Flash Point

by Thomas Locke

  She said, “You’ve taken this to a whole new level.”

  “We started small,” Kevin said. “Internet advertisements handled by your favorite techie.”

  “You found Karla,” Reese exclaimed.

  “Actually, it was Vera and her mystery people. They are very good at locating the hidden.”

  Karla Brusius had been a principal ally in Reese’s earlier project. Karla’s presence meant Reese could rely completely on her technician. “This is great news.”

  He smiled and went on, “So the first two presentations we made, we had maybe a dozen people show up.”

  “When was this?”

  “The first was four and a half months ago, the second six weeks later. We were just feeling our way. A little advertising in tech journals and regional university campuses. The people we were targeting, they are the ultimate cynics when it comes to standard PR. Plus we needed to see if the technology you read about in those files actually delivered.”

  “How many people made the cut?”

  “Four the first time, three the second. Then Karla noticed that a couple of our new guys had started their own websites. Chronicling their experiences. They tried to keep it under the radar, you know, techie to techie. Then things online sort of exploded.” He pulled several folded sheets of paper from his pocket. Flattened them on the counter between their meals. “This is from the most heavily trafficked site they put together.”

  The website’s banner headline read “I Hate My Life.” Reese didn’t need to read further but did anyway. The home page accessed half a dozen different chat rooms, all holding to the same theme. Every person who came here had a valid reason to want out.

  Out of their lives. Out of this existence. Out.

  Reese said, “So you’ve identified a valid trend.”

  “I think so. Anyway, for our third session, we had twenty-eight attendees. The fourth, thirty-seven. This is our fifth time at bat.” Kevin glanced behind him. “Karla said it had gone viral.”

  Reese bundled her sandwich wrapper and stuffed it into her empty cup. “So let’s go see what the next level looks like.”

  Their meeting was set to begin at noon. Precisely three minutes before the hour, they entered the motel’s largest conference hall and made their way to the front.

  The windowless room was well lit and the chairs comfortable enough. Kevin and Reese seated themselves at the front of the room. Reese took her time and studied the crowd. They were a motley crew. A considerable amount of piercings, body ink, and striking hair colors. Many in the audience wore T-shirts that read www.Ihatemylife.com.

  “The shirts are a cute touch,” Reese said. “Your idea?”

  “I’ve never seen them before.”

  “Five assemblies. Exponential growth. And now your very own cheering squad.” The crowd filled the room. Some looked like they had been there for hours. Several people in the front row ate impromptu meals. Reese asked the first of two questions she had been avoiding all morning. “How many trial subjects have you lost?”

  “Seven in the first month. One in the second. Since then, none.”

  The trend was as interesting as the number. “How many functioning operatives?”

  “We call them voyagers. Karla came up with the title. There are eighteen remaining.”

  Reese patted the folder’s cover. “So this new technology . . .”

  “It plays a role in keeping our voyagers safe, sure. A big one.”

  “You think there’s something else at work?”

  Kevin hesitated, then said, “Let’s leave that for later.”

  “All right.”

  “The answer is extremely . . .”

  “Complicated.”

  He frowned at her choice of words, but said, “Why don’t we focus on the new prospects.”

  So she asked, “Why the rush to build a larger team?”

  “Vera’s group is pressing hard for results.” Kevin gestured to the podium. “Time to get started.”

  “You want me to handle this?”

  “I prefer to vanish in plain sight. You’ve read the file. Given your past, I’d say you know more than anybody alive. Which is why you’re here and not still rotting in some cell. Think of this as your on-the-job training. Because it’s the last assembly I’ll ever attend.”

  “My name is Reese Clawson. You all know what this is about, otherwise we wouldn’t be here.”

  A massive guy was seated directly in front of her. He topped the scales at well over three hundred pounds. He spread his bulk over two chairs. His voice was as big as the rest of him, overbearing and obnoxious even when saying, “I’ve got some questions here.”

  “You’ve got one,” Reese corrected. “You ask a second question, you’re barred. You can never apply again.” She gave that a beat, her gaze drifting over the crowd, then taking aim at him again. “So. You want to ask your one question now?”

  The guy muttered, “I’ll wait.”

  “One comment or question per participant,” Reese told them. “Who goes first?”

  A voice called, “What’s the pay?”

  “Raise your hand. Okay. What have you heard?”

  “Nothing I can believe.”

  “Tell me anyway.”

  “Two hundred and fifty thou.”

  “Per annum. Everyone receives the same, including me,” Reese confirmed. All this was included in the folder she had left on her chair. She waited through the rustle of comments, then went on, “First, though, you have to pass the tests. Those will take up the rest of today. If you pass, you’re hired.”

  One of the wheelchair-bound women said, “It can’t be that simple.”

  “Nothing about this is simple. But it is straightforward. Next?”

  The big guy’s chairs creaked as he lifted his hand. “What’s the test?”

  “What have you heard?”

  “You pop us out of our bodies.”

