“He’s got a talent agency. He wanted to see what I thought of the band that was playing there last night. Also, apparently a lot of girls show up to listen wherever those guys play. He wanted to know what the young women were interested in. He didn’t think they’d talk to a guy in his forties, but hoped they’d answer a few questions from me.”
Morgan felt startled, but tried to keep it from showing on his face, “So what did you think about the band?”
“The drummer’s okay, if unimaginative,” she began. Morgan’s heart started to sink at this dispassionate but seemingly knowledgeable assessment. She continued, “The bass player doesn’t have much talent at all, but thinks he’s God’s gift to women. That guitarist though… The kid’s amazing. A great vocalist too. Did you know he’s only seventeen?!”
Morgan nodded numbly. “So, what were all those girls interested in?”
“The guitarist. Probably not for how he plays guitar though.” She rolled her eyes and spoke in a high-pitched singsong, “He’s so dreamy…”
“Not the bass player?”
“Oh, no—” Tilly’s eyes widened and she put her hand on his wrist, looking apologetic. “Oh, I’m so sorry. Do you know the bass player?”
Morgan shook his head, “Um, no—”
Tilly frowned, “The drummer?”
Morgan frowned back, “Why do you think I know someone?”
She tilted her head and searched his eyes, “I can tell. You know the guitarist, don’t you?”
He nodded, “He’s Kiri’s brother.”
“Oh!” Tilly said, her eyes widening. “I met him briefly when I came to visit Kiri, didn’t I? He looked familiar last night but I couldn’t figure out why.” She put a hand over her mouth, “Oh, Pradeep’s going to be pissed.”
“Pradeep’s your brother?”
Tilly nodded.
“Why’s he going to be mad?”
“Because I told you how amazing your nephew is. It’ll weaken his position when he tries to negotiate a deal.”
“Really? You think he’ll want to make an offer?”
Tilly laughed, “Without a doubt.”
“Lindl’s too young, he hasn’t even finished high school yet. Besides, he says all those girls are there for the bass player.”
“First point; Pradeep plans far into the future. Second point; only in the bass player’s dreams.” Tilly got an intent look on her face, “Pradeep thinks your nephew has immense potential, and he won’t be the only one. You’re his guardian now, and you need to start worrying that he’s going to get used by people who won’t have his best interests at heart.”
Suddenly sobered, Morgan sank back into his chair to consider the ramifications. “You think he needs a manager?”
Tilly nodded slowly. “Management’s what Pradeep offers. I, of course, think my brother’s fair and honest, but your nephew needs someone who’s completely on his side. I can suggest some people I know who specialize in entertainment law.”
“Not you?”
She laughed, “No, no. First of all, I don’t know entertainment law. Second, I have an obvious conflict, so you shouldn’t trust me. Third, if I were to negotiate hard on behalf of my client and against my brother…” she shook her head in dismay and widened her eyes, “there’d be hell to pay with my family.”
When they were leaving the restaurant, Morgan realized he’d had—once again—an extraordinarily good time. He turned to Tilly, “I— I really like you. I’d like to keep seeing you. Is that okay?”
She laughed again, “Yes. I like you too. But,” she waved a finger at him, “you just broke up with your wife last week. You shouldn’t commit to a long-term relationship this week. Or next. I think you should go out with at least a couple of other women before you start thinking you’re ready to settle down.”
“Oh. Okay,” Morgan said feeling bewildered. Is this just her way of getting rid of me? Or of saying she doesn’t want to date damaged goods that’re on the rebound? Or, is she just displaying extraordinary wisdom?
And, how am I supposed to find someone else to date?
***
On his drive home, Morgan’s phone said he had a call from Satya Monda. He touched the button on the wheel that picked it up, “Hello Satya.”
Without preamble, Satya said, “It’s an absolutely brilliant piece of theoretical work. I need to show it to a couple more people, but it’s possible that theory’s going to shake the foundations—”
“A couple more people?” Morgan said apprehensively. “You haven’t already violated that NDA, have you?”
“Um—”
“Satya!”
Satya laughed, “No, I haven’t violated your damned nondisclosure agreement. I just wanted to pull your chain.” He turned serious, “But, seriously, this needs to get out there. We need some experimentalists testing this theory. Just because the math works out, that doesn’t mean crap until somebody shows that this stuff actually happens physically, you know?”
“It’s not my theory to disseminate.”
“I know, it’s your brother’s, right? And if you’ve taken over as his guardian, you should have the right—”
“It’s not my brother’s. It came from some friend of his, and—”
“Who? I’ll be happy to call him and talk to him about it.” Satya produced a wistful tone that Morgan thought was just joking, “Maybe he’ll put my name on the paper and you can be my escort in Stockholm.”
“I don’t even know who it is,” Morgan said. “My niece knows who it is, but she’s been reluctant to tell me.”
Satya said, “Aren’t you her guardian now? Just tell her she has to tell you.”
Satya sounded like he couldn’t believe Morgan hadn’t recognized this obvious solution. Morgan realized that Satya’s family politics might be different from his own. Or at least from how Morgan thought a family should get along. Morgan said, “Her father was just killed. I’ve got to build some trust with her, not come on like some kind of dictator.”
