president now."

Rance Kendall of Kentucky had lost the Republican nomination, but gotten the VP slot. He had disappeared when Burleigh's crackdown came and apparently hadn't been worth hunting down. It was an unusual failure of Burleigh's exhaustiveness.

"He'll be here at one,” Curt said. “You'll be—?"

"Yes, I'll be ready."

She closed up her work, got a shower in the dorm, and changed into her last remaining clean outfit. Curt joined her outside the dorm just before one. A few minutes later, a sergeant came and asked them to follow him.

They went to the main meeting room, the one with the sole crepe-edged picture of the White House in pale imitation of Mount Weather's Memorial Room. There was no extra guard outside, and the only person waiting inside was a tall, lanky civilian with gray hair and a gray suit. Curt began stammering out a greeting, but Kendall cut him short.

"You must be Dr. Garritty. I'm Rance Kendall. It's an honor to meet you, sir.” He stopped pumping Curt's hand and switched to Lucinda. “And you, Dr. Peale. You've both done your country a great service, a historic service. Please, sit down."

Kendall took the head of the table. Curt and Lucinda sat in the first chairs down the right side. Curt said, “This is an unexpected honor, Mist—um, how should I address you, sir?"

"That's a fair question. The rump Republican convention named me the replacement nominee yesterday, and the full convention will confirm that whenever they can meet. That pretty much guarantees my election, even if the Democrats hadn't forfeited their moral right to run after their assaults on us. As for the succession now—” He gave a disarming shrug. “The guilty parties cannot be allowed to hold power through legalisms, and as I'm now the head of the opposition, it falls to me. For now, though, ‘sir’ is fine."

Lucinda accepted the arguments, disturbed as she was that they needed to be made. She still had a qualm. “What about the army, sir? Seems to me they've been in control for a couple days, here at least."

"They did what was necessary,” Kendall said. “They bore having members of their ranks being given the treatment as long as they could, and then they defended the country and the Constitution, as best they could. That done, now they will stand aside. America cannot be perceived as being under military control, must less actually being so. You have my word, doctor."

Lucinda nodded. Kendall had a superb speaking voice, well modulated for this intimate talk. He exuded an air of sincerity.

"Now, I've been briefed on the efforts you made to expose Burleigh's infamies, the risks you took, the price you nearly paid. I must say, words cannot contain the gratitude our country owes you. You will receive the appropriate rewards, in time."

"That's very kind, sir,” Lucinda said past the rush of pride in her chest, “but if you could see clear to let us go home, that would go very far in satisfying us."

Kendall's smile turned sad. “Would that it were that simple, Dr. Peale. Truth is, we still need your efforts. There remains much work ahead of us."

"I understand that, sir. There are a great many involuntary overlays we need to try to reverse. I'm willing to work on that, but it would be a great deal easier if I could do it back at Cal. Berkeley, back home."

"I'm sorry,” said Kendall. “That won't be possible for a while—and no offense, but Berkeley is the last place I'd choose for any part of this undertaking. Not that reversing the overlays is unimportant. There are easily thousands, even tens of thousands of people Burleigh has scarred, and maybe as many as a hundred honestly had it coming. We have to restore them from their mind wipes as best as possible, but there's also much more we need to do now."

Lucinda hadn't noticed the perpetual knot in her stomach often the last couple of months. She only noticed it now, when it returned.

"He diverted masses of resources to his partisan witch hunt, while ignoring and suppressing facts about Black Friday. I doubt you've heard who was really behind the bombing, but—"

"You mean Iran?” Lucinda said. “And maybe China?” Kendall had briefly gone blank. “I was present for the earliest interrogations."

"So you were,” Kendall said. “My mistake. So you know the full magnitude of their misprision, their assault against America instead of her true enemies."

His modulated voice was growing strident. “Burleigh and his crew—his party—have proven themselves an existential threat to America and to our liberties. That cancer cannot be tolerated. We have to eliminate it, with the selfsame method they used in trying to spread it. It's time to change their minds, for the better. And perhaps a great deal more."

Curt finally spoke. “We're going to be doing more overlays?"

"After all those gross abuses?” Lucinda added.

"When neural overlay has been proven so dangerous—"

"That's just the point, Dr. Garritty,” Kendall said. “You both must understand, the genie is now out of the bottle. Its power is loose upon the earth, available to whoever will use it as a tool, or a weapon. If we forbear to use this tool until the Democrats regain power—and they will: the wheel always turns—they will use it against us again, on all of America and anywhere else they can reach. By the time they're done, they will have abolished even the possibility of dissent against them.

"With the tool in our hands, we can forestall them. We can fight their absolutism right at the source, keep that nightmare philosophy out of power, perhaps permanently, if we're fortunate. The question now, doctors, is not ‘whether,’ but ‘who.’ Who will benefit from this power, us or them?” He dropped his voice. “It must not be them."

In the silence that followed, Lucinda yet heard a scream, inside her own mind. This was impossible, unthinkable. But no, nothing had started yet. It wasn't too late. She turned to Curt—

—who was slowly, and now more rapidly, nodding his head at Rance Kendall.

"You're right, Mister President. Sad to say."

"It is sad,” Kendall said, “but the greatest necessities are usually sad ones.” He turned. “Dr. Peale, what say you?"

His eyes transfixed her, pinning her like a butterfly in a collector's case. She drew two short breaths through the pain in her chest. “Mr. Kendall ... sir ... I'm sorry, but I cannot work for you now."

Kendall frowned. “Lucinda—” Curt started.

Lucinda's voice was trembling. “When the agents brought me to Mount Weather, I could see, from the helicopter, Washington still burning a hundred miles away. That's how long Burleigh had me working, without any let up—until four days ago, when it was almost my turn to be ‘fixed,’ to have my mind wiped. I am ... oh, God, I am so tired. I can't ... I can't..."

Lucinda was sobbing. Curt reached for her, enfolding her stiff body with his arm.

"...can't start this all over again. No..."

Curt patted her shoulder with his free hand. “Gov—Mr. Pre—sir, for what it's worth, I will vouch for the terrible pressures Lucinda has endured over the last eight months. Much of that time she was completely alone, everyone around her enemies, no one she could trust. And all that time, she was compelled to perform acts that violated her ethics and conscience.” He looked pityingly on her. “Everyone has limits."

"Of course, of course. Dr. Peale?” He waited until Lucinda lifted her eyes. “Doctor, I won't rush your decision. You take whatever time you need. For now, though, you do have those base scans of the overlay victims. I will see that they, and others, are used promptly to restore as many people as possible."

Lucinda nodded jerkily, as she began to recover from her outburst. Kendall reached to shake her hand. Her grip was still weak.

"Thank you again, Dr. Peale, for what you've done and what you've borne.” He took Curt's hand. “And you, too, Dr. Garritty. I'll have people in contact with you soon.” He got up, and by the time the others could stand, he was already leaving, without a trace of ceremony.

Lucinda snuffled and rubbed her face. “I'm sorry I made that scene, Curt."

"It's okay, it's okay.” He embraced her again, and still she didn't yield. “A delayed reaction. I don't blame you at all. But please, let me know how to help."

She pulled herself away gently. “I just need some time alone to pull myself together.” She forced a smile. “I'll be better tomorrow, honest."

She headed toward the door, but Curt trailed her. “If what the president said disturbed you, Lucinda, gave you doubts, we really—"

"No, Curt. No doubts. Like I said, I'm terribly tired."

He smiled and nodded. Lucinda kept her own pleasure inside. He believed her, because he wanted to believe her—even though she had told him several times, the best way to hide lies was within truths.

She squeezed his hand at the door and girded herself to tell him that one unequivocal lie. To her relief, it was easy.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Curt.” And she walked away, not looking back.

* * * *

She rolled into the tall grass, then got onto all fours and started to crawl away. A cry of “Dr. Peale!” stopped her for a second. He seemed familiar....

"Luci!"

That voice she knew. She scrambled back toward the road, as the passenger door swung open. She dove inside, and had her arms around Josh Muntz in an instant. “Oh God, Josh. So good to see you."

"Oh, Luci, thank God you're safe."

"Not yet, we aren't.” She pulled back and only then noticed Josh's other passenger. “Sam!"

Sam Jeong was half reclining in the back seat, to accommodate his braced leg. She reached over the seat back to surprise him with his own hug. “I thought you'd been killed,” she said.

"Almost was,” said Sam. “And we feared the worst about you, that you'd been—"

"Almost was,” she said. Josh was pulling back into traffic. “No, Josh, not west. Turn us around and go north for a couple miles."

As they made their turn in the diner's parking lot, Lucinda saw fresh headlights coming from the direction of the base. She hid herself under the dashboard. “What are you doing here? Why didn't you tell me?"

"We decided to drive cross-country to get you home after your last e-mail,” Josh said. “We thought Burleigh's bullies might still be tapping things, so we didn't say anything and made sure your parents didn't either."

So that's why she had gotten no replies. “And Sam, where have you been?"

"Hiding out, here and there. I hunkered down with Josh's dad for a few months. We thought the authorities might check your parents’ place, and they did."

Lucinda hadn't the luxury to feel outraged that moment. “Where were you thinking of taking me?"

"Ummm ... we hadn't really decided,” Josh said. “We meant to collect you and head back to California. Good an idea as any."

"So what's the crisis?” Sam asked. “Are the Democrats getting back in control?"

They were northbound, and Lucinda sat back up. “Worse, Sam. Kendall, the Republicans, they're intent on doing the same things Burleigh did. Overlaying ideological enemies, eliminating dissent. ‘Us or them,’ he said right to me, six hours ago. That's when I decided to escape."

Both men said “Oh God,” as one. Sam went on. “I can see where Kendall's coming from, but—"

"But nothing!” Josh shouted. “If Lucinda says we're fighting them, we are. So are we?"

Lucinda could not bring herself to look Josh in the eyes. He was so ready to support her, and she had betrayed him. And the man she had betrayed him with—how fast one's feelings could change. How fast a crisis could reveal true character.

How much would Josh's feelings change when she finally confessed her true character to him? She would do it—once they were off the road, resting for a while—but this moment, she had to lead.

"We're fighting them. I'm not sure how yet. Maybe we should stop somewhere with Internet access and get my story out. Or maybe I should get my story composed now, so I'm not trying to hurry and stumbling over words."

"I know who you can contact,” Sam said. “Frances Roselli at UCLA. I've gotten secret messages to her a few times. She'll be on your side."

Lucinda chuckled bleakly. Frances had left the Berkeley team early on, because she didn't like the turn toward politics overlay research had taken—a turn facilitated by Lucinda. A whole lot had happened since then.

"I'll write to her,” she said. “I'll write to plenty of people. That'll ensure word gets around."

"And if that isn't enough?” Josh asked.

Lucinda thought, then laughed again. “Kendall seemed to use the word ‘now’ very often when he spoke to us. Sauce for the goose."

Sam chuckled in quick, staccato bursts. Josh grinned at the show of confidence. Lucinda smiled for their benefit, even as she considered the odds.

Maybe President Kendall was right. Neural impression might be beyond control, and the only choice left was who would employ it to their ends.

But she wouldn't concede that without a fight.

They drove on, the car turning west toward the last glow of sunset light on the horizon.

Copyright © 2010 Shane Tourtellotte

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Earlier “First Impression” stories include “Trial by Fire” [April 2007], “Acts of Conscience” [March 2005], and “A New Man” [October 2003].)

[Back to Table of Contents]

Science Fact: ISOTOPY by Stephen L. Gillett, Ph.D.

Isotopes may be an old concept, but it's still important on the frontiers.

It sounds like something that's illegal in various backward places, huh? But it actually does mean the study of isotopes. The applications of measuring isotopic variations are now legion in the natural sciences, and they run from prosaic to very glamorous indeed.

Of course, we all now learn about isotopes in beginning science classes: they're different versions of the same chemical element. An element's properties are determined by the number of protons in the nucleus, the so-called atomic number, because that determines how many electrons orbit1 the nucleus, and that, in turn, determines the element's chemical properties. The number of neutrons in the nucleus, however, doesn't affect the chemical properties2, because, after all, they're electrically neutral. So different numbers of neutrons with the same number of protons lead to isotopes.

The sum of the number of protons and neutrons is the mass number, and so each isotope has a different mass number. Furthermore, for a given mass number it turns out that only certain combinations of protons and neutrons are stable—i.e., have the lowest energy or (alternatively phrased) the lightest mass. In fact, at most two3 combinations, separated by two atomic numbers, are stable. Other combinations will change, at a particular rate, to reach that stable mixture. That is, they're radioactive. For example, calcium-40 (40Ca, 20 protons, 20 neutrons) and argon-40 (40Ar, 18 protons, 22 neutrons) are both stable, but potassium-40 (40K, 19 protons, 21 neutrons) is not. It decays to one or the other, with an overall half-life of some 1.3 billion years—half-life, of course, being the time it takes for half the original amount of radioactive substance to decay.

All this is taught in high-school chem classes now. But isotopes’ discovery was fraught with more than the usual controversy and blind alleys. It all began around the turn of the last century, by two different paths that only converged by the 1920s or so.

And that fitful journey may hold a moral or two for the present, as well.

* * * *

Radioactivity and Isotopy

The first path was radioactivity. The demonstration that elements could spontaneously change was bad enough for the staid structure of nineteenth-century science. What was worse was the demonstration that some species with very different radioactive properties proved to be chemically indistinguishable. A mixture of ionium and radiothorium with thorium could not be separated by any chemical means, despite the fact that these three species have quite different radioactive properties. In modern terminology, ordinary thorium is thorium-232, with a half-life of some 14 billion years. Ionium is 230Th, with a half-life of only 7,700 years. It occurs in the decay chain for uranium-238. Finally, radiothorium is 228Th, with a half-life of less than two years. It occurs in the decay chain of 232Th itself.

All these nuclei, of course, contain the 90 protons that define thorium's chemical properties. In 1913, Frederic Soddy proposed “isotope” (from the Greek for “same place") to cover such situations: two radioactive substances that are chemically “indistinguishable” but have very different decays.

In the light of modern understanding, this all seems utterly reasonable. But imagine how preposterous it sounded to your well-trained nineteenth-century chemist!

And things just got worse. It was realized that radioactive decays must involve systematic changes of both atomic number and mass number. A beta decay (the expulsion of an electron) raises the nuclear charge by one; an alpha decay (expulsion of a helium-4 nucleus, with two neutrons and two protons) decreases the nuclear charge by two and the mass number by four. But you could compare the difference between the atomic numbers of uranium (92) and thorium with that of lead (82), and see immediately that there wasn't room for all the in-between decay products to be different elements! So some of them must be isotopes.

* * * *

The Mass Spectrograph

Also around 1900, the study of electrical discharges into gases was a big deal. Such studies, of course, led to such practical devices as neon signs and fluorescent tubes—not to mention the discovery of the electron by J.J. Thomson in 1897.

And such studies provided the other path to the discovery of isotopes. In modern terminology, the high-energy electrons in the discharge knock electrons off the gas atoms (or molecules), leaving the atom with a positive charge—i.e., a positive ion.

Obviously such ions will be attracted to a negative electrode. Thomson initially studied these “positive rays” just before WW I. It was difficult initially to distinguish their masses, because the rays came in all different energies, and of course the total energy depends on both mass and velocity. Finally, with a clever arrangement of magnetic and electric fields, he was able to focus ions with different masses at different places, independently of their velocities. (Note that all electrons are the same, so the question of distinguishing the masses of negative rays never arose.)

Thomson had invented the first crude “mass spectrograph"—or “mass spectrometer,” as they're called now. And using it, he showed that ordinary neon was made up of two masses of atoms, what we now call 20Ne and 22Ne, in the ratio of roughly 10:1. (Actually, there's a third stable isotope, 21Ne, but with an abundance of only 0.27%, its detection was far below the precision of Thomson's primitive device.) This provided evidence that “isotopes” not only were not confined to the heavy elements, but also weren't necessarily connected with radioactivity.

* * * *

Atomic Weights

Here's where the threads came back together. The nuclear decay chains of uranium and thorium both end at lead, and must involve a progressive loss of mass. Moreover, the lead derived from the decay chains must consist of different isotopes. Hence, the atomic weight of lead should depend on the source of the lead.

In a groundbreaking paper, Richards and Lembert (1914) found measurable differences in the atomic weight of lead from uranium decay, using only the classic chemical methods for the determination of atomic weight4. It's hard to imagine how astonishing this was at the time. Atomic weight was thought to be one of those Constants of the Universe. It's as though pi had turned out to be a variable. In fact, there's a whole forgotten literature on speculations for why atomic weights should have the values they do.

Richards had contributed to that literature; but more importantly, he was an extraordinarily careful experimentalist who'd specialized in determining atomic weights and had demonstrated their constancy within experimental error—till the work with radiogenic lead. (Of course, his reputation made that work all the more credible among chemists!) He received the Nobel Prize in 1914, becoming the first American chemist to do so. Even though it became obvious, with the discovery of isotopes, that atomic weights were not fundamental constants, he remained enthusiastic about the new studies. Indeed, in a major review written not long before his death (Richards, 1924) he presented the modern understanding of atomic weights as simply the weighted average of the isotopes making up that element. That's, of course, how scientists should behave, and it happens more often than is sometimes suspected.

Anyway, it turns out, too, that lead is the only element for which the so-called “radiogenic” components—those resulting from radioactive decay—can lead to a measurable difference in macroscopic atomic weight as found by traditional techniques. For example, as we'll see below, the proportion of strontium-87 (87Sr) in terrestrial strontium is slowly increasing over geologic time, because it's continually being added by the decay of rubidium-87 (87Rb). However, the overall change in strontium's atomic weight is utterly undetectable by classic wet-chemical methods. (It makes you wonder what else we're missing because we can't measure precisely enough, but I'm getting ahead of myself....)

Anyway, the idea that isotopes reflected different atomic masses of the same element was pretty well established by the 1920s, even before Chadwick's discovery of the neutron in 1934. In fact, Rutherford had suggested the existence of the neutron ("an atom of mass 1 with zero nucleus charge") in a lecture as early as 1920 (Rutherford, 1920), and by the 1930s the understanding of isotopes had essentially reached its present form. At a symposium on the discovery of deuterium (heavy hydrogen, 2H), Rutherford could even gently chide Soddy for complaining that deuterium hardly met his original definition of “isotope,” since its chemical properties are significantly different from ordinary hydrogen's (Rutherford et al., 1934). Rutherford pointed out that the properties depended on the relative difference in nuclear mass, and the mass ratio of deuterium to hydrogen is 2:1—far greater than any other isotope pair. Of course you'd expect bigger differences!

* * * *

And Back to the Present...

All of which is interesting, but why are isotopes useful? For lots of reasons, which run the gamut from the mundane to the very glamorous. I'll concentrate on geochemical applications, which is what I mostly know, and in which isotopic studies have become extremely important. In fact, probably most folks who call themselves “geochemists” these days are isotope geochemists.

* * * *

Age Dating—and Geochemical Evolution

Radioactive decay provided, for the first time, a direct way to determine the age of geologic materials, and “isotopic” or “radiometric” age dates are now routine. The idea is obvious: when a rock is formed, you start with a certain amount of a radioactive isotope, uranium-235, say, and then you count up how much is left—or rather, how many daughter products have accumulated.

Of course it's not that simple. Measuring the amount of daughter products is a big problem, but a bigger problem turns out to be finding a system in which you know how much pre-existing daughter product you started with. Ideally, of course, you want that to be zero. Certain minerals crystallized from a melt—i.e., those in igneous rocks—tend to be far and away the best candidates, because you know the crystal formed when the magma crystallized. Furthermore, you want a mineral that incorporates the radioactive parent atoms while excluding the daughter products. A nearly perfect example is zircon (zirconium orthosilicate, ZrSiO4). The zircon crystal enthusiastically takes up uranium (the parent) but has little affinity for lead (the daughter).

For all the caveats and cautions, with modern instrumentation and some attention to the geologic setting, the technique works extremely well. You can even get rock samples age-dated commercially! The “traditional” systems use the decay of uranium into lead (with the added feature that the two uranium isotopes allow additional internal consistency checks, because of their very different half-lives).5 Other routine systems are the already-mentioned decay of 40K to 40Ar, and of 87Rb to 87Sr (half-life of some 49 billion years). In addition, though, over the last few decades a number of new long-lived decays have joined them: samarium-neodymium (147Sm-143Nd, t1/2 ~ 100 billion years), lutetium-hafnium (176Lu-176Hf, ~ 40 billion years), and rhenium-osmium (187Re-187Os, ~ 40 billion years). That such extraordinary long-lived decays are now usable is more evidence of the increasing precision of the measurements. After all, with a half-life of 100 billion years, out of a thousand 147Sm nuclei present at the formation of the Earth, 970 are still with us.

Also in the last few decades, the slow change over geologic time in the isotopic composition of a daughter element, as it's added to the original complement from the decay of its precursor, has come to be widely used for the large-scale tracing of geologic processes. For example, over time terrestrial Sr becomes richer in 87Sr, as 87Rb decays away. Hence low, or “primitive,” 87Sr ratios mean a rock body has been geochemically isolated for much of geologic time.

This insight was strikingly applied in lunar geology. The lunar highlands—the ancient, light-colored, and heavily cratered terrane—contains a great deal of calcium feldspar (plagioclase). Strontium, as you might expect, tends to get concentrated in calcium minerals, because it's the chemical cousin of calcium in the periodic table. And the strontium from the lunar highlands has a very primitive 87Sr value. We knew the highlands were relatively old just from the density of craters on them, but this showed they're very old indeed, dating from not long after the accretion of the Moon itself.

* * * *

"Cosmogenic” Nuclides

We don't even always have to stick with isotopes long-lived enough to have persisted since the formation of the Earth for age-dating. Several much more ephemeral isotopes are also useful. Most famous is carbon-14, with a half-life of merely 5,570 years. It's formed continuously by the action of cosmic rays on atmospheric nitrogen. A high-energy incoming proton kicks a neutron out of nitrogen-14, the most common nitrogen isotope, to make 14C. In turn, that 14C becomes incorporated into atmospheric carbon dioxide, which is taken up by plants. Then animals eat the plants, so that all living things contain a minute amount of 14C.

Once the organism dies, though, the 14C decays away—and the amount left measures how long's elapsed since the organism's death. So in principle we have a way to date organic matter—provided, of course, that it's young enough that all of the 14C hasn't decayed away completely.

And also provided, of course, that we know how much there was to start with! Contamination by “dead” carbon (i.e., ancient carbon devoid of 14C) can yield anomalously old ages. If you naively date the plants growing in a limestone sinkhole, for example, you'll find they have apparent ages of several thousand years! They've picked up dead carbon from the calcium carbonate making up the limestone.

More interestingly, the amount of 14C, and of other so-called “cosmogenic” nuclides, changes with the cosmic ray flux—and that in turn can reflect changes in the Earth's magnetic field, the Sun's magnetic field, or even the galactic environment. This is another promising field of study—although, of course, it means that an independent method of determining ages is needed!

Carbon-14's the most famous, but several other cosmogenic nuclides are now finding use for age-dating and geochemical tracing: beryllium-10 (t1/2 ~ 1.5 million years) and chlorine-36 (t1/2 ~ 300,000 years), to name two. The systems are not nearly so clear-cut, and the quantities involved are much smaller, so not only is measurement more difficult, but the results are less straightforwardly interpreted.

Of course, as I've already implied, mass specs have come a long way since the days of Thomson, so that we routinely measure isotopes at concentrations orders of magnitude below what he could detect. The latest twist along this line is to use old particle accelerators as extremely high-powered mass specs, in so-called “accelerator mass spectrometry,” or AMS. AMS has extended the practical limit of 14C ages back to 60,000 years or so—roughly 10 half-lives. (The 14C atoms are so rare it's far more practical just to count them, in a mass spec, rather than to try to detect their decay!) And it makes the use of such species as 36Cl or 10Be even conceivable: for example, currently AMS can detect five atoms of 36Cl in 1016 atoms of stable chlorine (e.g., Jannik et al., 1991).

At these exceedingly low concentrations, mass discrimination also becomes a key issue, because there are interfering ions, typically molecules, with the same mass numbers but slightly different masses. 13CH+, for example, also has mass number 14—the same as 14C+. Another advantage of AMS is that such ions are largely broken up by the high energy of the beam, so they're not so much of a problem.

Again, it keeps coming down to how well can we measure.

* * * *

Extinct Nuclides

We've also found traces of geologically ephemeral nuclides in primordial solar-system material. Of course, the processes ("nucleosynthesis") that make the elements don't just make the stable nuclei: they make all nuclei, the amounts of each depending on such things as the temperature, particle flux, cross-section6 for reaction, and so on. And they include nuclides with half-lives up to a few tens of millions of years or so—long enough that some were still around when interstellar debris started accreting into the Solar System.

The first such “extinct” nuclide discovered was iodine-129 (t1/2 ~ 16 m.y.), which was fingerprinted by anomalous amounts of its decay product xenon-129 in certain meteorites (Reynolds, 1960). Xenon is a member of the noble, or “inert” gases; it's used to fill xenon flashtubes for strobe lights. Under normal conditions, it does not form chemical compounds. Iodine, however, is chemically reactive and will get incorporated into meteorites. Once it's there, even when it decays into xenon, the xenon remains trapped in the rock. Hence, meteorites coalesced within a few I-129 half-lives of the formation of the elements in the Solar System, because some 129I was still around.

Since then the spoor of many other extinct nuclides have been found, all with half-lives from around a million to a few tens of millions of years. One of the most interesting is aluminum-26 (26Al), with a half-life of around a million years. After many fruitless searches, its decay product magnesium-26 was found in aluminum minerals in some extremely primitive meteorites, in what appear to have been molten droplets of calcium aluminum silicates. Even more important, though, is that 26Al releases a lot of energy when it decays. The decay of uranium, thorium, and 40K keep the Earth tectonically and volcanically active from the heat they release (see “Refueling a Rundown Planet,” Analog, August 1991). This works fine on a planet the size of the Earth, but a small body like an asteroid cools off much too efficiently to get stirred up by the heat produced by these long-lived radionuclides. With a smidgen of 26Al, though, even asteroid-sized bodies would have melted, back when the Solar System was formed. This probably accounts for iron meteorites: when a body consisting of a haphazard mixture of planet-stuff melts, it chemically differentiates. That is, the rock floats to the outside, and the metal sinks to the inside to form a core. Later, as asteroids collide with each other over time, these differentiated bodies get broken up, to yield pieces both rich in iron metal and in rock. Take note, all you would-be asteroid miners!

One nuclide isn't even quite extinct. Plutonium-244 has a half-life of some 82 million years. (Note that this is a different isotope from the 239Pu used in bombs.) Since the Earth (and Solar System) are some 4.5 billion years old, about 55 half-lives of 244Pu have elapsed since the Solar System formed. That means there should be roughly 2-55 of the Solar System's original complement of Pu-244 left—or about 30 atoms in a sextillion. Not much—but surviving Pu-244 was identified in the early 1970s (Hoffman et al., 1971).

It's an astounding achievement to have identified such a few atoms. Finding a needle in a haystack is trivial by comparison.

Once again, how well can we measure?

* * * *

Fractionation: The Separation of Isotopes

Remember when they said that isotopes have “identical” chemical properties? They lied. They have almost the same chemical properties. As Rutherford pointed out to Soddy, the mass difference does have slight effects, and those effects get bigger as the proportional difference in the mass get bigger. Moreover, the effects can be measured in real-world systems, and they can tell us a lot.

For one thing, molecules containing lighter isotopes evaporate somewhat more readily, as you might expect. Such “kinetic fractionation” is how isotopes are purified commercially, but it also happens naturally: rainwater, for example, is “lighter” (i.e., depleted in deuterium and 18O) than the water from which it evaporated. In fact, the farther inland you go, the lighter the rain gets. (Isotopically, that is!) As the rain soaks into the ground, though, it gets a bit heavier as some of it evaporates back into the atmosphere. Furthermore, the longer groundwater is in the ground, the heavier it tends to get, as the water molecules tend to exchange hydrogen and oxygen with hydrous minerals.

This means that groundwater derived from recent precipitation is noticeably lighter than groundwater that's been there a while. This seems cute but academic until you realize that now it's possible to distinguish groundwater of different origins! Hence a well that is, say, largely drawing from a nearby river instead of a deep aquifer can be identified; not an idle consideration in the arid West with its tangle of water law. (The lawyers are circling....)

The binding energy of the more massive isotope is also slightly greater, and this energy difference also leads to fractionation, since molecules containing the lighter isotope are just slightly more ready to react. For example, living things are routinely lighter isotopically than the background values. With the seething cascades of chemical reactions in a living organism, those slight reactivity differences build up. This “isotopic signature” is how we can infer, for example, whether carbon is probably of biological origin, simply because if it is, it will be significantly depleted in carbon-13.

For another example, isotopically light sulfur, mined from the top of salt domes in the Gulf Coast, is also of biological origin. It results from bacterial activity. More generally, isotope studies are commonly able to constrain the source of sulfur in ore deposits. Since a great many ore minerals are sulfides, this is another application with real-world relevance—and it's all related to how well we can measure!

* * * *

Stardust

Physico-chemical separation is always proportional to the mass difference. So, for example, during water evaporation or biological metabolism the fractionation of 17O, with respect to 16O, is always half that of 18O vs. 16O. Nuclear processes, however, can give utterly different isotopic ratios, because it's the nuclear properties that matter. The original example is from radioactive decay itself, with the resulting build-up of daughter products over time.

Another example, though, is nucleosynthetic processes. Heavy nuclei can be made in a variety of different stellar furnaces (see “Forging Planet Stuff,” Analog, November 1990), and those different origins yield quite different isotopic mixtures. Solar System material, for example, seems to be dominated by nuclei forged in a hot, Type I supernova, which may have had serious consequences for the evolution of life, intelligence, and technology on Earth (see “Carbonosis,” Analog, March 1993).

Solar System matter overall is homogeneous isotopically, suggesting that it was pretty well stirred up in the nebula from which the planets and Sun formed. In the last few decades, though, tiny grains have been found in the most primitive meteorites that have wildly unearthly (or rather, un-Solar-Systemly) isotopic ratios that also can't be explained by geochemical fractionation. In particular, micron-sized grains of silicon carbide (SiC, the mineral moissanite) have anomalous ratios of both silicon and carbon.

What are they? They're probably truly stardust: the silicon carbide motes most likely condensed in a red giant's atmosphere just like ice crystals in Earth's, and then were swept up by the stellar wind and wafted out to interstellar space, where they eventually wound up in the raw material that became our Solar System. Presumably these are just the tiny fraction of grains that, through happenstance, managed to survive the mixing in the nebula. (Ironically, the grains weren't found sooner because SiC, under the trade name Carborundum, is routinely used for rock polishing! So the exotic SiC was lost in the noise.)

Since then, other such “pre-solar” minerals have been found, most also inferred to be of red-giant origin. See Ott (2001) for a technical review, if you're interested. Another consequence of this recognition of exotic material is that we no longer chauvinistically refer to “cosmic” isotopic composition; now more modestly we refer to “Solar System” composition.

