Higher Cause

by John Hunt

  “Well it’s not what my stockholders would call a productive time, if that’s what you mean. But it was a lot more fun! I spent the whole day with Otto, but we never talked about the purpose of the visit. During the mandatory exchange of initial pleasantries, I mentioned you and your plan and the conversation never deviated from that theme. He is eager to meet you. I think you will have another financier by tomorrow!”

  Petur was actually beginning to feel confident now. Before these last four days, he had failed to obtain any support other than the money Isaac had provided, but now he seemed to have a deluge of investors.

  “That’s great. I hope you’re right!” exclaimed Petur. “Thanks for giving him the pep talk.”

  Standall chuckled on the other end of the phone. “It was hardly a pep talk. We spent the entire day discussing potential pitfalls, advances, political, cultural, social issues. You name it, we probably talked about it. Couldn’t figure out who was going to clean up the garbage on the island, though. If everyone’s a scientist…”

  “Not everyone will be a scientist. The primary ideal of my planning has been to not plan, but to let the systems evolve freely within a framework that encourages success; but we have to get enough money first to see if it can actually be done. The first agenda item is to get the funding.”

  Standall concurred and the two men decided to meet for breakfast the next morning to discuss tactics to get Otto on board. Standall seemed to be much more than just a financier, Petur thought. He was diving in with both feet, and was acting more like a partner.

  Before hanging up, Standall added one cryptic comment. “Otto is a bit of an imposing figure, Petur.”

  The remainder of the evening Petur spent pursuing his favorite pastime: reading. He read just about anything. Political, medical, legal, scientific, social theory, economics, business and history. One can never know enough history. Written history contained all available knowledge of humanity’s societal being. Ignoring man’s history was as counterproductive as deciding to pay no heed to the lessons one learned in childhood. Recent history confirmed that mankind’s historical lessons needed to be repeated every generation. Petur delved into a treatise on governmental structures.

  The morning arrived with the disruptive bleating of the German telephone’s automated wake-up call. Petur groaned as he lifted the receiver a centimeter above the cradle, then dropped it back in place, silencing the infernal device. He had rarely disembarked from a warm bed without a fight, and today was no exception. As always, he had planned to squeeze a few more minutes of slumber out of the clock, and drifted back to sleep, secure in the knowledge that his watch alarm would announce when the time to arise truly approached.

  In the early morning hours, one can cycle through sleep sequences rapidly. In the ten minutes between the telephone’s attempt and the watch’s success, Petur dreamed that he was climbing down a ladder inside a long shining cylinder. Visible far above was a small circle of light — below was only darkness. He was aware of a fine mist throughout, and the smell of salt. There was no noise but for the clink, clink, clink of his shoes on the metal rungs of the ladder. He continued downward. After a moment, he realized he could no longer hear the sound of his shoes on the rungs. Above him, the light was no longer visible, replaced with a deluge of steaming frothy water dropping toward him. The roar of the water became deafening. There was no way out. Panic overpowered reason and even emotion as the tumultuous flood crashed down upon him, the pressure of the water forcing the air from his lungs. The power was overwhelming, ripping him off the ladder and racing him toward the darkness below.

  The sound of the watch alarm rescued him from his nightmare. He was drenched — not with water but with perspiration. He wiped the sweat off his forehead and realized all was well. Taking three deep breaths, he launched himself off the mattress, staggering toward the shower. He would need to present a very respectable impression to Otto Wagner, not the image that reflected back at him from the mirror. He was terribly disheveled — unshaven, with unruly light brown hair. His eyes were bloodshot. He had not even been drinking. Fortunately, the power of a long warm shower could overcome most adversities, but not the purple bruise that surrounded the gash at the top of his forehead.

  Breakfast with Standall was pleasant but shed no light on his enigmatic description of Wagner the previous evening: “You will see” was all that Standall said about the matter.

