Forrest felt silly.

His eyes were brown rather than their natural blue, and his hair dyed black. He wore a fake beard. Linwolse had applied make-up to his face to change his skin tone. As they drove to the industrial complex to the south of the city, he would occasionally glance at himself in the rear view mirror of the all-terrain vehicle. He could not recognize himself. The Enonians were masters of disguise; they had to be.

Forrest was driving, and Linwolse sat to his right. She was now a ravishing blonde with sparkling blue eyes, lavender lips, and white complexion. They both wore black jumpsuits and equally dark boots. He felt like they should rob a bank while they were out. He laughed.

"What?" Linwolse asked.

"Nothing," he said.

Forrest turned the vehicle into the narrow road that led to the Worldly Machines main gate. Up ahead they could see the guardhouse and bright lights.

"Here we go," he said.

Linwolse made no comment.

The vehicle pulled along side the guardhouse and a guard stepped out to meet them. Forrest rolled down his window.

"Do you people know it's three o'clock in the morning? No one is here." The guard was loudly chewing a wad of gum. Forrest recognized him as Buck Williams.

"We are supposed to meet with Jerry Henderson," Forrest said, trying to disguise his voice.

"I'm afraid Mr. Henderson is not here. You must be mistaken."

"No, I'm quite certain. He said to meet him here at three. Perhaps he is late."

The guard regarded Forrest suspiciously. He bent down and looked at Linwolse.

"Howdy, miss," he said.

"Hello, sir," she said with a slight come hither voice. "I know it seems unusual to have a meeting this time of night. We are from the World Government Commission on Advanced Technology, and we unfortunately have a very tight schedule. We are just passing through on our way to D.C., and Mr. Henderson really wanted to meet with us. This is the only time we could arrange."

"I see," the man responded. He smiled at her, showing crooked teeth. He turned and shouted at the other guard. "Hey, Blake, check Mr. Henderson's schedule, would ya? See if he's got an appointment."

At these words, Linwolse focused on the guard inside the building. She intercepted the neural transmissions in his brain and replaced them with her own thoughts.

"Yeah, the computer says he's got a three o'clock appointment. Funny I didn't notice that before," the inside guard said.

"Well, then, bring these people their name tags." He turned back to Forrest and Linwolse. "I'll need to see some identification."

Forrest handed the guard two blank, plastic cards. The man studied the cards. In his mind he saw the World Government logo, their pictures, names and other vita. These, of course, were the images projected into his mind by Forrest. He gave the cards back to Forrest.

"Looks okay to me," the man said. He pulled a remote control unit from his uniform and entered the code that would open the gate. Electric motors whined and the heavy steel gate slowly slid to one side.

The other guard approached the vehicle and handed his partner two nothings. These were in turn given to Forrest. Forrest gave one of the nothings to Linwolse, and they went through the motions of attaching the nonexistent name tags to their jumpsuits.

The first guard pointed a finger beyond the gate.

"Take the second right you come to. That'll lead you to the main entrance. I'll call ahead to let the security officer know you're coming."

"No, you will not," Forrest said.

"Excuse me?"

Forrest eyed the two men while Linwolse focused.

"Once we are through the gate, neither of you will remember that we were here. And you will not notice that the gate is open. When we return, you will not see us pass. Do you understand?"

The first guard frowned and the second looked dazed.

"You will not remember. We were never here. The gate is not open. You will not see us again. Do you understand?"

"Yes," both men said.

Forrest started the vehicle and pulled through the gate. The two guards stood side by side and wondered why they had come out of the guardhouse.

"Weaklings," Linwolse said. "That was so easy."

He killed the vehicle lights and drove in the dim illumination offered by the overhead lamps. He parked the car to one end of the building, and they walked the distance to the main entrance. Seeing the lobby through the large plate glass windows stirred confused emotions in Forrest. He thought of the thousands of times he had passed through it on the way to his lab. They could see the lone guard sitting at the security console. He recognized the man as William Delisa, a security specialist he had himself recommended for the job several months ago.

"This one will not be so easy," he said.

"I will handle him," Linwolse said. "You stay here until I motion for you."

"Okay."

