The Aegis Solution (20 page)

"I'd be happy to do so. But I have a feeling that there is another reason for your sudden arrival
here."

They had been following a meandering route through several turns, and finally arrived at an open
doorway with the plaque "Director" beside it. Kreitzmann entered and immediately walked to the large
conference table, set off to one side of the large office.

"Please have a seat. Can I get you something to drink?"

Eyeing the glass pitcher on the table, rivulets of condensation running down the sides, Elias
answered, "Water would be fine."

Kreitzmann turned over two inverted glasses and filled them both from the pitcher. Elias sat down
and was soon joined by the scientist, who took a swivel chair next to him.

"You're right. There was another factor in my decision to exile myself, in a manner of speaking, to
Aegis."

Kreitzmann waited silently.

"Throughout my life I have had two things which meant more to me than anything else. Not in the
order of priority, my work, of course, was one of them – the other, my wife. It was because of her that
I chose the lifestyle that I did."

"I don't understand."

Elias borrowed from his true feelings for his wife and allowed his face to reflect a gamut of
emotions as he spoke. "We were so much in love. From the day I met her until…well, until just recently,
we were one of those rare couples who are inseparable by choice."

"That is quite rare."

"Yes. Most married folks seem to relish getting away from each other in every way they can. Belinda
and I wanted the exact opposite. We would have been perfectly happy being within each other's sight
twenty-four hours a day."

"Sounds wonderful."

"It was and, as a result, I never took sabbaticals when I taught. Eventually, I quit teaching, refused
all invitations for seminars, workshops…well, you know, all of the demands on a scientist's time that
draw him away from home."

Kreitzmann nodded.

"My goal, which I attained, was to obtain private funding and establish a lab at my residence. We
bought a ranch outside of Albuquerque and turned one of the outbuildings into a lab. I worked there
with Belinda as my partner, helper, and companion. As I told you, I attended no conferences or
workshops. Nothing. I'm afraid I essentially became a recluse or a hermit, if you will."

Kreitzmann smiled. "I heard that about you. Bit of a mystery man."

"And in the process, my contempt for my fellow man grew. Rather exponentially, I might add."

The smile leaving his face, Kreitzmann asked, "And your wife? As committed to one another as
you are, is she with you here in Aegis?"

Somberly, Elias answered, "No, she's not. I lost her. Three months ago. To cancer."

"I am so very sorry."

"Thank you." Drawing a deep breath, Elias continued, "Losing her caused me to do a great deal of
soul searching. I decided that, without her, there was no longer any reason whatsoever to remain…out
there. My work had reached an impasse. My reason for living had died with her."

"You mentioned that you came to me for help with your work. How did you know I was in Aegis?"

"I didn't. I came to Aegis for the same reason so many others come here. It wasn't until after I
arrived that I discovered your presence. The news sparked something in me, and I realized that I did
still want to complete my research, if only to give Belinda and myself the satisfaction of doing so."

Elias expected to be asked from whom he had heard about Kreitzmann living in Aegis, but the man
seemed comfortable with the fact.

"I understand. And please accept my sincere sympathy for your loss."

"Thank you very much."

"I never married," Kreitzmann continued, without the slightest show of emotion accompanying
his statement, "so I never knew the love and connection that you described. I have been a slave to my
research since my college days. I envy what you had, even though it ended the way that it did."

"I wouldn't trade those years for anything in the world."

"I can tell that."

Slapping the tops of his thighs with his hands, Kreitzmann changed the subject. "I'm certain that
you are eager to discuss your obstacle, as it were. However, I would like to offer you a tour of our
facility. Perhaps you will see a niche that needs to be filled by a man of your talent and knowledge."

"I would enjoy that."



Elias stood between Kreitzmann and a lab technician with the name Bonillas stitched above the
pen pocket of her white lab coat. In front of them was a twenty-foot-long one-way mirror which
allowed viewing into a room filled with children. The youngsters, ages ranging up to approximately nine,
to Elias' eye, were scattered about the large room, which resembled a well-equipped day-care center.
Some sat at desks or at a large table; some were on the floor. All seemed occupied with toys, coloring
books, or other objects. At first glance the scene appeared normal to Elias; then he noticed that there
was no talking between or from any of the children.

Before he could ask a question, Kreitzmann commenced, "Doctor Bonillas, why don't you explain
to Doctor Brightman what we are accomplishing here."

"Of course, sir. This is our language enhancement lab."

"Language enhancement? None of them are speaking."

Elias had turned away from the view to look at Bonillas as he spoke, and noticed a slight grin curl
the corners of her mouth in reaction to his comment.

"There are many methods of communication. Speaking is only one of them. We are attempting to
utilize the human mind's tendency to adapt as our primary tool for the development of alternate
communication skills."

"You're too modest, Doctor Bonillas," Kreitzmann broke in. "I would hardly describe the success
you've had here as an attempt."

"Thank you, sir."

"I'm afraid I still don't understand."

"It's really quite simple," she explained. "Years of study and research, which preceded our work,
established that if the body is deprived of one sense...sight, for example...the other senses are enhanced,
to varying degrees, of course."

"This is true."

"Doctor Kreitzmann theorized that if that occurred with senses, why not with abilities?"