Of course, if you could gather together macroscopic quantities of these grains, the Si and C would have noticeably different atomic weights even as measured by the traditional wet-chemical methods. The atomic weight of terrestrial silicon is 28.0855; that of carbon is 12.011, since both elements are dominated by their lightest isotopes 28Si and 12C, respectively. However, the atomic weights of the SiC-mote elements are going to be more like 29 and 12.5, because both silicon and carbon are strongly enriched in their heavy stable isotopes (29Si and 30Si, and 13C, respectively). Imagine giving a sample of that stuff to a nineteenth-century chemist, or someone at an equivalent technological level! Maybe there's a story or two there ....

* * * *

Exotic Nuclei and Massive Particles

And finally, there's a notion kicking around that highly massive particles might be left over from the Big Bang. If such “Cahn-Glashow” particles are indeed stable enough to still be around, and if they have a negative charge, they will tend to glom onto an ordinary nucleus by simple electrostatic attraction. The resulting composite nucleus will look like an exceedingly heavy isotope of the element with one less proton (i.e., the next lower atomic number). Searches for such supermassive nuclei have been made (e.g., McInteer & Mills, 1991), so far with negative results—but if, say, there were only a thousand or so dispersed among the 1024-odd molecules in a glass of water, that's still far below the present detection limits.

* * * *

New Measurements —-] New Physics?

So perhaps we've come full circle. In the early twentieth century, measuring isotopic ratios lay at the very cutting edge of technology, and those cutting-edge measurements led to brand new science—science that is now routine. Now, with even better measurements, perhaps there's more new physics to be found. n

Copyright © 2010 Stephen L. Gillett, Ph.D.

* * * *

References

Hoffman, D.C.; Lawrence, F.O.; Mewherter, J.L.; Rourke, F.M., Detection of plutonium-244 in nature, Nature, 234, 132-4, 1971.

Jannik, Nancy Olga; Phillips, Fred M; Smith, George I; Elmore, David, A 36Cl chronology of lacustrine sedimentation in the Pleistocene Owens River system, Geol.Soc.Amer.Bull., 103(9), 1146-1159, 1991

McInteer, B.B., Mills, T.R., Superheavy isotope enrichment using a carbon isotope enrichment plant, Sep.Sci.Technol., 26(5), 607, 1991.

Ott, U., Presolar grains in meteorites: an overview and some implications, Planet. Space Sci., 49(8), 763-767, 2001.

Reynolds, J. H., Determination of the age of the elements, Phys. Rev. Lett., 4, 8-10, 1960.

Richards, T.W., Atomic weights and isotopes, Chem. Rev., 1(1), 1-40, 1924.

Richards, T.W.; Lembert, M.E., The atomic weight of lead of radioactive origin, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 36, 1329-44, 1914.

Rutherford, E., Bakerian lecture: Nuclear constitution of atoms, Proc. Roy. Soc. London A, 97(686), 374-400, 1920.

Rutherford, Lord; N. V. Sidgwick, F. W. Aston, P. Harteck, F. Soddy, M. Polanyi, E. K. Rideal, R. H. Fowler, R. P. Bell, J. D. Bernal, W. Jevons, Discussion on heavy hydrogen: Opening address, Proc.Roy.Soc.LondonA, 144(851), 1-28, 1934.

1 Yes, yes, speaking loosely.

2Another oversimplification! More later.

3 And after having said that, again I must waffle: ultimately, only one combination is truly stable. But the process by which one nucleus changes into another one two protons away, so-called “double beta decay,” is so breathtakingly leisurely that the nuclei are effectively stable even on a geologic time scale.

4 “Uranium lead” is largely lead-206 (206Pb) from the decay of uranium-238—far and away the most abundant uranium isotope.

5 Usually using zircons, which are a real pain to separate from the mass of an igneous rock, since it's a rare mineral. The age-dates are much cheaper if you separate your own zircons first and submit them to the lab. That's what grad students are for.

6 The effective “target area” a nucleus presents for intercepting other particles.

* * * *

About the Author:

Stephen L. Gillett has focused his research on the profound effects nanotechnology will have on environmental and resource issues, and is now working on a semi-popular book on those topics. He is also involved in several ventures on alternative energy technologies. In 2000, while at the University of Nevada, Reno, he organized a symposium that highlighted resource issues and emerging technologies.

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Short Story: ENCOUNTER IN A YELLOW WOOD by Bud Sparhawk

The trouble with long range plans is that a stage that lasts a long time doesn't feel like a stage....

Gus stepped off the plane into the bitter wind blowing across the plains from Canada. Three inches of new snow lay white on the unplowed tarmac while wispy snakes of meandering snowdrift ran across the cleared landing strip. Off in the distance something sparkled in the sunlight.

"Glad you could make it, Gus,” a thickly clad man with a colorful scarf wrapped around his neck said as he stuck out a gloved hand. “I'm Phil, Phil Metler."

"Is it always this cold?” Gus answered. The Lands’ End parka he'd brought obviously wasn't sufficient to ward off the chill. Even the wool sweater he wore beneath it provided scant warmth as they walked across the pad to the terminal building.

"Only for the winter months,” came the reply. Gus hoped it was a joke. “Actually, they have a decent spring and hot summer up here,” his welcome committee of one answered. “Last year summer came on a weekend, which was nice."

Gus had Phil pegged—a jokester. Well, maybe that was his way of keeping the depression of a cold winter at bay.

The interior of the terminal, a loose term for the small cinder block building with two and a half small rooms that served as office, operations, waiting room, booking desk, and rental car agency. Neither of the two workers looked up from their card game as they passed through to the parking lot.

"We're going out to the remediation site from here,” Phil said as they climbed into the car. “It's not far.” Once they left the airport the road appeared to run arrow straight through unrelieved treeless miles toward a distant vanishing point. They turned off after only five miles.

"This used to be a dump site,” Phil remarked as they got out of the car. “Tell you more about that later. Down below there's nearly ten million tons of compacted trash from the nauoughts-teens in one huge clay cell."

"Seems a strange place to have dumped waste.,” Gus remarked. There was no nearby municipality or any city worth the name within eight hundred kilometers.

Phil chuckled. “State figured there was nothing out here to worry about. No residents that might object to a waste dump, no zoning commissions to tie them up in red tape, and no freaking Greens objecting to despoiling nature."

"I know how that is,” Gus repliedGus had several encounters with the Greens before.

"Anyhow,” Phil went on, “The state figured that they could make a bit of change by dumping waste up here for a fee."

"I can't see how that would work. The cost of transport would outweigh any savings."

"Not when the state owns the land,” Phil shot back. “The only real cost was transporting the waste way the devil up to this god-forsaken place. The rates they offered were so low that four surrounding states supplied their own trucks and drivers. They had so much participation that they filled one of these cells each year."

Gus whistled. Filling most of the big city dumps took longer than that. “They must have had a stampede to get that much waste so quickly."

"It wasn't just the low cost, you understand.,” Phil continued. “Environmental and NIMBY considerations drove most of the decisions back then. Voters would rather pay for the gas than have a dump in their back yard."

The sparkling Gus had noticed from the tarmac turned out to be a maze of shining pipes sticking out of the ground. Three meters or so separated each rod from its neighbor. At the top of each rod dozens of smaller tubes connected to even smaller ones splayed out. The overall effect was like nothing more than a silver Christmas tree.

This was not quite what Gus had expected. He'd thought there would be a dozen or so rigs dotted around the landscape, not this glittering metallic forest. All it needed to complete a cheery holiday scene were a few Christmas balls and tinsel ropes.

"This is our newest application of an old idea,” Phil said as he led the way through the maze to an instrument rack. “Thought we'd try to improve it with some new twists.” He swept his hand to encompass the nearest array. “This setup is to see if our improved conical configuration allows for better dispersal of the vapor."

"I remember reading about this and why it wouldn't work—something about hydrostatic pressure limits?” Actually, he'd read that on the plane in an old article he'd pulled up.

"Yeah, that used to be a problem, but with the new tech we can push those pipes down past the old thirty-meter limit.” Phil unlocked the panel and looked at a screen. “That means they can reach the liquor at the base of even the deepest cell."

Gus started. The best depth he could get out of his genetically modified worker trees’ tap roots was a mere ten meters.

"We've packed hundreds of hydrogel straws into each pipe to draw liquids by microcapillary action—just like tree roots, but better.” He pointed at the flat flanges at the tips of the nearest array. “That's where the sunlight breaks down the evaporate. It's the same principle that tree leaves employ."

"I understand the theory of imitating natural processes, but is it as efficient as planting genetically modified trees and shrubs and letting Momma Nature do her thing? It certainly can't be cheaper.” Nor, he added to himself, as pleasing to the eye.

Phil clicked a query and was rewarded with columnar table of figures. “Maybe in the short term. I think this sort of installation, once perfected, will replace the natural phytoremediation processes; that is, if we can improve our production levels. The best output we've achieved so far is only a fraction of that produced by traditional methods, not that we could ever use traditional methods out here.” He laughed as he encompassed the sere landscape with a sweep of his arm.

Gus scanned the treeless plain. Phil was right. Given the long winter, the poor soil, and limited daylight hours, there was no way his thirsty trees could ever grow here.

"We need people who can figure out the best ways to get this tech in operation,” .” Phil continuedpointed to the west. “This pilot installation just covers one cell. Over there,” he pointed to the west, “we've got another four cells for future projects."

Gus glanced at the table on the screen, curious despite his aversion to this technology. “What sort of production did you say you're getting?"

Phil checked. “Latest results show we've been getting about five liters a day per array. Not much, but with better distribution and improved design we hope to double that."

"One mature tree evaporates nearly a hundred liters per day through its leaves,” Gus bragged. “My oaks get a little less and the willows and elms a bit more. I don't think that this stuff would be useful anywhere but here, where trees won't grow."

"How much do your trees evaporate in the winter, after the leaves fall?” Phil asked with seeming innocence. “These arrays won't depend on warm seasons. They'll be producing twenty-four-seven, twelve months a year. I'll bet when we get this perfected we'll see the total output is pretty close to a mature tree, if not better."

Gus had to admit that Phil was probably right, and considering that it would take an act of God Almighty to grow a productive tree in some environments, these metal arrays might be a more efficient alternative.

"Let me show you around and explain some of the other projects,” Phil offered. “We can start with the hydrostatic pumps."

* * * *

Phil made his pitch two hours later, as they were driving back to the airport. “We're building a really strong technical team to work on the distribution and spacing issues. We techs could really benefit from some practical field experience."

"Who'd want to live around here?” Gus answered. Life on the treeless prairie was not something he would relish, even if this unnatural project held any interest for him.

Phil grinned. “Don't blame you for that, but this is just a god-forsaken test site. We're working down south in warm and civilized San Antonio."

It didn't matter. These cold metal skeletons could never replace the trees in his heart.

* * * *

Gus and Daisy walked among the trees in the early morning, when the early autumn sun tinged the leaves yellow-gold and dappled red. All around them birds chirped their territorial messages, insects chattered incessantly, and a slight breeze stirred the air. This was a mature wood, far different from the few straggly saplings planted among the fresh stumps he recalled from so many years before.

"I walk here nearly every morning,” Daisy remarked. “I've always loved the sight and smell of this place."

Gus sniffed and pointed at the detritus that lay thick upon the ground, covering the mosses and crow's feet with faded, decomposing leaves. “The smell comes from the decaying vegetation."

"Always the practical one, weren't you?” she sighed. “It's part of the endless cycle of death and renewal. That is, if renewal will be possible now."

That combination of poetic reverie and biting criticism was unlike the Daisy he recalled from college. The environmentally aware young girl he once romanced might have become a fierce preservationist, but beneath that facade he recognized the same smile, tinkling laugh, and fierce temper that he'd loved long ago when they were in college and the world was theirs for the making.

They parted when he graduated and had to relocate for his new job. She, with graduate school still before her, had elected to stay. Their relationship must have been just one of those college romances because, despite their promises to remain in daily contact, the phone calls and emails gradually became less frequent. Eventually they stopped completely.

He couldn't recall who had stopped first, or when he noticed.

* * * *

A group of protestors were huddled near an old valve assembly connected to a rusting pipeline, the relic of an earlier time when they were still recovering methane. “Save the woodland,” one of their banners read. “Value nature, not profits,” read another, flanked by “Protect our children's heritage,” and “Save the Park."

Since his arrival he'd received angry telephone calls and even had a few hostile encounters with a fairly vocal group who were all about “preserving the woods from exploitation.” Even some of the sympathetic local council members had tried to invoke eminent domain to prevent the “rape of the landscape,” as one angry member had termed it. Fortunately, taking over private property went against the grain of the rest of the council.

"We tried to have them rezone the property,” Daisy admitted as they walked by. “That effort failed when your company's lawyers threatened an expensive court action."

"I understand that the council opposed the rezoning effort,” Gus replied. “I suspect they realized the benefits the town would get from having the mine."

Daisy sneered. “Yeah, that argument and a generous contribution to the local school fund managed to stop our initiative cold."

So long as the protestors didn't directly interfere with his survey, they weren't his concern. Still, he'd heard that some of the Greens could get physical, but that didn't look likely considering the preponderance of gray hair in the crowd. Retirees with little else to do, he suspected and wondered why the students weren't among them, as he and Daisy would have been. That was when protecting the environment had emotional import to their idealistic hearts and the Greens were the wave of a pure future.

"Lots of people don't want to lose this,” she said. “Can't say I disagree with them; chopping down the forest is not very popular in this town. Everybody loves our little preserve."

Those sentiments were something she'd made clear immediately the first night. Although they had been more than friends before, they were now just temporarily acquaintances, reduced to talking about the past, mutual friends, and catching up with the past fifteen years. Still, there were indications—a touch of the hand, a smile, a reference to a shared intimacy—that signaled that the fire of their past relationship was not completely extinguished.

Gus spread his arms. “I'm not going to chop down the forest, Daisy. All I've been asked to do is make a report on the condition of the site. Other people will decide whether or not to harvest the trees."

Daisy snorted. “That's a poor excuse! Just following orders won't absolve you of guilt. Your company's plans have sparked a lot of local protest. Saving this patch of greenery is the predominant issue of our local blogosphere."

"I won't feel guilty,” he continued shot back with some heat. “Nobody's going to change anything by protesting. Oh, it might delay it another year or two, but the fact that this place needs to be exploited is inevitable. What does it matter if the forest is cut down this year or the next? They'll restore the woods when they finish mining."

"Sure, in a decade or more and if they follow the original plan,” she said. “Our concerns are for the people living here now, not what might happen in some far future after we're all dead and gone.” She looked up as if she were trying to peer into his soul. “What happened to you, Gus? At one time you'd have been out here, carrying a placard and raring for a fight if it would stop the harvesting. Why did you change? When did you lose your ideals?"

"I didn't change,” Gus answered angrily. “I became an engineer whose job is just one link in the century-long project to get rid of the trash of the last century."

Daisy shook her head sadly. “But objectives change, just like people. We've grown to love this little patch of greenery as it is, Gus. You'd see that if you had any skin in the game."

Gus stopped at a large poplar that stretched tall and lean, that might have been a candidate for a ship's mast in an earlier age. The lowest limbs appeared five meters above his head and extended barely two to either side. The bark was peeling from most of them. “I'll have to core this one. Looks like it's dying,” he added absently as he unpacked his tools.

"Isn't there anything we can do to save it?” Daisy asked, her voice quivering slightly.

Gus snorted and scanned the tree's barcode. “Twenty-eight years old—that would make it a second-generation planting. It's probably outlived its usefulness, like that rotting lump over there. It looks like it might have been a maple tree from when they used shallow-rooted, natural species."

Daisy brushed fallen leaves away from the reddish pile. When she picked up a piece, it broke apart in her fingers. “I remember us picnicking on this stump."

Gus started, surprised that she would remember some small thing after all these years. “Takes a while for tree stumps to decay.” He thought about those college picnics as he selected a coring drill. Those were great times.

"Won't be any stump left from this one, though,” he continued as he twisted the drill into the trunk. “The contractors will probably pulp everything—trunk, roots, and limbs—when they cut it down."

Daisy stood and brushed her hands to rid them of the residue. Was she regretting those afternoon interludes? “That's typical behavior for an exploiter, isn't it? They don't give a damn about destroying this lovely, natural place just to follow a plan laid down long ago."

"Natural?” Gus replied as he pulled the core sample and examined its tip. “You know very well that this forest isn't natural.” He swept an arm around to encompass the entire wood. “If it were, the trees wouldn't grow in a rough grid and there wouldn't be just these few species around."

"The town understands this is an engineered forest, Gus. That's not the point now. Nobody cares how this started, only what we have now. We've come to love this quiet, beautiful retreat from civilization. It's an asset to the community."

"There were lots of species here at one time,” Gus continued. “Those first-generation maples, pines, and firs were removed a few years before we started college. You mentioned the stumps we used for picnics. Those original trees were cut down so they could plant these modified worker trees. It's all part of the long-term remediation program."

"I still don't think it's worth removing all of these trees even if they have been ‘engineered.’ They could easily replace these with more appropriate trees. It wouldn't cost that much and would improve the park a lot."

"Has everyone forgotten,” he continued, “That that these trees are just temporary? The owners never saw them as more than an interim step toward restoration."

"Whatever happened to the guy who used to protest about preserving the environment?” she asked. “Don't you care about what they're going to do to the environment now, for God's sake?"

Gus shook his head. It was just like Daisy to change the subject when he'd backed her into a corner. “I don't get sentimental about worker trees. They're designed to die quicker than normal, and without anyone's help. Look there.” He showed her soft, dark paste at the tip of the core sample. “This shows the core is already decayed. I wouldn't be surprised if most of these poplars are pretty much the same. I've also noticed a lot of woodpecker borings and owl and squirrel burrows."

"Birds and squirrels?” Daisy replied. “What does that have to do with ...?"

"Animals don't want to work hard to get a place to live,” he interrupted, glad that he had managed to surprise her by another sudden change of subject. “They're opportunistic. They love to find a dying tree that provides openings where they can burrow."

"I don't see how that's relevant to what we are talking about,” Daisy said in an attempt to get back on her argument's track. “Why should the town sacrifice a beautiful forest just for the sake of an outdated project? The Gus I knew would have known the right thing to do."

Gus stopped. “Are you asking me to report that it's not the right time? You want me to say they should give it more time?"

"Yes,” Daisy said eagerly, giving him one of those smiles that used to melt his heart. “You see how everyone adores this place. It's an asset to the community that no one wants to lose, not when the rest of the county is becoming increasingly urbanized. The only ones who support this are those who will profit.” She reached out and put her hand on his arm. “You do understand, don't you?"

Gus chose his next words carefully, wondering about the promise in her closeness. “I understand your point of view, but my job is only to see if these trees are ready to be removed. The decision to cut isn't mine."

"But your recommendation is key to that decision. What you say matters, Gus."

"No, Daisy, this was once the town dump, back when they stuffed garbage into the ground instead of recycling and reusing as we do today. Things were so bad that, when the dump was sealed, shrubs and trees were planted just to clean up the contaminated soil of surface pollutants.

"It took those initial scavenging plants nearly twenty years to do their job before they could be harvested for the metals they'd absorbed. After that they planted these worker trees. That was long before we were freshmen."

He held up a hand when she started to object. “All of these genetically modified worker trees have tap roots that enable them to absorb garbage's decomposition liquor along with the subsurface water being pumped down there. They, like the first-generation shrubs and trees, are elegant biological designs that deliver pollutants to the leaves. Then when the water evaporates, sunlight breaks down the complex molecules into something harmless."

He picked up a yellow-brown leaf. “When they examined these during the growing season, it indicated that production had nearly ceased. That's why they want me to do the final determination."

Daisy smiled. “Well, if they've made the trash safe, then why do anything more? This town's forested park is much more beneficial to the environment than a mine will ever be.” She smiled again. “We could even picnic here some day."

He hesitated. That implied invitation held interesting possibilities. Perhaps the years hadn't erased all of her feelings after all, just as this encounter was awakening his own.

"The pollution in this dump is why this site was never developed, Daisy. The soil was initially too dangerous to build anything or even use it as a playground. That's why it was selected.

"Look, down below is compacted trash from the nineteen-sixties and seventies, which means it doesn't contain much of the dangerous stuff that came with the computer revolution. Now that the project is in its last stages, the lead, mercury, trichloroethylene, or carbon tetrachloride levels are minimal. My company bought this site as a bet that it could dig up enough paper pulp, aluminum, glass, and steel to recycle so they can profit from sale of the improved land."

Gus hoped he was reaching her, but she still looked unconvinced. “Mining the dump will finally get rid of the refuse once and for all. Better still, in the short term it will produce income and jobs for the town so, in the end, everybody wins."

"But this nature preserve will be gone,” she added sadly. “The town would have lost something precious. There just aren't that many places you can get away from the built environment."

"As if these woods were any less.” Gus smiled. “You've got to take the long view, just like the founders of this project. It's a different type of recycling than we fought for in college: Each pound of metal pulled out of here means that much less raw ore needs to be extracted and processed elsewhere. Each ton of paper recovered means that many more trees won't need to be pulped. Even every ton of plastics recovered represents a savings in energy and transportation."

"But look at the cost to the community,” she argued. “Is it worth the loss of playgrounds for our children, picnic areas for families, and places where old friends can take a quiet walk? Is the loss to society worth years of having an open mine, heavy trucks, and God knows what else?"

"Of course it's worth the effort,” Gus replied evenly. “That's what we've always been fighting for. That's all I've been working for."

"I'm sorry, but I don't see it your way,” she said bitterly. “You'll still have other projects, and the hell with the destruction and loss you leave behind!"

Gus had no response as she stalked away.

* * * *

"Still around?” Daisy asked as she towered over him at the pizza shack. “I thought you'd be gone by now.” Did he detect a note of regret in her voice, or was that wishful thinking?

"They company wantoffered me a promotions me to learn aboutlead a new technology group, something I saw in the Dakotas a few months ago,” Gus replied. “It's a nice increase career move if I accept.,” Gus offered.

"It's a fucking bribe!” Daisy exploded. “They're only offering it so you'd recommend that it is all right to cut down the trees. Can't you see that?"

Gus shrugged. “Nonsense. The offer won't affect my professional assessment in the slightest. Just as it won't be influenced by anybody else's personal viewpoint.” He regretted the jibe the moment the words left his lips.

"No, no—it's a bribe,” Daisy repeated with increasing certainty. “Gods, Gus, are you so blind you can't see it? They need your recommendation so they can move ahead before we can get the political muscle to fight them."

Now it was his turn to be angry. “I'm going to base my report on the facts, and only the facts."

"That's just a stupid engineer's excuse,” she shot back.

Gus stood. “Listen, sweetheart, my report isn't a political debate where emotional opinions should be considered."

"So you say,” she answered and started to turn away. “But being an engineer also means taking responsibility for your actions. Don't take the bribe, Gus. Think about what's at stake, first.” Her voice caught on the last word.

Was she talking about the report or their renewed relationship? Was there an “if” in that request?

* * * *

All night Gus debated whether he should accept the position. Turning his back on the natural processes that had consumed so much of his life would be hard. As much as he saw those trees as useful instruments, he also loved their cool shadows and arches of greenery. He was like most people, where the sights and smells of a forest resonated deeply in his psyche, as if it were an instinctive call from the forests of his ancestry.

Perhaps that was the reason he so often softened the designs of trash-cell forests with aesthetic considerations, making the installations pleasant places during the years it took to clean the environment. The downside of those considerations was that it made people get attached to “their” woods, so much so that the preservationists never wanted it to change. It was easy to predict: people get attached to interim solutions and soon forget they are just that—interim. Taking the long view has never been a human trait.

His The aesthetic principles approach would disappear be lost when Phil's new technology was perfectedused. Instead of leafy forests and shady glades they'd be installing arrays of shining metal, tightly packed row upon row with no refuge for deer or squirrel, dove or woodpecker, cricket or butterfly. There would be no place to picnic, no place to contemplate, no resting place for the human soul.

No place for two old friends to walk on a cool autumn morning and no place for two lonely people to have a quiet picnic.

So, which was the right choice? Should he help develop the technology to speed the decades-long remediation processes and lose his forests, or continue on the professional arc he had followed for years to free the Earth of its man-made pollution?

Was Daisy's contention that this was a bribe correct? Was the offer a way of convincing him to finish the project so he could move on?

Even if she were right, did it matter? He thought long and hard about his choices, about his integrity, about Daisy, and about the part he had chosen so many years before. But mostly, he thought about the project and his role.

Daisy had once accused him of having no skin in the game, but she was wrong. His love for nature, the trees, and the environment were as strong as ever. But he also knew that the trees were a means, not an end, and his sentiments were as misguided as Daisy's.

Remediation was the ultimate goal. The objective had always been to purify the wastes sufficiently to allow trash to be recycled so something wonderful could be created.

With that understanding he realized that everything he could do to speed that end was worth the effort so that, some day, new forests might emerge, forests that included a broad spectrum of species and were rich in diversity and wildlife. If he, and others like him, were successful then, some day, there would be completely natural forests where people could wander, play, picnic, and fall in love.

He pulled out his phone and called Daisy. “I'm accepting the offer,” he began. “I need to learn this new stuff."

Daisy sounded less than thrilled. “I thought you already knew everything about phytoremediation technology."

"Just part of it,” he said sadly, ignoring the implied insult. “Skill sets don't last forever. Much as I love working with the trees I have to give them up.” When she didn't answer, he added. “Do you think you'd like San Antonio?"

"Get serious, Gus. I'm secure where I am,” she answered. “I know my subject really well and better still, I've got tenure. That's why I don't want my town torn apart by this damn project.” There was a long pause before she added. “It was nice seeing you again. Maybe you'll come back some day to see the dirt and filth you've caused.” In an earlier day he would have heard the phone slam down. As it was, there was only a click and a dial tonesilence.

He had lost more than his trees.

* * * *

Gus took a final walk though the woods to help clear his mind. The leaves were all gone now and soon winter would close its icy grip. If he let his report stand, then the leaves would never emerge and in the spring the sounds of bulldozers and cranes would fill the air instead of chirping frogs and singing birds. Exhaust fumes would replace the smell of emerging flowers.

As much as he regretted that he would never have that picnic with Daisy, he was buoyed by the thought that, once the project was complete and the site filled, something else would replace it—a nice park, perhaps, where the town's children's children could play.

As he left the woods for the last time he noticed Daisy standing among the protestors. He waved but got no acknowledgement. That was as it should be. Daisy was a part of his past and, just like the trees, no longer a part of his future.

He picked up his gear and walked away.

Copyright © 2010 Bud Sparhawk

[Back to Table of Contents]

Short Story: LOCKED IN by Brad Aiken

It's enlightening to see the world from a different viewpoint, but few would want one this different....

At the time, I didn't know it would be the last few seconds of my life—at least what most of us would call life.

I eased back into the oversized black leather chair that marked my spot at the head of the boardroom, listening to the same old inane arguments about why the privileged few of us sitting around that table should have had the right to define ethics a little differently than everyone else; why we needed to define it differently.

Bullshit. Those new guys may have been Ivy Leaguers, but they didn't know squat. Maybe I wasn't so different when I started out, but meeting Linda changed all that. “Never make a decision you can't sleep with,” she'd told me once. “Then go out and do it better than everyone else."

I wish she were still here to see how right she was.

Like most businesses, this one's always been populated by ass-kissers, and over the years it hasn't been too hard to get people to do things my way. But that new generation was different. Dave Dunnster had taken over old man Reiss's spot almost three years earlier and got under my skin right from the start. The younger board members may have respected me, but they could identify with Dave and he knew how to work a room.

I decided to let him have his say before reminding everyone that I hadn't built this company into a Fortune 750 powerhouse by accident. Even in this business there are some things you can't compromise on—especially in this business. I couldn't believe they were stupid enough to not see that.

Tuning out the noise, I looked past the blithering idiots sitting around the table to the view out the 103rd floor picture window that had sold me on that office twenty-eight years ago. A small etch mark in the lower right side of the middle panel, made by a careless window washer who couldn't balance his platform, had been growing like a spider web; I made a mental note to have Gladys call the maintenance crew chief again.

"For God sakes, Troy, how can you let that slide?” The familiar voice pulling me back into the conversation was that of my best friend, Tanner Hopkins, who had cofounded Nucleic Innovations with me back in 2015. “Are we really going to be part of this madness?"

I looked him squarely in the eye. Over my dead body!

"Troy?"

The twelve men around the table all gawked at my silence.

What the hell are you all staring at?

It was at that moment I realized the words had never left my mouth. I grabbed the blue Waterman pen out of the inside pocket of my blazer and scribbled as quickly as I could on the pad in front of me, which was embossed with our company's insignia, the classic image of two electrons orbiting a proton superimposed on a vertically oriented missile.

Before I made it through the first sentence, I could feel the strength draining from my hand. I wrote faster, but the markings soon became illegible. The pen dropped to the table and I slumped forward, helpless to avoid the painful crack of my skull against the wood.

"Jesus, Troy,” Tanner said. “You okay?"

I couldn't answer, couldn't even figure out a way to show him I was still alive, short of hoping he'd notice my eyes blinking.

"Troy!"

They tried to pull me up, but I started to slide under the table like a lump of Jell-O, unable to let loose the screams that were ricocheting around inside my head. It took a group effort to get me back to the same awkward position I'd started in.

Since the moment that pen had dropped from my hand, every fiber of my being had been concentrating on regaining control. And then I saw the look on Tanner's face.

I was going to die.

The wave of terror welled to a deafening roar.

Tanner disappeared from view; the unmistakable metallic sound of the handle to the fire-door separating us from the outer office was followed by a symphony of sounds pouring in from the outer office.

"Somebody call 911!"

My head bobbed back and forth against the glossy wood as someone tried to shake me back to life. The office buzzed with murmurs and the sound of chairs scooting across the floor, each one reverberating like a Saturday morning alarm clock you forgot to turn off the night before.

"Christ, he looks bad."

"Hang in there, Troy,” Tanner said. Then, the other direction, “For God's sake, hurry. It's Mr. Adams."

God knows how many of them crowded around the table. The voices, asking each other if I was moving, if I was dead. All I could see was the damn tabletop a half inch from my eyes, but I felt the pressure of dozens of gawking faces hovering just beyond my field of vision. I never thought I'd be so happy to be whisked off by paramedics.

The blare of sirens droned above my head and the white steel roof that filled my field of vision flickered with each bump in the road. The EMTs poked and prodded, blinded me with their flashlights, and bombarded me with questions I could only answer with silence. I looked back and forth as the two of them took turns grilling me. When they finally stopped, I closed my eyes tightly and took solace in the darkness.

If only Linda were still alive.

I tried to keep my eyes shut as the gurney was jostled across the pitted sidewalk into the ER, where we were stopped by a gravelly voice. “What do you got, Harve?"

The now familiar voice of one of my couriers sputtered back. “Not sure. Vitals are stable as a rock and he's looking around, but I can't get him to do a damn thing but blink every now and then. I haven't seen one of these in a while, but it looks like he's locked in."