He stood in the darkness as she entered the building and boldly walked up to the security station. When the man noticed her, he pulled the gun from his holster and held it on her, arms length. Forrest felt a moment of panic. Linwolse smiled and spoke, but Forrest could not hear her. The man seemed to relax a bit. They talked for a few minutes and then Linwolse unzipped the top of her jumpsuit and exposed her breasts. Forrest felt a rush of jealousy, but this was quickly replaced with dismay. Her breasts were not Enonian green, but instead had the same false color as her face. He realized that she had applied make-up to her body in the expectation that she might have to use it as a distraction. This bothered Forrest, but he tried to not think about it.

Linwolse moved behind the console and placed her hands on the man's shoulders while cradling his head between her breasts. The man smiled at her touch, and then slumped down in his chair, a silly grin on his face. Linwolse stepped back, zipped her jumpsuit, and nodded at Forrest.

He entered the building and approached her, almost running.

"What did you do to him?"

"Right now he thinks he is having sex with me."

"Did you have to do it that way?"

She stared at him. "We have a job to do, Forrest," she said tonelessly. "This one is strong, as you said, but there is no man that can resist the sexuality of an Enonian woman. I do what is required."

Forrest did not respond. He picked up the gun the man had left on the console and placed it back into his holster and snapped the flap closed. Nothing must be out of place when the man awoke.

He went to the security console and carefully entered the codes that would disable the security system. The codes he entered required a precisely timed sequence. If only one keystroke was out of place, a silent, external alarm would be triggered, and government agents would swarm the building within minutes. He hoped the codes had not been changed.

The message "Security System Off-Line" appeared on the console holodisplay, and Forrest realized that he had not been breathing. He took a breath and looked at Linwolse.

"It worked. Let's go."

He led her to the nearest elevator and slid his pass card through the reader. The device beeped twice.

"What does that mean?" Linwolse asked.

"It rejected my card. They've started the code updates. But they can't have completed the update, not this soon."

"The guard's card?"

"He won't have one, Lin. What he doesn't have can't be stolen." He spoke a little too curtly and knew he was feeling angry with her for exposing herself.

"The bypass procedure?" she asked, ignoring his tone.

"That's next."

Forrest snapped the cover off the reader, exposing a keypad. He punched in the first of two emergency bypass codes. The reader beeped acknowledgment of the first, and he entered the second code. The elevator doors opened. He felt an unreasonable sense of relief--unreasonable because he could only guess at which codes had been changed and which had not. And there might be something new he did not know about. Even though the primary security system was off-line, secondary systems were still active and could not be disabled without killing power. And that would trigger an alarm.

They stepped into the waiting elevator, and he jabbed the fourth floor button. The doors shut and the elevator rose.

"I appreciate your concern for me," Linwolse said.

"What concern?"

"It bothers you the way I subdued the security guard."

"Forget it."

"No, I will not forget it. It hurt you that I exposed myself to another man. That lets me know you care about me."

"You should already know that."

"And I do. But it is nice to be reminded." She smiled.

Forrest did not respond, but only looked straight ahead with a cold expression.

She continued with a less friendly tone. "Forrest, you are not being fair. Despite the alien appearance effected upon me by the keepers, you view me as a twenty-five-year old woman. But you know I am very much older than that. I have been on this planet over a hundred-thousand years, and I was born several thousand years before that. And during my time on Earth, I have had to defend myself against humans and my own kind. One learns to use whatever tools are available in that defense, and moralities and belief systems that have no basis in reality cannot be allowed to interfere. I have had to use my body many times to throw my enemy off. If I had not, I would not be alive today."

Forrest looked at her. "I'm trying to understand."

She nodded her understanding.

The doors opened and they moved into the hallway. The entrance to Forrest's lab was at the far end, and they walked in silence. He did not try his pass card, but entered the bypass codes directly. The door slid open.

The lab was well lit, and the sound of machinery could be heard. Forrest headed for his office. Linwolse did not follow. Forrest stopped and turned to her.

"What is it?" he asked.

"There is someone here." She indicated the mechanism that was working to one side of the lab.

"That's just an android."

The android turned and studied them briefly, its eyes lit with self-illuminance. It then turned its metal head back to its task and continued working.