“Well don’t take too long. The world needs that theory… Actually, the world needs the practical technology that could result from that theory. We’ve got to get the theory published so experimentalists can start attacking it.”
Morgan hesitated, “Before he died, my brother transmuted rhenium into iridium and platinum. Does that sound like the kind of thing the theory would let you do?”
“Holy mother! Was he doing it with proton capture or alpha capture with proton injection?”
“Alpha capture,” Morgan said reluctantly. “Does the theory predict that?”
“It predicts that you could markedly increase quantum tunneling of particles like protons or alpha particles. Exactly how you’d do it, I’m not sure. If your brother was really able to do it, that’s a major coup in its own right. Do you know how he did it? You could publish the method posthumously in his name.”
They talked a little longer and Morgan agreed to try to get the name of the person who’d developed the theory and let Satya know who it was. After he disconnected, Morgan found his head spinning with the implications. I wonder if this guy who developed the theory has a better claim to the transmutation technology than we do, he wondered. Or, maybe the patent’s mostly for reducing it to practice. After all, every patent’s probably based on a whole bunch of theories…
***
Kiri looked up at a knock on her door. “Hey cousin,” she said, seeing Adam.
He said, “I’ve been thinking about your idea for the fighting bot.”
“Which one?” she asked, having mentioned several.
“The one that wasn’t dumb,” he said, grinning to take the sting out of his words. “The tethered projectile or spear.”
Rolling her eyes, she said, “You mean the ‘sharpened piston.’”
“Yeah, yeah,” he said, walking across the room to sit down next to her on the bed. He had a pad of paper he turned toward her. It had a drawing on it. “So, we build a pointy wedge design. After the wedge sli
des under the opposing bot and tilts it up off the floor, your piston fires up into its undercarriage.”
She looked at his drawing. It showed one robot tilted up with the other one wedged in underneath it. The bottom one had a narrow tube inside it, out of which had extended a long pointed rod that had jammed up into the upper one. “Are you gonna make it retract, so you can fire it up under there again?”
“I’d like to. How would we do it?”
“If you used a linear electromagnetic driver, you could just reverse it to pull the piston back.”
“I looked at that. To get much velocity, you need really high surge currents.”
She shrugged, “Big capacitors.”
“Then you need big batteries and time to charge the capacitors. It’d be a lot cheaper to fire it with a large rifle cartridge.” He tapped the paper where she saw he’d drawn a magazine of what looked like cartridges without bullets. “Then you could fire it again almost as soon as you drew it back.”
Kiri shrugged, “So, you use another, smaller cartridge at the other end of the piston to push it back.”
He stared at the paper for a moment, then threw his arm around her and pulled her tight. “Great idea!” He leaned his head closer and enthusiastically kissed her cheek.
Kiri expected him to immediately draw away, but he didn’t, staying tight against her. Without moving her head, she turned her eyes toward him. His face was still near, his lips almost grazing her cheek. “Cuz—?” she asked quietly.
“You’re amazing, you know that?” he said, his lips so close that she felt his warm breath on her cheek. She got the feeling that if she turned toward him he’d try to kiss her on the mouth.
“Of course I am,” she said, trying to derail whatever was happening with a little humor.
“I— I’m crazy about you.”
She leaned her head away, face front, but her eyes still turned hard toward him. “You’re crazy all right—” she said, grinning to soften the blow, “—cousin,” she said, to remind him of their relationship.
“I’m adopted,” he reminded her, “we’re not really cousins.”
“Close enough,” she said leaning away. For a moment, he came with her, pulled by the right hand he had around her. Then his fingers slipped free. She looked at him. He looked crushed. Why does this keep happening to me? she wondered. She said, “I like you a lot too. And I understand that it’d be biologically okay. But my dad was just killed…”
Adam looked stricken, “I’m sorry! I’m such an asshole.”
She wrinkled her nose and gave him a faint grin, “True.”
Adam looked properly abashed. Kiri was wondering how she’d disengage from the situation when she was saved by her uncle calling up the stairs to say dinner was ready.
Morgan and Lindl had made hamburgers. When Adam and Kiri got downstairs, she worried that the strain between them would be obvious. To brighten the conversation, she said, “Hamburgers! Awesome.”
“And tater tots too?” Adam said. “Dad, I thought you were opposed?”
“I’m opposed to them on the basis that I eat too many,” Morgan responded, “but I figured that most of them would go into Lindl’s hollow leg and there wouldn’t be enough left over to make me fat.”
To Kiri’s great relief, as the meal progressed, it seemed like the awkwardness she’d had with Adam had diminished. When she put some mayonnaise on her hamburger, he said, “Mayo? Gross!”
She arched an eyebrow, “A hamburger’s most important function is carrying mayo to my mouth.” She took a big bite.
“Catsup and mustard for me,” he said, reassembling his burger.
They talked about inconsequential things for a while, then Lindl said, “Hey, Matilda’s working again. Was that what you were working on this morning, Uncle Morgan?”
Morgan nodded while Kiri stared. Matilda?! Why would he be working on Matilda?