* * * *

"Locked in.” Now there's an appropriate term for it. I surely was. It was the first time I'd ever heard that cursed diagnosis, and after ten more hours of tests the neurologist on call confirmed what the paramedic had guessed in ten minutes of scrutinizing my now worthless body.

I was locked inside a motionless shell. I could hear and smell and see, I could think as clearly as ever, I could feel the itch of my nose. Every fetid breath of every person who leaned over to examine me burned my nostrils with an intensity I'd never known before; there wasn't much else to entertain my senses. My head floated, detached from a lifeless body, a floppy mass of muscles that had no one telling them what to do.

I lay on a stretcher, unable to avert my gaze from the brilliant light of the procedure suite in the vascular institute, and listened as the interventional radiologist explained the procedure to his resident in vivid detail. My skin was now foreign to me, but I could feel the catheter as it was threaded up through the femoral artery, aorta, and then into the basilar artery, that tiny little bastard that cut me off from the world.

"There. Got it!” Dr. Siteu gloated. “Hooked it like the cork on a bottle of fine Merlot."

The radiology resident was impressed. “Man, look of the size of that sucker."

"Second biggest I've ever seen,” Siteu said with pride as he pulled the clot from the artery at the base of my brain, threaded it back out through my body, and deposited it on the instrument tray next to the table. I caught a glimpse of it on the LCD monitor to the right of the procedure table.

Siteu saw me straining to look and turned my head to help the cause. “So what do you think of that?"

It looked like a juicy purple earthworm.

"That's the sucker that was clogging up the works,” he said. “Feel any different?"

One blink for yes, two for no, they had told me. I blinked twice.

"It may take a while. Let's see how we did."

I felt a warm flush as he injected dye into the artery he'd just pulled the clot from. A streak of white puffed out of the tip of the catheter on the wall monitor. I wasn't sure what it meant, but the doctor seemed very pleased with himself.

"Perfect.” He turned to leave the room.

All that night I lay in the hospital bed staring at the ceiling. Dr. Siteu's words were encouraging, but I couldn't feel a damn thing. The procedure was a success, but I was not.

* * * *

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her face. It was an image I had tried so hard to erase, but never with more than fleeting success. If I'd only left the party when she pleaded with me, if only for once in my life I had let business take a back seat to what I couldn't see was the most important thing in my world, maybe I wouldn't have been so tired, maybe I would have seen it coming in time to stop.

I had regained consciousness just long enough to see her sitting beside me, that beautiful face all bloodied, just inches from my own as she took one last breath before I lapsed back into coma knowing it would be the last breath I'd ever see her take. That look has haunted me for almost eleven years.

Morning was a welcome relief. Nurses and doctors started filtering in. Hell, I was even glad to have my blood drawn. But it wasn't until the neurologist gave me the once-over that I realized I could move my right thumb an eighth of an inch; the procedure had indeed been a rousing success.

And so I lay there twitching my thumb. The day was interspersed with visits from therapists and brief depressing hellos from a parade of business associates who felt obliged to pay their respects, but could rarely stomach looking at me for more than a few seconds. Tanner would sit and bring me up to speed on the goings on at the office, but it was hard for him; he didn't know how much was getting through to me, and even he showed the restlessness of a discomfited sickbed visitor.

The days were interminable.

And then came the nights.

And Linda.

I'd learned to live with the pain, to banish the terrors by filling my head with other images, any images besides that battered lifeless face. She was the best thing that ever happened to me, and all I wanted was to forget her.

But now there was nothing else. No conversation, no books, no mindless escorts to stimulate my senses into pleasure divorced from joy. I couldn't even turn on the damn boob tube. Even in the worst of times, there had always been the promise of tomorrow, a hectic office, a roost to rule.

Tomorrow ... well, work was out of the equation now. There would only be more time to think.

And in between those unbearable moments came a parade of physical therapists, or as I came to know them, physical terrorists, who would take turns marching into my room every morning and again in the afternoon, stretching every joint in my body until tears ran from my eyes. It was their only signal that I could take no more. They tried to convince me that it was critical to maintain my range of motion to keep me from turning into a pretzel that would be in constant agony and begin to rot at every convoluted crevice that would harbor bacteria and fungi; a delightful picture that made the torture of therapy no easier to bear.

It was two weeks to the day after my stroke that the rehab doctor gave me the first glimmer of hope.

"Mr. Adams, we haven't gotten too far with your therapy."

Thanks for the insight, I said inside my head, as I lay motionless in bed. I never could have figured that out without you. Is that what eight years of med school and residency get you? I looked away and tried to tune him out. Asshole.

"But there is another option."

Wait. What? I looked into the eyes of Dr. Benson Burgess. Empathy. There's been a lot of that since I landed on the Rehab Unit, but I need more than that this time.

"A computer-brain interface."

I stared blankly.

"Have you heard of it?"

I blinked twice.

"It was developed around the turn of the century at Duke. First on monkeys, then later on humans with spinal cord injuries. It's a way of getting your brain to send signals to a computer that's programmed to control a robotic arm, a powered wheelchair, even a voice generator. It's not easy to master, but results have been pretty good in some cases."

Great. I'm a case now. What the hell; at least it's a chance.

"It takes a lot of money and a lot of work. It also involves cutting your head open and implanting a series of microchips on the surface of your brain. We haven't seen many complications, but it could cause a brain infection, seizures, even death if things go wrong. You still interested?"

Like I've got a lot of options. I blinked once.

The surgery took place one day later. I awakened in my room feeling no different than I had before the procedure; couldn't even get a look at myself or grope my skull.

Dr. Burgess entered with a wide grin. “It went great,” he said. “Wanna see?"

I blinked once.

He held up a mirror he'd carried in with him. The left side of my head was shaved and had a u-shaped incision that was stapled shut. I looked like a baseball with hair growing out one side.

"Your hair will cover all that in a few weeks,” he said. “The neurosurgeon placed seven chips along your pre-central motor strip."

My face was obviously blank, but somehow he caught my confusion.

"Uh ... the surface of your brain: the part that controls your right arm, your right foot and your speech. The chips will pick up the brain activity, send it through the wire he tunneled down to your belly...” He showed me the faint bulge under the skin on my neck and chest, and the small incision in my abdomen. “...and trigger the IR transmitter here.” He pointed to the incision. You'll wear a belt that will pick up the IR impulses and turn them into RF waves that are then sent to the computer, which will turn your thoughts into actions."

I hadn't thought it possible, but yes, the grin had gotten wider.

"Got it?"

I blinked once. At least I got the gist of it.

"Good. The first goal is to get you talking. Once we do that, the rest will go a lot faster.” He positioned the computer monitor in front of my face. “Now say hi."

Hi.

Nothing. So far, I was not impressed.

"No, no. Don't think hi, say hi. You've got to use the same part of your brain you would if you were talking. I know you're out of practice, but it's like riding a bike ... Okay, bad example, but you get my drift."

I did. Hi, I said again, and the voice came out of the computer almost as I said it. Shit, it sounds just like me. That last part just came out as garbled nothingness.

Burgess grinned. “Pretty cool, huh? The speech therapist programmed it with recordings we had from your office. It sounds just like you."

He understood me?

"Well, not that last part; that sounded like mush. The computer's got to learn what the signals coming from your brain mean. I programmed it to say hi in response to the first signal you sent, so hopefully you weren't screwing with me, because whatever you said first is going to come out as hi every time you say it from now on. Was it hi?"

I blinked once.

"Good. We'll do yes and no next, then if all goes well, I'll have the speech therapist get started with some vocabulary."

I spent the better part of the next month with a brunette named Marta teaching me how to talk through the voice synthesizer. She was deceptively demure, unrelentingly tenacious, and worked me to exhaustion; the verbal equivalent to my physical terrorists. One by one, she flashed pictures up on the monitor, I named the objects I saw, and the computer learned which signals from my brain corresponded to which words. Tedious, but very cool. I grew to look forward to these sessions. No doubt I would soon become little more than a memory to Marta, another patient in her files, but her daily visits came to bring a familiarity that I treasured in this chaotic abyss I'd fallen into.

And when I was not in therapy, my mind had time to play with my sanity. The harder I tried to forget, the more I remembered.

But in forcing me to confront all I had suppressed for the better part of a decade, my mind began to let me remember the woman I had loved. Memories of all the years before the accident began to wash over me. Our wedding, the briefcase she surprised me with as I left for my first day on the job, vacations and endless conversations about life, about kids. We both wanted them, the time was just never quite right. And then one day there was no more time.

So alone.

* * * *

Burgess had just returned from a trip to Israel to meet with some robotic engineers who were working on a new type of wheelchair for me. “So,” he said, “how's my favorite patient?"

"Tired of lying in this damn bed staring at the ceiling."

He smiled. “I see Marta's gotten around to the practical stuff. Good."

"Sweet kid, Marta, but enough's enough. When are you going to get me out of here?"

"Funny you should ask."

He walked out and a few seconds later there was a thump as the door burst open and The Monster—his words, not mine—whirred into the room with Dr. Burgess close behind. It was a wheelchair with a big black metal box on the back, which I assumed held the battery and computer, and a robotic arm tucked in along the right side.

"My new jail cell?"

"Your freedom. You're going to learn how to maneuver the chair with your thoughts and control this arm as if it were your own."

My own ... it looked like the detached arm from the terminator robot in the 3D remake of that old Schwarzenegger flick, a shiny mass of metal and cables in the form of a human limb without the skin. Only instead of being attached to a torso, it protruded from the end of a telescoping titanium rod emerging from the right side of the chair, where it pivoted on a ball joint of a shoulder. The dexterous fingers were going through a demo mode that made it look like they were the metallic equivalent of a disembodied magician's hand practicing the motions of a well-ingrained card trick.

I wasn't sure whether to be impressed or to vomit.

"Will I be able to play the piano?"

He laughed. “Ah, the age-old joke. Glad to see you've got your sense of humor back."

"I was a concert pianist before I went back to business school,” I said.

"Oh ... I, uh ... sorry.” Burgess turned beet red.

It felt good to be able to make someone squirm again. “So let's get to it. I'm going buggy here."

The next month was almost as tedious as the last. I was assigned a new team of therapists to show me how to use all the gadgets I'd need to function at home. My latest physical therapist, a brute of a guy named Bill, turned out to be a lot less intimidating than he looked. He taught me how to activate the automated transfer sequence that slid my body from the bed into the chair and back. Once I mastered that, the rest seemed easy by comparison, almost intuitive.

I learned a lot more than I ever wanted to know about being disabled, and even more about the recovery process. In spite of all the cool technology, it took a crap load of work to accomplish even the most mundane things I'd always taken for granted: feeding myself, brushing my hair, that kind of stuff. Other things like getting dressed, washing, even wiping myself ... forget it, the robots aren't that advanced yet. Not sure I'd really trust a robot to wipe my butt anyway. Your definition of vanity changes, to say the least.

An occupational therapist, as it turns out, has nothing to do with occupations of any kind, except their own, of course. It was Laura Feibelman's task to make me more independent in activities of daily living, which in my case boiled down to figuring out how to use the robotic arm. All I had to do was think about moving my own arm, and the thing mimicked my thoughts—not as easy as it might sound. Manipulating a soupspoon with a seventy-three-pound hunk of machinery strong enough to bend metal can be a little nerve-wracking. But practice makes perfect, and what else did I have to do?

The Monster's drive mechanism was a blast to learn. I could steer it with my new arm using a joystick, and to accelerate, all I had to do was push down on the pedal. My foot didn't actually move, of course, but my brain didn't know that unless I was looking down; the computer did all the work, but the end result was the same. It only took a few minutes to learn how to accelerate and brake, just like driving a car.

Eleven weeks to the day after my stroke, I was ready to return to my world.

Going home was the hard part. I'd grown so accustomed to everyone at the Rehab Center, it felt like my training wheels were being taken off and I was being pushed into oncoming traffic. Of course, it wasn't nearly that bad. Two nurse's aides had been working with me and the rehab staff for the past week, learning how to do whatever I'd need to have done at home. And the house was equipped with full environmental controls that let me manipulate everything through my computer-brain interface by tapping into the home automation system. Lights, heat, TV, telephone, and of course the pager that my aide wore on her wrist were all at my beck and call.

It's nice to have money.

Still, it didn't feel like home. Linda should have been there.

My newly appointed driver picked me up the next morning. Very tacky. I made a note to have them build me a van I could drive myself.

He unloaded me at the main entrance. It felt odd to be wheeling into the atrium at Nucleic Innovations through the same doors I'd walked through a thousand times before.

Tanner had been keeping me abreast of the boardroom battles going on in my absence. I whirred into his office in The Monster, bruising the polished wood as I entered.

Tanner started at the cacophonous intrusion.

My brain smiled, but I knew all Tanner could see was a blank face. “Guess I'll have to get some kick plates on those doors before I punch holes in them."

"Or you could wait for somebody to open it,” Tanner said, surveying the damage.

I ignored him. “So what's happening with the Shower Heads?” Shower Heads ... we always managed to come up with some innocuous name for each of our brutal inventions; in this case, missiles carrying a head of nuclear waste that would burst three hundred yards over its target and shower the area with its venom.

"We vote on Thursday,” Tanner said. “The Defense Department's pressuring us to come up with the goods or they're going to release it to another contractor."

I tried without success to bite my lower lip. “You know I'm not one to shy away from a new weapon system. Hell, we built this place on nuclear applications for war, but up till now it's all been miniature explosives like the Pea Shooter Grenades or nucleic power cells to run the tanks and planes. But this ... how will history judge us, Tanner?"

"Hell,” Tanner said, “how will we judge ourselves?"

"It would certainly end the argument about whether we crossed the line in letting the ethics of war justify what we do."

"So how do we stop it? The board's split dead even on this one."

"In which case, my vote decides the victor,” I said. “It's good to be king."

"I was afraid you wouldn't cash in that chip,” Tanner said.

I had never had any problems impressing my will on others, winning by conversion rather than coercion. A press of the hand, a gleam in the eye, a nod so subtle it only registered in the direction it was aimed. I could sway any vote my way and everyone would walk out thinking I was a nice guy; depends how you define nice, I guess. I ruled with an iron fist that no one noticed, but life would be different now; no time for nuance.

"I've been saving it for the right occasion."

When Thursday morning came I was ready to do battle. God, it felt good to mean something again. In spite of a crowded lobby, I had the elevator to myself; The Monster can be pretty intimidating. The bell dinged and when the doors slid open I rode out with purpose, right past the gawking secretaries and through the newly installed automatic door to my office.

Tanner appeared at the doorway a few minutes later. “Ready?"

"Let's get the bastards,” I said.

Tanner led the way and held the boardroom door for me as I rolled in. We were the last to arrive. My customary spot at the head of the table had been cleared to make room for the new mechanical me.

Dave Dunnster stood. “First on the agenda is the financials from the fourth..."

"We're not blind, Dave,” I sputtered. The agenda was up on our monitors plain as day.

"But it's protocol, Troy."

"Screw protocol. Let's get to the meat, shall we, gentlemen?"

The buzz around the table was comical. I had always placated these turkeys, and it was fun watching them adjust to my change in attitude; some experiences can affect your priorities. It was tedious using my new brain toys and I had to get business done before I collapsed from exhaustion.

"Right, then,” Dave said. “I assume you mean the Shower Heads."

I nodded, but my head didn't move. “Shit,” I muttered, then louder, “that was me nodding yes. Everybody ready to vote?” Of course they were. It was no big secret who was voting which way.

We went around the table with alternating yeas and nays, six: five, to me.

"I vote nay, which knots us up, and I'm invoking executive privilege to break the tie. The Shower Heads are off the table. Next order of business."

Negelein and Christopher looked stunned; they were squarely with Dunnster on this one, the prime movers to break me and send our horrific weapon to friendly governments all over the world. Negelein stood. “But you always said no one's vote should count more than anyone else's, Troy. That we're a democracy here."

"I lied. Next order of business.” I looked over at Dave, who was tapping at his mobile.

"I, uh ... under regulation sixteen, I request a recount."

I rolled my eyes skyward, one of the few facial expressions I was still capable of. Whose mind you gonna change? I said, but what came out of my synthesizer was “Of course, Dave."

I looked over at Tanner, who was staring in disbelief.

"Go ahead, Dave. Convince me,” my synthesizer said. What the hell's going on! I screamed in silence.

As Dave started to talk, I wheeled back and to the left. Thank God I still had control of my chair. I pushed ahead six feet, then turned right, to face the picture window.

"Troy?” Tanner said. “You all right, Troy?"

Hell, no. I pushed the accelerator in my mind, pedal to the metal, and headed straight for the glass with my footrest aimed at the spider web crack in the lower right of the middle pane.

The Monster was fast. I struck with the full force and considerable weight of the beast, following the shards of glass as they shot out from the 103rd floor window, arcing to the street below. I watched the surreal image unfold before me, strapped securely into my chair that now dangled precariously from the end of a robotic arm clasped to the steel frame of the missing window.

"Troy!"

I could hear the simultaneous cacophony of yells behind me. You all right? Are you nuts? My God, he's slipping! What do we do? Then a solitary Don't fall, Troy!

Now there was some good advice.

The lone voice of reason came from Judi Cee. “Hold on, we'll pull you in ... Somebody get something ... the fire hose, wrap it around the back of his chair."

They had me safely on the floor of the boardroom within minutes, still strapped into my chair. I wasn't about to hang around to see what else they'd have me say. I made a beeline for my office, with a trail of harried men in suits close behind.

The door slid open and I rolled in, then spun toward the pack of suits. “Tanner, stay. Everybody else, out.” The synthesizer was obeying me once again.

The jumble of commotion ceased and a roomful of blank faces stared back at me.

I said, “Sooner would be better than later."

A few of them nodded respectfully, others avoided my gaze altogether as they turned and shuffled out. I couldn't tell which ones the offended grunts came from. Dunnster's stare lingered, but he soon followed, and the door slid shut behind him.

Tanner stood in front of me with his arms crossed. “What the hell was that all about? Have you totally lost it?"

"In a manner of speaking,” I said. “Dunnster bugged the board room. He figured out a way to hijack my synthesizer; must have rigged up some sort of Wi-Fi hack. Those were his words you were hearing in there, not mine."

"Well, that's a relief."

"Not to me. I'm used to being the puppet-master, not the friggin’ marionette."

"Saw what it was like to have the shoe on the other foot, huh?"

"Damn right. It sucks."

"I suppose that kind of thing can change a man."

"I suppose."

As Tanner studied my expressionless face, a subtle grin crept across his lips. “But not you."

"Hell no."

"So what do we do now? If anyone finds out your synthesizer can be hacked, they'll try and pull you off the board."

"We keep it between us. I doubt Dunnster was dumb enough to let anyone else in on his plan."

"Probably right, but even if they don't give you the boot for that, they're liable to try and get rid of you for going suicidal. What the hell were you thinking in there?"

"It was the only way I could stop the vote. I couldn't just leave."

"Right. We were already underway. You'd have just counted as an abstention."

"And if I stayed, Dunnster was in control. I had to find a way to stop the vote and make sure we could move it to another venue, one where I can speak for myself."

"You think they're going to just forget what happened in there?"

"I'll tell them The Monster malfunctioned; the drive control went haywire. I've already hacked into the software and put a bug in the drive program. I'll activate it when we're done here. Just shut down my drive battery before you leave, then tell everyone what happened and call them in here for the vote. Pull in Clifford from IT; he'll confirm the malfunction, you'll pronounce me mentally fit, and we'll get this done today."

"What about Dunnster?"

"He's toast. I can tap into the mainframe now; it's easy to become a computer expert when your brain is part of the computer. With a few well-placed thoughts tied into Dunnster's personnel file, I'll make sure he's got his hands full just trying to stay out of jail. In fact, I think I'll tip him off before letting anyone discover his newly created transgressions just so I can watch him squirm."

"You're a scary guy, Troy."

I smiled inside. “Start preparing a short list for Dunnster's replacement."

Tanner fixed on the picture hanging on the wall behind me, the aftermath at Hiroshima. Perspective. His eyes narrowed and tracked toward my desktop monitor, then without diverting his gaze he made his way slowly around behind me to see the image that had been reflecting in the glass in front of Hiroshima, the tenth anniversary picture his wife had taken of me and Linda at the Starlight Grill.

He smiled and put a hand on my shoulder, then walked out the door without saying a word.

And for the first time in years I looked into Linda's eyes, thankful for the strength I could once again find there; more thankful yet that she would never see me like this.

Copyright © 2010 Brad Aiken

* * * *

READERS: If you are having problems finding Analog Science Fiction and Fact at your favorite retailer, we want to help. First let the store manager know that you want the store to carry Analog. Then send us a letter or postcard telling us the full name and address of the store (with street name and number, if possible). Write to us at: Analog Science Fiction, Dept. NS, 6 Prowitt St., Norwalk, CT 06855-1220. Thank you!

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Reader's Department: THE ALTERNATE VIEW: THE NICE WAY TO MAKE A SOLAR SYSTEM by John G. Cramer

Our Solar System seems well planned, with a neat set of four little inner planets fenced in by the Sun and the asteroid belt, with an outer region populated by a stately progression of four gas giants and bounded on the outside by the Kuiper Belt. The largest gas giant, Jupiter, with a mass of 318 Earth masses, is 5.2 AU from the Sun (where 1 AU is Earth's average orbital radius). Next comes Saturn with a mass of 95 Earth masses, which orbits at 9.5 AU. Uranus, the lightweight of the gas giants with a mass of 14 Earth masses, orbits at 19.6 AU. The outermost gas giant Neptune, with a mass of 17 Earth masses, orbits at 30 AU.

The regularity of the Solar System's planetary orbits was noted as early as 1715, and in 1768 Johann Bode proposed a “law” stating that the orbits of the planets in AU could be predicted by a mathematical relation, which we can now write as Rn = [4 + (3/2) 2n]/10, where n = 1, 2, 3, ... for the planets from Venus to Neptune, with n = 4 corresponding to a “missing planet” at roughly the orbital radius of the asteroid belt. The orbit of Mercury (n = 0) doesn't quite fit the systematics of the model and has a value of R0 = 4/10. But is this regularity an accident or an indication of some systematic natural process? It now looks like an accident, in that a new model of planetary orbits suggests that a chaotic catastrophe in the early Solar System produced the present orbits of the outer planets.

Planetary astrophysical models that assume the planets formed by the accretion of proto-planetary material in their present orbits are beset with great difficulties in explaining the origin of the great quantity of matter far from the Sun that was needed to form Uranus and Neptune and why Uranus is less massive than Neptune. There are also problems in explaining the origins of the asteroid belt, the Trojan satellites of Jupiter, the irregular satellites of the outer planets, and the formation of the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune. Further, the many large craters of the Moon, along with similar evidence of significant cratering on Mercury, Earth, Mars, and the large asteroid Vesta, tell a story of interplanetary violence that occurred about 900 million years after the formation of the Solar System. Planetary astronomers call this the Late Heavy Bombardment (LHB) period, a succession of collision events that up to now has lacked a plausible explanation.

The orbital dynamics of the Solar System seem deceptively simple. There is a massive central body, the Sun, and the other objects, being much smaller in mass and widely separated in space, have regular roughly circular orbits that are easily described by applying Newton's Laws of gravitation and mechanics. The Newtonian two-body problem is easily solved, allowing us to understand these orbits. However, the complications are in the details. One cannot really neglect the gravitational interactions between the planets, and particularly those between Jupiter and its neighbors. These interactions perturb planetary orbits and cause them to be unstable over large periods of time. While one can solve the gravitational two-body problem analytically, the three-body problem—for example, involving the Sun and two planets—has no analytic solutions. When it is solved numerically on a computer, the results are often chaotic, with small differences in starting conditions leading to dramatically different orbital outcomes, including planets ejected from the system. Thus, the present calm stability of our Solar System is an illusion, with chaos lurking in the past and possibly in the future.

Recently a radical new departure from previous models of Solar System formation, the Nice model, offers to provide an explanation for the mysteries of planet and moon formation and bombardment. The Nice model is the work of an international team consisting of Alessandro Morbidelli (France), Rodney Gomes (Brazil), Kleomenis Tsiganis (Greece), and Hal Levinson (USA), and is named for the French city of Nice where their ideas came together.

Basically, the Nice model starts with the four major planets ordered as Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus, with Jupiter in more or less its present orbit and the other planets in concentric orbits with radii increasing outward in steps of about 4.3 AU, with Neptune and Uranus inverted from their present ordering. In orbit outside Uranus initially are a cloud of thousands of “planetesimals,” icy bodies comparable in mass to the present asteroids but much more numerous. Roughly speaking, in the Nice model the primitive Solar System looks like a “bull's eye” target board with four concentric rings (the gas giants) surrounded by a dense outer cloud of dots.

This initial system is somewhat unstable, and as time progresses the major planets interact and alter their orbits a bit, while the outer cloud squeezes together a bit and develops gaps like the Kirkwood zones of the present asteroid belt. However, despite such movements, nothing much happens for millions of years, and the system gives the appearance of relative stability.

Then, at about 878 million years after formation of the system, all hell breaks loose. This occurs because the wanderings of the orbits of Saturn and Jupiter have temporarily come into a 2:1 orbital resonance. This exerts cumulative forces on the other planets, disrupting the orbits of Neptune and Uranus, and flinging them outward into the cloud of planetesimals, which scatter in all directions. It takes about another 100 million years for the system to calm down and reach a new state of equilibrium, which is very different from the previous one.

Because Neptune was closer to the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction, its orbit has been disrupted the most, and its orbital radius has increased by about a factor of two. Uranus has also moved to a larger orbit, which is now inside the orbit of Neptune but further from Saturn than before. But the biggest effect has been on the outer cloud of planetesimals. They appear to be gone. They have been largely dispersed. There are a few planetesimals now in stable orbits outside the orbit of Neptune, and these form the present Kuiper Belt. However, most of them have either collided with the major bodies of the Solar System or have been ejected from the System altogether. Their disruption has sent many high-velocity objects into the inner Solar System, accounting for the Late Heavy Bombardment described above. Thus, the Nice model explains the Kuiper Belt, the formation of Uranus and Neptune, the low mass of Uranus, the late Heavy Bombardment of the inner planets, and the origins of the Trojans, the irregular moons, and the asteroid belt.

A 7-megabyte QuickTime movie spanning 1.2 billion years of Solar System evolution according to the Nice model has been posted by Sky & Telescope on the Web at media. skytonight.com/video/SolarSystemSim.mov (in this URL, note that there are underscores between Solar, System, and Sim). The movie has been purposely slowed down at 878 million years so that the violent disruptions of the system, which happen fast, can be viewed more closely. It's fun to watch and to try to imagine the planetary violence that must have occurred when the planetesimals start flying off in all directions.

* * * *

Thus, the Nice model provides a neat explanation of the present configuration and violent past of the Solar System. It also suggests that the Solar System is “special,” like many other aspects of our present environment. When we are able to explore the planetary systems of other stars, we are not likely to find any twins of the Solar System, since its origins are the chaotic result of a particular set of circumstances. We might, however, find a system like the early Solar System, where a Late Heavy Bombardment is about to begin and the inner planets are about to be subjected to a cosmic 100-million-year rock concert. Space travelers take note. That would be a system to avoid.n

Copyright © 2010 John G. Cramer

* * * *

AV Columns Online: Electronic reprints of about 150 “The Alternate View” columns by John G. Cramer, previously published in Analog, are available online at: www. npl.washington.edu/av.

* * * *

The Nice Model:

R. Gomes, H. F. Levison, K. Tsiganis, and A. Morbidelli, Nature 435, 466 (2005).

A. Morbidelli, K. Tsiganis, A. Crida, H. F. Levison, and R. Gomes, Astronomical Journal 134 1790-1798 (2007), arXiv preprint 0706.1713 [astro-ph].

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Reader's Department: IN TIMES TO COME

Given that our issues actually appear several weeks before the nominal date on the cover, we face a perennial dilemma in scheduling “seasonal” stories and articles: Do they belong in the issue named for the month containing the relevant holiday, or the issue appearing closest to the actual date? Next month we face this question twice, with a linked story and article. You've probably read brief reports elsewhere of recent research on the biological and social significance of kissing; Richard A. Lovett has written an article exploring the topic in more depth, and, with collaborator Holly Hight, a story about where such research might lead. It doesn't take much of a stretch to conclude that those ought to go in the “Valentine” issue; but since “January/February” actually went on sale in November—before Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, and New Years'—this time we decided to put them in the issue that will actually appear closest to Valentine's Day. That, oddly enough, means “April."

Our April issue will also include, by another kind of appropriateness, funny stories by Carl Frederick and Stephen L. Burns, as well as a unique novella by John G. Hemry and stories by Brenda Cooper and Jerry Oltion.

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Department: BIOLOG: CHRISTOPHER L. BENNETT by Richard A. Lovett

* * * *

* * * *

Isaac Asimov famously wanted to be a mathematician before a bad experience with calculus forced him to do something else. Christopher L. Bennett didn't have quite that bad an experience with calculus, managing to “squeak through” to a major in physics. But he'd sympathize with Asimov. “I'm good at math through algebra,” he says. “When I hit calculus my brain freezes up."

Asimov went on to get a Ph.D. in biochemistry, initially only writing science fiction on the side. Bennett always wanted to write science fiction—and not just on the side. When the physics proved problematic, he got a second bachelor's, this time in history. “Partly, I was curious,” he says. “I wanted to study history other than the very Western-biased stuff I'd gotten before.” But the history major may have been at least as helpful to his science fiction as the physics. “I figured it would be a good thing to learn about different cultures and how they interact and evolve."

Bennett is a rare breed: a writer who always knew what he wanted to do and managed to make a full-time career out of it.

Star Trek was the key. When he was five years old, growing up in Cincinnati, he saw an ad for reruns of the original Trek. “I saw what looked like a funny—looking aircraft flying around in the night sky,” he says. “I discovered outer space, and after that, I was hooked."

Later, he had a set of building blocks that let him construct futuristic cities. “I would make up stories of what was going on in the cities,” he says. “I realized I was pretty good at this [and] realized it was what I wanted to do."

His first science fiction sale was to Analog ("Aggravated Vehicular Genocide,” November 1998), but many of his building-block-city stories were about Star Trek. For his day job, he still plays in the Star Trek universe. “Pocket Books has kept me rather busy writing Star Trek novels and stories [fifteen since 2003]. I'm one of the busiest people in their stable.” (There's also been an X-Men novel and a Spider-Man novel.) His next book will be one of the first set in the new movie's version of the Star Trek future.

It may sound clichéd to say it, he notes, but science fiction's unique appeal comes from the way it lets us look to the future. “It gives us a head start, encouraging us to think about what lies ahead,” he says.

As for the stories, he wants to balance the scientific and conceptual side with the character and emotional side. “There seems to be a sentiment in some circles that the emphasis should be more on one than the other,” he says. But when that happens, something often gets slighted. “I try to balance it."

And of course, there's always the old sense of wonder.