"Disgusting creature!" Linwolse said.

"It's only a machine."

"It saw us. It knows we are here."

"It's programmed to observe its environment. But it will pay us no mind. It's not conscious."

"I do not like it!" she said, too loudly.

"Lin, what is wrong with you? It's only a worker, an appliance. Disliking it makes as much sense as disliking a refrigerator."

"Do not let it come near me!"

Forrest shook his head in bewilderment. "It's not going anywhere. Forget it."

He continued to his office and she followed close behind. The door to his office was not locked and he entered. The room was in disarray. Memory cubes, holodisks, and printouts were scattered about, as if someone had been looking for something. This disturbed Forrest. Fred Norman, who was probably his replacement, would not create a mess like this. Not unless he was in a frantic hurry, and he had no reason to be in such a hurry. The launch window for the Forever was not due for two years, and there was only about a year's worth of work to be done. This had to be the work of government agents. His disappearance was causing problems for Worldly Machines; WG agents would be hovering over the facility like vultures, waiting for anyone to do anything the slightest bit suspicious.

Forrest activated the computer console and entered his access code. The code was accepted and it awaited further instructions. He went to a nearby cabinet and removed a carrier containing six memory cubes. He placed five of the cubes in receptacles, discarding the sixth. The five cubes would be enough to hold more data than they would likely need, but he decided the quickest why to download the data was to do a standard backup of the required files. He started the backup program. The process would take about fifteen minutes.

Linwolse stayed by the door as a lookout, but she seemed more concerned about the android than anything else.

Forrest went to the wall space between two cabinets on the far side of the room. Here he removed a ventilation cover and climbed part way into the narrow opening.

"What are you doing?" Linwolse asked.

"I've got a hidden memory cube in here. I sometimes work on private projects that Worldly Machines does not know about. I want to keep the code for myself."

Linwolse seemed to think nothing of this, and she continued to watch the android.

The cube was plugged into the holocorder that Forrest had wired into the small space months ago. He wondered why the WG agents had not thought to check the ventilation shaft. He retrieved the cube and eased his way out of the opening. The cube had a light blue translucent color rather than the usual white, indicating it had an extra high-density storage capacity. It contained the essence of Serp. Serp was, of course, dormant, awaiting a computer core large enough to allow him to regain consciousness. He placed the memory cube into the carrier sitting on the console.

He sat in the console chair and watched as the display reported the progress of the backup.

"How long?" Linwolse asked.

"About ten more minutes. Then we're out of here."

"Good."

Five minutes passed, and Forrest fidgeted. He had gotten what he really came for, and all he wanted to do was get away from Worldly Machines. But he had to wait for the download to complete. The files were his justification to the others for being here.

"We have been discovered!" Linwolse suddenly said. She came to his side.

"What? How do you know?" Forrest asked, alarmed.

"I can feel them. Many are approaching."

It occurred to Forrest that his office was rigged. They expected him, or someone, to come here. And a silent alarm had been set off. He could not be sure if the files being downloaded were valid. He aborted the backup program and yanked the memory cubes out of their receptacles. He placed them into the carrier and snapped the cover shut. He then placed it into the large inner pocket of his jumpsuit and zipped it closed.

"Let's go."

When they left the office, they found the android standing in their path holding a wide beam blaster on them. Its rigid, mouthless face could not possibly form an expression, but it seemed to Forrest that it was laughing.

"You are not to move," it said with its electronic voice.

"Your refrigerator is holding a gun on us," Linwolse said, sarcastically.

"You must put down the blaster and return to your work station," Forrest commanded.

The android did not move.

"Mind control does not work on a machine," Linwolse said.

"Its asimovic circuits have been disabled. It will kill us if we try to run. We've been set up."

Suddenly the android exploded in a blinding flash and Forrest covered his eyes. He felt hot metal and plastic impinge against his jumpsuit. He quickly brushed the shrapnel from his clothing before it could catch fire, and Linwolse did the same.

"What happened?" Forrest asked.

"I killed it. It does not die a very graceful death," Linwolse answered.

He did not have time to ask how. They heard vehicles approach the front of the building.