Elias felt a slight tensing of his neck muscles as he figured out the direction of this work. He
struggled to maintain his composure, as well as his cover of a disenchanted scientist who held mankind
in contempt. "Fascinating." His single-word comment sounded sincere to his ears.

Kreitzmann once again broke in, "As I'm sure you've already discerned, this path of study fits in
quite nicely with my overall thesis for the human race."

"I confess that I am not all that familiar with your underlying principle."

The man puffed up, obviously appreciative of the opportunity to expound. "I have always believed
that so much of what we are capable of doing – in fact, so much of what we are – is conditioned by the
environment."

"The Earth?"

The scientist smirked. "No, by ‘the environment,' I mean the society, the human beings around us."

"I'm not certain that I understand."

Gesturing toward the group on the other side of the glass, Kreitzmann explained, "This is a perfect
example. I have no doubt that our physiology provides for several methods of communication at the
point we are born. It is only because we are immediately surrounded by babbling fools, people who
exclusively utilize speech as the sole means to communicate, that we opt for the path of least resistance
and succumb to it ourselves."

"Of what other forms of communication do you believe we are capable?"

Triumphantly, Kreitzmann proclaimed, "Telepathy, for one."

"You're not serious?"

"Oh, but I am, Patrick. Do you realize how many times nonverbal, and by that I mean psychic,
communication has been documented in the laboratory? The incidence of successful communication
far exceeds the mathematical probabilities. And yet, the scientific community continues to ridicule the
study of the phenomenon, casting any researcher who dares to follow this path as fringe and a nutcase!"

Elias said nothing, waiting.

"Certainly, you are familiar with the work done in the past demonstrating the criticality of exposure
to certain stimuli at early ages."

"I am. The one which comes to mind is the study of musical ability."

"An excellent example. If a child is exposed to music and encouraged to play instruments at a very
early age, his or her ability to truly master the instruments increases dramatically. And the lifelong ability
to learn new instruments is substantially enhanced, as well."

"True."

"And the converse is true. If a child matures without the exposure to music, the part of the brain
which would be dedicated to this skill is assigned to other tasks and skills."

"I've read that."

"What we are doing here is developing and encouraging the skill to communicate psychically."

Forcing an expression of neutral interest onto his face, Elias asked, "How are you doing that?"

The smug grin returning to his face, Kreitzmann explained, "We are utilizing the same learning
technique for this field that we have perfected in several others. We create a perfect environment for
fostering a skill and immerse the child in it from birth."

It took all of Elias' will power to stop himself from strangling the madman on the spot. Instead,
maintaining his cover, he painted a smile across his face and remarked, "Immersion from birth?
Amazing. And the results?"

"I'll let Dr. Bonillas answer that."

The woman, who had been standing silently beside them through the dialogue, began to speak.
"Our progress has been slow, of course, due to the pace at which human children grow and mature."

"Of course."

"But we are obtaining a rather rapid increase in skill levels now that we are in Phase Two."

"Phase Two?"

Elias was astounded by the detachment displayed by Bonillas as she continued. "Phase One, where
we began, was limited by the fact that we were forced to utilize a virtual reality. Although this formula
has performed well in other arenas of our research, the concept of telepathy did not lend itself as well
to the modality, due to the lack of definitive feedback."

"I'm not really up to speed on the virtual reality you mentioned…."

"Of course," she interrupted. "I'm sorry. We created a room where the infants were first raised."

"This room?" Elias asked, pointing at the area beyond the glass.

"No. This is the Phase Two room. In Phase One, the virtual reality which surrounded the newborns
contained no spoken language."

"None? So the infants were tended to by adults who were not allowed to speak?"

"Yes, in part. They were not only barred from speaking, they were forbidden to respond to any
verbal communication."

"Including crying?"
 

"Including crying."

"Weren't some reactions involuntary?"

"Very perceptive," Kreitzmann noted. "We noticed that the caregivers were reacting to verbal
stimuli against their conscious will, so we corrected this problem by using only caregivers who were
completely deaf."

This conversation was becoming more of a test of Elias' self-control than he had anticipated.
Unable to say anything at the moment, he merely nodded.

Bonillas picked up where Kreitzmann had left off. "What we were able to accomplish in Phase One
was an intensification of the urge within the infants to communicate. We then exploited that urge with
an example which, quite frankly, was a wild guess as to how telepathy worked."

"Now, Doctor Bonillas, I think I would call it an educated guess."

Glancing over at her boss, she corrected herself, "An educated guess as to how telepathy worked.
As it turned out, we were closer than we thought."

Elias found his voice. "How so?"

"We had decided, after reviewing the available research, as well as the anecdotal evidence in the
record, that telepathic communication is symbolic, rather than communication which possesses a
vocabulary or grammatical rules."

"Graphic or pictographic?"

"Graphic," she replied.

"So," Elias asked, "if little Bobby wanted to convey that he was hungry, he visualized eating."

"Exactly. And, from what we can tell, very specific imagery. He would not only visualize eating, but
would visualize what he wanted – an apple, for example. And not just a generic apple, but a very precise
image of a green apple."

"Interesting."

"But Phase One was horribly frustrating. We were shooting in the dark, to coin a phrase. We had
no idea if we were making any progress."

"Why is that?" Elias inquired dutifully.