“Ah,” said Mary. She looked at the three occupants of the room. “No, I’m a geneticist.”
“Oh, I know you!” declared the black man. He got up out of his chair, the chair’s back making a relieved sound as it resumed a normal position. “You’re the woman who spent all that time with NP.”
“NP?”
“Neanderthal Prime,” said Krieger.
“His name is Ponter,” said Mary, somewhat miffed.
“Sorry,” said the black man. He extended his hand. “I’m Kevin Bilodeau, formerly with the skunkworks at Kodak. Listen, we’d love to pick your brain about the Companion implant. You saw it up close. What sort of arrangement of lenses did it have?”
“There was only one,” said Mary.
“You see!” crowed Lilly, looking accusingly at the man who, by process of elimination, must be Frank.
“Ponter said it used sensor fields to record images,” said Mary.
“Did he say what sort of sensors?” “Did he mention charge-coupled devices?” “Holography—did he say anything about holography?” “What sort of resolution did the sensors have?” “Did he mention a pixel count?” “Can you describe—”
“People!” said Jock loudly. “People! Mary’s going to be with us for a good, long time. You’ll have plenty of opportunity to chat with her. She’s still getting the orientation tour.”
The three apologized, and they all made small talk for a few moments, then Krieger led Mary out of the room. “They’re certainly enthusiastic,” she said, once the door was closed.
Krieger nodded. “Everyone here is.”
“But I don’t see how they can accomplish what you’ve asked. I mean, I’ve heard of reverse engineering, but without a sample of a Companion implant, how can they hope to duplicate it?”
“Just knowing that it’s possible may be enough to get them going in the right direction.” Krieger opened the door on the opposite side of the hall, and Mary felt her eyes going wide.
“Louise!” she exclaimed.
Sitting at a worktable, a notebook computer open in front of her, was Louise Benoît, the physics postdoc who had saved Ponter’s life when he’d first appeared inside the heavy-water tank at the heart of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory.
“Hello, Mary,” said Louise, speaking with the French accent Mary had come to know so well. She rose, and her thick brown hair tumbled halfway down her back. Mary was 38 and she knew Louise was 28—but Mary also knew that she herself hadn’t looked that good even when she was 18. Louise was busty, leggy, and had a model’s face; Mary had instinctively disliked her the first time they’d met.
“I’d forgotten that you knew Dr. Benoît,” said Krieger.
Mary shook her head in amazement. “You’re a one-man brain drain, Jock.” She looked again at Louise, wondering how anyone could be so radiant without makeup. “It’s good to see you, Louise.” And then, the cat in her coming to the fore, “How’s Reuben?”
Reuben Montego was the on-site physician at the Creighton Mine. Louise had had quite a torrid little affair with him while Mary, Ponter, Reuben, and she were all quarantined in Sudbury. Mary had assumed they were simply passing time, so she was surprised by Louise’s response. “He’s fine,” she said. “He helped me move my stuff down here, and I’m going up to see him again next weekend.”
“Ah,” said Mary, realizing she’d been put in her place. “And what’s your job here?”
“Dr. Benoît is heading our Portal Group,” said Krieger.
“That’s right,” said Louise. “We’re trying to work out the technology to open a portal from our side into the other universe.”
Mary nodded. Louise hadn’t spent all her time making love with Reuben; she’d also had many long late-night conversations of her own with Ponter Boddit, and doubtless knew more about the Neanderthal view of physics than anyone else on this version of Earth. Mary was ashamed of herself; Louise had never done anything to her—her only crime was being beautiful. “It’ll be nice to spend some time with you again,” said Mary.
“Say,” said Louise, “I could use a roommate down here. What do you think? We seemed to get along well when we were quarantined at Reuben’s.”
“Umm, no,” said Mary. “No thanks. I, ah, I like my privacy.”
“Well, you’ll have no trouble finding a place here in Rochester,” said Louise.
Krieger nodded. “Both Xerox and Kodak have had a lot of layoffs in the last few years, and they’re the city’s principal employers. You can buy houses for a song, and you’ll have your pick of hundreds of apartments.”
“Good to know,” said Mary.
“Try Bristol Harbour Village,” said Louise. “It’s an hour from here, but it’s right on one of the Finger Lakes. Gorgeous. Lots of deer, and you can see the stars at night.”
“Speaking of night skies,” said Mary, realizing Louise might be the one to ask about this, “on my last night in Sudbury, I saw the aurora borealis go nuts. What would cause that?”
Louise looked at Mary for a few seconds, as if she couldn’t believe the question. “Haven’t you seen the newspapers?”
Mary shook her head. “I’ve been busy getting ready to move here.”
“Earth’s magnetic field is behaving erratically,” said Louise. “Readings from all over the globe confirm that. The geodynamo strength is fluctuating substantially.”
“What could cause that?”
Louise shrugged. “No one knows.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“Probably not.”
“Probably?” said Mary.
“Well,” said Louise, “nothing quite like this has ever been recorded. There are a number of experts who think that Earth’s magnetic field is collapsing, as a prelude to a pole reversal.”
