by David Weber
"Less often, but more often than we'd like, the result is a child who's actually below the median line for our alpha lines. Many of them would be quite suitable for a gamma line, or for that matter for the general Mesan population, but they're not remotely of the caliber were looking for."
"And finally," her expression had turned somber, "we get a relatively small number of results where all early testing suggests the trait we're trying to bring out is present. It's in there, waiting. But there's an instability factor, as well."
"Instability?" It had been Herlander's turn to ask the question when Fabre paused this time, and the geneticist had nodded heavily.
"We lose them," she'd said simply. The Simões must have looked perplexed, because she'd grimaced again . . . less happily than before.
"They do fine for the first three or four T-years," she'd said. "But then, somewhere in the fifth year, we start to lose them to something like an extreme version of the condition which used to be called autism."
This time it had been obvious neither of the younger people sitting on the other side of her desk had a clue what she was talking about, because she'd smiled with a certain bitterness.
"I'm not surprised you didn't recognize the term, since it's been a while since we've had to worry about it, but autism was a condition which affected the ability to interact socially. It was eliminated from the Beowulf population long before we left for Mesa, and we really don't have a great deal in even the professional literature about it, anymore, far less in our more general information bases. For that matter, we're not at all sure what we're looking at here is what would have been defined as autism back in the dark ages. For one thing, according to the literature we do have—which is extremely limited, since most of it's over eight hundred years old—autism usually began to manifest by the time a child was three, and this is occurring substantially later. Onset also seems to be much more sudden and abrupt than anything we've been able to find in the literature. But autism was marked by impaired social interaction and communication and by restricted and repetitive behavior, and that's definitely what we're seeing here.
"In this case, however, we think there are some significant differences, as well—that we're not talking about the same condition, but rather one which has certain gross parallels. It seems from the literature that, like many conditions, autism manifested in several different ways and in different degrees of severity. By comparison with what our reasearch has turned up about autism, what we're observing in these children would appear to fall at the extremely severe end of the spectrum. One point of similarity with extreme autism is that, unlike its milder form and other learning disorders, new communication skills don't simply stop developing; they're lost. These children regress. They lose communication skills they already had, they lose the ability to focus on their environment or interact with it, and they retreat into a sort of shutdown condition. In the more extreme cases, they become almost totally uncommunicative and nonresponsive within a couple of T-years."
She'd paused again, then shrugged.
"We think we're making progress, but to be honest, there's an element on the Board which thinks we should simply go ahead and abandon the project completely. Those of us who disagree with that position have been looking for a potential means of breaking the existing paradigm. We've come to the conclusion—or, at least, some of us have—that what's really needed here is a two-pronged approach. We've very carefully analyzed the genetic structure of all of the children in the entire line and, as I say, we think we've made substantial progress in correcting the genes themselves, the blueprint for the hardware, if you will. But we're also of the opinion that we're probably dealing with environmental elements that affect the operating software, as well. Which is what brings you to my office today.
"All our evaluations confirm that the two of you are a well-adjusted, balanced couple. Your basic personalities complement one another well, and you're clearly well-suited to one another and to creating a stable home environment. Both of you also have the sort of affinity for mathematics we're trying to produce in this line, if not on the level we're looking for. Both of you have very successfully applied that ability in your daily work, and both of you have demonstrated high levels of empathy. What we'd like to do—what we intend to do—is to place one of our clones with you to be raised by you. Our hope is that by placing this child with someone who has the same abilities, who can provide the guidance—and the understanding—someone intended to be a prodigy requires, we'll be able to . . . ease it through whatever critical process is going off the rails when we lose them. As I say, we've made significant improvements at the genetic level; now we need to provide the most beneficial, supportive, and nurturing environment we can, as well."
* * *
And that was how Francesca had entered the Simões' life. She didn't look a thing like either of her parents, although that was scarcely unheard of on Mesa. Herlander had sandy hair, hazel eyes, and what he thought of as reasonably attractive features, but he wasn't especially handsome, by any means. One thing the Mesan Alignment had very carefully eschewed was the sort of "cookie cutter" physical similarity which was so much a part of the Scrags descended from the genetic "super soldiers" of Old Earth's Final War. Physical attractiveness was part of almost any alpha or beta line, but physical diversity was also emphasized as part of a very conscious effort to avoid producing a readily identifiable appearance, and Harriet had black hair and sapphire blue eyes. She was also (in Herlander's obviously unbiased opinion) a lot more attractive than he was.
They were very much of a height, right at one hundred and eighty centimeters, despite the dissimilarity in their coloring, but it was obvious Francesca would always be small and petite. Herlander doubted that she was ever going to be much over a hundred and fifty-five centimeters, and she had brown hair, brown eyes, and an olive complexion quite different from either of her parents.
All of which only made her an even more fascinating creature, as far as Simões was concerned. He understood that fathers were genetically hardwired to dote on girl children, of course. That was the way the species was designed, and the LRPB hadn't seen any reason to change that particular trait. Despite that, however, he was firmly convinced that any unbiased observer would have been forced to admit that his daughter was the smartest, most charming, and most beautiful little girl who had ever existed. It was self-evident. And, as he'd pointed out to Harriet on more than one occasion, the fact that they'd made no direct genetic contribution to her existence obviously meant he was a disinterested and unbiased observer.
