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 Dedicated to Robert Bentley for his pragmatism 
and encouragement—LWE 
Dedicated to Prof. Charles Blinderman for his support 
and encouragement—CP 


Chapter One


 A siren screamed somewhere on the streets below, then faded, and Casper Beech tried hard not to take 
it as an evil omen.


 After all, whoneeded evil omens to know he was facing disaster? Any time he got called in to see the 
boss, ithad to be bad news. Casper's entire life had been an ongoing demonstration of just how horrible 
the alleged Chinese curse, “May you come to the attention of people in high places,” could be.


 He supposed it had been bad enough even in the old days, before the perpetual Crisis, before 
everything, as the propaganda put it, had been made more efficient to meet the economic and geopolitical 
challenges of the twenty-first century. Now, though, when all the people in high places, all the bosses, 



were working together, it was hell. Any time he had to talk to the boss, any boss, his life got worse.

were working together, it was hell. Any time he had to talk to the boss, any boss, his life got worse.

 He hesitated in the doorway of the cubicle, peering in. “You wanted to see me, Mr. Quinones?” he 
asked.

 Quinones looked up at him, smiled, then leaned back in his chair. The chair did not squeak, as Casper's 
would have, but sighed faintly as the cushion reshaped itself under his weight. Behind Quinones the 
towers of Center City Philadelphia were visible through the broad expanse of window, towers that 
formed a panorama of glass and concrete glittering in the sun. A vapor trail straggled across the sky 
above the gleaming skyline.

 "Ah, yes, Casper,” Quinones said. “Please, come in and have a seat."

 Casper entered, his feet silent on the thick carpet, and nervously perched himself on the hard edge of a 
handy chair.

 Quinones leaned forward again, and pulled at a hardcopy folder on his desk. His screens were folded 
down out of sight, as usual—he was fond of saying that his work was with people, not computers. “I'd 
like to discuss your job performance, Casper,” he said, opening the folder.

 "Is there some complaint?” Casper asked uneasily. If he'd screwed up a liability trace he was dead, he 
knew it—but he didn't think he had.

 Of course, someone could have complained anyway.

 "Not exactly.” Quinones smiled. He turned over a few pages in the folder without bothering to look at 
them; it was clear to Casper that the documents were just props, something to keep his hands busy, to 
help him time his words for maximum dramatic effect. Anything important would have been on a screen, 
not on paper.

 "Casper,” Quinones said jovially, “we've come to the conclusion that your job skills are outdated. We 
need to keep up with the latest software, you know, and we're going to. An entire new system will be 
installed over the coming weekend, and it doesn't look like you'll know how to run it."

 "No, sir,” Casper admitted, “I probably won't.” Damn, he thought, am I about to be fired? If he once 
lost this job he'd probably never find another one anywhere in the Consortium, and outside firms didn't 
pay enough for him to live on. He was still paying off his parents’ legal fees; any cut in his income would 
mean he'd starve.

 He couldn't stop paying the debts, or they'd come and take everything he owned, up to and including a 
few body parts. Starvation, though, wasn't their problem.

 "We've considered our alternatives,” Quinones told him, leaning back again. “It's not cost-effective to 
re-train you by ordinary methods—it's simply too time-consuming. And bringing in someone new to do 
the work wouldn't be any better—again, too time-consuming. We need to have someone running traces 
withinminutes after the new software comes on-line next Monday morning—minutes, Casper.” He 
waggled a fat finger to emphasize his point, then continued, “We have come to the conclusion that the 
most practical course of action—theonly practical course of action, really—will be to send you in for a 
full course of imprinting in the use of the new software." 


 For a moment that didn't register; then the words sank in. Oh, God, Casper thought, neuro-imprinting 

 For a moment that didn't register; then the words sank in. Oh, God, Casper thought, neuro-imprinting 

 At least this meant he still had his job, though. He wouldn't have to join the unemployed and homeless, 
living in the streets. He'd still have both kidneys.

 "I suppose it's for the best,” he said, his voice thin and weak.

 "We think so,” Quinones said. Once again, he produced his artificial smile, this time a variant that was 
probably meant to be comforting and paternal. “And, Casper,” he added, “you won't be the only one. 
We've made arrangements with NeuroTalents LLC for a group discount. We'll be having quite a few 
people imprinted."

 "And I gotlucky enough to be sent off first?” Casper asked.

 Quinones nodded, deaf to the feeble sarcasm. “The work schedule decided it. You're the most available 
at the moment."