After all, he's never forgotten the boy who was once enchanted by the strange airplane, flying through the night.

Copyright © 2010 Richard A. Lovett

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Probability Zero: TEN THOUSAND MONKEYS by Tocho Ligon

First off, let me say this is not about monkeys. It is about cats, as all things should be.

Much has been published about the relationship between cats and quantum mechanics over the years. Schrodinger's horrid thought experiment involving a cat in a box is probably the best-known example. Pohl had a story in these very pages a few decades back called The Coming of the Quantum Cats. Heinlein's last novel, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, featured a feline named Pixel suspected of being able to perform quantum teleportation. As usual, both science and science fiction have missed the real crux of the issue.

Meanwhile, there exists a myth called the “Infinite Monkey Theorem,” an exercise in statistics investigating the possibility of works of literature being produced by simians seated at typewriters. If you care to look this up on that great bastion of scholarly research, Wikipedia.org, you will be directed to Félix édouard Justin émile Borel's 1913 article "Mécanique Statistique et Irréversibilité" The popular version of this theorem supposes a very large number of monkeys seated at typewriters striking keys at random, for a sufficiently (just shy of infinitely) long time, and concludes they are bound to eventually reproduce, for example, Shakespeare's Hamlet.

The statistical math behind this is straightforward. What makes this a myth, an experiment that will never be attempted, is the outrageous expense involved in placing huge numbers of monkeys in the presence of sensitive electromechanical equipment. Discounting contamination from monkey poop and the destruction from simple tossing about, the keys most likely to be pressed are the bottom row, which will quickly be destroyed by chewing teeth. Monkeys are uninterested in spending an infinite amount of time in front of keyboards, but they are quite interested in chewing on anything handy. The resulting text on a modern computer keyboard will consist of spaces, zeros, and decimals, possibly interspersed with a few consonants and assorted symbols from the peripheral keys. The only vowel likely to be hit by this method is “a,” making it nearly impossible to produce anything of literary merit.

One popular author, Don Marquis, actually came closer to the truth. Starting around 1916 (almost two decades ahead of Schrodinger, and barely behind Borel), he created a pair of characters named archyand mehitabel. The lack of capitalization is significant. Archy was a cockroach, and typed poems and short articles by diving onto typewriters keys. He was incapable of simultaneously striking both a character and shift key, and so pioneered modern texting. Mehitabel was archy's best friend, an alley-cat. These stories were so popular they resulted in a Broadway musical, with Eartha Kitt playing the part of mehitabel. Feel free to look all this up in that same scholarly source.

Still, Marquis missed the obvious, probably because the design of old manual typewriters was not appropriate for the experiment.

The basic fact is this. It only takes one cat to type a masterpiece, and it does not take much time.

Why Schrodinger used a cat for his gedanken experiment is not revealed in our scholarly source. The article therein suggests he did not recommend the experiment be done physically, but wished only to explore a bizarre prediction of quantum mechanics. Cats, as we all know, are the poster-children for bizarre. However, like any macroscopic entity, quantum mechanics is only a background detail in cats. What is clear is that cats defy statistics.

Folklore holds that cats have nine lives, based on centuries of anecdotes of cats escaping deadly situations repeatedly. It is no myth that cats generally land on their feet ... NASA has even investigated the phenomenon, documenting the remarkable skill with which cats extend their limbs and swivel their bodies to rotate themselves feet-down in free fall, in an exercise in PhD-level Engineering Mechanics. One day human astronauts may master the feat in zero gee environments.

Finally, cats are fascinated by the written word. All cat people know this to be true. More precisely, cats know their people stare endlessly at the written word, and so endeavor to place themselves between their people and whatever the people are reading. Or writing.

So it was that I found myself an author. One of the people I allow to share my home, Tom, was seated at that glowy rectangle with the bumpy thing on the desk in front of it. I've been training Tom lately. When I want to be fed, I give him some attention. I recently learned he will feed me if I give him a little “lap time,” after which I have taken to climbing onto the desk for a bit of head-butting. Today, I decided to flop down on that bumpy thing on the desk that occupies so much of his attention. This is a new one, with the bumps arranged in a remarkably comfortable curve, and I could not resist a little rolling about on it. The back massage feels terrific!

So please understand, none of this involves me intentionally typing. I'm simply doing what cats do; behaviors far more likely to result in a masterpiece than anything a silly troupe of monkeys are likely to do. And like most writers, I'll leave the fine points of formatting, punctuation, and capitalization to my editor.

Copyright © 2010 Tocho Ligon

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Short Story: DR. SKENNER'S SPECIAL ANIMALS by by David A. Simons

* * * *

* * * *

Some trends can make it a lot harder to be a specialist....

It had been a routine morning at the clinic. Blessedly routine. I'd spayed two cats, grown a fresh liver for a Doberman, and disimpacted a turtle, with no sign of any new special animals. But then Rover arrived, and there was no turning back.

I was scrubbing Larry the Parrot's infected foot when I heard the truck rumble up the driveway, spraying gravel, blaring its horn. I shouted to Ellie to corral the cats, coaxed Larry back into his cage, and stepped outside to the front porch.

The truck was one of those old-fashioned U-Hauls, the kind with the rolling rear door and granny attic, big enough to move a three-bedroom apartment. It had stopped at the top of my driveway, its wheels sunk deep in the gravel.

Two men scurried down from the cab. Both were decked out, head to toe, in fireman's gear: yellow trench coats, rubber boots, gloves, and opaque welders’ helmets, the visors masking their faces. One of the men carried a long metal pole with a forked tip. A cattle prod, it appeared.

"Ready?” mumbled the other. His voice was gruff, older. His partner nodded, pointing the cattle prod at the truck's rear door.

The older man unlocked the cargo door and rolled it upward. He pulled a metal chain from the truck's bed, looped it around his wrist, then stepped backward, pulling, like a fisherman reeling a deep-sea catch.

Slowly, an enormous animal emerged. Long toothy snout, red-scaled body, leathery wings, and a thick barbed tail. I muttered in disgust, but I can't say I was surprised. It was only a matter of time before some damn fool built a dragon.

The screen door creaked open behind me, and Ellie joined me on the porch. “Oh my,” she said, watching the men struggle with their big lizard. “I don't think he'll fit in the special room."

I wondered idly how she knew it was a he.

The dragon snapped at its chain leash, casting sparks, and the tall man zapped its flank with the cattle prod. The dragon jumped, whipping its head about in the air, and blew a four-foot fireball over the head of its assailant.

And then it yelped. A piercing, painful cry, like a dog whose tail had been stepped on. It plopped down on the gravel, whimpering, swatting at its face with clawed arms.

"Oh my,” said Ellie again.

"Send them away,” I said. “We're not treating it."

"Now doctor..."

"I mean it this time. It's too big. We can't hide it. Bogeys will find us. Or Cleansers. No more special animals."

The younger man jabbed the dragon again with the cattle prod, urging it to its feet, while his partner yanked on the chain. The dragon moaned, still rubbing its face with its wings. Aw, hell.

"I'm a legitimate veterinarian,” I said. “I specialize in horses."

"Yes, doctor, I know,” said Ellie, patting my arm. Before I could protest further, she walked down the porch steps, straight at the men and the dragon, shouting instructions. “Take him around back. We can chain him up in the horse pasture. Dr. Skenner will see you shortly."

* * * *

While Ellie escorted the dragon to my back pasture, I headed for the special room. I had twenty minutes until my one o'clock, enough time for a quick rounds.

The special room was a barn at the edge of my property, poorly hidden by a grove of young American chestnuts. When I opened my clinic, I'd planned to specialize in horses, focusing on the racing and equestrian communities of central Virginia, but my practice had taken an unfortunate turn.

I unlocked the barn door and slipped inside, and was promptly greeted by Radar.

Radar was my most confused special patient. He was supposed to be a minotaur (you know, bull's head, man's body, hangs out in caves in Crete), but his builders flubbed their calculations and wound up with a jumbled mixture of man and bull parts. He had human limbs and torso, hooves for hands and feet, a human neck, and a bull's head and horns. His brain, though, was all bull, which meant he liked cows (really liked cows), and when threatened, charged straight at the danger. But since he stood upright, the result of his charges weren't gorings, but face-first crashes into whatever stood in his way. I'd fitted him with a nose guard and a neck brace, but there wasn't much more I could do. His builders had abandoned him to me, so he roamed the special room.

Radar snorted, pawing at the floor in front of me with his hoof. Clop, scrape, clop, scrape. I put my hand under his chin and scratched. Satisfied, he sauntered away, and I began my rounds.

I stopped first at the mermaid's tank. She swam to the glass, splashing her tail.

The mermaid had been my first special patient, nearly two years ago. Brought to my clinic in an old mop bucket just after dusk by a man and woman wearing sunglasses and introducing themselves as Mr. and Mrs. Jones.

I'd read in the vet journals that some fools had begun manipulating cloning vats, mixing and matching templates to create “special animals.” Fantasy creatures. Only the builders weren't thinking through the biology any better than Hans Christian Andersen, so the animals had problems. They all had problems.

Ellie and I pulled the mermaid out of the bucket and laid her on my examining table. She was two feet long, with blond hair, green eyes, and small, water-wrinkled breasts. She curled up, moaning, blowing air out her mouth, in obvious pain.

"How old?” I asked.

"Four days,” answered Mr. Jones. “We're using a growth accelerant."

"Will you treat her?” asked Mrs. Jones.

I should have said no, of course. Sent them away, called the police. The BOGE legislation had already passed, and Cleanser gangs were forming. The last thing I needed so soon after opening my clinic was to get caught up in that.

But none of it was the mermaid's fault.

I examined her throat and torso, trying to find the source of the pain. Her belly was distended, so I suspected food poisoning or allergies. “What are you feeding her?"

The Joneses listed her foods, and I began writing up tests and prescriptions. It was Ellie, my twenty-year-old assistant, two weeks on the job, who figured out the obvious. She rolled the mermaid onto her side, poked at her fin, then looked up at me.

"So how does she poop?"

Six hours of surgery later, the mermaid had a functioning rectum and urethra. She now visits every two months for check-ups.

The mermaid spread her hand against the glass and flashed me a smile. Her intelligence was animal (human neural networks are still way beyond the vats), but her expressions were distinctly human, which I found disconcerting. I tapped the glass and continued my rounds.

Next was the centaur. The poor creature was a mess. His owners brought him in at one month old, complaining that he wouldn't gallop. He was lethargic, yellow-skinned, and bone thin. They assured me they'd mixed the templates correctly, carefully, and wondered what could possibly be wrong.

Geniuses. It shouldn't take a veterinarian, I told them, to realize that a human heart, kidneys, and liver cannot power an eight-hundred-pound horse. They left him for treatment and never returned.

I had the centaur on blood thinners to ease his circulation, light treatments for his jaundice, and regular dialysis to aid his kidneys. He was only six months old, but had the thin hair and sunken face of an old man. I doubted he'd live another six.

I checked his blood gasses, patted him gently on the flank, and moved on to the first of the three unicorns. (Every rich idiot, it seems, wants their little girl to have a unicorn. I'm constantly treating scalp infections and skull fractures.)

Before I'd finished patching the first horn, Ellie tapped her secret knock and slipped into the barn. Ah. My one o'clock horse. Normality. A paying customer.

"Ms. Clancy's horse is here?” I asked.

"No,” said Ellie. “I canceled that."

"What! Why?"

"Well, not a great day to run a horse in the pasture."

Oh yeah. There was a dragon in my back yard.

"Speaking of the pasture,” added Ellie, “our new patient needs your attention."

I rubbed antibiotics against the horn's base, scanning for fractures with my magnifier. “They can wait."

"He's ... misbehaving."

"Imagine that. A special animal misbehaving.” I glanced over at Radar, who was now seated on the floor next to me, legs spread, trying, unsuccessfully, to do something obscene with his hoofed hands. Ellie scratched his chin, distracting him.

"Fine,” I said. I handed Ellie the antibiotic gel, pointed at the horse feed. “Feed the unicorns. Two cups of oats. And a rainbow."

I kicked open the barn's rear door and trudged outside.

When my father ran the property, the back pasture had been a racetrack. I'd turned it into a grazing field. Several acres of tall grass, enclosed by a wooden fence, with a spring-fed pond in the middle.

Right now, it was on fire.

Well, not the whole thing, just a few square meters near the barn. The two firemen were dousing the flames with CO2 spray, their visors raised.

The dragon, meanwhile, was tied to a stone post thirty meters away, near the pond. He'd dipped his face into the muddy water and now lay on his stomach, licking the claws on his feet. Seemed content.

"Almost out,” said the younger man. “He tried to roast a squirrel. Your assistant got him tied up nice, now."

The men appeared to be a father-son pair. The father was in his fifties, with a stocky build and a face like an old truck grill. The son was tall and lean, with a too-perfect nose, teenager skin, gold-tinged teeth, and a stupid grin. West Virginians, no doubt.

They finished dousing the flames and turned to me.

"We hear you treat constructs,” said the father. “Will you help us?"

"Tell me your names."

"Smith,” said the father.

"Jones,” said the son.

How original. “Can he breathe fire on us from over there?” I asked.

"Not unless he's agitated,” said the father. I waited patiently for the explanation I knew he was dying to give.

"He's got two extra lungs,” said the father. “One extracts methane from his large intestine, and the second has a special hypergolic igniter compound we developed with our chemistry partners. When his body releases adrenaline, the igniter activates and combusts the methane."

"So he breathes fire when he's mad,” chimed the son.

"Yeah,” I said. “I get it."

"Trouble is, every time he blows fire, he yelps and whines like a bitch. Can you figure out what's wrong with him?"

"We got a buyer lined up in China,” added the son. “Fix him, we'll give you an equal share.” The father glared at him. The son stopped grinning.

"How old?” I asked.

"A few months."

"How was he made?"

"It's a complex formula,” said the father, eyeing me warily. “Took a lot of resources to develop."

Bastard. “Just tell me about the brain. What's the template for the brain?"

"Dog,” he said. “Mostly."

A puppy, I thought. I could handle that.

I pulled out my magnifier and stepped toward the dragon. I surveyed his face and head, zooming in on his eyes, his mouth, his nose. Yup. Just what I thought. Poor guy.

"So,” said the son. “Is something broke, or is he just a pussy?"

"Tell me, Mr. Jones,” I said. “Have you ever stuck your face into an oven?"

"He's got scales,” said the father. “Heat-resistant to three hundred degrees."

"Scales on his eyeballs? On his lips and nostrils?"

"Oh."

Yeah, oh.

"So will you treat him?"

"Without shutting off the fire breath,” added the son. “That's one of the buyer's specs."

I held my tongue, for once. “Leave him with me for a few days,” I said. “Maybe I can help."

* * * *

The next morning, I was building the dragon's “treatment” in my home workshop when Ellie burst in, panting.

Ellie's a chubby girl with short legs who runs about as well as my centaur. So I knew something was wrong.

"Bogey,” she said finally, once she'd caught her breath.

I stood. “Where?"

"At the front porch. Waiting for you. Surprise inspection."

"Is the clinic clear?"

"Yes."

"You sure?"

"Yes!” She paused. “Pretty sure."

I shoved the hardware under my workbench and slipped into my lab coat. We hurried back to the clinic to greet the Bogey.

When the special animals started appearing, their existence outraged certain moral segments of the population, many of whom were uncomfortable with cloned vat animals to begin with. A new government agency was formed, the Bureau of Genetic Enforcement, whose directive was to eradicate “unnatural” constructs.

In my experience, the Bogey agents were all either FBI rejects or Cleansers with a badge. But this guy didn't look like either.

He stood on the porch outside the clinic, dressed in jeans and an old fleece jacket. He was about forty—my age—with a round face, leathered skin, and a bushy beard. He carried a small hand computer and stylus, and nothing else. No cheap suit, no badge, no gun.

"Are you Dr. Skenner?” he asked. I said yes, shook his hand. “I'm Agent Stanwick. We've been tracking a dangerous construct—special animal. We got a tip that it might be heading here."

"What kind of construct?” I asked.

"You wouldn't miss it."

I paused, considering. “I'm sorry, Mr. Stanwick, but I can't help you."

From inside, we heard a crash, and then Larry the Parrot's squawk. Ellie's eyes widened, and she edged away from us, slipping back inside.

"Mind if I have a look around?” asked Stanwick. “Just so I can say that I did an inspection?"

I shrugged. “Suit yourself.” I led him up the porch—slowly—and pushed open the door.

Ellie faced us from the opposite end of the clinic, in front of the rear door. She kicked something outside with her heel, then jammed the door closed with her butt.

"Dr. Skenner's dog,” she said. “He's sometimes rude to guests."

A long black feather fell from the crook of Ellie's arm, floating to the ground. She stepped on it and smiled.

The harpy, of course. In for dental work. Must have been taunting the cats.

"Would you like a tour, Agent Stanwick?” offered Ellie, in her chipper customer voice.

"Yes, please."

Ellie escorted Stanwick through every corner of the clinic—the lounge, exam room, operating theater, the crates and baths—opening drawers and cabinets, peppering him with friendly chatter about my practice. The legitimate part, at least. I stayed behind, pretending to work on Larry the Parrot's foot, muttering under my breath.

After ten minutes of inspecting invoices for spayed cats and horse kidneys, I was certain he was good and bored and ready to leave, but I was wrong.

Stanwick circled back to the lounge and spoke to me through Larry the Parrot's cage. “Mind if I check your other buildings?” he asked.

Ellie flinched, but I couldn't tell if Stanwick noticed. “Of course,” I said. “I'll take you myself."

I turned to Ellie. “Would you mind the clinic while we're gone?” She hesitated, uneasy about leaving me alone with the Bogey. “And make sure nothing catches fire?” I added pointedly. Ellie opened her mouth, then quickly shut it. She began backing toward the clinic's rear door, the one leading to the pasture.

I ushered Stanwick down the porch steps, across the gravel circle at the head of the driveway, toward my cabin. The opposite direction of the special room.

"Your father was Robert Skenner, the racehorse trainer,” he said, as we walked.

I nodded. The guy had done his research.

"Why didn't you follow his path?"

I stayed silent.

My father was the kind of trainer who flogged horses till they won or broke or both. He tried to teach me, but I spent my childhood with the rejects—the old studs, the stable mares, the “disappointments.” Glue bones, my father called them. I left when I was sixteen, borrowed my way through vet school. When he died, I inherited his compound—this land—and turned it into my clinic. The drug lab became my office, the racetrack my grazing pasture, and the feed storehouse my cabin home.

I led Stanwick through my front door and gestured grandly. “Inspect away."

My cabin had become an extension of the clinic. A ratty couch, empty dog crates, stacks of vet journals, and my workbench filled the living room. The smell of horse feed still permeated.

I gave Stanwick the grand tour. He poked around, occasionally jotting a note on his hand computer. Mostly, he watched me and played Columbo.

"Are you a member of PETSA?” he asked.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Special Animals. I'd briefly joined the parent org, PETA, back in college, but quit after a feud with regional bureaucrats.

"No."

"Do you think people should be allowed build constructs? Special animals?"

"No. I think it's cruel."

He was standing next to my workbench, now, studying the hoses and lenses I'd been working on. I tried distracting him.

"Tell me, Mr. Stanwick,” I said, “do you work with Cleansers?"

Some of Virginia's moral folk thought the Bogeys weren't eradicating special animals quickly enough, and were taking matters into their own hands.

"Villagers with torches,” said Stanwick. “I despise them."

That surprised me. It must have showed.

"I don't enjoy euthanizing animals any more than you do, doctor. And truth be told, I don't euthanize all of them. Just the dangerous ones."

"And who decides that?"

Stanwick knelt beside my workbench, took a photo of the hose cuttings with his hand computer.

"Are you familiar with the Death Valley pupfish?"

I stared at him.

"Cyprinodon salinus. Found in a single salt creek in Death Valley. Evolved over millions of years as Lake Manly retreated. Amazing example of adaptive evolution."

He stood, dusting off the knees on his jeans. “Last month, a swarm of wild pixies invaded Death Valley and devoured the remaining pupfish. A hundred years of preservation, lost in one afternoon."

I pictured Tinkerbell, hovering over the salt marsh, fish bones in her hands, juices dribbling down her chin. I must have chuckled, which annoyed Stanwick.

"Not all constructs are harmless, doctor. They escape, they breed, they attack natural species. Sometimes humans. They're like invasive plants, only mobile. That's what PETSA fails to understand."

"Fascinating. What does this have to do with my living room?"

Stanwick sighed. “Your assistant. Ellie. How did you find her?"

I blinked. “Ellie? She was a referral.” A friend from my college days had given me her name. Said she was young, eager, and good with customers, that she'd “take the edge off” my personality.

"How well do you know her?"

"Enough to know that she's presumptuous and bossy, but good with animals. Now if you've finished your Dostoevsky routine, I'd like to get back to my patients."

Stanwick studied his hand computer. He was silent for several moments. “There's one more building on your property. A barn. Please take me there."

"Fine."

I took Stanwick back through my kitchen to the rear door, opened it, then stopped dead. I could still see Ellie slowly leading the dragon across the pasture, down the hill toward the forest. She tossed a soccer ball in front of him, while urging him forward with yanks on his wing. Slowly. Her damn pudgy legs.

I shifted my weight back and forth, blocking Stanwick's view until the dragon's bobbing head disappeared over the hill. I then walked him past my clinic to the entrance to the special room.

"This is it,” I said, pointing. “The barn."

"Can we go inside?"

"No."

Stanwick pulled out his hand computer and stylus and stared at me, waiting for an explanation.

"I keep horses in there. Sick horses. Many have surgically repaired legs and must remain still. If I take you inside, it might agitate them, and they might hurt themselves. Or you.” Stanwick scrawled notes onto his computer pad.

From behind the barn door, I heard a snort, and then a familiar clop, scrape, clop, scrape. Uh oh.

Stanwick stopped writing and stared at the door trying to make sense of the sound. A moment later: clop, scrape, clop, scrape ... CLOP CLOP CLOP CRASH! The door bowed outward, spraying dust, barely holding. Stanwick jumped backward and fell onto his rear.

"See what I mean?” I said. “Horses are skittish."

From behind the door, I heard a thud, followed by a long, mournful moo.

Stanwick stood slowly, without taking his eyes off the door.

"Are you denying me entrance to your ... horse barn?” he asked stiffly.

In my peripheral vision, I saw Ellie jogging slowly across the pasture toward the clinic, trying to keep her head low. “I'm afraid so. If you'd given me some advance notice, maybe a day or two, I could have moved the horses out and let you inspect all you want."

Stanwick scrawled a final note and then pocketed his computer. I led him back to the front circle, keeping him pointed away from the lumbering Ellie.

He climbed into his electric Hyundai and started the engine. Before driving off, though, he rolled down his window and faced me.

"Doctor, there's something you should know. That construct I'm tracking—the large one from West Virginia. Its owners let it roam free at night to hunt livestock. It has already eaten three sheep, four calves, and a goat.” He paused. “And a pair of old horses."

I stared at him, said nothing.

"You can't keep this up,” said Stanwick. “It's not sustainable.” He powered up his window and backed slowly down the driveway.

Once he'd gone, Ellie climbed down the porch steps and stood next to me.

"Radar is going to need a new nose guard,” I said.

"I'll take care of it.” She paused, wiping her brow. “You know, there is an alternative."

"Don't start with that again.” At least once a month, Ellie would mention that she knew people who rescued special animals. Transported them to the Republic of Vermont, or Canada, or some other Bogey-free place. PETSA, no doubt, though Ellie would never admit it. She'd suggest we make “backup plans,” prepare to flee north in case the Bogeys or Cleansers found us.

"Tell me, Ellie. How do these builders keep finding me? How do they know I'll treat their constructs?"

Ellie shrugged, unconvincingly. “News of good deeds travels."

"I'm a veterinarian, not a wizard. I specialize in horses."

She patted my arm. “Yes, doctor, I know."

* * * *

The next morning, I dragged a wheelbarrow out to the pasture, filled with supplies for treating the dragon. I'd lured him back from the forest the night before using heaping piles of dog biscuits. He was lying on the ground now, tied to the stone fence, chewing lazily on Ellie's soccer ball.

I emptied the contents of the wheelbarrow onto the ground, then turned it on its side, as a barricade. I put on a raincoat, bike helmet, and sunglasses. Not much protection if he truly fried me, but it was the best I could do.

I uncoiled my hose and hooked it to a gallon-sized jar of spray-on foam insulation. I climbed behind the wheelbarrow, pointed the hose at the dragon's mouth and nose, and gave him a good squirt. The dragon jumped to his feet and blew a fireball at the ground. He yelped, but not as loud as before.

Once he settled, I climbed out from behind the barricade. He watched me, appraisingly. After a moment, he lay down on the grass and licked his foamy lips. Do what you will, his puppy eyes said.

I climbed onto his back, straddling the base of his neck. With a wet towel, I wiped off the excess foam, leaving a hardening layer around his nostrils and lips. Then I unrolled the goggles.

I'd built the goggles from two large Plexiglas lenses, soundproofing foam, and two loops of rope. I strung one loop behind his neck and the other under his jaw, then placed the lenses over his eyes and drew the ropes taut.

The dragon jumped back to his feet, knocking me off his back. He beat on the lenses with his claws, but couldn't dislodge them. He eventually calmed and sat back down.

Unfortunately, though, I still had to test my treatment. I carefully lifted his flimsy wing and jabbed him hard with my fist in the soft, un-scaled tissue beneath, then dove behind the wheelbarrow. The dragon leapt back to his feet, roared, and blew another fireball.

And then ... nothing. No yelp.

Once he realized the pain was gone, the dragon hopped up and down, swinging his tail in a circle, and ... barked. I backed away, taking care to avoid the barbed tail, and began collecting my supplies.

The dragon spotted me and stopped hopping. He bent down until his giant head loomed over me like the T. Rex in that old Spielberg movie, and opened his mouth, revealing nasty sharks’ teeth. I wondered momentarily if I'd misjudged him.

He stuck out his scaly tongue and licked me from my chest to my forehead. The tongue was warm and scratchy, and his breath smelled faintly of intestine.

I forced a smile, letting the dragon saliva drip down my cheek.

"Do you really eat sheep?” I asked. “And horses?"

The dragon rolled out his tongue, panting, and thumped his barbed tail against the ground.

I shook my head, patted his neck. “I'll call you Rover,” I said. “Rover the Dragon.” He licked me once more and, content again, lay down and resumed chewing the soccer ball.

As I pulled off my raincoat and loaded the wheelbarrow, Ellie walked toward us from the clinic.

She started to say something, then saw the dragon's face and burst out laughing. “Your dragon,” she said, between snorts, “is wearing lip balm and sunglasses."

"They shield his exposed dermis from the ignited methane,” I explained. She spotted my bike helmet and raincoat, crumpled in the wheelbarrow with the hoses, and laughed harder.

"Did you come here to tell me something or just to mock me?"

"There's a phone call for you. It's that Bogey who was here yesterday. You really should carry your phone."

I pushed the wheelbarrow back to the clinic, Ellie trailing behind me, and picked up the telephone.

"This is Dr. Skenner."

"Look out your front door,” said Stanwick.

Ellie and I peered through the porch door. Outside, Stanwick stood at the lip of the driveway circle, next to his Hyundai. Behind him were four police cars, their lights flashing, and a large BOGE animal control van. Ellie gasped. I shut the door and put the phone on speaker.

"We took satellite photos of the construct in your back yard,” said Stanwick. “I have a warrant. Will you cooperate?"

I lowered the phone to my lap. Ellie slumped against the wall, head in her hands, biting her lower lip. Behind me, the harpy squawked once.

Stanwick spoke again, his voice softer. “Doctor, we passed some pickup trucks on Route 20, near Scottsville. They might have followed us. If you cooperate, I promise I'll only euthanize the dangerous constructs. We'll leave the others alone. And I'll help you keep your license. But if you don't, and the villagers arrive..."

I let my eyes wander the clinic. Larry the Parrot waddled back and forth across his perch, muttering obscene nonsense. The harpy squatted on the floor nearby, trying to jam her human mouth into Larry's food tray. The dog and cat crates sat empty—no spays or neuters today. Radar's new mask sat on the check-in desk, half finished. The back door was locked, the shade pulled to hide the pasture, and what roamed it.

Stanwick was right. This was not sustainable. I couldn't continue. I suppose I'd known that all along.

I raised the phone. “All right, Stanwick,” I said. “I'll cooperate. Give me twenty minutes to secure the animals."

"Thank you, doctor. Twenty minutes.” He clicked off the phone.

Ellie gaped at me. Tears welled. “You wouldn't,” she said. “Would you?"

For once, the girl actually believed me.

* * * *

Twenty minutes later, I climbed onto Rover's back, Larry's cage on my lap. I held the rope from Rover's goggles in one hand and the soccer ball in the other.

The pickup trucks had arrived a few minutes earlier—a dozen men, armed with everything from hunting crossbows to elephant guns. Stanwick's policemen were holding them back, at gunpoint.

In the distance, I heard Stanwick shout a final warning through his bullhorn. Where were they?

Then, above the forest, an enormous blue helicopter swept into view, flying low over the trees. It descended onto the far side of the pasture, swirling waves of grass. A cargo bay door fell open.

I spoke into my phone. “All set?"

"I guess so,” said Ellie.

"Well go then!"

The barn door flew open and out came Ellie, atop one of the unicorns, the mermaid on her lap, arms wrapped tightly around Ellie's neck. Behind Ellie, the rest of my rag-tag special animals followed: the centaur, plodding along, his dialysis bag taped to his chest; the other unicorns, swinging their horns in front of them like children playing with swords; the harpy, squawking like the Wicked Witch of the East; and finally, Radar, clopping along in the rear, sniffing the air for cows.

The Cleansers watched the helicopter land, then spotted Ellie and the animals racing toward it. They charged. Stanwick's policemen turned and charged with them.

My cue.

I chucked the soccer ball around the side of the clinic. “Fetch!” I yelled, swatting Rover on the neck.

Rover lay down, licked his foamed lips.

I whacked him with the goggles’ rope. “Rover! Get the ball! Fetch! Fetch!"

He sneezed, blowing puffs of smoke, and flapped his useless wings.

Remembering how Ellie coaxed him across the pasture the day before, I grabbed the edge of his wing and yanked it, harshly. Rover hopped to his feet and ran forward, bouncing on his fat legs. He caught up with the soccer ball, scooped it into his mouth, and continued around the side of the clinic, into the path of the charging Cleansers and Bogeys.

When they saw Rover, they stopped dead. Several gasped, backed away.

Stanwick raced up behind them, computer and stylus in hand. “Stay back!” he shouted. “Stay where you are!"

I pulled on the goggles’ rope, stopping about twenty meters away. Rover stared quizzically at the line of men, head cocked, still chewing on the soccer ball.

Then, just as I'd hoped, one brave Cleanser stepped forward, aimed his rifle, and squeezed off a round.

The bullet whacked into Rover's chest, not hard enough to penetrate the scales, but enough to dent.