"Shit! Let's go," he said.

"Where?"

"To the core," he answered. On the way out of the lab, he grabbed a small crowbar that sat on a work table.

They ran down the corridor at less than Enonian speed; Forrest had yet to master the art of rapid motion. They entered another room and then went through a door at its rear. The bypass codes worked at every juncture and Forrest was, for once, thankful for bureaucratic inertia.

The small room was the diagnostics center for the central computer. During the day technicians would sit at the various consoles monitoring the parameters required for successful operation of the mammoth computer. Now, the machine ran with a minimum load, essentially autonomous, running diagnostics, backups, and late night file transfers. The core could be seen through a window. There was no door.

Forrest took the crowbar and smashed the window, knocking away all slivers of glass so they would not cut themselves. He then climbed through the window and took Linwolse's hand as she followed. They were on a steel catwalk that lined the walls of the core chamber. He avoided looking down the four stories to the hard, concrete floor.

The core was huge. It covered ten-thousand square meters of floor space, and was six stories high. The circumference of the core proper consisted of anodized aluminum fins arranged in concentric sections--heat sinks. Cooling vents constantly dumped frigid air into the chamber. Inside, the core was a maze of microfiberoptics, holocrystals, superconductors and high-speed semiconductors arranged in an incredibly complex pattern that no one person could possibly understand. Except for the main computer aboard the Forever and the Network computers, it was the most powerful machine mankind had ever built, capable of over a thousand-trillion integer operations per millisecond. Despite having worked with the machine all of his career, Forrest could not help feeling a great sense of awe in its presence.

But he did not have time for that now.

He took Linwolse's hand and led her around the walkway. They crossed the narrow viaduct to the core, and he twisted open the latch of the maintenance hatch. He then pulled Linwolse inside, and secured the door behind them. They could hear the sound of water rushing through the cooling pipes, and below, the distant rumble of the fusion reactor deep in the earth that powered the core and the Worldly Machines complex.

The passageway was narrow and just high enough for them to stand upright. It led to the center of the huge machine. It seemed impossibly far way. The walls were covered with a thousand lights and displays spewing forth data that only a highly trained engineer could decipher. They made their way along the passage, occasionally passing hatchways that led to subunits of the core.

"I assume you have a plan," Linwolse said.

"Yes. I'm hoping they will not expect us to enter the core. And even if they do, they will not fire upon us for fear of damaging the core. When we get to the reactor, they will have more reasons not to open fire. There is a way out from the reactor, but it will be dangerous. It will be better if we get there before they discover us."

Five minutes later they reached the core center. An open circular space ten meters in diameter reached from the reactor bed to the upper level of the core chamber. A one meter diameter shaft at the center of the space traversed the same distance. Three ladders, equally spaced, were attached to the circumference of the open space.

Forrest leaned over the railing and peered the several stories down toward the reactor. He felt his stomach turned over and he stepped back.

"What is wrong, Forrest?"

"I can't stand heights. Never could."

"Now is not a good time to be phobic."

"I know."

He clenched his teeth and climbed over the railing onto the nearest ladder. His heart pounded against his chest and he felt a sense of panic. He grasped the rungs with unnecessary force. If he could just remember to not look down, and to pretend that only a few feet were between himself and the ground, he would be all right. He began the laborious descent. Linwolse followed.

"Faster! You will not fall," Linwolse demanded.

Forrest tried, but he could only increase his speed by a little. The descent took a full fifteen minutes.

They were standing on top of the reactor dome. The noise of the electric turbines was horrendous.

"You sure took your time, Forrest," Linwolse shouted over the noise. She seemed frustrated with him.

He ignored her and they climbed the steps to the concrete floor. They were deep within the earth now, well below the water table. The fusion reactor beside them was small by usual standards. But it was still large enough to transmute them and several city blocks into atomic plasma, should the containment field fail. That was extremely unlikely, but still, he could not forget the fact.

"Where to now?" Linwolse shouted.

He pointed to the tunnel that led into the darkness of the earth. They started in that direction, and then Linwolse stopped him.

"Someone is here," she said into his ear, still having to shout.

"Where?" Forrest asked.