 Casper remembered the list of jobs he had found on his screen when he had arrived at the office half an 
hour before, and he wondered what his co-workers were faced with if that schedule left him “most 
available.” He made no comment on that; he just nodded and asked, “When do I go?"

 "You'll see Dr. Jalali this afternoon for a physical. Assuming she doesn't find anything that would keep 
you from going, you're scheduled for tomorrow morning at ten."

 Casper suppressed a shudder. “I suppose it's well to get it over with quickly,” he said, trying 
unsuccessfully to force a smile.

 Quinones nodded again. “And you'll need a day or two for the new information to settle in,” he said 
blithely. Casper shuddered, and his discomfort with the idea finally seemed to register with his superior. 
“Don't worry about the imprinting,” Quinones told him, with another falsely paternal smile. “Those 
problems they had in the early days have all been taken care of. You'll be fine."

 Casper nodded. “I'm not worried about that,” he lied. He was quite sure Quinones had never been 
imprinted, and never would be if he could help it. The bosses didn't need to worry about such things. The 
Consortium took care of its managers, and the Democratic-Republican Party took care of the 
Consortium.

 Anyone who wasn't in the Consortium or the Party, though, was on his own.

 "Good,” Quinones said. He closed the folder. “And Casper, don't worry about coming in to work 
tomorrow, either. Just go straight over to NeuroTalents in the morning, and relax afterwards.” He smiled 
beneficently, as if he had just conferred a great favor.

 The smug bastard probably thought he had, Casper told himself. Aloud, he said, “Thank you. That will 
be nice."

 Then Casper slipped out of the office and wove his way back across the big room to his own little niche, 
where he collapsed into his chair. He sat motionless, sunk in gloomy inertia for several minutes before he 
managed to lift his fingers back onto the keyboard and start the day's first liability trace. 


 A California drug company had sold a Mexican factory a bad batch of stimulants and killed three 
workers. The drug company was a member of the Consortium, but its insurance company wasn't; the 
factory was Consortium-owned as well, and had no insurance. Casper's job was to trace ownership, 
liability, and contract terms to establish just who should sue whom in order to ensure that the Consortium, 
its member companies, and their stockholders either lost as little money as possible, or, if it could be 
arranged, made as much as possible off the incident.

 A California drug company had sold a Mexican factory a bad batch of stimulants and killed three 
workers. The drug company was a member of the Consortium, but its insurance company wasn't; the 
factory was Consortium-owned as well, and had no insurance. Casper's job was to trace ownership, 
liability, and contract terms to establish just who should sue whom in order to ensure that the Consortium, 
its member companies, and their stockholders either lost as little money as possible, or, if it could be 
arranged, made as much as possible off the incident.

 Imprinting was not something he looked forward to, but his mood improved as he worked. New 
software might make traces like this less tedious, and the imprinting would be quick, at any rate.

 And he still had his job. That was the most important thing. He wouldn't starve.

 Within an hour he was over most of his depression.

 Casper got the call to report to Dr. Jalali around 2:00; he shut down his screen and headed down to the 
medical offices on the third floor. The checkup was routine; the scanners found nothing which would 
prevent Casper from taking the imprinting as scheduled.

 He had mixed feelings about that. It was nice to know he was healthy, and his brain activity normal, but 
he almost wished that they had found a neural anomaly or something that would keep him from accepting 
an imprint.

 Of course, if he had had such a problem, he would have lost his job—but it wouldn't have been for 
cause, and he might have qualified for a disability income, or even have been able to swing a 
discrimination-against-the-handicapped suit. He'd heard the Party sometimes used those to keep 
companies in line.

 No, he told himself as he pulled his shirt back on, that was daydreaming. Nobody won discrimination 
suits against a member of the Consortium, and Data Tracers was a member in good standing. They had 
access to the best lawyers in the world—and of course, to people like himself, who would find ways to 
re-route any responsibility.

 And it didn't matter; his brain was perfectly healthy. Dr. Jalali said so. She had told him that he could 
take the imprint without any trouble at all.

 He sighed, and headed back to his cubicle.

 When Cecelia Grand called to say she had to work late at the law office, he snatched at the chance to 
cancel their date—he was too worried about the imprinting to deal with Cecelia and her whims. Instead 
he spent the evening home alone, drinking cheap beer and playing old, faded CDs until he finally fell into 
bed around midnight.

 That was Tuesday.

