David's Sling (5 page)

Bill shakes his head. "I guess not. It's incredible." A thrill runs through his mind. This Zetetic comparison of truth and materials makes the deepest sense to him—the truth, as Bill creates it for his audiences, is more valuable than any possible jewel.

"Congratulations on passing your first Zetetic test. Many people feel tricked when we acquaint them with this room. Actually, we offer just the opposite of a trick. We offer a lesson—a lesson that does not hurt, that is valuable, and that is not too expensive."

"I guess so." Bill still feels on the defensive. Yet he begins to feel the thrill of the hunt as well. Nathan Pilstrom makes a challenging target for his next report.

But Nathan steps through another door. Bill follows, tense and excited. What lesson lies in the room beyond the Jewel Hall?

He breathes a sigh of relief. A comfortingly normal room greets him. Its shape suggests the gentle contours of the overall building. A receptionist looks up at them.

Nathan taps a terminal on the side. "Take a look through our catalog of offerings. I think you'll be surprised at the number of ways that discriminating information can alter your life. Do you smoke?"

Bill shakes his head.

"Perhaps you would be interested in . . . no, probably not. How about a seminar on separating fact from fluff in newscasting?"

Damn this man! Bill frowns. "I don't think I need it."

Nathan stops. "My apologies. I don't mean to be pushy." He shrugs. "Sometimes I'm as bad as the car salesman we use as an example."

The receptionist, fielding a buzz from the intercom, interrupts. "Nathan, Senator Forstil has arrived."

He smiles at her warmly. "Thanks." He turns back to Bill with a final comment. "If you don't have specific needs for Zetetic methods, you should take the Sampler.

It'll give you some idea of how we apply surprising ideas to everyday problems."

"That sounds great." Yes, this is what Bill needs. Only with a broad view of the Institute can he find the most striking defects of the organization. The Sampler will be perfect.

Bill watches Nathan depart with cruel amusement. So Senator Forstil is involved with the Institute! He'll get some mileage out of that.

Only an expert could have discerned the quiet struggle in the soft-lit office. Nathan leaned against the edge of his desk, his arms folded. His head drooped, as if he might nod off at any moment. He seemed so casual, so cool.

But the expert would have spotted his twitch every time a stray sound rattled down the hall. The expert would have seen Nathan's lips draw to a short smile following each twitch. It was a smile of forgiving laughter—Nathan laughed at himself. He was very, very nervous about this meeting with Senator Forstil.

How annoying Nathan found it, to be the founder and president of an Institute dedicated to helping people overome unsanity, and
still
be subject himself to such irrational anxiety!

Still, denial of that anxiety would mark an even lower level of sanity. Nathan smiled at the anxiety and jumped at every sound.

He let his eyes roam across the walls of his office. People who associated him with the Information Age often felt surprise at his choice of decorations. A number of mementos seemed appropriate: a flow chart hung in one corner, describing the first PEP program developed by the Zetetic Corporation. The signatures of the PEP development team members filled one corner of the chart. A long, narrow, Escher print snaked across the wall behind his desk.

But the works that dominated the room were the maps. Age had broken off their edges, had yellowed the paper and cracked the ink, but they were still readable.

Worse than the mars of aging were the defects in their basic structure. All the maps had serious flaws; not one of them accurately represented the terrain it tried to depict. The maps always reminded Nathan to remain hopeful for, flawed as the maps were, men had achieved numerous victories using them. Those who used maps wisely always remembered the differences between the maps and their terrains.

The old maps held no more flaws than the internal maps modem men used to navigate through life—maps of inferred deductions about other people's motives and plans. The differences between those internal maps and external realities contained lethal potentialities; yet wisdom could prevail now as in the past.

Nathan jerked at a new sound. A light tread paused briefly just outside his office. Nathan shifted forward as the senator entered the room, and stared for a moment in surprise. The senator had been one of the silent mourners at Jan's funeral that morning, but the grief and mourning had peeled away, like a molted skin. His expression now belonged to a completely different person.