"In the tunnel. They must have anticipated us."

She took an object out of her jumpsuit pocket and gave it to him. It was about the size and shape of a tube of lipstick.

"What's this?"

"A disintegrator. Twist the end to the third mark. That setting is enough to kill a human, but without doing structural damage to the surroundings. Aim the lighted end at your enemy and press the sides to fire it. It has no recoil."

"This is how you destroyed the android?"

"Yes. Now adjust your eyes and let's go."

They went to the tunnel and stood, one to each side of the narrow entrance. The tunnel went for about fifty meters, and led to the pump station that supplied water to the reactor and the computer core. He looked at Linwolse and saw that her eyes were glowing. She indicated her eyes with her hand and gave him an intense look. He understood her, but he didn't know how to activate his biological infrared system. He returned a questioning look.

"Focus! Imagine that your eyes are glowing; think it into being." He could not hear her, but he did read her lips.

He closed his eyes and concentrated. A tingling sensation came to his eyes, and he opened them. It was easy once you knew you could do it. She smiled at him and entered the tunnel. He followed.

She moved close to him and spoke into his ear. "There are three of them."

Forrest could not sense them at all, much less how many there were. But then he didn't have thousands of years of practice.

They crept along the tunnel. It consisted of nothing but raw earth supported by braces and crossbeams. The tunnel wormed left and right, as if the diggers had followed a path of least resistance. He looked for the glow that would signal the presence of body heat.

When they were near the end of the tunnel, he saw it.

What happened next went too fast for Forrest to follow. Linwolse lunged forward, and then the whole place lit so brightly that his infrared system shut down. He heard machine gun fire and the whoosh of a disintegrator. And then there was total darkness as the sounds echoed around the bends of the tunnel, later to be lost in the now faint noise of the reactor.

"Linwolse?"

No answer.

He made his eyes glow. He could see the heat of four bodies lying on the earth. There were three males and one female. The female was Linwolse. He panicked and ran to her.

"Linwolse?" he cried.

She did not respond. He pulled her into his arms and felt for a pulse. She was alive. Forrest picked her up and carried her to the end of the tunnel, stumbling over some object with a residual incandescence as he went. The pump station was lit with flood lights. He laid her on the ground and searched her body for a wound. There was none; she had not been hit.

"What is wrong with you?" he asked, expecting no answer.

He then noticed the pinkish blush of her face and hands that even the make-up could not hide. It was like a sunburn and he wondered if she had gotten caught in the beam of her disintegrator. Or maybe he had fired his without knowing it. He shook her.

"Lin! Wake up!"

He looked at the pump and the reservoir located above and behind it. He climbed the ladder and dipped his cupped hands into the cool water. He brought the dripping water back to Linwolse and threw it in her face.

She stirred and looked at him with bloodshot eyes.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"I'm fine. But you're not. What happened to you?"

Her voice was raspy and she seemed very tired. "Sunlight."

What sunlight? There's no sunlight down here, Forrest thought.

She closed her eyes.

"Lin, we have to leave now. Others will be coming soon."

She tried to push herself upright. "I just need a moment to rest. You go on. I'll follow later."

"I will not leave you here!" he said adamantly.

Linwolse gave him a weak smile. "My hero." Her eyes began to close.

"You must stay awake!"

Noise could be heard coming from the other end of the tunnel. It would not take them long to travel the fifty meters to their location. There was nothing else to do.

Forrest picked her up, carried her up the ladder to the reservoir, and threw her in. She splashed about as consciousness returned. He jumped in after her. He put his arm around her waist and held her head above the water.

"Take a deep breath, Lin."

They both did, and Forrest took them under the water. He swam as best he could into the underground stream that flowed through the substratum of the earth. Linwolse did not have the energy to do anything but cling to him, and he held her tightly against him, while swimming with his legs and remaining free arm. It was about half a kilometer before the stream opened into the bottom of Wild's River. But he knew there were air pockets along the way where they could catch their breath. He just wasn't sure how far apart they were, and whether he could swim fast enough to reach them before their brains were depleted of oxygen. He kept close to the top of the stream, constantly checking to see if anything other than solid rock was above them. His mind began to beg for oxygen and he thought his lungs might burst. Mercifully, they came upon a small pocket.