  “Correct. We’re dealing with controlled out-of-body experiences. Emphasis on the word controlled. You go where we say, you do what we ask, you come back. That’s what we’ll be testing today. Whether you can get out, and whether you can obey commands while you’re . . .” She searched for the right word.

  The massive guy in the front row finished the thought for her. “Free.”

  She hoped he caught her smile of approval. “Next? You there at the back.”

  “What’s the success rate?”

  “Small. Right at four percent of trial participants. Our preliminary surveys suggest that many people find the experience too close to dying. They want to do it. But they’re afraid. Which is why we are here talking. It’s come to our attention that being dissatisfied with your physical existence actually improves our chances of achieving positive results. We—”

  Reese was suddenly flooded by a realization so intense she stopped in mid-breath. She gave the audience a long, slow look. The guy in the front row was actually not the largest person in the room. The chamber was packed, almost every seat taken, people standing by the side walls, with several wheelchairs along the back. Call it two hundred attendees. A smorgasbord of mismatched shapes and afflictions. But that was not what had halted Reese in mid-thought.

  Not one of them cared how she looked.

  Here before her were the outcasts. The jokes. The ones who’d never had a chance.

  Until now.

  Reese was filled with an empathy so intense her eyes misted.

  Kevin half rose from his chair. “Reese? You okay?”

  “Fine. I’m . . .” She studied the scowling giant seated in front of her. Just another no-hoper. Afraid even this chance would be denied him. Trying not to want it so much. “What’s your name?”

  “Carl.”

  “Don’t worry about the odds, Carl. I’m sure you’re going to do just fine.”

  24

  Brett walked down the Columbia University hallway, knocked on Josephine Banks’s open door, spotted the other woman seated in the professor’s offic
e, and hesitated.

  Josephine waved him in. “You’re right on time. Brett Riffkind, this is Rachael Standish, assistant academic dean. Brett, dump those journals on the table and pull up that other chair.”

  As Brett did so, the dean shifted her chair slightly, placing herself to the left of Josephine’s cluttered desk. The transition said it all, as did her frown. Rachael Standish was angular, not gaunt, but rather big-boned and lean and opinionated and impatient.

  If Josephine Banks was the least bit disturbed by Rachael’s hostility, she did not show it. “Rachael wants to know if you measure up.”

  “Perfectly understandable.” Brett had known dozens of academics like Rachael Standish. Hundreds. Most of them he liked. They lived for their work and their school and their students. They considered all outsiders as potential usurpers. Brett had no problem with needing to prove himself.

  Rachael said, “The university has questions. And doubts.”

  Josephine said easily, “We also have a problem.”

  “One that should have been handled in-house,” Rachael said.

  “Actually, we can’t.” Josephine smiled at Brett. “Nice clothes. Is that part of your current research gig?”

  “In a way.” Brett wore the second of three outfits acquired the previous afternoon. He had purchased three because Agnes Lockwood’s butler had phoned ahead and instructed the men’s store. Brett’s jacket was from Canali, a salt-and-pepper weave of silk and cashmere. Black woven silk Hermès tie. White-on-white shirt. Black gabardine Zegna slacks. Italian shoes he could have rolled up like socks. This one outfit had cost four thousand dollars.

  Rachael Standish clearly was uncertain how to take Brett’s appearance. She had expected to meet an out-of-work former academic who would carry a mantle of quiet desperation. Unemployed academics flooded this very tight market, frantically searching for something, even a temporary posting, that would grant them a hint of legitimacy.

  “As I was saying,” Josephine went on, “Brett was a gifted UCSB assistant professor who gave up a promising role in order to follow a highly controversial research track.”

  Rachael gave him another heel-to-hairline examination. “Controversial in what way?”

  “Risky. Outside the boundaries of current parameters. I was opposed to it. Vehemently.” Josephine smiled. “It appears I was wrong.”

  “And precisely what—” Rachael was halted by another knock on the door.

  Lena Fennan stepped inside. Brett had been expecting her arrival. Even looking forward to it. And yet nothing could have prepared him for the impact.

  The previous evening, Lena had looked shattered. Totally undone. She had stumbled through a fractured explanation with the quiet desperation of the recently bereaved. Brett had drawn her into a relatively quiet alcove and listened carefully to everything she was willing to tell him. About what Lena called events, and this final encounter with her temporal self.

  What he had failed to fully realize was her beauty. Because last night it had been overlaid by a powerful sense of tragedy.

  Not today.

  Lena Fennan was not just lovely. She was fierce. She wore a travel-weary business suit of emerald green that caught golden flecks in her slightly slanted eyes. Beneath the jacket was a blouse of some shimmering material, probably silk. Her clothes were far from new, her shoes and briefcase were scuffed, and her dark hair spilled over her shoulder in careless disarray. But none of this mattered. An intelligent impatience sparked from her, so strong it reached across the office and smacked Brett in the gut. She was, in a word, stunning.

  Brett said, “This is Lena Fennan. I invited her to attend my class.”

  The dean snapped, “It is not your class unless I say so.”

  “Until we say,” Josephine corrected.

  Rachael’s irritation scattered over them all. “Inviting an outsider is out of the question, today of all days.”

