Jack McDevitt - POLARIS

“It’s not supposed to happen. But Boland says, you put somebody under stress, and sometimes it does.”

“Tell me about Shawn Walker.”

“Walker was a son of a bitch.”

“What did he do? Threaten to tell what he knew?”

“He didn’t really understand what it was about, didn’t realize it was for him as well as for everybody else. All he saw was that he had a chance to make a killing. He knew we’d pay to keep him quiet. So he kept pushing. Pushed until we’d had enough.”

“Did Taliaferro help with that?”

“No.” All I could see was the pressure suit and the helmet. Her face was completely in shadow. “He didn’t have the stomach for it. Jess wanted him dead, just as I did, but he didn’t like the idea of having to do it.”

“So you took care of it.”

“Listen. I don’t need any moral lectures from you. You buy and sell the past.

Make your money. You don’t care whether everything goes into private collections, whether people hoard it so they can sell it off down the line. All you care about is turning a profit. I did what had to be done. And I can tell you I’d have preferred to see you walk away from all this. But you just didn’t know when to let go.”

I could feel the scrambler lying against my thigh. But it was down in a cargo pocket. It might as well have been in the Belle-Marie. “As soon as the Sentinel and the Rensilaer started back,” I said, “you sent your last message.”

“Yes.”

“And then you brought the Polaris here.”

“Of course. We left in the late afternoon, ship’s time, and we were here early next morning. I even spent a couple of nights here before going back.”

“Why’d you do it, Maddy?”

“Why’d I do what?”

“The whole Polaris thing. You were giving up who you were. Going into hiding for a lifetime. Was it that they promised to make you young again?”

She kept the lamp pointed at my eyes. “I think it’s time to end this. It’s getting up to an hour and a half since you came down here, and your buddy will be getting antsy. I want to be out at the airlock when she shows up. To say hello.”

“You were listening-”

“Of course I was.”

“So you’re going to have to kill two more people.”

“As soon as she sticks her face in the hatch. I’ll make it quick. Like you. She won’t even know I’m there.” Her finger tightened on the trigger. “Good-bye, Alex,” she said. “Nothing personal.”

“Chase, where are you?”

“She can’t hear you down here, Alex.”

It must have been a nervous moment for him, but I had her in my sights and could have taken her out at any time. She was standing in the doorway, half-in, halfout, paying no attention anywhere except to Alex. Completely fooled by a scripted conversation. The plan, of course, was to let her talk as long as she wanted. But obviously not to let her shoot anybody.

I suspected she would not give up meekly, and she had the pistol. If I told her to put it down, she could keep it trained on him, and we’d have a standoff. So I decided to go the safe route. Shoot first, talk to her later.

I aimed and fired. Scramblers, of course, are not lethal. There are some people who say that’s their drawback. Maddy gasped, and her lights went out. The pistol drifted away from her, and she just hung there, locked to the deck by her grip shoes.

Alex took a deep breath. “Chase,” he said, “where’ve you been?”

“Been right here,” I said. “The whole time.” I pushed past the woman into the room. She swayed.

“I was afraid maybe you got lost.”

I took her pistol and put it in my belt. Then I slipped the scrambler into a pocket.

“I was behind you the whole way, Big Guy.”

“I’m glad.”

I put my lamp up close to her helmet. “Is it really Maddy? How can it be?” I was looking at Teri Barber.

“Yeah, it is.”

“Incredible. I hope I look that good at a hundred.”

“She’s not quite that old.”

We stood quietly, trying to absorb the reality of the moment. “How did you know?”

“I didn’t, for certain. But I couldn’t think of any scenario that would account for three women, Barber, Shanley, and Maddy, who looked so much alike. And the fact that Kiernan looked like Taliaferro, and Eddie Crisp resembled a young Dunninger.

Even parents and their kids don’t look that much alike.”

“They could have been clones.”

“Not this bunch. Maddy, maybe. The others? There was no record of any clones.

And anyhow, they were population-control types. Opposed on principle to cloning except in special cases.” He shook his head. “I couldn’t imagine any reason for them to do that.”

“So you decided Dunninger had already achieved his breakthrough-”

“-And that it did more than extend life. It restored damage caused by the ageing process. Yes.”

“So they’re all alive? Except Dunninger?”

“And Taliaferro. Yes, I think so.”

“And they’re at Morton College,” I said.

“Very good, Chase. I don’t know whether they actually spend time there or not.

But I don’t think there’s any question that’s their base.”

“Margolis? Is he one of them? He didn’t look like anybody.”

“I don’t think so. I think he’s just hired help.”

I was shining my light around the room. Taking my first good look at the place we’d been searching for. “Taliaferro,” I said. “What happened to him? I mean, why’d he disappear?”

“He benefited from Dunninger’s discovery, like the rest of them. Except a couple of years passed before they administered it to him. I assume Mendoza was handling that.”

“Why would they wait?”

“Probably because they wanted to keep Taliaferro in charge at Survey. Once he became like them, his ageing process would go into reverse. He’d start getting younger every day.”

It was hard to swallow. “Alex,” I said, “I always understood age reversal was impossible.”

“That’s what the experts say. Obviously, Dunninger, and maybe Mendoza, figured out a way.”

I tied the generator into one of the circuits and adjusted the voltage. Alex hit the switch, and the lights came on. He took the key out of his pocket and handed it to me.

“Do the honors,” he said.

We went into the corridor, picked a closed door at random, aimed the remote, and pressed the button. Nothing happened, and we moved to the next door. “It’s here somewhere,” said Alex.

It was at the far end of the hall. I will never forget watching a guide light activate while the door tried to swing inward, but it wouldn’t because it was wedged tight so Alex gave it a kick. That broke it open and a table lamp came on. Maddy’s apartment.

“Congratulations,” I said.

“Yes.” He was wearing a large smile. “We do seem to have done it, don’t we?”

“And the rest of them stayed in these other units,” I said.

Alex nodded. “I wonder what the mood was like.”

I could hear Maddy breathing over her open channel. “So what’s next?” I asked.

“We take Maddy back and figure out what we’re going to do with her. And then we’ll have a conversation with Everson.”

“You think he’ll agree to that?”

“Oh, yes,” Alex said. “In fact, I’ll be surprised if he’s not in touch as soon as he hears we’re back.”

“Do we need to do anything else here?”