“You guys must be hungry,” Sudden said, pointing at the spread.
“Got some friends coming over,” Clarence said, smiling. “Gonna watch a few games. Help yourself, man. Want some kick-ass Chardonnay?”
He reached into a bucket and pulled out a bottle of J. Lohrs.
“Sure, why not? You play for Georgia?”
“Red shirted. Hurt my knee. On the practice squad. For now.”
Guard?”
“Yeah. Met Noura rehabbing my leg. You a real spook? Good career for someone like me, in case I don’t make the pros?”
“You like to hit people?”
The kid smiled.
“Oh, yeah.”
“You’d fit right in.”
They exchanged high fives, then spent an enjoyable half hour talking college football while Noura flitted about getting things ready for the party. At one point she put out a small plate of wings, complete with sour cream and celery.
“Just to hold you over, Clarence,” she said. She looked at Sudden. “Help yourself. There’s another million in the oven. It don’t pay to be a chicken in Georgia. I’ll see if I can move Sam along.”
“A woman’s minute has some leeway,” the football player said at one point. “Dig in.”
Sudden did. The wings were delicious but their sauce was hot enough to take the chrome off a car bumper, and he said so.
“Man, this isn’t even the good sauce,” Clarence said. “Noura’s savin’ that for the party.”
Some of the other guests arrived. They were an eclectic mix, mostly jocks, of various races and nationalities, all loudly enthusiastic about being young and hip. Sudden had 10 years on most of them but his line of work and the fact that he looked like he could handle himself gained him some credibility. It wasn’t a bad bunch, but he was glad when Samantha finally emerged. Hair down, no glasses, short black cocktail dress and high heels.
“You look terrific,” Sudden said.
“I figured I’d try to look like a Bond girl.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake. Give me a break, will you?”
They said their goodbyes and left. It was a 15-minute drive to the faculty party, which was at the home of an assistant dean.
“They really discourage adjuncts from attending these things?”
“Yes. Nothing is ever said outright. But it’s implied. I think we embarrass the tenured crowd.”
“Why?”
“Because they know they couldn’t get along without us. In fact, I’m quite certain the school could do without them, more than us. Did you know that public colleges and universities educate more than 70 percent of this country’s students? They were hurt by rising costs and cutbacks in state revenues even before the recent recession. They had to raise tuition and slash courses. Believe it or not, some even cut enrollment.”
“And hired more adjuncts.”
“Yes. They replaced full-time professors who retired with part-time instructors like me. No health or pension benefits. Paid $3,000 a course. We’re invisible, not expected to participate in academic life. Most of the adjuncts I know leave campus as soon as their classes are over. I think that something like half of all instructors are now part-timers. It’s a lot worse at community colleges, where they are the vast majority. We’re the farm workers of higher education. I didn’t find out what courses I was teaching until a week before classes started. I share an office with three other adjuncts. In addition to lectures, we’re expected to give a midterm, a final exam and a grade, and that’s it. No real interaction with students.”
“Why do it?”
“Means to an end. I get a tuition break here. I have made some contacts. There is always the chance that I’ll make a splash and be asked to stay on. Maybe I’ll meet a rich, tenured professor and he’ll marry me.”
“Good Lord.”
Samantha laughed.
“I’m busting your balls. I’m not planning to marry anyone.” Then she batted her eyelids. “Unless it’s a dashing spy.”
“I should have saved my ‘good Lord’. Keep talking like that and you’ll see how fast I can dash.”
***
The assistant dean was named Bertram Silverstein and he lived in a modest colonial on the other side of Athens. His wife, whose name Sudden didn’t catch, greeted them at the door holding a toddler who was crying. They could hear thumping and a man’s exasperated voice coming from somewhere up a flight of stairs.
“Bert’s upstairs trying to get the twins in bed. This one is being a nudge.” She gave the squirming kid a peck on his wet cheek. “The party is out back on the terrace, through there.” She pointed toward the back of the house. “Soon as we put the kids down we’ll be out. Save me a vodka.”
With that she headed up the stairs.