Mary had heard vaguely of these, but she was pleased that Krieger was the one who said, “Which is?”
“Earth’s magnetic field switches polarity from time to time—you know, the north pole becomes the south pole, and vice versa,” said Louise. “It’s happened over three hundred times in the geological record, but never in historical times, so we really don’t know much about the process. But it’s always been assumed that the reversals occur by the field collapsing, then growing back up again.”
“And you say there’s nothing to worry about,” said Krieger. “It’s not associated with mass extinctions, is it?”
Louise shook her head. “No. The field was actually reversed from its present orientation at the time the dinosaurs died out, but it had been in that state for over a million years before the end of the Cretaceous.” She smiled that mega watt smile. “The worst thing we’ll have to do is repaint our compasses.”
“That’s a relief,” said Mary.
Louise nodded. “And even that may not be necessary,” she said. “As far as we can tell, which pole ends up being north and which one ends up being south is determined quantum mechanically, meaning it’s entirely random—and that means there’s only a fifty-fifty chance of the field reemerging with its polarity reversed.”
Krieger raised his eyebrows. “But if that’s true, then if there’d been a magnetic-field collapse when the dinosaurs died out, we wouldn’t know about it if the field had come up with the same polarity it had had before.”
“You’re worrying for nothing, Jock,” said Louise. “The magnetic-field collapses that we do know about aren’t associated with extinctions. So it doesn’t make any sense to assume that the ones that we missed, because the field happened to come up with the same polarity it had before it collapsed, had any biological effects.” She smiled at Krieger, who, Mary noted, still seemed lost in his own thoughts. “Don’t worry,” Louise said, “I’m sure we’ll all come through this one just fine.”
Chapter Nine
“You told me earlier,” said Jurard Selgan, “that your sole interest in seeing the portal reopened was in bringing benefits to the people of our world.”
Ponter nodded curtly. “That’s right.”
> “And since the ability to be in contact with that other world depended on the quantum computer that you had developed with Adikor Huld, naturally you would stay here, on this Earth, helping to oversee the quantum-computing facility.”
“Well…” began Ponter, but then he trailed off.
“You did say you had no personal interest in this issue, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but—”
“But you fought the High Gray Council yet again, didn’t you? You insisted that you personally be allowed to return to the other Earth.”
“It was the only thing that made sense,” said Ponter. “No one else from our world had ever been there. I knew some of the people, and had learned a great deal about their world.”
“And you refused to transfer the Gliksin linguistic database your Companion implant had gathered to anyone else unless you were guaranteed the right to be part of the next group traveling to the other world.”
“It wasn’t like that,” said Ponter. “I merely suggested that my presence would be useful.”
Selgan’s tone was gentle. “You did more than just ‘merely suggest,’” he said. “Like most of the world, I saw much of this on my Voyeur. If your own memory of the events has faded, we can easily access your alibi archives from that day. That’s why my therapy center was built here, close to the Alibi Archive Pavilion. Shall we go over there and—”
“No,” said Ponter. “No, that won’t be necessary.”
“So you did use—is ‘coercion’ too strong a word?—to get yourself back into the other world?”
“I wanted to make the greatest possible contribution I could. The Code of Civilization requires that of each of us.”
“Yes, it does,” agreed Selgan. “And if that contribution—if the greater good—could best be served by committing a crime, well, then…”
“You’re wrong,” said Ponter. “I hadn’t even contemplated my crime yet. My only goal…” He paused, then continued. “My only goals were to help with continued contact, and, yes, to see my friend Mare Vaughan. I never would have gone over there if I’d known what I was going to end up doing…”
“That’s not entirely true, is it?” said Selgan. “You said even if you had the opportunity to relive the moment of your crime, you still would have committed it.”
“Yes, but…”
“But what?”
Ponter sighed. “But nothing.”
The High Gray Council had finally acquiesced to Ponter’s demand that he be allowed to leave the quantum computer in Adikor’s care, so that he could return to the Gliksin world. He’d expected a reluctant agreement—and he was sure that was what it was—but he hadn’t expected to have the title of “Envoy” bestowed upon him
As much as he wanted to return, to see Mare again, he did have mixed feelings. His last visit had been an accident, and he’d been terrified that he would never get home. Although he and Adikor did believe that the portal could be reopened, and kept open indefinitely, no one really knew for sure. Ponter had almost lost Adikor, Jasmel, and Megameg once before; he wasn’t sure he could stand the possibility of losing them again.
But no. He would go. Despite his concerns, Ponter wanted to go. Yes, he was interested in finding out how things would develop with Daklar Bolbay. But it would be most of another month until Two became One again—his next opportunity to see her—and, if all went well, he would be back in this world long before then.
Besides, this time Ponter would not be traveling alone. He’d be accompanied by Tukana Prat, a female of generation 144, ten years his senior.
The first time the portal opened had been an unforeseen event. The second time, it was a desperate rescue attempt. This time it would be a planned, orderly operation.