Rover yelped. His head snapped around, zeroing on the man who fired the shot. A low growl rumbled up from his chest, and slowly, he reared up on his hind legs, towering over the assembled army. Puffs of smoke curled out from his nostrils. His jaw clenched, exploding the soccer ball. Pop!

"Better run,” I said.

An enormous fireball erupted from Rover's mouth, barreling down on the men. They ran.

We'd stopped far enough away that the fire didn't cook anyone. (Well, maybe a few eyebrows got singed, and the Cleansers necks might now be a shade redder.) But it definitely scared the bejeezus out of them. They scattered, dropping weapons, screaming, racing toward their trucks.

"Sic ‘em."

Rover gave chase, blowing puffs at the feet of the fleeing men, then raced after their cars and trucks as they skidded down the driveway. He pursued them to the end of the property, stopped, “barked” once, then padded back toward the clinic.

All of the cars were gone now—except for one. Agent Stanwick's electric Hyundai still sat at the top of the circle. He leaned against it, watching Ellie and my animals load into the helicopter, calmly taking photographs with his hand computer.

I urged Rover forward, stopping ten meters from Stanwick. “Put the camera down and back away,” I said.

Stanwick studied me. “You're not a radical,” he said. “You won't kill anyone."

"This isn't a horse, Stanwick. No guarantees."

He hesitated, then sighed and tossed his computer to the ground. I gave Rover a poke under his wing, and he melted it.

"Next one fries the Hyundai,” I said.

Stanwick watched Ellie and my animals for another few moments, making mental notes, no doubt. Then he fished keys from his pocket and climbed into the Hyundai. He rolled down a window.

"Remember the Death Valley pupfish, doctor,” he said. He amped the car and began backing down the driveway. “I will find you."

Rover and I waited till Stanwick's car had disappeared onto the road. Then I gave his wing a tug, and we trotted around the clinic to the back pasture.

Ellie had finished loading everyone but Radar and the harpy. While she shooed the harpy up the ramp, Radar sauntered around the copter and stretched a hoofed arm toward the propeller. Ellie snagged him in time and hustled him up the ramp. The copter's door swung shut and it teetered into the air, heading back out over the forest.

The rendezvous point was twenty miles west, under dense foliage in the Blue Ridge Mountains. There, we'd meet ground vehicles and head north. Ellie's PETSA friends wouldn't tell me the final destination yet, but they assured me the animals would be safe.

As Rover trotted across the pasture, I turned back once more to look at my clinic and cabin, the overgrown racetrack of my childhood, the place where I'd planned to spend my career, my life.

But I couldn't linger long. I knew that as soon as Ellie and her entourage arrived at the rendezvous, the mermaid would need water, the centaur would need dialysis and oxygen, and Radar would need—well, I'd find out when I got there.

"Let's go, boy,” I said. “Let's find you a new home.” We bounded for the trees.

Copyright © 2010 David A. Simons

[Back to Table of Contents]

Novelette: THE HUB OF THE MATTER by Christopher L. Bennett

Tools can be used without being fully understood. Even really big tools....

It is a universal law that the faster a mode of transportation is, the more extreme its associated delays become. The Hub offered instantaneous travel to anywhere in the galaxy, so its gridlock achieved truly cosmic proportions.

The wait might not have been so bad for David LaMacchia if he hadn't been seated in the midst of a family pod of Hijjeg tourists returning home from Earth. He'd expected everything in space to be grander than it was back home, but he hadn't expected that to include his personal curse that the fattest individual on the bus—or in this case, the members of the largest, smelliest species—always sat next to him. My first lesson in galactic travel: from now on, take the aisle seat.

Once the transport finally got clearance to enter the Sol System Hubpoint, the surrounding bulk of Hijjeg flesh and the watering of David's eyes made him miss the split-second transition to the Hub itself. He was here, just south of the far end of the galactic bar, forty thousand light-years from home. But he was still surrounded by Hijjeg and losing the feeling in his crushed extremities. The wait was even greater at this end, for as the single means of faster-than-light travel known to exist—the single point that every ship had to pass through to get anywhere—the Hub was, admittedly, something of a bottleneck.

Finally the transport docked at Hubstation 3742, serving Earth and worlds of comparable biochemistry and socioeconomic status. David found himself bustled off the shuttle by the press of Hijjeg bodies before he'd fully managed to restore circulation to his limbs. This is it, he thought as his luggage caught up with him after a frantic search, rubbing against his leg and offering up its handle. Here is the place where I begin my quest.

It looked uncannily like a bus station. Smelled like one, too, but with aromatic overtones unknown on Earth. David's shoulders slumped. “This is the Hub?"

"What is to expect?” rumbled the largest of his Hijjeg seatmates as it trundled past, family pod in tow. “Low-rung world like yours getting good facilities? You want it, you earn it."

His doubts evaporating, he gave the opinionated hillock a defiant smile. “My friend, that's exactly what I'm here to do."

The Hijjeg rumbled. “Good luck. My world try for six generations. Still stuck in this dump."

"Thanks!” David replied. “Good luck to you too."

As he navigated the crowd, David was thrilled to see so many exotic kinds of life in more types of mask, suit, exoskeleton, and other life-support mechanisms than he could identify; business and tourism transcended most environmental categories. It more than made up for the smells.

Finally he found the lobby area for the Hubstation's hotel—about thirty meters past the end of the line for the registration desk. He napped on the back of his trunk until it finally reached the desk, and it gave a whirr of relief when he climbed off and stretched his limbs. “Boy, this place is busy! I hope you still have some empty rooms. I'm exhausted."

The desk clerk, a cadaverous, blue-skinned Jiodeyn, peered at him with four small black eyes. “Empty rooms, sir? No, sir, we have none currently."

"Oh.” David slumped. “Then where am I going to sleep?"

"We have a number of rooms available, sir."

Huh? “But you just said there were no rooms."

"No empty rooms, that's correct, sir."

"Wait ... you mean I'd have to share a room?"

"No, sir. You would have your own space."

"Space. I'd just have part of the room?"

"One segment, sir, but you would have the full space."

He blinked. “Do we take turns?"

"No, sir, you may stay as long as you wish.” The clerk looked him over. “Provided you can pay."

"But other people will be in the room."

The Jiodeyn spoke as if he were doing David a favor by being so patient. “Each suite accommodates seven, sir."

"O ... kay.” David had lived with roommates before, during his college career—all five months of it—and he doubted any of them would be as interesting as the aliens he could meet here. “So there are seven beds per room?"

"No, sir, just the one."

"For seven people?" he cried.

"We don't pry into how our customers use their beds, sir,” the clerk replied primly.

"Isn't that kind of ... well ... cramped?"

"Our beds are quite roomy, sir."

"They'd have to be,” David muttered. Feeling a bit dizzy, he tried a different tack. “Look, what about life-support? You wouldn't put an ammonia-breather or a silicone life form in the same suite with me, right?"

The clerk glared. “Sir, this establishment does not discriminate."

"But that would kill me!"

"Not necessarily, sir, since you have not chosen a room yet."

David took a breath and spoke very carefully. “Okay. Look. Do you have any rooms occupied only by species whose life-support needs wouldn't kill me?"

The Jiodeyn checked his computer with two of his four arms. “Suite forty-seven currently holds five oxygen-breathers and one chlorine-breather. That is the best we can do at this time, sir."

"Does the chlorine-breather wear a mask or something?"

"Not in his room, sir."

David gasped. “Then how am I supposed to not die?!"

"That will be no problem, sir, so long as you stay in your own room."

"But you said he's in the room too!"

"Yes, sir. Would you like me to page him?"

"I don't know,” David said, shaking his head. “What page are we even on?"

A new voice spoke. “That room will be fine for my friend here, Yolien. Put it on my account."

David turned to see a tall, elegant, relatively humanoid biped with tawny skin, handsome leonine features, and a mane of golden feathers down his back. No surprise, he thought, that a Sosyryn would come to his rescue.

The clerk took it in stride. “Very good, Mr. Rynyan. Here is your key, sir.” He handed David a small crystal rod.

At the Sosyryn's prompting, David took the key, but he was still confused. “But what about—"

"You're new to the Hub, aren't you?” Rynyan asked as he led David aside. At the human's nod, he continued. “The rooms are tesseracts, you see. They use a quirk of the spacetime around the Hub to extend into four dimensions. Eight cubic ‘faces,’ making for seven rooms and one entry interface. The only way the Hub complex can handle the volume of traffic, you see."

David was beginning to catch on. “So the key..."

"Rotates the interface to the particular room it's associated with. You use that key and you'll have no worries about opening the wrong room, inhaling chlorine, and dying in agony as your mucus turns into hydrochloric acid.” He paused. “Well, so long as the interface doesn't malfunction. The maintenance crews don't get out here as often as they could,” he went on with no change to his breezy, reassuring tone. David looked warily at the key.

"Ah! I've been rude. I am Rynyan Zynara ad Surynyyyyyy'a. Welcome, traveler, to the Hub."

David shook his hand. “Hi. David LaMacchia."

"Human, right?” Rynyan asked. “From Earth?"

"And proud of it."

"Good for you! I suppose someone has to be. I've taken an interest in your planet, you know. That's why I'm slumming here—I'd been hoping to meet someone interesting from Earth. Are you interesting?"

"That's what I'm here to find out."

"Good answer! You humans have such clever ways of saying ‘no.’ Well, Earth is a lovely world anyway,” he went on before David could answer. “Shame about the climatic catastrophes, though. They must be terribly inconvenient."

"Uhh ... thanks. Really, we'd be much worse off if it weren't for all your people's help."

Rynyan spread his arms magnanimously. “It's our purpose in this universe. I mean, we have no problems of our own, so we need to have them imported.” He gave a passing imitation of a human laugh. “I joke. Seriously, your world was fortunate to be discovered when it was. Rysos was in similarly dire straits millennia ago. Then contact with the Hub Network and its advances and wealth let us make our world the paradise it is today. It is our privilege to share our ... well, our privilege with others who are less ... privileged.” He tapped his neck, where he presumably kept the implant that translated his speech impulses into the language of his choice before they reached his mouth. “That can't be quite right."

"I really admire your people,” David said as Rynyan led him toward his room, his trunk scuttling wearily behind. “You're so egalitarian. You have so much, but it isn't hoarded by a greedy few. You make sure everyone benefits from it."

"The gratitude of others is our wealth,” the Sosyryn replied. “Now, let me do something really generous for you. My cousin just endowed an orphanage, and I'll never live it down if I let that uncultured boor out donate me."

"Oh, no, I couldn't. The room is fine."

"Come now, there must be something. What is it you hope to gain here at the Hub?"

David's eyes lit up. “It's been my mission in life to get here. I didn't have much growing up, but I always believed that I—that humans—were capable of better. There's a whole galaxy out there, just on the other side of the Hub, and that's where humanity's future lies. Where my future lies. It cost me all my savings just to get a ticket offworld. And now I'm here."

"What a charming story. And now that you're here, what will you do next? Or do you plan to kill yourself now that your life's goal is achieved?” he asked with sincere curiosity. “That would be an unconventional thing to help you with, a bit tricky to work into the plus column, but I suppose I could work something out."

But David smiled. “Oh, I've only just begun to chase my life's goal. You see ... I'm going to figure out how the Hub works."

"Oh, oh, I can tell you that!” Rynyan said excitedly. “It's at the center of mass of the dark matter halo that encompasses our galaxy and its satellites, and it connects to every point within that halo, so long as you know the right entry vector. All you have to do is dive in at the right speed and angle and—"

"No, no, I know that part!” David said, chuckling. “I mean I'm going to figure out the part nobody else has figured out yet."

Rynyan stared. “You mean the relationship between the Hub vectors and the exit points?"

"Right. I'm going to find the pattern. I'm going to make it possible to go anywhere in the Galaxy by choice, not just by trial and error."

The Sosyryn gaped at him. “Why, this is delightful! I'd forgotten they haven't yet cured insanity on your world! Do tell me more, this is invigorating!"

David took the comment in stride. “I know it sounds crazy. But somebody's gotta be the one to solve this, and it might as well be a human."

"Oh, this is an entertaining delusion! How do you intend to proceed?"

David explained his plan to hire a Hub scout, one of the pilots who took their ships into the Hub on random vectors in the hopes of discovering promising new destinations. It had been such a scout who'd stumbled across the Sol System thirty-four years ago; once that vector was logged and recorded, it allowed steady access to Earth, at least until Sol's drift took it away from the Hubpoint over the next few millennia. But missing the correct vector by a milliarcsecond could send a ship to the other end of the galaxy or a Magellanic Cloud; the relationship wasn't remotely linear, if there even was one. David believed there had to be, and he'd brought instruments that he hoped would prove it. “I just keep collecting data with each jump we make, try to find a pattern. That's why it has to be a Hub scout. They make the most trips."

"You're in luck,” Rynyan said. “I just happen to know a very good Hub scout. And she's human, too, so I'm sure she'd be happy to help you out."

"Can you introduce me to her?"

"Absolutely. She positively adores me."

* * * *

"You're an idiot, Rynyan,” the Hub scout said.

Her name was Nashira Wing, and she'd spent a lifetime trying to live it down. It was just her rotten luck that she'd turned out to be better at piloting than anything else. “And so is your friend,” she went on, “if he thinks he has any chance of cracking the Hub."

Nashira's insult bounced off Rynyan's impenetrable skull as usual, but the Sosyryn stood up for his new pet charity case. “He's not an idiot."

"Thank you,” the man named David said.

"He's a lunatic,” Rynyan went on, beaming. “I've always wanted one of my own."

Nashira tilted her head to regard him. “Doesn't charity for lunatics involve curing them, not indulging them?"

"Oh, where's the fun in that?"

She turned to the young, sandy-haired human, making an effort to soften her expression. She often welcomed the “dragon lady” severity her crisp Asian features and sharp-edged soprano could assume, but this David LaMacchia was a harmless wide-eyed hick who didn't know any better. “Look ... David? If there were a way to predict the relationship between entry vectors and exit points, somebody would've done it already. It's what they call an NP-complete problem—there's no way to solve it in a finite amount of time."

"But a solution can be verified in a finite amount of time,” David responded, showing that he wasn't completely ignorant about the subject. “If we have a theory to test, we can confirm it."

"And what makes you think you can find a solution nobody else in thousands of planets has thought of? Are you some kind of supergenius?"

"Nope. Just an ordinary human."

"No degrees in astrophysics, quantum physics, anything like that?"

He shook his head. “Don't need ‘em.” He tapped his face next to his eye. She saw text dancing across his contact lens interface. “A wikigoogler. I've got the sum total of human knowledge at my fingertips. Or ... eyetips."

She scoffed. “What?! You think that's gonna give you some special insight?"

"The collective insight of the entire human species,” he answered with pride.

"You think that amounts to anything?” She let her face grow severe again, and her voice along with it. “You have no sodding idea what it's really like out here, do you? You don't understand what it means to be in a society with thousands of worlds, with civilizations thousands of times older than ours. I've heard it all—humans wondering why the rest of the galaxy hasn't gone gaga over Shakespeare and Mozart and the Grand Canyon and chocolate. It's because the galaxy is just too big. Too old. There's too much stuff in it. Everything we have, everything we've ever built or written or thought of, somebody else did it first or has something better. There's nothing new under the stars.

"Why do you think Earth is still so poor after thirty-four years on the Network? Because we have nothing to offer anybody. No reason for them to care about us."

David glanced at Rynyan. “The Sosyryn care."

"Please. Haven't you been listening? You're his new toy. Charity is something Sosyryn do to pass the time. They've wiped out all hardship on their own world, so they're bored stiff looking for something to do."

"You mean,” Rynyan corrected with his typical polite condescension, “that we seek to spread the fruits of our prosperity to others."

"So we'll bow down in gratitude and make you feel like there's a point to your existence.” She turned back to David. “But they've never suffered, never wanted for anything. They can't understand pain, so they can't really care. So before his ... enabling gets you hurt, let me be cruel to be kind. Drop this. Now. Go back to East Bloody Podunk and work at the general store."

"I've got nothing to go back to,” David said. “No money to live on ... or to buy a ticket with. The only way I can go is forward."

Her heart threatened to go out to the poor fool, so she yanked hard on its leash. “Rynyan was right. You are insane."

"You think I don't know how the galaxy looks at humans, Ms. Wing? That's the whole reason I'm out here. Because somebody has to be. Because we can't let ourselves be brainwashed into thinking the galaxy's right about us. Sure, they've all done wonderful things ... but none of them are us."

"And what makes us so much better than anyone else?"

"We're not better. But we're new. We can come at the universe fresh, apply our unique way of thinking, maybe hit on something nobody else ever thought of.

"I'm not saying it's a sure thing. But I know humans can contribute something important to the galaxy. Why not this? And how will we ever know unless we try?"

"Well, you don't start small, I'll give you that."

"How can you not be excited at the possibility?” he continued, eyes gleaming. “I mean, you're a Hub scout! A pioneer, braving unknown frontiers, seeking out strange new worlds and new—"

"If you split an infinitive, I'm leaving,” she told him. “You think this job is glamorous? Some big adventure you can tag along on? Let me tell you something. Space isn't empty. Space is beyond empty. At least ‘empty’ implies there's something there that can be filled. Space is nothing, with trace impurities.

"Now, imagine jumping randomly into nothing for a living. Imagine the odds of happening to materialize in range of one of those trace impurities, one that's interesting enough that people might want to come to it. Can you imagine that?” He thought it over, and she interrupted before he could speak. “I'll give you the answer: You can't. Whatever you're imagining, it's not even close.

"Now, imagine knowing that if you do eventually find a Hubpoint that's close to a star or planet, there's no way to know you won't emerge directly inside it and get an instant, no-fuss burial or cremation thrown in free with your death. Not that I'm complaining; that undercurrent of mortal terror before every dive helped relieve the monotony for the first year or so."

"And now?"

"Now it offers a ray of hope.” He stared. “That's what being a Hub scout is, kid,” she went on. “I don't do it for the adventure. I do it because I'm a human, and that means I'm desperate. I'd quit faster than a Hub dive if I got a better offer."

Rynyan leaned forward, leering. “That room in my mansion is still available for you."

"I said a better offer.” She shuddered. “What is it with you? I'm not even your species."

"It is my duty as a Sosyryn to share my people's bounty with other species,” he intoned. “If that includes sharing the wonders of Sosyryn sex, then I stand ready to serve."

"More like your own people are so decadent and dull that you have to look elsewhere for excitement. I'll stick to humans, thanks."

He shrugged. “Well, if you want to settle for males with only one penis..."

Mercifully, David got back on topic. “Look at it this way: your job won't be so boring if you have me along for company. I don't care if we find any interesting destinations—it's the jumps themselves I want to study.” He smiled. “And it means your jumps will be accomplishing something even if they don't come out anywhere good."

"Except this crazy plan of yours isn't going to accomplish a bloody thing,” she said.

He looked sad that he was unable to infect her with his enthusiasm. But he didn't give up trying. “Taking me along will accomplish one thing, at least. It'll get you paid. You can save up more toward getting a better job."

Nashira remained skeptical. “You can't even afford a ticket home. How're you gonna pay me?"

"Rynyan's agreed to fund the expedition."

She turned to Rynyan. “Really?"

"Absolutely. It sounds like a marvelous adventure. I'll be coming along, of course, to make sure my donation is put to good use."

Nashira quailed. The prospect of Rynyan's company almost outweighed that of Rynyan's money ... but only almost. If Sosyryn got their kicks out of spreading their obscene wealth around on charity, who was she to refuse to take advantage of it? “Okay, Mr. LaMacchia."

"David."

She ignored it. “It's against my better judgment ... but as long as I'm getting paid, you can come along ... provided my supervisor okays it.” Not that there was any chance Kred would go for it; he hated variations from procedure. But he wouldn't have any grounds to forbid it, either. She just didn't want to seem too eager.

David took her hand and shook it ardently. “Thank you, Ms. Wing. When we crack the code of the Hub, I'll make sure the history wikis say only nice things about you."

Rynyan leaned across the table, putting a hand on her arm. “If all it takes to change your mind about an offer is money, my dear..."

A moment later, Rynyan began to understand pain.

* * * *

"What's this about you taking on passengers, Wing?"

Nashira sighed. She should've known Mokak Vekredi would've found out about this. The molelike Zeghryk may have been myopic in more ways than one, but he certainly seemed to hear about everything that went on in the Hubstation he managed. “Why, hello, Kred,” she replied with feigned affection. “You're positively glowing today, dear. Pregnancy agrees with you."

The diminutive alien's night-adapted eyes darted away under their tinted goggles. “I don't know what you're referring to. I asked about these passengers. They're attempting to study Hub travel?"

"That's the idea. So when are the babies due?"

"I know of no babies,” Vekredi insisted, ducking down to hide his swollen belly behind his desk. Nashira stifled a laugh. Kred was so easy. Zeghryk were prolific breeders, hermaphrodites that could produce dozens of litters from a single mating. The boons of Hub contact had cured disease and conquered dangers, letting their population explode and forcing them to migrate offworld en masse. On learning that other races might feel threatened by their rampant growth, they'd made a decision typical of the officious Zeghryk mindset: by denying the problem existed, they could make it go away. They utterly refused to discuss the concept of sex or procreation with outsiders, insisted that they were all male, and denied ever being pregnant or raising children—even when they were visibly pregnant or surrounded by young, one or both of which they usually were. The xenosociologists had their theories for this strange behavior, but Nashira had her own theory, which was that Zeghryk were freaking idiots.

Which must be why they so often took jobs in middle management. “Your job is to search for profitable destinations,” Vekredi went on. “Not to ferry tourists."

"Hub scouts take scientists along all the time. You know the regs, Kred. I'm not violating any procedures by bringing these guys along.” She knew she'd have him there. He lacked the imagination to be comfortable with anything beyond clearly drawn procedure.

"Yes, but the Dosperhag want you to refuse this particular ... expedition."

Nashira grimaced. Unless it involves following direct orders from above. “The Dospers don't own the Hub, Kred. Nobody does."

"It is in their territory."

"Only ‘cause they moved their star system to keep it there."

"Exactly. The Dosperhag have an enormous investment in the Hub. They are entitled to ... take an interest in its operation."

She shook her head. “You mean try to quash any attempt to figure out how the Hub works, just in case someone figures out how to build another one and take away their gravy train."

Vekredi blinked. “Their concerns run far beyond the import of meat-based sauces."

"Come on, Kred, they're being paranoid! Nobody's ever gonna crack the Hub."

"Of course not. But the Dosperhag feel that people should be discouraged from undertaking such futile efforts—possibly risking their lives for nothing."

She hoped she was right that Vekredi lacked the subtlety for that to be a veiled threat. “Look, this guy's just a kid with delusions of grandeur. He can barely find his sodding hotel room. The Dospers have nothing to worry about."

The little manager fidgeted. “I suppose not. However...” He leaned forward and spoke conspiratorially. “There is no procedure violated if his experiments ... fail. And such failure would serve to ... caution others against similar attempts."

Okay, so he did have a trace of subtlety after all. Not much, though. “No way, Kred. I'm not gonna sabotage this guy's equipment."

"What is your interest in defending him, Wing? Simply that he is of your species?"

He was really getting on her nerves now, so she reciprocated. “Yes, Kred. I'm madly in love with him. I'm going to spend the whole trip having wild, athletic sex with him.” Vekredi cringed. Zeghryk didn't like discussing other species’ sex lives either. “In fact, maybe I'll settle down with him and have lots and lots of babies. I bet you can give me all sorts of wonderful advice on mothering. Maybe your children can baby-sit for me!"

"They're not children!” Vekredi insisted by rote. “They're ... small relatives. And none of this is pertinent."

"There's nothing pertinent about any of this, Kred! There's no point in sabotaging something that won't bloody work to begin with!"

The fidgeting increased. Kred was torn between two imperatives: following orders from his superiors and following his beloved procedures. She wondered if his head would explode. That would be fun to see. “There might be a point,” he managed to say. “I know you are eager for promotion out of the scout position. A good performance review from me could open new doors for you, Ms. Wing."

For once, she had no comeback.

* * * *

This time, David got to see the view. Once Nashira's scout ship, the Starship Entropy, launched from the Hubstation into open space, he gasped in awe. The sky was ablaze with stars and nebulosity in all directions, making the skies of Earth seem empty by comparison—but the Bulge itself filled nearly half the sky with an unbroken mass of yellow-white light. Against this magnificent backdrop lay the enormous ring habitats that surrounded the Hub concentrically, their rotations providing different gravity levels to accommodate the thousands of species participating in the Hub Network.

The Entropy was one of countless vessels shuttling between the Hubstation rings and the heavily armored Shell that encased the Hub, the light from their various drive sinks and exhausts creating a multicolored light show rivaling the galactic splendor beyond. It looked like freeway gridlock on Earth, except in three dimensions and less cluttered; the lethally hot plasma exhaust from fusion engines tended to discourage tailgating.

But Hub scouts tended to be given priority, since there were simply so many untried Hub vectors remaining to test. The Entropy was able to soar past the gridlock on a reserved vector and was soon passing through a hatch in the Shell. “That's no moon, it's a space station,” David quipped, but Nashira ignored him.

As they passed through the intricate array of launchers and scanners inside the Shell, David was finally able to look upon the Hub itself. It was less impressive-looking than he'd expected, just an odd pucker in the center of the Shell, faintly glowing with the trace energy that seeped through from literally every point within the galactic halo, but oddly difficult to focus his eyes on.

But as the Entropy took its place on the launch rail and was shunted around the curve of the Shell toward its dive trajectory, David remembered just how impressive the Hub really was. “This is so cool,” he said. “Here we are, about to go someplace no human or Sosyryn has ever been in the history of the Universe."

"Yep,” Nashira said. “Hey, you did remember to update your will, right?” David swallowed, suddenly remembering what Nashira had said about the risks of her job. She cackled at his expression. “Now that's the Hub scout spirit. Nice knowin’ ya, suckers!” she cried as the Entropy was launched from the rail and dove into the Hub. David missed the transition because his eyes were squeezed shut.

After a few moments, he realized he wasn't dead, and dared to open them again—only to gasp at the vista that spread before him on the cockpit's wraparound display wall. Out there, just beyond the ship's nose, the whole expanse of the Milky Way spread out before him, its two major spiral arms and central bar clearly delineated. Off to the side, both Magellanic Clouds were visible, two small, irregular clumps of light with a faint streamer barely detectable between them. He looked to the other side and saw a spray of red-orange stars, a globular cluster a few thousand parsecs off their starboard bow.

"Wow,” he finally said. “Wow. There, you see, Nashira? Our very first dive, and we get something ... this beautiful. What are the odds of that?"

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, about 4,999 in five thousand. Dives can take you anywhere inside the halo, and the galaxies make up a fiftieth of a percent of that by volume. I see views like this every bloody day, and so do the tourists who go to the hundreds of destinations with views just like this. Destinations that actually have nearby stars to support the tour facilities. Here, we'd be lucky to find a speck of dust within a parsec."

As David's face fell, Nashira worked the controls. “Now let's get back before we lose the beam."

He put his hand on her arm. “Wait. Can't we just stay here a little longer? It's my first time."

"And it's my first time today. I've got a lot of vectors left to test."

"Please? Come on, can't you remember what it was like the first time you saw this?"

She sighed. “All right, I guess there's no harm."

"Uhh, we can call for pickup after the beam's shut down, right?"

"Long as we've got the ‘lopes."

David kept drinking in the sight until the laser beam that “held the door open” along their Hub vector shut down, about four minutes after the dive. When the Dosperhag had first stumbled upon the Hub millennia ago, they had lost many probes and ships to one-way interstellar journeys before discovering the beam effect. That simple discovery had made the Hub viable for interstellar travel and begun bringing the galaxy together. As a result, the Dosperhag had become one of the most prosperous and influential races in the galaxy—although their low-gravity, metal-poor biology limited their ability to visit other worlds, so they were content to share the burden of managing the Hub with others. David cast a glance back at his instruments, hoping they would bring about another simple revolution—for the benefit of all, but in the name of humanity.

Nashira caught his glance. “Okay, I might as well ask—what's this big theory of yours for how the Hub works?"

He smiled at her interest, however marginal it sounded. “Well, I got the idea from a twentieth-century physicist called Richard Feynman. He thought that every particle in the Universe was really the same particle, bouncing back and forth endlessly through space and time. I think he was onto something. I'm theorizing that every particle in the Universe is just a cross-section of one great big cosmic string ... and the Hub is a sort of tangle where all the paths intersect. The Hub vectors are the paths the strings take. So if I can identify the string signatures and how they intersect, we'll be able to predict where a Hub vector comes out!"

Nashira stared at him blankly until David said, “Was I clear enough? Do you need something explained?"

After another moment, she turned to Rynyan in the back. “Rynyan, I owe you an apology. For once, you were right. You've found yourself a grade-A lunatic."

Rynyan preened. “I bring you nothing but the best, my pet."

"It just sounds crazy to you because it's not accepted by the galaxy,” David told her. “But that's exactly the kind of new idea we need to try!"

"Forget it. I'm just the driver. You play with your gadgets all you want, doesn't matter to me. Whatever happens with that stuff, it's not my problem."

David chuckled. “You make it sound like something bad's going to happen. What could go wrong?"

"Nothing. Never mind.” Nashira cleared her throat and headed back to the communication shack. “I'm calling for retrieval."

David hastened to follow. “Ooh, I want to watch. I've never seen a quantelope."

A quantelope was a small, rabbitlike creature with purple fur and two small horns on its head. And the whole of galactic civilization rested upon its tiny shoulders. The Hub allowed instantaneous travel, but the blanket energy leakage obscured any radio traffic. The only way to communicate with the Hub from a distance, whether to confirm a viable Hubpoint or to request a beam for a return trip, was by talking to a quantelope. Somehow, in the ultracold environs of their homeworld, these ammonia-based animals had evolved with Bose-Einstein condensates in their bloodstreams, allowing their brains to become quantum-entangled with those of their relatives. A little gengineering had turned them into quantum radios, able to parrot anything heard by one of their entanglemates. Which made them dandy for interstellar communication but unwise to keep as pets in one's bedroom.

David was torn between staring in awe and giggling as the tiny, adorable beastie stared up out of its cryotank and intoned in a deep voice, “You're overdue, Entropy. Anything to report?"

"False alarm,” Nashira said, and asked for a beam. Moments later, a spot of laser light appeared in the middle of nowhere, Hubpoint distortion scattering enough of its light to make it visible from any direction. Nashira piloted the Entropy until it aligned with the beam and rode it back through the Hub.

"Do us both a favor,” Nashira said once they were in the Shell again. “Get off now and take Don Wannabe here with you. You're not going to find anything."

"We've barely even started,” David said. “And I, for one, would love to see our galaxy from a few dozen more angles."

She turned to David's backer. “How about you, Rynyan? We've been doing this for nearly fifteen minutes. We must have exceeded your attention span by now."

"I am never bored so long as I have your beauty to gaze upon,” he said. “Though honestly, that jumpsuit doesn't let me gaze upon nearly enough of your beauty. I'll buy you some Earth lingerie to wear for me tomorrow."