He brought them up.

"Breathe deeply, Lin."

She did as told, her eyes half closed. They could not have come more than twenty meters. And if there wasn't another air pocket twenty meters further down, they were in trouble.

But whatever the case, they could not stay here.

He pulled them back under and swam as hard as he could, his glowing eyes providing the only light to guide their way. It seemed like forever, but finally they came to another air pocket.

This one was much larger. It was a small cavern about thirty meters in length, with an embankment to one side. He pulled himself and Linwolse up onto the bank. His breathing was laborious and his arms and legs ached. If he tried to swim the remaining distance, they would surely die, he felt. The cavern had irregular cavities and passages carved by ancient waters. With Linwolse in his arms, he located a hidden hollow and carefully laid her down. She was unconscious, but breathing. He went back to the embankment and retrieved the small weapon from his pocket. Hopefully the water would not have damaged it. He twisted the end piece until it clicked on the third marker. Its light came on, and he aimed it at the far side of the cavern, squeezing the sides. A tight beam struck the earth and a puff of smoke rose into the air. Not enough to bore a hole through the earth, but it would surely melt human flesh. He sat and waited for his pursuers to bring him air tanks.

Five minutes passed before he saw a light beam under the water. A diver followed, and Forrest carefully aimed the disintegrator at the diver's head. The beam hit dead on and the diver convulsed and then sank to the bottom under the weight of the air tank. Another diver came into view, and Forrest turned his brains into soup. He waited another minute, and when no one else showed up, he jumped into the water to retrieve the air tanks and fins from the dead bodies. After twisting the valves shut, he checked the gages. Both tanks had a fresh charge.

Forrest waited another five minutes. He wished he had Linwolse's ability to sense humans at a distance. No one else appeared, and he decided that the two dead divers were the only ones, although others would be waiting at the pump station.

A blinking light caught his attention on one of the bodies. A plastic bag attached to the diver's belt contained an electronic device. He recovered the bag and removed the device. It was a radio.

He didn't know if he could exert mind control at this distance, or over the radio, but he was going to try.

Forrest extended the radio's antenna and pressed the talk button.

"To whom am I speaking?"

"Sam?"

"This is not Sam. Sam's dead. Both of them are dead. Who are you?"

There was hesitation on the other end, then, "Who th' hell are you?"

"Who I am does not matter. What matters is that I've attached an explosive device to the fusion reactor. All I have to do is press a button, and the reactor goes."

"And kill yourself, too?"

"My instructions are to die before allowing myself to be captured. If I take all of you and this complex with me, I don't mind."

"How do I know you're telling the truth?"

Forrest could hear the stress in the other man's voice.

"Go see for yourself. But don't try to disarm it. I will detect that and set it off."

There was no response from the other end. Forrest concentrated as hard as he could. A painful several minutes passed.

"Okay, we found the device," the man said. "What do you want?"

"Only to get out of here. When I'm safely away, you may then disarm the bomb."

"And the girl? Is she alive?"

"Of course she is." Forrest could not understand why he asked that question.

"How do I know you will not set the bomb off anyway?"

"I may be a thief, but I have my honor. I have no desire to kill you or destroy this place. I got what I came for. All I want now is for me and my companion to go free. And besides, what choice do you have? Think about it. If you pursue us, we all die. If you do not, then we go free and you live. It's your choice."

More hesitation.

"Okay, you win," the man returned. "But remember this: we will find you eventually. You've won this time, but you can't win every time. One day you will be mine!"

"That's the name of the game," Forrest replied.

He set the radio on scan mode and set it aside.

"You handled that very well," Linwolse said, her voice weak.

Forrest turned and helped her down to the embankment.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

"Weak. My skin burns, and I can't see in the dark. But I'll be okay in a few nights." She put an arm around him and laid her head on his shoulder. "I'll be okay, thanks to you."

"We better go before they have time to get stupid," he said.

"Yes."

He took off her boots and replaced them with a set of fins. "I don't expect you to use these. But just in case," he said.