Somehow, Harriet had not been impressed by his logic.
He knew both of them had approached the prospect of parenthood, especially under the circumstances, with more than a little trepidation. He'd expected it to be hard to risk letting himself care for the girl, knowing as much as they'd been told about the problems the Board had encountered with this particular genome. He'd discovered, however, that he'd failed to reckon with the sheer beauty of a child—his child, however she'd become that—and the complete and total trust she'd extended to her parents. The first time she'd had one of the childhood fevers not even a Mesan star line was totally immune to, and she'd stopped her fretful crying and melted absolutely limply in his arms when he'd piecked her up, nestled down against him, and dropped into sleep at last, he'd become her slave, and he knew it.
They'd both been aware of the fact that they were supposed to be providing the love and nurture to help ease Francesca through the development process, as Fabre had put it. They'd been prepared to do just that; what they hadn't been prepared for was how inevitable Francesca herself had made it all. Her fourth and fifth years had been particularly tense and trying for them as she entered what Fabre had warned them was the greatest danger period, based on previous experience. But Francesca had breezed past the critical threshold, and they'd felt themselves relaxing steadily for the last couple of years.
And yet . . . and yet as Herlander Simões sat in his k
itchen, wondering where his wife and daughter were, he discovered that he hadn't relaxed completely, after all.
He was just reaching for his com when it sounded with Harriet's attention signal. He flicked his finger to accept the call, and Harriet's voice sounded in his ear.
"Herlander?"
There was something about her tone, he thought. Something . . . strained.
"Yes. I just got home a few minutes ago. Where are you guys?"
"We're at the clinic, dear," Harriet said.
"The clinic?" Simões repeated quickly. "Why? What's wrong?"
"I'm not sure anything is wrong," she replied, but multiple mental alarms were going off in his brain now. She sounded like someone who was afraid that if she admitted some dire possibility it would come to pass.
"Then why are you at the clinic?" he asked quietly.
"They screened me just after I picked her up at school and asked me to bring her down. Apparently . . . apparently they picked up a couple of small anomalies in her last evaluation."
Simões' heart seemed to stop beating.
"What sort of anomalies?" he demanded.
"Nothing enormously off profile. Dr. Fabre's looked at the results herself, and she assures me that so far, at least, we're still within parameters. We're just . . . drifting a little bit to one side. So they wanted me to bring her in for a more complete battery of evaluations. I didn't expect you to be home this early, and I didn't want to worry you at work, but when I realized we were going to be late, I decided to screen you. I didn't realize you were already at home until you answered."
"I won't be for long," he told her. "If you're going to be there for a while, the least I can do is hop in the car and come join you. And Frankie."
"I'd like that," she told him softly.
"Well, I'll be there in a few minutes," he said, equally softly. "Bye, honey."
Chapter Seven
"I don't mean to sound skeptical," said Jeremy X, sounding skeptical. "But are you sure you're not all just suffering from a case of EIS?" He pronounced the acronym phonetically.
Princess Ruth looked puzzled. "What's 'Ice'?"
"EIS. Stands for Excessive Intelligence Syndrome," said Anton Zilwicki. "Also known in the Office of Naval Intelligence as Hall of Mirrors Fever."
"In State Sec, we called it Spyrot," said Victor Cachat. "The term's carried over into the FIS, too."
Ruth shifted the puzzled look to Jeremy. "And what is that supposed to mean?"
"It's a reasonable question, Princess," said Anton. "I've spent quite a few hours pondering the possibility myself."
"So have I," said Cachat. "In fact, it's the first thing I thought of, when I started re-examining what I knew—or thought I knew—about Manpower. It wouldn't be the first time that spies outsmarted themselves by seeing more than was actually there." He glanced at Zilwicki. " 'Hall of Mirrors Fever,' eh? I hadn't heard that before, but it's certainly an apt way of putting it."
"In our line of work, Ruth," said Anton, "we usually can't see things directly. What we're really doing is looking for reflections. Have you ever been in a hall of mirrors at an amusement park?"
Ruth nodded.
"Then you'll know what I mean when I say it's easy to get snared in a cascade of images that are really just reflections of themselves. Once a single false conclusion or assumption gets itself planted in a logic train, it goes right on generating more and more false images."
"Fine, but . . ." Ruth shook head. The gesture expressed more in the way of confusion than disagreement. "I don't see that as any kind of significant factor in this case. I mean, we're dealing with internal correspondence between people within Mesa Pharmaceuticals itself. That seems pretty straightforward to me." A bit plaintively: "Not a mirror in sight."
"No?" said Cachat, smiling thinly. "How do we know the person on the other end of this correspondence, back on Mesa"—he glanced down at the reader in his hand, then did a quick scan back through the report—"Dana Wedermeyer, her name was—"
"Could be a 'he,' actually," interrupted Anton. "Dana's one of those unisex names that ought to be banned on pain of death, seeing as how they create nothing but grief for hardworking spies."