Nashira spun the ship around sharply to redock on the launch rail, sending Rynyan into the bulkhead. “Ooh, I love it when you get physical,” he said.

"Last chance to get off, save us all some grief,” she told David.

"I don't give up that easy,” he replied. “Let's dive."

The second dive was on the same trajectory as before, but a centimeter per second faster. They came out a good hundred kiloparsecs from where they'd been, this time seeing the Milky Way edge-on from the other side. Over the next few dozen jumps, David certainly got his wish to see his home galaxy—and the various satellites and clusters that shared its dark-matter halo—from every possible angle.

On the second day, Rynyan's generous donation of lingerie items was jettisoned eight thousand parsecs beyond the Canis Major Dwarf galaxy. On the third day, they actually materialized inside the Virgo Stellar Stream, the remnant of a dwarf spheroidal galaxy being torn apart as it slowly merged with the Milky Way's disk. Despite his fascination with the extragalactic vistas, David was somewhat relieved to see a starry sky, even a sparse one like this. “I'm picking up energy readings,” Nashira reported. “Looks like radar transmissions."

David perked up. “A new species? First contact?"

Her eyes were wide as she studied the readings, narrowing in on the source. “Maybe. If we're lucky..."

"I bet you get a huge bonus for this!"

"Wouldn't suck..."

After a moment, she slumped. Then she socked David in the shoulder, hard. “Damn you! You sodding moron, trying to get my hopes up!"

"What is it? No aliens?"

"Oh, there are aliens, all right! Great big sodding technical civilization, colonies all over their system."

"Then what—"

"They're eight light-years away, that's what! We can't go there! We can't make contact! This is even worse than finding nothing! Do you get now why I hate this job?"

"Hey, it's not a total loss. I'm sure they'll want to set up a science outpost here to study them."

"Oh, great, scientists. No tourism, no trade. I'll be able to buy new shoes with my bonus.” She grimaced. “And now I have to fall further behind schedule so I can collect preliminary readings. A little present for the grandkids I'm never gonna have at this rate."

"Hey, doing science. That sounds exciting."

"You want to do science? You want to help?"

"Do I!"

She pointed. “Push that button."

He did so. “Now what?"

"That's it. It's done. The ship's taking readings. What do you think, I have xenology degrees? I'm a bloody pilot.” She crossed her arms. “Nothing to do now but sit and wait."

She went back to get a sandwich. David heard Rynyan moving to intercept her. “If you'd like a way to pass the time, I've been studying this book called the Kama Sutra. I think its proposals would be very adaptable to a merging of our species."

"You remember David's theory, Rynyan? About how the particles in all our bodies are really the same particle looping back on itself?"

"Yes,” he replied, nonplussed.

"Well, if he's right, then if you want to have sex with me ... you can just go fuck yourself."

* * * *

"These are acceptable results,” Vekredi told Nashira as he reviewed her reports. “I'll forward them to Research for eventual follow-up. The size of your bonus will be contingent on how these results pan out."

Nashira declined to hold her breath. It was a big galaxy, plus eight small galaxies, and there was already plenty to keep the universities and research centers of the Network worlds busy for centuries. If she were lucky, she might see the bonus before she retired. If she lived that long.

"Meanwhile, I trust Mr. LaMacchia has made no progress?"

"Of course not, Kred."

He peered at her through his goggles. “Then you have taken action to ... neutralize his equipment?"

"His equipment is off-the-shelf junk, and he barely knows how to use it. Even if there were something to find, I'm not gonna bother sabotaging something that has no chance of finding it. I don't kick people when they're already down for the count. Not worth the pain in my toes."

"Very well,” Vekredi said after a moment. “Since your position is clear, the subject will not be raised with you again."

"It better not be.” She didn't tell him how close she'd come to sabotaging David's equipment anyway. That bonus would have done her some real good, even if it had been for a pointless act. But if she'd let Kred and his bosses use her that way once, she'd never be free of them.

And maybe, on some level, she didn't like the idea of betraying David LaMacchia. Not that she was getting sentimental; if she'd felt it was in her best interests to screw him over, she would've screwed him over and had no trouble living with it. But she was just a little bit glad she didn't have to.

They soon settled into a daily routine, with David improvising new scan techniques with his instruments while Rynyan “supervised” and flirted, and Nashira tried her best to ignore them both. Each morning she advised them to give up and leave her to her sullen solitude, and each morning they climbed aboard with unrelenting enthusiasm.

But after a week in which none of the three made any progress toward their respective goals, David was beginning to think a change of tack was needed. “We need to go through the Hub as slowly as possible,” he told Nashira. “Just drift into it. Maybe a slower passage will get me better readings."

"The jump's instantaneous,” Nashira said.

"But it can't be. The front of the ship enters the Hub before the back does. There has to be some kind of transition."

"The controllers won't like it. A slow dive means delays for other ships."

And David turned to the Sosyryn. “Rynyan?"

"Not to worry. I'm wiring the bribes into their accounts as we speak."

And so, thanks to Sosyryn generosity, one controller was able to buy a lavish anniversary meal for each of his six spouses, another was able to decorate her hothouse-dwelling with the finest K'slien pornographic topiaries, and Nashira was able to read insulting and threatening instant messages from a dozen fellow pilots before the Starship Entropy finally crept through the Hub.

She was still composing suitably scathing replies when they reached the other side, hoping to provoke a good brawl in the pilots’ lounge later on and get enough bones broken to justify a medical leave. So she ignored David's gasp of amazement. Then she ignored Rynyan's gasp of amazement.

Then Rynyan grabbed her head from behind and tilted it up to the viewing wall. And she gasped in amazement.

"I've never seen anything like that,” David said.

"Neither have I,” Rynyan said, “and I'm not even a backwater hick."

"I don't know if anyone has,” Nashira said.

What they saw, so the Entropy computer told them after digesting a few minutes of scans, was a red giant star a few AUs in front of them. But not just any red giant. This star had not one or two, but four hot Jovians in close orbits around it. All four had been engulfed by the star's expanding atmosphere as it swelled past its main-sequence confines. But they had not been fully vaporized, for they were large, and the extremely hot hydrogen around them was also extremely tenuous. Rather, they had carved out gaps in the vast hydrogen cloud, bulldozing their orbital paths clear. Their gravity had concentrated the star's hydrogen into the zones between their orbits, confining it against the outward push of the stellar wind from the white-hot, dying core. Friction with the stellar atmosphere had eroded their own atmospheres, which had coursed behind the planets like cometary tails and been blown outward to mingle with the confined hydrogen in between them, spiking it with trace amounts of ammonia, methane, ice crystals, hydrocarbons, and organic compounds.

In short, the newly dead white dwarf was surrounded by a system of immense, multicolored rings, so vast that the Jovian planets functioned as shepherd moons. These rings were encased within the tenuous remains of the red giant's outer atmosphere, minus the layers that had already sloughed off to begin forming a planetary nebula around it, nested shells encasing the nested rings.

"This is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen,” David said.

"The hell with that—this is gonna make me rich!” Nashira replied with glee. “Oh, we'd better get back so I can stake a claim on this place! Wing's Rings, they'll call it!"

"You can do that?” Rynyan asked.

"If I'm quick about it. If I can do an end run, get the paperwork done in my name before I have to report this to Kred. I'll still have a ton of debt to work off, but eventually I should be able to get out of this shitty job and rub my success in their faces and assorted sensory clusters. One quick scan and then we go back!"

"Whoa, what's your hurry?” David asked. “Come on, Nashira, look at it! You've found something incredibly beautiful, something that nobody has ever seen before. How can you not be thrilled by this? How can you not give yourself a little time to be moved by it?"

She glared at him. “You're right. This is an amazing place. It's gorgeous. Anyone would give a fortune to retire here. And I can never see it again. That's a Hub scout's life, understand? We try the new vectors, the ones nobody's been to before. Well, we've been here now, and that means I'm not coming back. So where's the percentage in letting myself give a damn about it, except as a way of maybe someday getting out of this life?"

He was nonplussed. “But ... if you did get out, you could still come back."

"If I'm lucky,” she told him, reality setting back in. “If nothing else goes wrong. If I don't materialize inside a brown dwarf tomorrow. That's my life, kid."

David was quiet for a time. “I'm really sorry,” he said, and it sounded like pity, so she hated him for it.

She spent a few minutes ignoring him, studying the scans to make sure there was nothing here to jinx her find. Once she was satisfied, she jumped out of her chair and headed to the comm shack, pushing past Rynyan, who was loitering in the hatchway and clearly relished the close contact. “I'm calling for the beam. Sooner you two dreamers are out of my hair, the better.” And out of my head.

A few moments later, she screamed. “What is it?” David cried, rushing in after her with Rynyan behind him. She just pointed and let them see for themselves:

The quantelopes were dead.

A quick investigation showed that the cryotank's supposedly failure-proof systems had failed. The quantelopes had boiled alive well before reaching room temperature. “Well!” Rynyan declared. “I shall certainly complain to the manufacturer when we get back."

"When we get back?!" Nashira cried. “How exactly do we do that? We have no way of contacting the Hub!"

"Won't they send a ship to find us when we don't report in?” David asked.

"In about five years, maybe. For all they know, we're inside a planet or got caught in a war or a supernova wavefront. They'll give it time for the danger to move past the Hubpoint."

"Oh.” He paused. “Well, we'll have to figure something out ourselves, then."

"Don't you get it?! We're dead! There's nowhere habitable in this system. The ship's got less than a week's supplies for three. God, it'd be better if we'd come out right inside the bloody star, been flash-vaporized."

She went back to the cockpit and took her seat, tempted to fire up the drive and fly the Entropy into the star. Instead, she just clunked her head down on the console and wrapped her arms around it. I never thought I'd go this way. I thought I'd never even know I'd died. She damned the Universe for getting her hopes up just before it killed her.

She felt a hand on her shoulder—a human one, at least. “Maybe there's another way,” David said. “Maybe the scans I took can let us figure out a way back, or at least a way to contact the Hub."

"Stop deluding yourself, kid. You ... are going ... to die."

He sat down beside her. “I don't think it's deluded to go on trying. If you try, at least you have a chance. If you don't try, you have none.

"That's the whole point of what you do, Nashira. It's why I admire you so much. Your job, it's all about playing the long odds, risking it all to find things you have only the tiniest chance of finding. The fact that you do this job at all tells me that there must be a part of you that believes in hope."

"Hope just sets you up for disappointment, David."

"I don't believe in disappointment,” Rynyan said. “Just delayed gratification. We'll be home by dinnertime.” He rubbed his belly. “That reminds me, I need a snack."

"Go ahead,” Nashira told him. “No point in rationing our food anyway."

"Nashira..."

"Don't, David. You just go play with your toys until you figure out we're buggered."

He spent a few hours with his instruments before growling in frustration. “Let me guess,” Nashira said.

"It's not hopeless,” he insisted. “Just difficult."

"There's nothing there."

"There's some data ... I just have to figure it out."

"Random noise."

"I'm not giving up. At least...” He sighed. “At least it's something to keep me occupied if..."

"So you're finally starting to admit it."

He returned to his seat next to hers. “Okay. Maybe we are going to die here."

She stared. “How can you be so calm about it?"

"Are you kidding?” He gestured to the display. “I got to see that."

"You're not disappointed that you'll never get to crack the Hub and make the galaxy sit up and notice humanity?"

"At least I tried. I set a goal for myself, a big goal. Something more than just working a nine-to-five and watching the vidnet. That's not enough of a life anymore, not when there's a whole universe for us to reach for. I know a lot of people back home who dream of coming out here. But they'll never actually do it. Because they're not stupid or crazy enough to risk everything to try it. But I was. I was stupid. I was crazy. And so I really tried. And I made it out here. Maybe I'm going to die, but at least I actually lived first.” He turned back to admire the rings. “Just look at it, Nashira. We get to see something nobody else has ever seen. And it's all ours, for the rest of our lives. That's not so bad a way to go, is it?"

Nashira looked into his eyes for a while. Then she turned to the display and really saw the rings for the first time.

After a while, the rings blurred, and she realized she was crying. In wonder. “It really is beautiful."

"It's an amazing universe,” David said.

"Yeah ... I guess sometimes it is.” She found herself looking into his eyes again ... and found herself not wanting to look away. She felt herself moving closer to him, closer...

And then the proximity alert went off. Nashira spun back to the console in bewilderment. “What? There—there's a ship coming! It just came through the Hub! We're saved!"

"Well, it's about time they got here,” Rynyan spoke up. “The snacks on this ship aren't very good."

Nashira heard something more than his usual cluelessness in his voice. She turned to face him. “'They’ who?"

"Oh, just some friends of mine. Business partners, really. They're here to secure my claim."

She stood. "Your claim?"

He grinned and gestured toward the glorious vista beyond. “Welcome to Rynyan's Rings. I'm going to donate them as a federal park, so the entire Network can benefit from them!"

"You—you! You—when the hell did you ... How did you ...?"

"Oh, I called them hours ago! While you were doing the system scan. The quantelopes were fine when I used them. Oh, I do hope I didn't break something. If so, I'll pay for—"

"You bastard!” She pinned him against the bulkhead. “You come aboard my ship and you have the gall to jump my claim?!"

"I prefer to think of it as saving your life. Which I'm sure you'll agree is a much more generous act than letting you have the claim to the Rings. Along with my donation of the Rings themselves, I'll be the envy of all Rysos come tallying season!"

"Saving my—you didn't even know we'd be in danger when you made that call!"

"The intent doesn't matter,” he said with the serene smile of the bodhisattva who'd eaten the canary. “The meaning lies in the gift itself."

* * * *

"The failure of the cryotank is being investigated,” Vekredi told them upon their return to Hubstation 3742. “Naturally the reliability of our quantelope communication is of the highest priority to us. But I hope this incident has driven home to you, Mister LaMacchia, that Hub scout missions are intrinsically dangerous. If you continue your ... researches in this vein, the Hub management cannot be held liable for the consequences. Do you understand me, sir?"

"Yes, thanks,” David said. “Your translator's working fine."

Vekredi nodded in satisfaction and waddled away. Once he was out of earshot, Nashira punched David in the shoulder. “Don't you get it, kid? Translated or not, that was a threat. No way that tank just happened to fail. It was sabotaged."

His eyes widened. “Are you sure?"

"I can't prove it, but I know it. The Dospers wanted me to sabotage your equipment, but I refused. So they had someone sabotage my ship instead."

"Why would they do that?"

"Because they don't want to lose their monopoly on interstellar travel! If you keep digging, David, they'll keep trying to stop you."

"Oh my God,” he said. Then he grinned. “This is great!"

"It's great that they tried to kill us?"

"Don't you get it, Nashira? Thousands of species have studied the Hub and found nothing. If the Dosperhag are afraid of what I'm doing ... it means they must think there's a chance that I can find something. A chance that humans—insignificant, irrelevant humans—can offer the galaxy something that nobody else can.

"And you know what that means?"

"It means,” Rynyan said thoughtfully, “that maybe there is an answer after all. One the Dosperhag have been covering up. You might actually be sane after all.” He slumped. “Aww."

"More than that,” David said. “It means—"

Nashira sighed, troubled that she was beginning to understand how he thought. “It means you can't give up now. That you're gonna keep trying to show the galaxy what humanity can do."

"That's right.” He shrugged. “Maybe I won't keep studying Hub travel—not openly, anyway. I'm not that stupid.” He winked. “But there have got to be other things humans have to offer the galaxy. And I'm going to find them, no matter how long it takes. Just like you're gonna find another special place someday, no matter how long it takes."

"And just as I,” said Rynyan, “will find a way to share the wonders of Sosyryn sex with Nashira, no matter how—"

"Not happening, Goldilocks,” she told him absently before turning back to David. “You're gonna get yourself in so many kinds of trouble."

"Then it's a good thing I have Rynyan to help me out."

"Like I said: you're gonna get in so many kinds of trouble.” She sighed again, knowing she was going to have to keep an eye on the kid until he got a better feel for the big, bad galaxy. If only because she shuddered to think what would happen to humanity's reputation with David and Rynyan carrying the torch.

But maybe, she thought as she studied David's eyes and infectious smile, she had one or two other reasons to care what happened to him. Maybe he'd reminded her what it felt like to care.

So she'd have to stick close until she figured out whether to thank him or take revenge.

Copyright © 2010 Christopher L. Bennett

[Back to Table of Contents]

Novelette: NARROW WORLD by Carl Frederick

There's a fine line between disrupting an ecosystem and creating a new one....

Grass tastes good. Rats taste better, but I need to cough fur. Birds are good too. But they are hard to catch and most are too big. The rats are in front of us. There's nowhere else they can be—except behind us. When we are hungry again, we will run and catch them and play with them and eat them.

On one side there is a big, wide trail with lots and lots of things that smell bad. The things are big and they move so fast that we can't cross the trail. On the other side, there is another big trail with things going the other way.

A big, big bright thing with a lot of holes in its side is stopping at the edge of the trail. Big animals are getting out. They walk on their back paws and they smell male. Their fur is bright and shiny. They have big front paws with long toes and they carry bags. We hide in the tall grass.

* * * *

When the bus had pulled out of the hydrogen refueling station fifteen minutes earlier and continued leisurely north on Route 81X, Adrian fantasized that it would keep going, picking up speed on that arrow-straight superhighway, to deliver him to Canada, to home—freedom. Looking out the window, he saw the reflection of his neon orange jumpsuit, as well as the orange images of the other passengers. He pressed his nose against the window, concentrating instead on the dark, threatening sky and the green of the highway median strip—and the roadside litter, his calling of the moment.

Just weeks ago, he'd come as a freshman to Cornell University to study forest ecology. Now, he was an inmate at the Elmira Correctional Facility. He stared out the window. Studying highway-median ecology. He tried to smile at the thought, but couldn't. He leaned his forehead against the glass and closed his eyes tight.

Wake up! Wake up! Wake up! As the bus slowed and drove onto the edge of the median, the Voice-Vibe rumble strip sent the alert through the vehicle. Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!

"Alright, guys,” the correction officer called out. “As you go out, pick up a bag and a box lunch. You have fifteen minutes to eat it."

With practiced routine, the convicts streamed from the bus in the order of their seating. Adrian's seatmate, Jake, slid to the aisle and Adrian followed. Jake seemed to be in his mid fifties, but he moved like he was in his eighties. They took their lunches and trash bags, and stepped into the fresh air. Under Adrian's urging, they sprawled down as far from the bus as was possible without drawing a rebuke from the corrections officer.

Adrian tore into his box lunch, but Jake just stared at his.

"Are you okay?” asked Adrian.

"Yeah, I guess.” Jake pushed away the box. “It's just that I've been feeling tired lately. Not really able to become interested in doing anything—not even eating.” He looked skyward. “Probably the weather."

Adrian glanced upward. Thunderheads and distant lightning, but it was dry and felt as if it would stay that way. And if it didn't, he had an empty litter collection bag he could slip over his head to keep off the rain.

Jake, seemingly reading his thoughts, said, “Heat lightning, probably. And damn! It is hot.” He fingered his litter bag. “But it's nice we can get out into the countryside. Six months ago, our job was done by litterbots."

"I read about those,” said Adrian vacantly, not really interested in the conversation. “But they didn't work as well in the rain as they were supposed to."

Jake scowled at the sky. “And with this freaky weather lately, rain seems to come whenever it wants."

"Global warming."

"Who knows? Anyway, we might be the first people to have set foot on this median strip in years."

Adrian collected the refuse from his lunch. Jake held open his litter bag, and Adrian tossed the garbage in.

"We're cheaper than litterbots,” said Jake. “Maybe even smarter."

Adrian chuckled. The fresh air and Jake's gentle companionship had lightened his mood.

"I must say,” said Jake, “that you don't seem the type to be a convicted felon."

Adrian stiffened.

"No offense.” Jake made calming motions with a hand. “I imagine you're innocent.” He looked toward the white bus with the letters NYDOC stenciled on its side. Around it sat other orange-clad inmates eating their lunches. “New York Department of Correction.” He chuckled. “Everyone here is innocent."

Adrian hung his head. “I guess I'm not actually innocent."

"Oh?"

"I'd been invited to a dorm party,” said Adrian, still gazing down at the grass. “I'd never been away from home before, and there I was—in college. Someone offered me a ... a joint. And I felt I'd be laughed at if I didn't try it."

"And you were busted."

"Yeah.” A succession of painful thoughts flooded Adrian's mind. “Three months. I'll miss my entire first semester. Busted for drugs.” He shook his head slowly. “I don't know how I'll ever be able to face my mother. I can't stand this."

"You are innocent,” said Jake in a soft voice.

A sudden bright flash bleached the sky, followed by a great rumbling crash. Adrian jerked his head around. So did Jake, but with less energy. Across the highway, a tree smoldered, and as they watched, a limb cracked and plunged to the ground.

"Jeez!” cried Adrian, rolling to his feet. “Closest lightning strike I've ever seen."

With almost audible creaks and groans, Jake stood as well. “We'd better get back to the bus."

"I don't want to,” said Adrian, all at once, resolute.

Jake looked back and just then came a second blinding flash, a deafening peal of thunder—and then an explosion.

"Oh, my god!” shouted Jake. He stood rock-still, staring at the bus that was engulfed in pale-blue flame. Other inmates, arrayed around the bus also stared at the sudden conflagration.

"Blue flame,” said Adrian, almost at a whisper. “The hydrogen tank must have ruptured."

"Yeah.” Jake started toward the bus. “Come on."

"No!"

Jake turned to stare. “There are lot worse places to be than in a minimum security prison."

"I'm not going back,” said Adrian, crumpling the litter bag he held. “I ... I can't take it."

Jake nodded.

"Please don't tell,” Adrian pleaded.

Jake paused for a moment. “I've never even seen you.” He stooped and, with more alacrity than Adrian had ever seen in the man, picked up his lunch box. He tossed it to Adrian. “Take it!"

"Jake. Thank you.” Adrian turned and, still carrying his litter bag, ran north on the median, making for a diminutive copse of trees.

From the concealment of the pin oaks, still in full leaf in late September, Adrian peeked out, taking in the scene of the distant bus. Everyone faced the bus and no one seemed to take note of anything else. Two men that he could see were down, neither of whom were dressed in orange.

Adrian let out a breath he'd not known he was holding. Clearly, he'd not been missed—not yet, at any rate. But he dared not move on. In his orange jumpsuit he'd stand out like Canada Day fireworks.

In an act of impulse, Adrian yanked down the zipper of the hated jumpsuit, the mark of his captivity. He wriggled out of the garment and stood clad only in underpants, socks, and sneakers. Absently, he contorted the suit, folding legs and arms inward, forcing the jumpsuit into a bright orange, soccer ball sized sphere.

He slipped the balled suit into the litter bag and then ran—first at a crouch, then erect and at full speed. If anyone noticed him from the road he'd look like a nutcase, but not an escaped prisoner.

He ran until winded and then jogged to the next copse of trees for cover. There's no way I'll get from here to Canada in nothing but my underwear. “Wait a minute!” He grabbed the litter bag by its bottom, letting the orange ball fall to the grass. Taking the black plastic in his teeth, he chewed holes for head and arms.

He wriggled into his makeshift clothing and looked himself over. Not bad! Could use a belt, though.

In better spirits than he had been recently, he took an impulsive running kick at the orange ball, sending it into a high arc. It landed in the grass, then rolled gently into a northbound lane. With mixed emotions, Adrian watched as cars, like soccer players, worked the ball forward. Yes, he hated those prison clothes, but now all he had was underwear and a litter bag tunic.

When the last trace of the orange sphere had vanished from sight, Adrian picked up Jake's lunch and ran again. He felt free—underdressed but free. He smiled with a thought. He could always say he was the victim of a fraternity prank—stripped and abandoned on a median. As he ran, he experienced the runner's high, a feeling of unreasoned exhilaration. He had visions of hitchhiking north to the border. And there, he'd sneak across. It wouldn't be hard. The Canadian border was still relatively unpatrolled. And Canada wouldn't send him back. There was only one negative: he'd not be able to go back to Cornell. “But who cares?” he gasped aloud. Anyway, the U of Toronto was his second choice. He was sure they'd take him.

Gradually, his run slowed to a jog and then to a walk. As he proceeded north on the ribbon of green bounded by the two torrential bands of traffic, he scowled at the profusion of Styrofoam cups and fast-food wrappers—the litter his crew had been tasked to collect. It was disgusting—the idea of people throwing stuff from their cars. He gave a tight-lipped smile. Those very people had made possible his escape.

As the sun lowered to its setting, Adrian all at once felt tired—exhausted. At a small stand of trees, an oasis of dwarf sugar maples, he stopped to take stock of his situation, to observe, to plan, to rest, and to eat Jake's lunch.

Sitting under a tree munching a sandwich, Adrian gazed vacantly at the hurtling traffic. The legal limit, according to a sign, was seventy-five miles per hour. Adrian mentally converted it to a more familiar measure. One hundred and twenty kilometers per hour. Fast! And most of the cars were speeding: one hundred thirty, one hundred forty kilometers per hour, probably. Adrian shook his head. At that speed, the drivers would scarcely have time to contemplate the scenery. No one would take notice of him. Strangely, the thought made him lonely. He was, for all practical purposes, alone. He might as well be on another planet. He'd have thought the road noise would provide some comfort—the sound of people going places. But the traffic was so heavy and regular, the noise sounded as a constant hum; he had to concentrate to even notice it anymore.

A motion in the grass some six or seven meters away drew his attention. A kitten! Then, he saw a second and a third moving slowly toward him.How the heck did kittens get onto this median? He felt a surge of anger at the thought that they'd simply been abandoned. His eyes then widened in astonishment. The animals were certainly kitten-sized, but their proportions were those of adult cats. And they moved with the grace and poise of adults. They moved close to the ground, stalking. Puzzled as he was over the size of the creatures, Adrian was even more puzzled and intrigued by their behavior; they seemed to be working as a group; he'd not known cats to hunt cooperatively.

Then, he saw what they hunted. Mice—five or six fuzzy gray patches on the grass. He watched as one of the cats pounced. Then, as the cat played with his catch, Adrian observed the tiny gray creature's head. It was blunt and chunky; the head not of a mouse but a rat—a baby rat. Adrian narrowed his eyes with the realization that, as were the cats, the rats were most probably adults. Two cases of dwarfism. Because of limited prey for the cats and scant food for the rats, I guess small is better—and their populations are probably very low. He'd read about islands where the fauna were much smaller than their mainland cousins. And this median strip is for all practical purposes, an island—a long, thin island.

Adrian thrilled to the notion of median strips having their own unique ecological systems. He felt giddy with an idea. He'd study it somehow at college. He smiled, visualizing himself as a highway median ecologist—the first and only.

Maybe, thought Adrian, his incarceration had been a blessing—fate showing him the way to his future. He opened Jake's box lunch and tore off the corner of a sandwich containing some unidentifiable, institutional sliced meat. He crouched and held the food toward one of the cats, who'd not caught a rat.

"Here, cat! Puss, puss, puss."

The cat crept forward warily, showing caution rather than fear.

"There's a good cat."

The cat took the meat, and Adrian moved to stroke its fur with his free hand. Suddenly, the cat twisted around, hissed, and bit him at the fleshy point between the thumb and forefinger, drawing blood.

"Damn!"

The feral cat ran to join the others.

Adrian worried about disease. If the median strip could have its own varieties of fauna, it could well have its own set of bacteria and viruses—strains for which humans had never developed antibodies. Adrian shook his head and resolved not to think about it. It was just another occupational hazard of being a highway-median ecologist. And it was a much smaller hazard now than in the days before the universal rabies, tetanus, West Nile vaccine that all kids got—all Canadian kids, at any rate.

Remembering his sandwich, he polished it off and then scarfed down the cookie and emptied the juice box. By reflex, he looked for a trashcan. But, of course, there weren't any. Feeling chagrined, he set the box down at the edge of the road. He himself had become a hated litterer. Not a great way to start my life as a median ecologist.

In good spirits after eating, he continued north. He stopped momentarily to look at an animated information panel suspended over the southbound lanes. It glowed bright against the growing darkness. The sign blinked a warning of congestion due to an accident. The bus, probably.

As he watched the streaming traffic, he playfully thought of the vehicles in ecological terms: the tandem trailers were the elephants. The motor homes were the dumb cows, the SUVs the ... the wildebeest, the Japanese econoboxes the deer, and the police cars the carnivores. He smiled. And the potholes, the pathogens. But there were no potholes, not even cracks on the roadway. For that matter, he'd seen no police cars either. Not much need for them with cameras to detect accidents and speeders. He worried that they'd catch him, too, but decided that the cameras probably didn't cover the median.

Back in Canada, he'd seen road crews. But this high-tech Route 81X seemed to have no need for them. Adrian shivered with the thought that not only was he the first ever median ecologist, but also the only human being in the entire ecological system. Feeling lonely, he turned away from the traffic. The median was dark now, and forbidding. But even though he seemed to be invisible to the passing traffic, it would be good to be able to pee without feeling he was making a spectacle of himself.

He felt he'd gotten far enough away from the bus that it was safe to attempt to hitchhike. But there was no way anyone would stop to pick him up at night—especially not the way he was dressed.

He saw another clump of trees ahead. There, he'd stay until morning. Finding a soft patch free of weeds or roots at the base of a tree, he plopped down and closed his eyes.

He woke in the dark, frozen. He curled into a ball, but that didn't help. He tried pulling his arms inside the litter bag and warming his hands between his thighs. Then he ducked his head inside as well, breathing through pursed lips in an attempt to warm the air a little. He wished he'd not been so careless with the jumpsuit.

Sleep came hard.

* * * *

Adrian rose shortly after sunrise, cold, hungry, thirsty, and far from rested. His eyes on the sun with its promise of future warmth, he ran in place, trying to generate some heat. Yes, the sun would soon enough fill one of his needs, but as to the others ... He'd have to try flagging down a northbound vehicle for a lift without delay. His best shot would be to try flagging trucks with Canadian license plates.

He walked to the edge of the median and soon saw that not only was flagging down a Canadian truck impossible, but there was no way he'd be able to flag down anyone. He was next to the high-speed lane, and with the continuous heavy traffic, no vehicle could as much as slow down. He looked across to the slow lane. It was better, but not much better.

As he stared into the traffic, the realization slowly grew on him that it was hopeless—all of it. He'd never get across those four lanes. The whole idea of fleeing back to Canada was a silly dream. He clenched his fists. There was nothing else to do but give himself up. He shuddered at the thought of wearing neon orange again. I can't go back.

He gazed across the roadway. Even if he really did want to surrender, he'd have to cross to the other side and then hunt around for a cop.

He chose to continue walking north. He knew what was in the other direction—nothing. And the bus certainly would have been removed by now. He started walking, trying to think of something to do.

A road sign caught his eye: “Unlawful to Pick Up or Discharge Hitchhikers.” He sighed and kept walking. Giving himself up was the only thing he could do.