  Standall had rented a little Fiat from an economy rental car company, again belying his impressive wealth. The two men climbed into the subcompact. Petur’s tall body fit surprisingly well once the seat was moved all the way back. He peered into the rear seat, pleased that no one else was planning on riding with them. Even Standall’s short female friend wouldn’t have been able to slip her amazing legs into that narrow gap behind Petur’s seat. Petur was about to ask about her, but Standall spoke first and began a dissertation about the history of the city.

  Standall drove the car expertly through the complex highway structure around Mannheim, working his way to the eastern periphery. Evidence gradually revealed that this was indeed an industrial center. Enormous chemical storage tanks began to dot the landscape, connected by sinewy pipelines that wove through buildings, over hills, and under the roadways. They were all kept immaculate, sparkling, and, unlike the grotesque chemical plants of New Jersey, they seemed to fit well in their surroundings — a counterpoint to nature. All seemed appropriate.

  Standall kept talking, and drove past the industrial areas and eastward toward Heidelberg. He pointed to his left. A castle sat prominently on top of a hill several kilometers to the north. Petur could imagine its importance in the Middle Ages, as it looked out over the surrounding lands and guarded the people from barbarian invasions. Standall raised his eyebrows, indicating that the castle was their destination.

  They reached the approach to the castle almost twenty minutes later. The castle jutted out from the hillside high above them, stone and masonry walls obstructing the view of the structures inside. The castle had indeed been a fortress, serving its purpose well through the centuries, and it could still be considered a fortress today. The little car reached the sole entrance, well guarded and heavily gated, and it was greeted by a stern man in a gray uniform. The man recognized Standall. He turned into a small guardhouse from which he called the main residence, received approval, and waved them through.

  The narrow drive up to the main house was frightfully steep, and the inadequate engine of the little car moaned under the strain. To the right, the car was almost grazing the tall outer wall of the fortress. To the left was a sharp drop to a forested area below. As they neared the top of the hill, the view of the valley was suddenly revealed, the early morning sun reflecting off the Rhine and cascading over the surrounding agricultural area. A faint mist lifted lazily off the river and caught the sun’s rays. The expanse of bright green fields was littered with quaint German villages, interspersed throughout the valley. The edge of the chemical-industrial area in eastern Mannheim just could be seen to the west — brilliant flashes of sunlight reflecting off the polished metal sides of the chemical storage tanks.

  Beyond a sharp curve to the right the road suddenly flattened, and the racing engine, less hindered by the force of gravity, propelled the little car urgently forward. Standall backed off the gas, depressed the brake, and deftly steered the car through a narrow ingress in the formidable wall. The road ahead was straight and lined with meticulously pruned and carefully positioned trees, behind which lay three small houses on either side. The trees were set far from the road at first, but were closer set in toward the end, creating the illusion of distance and making the already-grand main house look even larger.

  The landscaping was conscientiously maintained, hedges well trimmed, flowers blooming in a pattern that must have been planned deliberately. Nothing was haphazard here. The only incongruity was the general state of disrepair of the interior beyond the enormous wall. Several piles of rubble lay beneath breac
hes in the top of the edifice. It seemed as though no effort at repair had been made.

  The main house dominated the compound. Clearly medieval, it appeared like the castles one would see in Hollywood tales of knights and conquests, but completely lacked the airy pinnacles and spires familiar to fairy tale enthusiasts. Heavy, strong, and intimidating, was the impression it conveyed. Petur was expecting to see a moat and a wooden drawbridge. But nothing blocked their transit to the house, and Standall stopped the automobile in front of a wide stone stairway that led to the front entrance.

  “So, here we are,” said Standall. “Pretty impressive layout, wouldn’t you say?

  “To say the least,” Petur replied. “Is this corporate or personal?”

  “Both, I think, as most of the corporation is owned by Otto. But this is where he lives, and where he entertains, so I think he calls it his home.”

  The two men were walking up the broad stone stairway to the main entrance. Standall paused before ringing the buzzer on the side of the door and looked at Petur.

  “Otto is a very nice man. But, like his dwelling, he is intimidating in appearance. Don’t let it phase you.”

