Robert Wilson - Axis

She knew or could imagine much of what went on here. The compound no doubt functioned like other such communities, apart from their experiment with the child. Hidden somewhere, probably underground, were the ultra-low-temperature bioreactors in which Martian "pharmaceuticals" were propogated and stored. She had already seen the pottery kilns that functioned as camouflage: an uninvited visitor would be offered crude crockery and Utopian tracts and sent away none the wiser.

Diane had known or met most of the founding members. Only one of the original founders had not been a Fourth, and that was Mrs. Rebka herself. Presumably she had taken the treatment since.

"What I have to tell you," Diane said, "is that Genomic Security is in Port Magellan, apparently in force. And they'll find you before long. They've been following the Martian woman."

Mrs. Rebka maintained a steely calm. "Haven't they always been following the Martian woman?"

"Apparently they're getting better at it."

"Do they know she's here?"

"If they don't, they soon will."

"And your coming here might have led them to us. Did you think about that, Diane?"

"They've already connected Sulean Moi with Kubelick's Grave. They have Dvali's name. From there, how hard would it be for them to locate this place?"

"Not hard," Mrs. Rebka admitted, staring at the tabletop. "We're modest about our presence here, but still…"

"Still," Diane said, dryly. "Have you planned for this contingency?"

"Of course we have. We can be gone within hours. If we must."

"What about the boy?"

"We'll keep him safe."

"And how's the experiment going, Anna? Are you in touch with the Hypotheticals? Do they talk to you?"

"The boy is sick." Mrs. Rebka raised her head and frowned. "Spare me your disapproval."

"Did you ever consider what you were creating here?"

"With due respect, if what you say is true, we don't have time to debate."

Diane said—more gently—"Has it been what you hoped?"

Anna Rebka stood, and Diane thought she wasn't going to answer. But she paused at the door and looked back.

"No," she said flatly. "It hasn't."

Lise woke when sunlight from the window touched her cheek like a feverish hand.

She was alone in the room. Turk had gone off somewhere, probably taking a pee or inquiring about breakfast.

She dressed in the generic shirt and jeans the Fourths had provided for her, thinking about Avram Dvali, framing the questions she wanted to ask him. She needed to talk to him as soon as possible, as soon as she washed up and had something to eat. But there were hurried footsteps from the corridor beyond her door, and when she looked out the window she saw a dozen vehicles being loaded with supplies. She drew the obvious conclusion: these people were getting ready to abandon the compound. Lise could think of dozens of good reasons why they might want to. But she was suddenly afraid Dvali would be gone before she could talk to him; she hurried into the corridor and asked the first person who passed where she could find him.

Probably the common room, the passing Fourth advised her, down the corridor and left off the courtyard—but he might also be supervising the loading. She finally located him by the garden gate, where he was consulting some kind of written list.

Avram Dvali. She must have glimpsed him at the faculty parties her parents used to hold in Port Magellan, but she had seen so many unin-troduced adults at those events that their faces had been blenderized by memory. Did he look familiar? No. Or only vaguely, from photographs. Because he had taken the Fourth treatment he probably looked much as he had twelve years ago: a bearded man, big eyes in a rounded face. His eyes were shaded by a broad-brimmed desert hat. Easy to imagine him circulating through the Adams living room, one more middle-aged professor of something-or-other, a drink in one hand and the other prospecting in the pretzel bowl.

She suppressed her anxiety and walked straight toward him. He looked up as she approached.

"Miss Adams," he said.

He had been warned. She nodded. "Call me Lise," she said—to quell his suspicions, not because she wanted to be on a first-name basis with a man who had created and confined a human child for purposes of scientific research.

"Diane Dupree said you wanted to speak to me. Unfortunately, at the moment—"

"You're busy," she said. "What's going on?"

"We're leaving."

"Where are you going?"

"Here and there. It's not safe to stay, for reasons I imagine you understand."

"I really just need a few minutes. I want to ask you about—"

"Your father. And I'd be happy to talk to you, Miss Adams—Lise—but do you understand what's happening here? Not only do we have to leave with all deliberate speed, we need to destroy much of what we've built. The bioreactors and their contents, documents and cultures, anything we don't want to fall into the hands of our persecutors." He consulted a printed paper, then made a checkmark as two men dragged a dolly of cardboard boxes to one of the trucks. "Once we're ready to go, you and your friends can ride with me for a while. We'll talk. But for now I need to attend to business." He added, "Your father was a brave and principled man, Miss Adams. We disagreed about some things, but I held him in the highest regard."

That was something, at least, Lise thought.

Turk had gotten up early.

The sound of hurried footsteps in the hall woke him, and he was careful to roll out of bed without disturbing Lise, who had climbed in with him sometime during the night. She was half-wrapped in a blanket and softly snoring, tender as the creation of some benevolent god. He wondered how she would react to what he had told her about himself. Not the CV she'd been hoping for. More than enough to chase her back to her family in California, maybe.

He went to find Ibu Diane, meaning to offer his help if help was needed: everybody seemed to be carrying something. The Fourths were obviously getting ready to abandon the place. But Diane, when he found her in the common room, told him all the duties had been assigned and were being performed in some meticulous order by the Fourths, so he made himself breakfast. When he figured it was time to wake up Lise, if she wasn't up already, he headed back to their room.

He was intercepted by a young boy peering out of a doorway down the corridor. It could only be the boy Diane was so worked up about—the half-Hypothetical boy. Turk had pictured some freakish hybrid, but what stood in front of him was just a babyfaced twelve-year-old, his face flushed and his eyes a little wide.

"Hey there," Turk said cautiously.

"You're new," the boy said.

"Yeah, I got here last night. My name's Turk."

"I saw you from the garden. You and the other two." The boy added, "I'm Isaac."

"Hi, Isaac. Looks like everybody's pretty busy this morning."

"Not me. They didn't give me anything to do."

"Me neither," Turk said.

"They're going to blow up the bioreactors," the boy confided.

"Are they?"

"Yes. Because—"

But suddenly the boy stiffened. His eyes widened until Turk could see the small uncanny flecks of gold around the irises. "Whoa, hey—you all right?"

A terrified whisper: "Because I remember—"

The boy began to topple over. Turk caught him in his arms and called for help.

"Because I remember—"

"What, Isaac? What do you remember?"

"Too much," the boy said, and wept.

By dawn Brian Gately was on a transport plane lofting out of Port Magellan's major airport, strapped into a bench seat with Weil on one side of him and Sigmund on the other. Elsewhere in the plane was a group of armed men—not quite soldiers, since they wore no insignia on their flak jackets. The interior of the plane was stripped-down and possessed all the homely comfort of an industrial warehouse. Brian could tell day was breaking by the red glow coming through the porthole-sized windows.