 Wednesday morning he awoke at the usual time without meaning to; since his appointment was at ten he 
had intended to sleep late. Instead he took his time over breakfast, and left his apartment an hour later 
than usual. 


 He reached NeuroTalents in plenty of time despite his dawdling, and walked slowly through the 
Institute's lobby, admiring the fountains and the greenery that grew toward the high glass ceiling. Studying 


the scenery put the inevitable off for another minute or two.

 NeuroTalents’ receptionist was a handsome young man; the way he was dressed made Casper feel 
shabby. 
Which was reasonable, really—Casperwas shabby. He knew it, but he didn't like to admit it. 
"May I help you?” the receptionist asked. 
"I hope so,” Casper said uneasily. “I'm scheduled for an imprinting at ten. The name is Casper Beech, 


3036-94-7318." 
The young man sucked on his teeth as he checked his screen. “Ah, yes,” he said, “I have it here. We've 
received your records and the report from Dr. Jalali.” He swung a screen around and handed Casper a 


stylus. “If you would just sign this waiver of liability, we'll take care of you immediately."


 Casper read over the form; it was a standard corporate waiver, with NeuroTalents and his employer 
agreeing to cover any medical expenses that were incurred in exchange for his forfeiting his right to sue. 
He grimaced. He was already uncomfortable about the procedure, and this waiver was not encouraging 


in the least. Every day at work he saw reports on what could happen to people who signed these. 
It wasn't as though he had any real choice, though. He signed the form and tapped ENTER. 
The receptionist checked the signature against a display on his primary screen, then nodded. “Very 


good, Mr. Beech,” he said. “If you would take that elevator there up to the fourth floor, a technician will 


see you." 
He was even more nervous than he had realized; when he first tried to give his floor the elevator 
answered, “We're sorry, sir, but your order was not understood."


 "Four, please,” Casper repeated, trying unsuccessfully to distract himself by wondering, as he had for 


years, why so many machines were programmed to speak of themselves in the plural. 
When he reached the fourth floor a green-smocked technician with a clipboard awaited him. “Please 
follow me,” the technician said brusquely before striding down the corridor. She didn't look back, and for 
a moment Casper thought wildly of making a run for it.


 But where would he go? Meekly, he followed her.


 His guide brought Casper to the open door of a small room and pointed inside. “Put your clothes in 
there,” she said. “I'll be back in five minutes." 
The technician left. Casper was relieved to find a paper jumpsuit and slippers on a shelf; he began to 


change, and pulled on the second slipper just as the technician returned. 
"This way, sir,” she said. 


 He was strapped into a large, complicated chair in a smaller room a few doors down; then the technician 

 He was strapped into a large, complicated chair in a smaller room a few doors down; then the technician 

 "There's nothing to worry about,” the technician said, clearly reciting a set speech. “The monitors are just 
to keep tabs on your bodily functions. Once we start the procedure, a sleep inducer will put you under 
for the duration. When you wake up, it'll be over.” She smiled mechanically.

 Casper smiled back shakily, and closed his eyes. The technician flipped the switch to start the sleep 
inducer, and Casper quickly slipped under.

 The technician checked him over swiftly and efficiently; then she waved the go-ahead signal to the 
monitor camera and slipped out of the room. In the central control room another technician saw the 
signal, hit a button, and turned away.

 The procedure was fully automated, with technicians present only to troubleshoot when something did 
not go according to schedule. Under most circumstances, unless an alarm went off or the machines told 
them something was wrong, their attention was directed elsewhere. After all, watching someone sleep is 
impossibly dull, even if the subject's brain is doing various interesting things.

 Casper's chosen skill file consisted of a few gigabytes of data on a microptical disk, tagged and ready to 
be fed into his brain; first, however, the scanners had to examine Casper's neural pathways and 
brainwave patterns. The file would be imposed on these pathways, but the machines had to be sure that 
the file was not so radically opposed to the recipient's mental structure that some harm could occur. Dr. 
Jalali's preliminary survey had shown that Casper's brain could accept imprinting, but not that he could 
accept any particular program; since the individual programs were all proprietary information owned by 
NeuroTalents or their independent vendors, not to be distributed freely to other companies’ doctors even 
within the Consortium, the doctor had not had the information to verify that Casper could handle this 
specific skill-set.

 The central computer began matching program details against neural pathways, checking for conflicts.

 While the mapping was taking place, however, a badly-worn sector of old disk storage finally gave out, 
dropping approximately sixty bytes from the system's primary command programming, from a total of 
some two and a half million lines of code.