Adam turned toward his dad. “You worked things out with Alan?”
Morgan nodded again.
Adam said, “Does that mean our financial issues are— okay now?”
Morgan frowned, as if he didn’t really want to talk about it, but then he swallowed and said, “Presumably. But I don’t think we should start counting our eggs until we’ve at least seen them.”
“Wait a minute,” Kiri heard herself asking, “you worked for Matilda?” She realized she’d be ever so much more impressed with her uncle if he worked for Matilda rather than some other company.
Morgan just nodded.
Kiri turned to Lindl, “How did you know about this?”
He shrugged, “I talk to my roommate about things like that. What do you talk to him about?”
“He didn’t work for Matilda,” Adam said. “He founded her.”
Kiri felt her eyes widen as she turned to look at her uncle. “Really?”
Morgan shrugged and gave a barely perceptible nod. “Not just me, it was me and four of my buddies from college.”
“But he’s the guy who did the software,” Adam said.
Kiri still had her eyes on her uncle but his eyes were on his hamburger, as if he were embarrassed. And he’s humble about it, she thought. The fact that it kind of had to be dragged out of him makes me respect him so much more. She said, “That’s— impressive.”
Epilogue
Sunday, mid-June
The Djais were on a rise overlooking the Blue Ridge Parkway. They’d eaten a picnic in a small down-sloping meadow that broke the trees enough to let them look out over the green hills Daryn had so loved. They’d been reminiscing about his life with both tears and laughter.
At a nod from Morgan, Lindl got up, put on his acoustic guitar, and stood looking out over the apparently endless forest. He started playing a peaceful tune he’d written for the occasion.
After he’d been playing for a while, Kiri walked up beside him. She stood on his right and put her left arm around his waist. Turning, she waved Morgan and Adam up beside her. When the four of them stood side-by-side, each with an arm around another, she began to recite from memory:
We will never comprehend
Why he’s gone and why it ends
We’re here to speak of how we’ve lost
A friend and loved one to the frost
The frost that nips us all at last
No matter that we’re quick and fast
So give our hearts a path to mend
And in our souls let joy transcend
When she finished, but for the continuing guitar, they stood in silence for a couple of minutes. Then Kiri turned to look at Morgan. His throat worked a little, and he hoarsely began:
We are gathered at the end of life
To mourn a passing and end of strife
Our hearts are torn by his release
Our souls cry and hope he’s at peace
We all want to know why it ended this way
But none of us— are going to grasp it today
Kiri turned to look at Adam. He took the lid off the urn.
Lindl kept playing as they took turns sprinkling Daryn’s ashes in the little meadow.
Afterward, as they walked down the hill toward the car, Adam and Kiri wound up about thirty yards in front of Morgan and Lindl. Morgan had noticed they’d been acting awkwardly around each other a week ago, but whatever’d happened between them seemed to have smoothed over. They’d been getting along well and Kiri’d gone back to giving Adam shit at every opportunity.
Morgan felt at peace. He still regretted fighting with his brother as well as all the years they’d spent apart. But the first installment of the money from Matilda had come in so he felt confident that he’d be able to take care of his brother’s children. He even planned to give Arlette a few million—in memory of the good years they’d had together.
And, it was possible that Lindl and Kiri wouldn’t need any financial support from Morgan. Kiri’d been able to get Daryn’s alpha capture system to run, apparently without any difficulty. They’d sent a sample of the
iridium to a potential buyer and Morgan couldn’t imagine why the buyer wouldn’t want it. Lindl and Kiri should easily be able to go to college on the profits from the iridium sales alone, though Lindl had been making more noise about skipping college and going on the road instead.
One difficulty was that Kiri’d been strangely resistant to naming the author of the quantum tunneling theory alpha capture was based on. Morgan felt fairly certain his niece and nephew could license patents on the technology for a tremendous revenue stream. However, he couldn’t seem to make Kiri understand how important it was that they reach an agreement with the theory guy before they began sales. Kiri was still claiming the guy’d given Daryn the theory, free and clear, but even if that were true, Morgan wanted to have legal, signed documentation of that fact. He didn’t want the guy coming around later to file a lawsuit.
Lindl cleared his throat. Morgan and he’d been walking quietly, side-by-side and Morgan had felt like it was a companionable silence. Now he glanced over at Lindl, concerned that he might not have noticed that Lindl was in distress. They were, after all, walking down the hill after a memorial service for the young man’s father. He took in Lindl’s face and decided the young man didn’t look distraught, though he did have a serious expression on his face.
“Uncle Morgan?” Lindl said.
Morgan nodded, “Something on your mind?”
“Yeah. I’d like to tell you something in confidence. Something I need you to promise me you’ll never tell anybody I told you.”
Morgan looked over at his nephew, wondering what in the world this could be about. “You haven’t committed a crime, have you?” he said lightly, as if he were joking. Inside, he hoped he’d be able to laugh about the sudden fear that’d just come over him—once Lindl had told him whatever he was about to tell him.
Lindl said, “Oh. No, no crime. Just a secret.”
“Okay, sure. I’ll never tell anyone.”
The Transmuter's Daughter Page 26