“Seem like regular people,” Sudden said.
“Dean Silverstein is one of the nice ones,” Samantha said. “He actually talks to me.”
There were perhaps 20 people out on the terrace, which led down to a large manicured lawn bordered by a picket fence. There were several unoccupied Adirondack chairs spaced close together in the far corner of the yard. Many of the guests on the terrace were alternately working a rectangular aluminum table set up as a bar and a patio table laid out with a variety of finger foods, none of which looked particularly appetizing. The night air was cooler in the dusk, but it was still pleasant. Most of the guests were dressed casually, slacks and shirts for both sexes, with the occasional tweed jacket with leather elbows thrown in for effect. Sudden spotted the two professors he’d chased from Youngblood’s office earlier that afternoon. Angstrom and Blaylock. Leslie and Paul, but he didn’t know which first name went with which person. Leslie, he realized, could go either way. They both stared at him when he came out to the terrace and then put their heads together. They looked as if they were hoping for more fireworks.
A leather-elbowed and turtle-necked Maxwell Youngblood stood off to the side talking with two other people, one of whom was Melissa Krige, the woman he’d shared with Baker. She was wearing a cocktail dress similar to Samantha’s, but in teal blue. Youngblood visibly started when he spotted Sudden, who gave him a wave and a smile.
The bar was self-serve, and that’s where Sudden and Samantha headed. There was a lot of nondescript wine, but he was relieved to see a few liquor bottles.
“What will you have, Sam?”
“Vodka, rocks, twist.”
Sudden fixed two and then they walked toward Youngblood.
“Who’s the guy talking with Youngblood and Krige?”
“Hayden Potterfield. Chair of the Physics Department. He’s a B.F.D.”
“Excuse me.”
“Big Fucking Deal.”
“Max,” Sudden said expansively when he reached the small group, who all held glasses of white wine. “I want to thank you again for inviting me tonight. You remember Samantha Brooke, don’t you? The talented adjunct I told you about. The one you promised to help along the tenure track?”
The look on Youngblood’s face was priceless. Samantha kicked Sudden in the ankle.
“You didn’t tell me about Professor Brooke, Maxwell,” Potterfield said.
“I was going to,” Youngblood said, staring at Sudden. “Waiting for the right moment.”
Sudden stuck out his hand and introduced himself as a Deputy Director of Funding for the Department of Education. That brought expansive smiles and handshakes all around, although Youngblood’s smile was more of a grimace. They made small talk for a few minutes and then Potterfield drifted off. When Samantha and Melissa began to exchange dress compliments, Youngblood leaned into Sudden and hissed, “You have some nerve putting me on the spot about tenure. I don’t even know the young woman.”
“She teaches in your center.”
“There are many adjuncts. They come and go.”
“This one came, and is staying, Max. Pull some strings or quarks, or whatever it is that you eggheads do.”
“This is outrageous.”
“Surely. And
just to let you know, Samantha didn’t put me up to it. I can show you the bruise on my ankle where she just kicked me for opening up my mouth. I winged it on the spur of the moment when I saw you with Pothead, who, I understand, carries some weight in these august parts.”
“It’s Potterfield. That doesn’t mean we can just create a tenured position for her. She doesn’t have much experience. Probably hasn’t been published. It just isn’t done.”
Sudden had steered Youngblood over to the bar. He poured the flustered director another wine and fixed himself another vodka.
“Listen, Max, let’s cut the B.S. I stepped in enough of it at Baker’s farm. I did some research. Your science center is the new pride of the university. It brings in top talent and, more importantly, a lot of money. You may be a world-class pain in the ass, but you are also hot shit among your peers. Between you and Potterwhatever, you can at least get Sam a head start. More classes. Get her involved in campus life. Invite her to all the parties. Mentor. Nurture. I’m not asking you to hand her tenure on a silver platter. But she’s bright. I think she’ll earn it. Especially with you looking out for her.” Sudden clinked glasses with Youngblood. “I’d really appreciate it. By the way, where is your wife? I’d like to say hello.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Youngblood said miserably.