  Had the dean not been so insistent, Josephine would probably have agreed. But the department chief’s gaze hardened and her lips compressed, and she pointed out, “I invited you.”

  “That is hardly a point of comparison.”

  Josephine turned to Lena and asked, “What is your interest in Dr. Riffkind’s class?”

  Clearly Lena had not expected this level of hostility. She answered so slowly Brett had the impression she was making it up as she went. “I am thinking of hiring him as a consultant.”

  Brett did his best to hide the fact that he shared the women’s surprise. Rachael demanded, “What exactly is it that you do?”

  Again the slow formation, the building of her answer word by word. “I run an investment portfolio at Baker Meredith.”

  “I’m sorry, what—”

  “We’re a boutique investment group, six hundred million under management. We are examining a substantial investment in a firm tied to Dr. Riffkind’s current work.”

  For the first time since Brett had entered the room, the dean sounded uncertain. “All consulting contracts with academic personnel must be approved by the university.”

  “That’s what we’re trying to determine, isn’t it?” Josephine pointed out. “Whether Dr. Riffkind is to be employed.”

  “Temporarily,” Rachael replied.

  Josephine smiled and rose from her desk. “It’s almost time for class.”

  “My name is Brett Riffkind. I was associate professor at UCSB in neurobiology. Two years and four months ago, I took a sabbatical to research one aspect of today’s class. I don’t know if the university still considers me on sabbatical. All I can say for certain is, I haven’t been officially dismissed. The university thinks my work has potential, but they also see it as high risk. They decided to string me along, especially since I’m not drawing benefits or salary. So I remain caught in a sort of academic limbo.”

  Brett slipped out of his jacket and draped it over the back of a wooden chair beside the scarred podium. He took a good look around. Lena looked with him. The classroom was a wooden arena, rimmed by eleven curved rows that rose steeply from where he stood. The original wooden benches had thankfully been replaced by padded contour chairs. Each position held two plugs, for a computer and something else, probably a phone. A few of the hundred or so students had pens and pads at the ready. The majority were using laptops or tablets. All of them shared an expression of bored hostility.

  “To give me a perspective of this class, how many of you are grad students in biology? Raise your hands, please. Six. Good. How many in psychology? Four. Neuroscience? Two. The rest of you are undergrad seniors, correct? How many are premed? Too many to count. Fine. Thank you.”

  Brett already knew this. Lena had walked to class behind the trio and had heard Josephine give him a swift overview, both of the class and of the issues they faced in the lesson plan. Lena liked how Brett used this opportunity to make the students respond. A small but significant icebreaker.

  “Today’s lesson is intended to introduce how quantum theory is tied to neuroscience. I understand your former professor and her assistant have both told you the whole concept is nonsense. I have a word for such people.” Brett gave that a beat, then finished, “I call them dinosaurs. In ten years they will all be extinct.”

  He rested one arm upon the empty lectern as he turned around. Brett spoke with no notes. He examined the wall of blackboards. They were levered so he could raise or lower them as he pleased. The previous lecturers had failed to completely clear away their work.

  Brett studied the cloudy confusion as he went on, “I understand the professor and her postgrad minion handed you a lot of theory and math to disprove the whole concept. In our first class I won’t use either. I don’t need to. Facts are facts. And that’s all I’m going to discuss with you. Facts.” He turned back to the class. “To begin with—” He was halted by an upraised hand. “Yes?”

  A student asked, “Will we be tested on this?”

  “Fair question. The answer is, today I’m the one being tested. That’s why Dr.
Banks and Dean Standish are seated up there on the top row. So let’s leave that issue for the next class, if there is one. Okay? Good. Now for ground rule one. I am dealing with some very complex issues here. I want you to make note of your questions. Ask anything you want. I welcome them all. But only when I pause and invite your responses.”

  He examined the class for a long moment, then repeated the word, “Facts. The first fact is, the relationship between quantum mechanics and biology is no longer theory. It has been proven. Six times, to be precise. By carefully structured experiments that leave no room for doubt. Six experiments that have been noted by the world’s most prestigious scientific journals. Facts, ladies and gentlemen. Today we begin dealing with the new reality.”

  Lena sat by herself so she could carefully examine both the man and this situation. She wanted to peel back the surface and determine why she was here. Or try to. So far all she could say for certain was Brett Riffkind belonged in front of a classroom. He dominated the lectern like a star. He managed to bend the room’s high fluorescent lighting so that it aimed tightly and tracked his every movement.

  “We are entering into a new and very strange world that is in the process of redefining our entire field,” he said. “And it is not just biologists like your professor who feel threatened by this. Until about five years ago, quantum physics remained isolated in the lab. This was where physicists felt safe. They could control everything. They defined the box, the scientific parameters governing every experiment. But progress these days is all about tying quantum physics to the real world. The previous generation of quantum scientists is very uncomfortable with this step. Terrified, in fact. They dislike the uncontrolled messiness of the real world. Life, in effect, scares them.”

  Brett gave the class a long look. “And it should. Because for many of them, these new developments signal the end of their careers.”