Maybe he'd encounter a car with a flat tire or something. He hadn't seen one all the previous day, but maybe he'd get lucky. And maybe it'll be a Canadian going home. He shook his head. Stop dreaming.

He walked at the edge of the road, looking for a patrolling police car. He's seen none so far, but he couldn't conceive of a major highway without police cars—even if there were automatic cameras. Maybe, he'd just been unlucky so far. He thought about emergency telephones. But he couldn't remember seeing one. Canadian highways had them at regular intervals—but now that he thought about it, it seemed superfluous; everyone had a cell phone in his pocket these days. His hand automatically moved to where a pants pocket should be. But of course, he didn't have a cell phone—or a pocket.

As he walked, he grew increasingly hungry and, with his black plastic tunic absorbing the head of the sun, thirsty. Soon, thirst predominated. As the sun neared the zenith, he could think of nothing but water. He lowered his eyes to the ground—and saw the litter, and saw it in a new light. Maybe he could find some food among all the wrappers and such. And more importantly, water.

Now, he actively sought out litter, going from one side of the median to the other at the sight of white cups against the green. On his third try, he picked up a cup, pulled off its lid still holding a straw, and found clear liquid within—melted ice, probably. Again, he worried about disease, but only briefly; disease was abstract whereas dying of thirst wasn't. He downed the liquid—delicious with a slight hint of cola flavor. Soon, he found more liquid-bearing cups, enough to slake his thirst. His lips stretched into a tight smile.

Those littering drivers he'd formerly held in such contempt might well have saved his life.

His hunger grew steadily more intense, and he began to seek out food wrappers as well as drink cups. He found a few, but they held no scraps of food. Many of the wrappers had little bits of paper torn out—nibble marks. With a shiver, Adrian realized he was competing with the rats for food.

But he had to get food. He decided he'd just have to walk across the road. Cars will either stop or they won't. He stepped onto the road but then darted back. He couldn't bring himself to risk death that way.

Exhausted, starved, and thirsty again, he trudged onward, hoping to encounter a miracle. And if he didn't, maybe tomorrow, Saturday, traffic would be lighter and he'd be able to cross.

A flash of orange in the distance caught his attention. He froze with recognition. His jumpsuit soccer ball lay at the edge of the median. Still a round orb, but dirty. He couldn't help but think it was an omen—that the police were pursuing him. He retrieved the ball, but couldn't bear the idea of deconstructing it and putting on the jumpsuit. After dark, he would. The hated garment of incarceration would provide warmth.

* * * *

Dan was out sick with a strep throat and Philip had been grounded for talking back to his mom, so that left only three members of the Screaming Beavers in attendance at the patrol meeting. Still, it was hard for Kiefer Bernhardt, the patrol leader, to deliver the news that his dad had been suddenly called away for an emergency meeting in Albany and wouldn't be able to take them on their weekend patrol campout. Kiefer held onto a map as one might a security blanket.

"What?” Alex shouted, the noise reverberating off the basement walls of the rec room. “That stinks!"

"But we've already bought our food and packed and everything,” Paul said in a pleading voice.

"Yeah, I know” Kiefer smoothed out the map on the ping-pong table. “But we can still go on a day-long hike tomorrow."

"It's not the same,” said Paul.

Kiefer pressed on. “My brother's home from college this weekend. He said he'd drive us out in the morning and pick us up sometime after we've finished dinner."

Paul wrinkled his nose.

"Wait a minute,” said Alex. “You mean there'll be no adults with us?"

"Yeah."

"This could be fun, then,” said Alex.

"Yeah,” Kiefer said with enthusiasm, happy that his patrol wasn't angry with him any more. “But we can't go to Shendegen Hollow. Jay's car doesn't have four-wheel drive."

"Where'll we go then?” said Paul.

"Anywhere.” Kiefer ran his hand over the map. “Well, anywhere we can drive to in an hour. As long as it's safe."

"What do you mean, safe?” asked Alex in a suspicious voice.

"I don't know,” said Kiefer. “Jay said it. I think he means some place public where a pervert or something won't come and try to molest us."

Alex and Paul laughed.

Kiefer indicated the map. “Come on, guys. Let's figure out where we're going."

Paul leaned in over the map and pointed to a road that had been highlighted with a red marker. “What's this?"

"Route 81X,” Kiefer said with a touch of pride. “My dad's the chief landscape architect for the whole road."

"Landscape architect?” Alex giggled. “You mean he designs trees?"

"Well, actually, he does. Treez with a ‘z.’”

Again, Paul wrinkled his nose. “You mean all the trees on that road's median are phony?"

"They're real. Dad says 81X is probably the last highway that'll have real nature. After that it'll be all Neoturf and stuff from Treezcorp.” Kiefer touched the tip of his forefinger to the red line at Whitney Point, the closest point to home. “The median's great. Lots of clumps of trees, bushes, and growth-limited grass so it never needs mowing."

"Wish my yard had that,” said Alex.

"Dad says it's a thin island of nature.” Kiefer moved his finger along the line. “It goes clear up to Canada."

"Then...” Paul hesitated. “Then why don't we take our day hike on the 81X median?"

Alex and Kiefer looked at him. Then Kiefer, realizing Paul was serious, laughed. “Come on!"

"Why not?” said Paul. “Your brother could let us off, and we could hike as far as we want, and it would still be easy for him to find us and pick us up after dinner."

Alex glanced at Kiefer. “You know, it's not a bad idea.” He laughed. “And on a median strip, you wouldn't get us lost like last time."

"What? I never got you—"

"Maybe it's not a good idea,” said Paul, distantly. “If there was a motorcycle gang or something coming up the median, we'd be toast."

"Oh, come on,” said Alex. “81X is perfectly safe. Zillions of people'll be able to see us all the time."

"But what if there's an escaped leopard loose on the median?"

"Paul!” Alex threw a glance at the ceiling, and then laughed.

"Jeez!” Kiefer said in frustration. “Anyway, it wasn't a leopard. It was a bear."

"What?” said Alex, swiveling to face Kiefer.

"Happened before you moved here. Some gypsy or something. His van broke down and his bear got loose."

"Come on!"

"Scout's honor,” swore Kiefer. “He was afraid of getting in trouble, so he set traps for the bear."

"It's true,” said Paul. “And the bear wandered into the road, and a truck hit it. Killed it.” Paul whispered as if he were telling a ghost story. “And the gypsy died a few months later of a very mysterious disease."

"Wow!” said Alex.

"Okay, okay,” said Kiefer. “That was a long time ago. I like the median idea. Let's just do it."

"But zillions of people,” said Paul. “What about going to the bathroom? I'd like to go without it being show time."

"Yeah,” said Kiefer.

"Hey!” said Alex after a few seconds where no one spoke. “My dad has an ice-fishing tent. There's a big round hole in the bottom of it. I'll, um ... borrow it.” From his advantage of one year of age and eight inches of height, Alex glowered down at Paul. “Satisfied?"

"I guess."

"Good.” Kiefer folded up the map. “A wild campout. No video games, no cell phones."

"Wild?” Alex barked a laugh. “On a highway median?"

"Well, other than that. And an ecological campout. Everything packed in and out."

"Except what's under the ice-fishing tent,” said Alex.

Paul giggled.

"Tomorrow morning, eight o'clock. Here,” said Kiefer, conscious of acting the part of patrol leader. "I'll bring a cell phone so I can call Jay to pick us up. ‘Kay?"

"Yeah."

"Fine."

* * * *

Robert Bernhardt pulled his car into the lot at the New York Center for Disease Control. He had no idea why he, a landscape architect, had been called to a meeting of epidemiologists, and he was miffed that he'd not been able to find out why. And on a Saturday morning, yet.

He got off the elevator at the twenty-third floor, and as he walked into the posh conference room, he promised himself that he'd make it up to Kiefer—and to Kiefer's Scout patrol.

He gazed out the window, down at a portion of Interstate 787. Ugly as sin! The median's vegetation seemed nothing but weeds. Probably ragweed. As he watched, a low ground fog began to drift in over the road. Another manifestation of the strange weather of late. His lips stretched into a thin smile; the fog did make the median look less ugly.

At the sound of a door opening at the far end of the room, Robert turned and saw two men come in, paper coffee cups in hand.

One of them stepped briskly forward and extended his free hand. “Ah, Dr. Bernhardt. Good of you to come.” He gave a hint of a bow. “I'm Zoltan Latzko.” Nodding toward the door, he added, “Coffee?"

"No, thank you.” Robert smiled. “And it's Mr. Bernhardt."

"Ah."

They exchanged introductions: Zoltan Latzko was an epidemiologist with the National Center for Infectious Diseases, and the other man, Dwayne Bates, a heavy-set individual with what looked like a permanent scowl, was the Assistant Director of the New York State Emergency Management Office.

"I rather imagine, Mr. Bernhardt—” said Zoltan while indicating that they should all sit, “—that you've heard of the Route 80 Effect?"

"You mean that the ecologies north and south of 80 are different because animals can't cross the road?"

"Just a slight difference,” said Zoltan. “Since animals can still cross at intersections, the difference is only equivalent to a hundred miles or so.” He raised a hand as if flourishing an imaginary piece of chalk. “And not merely Route 80. We have a grid of mini ecologies delineated by the interstate highway system.” He caught Robert's eyes with an intent stare. “But your Route 81X median has a sharply different ecology. Dangerously different, perhaps."

"Dangerously different?” Robert canted his head. “Surely, you don't mean the small cats, do you?"

While Dwayne seemed almost angry, Zoltan appeared surprised. “Oh, you know about the cats, do you?"

"My grounds foreman's mentioned them,” said Robert. “They're rare. Cute little fuzzballs, he called them."

"Cute?” Dwayne said almost at a bellow. “They carry a serious disease."

"We don't know that for sure,” said Zoltan in an annoyed voice. He turned to Robert. “We've been seeking the vector for a condition that's affected a significant number of inmates in the New York prison population. They have some sort of immune deficiency. And yes, it could be serious."

"An immune deficiency?” said Robert, feeling a response was expected.

"No. Not what you think,” said Zoltan. “A bug of some sort. Unknown to us. The symptoms are tiredness and passivity, listlessness and a diminishing of the will, and, we think, an increased susceptibility to other diseases."

"That's not exactly a bad thing with prisoners,” said Dwayne, appearing almost jovial after his previous outburst. “I mean the passivity and tiredness."

"It sounds like mono,” said Robert. “Mononucleosis."

"Yes. But it does not go away.” Zoltan exchanged a glance with Dwayne before continuing. “All right. This is confidential information.” He paused. “It seems that if a person with the virus then contracts one of a number of other viral infections—death could possibly occur."

"Could possibly occur?” Dwayne sputtered. “This has all the signs of a possible pandemic. It needs drastic actions—it could be a new AIDS."

"Come, now,” said Zoltan dismissively. “That's a great overstatement."

Dwayne's face reddened and Robert tried to calm the situation with a question. “Where did the bug come from?"

"We didn't know until a few days ago.” Dwayne swiveled away from Zoltan. “There was an accident with a Department of Corrections bus carrying inmates. Many of them had been doing litter pick up on Route 81X for months. They were given routine medical checkups—automated blood analysis and that sort of thing—and many of them had the virus."

"The longer an inmate had been assigned to the 81X litter collection,” said Zoltan, “the more of the virus he had.” He smiled as Sherlock Holmes might have after solving a case. “So we're reasonably confident they contracted it on the 81X median. And the cats seem to be the likely carriers."

"That's crazy,” Robert blurted without thinking. “How could it have developed in the tiny confines of the median?"

"Not so tiny,” said Zoltan. “Not wide, surely, but very long. And in any case, we've just gotten a road-kill cat. It's being analyzed now."

"We think the virus came from an escaped Eurasian sun bear,” said Dwayne in a flat voice. “And then it mutated.” He sighed. “Global warming seems to encourage new strains of diseases. We can't take chances with them."

"An escaped bear?” Robert couldn't help the incredulity in his voice.

"It's a long story.” Dwayne stared down at his coffee cup, as if he were addressing it and not Robert. “We've decided to sterilize the median—"

"You've decided!” said Zoltan.

Dwayne ignored the interruption. “We'll have to close the highway and send choppers over to sterilize everything on the median—from Binghamton to the Canadian border."

"That's wrong-headed,” said Zoltan with a scowl. “We can't exterminate an entire ecological system. It's monstrous. An isolated, narrow world."

"We have to,” said Dwayne. “We'll blanket the area with announcements, then close the highway and then just do it."

"That world isn't the only thing that's narrow,” said Zoltan under his breath.

Dwayne slapped a hand to the conference table, shaking the coffee cups. “Look. We've been lucky so far. The prison population is automatically isolated. No physical contact with non-prisoners. Even the doctors treating them wear surgical gloves. Which is good because Zoltan here says the virus could possibly be spread by physical contact."

Zoltan threw himself back in his chair. “Could possibly!"

Dwayne glowered at the epidemiologist. “I'm not going to trust the safety of New Yorkers to luck."

Zoltan glowered back.

Robert, again attempting to lower the heat, asked, “What do I have to do with all this?"

"We need to know how deep the turf cover is,” said Dwayne calmly. “And how stable is it? Could it be excavated without sending dust into the air?"

"Very stable. The turf depth is less than six inches, except under the trees where there's a four-foot pit. Under that, it's 337-asphalt.” Robert narrowed his eyes. “Why?"

"We want the median replaced with Neoturf and Treez as fast as possible,” said Dwayne. “Can your company handle it?"

Robert sucked in a breath. This would be a very lucrative contract. “It'll be expensive."

"It's been in the works for some time,” said Dwayne. “Artificial is cheaper and easier to maintain, and biologically cleaner.” He pursed his lips. “But now it's an emergency. We don't need to send it to bid."

Robert considered the logistics. “Unfortunately the EPA now considers the asphalt binder we used a mutagen. This will require some care. But I think—"

Zoltan's cell phone rang. He extracted it, stared at the caller ID for a moment, then excused himself and hurried to a corner of the conference room where he held a whispered conversation. Robert and Dwayne watched in silence.

After less than a minute, Zoltan returned to the table. “They've tested the cat,” he said. “Not a trace of the virus.” He sat heavily. “I expected otherwise. Cats groom themselves and each other. I'd have thought we'd see the virus.” He turned suddenly to Robert. “Is there another population of mammals on the strip?"

Robert shook his head. “Not that I know of."

"Hmm.” Zoltan stroked his chin. “Probably rats. There are always rats.” He pounded a fist softly on the table. “Yes,” he said, as if to himself. “The cats must have acquired an immunity to the disease. Probably the virus is carried by rats.” He turned to Dwayne. “You can't sterilize the median now."

"What?"

"We need time to study this. A cat bite or scratch could be an inoculation against the disease."

"Pure speculation—since we know birds don't carry the virus either.” Dwayne drew a hand across his forehead. “And unfortunately, we don't have the time."

"Why not?” Zoltan demanded.

Dwayne's cell phone rang. Seemingly by reflex, he pulled it out and flipped it open.

"Bates,” he said.

"What?” Dwayne leaned forward in his chair. “Why the hell didn't you tell me this before?"

"Any sign of him?"

"Do? What the hell can we do?” Dwayne flipped his phone closed.

"What is it?” said Zoltan.

"There's an inmate missing.” Dwayne shoved the phone back in his pocket. “From the bus. A kid. It looks like he ran away in the confusion of the accident."

"And you just found this out now?"

"The paperwork was lost in the explosion,” said Dwayne in a flat voice. “And the guards were hospitalized.” He sighed. “We have a sweep out for the kid. In his prison jumpsuit, he should be easy to spot."

"He hasn't been so far,” said Zoltan.

"We haven't been looking for him until now.” Dwayne shook his head, slowly. “None of the highway surveillance cameras have picked him up. He's probably still hiding out on the median strip."

"That's impossible,” said Zoltan. “It's been days. He can't still be on the median."

"Wait a minute,” said Robert, aghast. “He might be on the median. And if he is, then what? Is he going to be ... sterilized along with the trees?"

"I hope he is on the median,” said Dwayne.

"What? The kid's a criminal. So sterilize him. Is that it?"

"If he's on the median, we'll apprehend him."

"How?” Zoltan asked.

"First,” said Dwayne, in flat voice, “the traffic will be diverted off the road. Then choppers with narrow-focus sound warnings will fly along the median. A few minutes later, another chopper, flying low, will visually search for possible stalled cars on the median and other irregularities. And in his orange prison jumpsuit, the kid will stand out like a school bus on a golf course."

"Maybe.” Robert pointed out the window. “But if you hadn't noticed, there's a ground fog over Route 787. Probably means 81X is none too clear either."

Zoltan clenched a fist. “Mr. Bernhardt is right. You've got to stop this sterilization."

"I'm sorry, Zoltan.” Dwayne put an elbow on the table and lowered his head onto a closed fist. “Homeland Security has taken it out of my hands."

* * * *

"Remind me why we're doing this,” said Alex as he trudged along under the weight of a heavy pack. They had just encountered yet another cluster of well-behaved trees.

Kiefer, in the lead, weighed down by his own pack and with binoculars hanging around his neck, was happy for the excuse to stop. They'd been hiking for over an hour. He turned to Alex. “I thought it would be fun."

From behind, Paul said, “The fog is sort of neat.” He moved forward and the three formed a small circle. “But it's like hiking in a big treadmill.” Paul had brought a walking staff from home, and he leaned on it. “Our only choice is direction and even that doesn't matter. It's all the same. Grass, trees, grass, trees. Even getting lost is more fun."

"Yeah,” said Alex. “Borrring!” He leaned back, resting his pack against a tree. “And you had to make it a wild campout—no computers, radios, video games, cell phones except yours.” He looked off at the traffic passing like ghosts in the mist. “Yeah, wild."

"I guess it maybe wasn't such a good idea,” said Kiefer. Then he brightened. “Hey. What if we set up for lunch now and after we eat, I'll phone my brother to pick us up here." He smiled with a thought. “We could all go to a movie together or something—a patrol movie."

Alex chuckled. “Patrol movie. Yeah."

"Let's set up a tent,” Paul said abruptly.

"A tent?” Kiefer wrinkled his nose. “Why?"

"Because,” Paul glanced at the haze-enshrouded streams of traffic, the aluminum highway display board stanchions, the Styrofoam roadside litter. “Because it would make me feel like we're real."

Kiefer and Alex exchanged amused glances; Paul, at twelve, was a year and a half younger then the others and something of a mascot, and sometimes he said very cool things. “Yeah, fine,” said Kiefer.

"What's for lunch?” said Alex as he unsnapped his pack and let it slip to the ground.

Kiefer slipped out of his pack. “Spaghetti, tube steak, purple bug juice, and butterscotch toothpaste.” He extracted the patrol cook kit and camp stove from his pack frame.

Paul set up the pop-tent. Kiefer set up the stove, filled the cook kit's saucepan with water, and threw in the spaghetti and hot dogs. Alex poured the grape drink powder and lots of sugar into the aluminum coffee pot, added water, stirred and sampled the result. Then, out of need, Alex set up the ice-fishing tent.

Afterward, the three sat cross-legged around the camp stove, waiting for the water to boil.

Alex looked lazily toward the northbound traffic. “Doesn't it ever stop?"

"There's always traffic,” said Kiefer. “My brother says that since they started metered access, there's constant traffic 24/7.” He reached into his pants pocket. “And speaking of my brother, I'd better call to get him to pick us up.” He withdrew a cell phone and set it on the ground where it disappeared in the high grass. “But first, where are we?” He took up his binoculars and scanned the southbound road. “Mile marker 34.3. And let's see ... Two miles until the Whitney Point exit."

"Hey!” Paul called out, pointing toward a motion in the nearby grass. “Look at that!"

"Hey, neat,” said Alex. “Mice."

Kiefer swiveled his binoculars to the grass and refocused. “No, I've had pet mice and I've had pet rats. These are definitely rats.” He lowered the binoculars. “But boy, are they ever small!"

Paul crawled over and scooped one up in his hand. “They're friendly.” He played with the little rat, letting it run up his shirt and sit on his shoulder.

The other boys caught their own rats and played with them while their spaghetti gelled.

Paul happened to look away. He froze. “We're not alone,” he said at almost a whisper. “There's someone over there."

Kiefer followed Paul's gaze and saw a person, made indistinct by distance and fog. He brought his binoculars to his eyes. “Jeez! It's a man. He's carrying an orange basketball or something. And it looks like he's only wearing a garbage bag."

"Come on!” said Alex.

"He's not an old guy,” said Kiefer. “He looks like he's about my brother's age.” He handed the binoculars to Alex while keeping his eyes on the approaching figure.

"Look at the way he's moving,” said Alex. “Do you think he's drunk? Maybe he was so blitzed he just ripped off his clothes."

Kiefer gave an “I don't know” shrug.

Paul looked down at his scout uniform and then back at the man. “Maybe,” he said in a slow, dreamy voice. “Maybe he didn't want to be what his clothes wanted him to be."

* * * *

Adrian weaved from one side of the medium to the other, looking for Styrofoam encapsulated sustenance. He felt unsteady on his feet from lack of food and he was thirsty, perpetually thirsty.

Angry again at the unfairness of his court trial and conviction, he'd once more stripped off his jumpsuit and converted it into a soccer ball. He carried it as he foraged for water and food. He wondered, though, if he'd last through the day to sleep in it again.

He found a cup with a couple of ounces of melted ice water: a major find, a tiny lake. He threw back his head and downed the precious liquid, licking the last hint of moisture from the cup. He brought his head forward and happened to look, not downward for litter, but forward. He squinted, not trusting his eyes. There among the trees he saw what looked like a tent. Two tents, in fact. Impossible! And stranger still, it looked as if there were people sitting in front of one of them—small people. Island dwarfism with people? No! It's got to be a mirage? Wishful thinking?

Adrian lurched toward the trees. As he drew closer, he saw that the people weren't dwarfs, but three kids in American Boy Scout uniforms—and they were sitting in front of food. It smelled wonderful. He came to a stop in front of them, but he couldn't take his eyes off the boiling pot.

One of the kids, the tallest one, got to his feet. Then the other two stood.

"Hi,” said Adrian.

"Hi,” the tall kid said warily.

They looked at each other in silence for a few seconds.

"Was it that you didn't want to...” said the smallest kid in a small voice, “didn't want to get your scout uniform dirty?"

Adrian couldn't help chuckling. “Technically I still am a scout. Central Escarpment Council, Mississauga, Ontario.” He extended his left hand to the tall kid. I hope American scouts also shake with the left-hand.

The tall kid hesitated, then smiled and shook hands. “I'm Kiefer.” He paused. “But everybody calls me Kif. I'm ... I'm the patrol leader of the Screaming Beavers.” He pointed to the short kid standing beside and a step behind him. “That's Paul, and"—he swiveled his head to his other side—"that's Alex."

"Hi,” said Alex with a small wave of the hand.

"Are you hungry?” asked Paul.

"I'm famished." Adrian realized that this time, it was not merely a figure of speech.

Kiefer nodded over at the pot. “It's probably not going to be any good, but there's a lot of it. We always make too much."

Over the next half hour or so, Adrian and the scouts became easy friends. Kiefer had lent Adrian a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. Since Adrian was thin and Kiefer big for his age, the fit wasn't too bad. Adrian had afterward, with a running soccer kick, sent his jumpsuit fifteen or so yards down the median. He, an intramural soccer player, felt embarrassed that he'd not been able to kick it farther.

Having so recently been an active Venture Scout back home in Canada, chatting around a cookout felt natural to Adrian.

"...and the prosecutor hated drugs and hated Canadians and hated Cornell. He said he'd make an example of me.” Adrian, lounging against a tree, took a suck at his butterscotch pudding squeeze tube. “Three months sentence. And so there goes most of my freshman year at Cornell."

"That stinks!” said Alex.

"My brother's at Cornell,” said Kiefer. “He's majoring in computer science. What were you studying?"

"Were.” Adrian gave a bark of a laugh. “I was majoring in forest ecology.” He took a long breath. “But when this is over, I'll try to get in to the University of Toronto and specialize in the ecology of median strips of divided highways."

"Ecology of median strips?” said Alex. “For real? I didn't know you could study that."

"Well, you probably can't—yet.” Adrian glanced from one traffic river to the other. “But there is a separate ecology here. It's like a world, an island—narrow and long. Seeds can get here by birds or wind but not by being carried by mammals.” He felt himself warming to the subject. He really did want to study it at U of T. “Any mammals that do get here are probably the most adventuresome and most intelligent—if they've risked crossing the highway. And the ecology isn't static. I'd guess that the mammals would be moving north because of global warming.” Feeling suddenly self-conscious, he stopped. It wasn't “cool” to be recklessly enthusiastic.

After a few moments of silence, Paul said, “Here are some moving north right now.” He pointed at the animals, a group of small cats. “They're cute."

"Kittens!” Kiefer rolled to his feet and moved slowly forward at a crouch, tempting the cats with butterscotch pudding.

Showing no sign of fear, a cat approached him. Kiefer held out the squeeze tube and moved his other hand to pet the animal.

"No!” shouted Adrian.

The cat darted away and Kiefer turned angrily around.

"Yeah, they're cute,” said Adrian, getting to his feet. “But they're full-grown cats. And they're vicious. Cute, kitten-sized, and vicious."

"Come on!” said Alex. “Vicious."

"Killer cats of the narrow world,” said Paul.

"I'm serious,” said Adrian. “One of them mauled me.” He pointed to the bite mark on his hand.

"Jeez!” said Kiefer.

The four watched as the cats skirted around the campsite and continued north.

"Probably following the rats,” said Kiefer.

"You've seen the rats?” said Adrian.

"Hey,” said Paul. “What's going on?” The others turned to look at him. “The traffic.” He pointed. There were far fewer cars and trucks than there had been just minutes earlier.

They stared at the diminishing traffic.

"An accident?” said Alex.

"On both sides?” said Kiefer. “No. I don't think so."

Over the next five minutes, the traffic slowed to the occasional car, and then to nothing and the road noise was noticeable by its absence.

"Spooky,” said Paul.

"I wish we had a radio,” said Alex.

Paul looked up the highway display board stanchion to a message panel, but its angle obscured the message. “Wish we could read that."

"Oh, wait!” Kiefer, apparently remembering he had binoculars hanging down over his shirt, brought them to his eyes. “There's another display board."

"What's it say?” said Alex.

"It says...” Kiefer adjusted the focus. “Highway closed. Exit now. Danger. Do not stop. Do not leave your vehicles.” He aimed lower. “Hey. The rats are running across the road to the other side."

"They know enough to get away from the cats while they can,” said Adrian.

"Do you see any cats following them?” said Paul.

"No."

"I wonder what's going on.” Alex said.

Kiefer lowered his binoculars and turned to Adrian. “I wonder if they're stopping traffic,” he said, looking at Adrian with a touch of apprehension. “So they can catch you." He narrowed his eyes. “Are you sure all you did was smoke some marijuana?"

"Yeah,” said Adrian. “That's all I did.” He felt a tinge of embarrassment as he noticed he'd unconsciously raised his hand in the scout-sign. “Scout's honor,” he added with a self-effacing smile.

"Come on, Kif,” said Alex. “He's okay."

Kiefer smiled. “Yeah, I guess.” He glanced back over the deserted roadways. “Maybe we'd better pack up and follow the rats."

"Why?” said Alex. “I think we should stay put and see what happens."

"It's sort of exciting,” said Paul. “I'd like to stay."

"Yeah, okay,” said Kiefer. “But let's pack up anyway. In case we have to leave in a hurry."

Even with Adrian helping, breaking camp went slowly—degenerating to tag games at times.

"Just like my old troop,” said Adrian, smiling. “Takes forever to pack up because everyone hates to do cleanup."

"I hate it too,” Kiefer said.

"What's that?” said Paul, softly, staring off in the distance.

Kiefer used his binoculars. “Looks like a helicopter. It looks like it's coming this way."

In silence they watched as the helicopter drew close. When it had gotten almost on top of them, a sound boomed down from it.

"Attention. Danger. Attention."

"Focused sound waves,” Adrian said under his breath. “Impressive!"

"Attention. Anyone on the Route 81X median. Leave the median at once. Phone 911 if you need assistance. Grave danger. Leave the median at once."

Paul began jumping up and down, waving frantically at the helicopter. “Hey! There are people down here! We're on the median."

"Save your breath,” said Alex. “It's a drone."

"A drone.” Kiefer scowled. “That's dumb. Using a drone for something like this."

"Phone 911 if you need assistance. Grave danger. Leave the median at once."

Kiefer reached in his pocket. “My cell phone! Damn it! I've lost my phone."

"Guys,” Adrian said evenly, trying to keep the fear out of his voice. “I think we'd better get out of here."

"I've got to find that phone. It's my brother's.” Kiefer glanced at the helicopter. “He'll kill me if I lose it. Anyway, we have time. They wouldn't warn us and not give us time."

Kiefer started searching, walking back the way they'd come, peering down into the grass and feeling around with a foot. Alex and Paul joined the search.

Adrian had about decided to threaten them with bodily harm if they didn't pick up their gear and leave the median, when a horrible scream rent the air. Kiefer keeled over, falling hard to the ground. Adrian sprinted to him. The boy was clutching his bloodied lower leg and howling. Instantly, Adrian understood the situation although he could hardly believe it. Kiefer's leg was held in a high-tech bear trap. Adrian dropped to his knees. Before his family had moved south from northern Manitoba, he'd seen those traps used to keep Polar Bears out of populated areas. “Don't struggle! It's a resistance-adaptive trap. The more you struggle the tighter it gets."

Paul and Alex jogged up. “Oh, my god!” said Paul, breathing in gasps and looking traumatized.

"The skin's broken,” said Adrian, examining the trap without success for a release lever. “But, despite what looks like a lot of blood, he's not seriously hurt."

"What'll we do?” Alex said at a whisper.

"You and Paul get out of here!"

"No.” Alex barked the word. “I'm not leaving him."

"Me neither.” Paul clearly nauseated by the sight of the blood looked away. “Oh no!” he said, his eyes, horror-filled and locked on a distant image.

Far away, two helicopters looming out of the fog progressed slowly but steadily toward them. From the bottom of the front helicopter, a gray gas spewed out, broadening to a cloud as it found the earth below. From the second helicopter, a painfully brilliant violet beam shot out, raking back and forth over the median.

Just then, a wolf howl came from the ground.

Everyone jumped at the sound—except Kiefer.

"Kif's phone,” Alex called out. He sprinted toward the sound.

While Paul again jumped up and down, waving, trying to get the helicopters to see him, Alex ran the phone to Kiefer. He flipped open the device as he handed it over.

"Why won't they see us?” Paul wailed as he waved and jumped.

From the phone came a voice. “Kif. Get the hell out of there fast. Kif. Can you hear me?"

Kiefer's lower lip quivered. He slammed closed the phone and began to cry.

Adrian turned to Alex and Paul. “Get out of here!” he shouted. Then he added. “Hurry! Bring help.” He knew he was only saying that to give them an excuse to run; there was no way on Earth that they'd be able to bring help in time.

Alex and Paul stood as if rooted.

The wolf howled again, but nobody paid attention.