Silverstein and his wife finally made their appearance. Her name turned out to be Beth and Sudden poured them both stiff vodkas.
“God, I need this,” she said.
“It’s not easy,” Sudden said.
“Do you have children, Cole?”
“No. But I know a tough job when I see one.”
Her husband turned to Youngblood.
“Maxwell, you look ill. Stand too close to the linear accelerator?”
Youngblood managed a small smile.
“I haven’t eaten. I think I’ll get something.”
He hurried away.
“Try the crab puffs,” Beth Silverstein said. “They’re from Trader Joe’s. I made the asparagus sandwiches.”
“I’ve heard about the accelerator,” Sudden said, making a mental note to skip the asparagus sandwiches, which he suspected might be contaminated with virus-laced toddler drool. “I didn’t think it was at the science center.”
“It’s not,” Bert Silverstein said as his wife moved away and started socializing. “But we all spend a good deal of time out at the facility.”
“Where is it?”
“About 12 miles west of town.”
“Is that for safety reasons?”
“No, space reasons. The accelerator is almost a kilometer long, although the target end where we smash particles is in a barn-sized building.”
“A kilometer?”
“Yes. It’s a modest machine. Some of the bigger ones have tracks almost four times that length. The longer the tube, the faster particles can be sped up by the relays and magnets.”
“So, it’s different than, say, the Hadron Collider.”
“Oh, yes. Vastly. Hadron uses the same principle. Accelerating matter. But it’s built in a huge circle. Particles can whip round and round until they approach the speed of light. You’d have to build a straight-line tube to the moon to get anywhere near the same effect.”
“Does either type of collider have a military application?”
Silverstein looked confused.
“I thought someone said that you worked for the Department of Education, the funding end, or something.”
“I do. And we have strict guidelines on where our money goes. We can fund research, but if there is a military component requests have to go through the Department of Defense. We don’t want anyone double-dipping at the taxpayer’s expense.”
Sudden surprised himself with how easily he was able to lie about what he was really doing. Silverstein shrugged.
“I see. Well, as far as I know, our accelerator is used strictly for research, which is available to the scientific community and the public at large.”
“So, nothing that would be classified?”
“Hell, no. People always confuse us with that sort of thing because they hear we are splitting atoms, which I guess we do on occasion. But it’s not nuclear fission or anything. Nothing self-sustaining or explosive. We shoot protons and electrons at the nuclei of various elements and study the pieces that are thrown off.”
“Nothing that can be weaponized?”
“I suppose if you stood someone between the beam and the target, it might blow a hole in them. A very small hole. Easier to just shoot them with a revolver. And certain beams might not hurt them at all. In fact, miniature versions of what we have are used in hospitals all the time, to blast tumors.”
“What about the Hadron Collider.”
“Same thing, although I imagine their holes might be bigger, given the energies involved. But why zap people one at a time? You can go in any gun store and buy something that can take out 20 people in the time it takes to rev up a collider.”
“Speaking of holes, what about the concern that Hadron might create a black hole.”
“Which would then suck up the Earth and the solar system?” Silverstein poured himself another drink for the both of them. “A black hole is theoretically possible, I suppose, if you like odds of a trillion to one, about the same as me getting my kids to sleep on time. But most scientists believe that such a phenomena would be the size of a grape seed and disintegrate almost immediately. Again, not much of a weapon. Couldn’t put it in your pocket, or anything. And even if it was bigger, who would screw around with something that, by its nature, would undoubtedly destroy its maker in a nanosecond. Makes no sense.”
Sudden had to agree with the man. But then, what was Roger Baker doing at the University of Georgia’s linear accelerator, and what was his contact doing at the Hadron Collider?
CHAPTER 14 - SANTA KLAUS
Almost 5,000 miles away, Klaus Bokamper was wondering the same thing. He was no closer to figuring out if the Hadron Collider would prove useful to his assignment than he’d been a month earlier, when he’d received the cryptic message and some calculations from Baker at the University of Georgia. Charles — the use of human names was now second nature to them — had wanted to know if there had been any progress and hoped that his latest equations might prove useful. The poor fellow was probably getting nervous. The linear accelerator had provided some basic information in the beginning, but they knew the real answer — if there was one — now lay in the Hadron facility.