There was always a chance that things would go wrong; that the portal would open to some other world, or that Ponter had misconstrued the Gliksins, and that they were actually waiting for an opportunity to swarm through from the other side. To that end, Bedros, one of the elder members of the Council, would hold a detonator in his hand. Mining explosives had been placed all around the rooms of the subterranean quantum-computing facility. If things turned bad, Bedros would detonate the explosives, bringing thousands of pertavs of rock collapsing down, filling in the chamber. And although the transmissions from Bedros’s Companion implant couldn’t reach the surface from here, they could reach the explosives; if Bedros should die—if Gliksins or other creatures swarmed through with weapons firing—his Companion would set off the explosives.
Adikor, meanwhile, would hold a less-stringent panic button. If something went wrong, he could shut off all power to the quantum computer, which might sever the link. And if he died, his Companion could do the same thing. Up on the surface, the entrance to the Debral nickel mine had likewise been rigged with explosives, and enforcers stood watch there, ready to act in case of emergency.
Of course, Ponter and Tukana weren’t going to just burst through to the other side. A probe was to be sent through first, with cameras, microphones, devices for sampling air, and more. The probe had been painted bright orange and had a ring of lights encircling it. They wanted there to be no possibility of the Gliksins misconstruing it as a stealthful attempt to eavesdrop—Ponter had explained the strange Gliksin obsession with privacy to the others.
Like the robot that had been sent through before to help rescue Ponter, the probe would feed its data back to this side through fiber-optic cabling. But unlike that hapless robot, it would also be anchored by a strong synthetic-fiber rope.
Although the probe was high-tech, and the Derkers tube that would be used to force the portal to stay open was a reasonably sophisticated piece of mechanical engineering, the actual insertion of the tube was to be a decidedly low-tech operation.
Ponter and Adikor’s quantum computer had been built to factor truly huge numbers. When so doing, it accessed parallel universes in which other versions of itself already existed, and each of those other versions tried a single potential factor. By combining the results from all the universes, millions of potential factors could be checked simultaneously.
But if the number being factored was so gargantuan that it had more candidate factors than there were parallel universes in which this quantum-computing facility already existed, the quantum computer would be forced to try accessing universes in which versions of itself did not exist. But as soon as it did connect with one of those universes, the factoring process would crash, creating the gateway.
The quantum-computing facility had originally consisted of just four rooms: a dry toilet, an eating room, the control room, and the massive computing chamber itself. But three more rooms had just been added: a small infirmary, a sleeping room, and a large decontamination facility. People would have to pass through decontamination going in either direction, to reduce the chance of taking something inimical from here to the other world, and to cleanse them of any pathogens they might have brought back. The Gliksins had limited decontamination technology; either having almost no body hair made it easy for Gliksins to keep clean, or having tiny noses made them blissfully ignorant of their own filthiness. But tuned-laser bodily decontaminators—to which the specific protein structures of human skin, flesh, organs, and hair were transparent, but which vaporized germs and viruses—had long been in use in this world.
There had never been so many people in the quantum-computing facility before. Ponter and Adikor were there. So was Ambassador Prat, and three members of the High Gray Council, including both of the local representatives. Dern, the roboticist, was on hand, too, to operate the probe. And two Exhibitionists were there with recording units, taking pictures they would relay once they got back up to the surface.
And now, it was time.
Adikor stood at his control console on one side of the room, and Ponter stood at his on the other. Dern had a separate console, perched on a tabletop.
“Got everything you need for the trip?” asked Adikor.
Ponter did a final check. Hak, o
f course, was always there—and had been upgraded with a full medical/surgical database, in case anything happened to Ponter or Tukana in the Gliksin world.
A wide leather band covered with pouches encircled Ponter’s waist. He’d already done the inventory: antibiotics, antivirals, immune-system boosters, sterilized bandages, acauterizing laser scalpel, surgical scissors, and a selection of drugs including decongestants, analgesics, and soporifics. Tukana wore a similar belt. They also both had suitcases containing several changes of clothes. “All set,” said Ponter, and “All set,” repeated Tukana.
Adikor looked at Dern. “What about you?”
The fat man nodded. “Ready.”
“Whenever you want to proceed, then,” said Adikor to Ponter.
Ponter gave Adikor a splayed-fingers gesture. “Let’s find our cousins.”
“All right,” said Adikor. “Ten!”
One Exhibitionist was standing next to Adikor; the other, next to Ponter.
“Nine!”
The three members of the High Gray Council looked at each other; more had wanted to attend, but it was decided that three was the maximum that could be risked.
“Eight!”
Dern pulled out some control buds on his console.
“Seven!”
Ponter looked over at Ambassador Prat; if she was the least bit nervous, she was hiding it well.
“Six!”
He then looked over his shoulder at Adikor’s broad back. They had deliberately not said any elaborate goodbyes last night; neither wanted to admit that if something went wrong, there was a chance that Ponter would never come home again.
“Five!”
And it wasn’t just Adikor he stood to lose. The thought of his children ending up with no parents so early in life had been Ponter’s biggest worry about repeating his journey.
“Four!”
A lesser—but still significant—worry was that Ponter would fall ill again in the Gliksin world, although doctors here had boosted his immune system, and Hak had been modified to constantly monitor his blood for foreign bodies.
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