"Go!” Adrian screamed, raising his fist. “Forget your gear. Just go!"

Alex and Paul, as one, ran off the median toward a southbound exit.

Adrian glanced over his shoulder at the helicopters. They were getting very close. And so was the ominous cloud. Then, abruptly, Adrian stood and began running.

"Don't leave me!” Kiefer cried out.

Adrian sprinted down the median to where he'd kicked his jumpsuit. He swept up the bright orange ball, then yanked and pulled it back into the form of a jumpsuit. Frantically, he began waving it at the helicopters. They should be able to see this even on Mars.

Adrian started to cough as the edge of the cloud enveloped him, but still he waved the neon-orange suit. Then things went dark. He thought he must be blacking out, but saw that the rear helicopter had switched off the purple beam. He thought the front helicopter had stopped emitting the gas, but wasn't sure. Then he did feel himself blacking out for real.

* * * *

Adrian woke to find himself in a hospital room. The three scouts were there also, Kiefer in bed while Paul and Alex, dressed only in hospital gowns, played cards at a table. Adrian understood why Kiefer was there and could guess why he himself was there. But the other two? He'd seen them run to safety.

Adrian sat up, drawing the attention of the other three. “Hi!” he said.

Kiefer filled him in. “The helicopters stopped, thanks to you, and a few minutes later, an ambulance came and took us all away."

"This isn't a local hospital,” said Alex. “It's in Albany, I think."

"But you and Paul weren't hurt,” said Adrian. “Why did they take you two here?"

Alex shrugged.

"All I know is,” said Paul, “that they took enough blood from us to feed a colony of vampire bats."

Adrian wrinkled his nose. “I don't understand this."

Then a nurse came in and Adrian did understand. She wore a jumpsuit rather like his had been but white, and it had pockets. Her hands were protected by surgical gloves and she wore a heavy facemask. She was young and Adrian speculated that without her protective-wear, she would probably look gorgeous.

She came up to his bed.

"This is a quarantine ward, isn't it?” said Adrian.

"Yes,” she said, her voice muffled. “But no longer for you.” She looked at him critically. “Do you think you can walk?"

Adrian swung his feet to the floor and pulled down on the hem of his gown. “Yeah. I'm fine."

"Good.” She pointed to the floor. “Step into those slippers and follow me.” She smiled. “And by the way, you have a visitor."

Adrian smiled, sheepishly. “Could I get dressed, first?"

"Not in here. We've got your clothes in an examination room. You'll have to get dressed there."

"Is it my dad?” Adrian asked.

"Someone else,” said the nurse. “Let's go."

"Yeah. Okay. Just a sec.” Adrian said goodbye and thanks to the scouts. He promised to mail his borrowed clothes back to Kiefer and the two scribbled each other's e-mail address on a hospital note pad. Then Adrian followed the nurse from the room. He had an uneasy feeling that he was being transferred away because he was a convicted criminal and they didn't want him to contaminate the scouts.

The nurse slipped off her protective respirator. “You're quite the hero, you know,” she said, breaking in on his thoughts and giving the lie to them.

"What?"

"The way you saved young Kiefer, there."

Adrian felt himself blush. Yes, she was attractive. He tried to think of something to say that wouldn't ring of false modesty, but before he got the chance, she said, “Oh, I forgot. Your father is driving down to bring you back home. He should be here in a few hours."

"Home? But—"

She laughed. “Oh, you're not a felon anymore. You've been pardoned, or your appeal succeeded or something like that. I don't know the details."

The news took his breath away. “That's ... that's wonderful!"

The nurse gave a good-natured laugh and sent him into an examination room. “I'll send in your visitor.” As she started to close the door, she added, “You'll have time to get dressed."

As Adrian dressed, he noticed that the borrowed shorts and shirt had been laundered. And that made him wonder: Why was everyone quarantined, and why wasn't he himself quarantined anymore?

A knock interrupted his thoughts. He opened the door and admitted a man he'd never seen before.

"Adrian?” said the man.

"Yes, sir?"

"I'm Robert Bernhardt, Kiefer's father.” The man sat in one of the two chairs in the room and indicated that Adrian sit in the other. “First, I want to thank you for saving my son's life."

"I didn't do anything special.” Adrian bit his lower lip, then pressed on. “Could you tell me what's going on? Why are we at this hospital?"

Mr. Bernhardt told him about the “median-disease” virus and that Adrian's blood analysis showed that he was virus free. “They have an idea what gave you the immunity. But they're astonished that it developed so fast."

"And the scouts?” said Adrian. “Kiefer?"

Mr. Bernhardt shook his head slowly.

"I'm sorry to hear that about Kiefer,” said Adrian. “We've sort of become friends."

"Yes. He's told me that.” Mr. Bernhardt leaned forward. “Did you happen to see any of the dwarf cats on the median?"

"What?” Adrian canted his head. “Yes. Why?"

"And,” Mr. Bernhardt went on, “by any chance, did one of them scratch you?"

"Scratch me.” Adrian pointed to his arm. “It bit me. Here. You can still see the fang marks."

"Kiefer didn't get bitten though, did he?"

"No.” After a few seconds of silence, Adrian added, “He was about to be, but I scared away the cat."

Mr. Bernhardt's face showed a twinge of sadness followed immediately by a pained smile. He stood and extended his hand. “It's been good meeting you, Adrian.” He paused with his hand on the doorknob. “Kiefer asked me to go back to the median to pick up the scout gear. And I will.” He sighed. “But I've got to find one of those cats,” he said softly, as if to himself. “I've got to."

* * * *

A bright light came from the sky. And then a bad smell came down. A bad cloud. We choked and coughed and coughed blood. We were too weak to hunt. All the rats gone. I am alone. No cat moves. I am hungry. And I feel very bad.

Copyright © 2010 Carl Frederick

[Back to Table of Contents]

Reader's Department: THE REFERENCE LIBRARY by Don Sakers

Time travel has been around at least since the eighteenth century, but it took Charles Dickens (in A Christmas Carol, first published in 1843) to introduce the concept into general consciousness. Even then, time travel was always accomplished by supernatural means: angels, demons, spirits of one kind or another.

It wasn't until 1881 that an author came up with a method of time travel linked to a machine: that was Edward Page Mitchell in The Clock That Went Backward. H.G. Wells deserves credit for being the first author (in English, at least) to use a true “time machine"—and it's not in the story you're thinking of. Wells’ short story “The Chronic Argonauts” appeared in 1888, and tells the story of an inventor named Dr. Moses Nebogipfel and his invention, a machine that travels in time. In the end, Dr. Nebogipfel departs, searching for an era more suited to his abilities. (And admit it, haven't we all wanted to do the same, at one point or another?) Wells revisited the concept of mechanical time travel in 1895, with the much more successful short novel The Time Machine.

Science fiction in the Gernsback age (before 1939) did not concern itself much with time travel. But in the Campbell “Golden Age” and later, authors such as Heinlein, Asimov, and Poul Anderson took up the theme and wrote some of the seminal works of temporal journeying—many of them in Analog's predecessor, Astounding.

With a background like that, it may seem heretical to raise the question of whether time travel is truly science fiction at all.

One quick and dirty distinction between science fiction and fantasy is this: sf deals with things that are possible, while fantasy is the realm of the impossible. And despite a few promising loopholes in quantum physics, time travel is very probably not possible, at least in the universe as we currently understand it.

Yes, but: loopholes aside, time travel is one of those concepts that has been, as they say, grandfathered in. Sure, the laws of physics make it most unlikely that a real time machine could ever exist—but the same can be said for faster-than-light travel, miniaturization, psionics, and other staples of science fiction. In truth, this is one of those questions that prove that science fiction and fantasy are more a continuum, rather than mutually exclusive categories.

There's a fairly pragmatic rule of thumb that helps draw the line in most time travel stories, and it's based on the exact method used for moving through time. If the temporal displacement is carried out by supernatural forces, magical spells, or sheer force of will, then the story is presumed to be fantasy. If the time travel takes place using a machine, vehicle, gadget, or some other technological-sounding method, then you're most likely dealing with science fiction.

There are many very fine time travel fantasy tales (as well as a great many more dreadful ones, especially since Diana Gabaldon's excellent Outlander series established the field of “time travel romances"). Among them are Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Jack Finney's Time and Again, Richard Matheson's Bid Time Return (filmed as Somewhere in Time), and even Audrey Niffeneggar's recent The Time Traveler's Wife. But we're here to talk about science fiction, not fantasy.

In sf, there are two basic ways to approach time travel, and both of them revolve around what's called the Grandfather Paradox. For those who aren't familiar with this situation, here's how it goes: A time traveler goes back into the past and kills her own grandfather in the cradle. But if Grandpa dies before he gets together with Grandma, then the time traveler will never be born ... so she won't be able to go back and kill Gramps. But if Gramps lives, then his granddaughter will be born after all, will grow up to become the time traveler, and will go back to kill him.

One way out of the Grandfather Paradox is to assume a multiverse of many different parallel and divergent universes. (I talked about the multiverse and alternate universes in more detail a while ago, in the October 2009 issue.) Our hero kills Grandpa and instantly an alternate timeline branches off: one that contains both dead infant Gramps and the adult time traveler. Unless she can cross universes, the traveler is marooned in a world in which she will never exist. Sometimes there is only one timestream, with previous alternate histories erased.

Various authors have played with this basic notion, perhaps the most definitive being David Gerrold in The Man Who Folded Himself.

This approach leads naturally to a much grander concept, that of a corps of time travelers on a mission to police the multiverse and steer the timeline(s) in the direction that seems best to them. Among the classic examples are Jack Williamson's Legion of Time, Poul Anderson's Time Corps series, Isaac Asimov's The End of Eternity, Kage Baker's Company series, Heinlein's later “World as Myth” novels, and the Time Lords of Doctor Who.

Back to the Grandfather Paradox. There's another answer, and that's to assume that the timestream is absolutely invariant. Everything that has happened will always have happened. No matter how hard our intrepid hero tries, she will never succeed in killing the infant Grandpa. Her gun will jam, her garrote cord will break, the stresses of time travel will have rendered her poison harmless. Even if she does kill Gramps, it will turn out that Grandma was having an affair with someone else, who (surprise) was her real grandfather. Anything that seems to be a paradox will inevitably have a logical explanation. In this sort of tale, people are always becoming their own ancestors or descendants (or both), or taking the place of some actual historical figure whom they've accidentally removed from history.

As near as I can tell, the first person to explore this idea was Heinlein, in the story “By His Bootstraps” (in the October 1941 issue of Astounding). He later refined the notion in a shorter and tighter story called “—All You Zombies—” in which a whole raft of seeming paradoxes turn out to be nothing more than a matter of perspective. In The Door Into Summer, Heinlein explored the question once again; his hero traveled both forward and backward in time and tied up every loose end. Quite a while later, Michael Moorcock's powerful Behold the Man showed a time traveler who went back to first-century Jerusalem in search of the historic Jesus, with shattering consequences.

In recent years, the multiverse theory of time travel has become almost the default in science fiction. Part of this, I'm sure, is due to the physicists prattling on about parallel universes and alternate timelines as if they invented them, once again stealing our best ideas and transforming them into banal but respectable talk about strings and branes and itty-bitty particles doing bizarre things to one another in the odd corners of spacetime. When Anderson and Heinlein and Doctor Who were exploring the multiverse, it was “just science fiction"—but let a few cosmologists get into a drunken gabfest on a train, and suddenly the idea is respectable, thank you very much.

Ahem. In any case, it's refreshing to see a major sf writer going back to the “invariant timeline” concept. Which brings us to:

* * * *

Time Travelers Never Die

Jack McDevitt

Ace, 384 pages, $24.95

ISBN: 978-0-441-01763-8

Genres: Trips in Time

* * * *

Time Travelers Never Die is another “young man's life changes completely when he receives an unexpected gift from a relative” book. Nothing wrong with that; it's the pattern of many a fine story.

Michael Shelborne, physicist and renaissance man, vanishes one day. His adult son, Adrian Shelborne ("Shel"), is given a package from his father: in the package are three small devices with cryptic controls and handy belt clips. An accompanying note from Dad instructs Shel to destroy all three devices at once. Like that's going to happen.

Instead, Shel experiments with the devices (wouldn't you?) and finds that they are—you guessed it—time machines.

Shel at once goes back in time a week and catches Dad before his disappearance. When asked why he wants Shel to destroy the machines, Dad explains that he and an assistant found out that the invariant timestream does not allow paradoxes. When they tried to force one, going back to alter a trivial recent event, the assistant died of a heart attack. Dad calls this the Cardiac Principle: the continuum does not allow paradoxes.

Shel, back in the present, has one problem left: where did Dad disappear to? He enlists the aid of his friend Dave Dryden, and soon the two of them are off on time-spanning adventures.

Shel and Dave's various journeys are the real meat of the book, and they're quite a bit of fun. They head for the Library of Alexandria and bring back copies of lost works by Sophocles and others. They participate in the civil rights march on Selma. They talk to Galileo and track down Dad living happily in Renaissance Italy.

Although they have both agreed not to attempt to travel into the future, both of course do so—privately. Dave brings back race results and makes a killing at the track; Shel establishes an identity and an alternate home at the end of the twenty-first century. But then Shel learns something he shouldn't know: the date and circumstances of his own death.

From there the book unwinds along an inexorable path, all loose ends fusing together to eliminate any hint of paradox. And even though any halfway-experienced sf reader will know at once where the story is going, it doesn't matter ... getting there is the best part.

Time Travelers Never Die isn't just a clever and enjoyable time travel adventure. It's also a philosophical and moral meditation on one of the great unanswerable questions. You probably noticed, in the discussion of multiverse vs. invariant timeline, that the dichotomy is essentially the same as that eternal struggle between free will and determinism. This is the real issue that Time Travelers Never Die tackles.

You see, Shel and Dave have two different ideas about interacting with history. Shel believes that they must do nothing to interfere with the events and people they witness. Dave, on the other hand, wants to participate in history ... even knowing that he is powerless to change things in any substantial way. And in the end, Dave's belief in free will comes into direct conflict with Shel's acceptance of determinism ... a conflict that will have enormous impact on both men.

* * * *

The Return

Ben Bova

Tor, 432 pages, $25.95

ISBN: 978-0-7653-0925-9

Genres: Adventure, Alien Beings

Series: Voyagers 4, Grand Tour Universe

* * * *

There seems to be a tendency, in some venerable science fiction writers, to unify their various works into one great multiverse. Poul Anderson was perhaps the first, linking the Polesotechnic League of Nicholas van Rijn with Dominic Flandry's Terran Empire in one future history. Asimov did it when he brought the Foundation and Positronic Robot series together; Heinlein's later books pulled together everything he'd ever written and threw in the Oz, Barsoom, and Lensman universes for good measure.

Now Ben Bova is apparently feeling the urge, bringing characters from his Voyagers series into the universe of his Grand Tour.

The Voyagers books (Voyagers, The Alien Within, and Star Brothers) tell the story of astronaut Keith Stoner, first explorer of a strange alien starship that entered the Solar System. Stoner acquired the abilities and memories of the long-dead alien pilot, and eventually built his own starship. With his wife and children, he fled to the stars.

Now, a century later, Stoner and his family return to Earth. But it's not the Earth they left; somehow, they have crossed over into the Grand Tour universe. And Stoner's not happy about it.

In the Grand Tour series (as we most recently saw in Mars Life), Earth is no longer an attractive place. The anti-science and anti-technology kooks are winning the day, and ecological disaster looms.

If anyone's going to save humanity, it's got to be Keith Stoner. And the rest is pure Bova: careful scientific and cultural extrapolation, well-drawn characters, and interesting philosophical underpinnings. While I'm still not convinced that bringing these two universes together was the best idea ever, Bova certainly makes it work.

It'll be interesting to see where he goes next.

* * * *

From the Pen of Paul:

The Fantastic Images of Frank R. Paul

Edited by Stephen D. Korshak

Shasta/Phoenix,

128 / 144 / 160 pages,

$39.95 / $59.95 / $395.00

ISBN: 978-0-9800-931-1-7 (hardcover)

978-0-9800-931-2-4 (deluxe)

978-0-9800-931-3-1 (ultra deluxe)

www.shasta-phoenix.com

* * * *

As long as there's been science fiction, there's been science fiction art. And at the very beginning of science fiction art, there was Frank R. Paul.

Shashta/Phoenix has produced a magnificent coffee table book (9 x 12 inches) showcasing the life and work of Frank R. Paul. Paul has been called “the father of science fiction art,” and if anyone can lay claim to that title, it's Paul. Among the thousands of pieces he created were some of the most famous and iconic images of science fiction—including the cover of Amazing Stories number 1, early issues of Astounding, and the first book covers of such classics as The Skylark of Space and John W. Campbell's The Mightiest Machine.

When you think of pulp sf, you're probably thinking of Frank R. Paul illustrations. Bright colors, fantastic air- and space-craft, futuristic cities, magnificent planetary vistas, odd aliens—he did it all, and inspired countless others to follow his lead.

There's plenty of textual information in this book: biographies of Paul, an appreciation by Forrest J. Ackerman, a preface by Arthur C. Clarke, and a detailed bibliographical index. But the best part of the book is the pages upon pages of Paul magazine covers and paintings, reproduced in full gorgeous color. I can't imagine an sf reader who could walk by this book without picking it up, or leaf through it without getting snared for hours.

The book comes in three different editions. The Hardcover Trade Edition has 128 pages and costs $39.95; it is a limited edition of 1,000 copies.

The Deluxe Edition has 160 pages, including much more art, and has a slipcase. This one costs $59.95 and is limited to 874 copies.

The Ultra Deluxe Edition is leather-bound and slipcased, and signed by Sir Arthur as well as editor Stephen D. Korshak and contributors Jerry Weist and Robert Hill. There are 126 numbered copies, and the cost is $395.00. All three editions are available from the Shasta/Phoenix website listed above.

Whether you want to relive the nostalgia of those long-ago days, or you're a young whippersnapper who wants to see what all the excitement was about, you ought to treat yourself to this volume. If you're going to spring for the Hardcover, take my advice and scrape up the extra twenty bucks for the Deluxe Edition: it's definitely worth it.

Copyright © 2010 Tom Easton

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Reader's Department: BRASS TACKS

Dear Stan,

Having just read the editorial in your September issue, I wanted to give my thanks to your father (as you suggest) for the influence that helped cause many years of a very enjoyable reading experience.

My own father, David Lyle, just recently passed away after battling cancer for the last year. Analog has been a part of my relationship with him from as long as I can remember. So much so, that your publication was mentioned in my eulogy at his funeral. Starting as early as fifth grade, and all through high school, I remember picking up copies of Analog along with nonfiction magazines (my dad was a forensic chemist and subscribed to several work related publications) and I strongly believe this reading played a large role in shaping who I became. After all, how many fifth graders know anything about Schrodinger's cat? I learned from a young age to ask questions, question the answers, and in general to think creatively.

After I'd grown up and moved out, Analog was a part of every visit to my parent's house. He always kept each issue and passed them on to me to take back home. I have stacks and stacks of past issues, along with virtually a library of other science fiction (and a few nonfiction) books, hoping that one of my own children will develop an interest. My mother has changed the subscription address to my own so that I will receive the remaining issues directly, but I have to be honest and say receiving the first one that way will be emotionally difficult for me.

Anyway, thanks again for the years of great reading, and for providing one of the main connections between my father and myself. Please keep up the great work!

Nathan Lyle

Ishpeming, MI

* * * *

Dear Stan,

Don Nix's letter in the October 2009 issue repeats a classic conservative claim: that the New Deal, rather than improving the economy, actually prolonged the Depression, and that the economy would have recovered much sooner had “free enterprise” been allowed to work its marketplace magic. “Doing nothing,” he says, citing an earlier letter from reader Sue Jarrell, “is the best course and will work out."

Unfortunately for this argument, what even conservatives mostly agree ended the Depression was World War II. The preparation for that war, and the war itself, involved the conversion of the U.S. to a virtually absolute command economy, a government intervention far beyond the scale of the New Deal.

Had FDR dared attempt any such thing for non-military purposes, he'd have been impeached or assassinated in short order—but in the wake of Pearl Harbor, such was the urge to teach those “little yellow monkey men of Nippon” (and, oh yeah, what's-his-name, Hitler) who was who and what was what that just about anything went. (At least at first, the war against Hitler was seen by most Americans as secondary to avenging what many Americans saw as not only a national but also a racial insult.) If the argument Nix and Jarrell borrow from conservative economist Thomas Sowell were correct, the wartime command economy should have left this country economically crippled by 1945—but instead, we emerged into a peacetime boom.

As for the New Deal's effects, it's a matter of record that during FDR's first term, unemployment dropped from 25 percent to 14 percent. It's also a matter of record that under heavy pressure from the Supreme Court, dominated by conservative Republican appointees, and, after the 1936 elections, from a Congress controlled by a coalition of Southern Democratic and GOP conservatives, President Roosevelt was forced to scale back the New Deal—and that then the unemployment rate, rather than falling further, rose to 19 percent by the end of 1939, before the start of war preparations. Or, in other words, the New Deal worked, as long as it was allowed to. That it did not end the Depression before the Second World War is seemingly not due to its being too much, but too little—unless one cares to make the argument that government military programs possess some special economic magic civilian programs don't. Somehow, I don't find that very convincing.

Eric B. Lipps

Staten Island, NY

* * * *

Dear Dr. Schmidt,

Thoroughly enjoyed the November issue. Your choice of stories in this issue seems to reflect your editorial on the need to publish everything in SF from the mundane to the highly improbable.

As you wrote, many devices and techniques now in everyday use would be regarded as magic not that long ago. John Campbell, writing in the early 1950s, pointed out that scientists working before World War II would have difficulty understanding how a simple transistor radio works.

Since the optical microscopes of their day could not resolve the solid-state logic elements of a PC or even a digital camera, they would have been utterly baffled by them.

Even as it was in the past, it is likely that the latest scientific thinking will be swept away by new experimental findings. In my youth, I was taught that planetary formation was an extremely rare event, the result of a near collision of two stars; today we have proof by observation that practically all stars have planets. Planetary formation theory has been revised to match the new data.

In the novelette, “Joan,” the inventor of the time machine is unable to show that a round trip in time has ever occurred; his audiovisual recorders haven't run, recorded nothing, and he is about to dismantle his machine. Kate, the protagonist, is, of course (among other things), an audio-visual recorder. She uses his machine, goes back in time and returns complete with memories of her trip. She is aware that she has come back to a new world, one with a different past. This implies that there is a world where the inventor has proof his machine works and is safe to use, even though he did not actually send it himself! Also, back in the world she left, when Kate pushes the Go button, apparently, nothing happens! If, in Kate's new world, the inventor repeats his experiment, his recorder again returns with its tape still at the start! In a third world, he then has proof the machine worked twice! In every world but the very first, he has proof his machine worked, one or more times, but his next trip may fail, as will all attempts thereafter! As has been said before, going back in time always creates a paradox.

"Foreign Exchange” leaves several questions unanswered: why does an exclusively telepathic creature have a “mouth noises” name? What does “Tnaxis” exhale? What chemical reaction between methane, CH4, and “dry cat food,” made up of compounds of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, provides energy for his metabolism? Again, on Titan, methane is mostly a liquid; how then, can Tnaxis survive at Earth temperatures? Of course, this was a fun story and these items are not central to the plot.

"Amabit Sapiens” has a similar chemistry problem, which is central to the story. How, in the anaerobic environment of an oil well, does a bacterium extract energy from a hydrocarbon (crude oil) by freeing hydrogen? What does it react the crude oil with, water? The metabolite would seem more likely to be carbon dioxide than hydrogen.

In “To Climb a Flat Mountain,” how to construct a square (per the cover, or a cube, per the text) that has low gravity and also a dense, but breathable atmosphere, seems a problem, even without worrying about the structural strength of the material to make it out of (same problems as Niven's ringworld). Good adventure story but some suspension of disbelief required.

Donald M. Seib

Cocoa Beach FL

* * * *

Dr. Schmidt,

We have received our November 2009 Analog Science Fiction and Fact.

My husband purchased the first subscription as a gift for me many, many years ago and I have enjoyed reading every issue and every story until this month.

The second item in the table of contents is a novelette entitled “Amabit Sapiens” by Craig DeLancey.

I have to tell you—this was by far the goriest story, and one that I personally believe did not belong in Analog. It may be a fiction, but it isn't what I'd call science fiction.

I was totally unprepared for the unexpectedly gruesome details repetitiously getting more horrific throughout the story.

Frankly, I was very disappointed that your editing team saw fit to include this item.

Respectfully,

Mrs. A. Schonwald

* * * *

Sorry you didn't like the story, but “goriness-level” has nothing to do with “science fiction level."

* * * *

Dear Dr. Schmidt,

This past week I did something I had never done before. I read Jeffery Kooistra's treatise (or should I say expose) of a rather feeble attempt by a misguided group of followers of a certain ex-vice president to persuade the American people of a potential serious change to our global temperature. I regret the omission from the article of certain proofs of facts as reported by Mr. Watts and so noted by Mr. Kooistra in his informative statement (may I dare to call it a tour-de-farce?). You should speak to whoever heads the printing house that does your work! I congratulate Jeff on producing a statement that certainly gets my approval. Now—if Jeff could follow up this initial undertaking by discovering who is responsible for producing the obviously doctored pictures purporting to show the progressive melting of the polar icecaps—my cup would be truly running over.

Fred Hauser

Ho-Ho-Kus, NJ

PS. The following is something I just want you to know. I read my first Astounding in 1937 (I was 16) and any issue I could find after that, until I became a subscriber in 1958 and I have every copy since then in my basement. I joined the Army in 1942, they sent me to Los Alamos in February 1944, and thanks to Cleve Cartmill's “atomic bomb” story, when they asked me what I thought they were doing I said, “I think you're working on making an atomic bomb” and bingo—I was put in the group that did just that.

* * * *

Dear Dr. Cramer,

I have been reading Astounding/Analog for 60 years. Your Alternate View columns are the best content I have seen. Every one is worth the annual subscription rate and more. Overbye's cosmology and physics articles in the Science Times are good, but do not come close to your depth and exciting content.

Thanks so very much for efforts over the years. Fabulous and fascinating stuff! Forever appreciated!

Fred Stahl

* * * *

Dear Drs. Schmidt and Cramer,

December's 150th Cramer Alternate View column has moved me to express my gratitude. Not only has no Dr. Cramer column ever disappointed me, but each Cramer column puts me in touch with something that I feel really matters to what is actually moving current science in physics. Dr. Cramer has taught me a slower, denser way to read, which the clarity and forthrightness of his writing, and particularly the wonderful coherence of the thought he leads me through, always reward. His latest column helped more than I can express to be a true communicant of research actually in progress into dark energy and dark matter. It offers a completeness of relevance I have found nowhere else. I appreciate his economy and care for inclusiveness, and these columns never let me down. At the level of information about science that is actually being done, and particularly about its significance, they privilege me incomparably.

Sincerely,

Joseph E. Quittner

Cleveland Heights, OH

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Reader's Department: UPCOMING EVENTS by Anthony Lewis

5-7 March 2010

POTLATCH 19 (Northwest SF conference) at Hotel Deca, Seattle, WA. Book of Honor: Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny. Membership: $65 in advance, more at the door; youth membership $25, supporting membership $20. Info: potlatch-sf.org/; potlatch19@gmail. com; c/o Suzanne Tompkins, PO Box 25075, Seattle, WA 98165.

19-21 March 2010

LUNACON 2010 (New York City area SF conference) at Hilton Rye Town, Rye Brook, NY. Writer Guest of Honor: Tanya Huff; Artist Guest of Honor: Theresa Mather; Musical Guest: Allison Lonsdale; Fan Guest of Honor: Dominick Carrado. Membership: $45 until 14 February 2010, $55 at the door; children $15 until 14 February 2010, $25 at the door. Info: www.lunacon.org; info@lunacon.org; PO Box 432, Throggs Neck Station, Bronx, NY 10465.

2-4 April 2010

MINICON 45 (Minneapolis SF conference) at Sheraton Bloomington Hotel, Bloomington, MN. Author Guest of Honor: Brandon Sanderson; Art Guest of Honor: Dan Dos Santos. Membership: $45 until 10 March 2010 (student $30), more thereafter and at the door. Info: mnstf.org/minicon45; PO Box 8297, Lake Street Station, Minneapolis, MN 55408.

9-11 April 2010

RAVEN CON (Richmond area SF and gaming conference) at Holiday Inn Select, Richmond, VA. Author Guest of Honor: Richel Caine; Artist Guest of Honor: R. Cat; Gaming Guest of Honor: Steve Long. Membership: $35 until 1 April 2010, $40 at the door. Info: www.ravencon.com; webmaster@ravencon.com; 3502 Fernmoss Ct., Charlotte, NC 28269.

2-6 September 2010

AUSSIECON FOUR (68th World Science Fiction Convention) at Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Guest of Honor: Kim Stanley Robinson; Artist Guest of Honor: Shaun Tan; Fan Guest of Honor: Robin Johnson. Membership from 1 January 2009 until some later date (see website for latest details): AUD 210, USD 175, CAD 185, GBP 100, EUR 120, JPY 16000; supporting membership AUD 70, USD 50, CAD 50, GBP 25, EUR 35, JPY 4900. This is the SF universe's annual get-together. Professionals and readers from all over the world will be in attendance. Talks, panels, films, fancy dress competition—the works. Nominate and vote for the Hugos. Info: www.aussiecon4. org.au/; info@aussiecon4.org.au; GPO Box 1212, Melbourne, Victoria, AUSTRALIA 3001

* * * *

Running a convention? If your convention has a telephone or fax number, e-mail address, or web page, please let us know so that we can publish this information. We must have your information in hand SIX months before the date of your convention.

* * * *

Attending a convention? When calling conventions for information, do not call collect and do not call too late in the evening. It is best to include a S.A.S.E. when requesting information; include an International Reply Coupon if the convention is in a different country.

Visit www.analogsf.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.

Table of Contents

- Reader's Department: EDITORIAL: THE TWISTED ART by…

- Novella: OF ONE MIND by Shane Tourtellotte

- Science Fact: ISOTOPY by Stephen L. Gillett, Ph.D.

- Short Story: ENCOUNTER IN A YELLOW WOOD by Bud Spa…

- Short Story: LOCKED IN by Brad Aiken

- Reader's Department: THE ALTERNATE VIEW: THE NICE …

- Reader's Department: IN TIMES TO COME

- Department: BIOLOG: CHRISTOPHER L. BENNETT by Rich…

- Probability Zero: TEN THOUSAND MONKEYS by Tocho Li…

- Short Story: DR. SKENNER'S SPECIAL ANIMALS by by D…

- Novelette: THE HUB OF THE MATTER by Christopher L.…

- Novelette: NARROW WORLD by Carl Frederick

- Reader's Department: THE REFERENCE LIBRARY by Don …

- Reader's Department: BRASS TACKS

- Reader's Department: UPCOMING EVENTS by Anthony Le…

- [Back to Table of Contents]