She nodded understanding. Forrest attached an air tank to her back, placed the breather in her mouth, and carefully lowered her into the water. He then put on the other fins and air tank. He joined her in the water, and pried the lantern from the first diver's dead fingers. Linwolse could not see in infrared, but she could see with normal light.

Soon he was swimming toward the river with Linwolse held close beneath him.

No one tried to stop them.
 

They arrived back at the house three hours later, just an hour before sunrise. He was carrying the unconscious Linwolse in his arms as he went up the front steps of the house. His bare feet hurt, and he was weak with exhaustion. Lasandra met them at the front door.

"Did not go so well, did it?" she said. There was a testy tone in her voice.

Forrest glared at her. "Not as well as we would have liked. But we got what we went for, and we're alive."

He walked past her and headed for the stairs.

"What happened to Linwolse?"

"I don't know. They hit her with some kind of lightbeam. She'll be okay."

Lasandra followed him up the stairs. "She appears to be sunburnt."

"The only problem with that theory is that the sun has been on the other side of the Earth the whole time." Forrest had no patience for Lasandra right now. He was tired, both physically and mentally. All he wanted to do was tend to Linwolse's injuries and then to sleep.

"Mandoss wants to see you, now!"

Forrest sighed. "When I've put Lin to bed, I will go to him."

"I don't think he will like you keeping him waiting. He is very angry." She seemed to be enjoying herself.

"Fuck Mandoss! I'll go to him when I'm done with Lin."

Lasandra smiled. "He will be in the planning room, next to the dinning hall."

"Okay!" He entered his room and shut the door in Lasandra's face.

Forrest laid the sleeping Linwolse on the bed and removed her jumpsuit and undergarments. He examined her body. Apparently the jumpsuit had protected most of her. But her face and hands were beginning to blister. The make-up on her body was streaked from the underwater swim. He gently shook her to wake her. She looked at him through red, bleary eyes.

"We are home?"

"Yes, safe and sound. Let's get you into the shower. You are a mess. Up to it?"

"I think so."

He helped her into the shower and adjusted the water to a comfortable warmness. Using a sponge, he washed the make-up from her body. He was glad to see her natural skin color show through. Gently, he dabbed her face and hands, trying to remove the make-up without hurting her.

"You okay?"

"Yes. It hurts, but I will get through it."

"I'm sorry," he said.

"It is okay, my love."

When they were done, he helped her into the bed.

"Are you going to join me?" she asked.

"Later." He pulled the covers over her and she smiled at him. "I have to talk to Mandoss now. But I'll be back soon. You go to sleep and rest."

She grabbed his arm. "You must tell Mandoss something."

"What?"

"They know about us."

"How can that be?"

"The light, it was an exact replication of the sun's radiation. There can be only one reason for that."

"But why wasn't I affected?"

"You are not yet as sensitive as I am. I blew the light out before it could do you harm."

"Do you think we are in danger here?"

"I do not know. Maybe they do not know who or where we are. But they do know something about us. They know we are sensitive to the light of the sun. Tell Mandoss." She closed her eyes.

Forrest watched her sleep for a few moments, and then left the room.

He had not seen the planning room before. It was brightly lit, and several consoles sat against the walls. A huge holoviewer sat in the middle of the room projecting what Forrest guessed was a local star map. A heavy, elaborately carved, wooden desk occupied one end of the room. The desk was polished to a perfect shine. A few very old, but well kept, writing utensils sat on the desk, along with a few papers and an old leather-bound book. Mandoss sat in the matching high-back chair behind the desk. There was no one else in the room.

Mandoss gave Forrest a stony look. "Did you get your files?"

"Most of them." He retrieved the carrier from his jumpsuit and showed the memory cubes to Mandoss. "I had to abort the download when we found we had been discovered. But this should be enough. It'll get us started anyway."

Mandoss grunted. He did not seem to be interested in the cubes. Forrest returned them to his jumpsuit.

"I hear Linwolse was injured."

"Minor injuries. She'll be okay in a few nights. All in all, the mission was successful."

Mandoss glared at him. "It was not a successful mission! A successful mission is one where everything goes with perfect precision. You go in, you come out, and no one is the wiser. That is not what happened tonight!"

