Greg Bear - Mariposa

Wearing a purple two-piece swimsuit under a white net cover, canvas boat shoes printed with cartoon flowers-tanned, hair almost strawberry from sun and salt-Rebecca looked like a surfer girl who did not know how to grow up. That was what she wanted and needed right now.

She felt like a teenager and she had the broken arm to prove it-from surfing a big surge wave with far too much confidence in her not-so-young bones.

The flexible blue cast on her left arm was alive with shifting patterns and drawings-paisley curlicues, constellations, sunbursts, and smiling moons. She would be losing the cast in a week and thought she might miss it.

She did not resemble in the least the former FBI agent featured on news shows, the Web, and plastered on wanted posters in every sheriff's office on the Gulf Coast-along with a handful of nefarious accomplices.

Alicia Kunsler was locked up in Cumberland, perhaps in the same cell once occupied by Edward Quinn. Daniel Haze, former director of the Secret Service, was rumored to be either dead-a suicide-or living in Chile.

Rebecca thought the latter was more likely.

Most of the cabinet members of the former administration were under house arrest. Their indictments and trial dates might never arrive. The whole story would likely collapse within a year-with unpredictable repercussions for President Raphkind, who was said to be neither a nice man nor a happy one.

Fouad Al-Husam and William Griffin were rumored to be in Singapore-perhaps following a trail. Whether or not they had remained in the Bureau and become witnesses for the government, no one could say.

Jane Rowland could have cleared them all. But of course Jane Rowland could not say a word. Her agency did not exist.

Tom Cantor also did not exist.

Little Jamey Trues met his family in New Mexico, which refused to extradite him back to Texas. Four months later, the governor of Texas was impeached and removed from office.

Half of the staff of the Texas Department of Corrections-along with the entire sheriff's department of Lion County-was relieved of duty.

Surprise, surprise-Axel Price and his large family had turned up six months ago in the Dominican Republic, to be warmly greeted by Colonel Sir John Yardley. Like the Saudi prince, Price reportedly sported two deep, unsightly scars, one on each cheek-and was said to be broken both physically and psychologically, perhaps because he had no idea where his fortune had gone, and so no idea what he was going to do next.

Fouad had never said a word about his actions at the Smoky. But to Rebecca he had murmured, on the flight back to Maryland, "Bad kings kill the land."

After several days of gray, wet weather, the Florida sun had this afternoon returned to its powerful conviction that the Earth was not nearly warm enough. Its brazen light was as extraordinary as the food. The parking lot reflected a hot metal glow on her face, but she barely squinted.

Rebecca dabbed the second half of a hard-boiled egg in the pinkish dressing-rich with chunks of green olive-and watched storm-driven combers roar up onto the beach, throwing golden spray almost as high as the fishing pier.

The long drought was over. One after another, powerful hurricanes were pushing up from the gulf into Texas and Mexico, bringing muddy floods to Lion County, El Paso, and Juarez.

Excellent surfing, the best the locals had ever seen.

The waitress approached and Rebecca lifted her dessert menu as if to block the glare, but in fact she was covering the woman's face. Faces were too intense even now-she read too much into them, did not know how to stop her infinitely detailed interpretation of the twists and tics of so many muscles.

She had as hard a time with faces as she did with utter darkness. Darkness terrified her-and that was only one reason why she loved it.

She took joy in being scared.

Rootless.

Nascent.

Still, she preferred daytime, wide white beaches, hot sun. And until yesterday, she had preferred to be alone.

Soon she would conquer both faces and darkness and society. She would come out of her cocoon and spread her wings, fully human again and stronger than ever.

Dr. Plover, the third time around, had finally gotten it mostly right-if you allowed for a long latency.

And some interesting new wrinkles.

The waitress asked her what she wanted for dessert.

"Key Lime pie," Rebecca said. "And malt vinegar."

"For the pie?"

"Just bring it," Rebecca answered curtly.

"Sure thing, hon. Coffee with that?"

Rebecca smiled behind the menu, her eyes crinkling.

"No thank you… hon," she said.

Vinegar acted on her much like coffee-which she could no longer drink. Vinegar was the new caffeine. Caffeine was the new cause of severe migraine headaches.

"Right." The waitress departed and Rebecca faced the sun again.

A man she did not know moved over from the bar, casually stopped by her table, and leaned in too close. "Waiting for someone?" he asked. In his thirties, sunburned, puffy from drink and worry, wearing a pink golf shirt and white slacks, he was from central Ohio, very likely on vacation from a recent divorce.

All this from the corner of her eye.

"Yes, I am," she said.

"Well, I'll be back if he doesn't show."

Rebecca forced herself to look the man full in the face. She lifted her upper lip, revealing eyeteeth, and blinked, eyes wide and green and pale, like a baby's.

Then she reached down for the black fiberglass cane with the shining steel head parked between her knees. Twirled it with two fingers.

The puffy sunburned man backed away as if stung, bumping into a table. He quickly paid his check and left the restaurant, but not before muttering something to the waitress.

She brought Rebecca her Key lime pie and Heinz malt vinegar in a dribble-top bottle. "Man, I need what you got. Can you teach me that trick?"

Rebecca shook her head. "Comes with baggage," she said.

She paid her bill just as the metallic blue Bentley drove into the parking lot, top down.

The waitress gawped. "Jesus, what's that kind of car cost? Where does he drive it, to the grocery-to the beach?"

To Brazil, Rebecca thought.

Nathaniel came into the restaurant and stood by the antique brass cash register. With a big grin, he hoisted a cardboard sign with three words lettered in thick black marker: "Jones Motor Tours."

Rebecca picked up her cloth sling bag-all she had in the world, plus the cane-and walked over to take his arm.

They had not seen each other in a year.

They hardly knew each other.

The waitress gawped some more, lost in her dreams, then smiled broadly and silently applauded Rebecca.

Nathaniel led Rebecca to the parking lot and opened the Bentley's door.

"She's going to remember this," Rebecca said as he pushed the starter button and the Bentley purred to powerful life. "Can we be a little less obvious from now on?"

"Of course," Nathaniel said. "How's the cosmic mind?"

"Coming along," Rebecca said. "Killed anybody yet?"

"No," Nathaniel said. "Well, actually-I found Jerry Lee in New Mexico."

"Oh," Rebecca said.

"He was in a bad way. Not really a human being any more. I did him a mercy. There's still a couple of hundred of us out there… Could go either way, I guess. Not much I can do about them."

"What did Jones think?"

"Jones doesn't communicate with me anymore."

"Still working?"

"Who knows?" Nathaniel said. "Let's just say he was feeling generous. Mr. Price's money has been placed at your disposal."

"My disposal? Not yours?"

"I'm not sure Jones trusts me. We're too much alike."

The Bentley's warm cream leather heated her skin as they drove northwest along the Bayfront Parkway toward Pensacola.

"How long do we have, really?" Rebecca asked Nathaniel.