 When the time came to check the scan against the waiting skill file, an uninitialized variable came up 
garbage—the code that should have set it was missing. The error-handling software, never tested in this 
particular situation, attempted unsuccessfully to compensate.

 The waiting skill file was ignored. The mapping continued, into secondary and then tertiary areas of 
detail, levels that were totally unnecessary for an ordinary skill imprint. A set of restricted-access files, 
quite separate from the scheduled one, was accessed and readied.

 A technician looked up casually from his magazine at the monitoring panel, then stopped and looked 
again. He had thought the subject in Suite B was in for a regular skill imprint, but his instruments showed 
that he was in the middle of optimization programming.

 He didn't remember anyone scheduling any optimizations. Weren't there supposed to be extra 
precautions for optimizations? A skill imprint just added a few new patterns to the subject's brain, 
plugging in a little new information and some artificial habits, but an optimization more or less rebooted 
the entire brain, streamlining the entire personality and redirecting it toward a predetermined goal, adding 


whatever information and habits might be useful for that purpose.

whatever information and habits might be useful for that purpose.

 The technician looked for warning flags, but found none. The system appeared to be running smoothly.

 Well, he told himself, it wasn't any of his business, as long as the machines were running properly. With a 
shrug, he went back to his reading.

 The computer's optimization program examined the map that had been made of Casper's brain. It then 
compared this map with its available imprint programs, matching more than seven million points of 
comparison. The more closely the map and the program matched, the more efficiently the subject would 
assimilate the program; the more efficiently the program was assimilated, the less likely it was that parts of 
the program would be lost.

 It took the computer seven minutes and forty-three seconds to find the program that most closely 
matched the map it was using. Having found this match, the computer checked its insertion options.

 There were no options specified in its damaged instructions, so it went to its ancient default settings, 
unused for half a decade. The computer prepared for a wetware flash.

 Up until now Casper had slept peacefully, but when the flash began his body stiffened under the shock.

 A brain flash had been described by one of its early recipients as the mental equivalent of being 
force-fed a large apple in one bite, and most people who had had the experience since agreed with this 
description. An optimization was an extreme case, however, and Casper felt as if his entire brain and 
sensory apparatus were being overloaded, burned out, then instantly rebuilt and overloaded again. His 
mind, unable to handle this, simply shut down.

 The flash was over in one and three-tenths seconds, but Casper's twitching body didn't begin to relax 
until several minutes later.

 The technician on duty, between bites of a sandwich, noticed the readings on his panel and sat up 
abruptly, dropping his lunch back into its bag. He took a moment to make sure that the readings weren't 
into the danger area, and then he sent another technician down to check on the subject.

 Casper was waking up when the technician arrived and began hurriedly to disconnect him. He lay 
passively, not really aware of anything, until the technician handed him a cup of water.

 Forcing his hand to close on the cup served to jar his thoughts into motion again. He sat up and tried to 
drink the water, but as much went onto the floor or his shaking fingers as into his mouth.

 "...sure you're all right?” he heard.

 Casper realized that the technician was talking to him. He made a conscious effort to find the technician 
with his eyes and bring him into focus. His mouth worked for a moment before he could force any sound 
out.

 He didn't want any trouble; he might lose his job if anything was wrong, and there wouldn't be a 


disability pension, not when he'd gone this far. “I'll be fine,” he said at last. “Just let me sit for a minute."


 The technician nodded and began examining the chair. The first thing he did was to check the chair's 
recording devices, assuring himself that they were working properly. 
Casper pushed himself upright, swaying slightly as he stood. “I think I'll be okay after I get some fresh 


air,” he said.


 "Yeah, I hope so. Here, let me help you,” the technician said. He took Casper by the arm and led him to 
the changing room. 
The technician did more of the work of dressing him than Casper could manage for himself, but after 


several minutes he was in street clothes again. The technician helped him to the elevator. 
By the time they reached the lobby Casper was feeling well enough to proceed on his own. He scrawled 


his signature illegibly on a paper acknowledging completion of contracted services, then managed to 
make his way unsteadily down the mall to the subway. 
He began feeling worse again on the train. He barely recognized his home station, but got out before the 


doors closed and staggered back to his building. He stumbled twice on the broken steps, but finally 


fumbled his way into his apartment, where he undressed and stumbled into bed. 
At NeuroTalents the technician who had spotted the irregular procedure said angrily to one of his 
shiftmates, “I thought they didn't flash wetware any more." 
"They do in emergencies,” she answered. “But you've got to have a doctor present." 
"Well, there wasn't any doctor on this one, and it wasn't much of an emergency, either." 
She shrugged. “Programming error, I guess. Think we should report it?"