Forrest felt anger. "Look, Mandoss, I am not one of your troops. I did not volunteer for this job. I didn't want it. You chose me, not the other way around. You get what you pay for, and you paid nothing for me."

"Do not be insolent with me, Forrest. I have given you immortality. I have given you the chance to see the universe. But never forget that I can kill you with only a thought."

"I do not doubt that," Forrest said with a neutral tone.

"Damn you!" Mandoss spat.

The two men stared at each other a moment.

"Linwolse said I should tell you something."

"And what is that?"

"She believes that they know about us. It was a bright light that caused her injuries. She is sunburnt. She says the light was an exact replication of sunlight. Fortunately she blew the light out before it could do more harm."

"And she reasons that they know about our sensitivity to sunlight."

"Yes."

Mandoss laughed. "So it begins again."

"You don't seem very concerned."

"Of course I'm concerned. But I have been through this hundreds of times. Do not expect me to panic."

"We may not be safe here."

"If they knew we were here, they would already be upon us. No, they may suspect something of our nature, but they don't know who we are or where we are. We are safe here for the time being."

"I hope so. Is this all you wanted to see me about?"

"No. I have a question for you, and I hope you do not know the answer."

Forrest gave him a puzzled look. "What is that?"

Mandoss stood and placed his hands on the desk. "Why have they moved the launch date to a week from now?"

"What? That can't be right. They can't possibly be ready. And the launch window is not until two years from now."

"An acceptable launch window occurs next week. They have chosen that as the launch date. What do you know about this?"

"This is news to me. I've been out of touch for several days, you know. This is what the Network reports."

"Yes, and other sources we have."

"That doesn't give us much time to prepare." Forrest wondered what the other sources were.

"No it doesn't. You know nothing about this?"

"No, I do not. I'll check the files I have. Maybe there is a clue."

"Your precious files are useless now. They have moved up the launch date because they suspect someone is planning to steal the Forever."

"They've been suspicious of genoclonic groups all along."

"True, but they knew who they were. Until now, they did not know about us."

"So they will be expecting us."

"Yes."

"What do we do now?"

"We take the Forever as planned, just two years earlier than expected."

"How?"

"That is not yet decided. We do have contingency plans. There will be a planning meeting at nightbreak tomorrow. I expect you to have a plan for gaining control of the Forever."

"I will try."

"You better do more than try," Mandoss said, sharply. "You better have a plan that will work."

Forrest could see the truth in his words. And he knew he might not live beyond the following night.
 

Back in his room, Forrest sat at his desk. He removed the carrier from his jumpsuit and set it on the desk. He retrieved the blue cube and plugged it into the receptacle. The console automatically activated, and he logged on to the Network. He entered a secret code a friend had given him before going to prison for hacking the system. The code gave him administrative access to the Network. He instructed the Network to accept the new code he was about to upload, and to make it part of the kernel.

The Network acknowledged his instructions, and signaled that it was ready to receive the upload.

Forrest hit the upload key. He watched as the display reported the progress of the upload. The stream of binary data that was the essence of Serp's life would soon be copied with multiple backups into the Network's core. And once the upload was complete and verified, Serp would be activated. He would be a part of the Network's primary operating system, a conscious, living being with the whole world as his domain.

But he would be like a lost child. He would have no contact with Forrest, his creator. Forrest could only hope that he would adapt well to his new environment.

Forrest might not survive the next twenty-four hours, but Serp would at least have a chance.

The upload would take several hours.

Forrest undressed and stepped into the shower. He washed the dye out of his hair, and the make-up from his face. The fake beard was lost somewhere in the underground stream that fed the reactor at Worldly Machines.

He toweled himself dry and looked at himself in the mirror. It seemed that he had aged years in one night, and he was not supposed to age at all. The reflection that entered his eyes was that of a stranger. He had killed two men that night, and he was yet to feel any remorse over the fact.

He went to the bed and got under the covers next to Linwolse. She was sleeping soundly, and he did not touch her for fear of waking her. He willed the lights off, and lay thinking in the darkness.

He told his mind that it must produce a workable plan for taking the Forever, and that the plan would present itself to his consciousness at next nightbreak.

But his mind would not let him sleep.