***֎֎֍֍***
Five days later, Arlan still found himself constantly thinking about Myr Sevii and her strange field. He stopped by Joe’s desk, “Does Ms. Sevii live in Kansas or Missouri?”
Joe gave him an amused look, “Kansas.”
“Find out what books, tuition, room at the dorm and meals at the cafeteria are at KU or Kansas State.”
Joe gave him a puzzled look, but said nothing more than, “Okay.”
Joe sent him a message with a budget and Arlan replied, “Tell Ms. Sevii that I’ll provide a college scholarship of $25,000 a year as long as she maintains at least a B average on a minimum of fifteen credit hours per semester. In return I’ll want her to sign an agreement granting Miller Tech five percent of her income from any inventions related to her static suppression field.”
Prologue 2
Myr settled into a Zen-like feeling. Her feet thumped steadily on the road. Her breath moved in and out. Her mind floated, sometime seeming like it was trailing along a little bit behind and above her body as she sailed along the running path.
She loved the feeling she got when she ran. She experienced a sensation of otherworldliness and on this cool spring morning the mood felt stronger than usual. As if she could go anywhere and do anything.
It felt even better when she was in a race. Not that this was actually a race, she’d just gone out for a run. But then this guy had turned onto the same street. His pace had been slower than hers, but he’d immediately speeded up to stay beside her. Myr wasn’t sure whether he was running beside her because he found her attractive or because he was just too macho to let a girl outrun him.
However, she did wonder whether he’d be able to keep it up. Most guys couldn’t.
It wasn’t long before she could tell even out of the corner of her eyes that he was starting to struggle to keep the pace. Meanwhile, she was still sailing effortlessly along. Curiously, she wondered what he was going to do when exhaustion really started to hurt. She got her answer at the next corner when he suddenly turned right. Since that street didn’t have a good sidewalk for running, she was pretty sure he hadn’t intended to go that way. He was just too embarrassed to let her run him into the ground.
She finished the run with a charge up the stairs to her floor in the dorm.
In the shower, the placid joy she’d felt during her run faded and the problems of her world crashed back in. Though, with sustained and hard-fought effort, she’d managed to maintain her better than B average through seven and a half semesters now, she knew that no one would think of her as an especially stellar student.
Myr didn’t feel stupid. In fact, despite her self-aware concern that she might simply be arrogant, she usually felt smarter than her fellow students. She was certainly better at figuring out how to do things. But her memory… Her damned memory was nothing to write home about. She thought of herself as having a great CPU, but a tiny hard drive. She might be able to figure it out a lot faster than her classmates could the first time, but when the same problem came around again she had to work it out all over again. They just remembered how they’d solved that problem the first time. Her constellation of abilities and lacks translated into great scores on projects but poor scores on tests.
Unfortunately, there were a lot more tests than projects here at KU.
When she’d first gone off to KU, she’d pictured herself spending her spare time researching, understanding, and improving her field for suppressing the electrostatic force. Instead, she’d found herself using almost every free minute to study, just so she could pull down the grades required by her scholarship agreement with Arlan Miller. Now, she wanted to go to graduate school in physics or engineering. She hoped that such training might give her the skills to investigate the phenomenon she’d accidentally discovered in high school.
The agreement she’d signed with Miller didn’t specify whether or not the scholarship would continue if she went to grad school. She’d decided to go ahead and apply to programs with the hope that he’d continue to support her. She couldn’t help but worry about what he thought he was going to get out of the hundred thousand dollar investment he’d already made in her education. Sure, Miller was a big time businessman in the tech industry and a hundred grand might seem like an insignificant drop in the bucket to him. But, she found it hard to believe that a hard-nosed entrepreneur like Miller would invest that kind of money for a five percent return on a high school science project that she still refused to explain to him. He had to be either incredibly benevolent, surprisingly naïve, or have some hidden agenda that Myr just didn’t understand.