 The tech hesitated. The prospect of additional paperwork overcame his moral outrage, and he said, 
“Nah, I guess not." 
The other nodded.


 "Hell of a thing, either way.” The other technician was no longer listening, he saw; she had gone back to 
watching her pocket video set. “No wonder they get the liability waivers first thing,” he mumbled to 
himself as he checked over his board.

 Chapter Two

 Casper awoke the next morning with a tremendous headache. He sat up slowly, but as he came upright 
nausea boiled up in his belly. For a long uncomfortable moment he thought he was going to vomit. Black 
spots appeared in front of him. He lay back and put his pillow over his face.

 It was twenty minutes later before he could make the major effort necessary to reach for the phone and 
call in to work and let them know he wouldn't be in. That done, he rolled over and went back to sleep. 


 He slept until shortly before six o'clock the following morning, when he awoke to find the headache 
gone, but not the nausea. He still felt weak and shaky.


 Even as his stomach told him otherwise, he knew he had to eat something. He managed to stagger into 
the kitchen, where he forced down some leftovers from the refrigerator.


 That relieved the nausea slightly, to his surprise. Blinking gummy eyes, he worked out the next thing to 
do; he went into the bathroom to take a shower.


 Standing under the hot water made him feel almost alive again, and when he got out he decided he really 
ought to try to go in to work.


 He sat on the edge of his bed for several minutes before he had enough energy to get up and finish 
dressing, moving slowly toward the door as he fastened buttons, zippers, and Velcro.


 He stumbled down the stairs and out onto the sidewalk. As he aproached the entrance to the subway he 
missed a turn, and didn't realize until he passed a construction site that he was going the wrong way. He 
turned around and retraced his path.


 He had walked that same path to the subway for years. He would have sworn he could walk it in his 
sleep. That he had missed a turn meant he was in worse shape than he had thought.


 If old, comfortable mental patterns like that had been disturbed—was that a side effect of the imprint? 
Did it clear out the old to make way for the new?


 Nobody had ever mentioned that, and he didn't like the idea at all. If he had lost memories, would he 
ever even know they were gone?


 By the time he reached the foot of the subway station stairs the regular morning commuter crowd had 
gathered on the station platform, filling the tunnel with the smell of sweat on top of the ingrained stench of 
dirt, metal, and urine, a stench that had seeped into the very grit on the walls.


 All in all, perhaps two dozen people were waiting for the next train. Casper leaned against one of the 
pillars and looked at them.


 In the evenings the subway crowd included many couples, family groups, and youth gangs. Here, though, 
the crowd was entirely composed of individuals. Casper found this oddly interesting, and watching them 
took his mind off the pounding in his temples.


 It occurred to him that if those individuals could be unified, somehow, they could—well, could what?


 They could do things, certainly—but what?


 He shook his head slightly. His thoughts were a jumble, and he gave up trying to force them into 
coherence.


 A train screeched into the station, stirring up the dirt and filling the station with noise, and he joined the 
others in boarding it. He was lucky enough to get a seat immediately, and he rode with his forehead 
pressed against the window, looking out at the tunnel.


 There were a lot of details that he seemed to be noticing for the first time—the location of the pillars, for 


instance, as the train pulled into the next station. Except for one broken stump near the far end of the 
platform the pillars provided excellent cover, and a pillar would never be more than four or five meters 
away. The occasional bullethole proved that the pillars were a formidable barrier—good defenses to 
cover a retreat down the tunnel.


 What an odd thing to notice, Casper thought, startled by his own musings. Why would he pay any 
attention to something like that? His study of the crowd back on the platform had been curious, too. He 
had been vaguely aware of where everyone was, all of the time he was there. And he hadn't so much 
noticed that everyone was alone as he had noticed that no one was together, that there was no 
organization in the crowd.


 Why was he thinking about that?


 Why was he thinking aboutanything when he felt so rotten?


 He turned to face into the train, leaned his head back, and closed his eyes. The motion and stink of the 
train upset his stomach, though, so he opened his eyes again, which seemed to help.


 He was staring at the man seated on the other side of the car. The man shifted angrily in his seat, and 
Casper, realizing what he was doing, averted his gaze.