First analysis: short but snappy. His silvery gray hair was swept back in precise curves. His mustache was neatly trimmed, and his mouth gave no hint of pleasure or pain. His expressionless gray suit fit him with the precision of custom tailoring. A sharp streak of yellow crossed the face of an otherwise somber silk tie, and a tiny gold pin with a single diamond chip glinted on his lapel.

He gazed calmly at Nathan, as he analyzed Nathan in turn.

First synthesis: Forstil projected an image of controlled power—a power channeled to sharply defined purposes. The illusion carried through to each detail of his appearance with a perfection too great to be unintended—so great it could partly fulfill its own prophecy.

The senator's meticulous illusion frustrated Nathan's need for insight. What motivated this man? What were his ethics? Would Nathan have to manipulate him, or would education be enough? In this first meeting, Nathan didn't have a choice: his own ethics demanded crisp honesty, unless the senator himself revealed manipulative behavior. Nathan had to try education.

Meanwhile, Nathan was sure the senator's calm blue eyes had seen more of him than he had seen of the senator. Hilan had seen that Nathan was a soft touch for truth. He knew Nathan preferred simple, open dealings. Nathan smiled, and though the smile felt foolish, he continued. "Senator," he greeted the projection of power with an outstretched hand, "what do you think of the Institute?"

They shook hands: again, nothing revealed. Senator Forstil's face broke into a half-smile. "The Zetetic Institute," he rolled the words off his tongue, toying with the sounds. "Ive seen your building. Jan and I have discussed some parts of Zetetic philosophy. But I know nothing about your organization. What is a Zetetic Institute?"

Was there sarcasm there? Forstil gave no hint. "A good question," Nathan replied, "but it has a difficult answer." He pointed to the low table across from his desk. "Chair?"

Four chairs encircled the smoke-gray glass table. Two of the chairs slunk low into the carpet; the other two displayed more austere lines, encouraging one to lean forward into the conversation. The senator took one of these.

Nathan had at times taken a low seat when faced with dangerous people, to give them a false sense of security. He sighed, thinking about the number of times he had had to use manipulative techniques, just to avoid being harmed by other people's manipulations. He took the high seat opposite the senator. Nathan suspected the senator was not easily manipulated.

The senator's probable immunity was more surprising than most people realized. The typical manipulator succeeds because he believes his own propaganda, and thus becomes vulnerable to the propaganda of others. Jan's analysis said this man doubted his own illusions.

Forstil watched him patiently. Nathan returned to the senator's question: what is a Zetetic Institute? Jan had surely described the Institute for him before, so this question undoubtedly had qualities of a test, as well as a request for information. His only possible response was indirect—as unsatisfying as the description Jan herself had surely given. "Let me describe the Institute in terms of what it is
not
," Nathan began. "First, it is not a building, or a collection of buildings. Most of the people who work with the Institute work at home, wherever home may be—from a condo around the corner in the Hunter Woods complex in Reston, Virginia, to an earth shelter outside Bozeman, Montana.

"The Institute should not be viewed as a corporation, though legally it is incorporated in the state of Virginia. Only a handful of people work for the Institute full-time. The others come and go, depending on particular contracts and projects that interest them.

"The Institute is not a cult—" Nathan felt some deja vu, having discussed this with the tall, angry man on the way in "—though the people of the Institute share many attitudes, behaviors, and slang expressions. It would be more accurate to say we share a common meta-philosophy—a philosophy about building your own philosophies. We are eclectics, taking the best or most useful ideas we find, wherever we find them, and weaving them into cloths of many colors."

"Sounds like a quick way to mental breakdown," Forstil observed. "Grabbing bits and pieces of ideas and lifestyles without a consistent framework."

"Only if it becomes an obsession," Nathan replied easily. "Only if you grab bits and pieces indiscriminately. The term 'zetetic' comes from the Greek word for 'skeptic.' A healthy dose of skepticism is the first thing we teach people who come here." Nathan frowned. He had not yet communicated the ethos of the Institute. But what more could he say? The Zetetic Institute could not be described using Industrial Age terminology, any more than quantum mechanics could be described with Aristotle's concepts of waves and particles, or any more than the Tao could be defined in terms of Western civilization.