Myr still worried about that hidden agenda. When honestly assessing herself, she recognized she was pretty. However, even if she worked hard at it she wasn’t going to be the kind of beauty that men pursued relentlessly. Still, she knew that different people liked different types and felt a deep-seated anxiety that perhaps she just happened to be Arlan Miller’s type.
Myr Sevii was not the kind of woman who would accept a sugar daddy.
Myr snorted. She’d been feeling particularly paranoid today. Sternly, she reminded herself that Arlan Miller had been a perfect gentleman the three times she’d met him. Once at the science fair, once to sign her scholarship contract, and once when he’d been an invited guest lecturer at the University.
She’d gone to his lecture because she’d decided it’d be rude not to attend a talk by the man who was paying for her education. She’d found his talk inspiring. She’d gone up to shake his hand afterward, actually wondering if he’d even recognize her after several years. That hadn’t been a problem. He’d firmly taken her hand for a shake, nodded and said, “Ms. Sevii. I hope you’re enjoying college?”
For a moment, Myr had thought he was trying to remind her of the fact that he was paying for college. In fear that he was about to ask her to go somewhere, she’d said, “It’s a lot more work than I’d expected.” She’d wanted to be able to beg off any invitations.
No invitation had been forthcoming. He’d merely said, “Keep after it then.” Without further ado he’d turned to the next person in the fairly long line of those who’d been waiting to meet him.
Sometimes she thought about how embarrassed she’d have been if he could have read her paranoid thoughts.
Prologue 3
Myr sighed. Her professor was a guru in solar cell technology. He had several plausible hypotheses regarding the doping of photovoltaic membranes. As his grad student, Myr was assigned to fabricate test cells based on those hypotheses and then determine the new cells’ efficiency. This most recent test cell was generating current, but like all the other ones she’d fabricated, it was producing less power than cells that were currently available on the market.
Myr could accept that when research was extending into untrammeled ground, results wouldn’t always be what you’d expected or hoped for. Still, solar cell research wasn’t what she’d hoped to be doing when she’d applied to grad school. Worse, Dr. Krishan, her professor, always acted like any disappointing outcomes of the test runs were due to some kind of failure on Myr’s part rather than an indication of an incomplete or incorrect hypothesis.
As if her thought had brought it on, she heard Krishan’s voice behind her, “Myr, have you got the results of the latest run?”
Myr tried not to frown as she turned. She indicated the display screen, “Yes. Unfortunately, they’re not what we hoped.”
“Oh, come on, Myr!” Krishan said in a disappointed tone. He sat down in a neighboring chair and scooted it over so he could look at the screen with her.
She could understand his disappointment, but, as usual, he started asking aggressive questions about how she’d carried out the fabrication. Not, as she could have accepted, queries about possible errors she might have made due to her inexperience, but instead questions that somehow seemed to express his doubts about her competence and attention to detail.
Finally Myr interrupted, “Dr. Krishan, obviously you have doubts
about whether I’m doing the fabrications correctly. Can I suggest that we build a test cell together from start to finish? That way we could determine whether I am in fact doing any of the steps in a fashion other than exactly the way you would want me to do them?”
Krishan got an irritated look. Very authoritarian, he didn’t like it when Myr questioned him or even implied doubt. “No, no. I just want you to do the experiment right.”
Feeling angry, Myr said, “As far as I know, I am doing it right. I don’t think talking about it over and over again is going to elucidate any errors I might be making. I think we have to actually physically do it together to…”
“No!” Krishan interrupted. “You just need to do it again. And this time get it right.”
Myr blinked at him a couple of times, then said, “I quit.” She picked up her little sound-bar and slid it into her backpack.
“What? No! You can’t quit. You won’t get your degree. You won’t be able to get letters of recommendation…”
“Yeah,” Myr interrupted, feeling some despair over what her cantankerous personality was about to do. “I can quit. This is a free country. And, I’m not going to work for you when you constantly try to blame me for the results that the cells produce. This is science and results sometimes aren’t what we hoped for. That doesn’t necessarily mean the experiment was done incorrectly.” She stood up.