Cachat and kept going. "How do we know that she or he was working for Mesa Pharmaceuticals?"
"Oh, come on, Victor," protested Ruth. "I can assure you that I double-checked and cross-checked all of that. There's no question at all that the correspondence we dug out of the files came from Pharmaceuticals' headquarters on Mesa."
"I don't doubt it," said Victor. "But you're misunderstand my point. How do we know that the person sending these from Pharmaceuticals' headquarters was actually working for Pharmaceuticals?"
Ruth looked cross-eyed. A bit cross, too. "Who the hell else would be sitting there but a Pharmaceuticals employee? Or high-level manager, rather, since there's no way a low-level flunky was sending back instructions like those."
Anton sighed. "You're still missing his point, Ruth—which is one I should have thought of myself, right away."
He looked around for someplace to sit. They'd been having this discussion in Jeremy's office in the government complex, which was quite possibly the smallest office used by a planetary-level "Minister of War" anywhere in the inhabited galaxy. There were only two chairs in the office, placed right in front of Jeremy's desk. Ruth was in one, Victor in the other. Jeremy himself was perched on a corner of his desk.
The desk, at least, was big. It seemed to fill half the room. Jeremy leaned over and cleared away the small mound of papers covering another corner of his desk with a quick and agile motion. Barely more than a flick of the wrist. "Here, Anton," he said, smiling. "Have a seat."
"Thanks." Zilwicki perched himself on the desk corner, with one foot still on the floor, half-supporting his weight. "What he's getting at, Ruth, is that while it's certainly true that this Dana Wedermeyer person was employed by Mesa Pharmaceuticals, how do we know who he was really working for? It's possible that he—or she, damn these stupid names and what's wrong with proper names like Ruth and Cathy and Anton and Victor?—had been suborned and was really working for Manpower ."
He pointed to the electronic memo pad in the princess's hand. "That would explain everything in that correspondence."
Ruth looked down at the pad. Frowning, as if she was seeing it for the first time and wasn't entirely sure what it was. "That seems a lot more unlikely to me than any other explanation. I mean, presumably Pharmaceuticals maintains some sort of supervision over its employees, even at management levels."
Victor Cachat sat a bit straighter in his chair, using a hand on one of the armchairs to prop himself up enough to look over at the display of Ruth's pad. "Oh, I don't think it's all that likely myself, Your Highness."
She turned her head to glare at him. "What? Are you going to start on me now, too, with the fancy titles?"
Anton had to suppress a smile. Just a few months ago, Ruth's attitude toward Victor Cachat had been one of hostility, kept in check by the needs of the moment but still sharp and—he was sure the princess would have insisted at the time—quite unforgiving. Now . . .
Once in a while, she'd remember that Cachat was not only a Havenite enemy in the abstract but was specifically the enemy agent who'd stood aside—no, worse, manipulated the situation—when her entire security contingent had been gunned down by Masadan fanatics. At such times, she'd become cold and uncommunicative toward him for two or three days at a time.
But, most of the time, the "needs of the moment" had undergone the proverbial sea change. Cachat had been present on Torch almost without interruption since the planet had been taken from Manpower, Inc. And, willy-nilly, since she was the assistant director of intelligence for the new star nation—Anton himself was the temporary director, until a permanent replacement could be found—she'd been working very closely with the Havenite ever since. Of course, Victor never divulged anything that might in any way compromise the Republic of Haven. But, that aside, he'd been extr
emely helpful to the young woman. In his own way—quite different way—he'd probably been as much of a tutor for her as Anton himself.
Well . . . not exactly. The problem was that Cachat's areas of expertise were things that Ruth could grasp intellectually but probably couldn't carry out herself, in the field. Not well, certainly.
Unlike Ruth and Anton, Cachat was not a tech weenie. He was adept enough with computers, but he had none of Zilwicki or the Manticoran princess's wizardry with them. And while he was an excellent analyst, he was no better than Anton himself. Probably not as good, actually, push came to shove—although they were both operating on a rarified height that precious few other spies in the galaxy could reach to begin with.
Victor's greater age and much greater experience meant that he was still a better intelligence analyst than Ruth, but Anton didn't think that superiority would last more than a few years. The princess really did have a knack for the often peculiar and sometimes downright bizarre world of the aptly-named Hall of Mirrors.
But Cachat's real forte was field work. There, Anton thought he was in a league of his own. There might be a handful of secret agents in the galaxy as good as Victor was in that area, but that would be it—a literal handful. And none of them would be any better.
Anton Zilwicki himself was not one of that theoretical handful, and he knew it. To be sure, he was very good. In terms of fieldcraft, as most people understood the term, he was probably even as good as Victor. Very close, at least.
But he simply didn't have Cachat's mindset. The Havenite agent was a man so certain in his convictions and loyalties, and so certain of himself, that he could behave in a crisis like no one Anton had ever encountered. He would react faster than anyone and be more ruthless than anyone, if he thought ruthlessness was what was needed. Most of all, he had an uncanny ability to jury-rig his plans as he went along, seeing opportunity unfold whenever those plans went awry where most spies would see nothing but unfolding disaster.