 The train finally pulled into the Race/Vine station, and he swayed to his feet. There were almost as many 
people getting on here as getting off, and Casper, in his unsteady state, had a little trouble getting through 
the doors. Eventually he made it onto the platform and headed for the stairs to the street.


 The short walk to the office seemed interminable, but at last he made it, only slightly late.


 Quinones happened to be arriving at the same time as Casper. He nodded a greeting.


 "Feeling all right today, Beech?” he asked.


 "Yes, Mr. Quinones.” Casper hesitated, then added, “I had a bad time with the imprinting, but I feel fine 
now."


 "Good, good,” Quinones said; Casper braced for a slap on the back, but it didn't come. “We've got 
quite a bit of work for you to do,” Quinones said.


 "I'm ready for it,” Casper told him. He didn't bother to try to smile or sound enthusiastic; he knew he 
couldn't pull it off, and Quinones wouldn't care in any case.


 Quinones strode off to his office while Casper shuffled to his desk. He sat down, logged on, and looked 
at the list of work that awaited him. There were eighteen urgent traces already in the queue, some of them 
obviously complex and time-consuming, and more would probably come in before quitting time.


 He sighed.


 "It's going to be a busy day,” he muttered.


 Lester Polnovick stopped his crane and rubbed his forehead. He'd had a ferocious headache ever since 
he had left NeuroTalents the day before, after his imprinting. The flicker from the crane's monitor screen 
seemed to be making it worse; he couldn't turn the screen off, but he did turn down the brightness. 


 The headache wasn't important, he told himself. What was important was that after years of failing the 
qualifying exams for management positions he had scraped up the money to have the necessary skills 
imprinted. Crane work was getting scarce, now that robots were doing most of it, and the pay wasn't 
what it used to be; it was time to move on. Soon he'd be exchanging his blue collar for a white 
one—symbolically, at any rate, since the collar of his work shirt was silver-grey, and he hadn't seen a 
white shirt in years, not since the city, at the insistence of the Consortium and with the Party's blessing, 
had given up enforcing the clean air laws.

 The headache wasn't important, he told himself. What was important was that after years of failing the 
qualifying exams for management positions he had scraped up the money to have the necessary skills 
imprinted. Crane work was getting scarce, now that robots were doing most of it, and the pay wasn't 
what it used to be; it was time to move on. Soon he'd be exchanging his blue collar for a white 
one—symbolically, at any rate, since the collar of his work shirt was silver-grey, and he hadn't seen a 
white shirt in years, not since the city, at the insistence of the Consortium and with the Party's blessing, 
had given up enforcing the clean air laws.

 Lester waved and grabbed the control levers. He swung his load of temporary flooring around and 
raised it to the top of the building framework, and then looked over the growing structure while the crew 
was unloading the sling.

 This was to be the Volcker Financial Center, Philadelphia's attempt to claim its share of the booty now 
that yet another string of terrorist attacks had finally driven New York's Wall Street to decentralize.

 Lester was unimpressed with the structure. “It wouldn't take much to bring that whole thing right down,” 
he mused aloud; due to spending so much time alone in the crane's cab he had gotten in the habit of 
talking to himself. “Just a small charge there, there, and maybe there, ought to do it.” A certain warm 
satisfaction seeped into him at the realization.

 Then he frowned. “Why did I think of that?” he asked himself. “What do I know about it?” Could there 
have been information in his imprinting about explosives and demolition? What the hell didthat have to do 
with management?

 Had there been some sort of error? Some of the technicians at NeuroTalents had looked sort of worried 
when he had left.

 His headset crackled, and he forgot about it. “Okay, Les, go get another load,” the crew boss's voice 
told him.

 Les swung the crane back toward the pile of flooring, and waited for the next batch to be secured.

 Stu and Carl had just finished strapping another load into the sling when the lunch whistle blew. Les 
reached for the ignition switch, then paused. Slowly, without quite knowing why, he withdrew his hand. 
He waited quietly in the cab until the rest of the crew had settled down for lunch, and then he slipped out 
the side door.

 He didn't know at first where he was going, but using a stack of pipes for cover, he made his way 
towards the shack where the explosives were stored.

 He stood for a moment at the door, uncertain what he was doing—or rather, why he was doing it. He 
knew what he wanted, knew that hehad to do it, but he didn't know why.

 But then he shrugged. It didn't matter why; hehad to do it. He reached for the handle.

 As he had hoped, the shack was unlocked, despite strict company regulations and city ordinances to the 
contrary. Convenience had won out over the law once again. 