From under lowered brows Krishan threateningly said, “Go and you’ll destroy your career.”
Myr looked him in the eye as she said, “Though I fear you are, it’s my sincere hope you’re not that petty.” She headed for the door.
***֎֎֍֍***
“End connection,” Carol said to her AI to end the phone call. She sighed. Trust Myr to get pissed off at her professor and quit graduate school. When she’d been home last, Myr had endlessly bitched about how Dr. Krishan wouldn’t let her work on her own static suppression research. Krishan only wanted Myr to work on his solar cells and apparently had a tendency to blame Myr for bad results. Of course Carol couldn’t know whether Myr might actually have screwed up the experiments However, because of Myr’s usual attention to detail, Carol suspected that there actually was something wrong with Krishan’s theory.
Nonetheless, Carol suspected that Myr’s touchy attitude probably contributed significantly to their inability to get along.
Besides, Myr’s focus on her static suppression results despite Krishan demanding her full attention to his solar cells probably added to the friction. Nothing Carol had been able to say over the years had been able to convince Myr that the static suppression effect might not be as important as Myr thought it was.
Carol headed up the stairs to see if she needed to clear anything out of Myr’s old room. Myr’d obviously have to stay with them until she found a job of some kind.
***֎֎֍֍***
Joe stopped Arlan on his way to his office. “I got a call from your pet student. She’s quit grad school.”
Arlan paused, “Myr Sevii?”
Joe nodded, “I didn’t know you had any other student charity cases.”
Arlan felt a little irritated by Joe’s snarky tone, but refrained from barking at him. “Did she say what happened?”
Joe shrugged, “Didn’t get along with her professor. Had already learned how to do experiments, and she says that’s the only reason she was there.”
Arlan looked out into the distance for a moment, then said quietly, “Tell her we have a job for her if she wants it.”
***֎֎֍֍***
Aleks walked into Papa Bob’s and found Joe Barker sitting in a back-corner booth. Joe had a barbecue sandwich and had ordered a beer for Aleks, knowing Aleks wouldn’t eat. Aleks checked the occupied booth next to theirs and felt relieved to see that the people in it were a family with noisy kids. He sat down in the back of the booth so that he and Joe were both adjacent to the same corner, “What’s up?”
Barker swallowed and wiped his face with a napkin. Speaking quietly, he said, “He offered a job to that girl who claims to have discovered a new kind of field.”
Irritation welled up, but Aleks didn’t let it show. Barker had told Aleks about this girl years ago when Aleks first recruited him. Aleks picked up his beer, carefully touching only the labels so he wouldn’t leave fingerprints. After taking a sip, he said, “I pay you to tell me about new technology he’s actually developed. Not, pie in the sky imaginary technology he’s hoping he might develop someday.”
Barker leaned back in his seat and, giving Aleks a steady look, took a sip of his own beer. “You also pay me,” he made little air quotes with his fingers, “ ‘to keep you apprised of new areas of research.’ ”
Aleks felt a small stab of fear at the careful quotation, “Have you been keeping records of our conversations?”
“No… But I felt like it was pretty important that I remember exactly what you said you’d pay for. You seemed like the kind of guy who might try to weasel.”
Aleks sighed, “I’ll pay, don’t get excited. I just like real information better than vapor. Speaking of which, have you got any new info on the fuel cell membranes?”
Barker nodded and lifted something out of his lap, holding it out of sight beneath the corner of the table. It’d be a small, opaque, Ziploc baggie that Barker had kept wrapped up in a piece of Clorox wipe. Inside the bag would be a mini USB flash drive that Barker had already wiped with a Clorox wipe to make sure there weren’t any fingerprints or DNA on it.