But he had to answer, quickly and succinctly, for this man. "If I were to be so foolish as to sum up what the Institute is, rather than what it is not, I would say it is an Information Age resource pool for solving Industrial Age problems. Once the country makes the transition to a full-fledged Information Age society, the Institute will hopefully become a place to solve Information Age problems. For the moment, however, the Industrial Age and its institutions represent the important dangers to human progress."

Forstil gave him a barely perceptible nod." And Industrial Age problems include everything from cigarette smoke to nuclear weapons."

Nathan relaxed. "Exactly."

"Very well." Hilan seemed to accept the basic idea of the Zetetic Institute, despite the ambiguities. "Now, what is a Sling?"

Nathan smiled; Forstil had moved to the central topic with bracing efficiency. "The Sling is an Information Age weapon for defeating Industrial Age armies. It may be the only chance free societies have in a world where they must compete with leaders of subjugated societies—leaders who can be far more ruthless because they aren't shackled by fickle popular opinion."

"That's fine rhetoric, Mr. Pilstrom. But what does it mean?"

"Let me demonstrate." Nathan whirled out of his chair and retrieved a keyboard from his desk. A color display in the wall next to Hilan glowed with a three-dimensional, skeletal, layout of an airplane. Forstil squinted at it. "Is it a glider?"

"Almost." As Nathan spoke, a set of arrows highlighted critical features. "The overall design comes from glider technology, most distinctively in the wing shape. The frame is built with high-strength composite fibers.

"That's where the resemblance to gliders ends, however. The tops of the wings are covered with amorphous semiconductor solar cells for power, which drive the tail prop as well as the on-board electronics. By optimal use of wind currents and solar power, the SkyHunter can stay airborne for months—until it wears out, in fact." Nathan smiled, concentrating on his keyboard. The skeletal aircraft grew skin; the background clarified into a mountain-lined horizon; and the craft lifted into the air, until it disappeared. "The SkyHunter contains no metal, so it is radar-invisible. It has no engine flare, so it is infrared-invisible. Paint it sky blue and cruise it at 30,000 feet, and it is lightwave-invisible—a completely undetectable platform."

The senator's voice sounded strained. "Is this room a secure facility?"

Nathan looked baffled for a moment, then laughed. "None of this is classified, senator. This is a picture of the WeatherWatch recon plane. It was designed by Lightcraft Corporation and manufactured by Lockheed for meteorologists. They collect high-altitude weather data in the Arctic for forecasting climate."

"You mean they built a stealth patrol plane
by accident
?"

"Yes," Nathan chuckled. "More or less. We have made some substitutions to heighten the effect, such as the materials for the solar arrays. The important mods, however, are down here." The view changed again, to the underbelly, which sprouted clumps of thin fibers. "We replaced the normal weather sensors with down-looking optical and infrared detectors. And there is an anchor point for bombs."

"How many bombs can a glider carry—two or three? Hardly the killing power of a battleship." The senator turned away from the screen to critique Nathan. "I'd overlooked that problem. You'd need thousands of these to stop an armored division."

Nathan shook his head. "Actually, we think it'd take three or four SkyHunters to stop a division." As Forstil objected, Nathan held up his hand to interrupt. "Remember, this is
an Information Age
weapon. The most critical part of the weapon cannot be seen in any picture. The critical part is the
information processing
, the
intelligence
."

The wall display changed again—to an aerial scene of forests, threaded by a delicate web of narrow roads. The picture changed hue. The forest became a ghostly orange, and bright dots of blue now stood out as they lumbered along the gray streaks of road. 'This is an infrared image," Nathan explained. "The blue dots are tanks. " The view zoomed in on a patch of green. Forms with the outlines of human beings hustled, or paused, or lay on the ground. "The division command post," Nathan explained. The view zoomed one more time, on a particular figure. He was surrounded by other figures that came, listened for a time, then hurried away again. The scene brought to mind a queen bee groomed by her court of drones. "The commanding general."