 "What's going on here, Polnovick?” said the voice of Keough, the ground-crew foreman, as Les felt a 

 "What's going on here, Polnovick?” said the voice of Keough, the ground-crew foreman, as Les felt a 

 "I noticed the door to the shack was open,” he said, turning. “I just thought I'd close it."

 "Yeah, well, why don't you just let me worry about it.” Keough eyed him suspiciously, then pushed past 
him into the shack. “You got something going in here? Something special, maybe?"

 "Nope,” Polnovick answered. He smiled. He knew what to do. “You want to check, go ahead. 
Whatever you say.” He picked up a discarded length of pipe, hefted it silently, and then followed Keough 
into the shack.

 Casper worked through lunch, eating a vending-machine sandwich at his desk. He was having trouble 
working—even the simplest, most routine tasks seemed to be giving him trouble. He just couldn't get his 
thoughts in order; the habits of years all seemed to have disappeared. It was probably a residual effect 
from his bad reaction to the imprinting, he told himself, but whatever the reason, it meant that it took him 
longer to do his work.

 And so far, he had not picked up any new techniques or knowledge that he was aware of—but then, the 
new software wasn't running yet. This was Friday, and it would go in over the weekend.

 He was also supposed to have been given improved techniques for handling the old stuff, though, and 
any improvements certainly hadn't made themselves obvious.

 His office nemesis, Mirim Anspack, was among the first to return from lunch, and for the moment the 
two of them were the only people in the main room. She was Cecelia's roommate, and in fact Casper 
had only met Cecelia when the latter came to the office to pick up Mirim. Even before that momentous 
occasion, Mirim had delighted in teasing Casper; once he started dating Cecelia he had become the 
target of endless double entendres, and now that the imprinting and Casper's bad reaction were common 
gossip she had a new topic to tease him about.

 Casper didn't really mind. He was used to it. He could take it, and even dish out a little in return. If he 
hadn't been able to, Mirim would have left him alone after awhile; she wasn't cruel, just playful.

 She loitered near her desk for a few minutes, plotting her mischief, before approaching him.

 "So how's our new super-operator doing?” she asked.

 "Plodding along, like the rest of you. Wouldn't want to make you look bad."

 "Oh, you needn't worry; none of us would think of competing with you! No, we'll let you do everything, 
shall we?"

 "From the job list, I believe it. Can anyone do anything around here without me?"

 "We manage, although how..."

 A heavy rumble interrupted her; they both looked up, startled. The first rumble was followed by a 
second one several seconds later; the building shook, and a window blew out, scattering glass across the 
floor. Mirim and Casper both ducked down behind the desk. 


 They remained there for several seconds, not coming out of cover until they heard sirens. 
Cautiously, they crept out, side by side. Mirim was first to stand. 
"Whatwas that?” she gasped. 
"Sounded like an explosion—probably something commercial, not military.” Casper cocked his head to 
listen. “And that's small arms fire. Pistols, shotguns, maybe a submachine gun. I'd guess it's the police." 
Mirim looked at him, startled. “Where'd you learn anything about weapons?” she asked. 
"I don't know,” Casper answered, puzzled. “I just seem to know it.” He shrugged the matter aside and 
added, “Let's go take a look." 
Step by careful step they crossed the room, and together they peered out the shattered window. 
The street was covered with broken glass and litter; windows on other floors had gone, as well as their 
own. A few people lay on the sidewalk, apparently injured, and a car had gone out of control and run up 
onto a flight of steps. 
"What the hell is going on here?” Casper demanded. 
"I don't know. Maybe we'll get some answers soon, though—look there.” Mirim pointed towards the 
end of the block. A police cruiser with its roof-speakers up had just turned the corner and was driving 
toward them. They leaned out the window to hear better. 
"The area west of Twentieth Street between Chestnut and Arch, all the way to the river, is being 
evacuated,” the speakers announced. “If you have someplace to go outside of this area, please go there 
immediately. If you have no place to go, you should go to the Thirtieth Street Station at once. The area 
west..." 
Casper and Mirim looked at each other. “What the hell?” Mirim asked. 
"Must be terrorists,” Casper suggested. 
"Must be,” Mirim agreed. The two of them stared for a moment. 
"Want a ride?” Mirim asked. “The subways will be hell." 
"Yeah, thanks,” Casper said. “Let me get my jacket." 
"Would you like to come over to my place?" 
Casper hesitated. “I don't think so,” he said. 
"Oh, come on. I don't have any vile purpose in mind, I'm just being sociable. Cecelia will be there." 
Casper considered that. “You're sure?” he asked. 
"Of course I'm sure. Her office is in the evacuation zone, too, right?" 


