Jack Chalker - The Messiah Choice

“Not quite. Uh—how is she today?”

“Mixed,” the Bishop replied gravely. “She’s right on the edge, Greg. Right on the edge. Do you know what she’s doing out there? Building a sand castle. She’s got her hair in pigtails, and earlier she asked me if we’d buy her a dog to play with her. She’s put on a fairly thick southern American accent and let her grammar go to pot. When she’s like this she wants to be called Missy—apparently a family nickname from when she was this age.”

“You mean she’s becoming what she looks like?” That worried him.

“I only wish that were true. It would be easier to deal with. No, my boy, she’s splitting in two. When she’s Missy she doesn’t ask questions or take on airs, she just acts her physical age and that’s that. When she has to be Maria, though—when she’s forced to be—the change is quite remarkable. We took her on a shopping spree, so to speak, and the two sides were never more evident in what she bought or how it’s used.”

“I need to ask her questions about the island. How do I get Maria to come out.”

He sighed, stood up, and stretched. “You go back in to your little war games there. I’ll fetch her, but give her half an hour to get cleaned up. Be warned, though—Maria totally blocks out the idea that she’s in a child’s body. She doesn’t see herself that way, but rather as she was.”

“She’s going ’round the bend, then. How dependable will she be?”

“Well, that’s a matter of opinion. I don’t think it’s schizophrenia, if that’s what you mean. I think it’s deliberate, if not totally conscious. It is her way of coping.”

Greg nodded worriedly and went back in to Frawley. “O.K.,” he said, so we have the caves to deal with, and we have to assume they can get from here to there, maybe several places, without being seen. That just complicates the problem. Still, they wouldn’t have let me get all the way to the power plant when I ‘invaded’ the place if they thought that access posed a security threat. I mean, they could have stopped me without blowing their cover.’’

“I agree. Now, that power plant—it is a small experimental fusion reactor, totally self contained?”

“Yeah, that’s true. Not very cost efficient in that form, but it allows a totally independent power supply to be fed to the computer and the grids. It’s used only for that, though. The power for the basic Institute is still generated by burning oil, which comes in by tanker every six weeks. It seemed wasteful to build a whole pipeline from Port Kathleen up the mountain, so instead a shorter line was installed here, at the base of the cliffs in back of the Institute. A small pumping station takes off the oil and stores it in these two tanks here, at sea level, then pumps it up to the Institute’s tanks as needed along this nearly vertical pipeline.”

“Uh huh. And the pipeline only goes up two thirds of the way up the sheer cliffs on the north side, I see. That means the tanks themselves are on level six.”

“Right. There’s a ladder along both sides of the pipe, just in case, but it ends at that point and there’s no access to Level Six from the cliffs. The pipe goes in through a hole only big enough for it, and the wall and tanks are on the other side, perhaps a foot or two, whatever was required for stability.”

“Monitors?”

“Well, the basic tank and pumping station is unmanned but heavily guarded electronically. Additionally, there are six all-weather cameras, two of them infra-red types, mounted at various points along the ladders, and sound monitoring gear at various other points. If necessary, they can send a lethal voltage right through those ladders, and they’re usually carrying a non-lethal charge to begin with to discourage anyone and also to keep away the birds and other critters that might accidentally set off their alarms.”

“It sounds pretty formidable. That’s the way you did it last time, though?”

He nodded. “It’s the most vulnerable area of the island. I picked a new moon and had a small storm to help, so there was some electrical interference for them to contend with anyway. I wish we had somebody who could arrange a storm this time, since we’re locked in to the dates.” He sounded sad and wistful saying that, remembering someone who could arrange such a storm at will. “I’m pretty sure that they’ll have a patrol boat anchored at the dock, too. No, I wouldn’t come up the back side, but of the two remaining routes the least chancy—and it’s still a dilly—is to come up the west face from this little cove here.” He pointed to it on the model. “I’m sure they have no monitoring down there simply because it’s where I put in for the day when I escaped, and they never caught me.”

“Uh huh. Less of a climb, but still a deuced ordeal, and no ladders.”

“It’s a bad climb, that’s for sure—almost a sheer drop, and complicated by this small but spectacular waterfall here. But it gives some shelter to people below, if we can get a boat in that far past the patrols and radar network, and if one man, a good, experienced climber, could get up there and anchor something. He’d take up a rope, then we’d attach that rope to a good rope or woven synthetic line ladder. With enough people up, we could use the same network to rig a primitive hoist and bring up the equipment.”

“We’d be sitting ducks up there until it was all done,” Frawley noted. “And the ladder would have to go before we moved anywhere.”

“Agreed, but the sitting duck stage in unavoidable no matter how we come in, and as for the ladder—well, you only wanted a one way trip, didn’t you?”

Frawley sighed. “Yes. Quite so. All right—now we’re up with all the equipment. Now what? Isn’t there a network of security sensors about the cameras strung here and there?”

“Yes. It’s called the grid, but it’s been there for some time. There are only a couple of cameras up there, in that region, both with heavy duty power packs, since you can’t really run power lines. Their outputs run up to small microwave transmitters sticking out of the treetops, where the signal is beamed back to security and SAINT. King’s base assures me that the latest satellite photos still show only those two—one here at the waterfall, the other covering the remaining cabin and pump, where they kept Angelique. That was one extra reason for putting her there. There are a few battery powered microphones as well, including a couple whose existence I’m going to assume since I would put them there—one here at the lookout, for example, which is how they knew Angelique was going to escape. Until now, I wasn’t really sure how their output got back, since they’re not tied into the transmitters for the cameras, but I think I’ll get the answer in a few minutes, for I just saw the Bishop waving out the back window. Excuse me.”

He went into the living room and stopped dead in his tracks.

“Hi,” said Maria softly.

He hadn’t even known they made dresses like that in such a small size. She was apparently wearing falsies, and a clinging, smooth satiny dress of dark green material that was split most of the way on both sides. She had let her hair down, applied heavy makeup including eye shadow, rouge, and lipstick, and clip-on dangling earrings. She was even wearing a pair of matching high-heeled shoes in her tiny size. She looked more like a midget whore than a ten year old, he thought, even to the moves, except for the fingernails. Missy, it appeared, bit hers. He remembered the Bishop’s caution that she either believed, or pretended, that she was fully adult in this phase, and although he didn’t need this kind of adult he did indeed need that adult’s memory.