Bokamper was getting pretty nervous himself. Baker had disappeared. Other than the recent coded inquiry referring to their personal project, they’d kept in regular touch through the normal channels between the Georgia facility and Hadron. Scientists all over the world were always exchanging information, gossip, even ball scores over the Internet, using company computers that anyone could access. Bokamper and Baker kept tabs on each other through inanities that weren’t even in code. A baseball score in the summer (or football and basketball scores in other seasons) and European soccer scores, traded weekly, were all that were necessary to let each other know that they were all right. Baker, he knew, had become a rabid Atlanta Braves supporter. Bokamper himself now followed soccer; he was an Arsenal fan.
But after Baker missed two weeks, Bokamper made some discreet inquiries, from a hotel in Paris, only to find out that no one knew where Baker was. He reported back, but his commander merely told him to concentrate on his work. Baker wouldn’t be the first of their kind to be lost. The important thing was to find a way to get the hell off this goddamn planet.
“Jesus, Santa, what the hell are you doing here? It’s 2 AM! Don’t you ever sleep?”
Bokamper was startled. He swiveled his seat in the control room of the Hadron Collider complex to face Jules Noiret, one of the facility’s security guards. Everyone, from the guards to the senior staff, liked to call Bokamper “Santa Klaus” because he seemed to remember everyone’s birthday and was always so generous with his gifts on th
ose days and the holidays, particularly Christmas.
“Too much coffee at dinner, Jules,” Klaus said easily. “Besides, I like to be able to run my programs in peace and quiet. This place is a madhouse during working hours.”
That much was true. Late at night, Klaus was able to use the computers in the control room unwatched by prying eyes. Not that any of his colleagues would have understood his equations, but they would surely have been intrigued.
“What are you working on?”
Jules wasn’t a bad guy, but he liked to chat with anyone he could find in the building after hours. Klaus assumed he was bored and lonely. He wasn’t a threat. He didn’t know one equation from another. Bokamper didn’t even bother to clear his computer screen.
“I’m trying to figure out how I can create a time warp to travel between galaxies,” Bokamper said.
“Well, good luck with that,” the guard said, not realizing he’d just been told something very near the truth. “Just don’t create one of those black holes and blow us all up.”
Bokamper smiled. A black hole was just what they needed. He wasn’t worried about blowing anything up. That was a theoretically impossibility. He just needed a doorway.
“Can I bring you something from the canteen, Doctor?”
The underground facility contained a small self-serve break room set up with coffee machines and refrigerators where staff could keep food and snacks. Everyone called it the canteen.
“A coffee would be nice. Decaf. Black.”
“Croissant? Marcel brought some in for everyone this afternoon.”
“Oh, what the hell. Sure.”
The guard left and Bokamper went back to his ruminations. It wasn’t like he would regret all his experiences on Earth. The sex had been a revelation. He blessed the technicians back home who had decided that their latest physical alterations should include working genital organs, especially after earlier fiascoes. And did they ever work! Bokamper came from society where sex, as humans knew it, didn’t exist. He was of the opinion that the “people” on his planet didn’t know what they were missing. He had been “programmed” to like human females, and once he got the hang of the various courtship rituals, had no problem finding willing partners. He apparently was better endowed than most human males, and it didn’t take long for that word to get out among the female population at Hadron. The women scientists, married or single, were among the most lusty. At first he had a problem with the sheer pleasure of orgasm; the technicians had obviously connected all the synapses too perfectly. But as soon as he cured his early tendency to ejaculate prematurely — really mind over matter and his dual brain was capable of incredible feats of control — he concentrated on pleasing his partners, to the point where several actually passed out! Not that they didn’t come back for more. As for his own sexual release, well, delayed it was even more sublime. He wondered if he’d be allowed to keep his new apparatus back home.
TWO SUDDEN!: A Pair of Cole Sudden C.I.A. Thrillers Page 24