Sure enough, when Aleks held out his hand, Barker dropped a little baggie into it. Aleks couldn’t blame him for being careful, industrial espionage was a big deal nowadays, especially in view of the increased tension between some of the major industrial countries. It was just that Joe Barker didn’t seem like the kind of guy who’d be cautious.
Feeling, as always, like he was buying a pig in a poke since he had no idea what would be on the drive, Aleks put the baggie in his pocket. Unfortunately, Joe seldom provided any information on how to replicate the technology, only enthusiastic descriptions. The lack of substance was angering Aleks’ boss. Aleks reached into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a cigarette pack and shook ten cigarettes into Joe’s hand. Some deft person somewhere had tapped the tobacco out of the cigarettes, slid a very tight roll of 3 one-hundred dollar bills in where the tobacco had been, then packed tobacco back in on top of the money. Then they’d put the cigarettes back and sealed the pack so it looked like it’d never been disturbed—even to the thin wrapper of plastic and the seal.
Barker took the cigarettes and slipped them into his pocket. He’d finished his barbecue sandwich. Toasting Aleks with his nearly empty beer, Barker got up and walked out.
Aleks sat, finishing his beer and pondering the frightening woman who’d hired him, then told him to move out here to Kansas in the center of the United States. He was watching a couple of other tech startups, but the main reason for being in Bonner Springs on the outskirts of Kansas City was to keep an eye on Arlan Miller. Early in his career, Miller had invented some interesting things himself. However, he’d built most of his powerhouse company on an astonishing talent for identifying unrecognized geniuses who might invent something in the future. Kelley, Aleks’ handler, was convinced that Miller Tech was going to come up with some kind of major invention. Aleks was supposed to recognize it and steal its secrets before Miller got it patented.
Aleks sometimes entertained the idea that Kelley might be a spurned lover of Miller’s, bent on getting revenge by stealing his best ideas and providing them to his competitors.
In any case, so far there hadn’t been any major innovations and Aleks felt like he might be wasting his life waiting for the big strike Kelley was banking on.
He’d tried to quit once. Thinking about that made his shortened left pinky finger twinge. Looking down at it, he thought about how Kelley’d smashed it with a hammer the day she’d explained to him that quitting wasn’t an option.
The doctors had only been able to remove the
crushed part of Aleks’ finger. She might look like a nice person… but she’d proven repeatedly that she could be unspeakably brutal.
When the waitress came by, Aleks paid with cash.
***֎֎֍֍***
Carol felt exhausted. She’d always counted her nursing degree as a blessing. It paid good money, provided health insurance that covered Connor and allowed her to work odd schedules that she could fit around the needs of caring for a disabled son. She typically worked four 10-hour shifts per week with some shifts falling on the weekend. This gave her some weekdays when she could take Connor to the doctor, the brace shop and therapy.
She hated that her schedule also left Connor home alone some days, especially weekends when he didn’t go to school, but he’d learned to adapt. He’d searched online to find kits that Myr had installed to motorize their doors. That way, his AI could open the door and Connor could drive his wheelchair out the door and down the ramp to where the handicapped bus picked him up for school. The same thing worked in reverse when he got home. She left food out where he could get to it and he’d gotten to be pretty self-sufficient.
However, she dreaded the day when the disability from his dystrophy became severe enough that he really needed full-time care. No matter how much she’d prefer to care for Connor herself, she’d have to put him in a facility so she could keep working. She had to work in order to keep him on the insurance that would pay for increasingly expensive care.
Working ten hour shifts left her pretty tired, but since Myr had quit grad school, lost her scholarship from Miller and moved back into Carol’s house Carol had been volunteering for more overtime. Myr’s being at home had increased expenses but also provided someone to stay with Connor. But I’m too damned old to be working a fourteen hour shift like I did today, she thought. She sighed, Forty-five isn’t all that old, why do I feel like I’ve got one foot in the grave?
Discovery: Proton Field #1 Page 2