  Standall pressed the buzzer and within a moment a man who could only be Otto Wagner himself pulled open the heavy iron door.

  Petur, accustomed to being taller than most men, took an uncontrolled step back as he looked upward at the smiling face of the enormous man who stood before him. The man’s head was perhaps the most striking — even horrific — feature. It was the largest head Petur had ever seen. The forehead was bulbous, uneven and prominent, overshadowing the deep-set, dark eyes. The lower portion of the face consisted almost entirely of a grossly disproportionate chin, reminiscent of the jawbones of australopithecines found by anthropologists in Africa. A deep divot, impossible to shave, pitted the protuberant flesh under the lower lip. A broad nose, with cavernous nostrils filled with graying hair, separated the smiling mouth from the twinkling eyes above.

  The man’s body was adequately designed to support the massive head. A neck most akin to a tree trunk was powerfully rooted between two broad and muscular shoulders. Arms and legs were reasonably proportional to the wide, not fat, torso. As Petur reached out to shake the man’s hand, his own hand was consumed in the grasp. The size discrepancy was as if a grown man was shaking hands with a toddler, the large fingers wrapping entirely around Petur’s palm, and overlapping the hammer-like thumb.

  Otto Wagner’s voice was deep and resonant, almost as impressive as his physique. “Welcome, Mr. Bjarnasson. And how are you today, Thomas?”

  Standall nodded to affirm he was well as Petur spoke. “Thank you for meeting with me on such short notice, Mr. Wagner. You have a marvelous and interesting place here. My trip to Germany will have been worth it even if I leave with memories only of your home.”

  “It is my pleasure to meet with you, and if my hopes are confirmed, you may be leaving with more than memories. Thank you for driving all this distance. Please indulge me by accepting a little tour of my humble home. And also call me ‘Otto,’ as my friends all should.”

  The large man was congenial and conveyed a warmth of spirit that was infectious. Petur could see plainly why he was an effective corporate leader and employer.

  The cavernous entrance hall was exactly as one might expect of a medieval castle. There were full suits of armor, holding in gloved hands the requisite panoply of swords, maces, and shields. Tapestries with faded artistry covered each wall, serving to partially dampen the echoes of the men’s footsteps and Otto’s hearty laughter. The floor was cold gray stone.

  “The ceiling is over ten meters high in this room, and completely flat,” said Wagner, his English excellent, but heavily accented. “By all rules of physics, it should collapse upon us. I honestly have no idea how it remains intact. But worry not. The odds of it falling at this moment are low, given that it has been up there, untouched, for over five hundred years. In all that time, my family has never been sued for any emotional injuries from a collapsed roof.” Standall and Wagner laughed, having each experienced the frustration of frivolous lawsuits. Petur joined in, and hoped he never would.

  Wagner pointed to a rather plain looking suit of armor. “That suit allegedly belonged to my twelfth-great grandfather. Note the breastplate.” There was a ragged and rusting hole at the position of the heart. “An English cousin stove him through while jousting during a tournament. Apparently, my twelfth-great grandmother was a desirable woman, and that cousin decided to make her more available by removing the protective muzzle from his lance. The sharp point found its mark. My ancestor was killed instantly.

  “Look at the engraved words under that hole. They translate to ‘victory comes from a strong heart.’ ” He smiled. “I suppose that a corollary in my family’s case would be ‘defeat comes from a hole through your heart.’” His heavy laughter resonated in the great stone room, despite the best efforts of the tapestries to quiet the sound.

  He led the two men onward, up to a suit of chain mail. Thousands of tiny metal rings were forged by hand and painstakingly interconnected to create this protective barrier, designed to prevent sharp objects from reaching the skin. It provided no obstacle to heavy blunt devices such as the mace. This was a suit unlike any Petur had seen in a museum or book. The leggings were forged all the way to the toes, where each individual toe had a tiny chain mail coat. Each finger likewise was separately protected. It seemed entirely nonfunctional, for no one could walk in that apparatus.

  “My ancestors were a humorous lot. This suit was commissioned by my twelfth great-grandmother in the mid-sixteenth century, as a gift for her new husband — that English cousin I mentioned earlier. Our family lore has it that she possessed such love for him that she was unwilling to sacrifice a single part to battle.” He paused. “Note the genital area.”

  Indeed, there hung between the legs a carefully crafted metallic sheath, clearly designed for a man’s privates.

  “If you look closely, you can see that at the base of the sheath is a hinge.” He shifted his gaze to a nearby table on which stood a glass display case. “In there is a note from the wife, written in English, which says, ‘In the heat of battle, think of me warming your bed at home, and let that keep your priorities straight.’ ” Otto laughed, “I surely would not want my priority straight when there are swords flying around.”

  Otto continued the tour of his “house,” as he called it, with a continual recitation of humorous anecdotes, most of them at his own or his family’s expense. They walked through a grand hall, used for formal entertaining for centuries. On the walls hung portraits of generations of Wagners. Next was a small sitting room. Rippled glass within tall windows lined one wall and provided modest lighting for the red velvet couches and chairs scattered amongst several marble sculptures. Prevalent throughout was a musty scent that bespoke the antiquity of the place.

  After strolling through a dark medieval dining room with a long narrow table in the center, they were guided through a swinging doorway into a very modern kitchen facility filled with the most modern appliances. The gray stone castle floor had been replaced with glistening white tile. The room was brightly and diffusely lit by an unidentified light source that served to make the entire ceiling glow, as if the ceiling itself was a giant fluorescent bulb.

  Passing through another set of swinging doors revealed an unequivocally modern living room, brightly lit, without even a suggestion of an antique. An ivory colored leather sofa sat between two tall sinewy brass halogen lamps. Across the room was a wide-screen television. Man-sized stereo speakers stood on either side. Several smaller speakers were scattered in various corners of the room, some hanging from the ceiling. A mirrored armoire, which could only be a bar, sat in the corner. Petur had a sudden longing for a bloody Mary.

  Otto pointed around the room. “This is where I really live. All the other is for heritage and show. I can put on a facade of European regency and respectability with those rooms up front, and
still be able to walk to the bath in the morning without abusing my bare feet on the cold stone. In fact, my bedroom has this marvelous thick pile carpeting … Ah, but you do not want to hear about that. Let us move on.”

  There was a well-equipped exercise room, much of the equipment having been custom made to tolerate Wagner’s bulk. He had an office here also, with nothing particularly grand about it. It led through to one more room.

  This next room looked like the Command Information Center on board a nuclear aircraft carrier. Computer monitors were everywhere, translucent situation boards cut off the room’s corner angles. A large round table surrounded by black leather padded office chairs occupied the center of the room. One entire wall was a rear projection television monitor. The remaining walls were carpeted with sound absorbing black felt.

  “What do you do here? Control a nuclear arsenal?” Petur was astounded at the place.

  “I have a rather large corporation, worldwide. This is where I can keep informed, twenty-four hours a day. Our transactions in Tokyo; our ships’ locations at sea; weather forecasts. This room saves me from having to go to the city every day. I am far too old for that.” Petur thought that he might barely have been fifty.

  “Well, enough showing off. Let’s get down to business. Have you two had breakfast yet? My chef prepares an outstanding omelet — I know, I just had one.”

  Standall took the lead. “We had a nice breakfast at the hotel, thank you.”

  “Good,” said Otto. “Then, Petur, why don’t you start straightaway.” He paused for a moment. “Try to convince me to give you a billion dollars.”

  5. A Possibility of Fusion

  JEFF BADDORI stretched his long arms above his head, pushed himself away from the headboard, and wiggled his toes protruding from beneath the covers at the far end of the bed. Yesterday evening had been wonderful.

  A cool breeze rustled the leaves outside his open window. The air was fresh and crisp, and the sun was bright. Jeff stood up, stretched again, then put on jogging shorts and sneakers and walked down the stairs and outside. He had never much cared for jogging before moving to San Diego — it seemed dull, destined to cause arthritis in your knees. But here it was different.