 "Well, yeah,” Casper admitted. “All right, then, I guess it's safe."

 "Well, yeah,” Casper admitted. “All right, then, I guess it's safe."

 Casper groaned.

 Cecelia was already home when they arrived, and the apartment also held a very large, heavily muscled 
man named Leonid—Mirim's current bedmate, Casper knew.

 Leonid greeted Mirim with a passionate kiss, coupled with some indelicate pawing of her body; he then 
seemed to take sadistic delight in squeezing Casper's hand until it hurt. The first chance he got, Casper 
checked Leonid's knuckles to see if they were calloused from dragging on the ground.

 A TV feed was on their main video screen, quietly burbling CNN's usual line. “There was a news 
bulletin about five minutes ago announcing the evacuation,” Cecelia said as she brought in a tray of 
snacks. “Other than that, nothing."

 Nibbling on celery sticks and tortilla chips, the four of them settled down in front of the video; Mirim 
found the remote and began switching from one channel to the next.

 After nearly twenty minutes of nothing—CNN and al-Jazeera USA were covering the fighting in Siberia, 
while FoxNews had yet another congressman defending his record—she found a placard announcing a 
special bulletin on the city-mandated local news channel. She put down the remote, and a moment later 
the card was replaced by a man in light body armor, with a microphone in his hand.

 "This is John Covarrubias speaking to you from the corner of Market and Twenty-First. Just a few 
blocks from where I'm standing a construction worker by the name of Lester Polnovick has apparently 
gone berserk, and committed acts of wanton destruction. The situation is still confused; details remain 
vague. No known terrorist organization has claimed credit, nor has Polnovick made any demands."

 John Covarrubias was replaced by a view of the construction site. The partially-completed structure 
near the center of the lot had collapsed against a neighboring building. Police and rescue workers 
swarmed over the rubble.

 "As we understand it,” Covarrubias continued as the camera panned across the site, “Lester Polnovick, 
a crane operator, blew up the partially completed structure of the Volcker Financial Center, using 
explosives from the dynamite shack and causing it to collapse against the neighboring Takeuchi building.” 
A closeup of the tangle of girders piled against the buckling wall of the Takeuchi building flashed onto the 
screen. “Most of the construction crew had gathered here for lunch. At last count, seventeen were killed 
by the blast or the subsequent collapse; twenty more were seriously injured."

 Another shot, this time of a half-crushed police cruiser. “Officers Santiago and Hojaji of the city police 
were the first on the scene. Their vehicle was demolished by several steel girders dropped from 
Polnovick's crane. Officer Hojaji was killed instantly. Paramedics removed Officer Santiago from the 
scene, and we have no information on his whereabouts or condition."

 Covarrubias appeared on the screen again. “After this, Polnovick apparently used his crane as a 
battering ram on the surrounding buildings; because of the lunch-hour break few people were in the areas 
assaulted, and no injuries have been reported. The area has now been evacuated. Polnovick is still in the 
cab of the crane, and is believed to be armed." 


 "I wonder what made him do it?” Cecelia mused.

 "I wonder what made him do it?” Cecelia mused.
t 


him off." 
"There's been a lot of that sort of thing going on lately,” Leonid said authoritatively. “Incidents taking 
place all over the country. The continent, even."


 "Do you know much about that sort of thing?” Casper asked, looking up, wondering if Leonid might 
actually have a brain after all. 
"Leonid works for a security firm,” Mirim said. 
"It's part of my job to know what's going on,” Leonid said smugly. 
"And there's been a lot of this going on?” Casper asked. 
Leonid shrugged, then held up his hand for silence. “The SWAT team's on now. Let's see them take this 


guy down." 
They watched as the cameras followed the SWAT team moving into position. Leonid grunted with 
pleasure when a team sniper fired a single round, killing Polnovick as he sat in the cab of the crane. 
A thin stream of crimson trailed down the rusty metal siding below the cab window, and the news 
camera zoomed in. 
"Oh, God,” Cecelia said, flinching at the sight. Casper took her hand and squeezed it. 
"It could have been a lot worse,” he said. 
"Sure,” Leonid agreed. “Only nineteen dead and twenty injured. Why, just last month a dam in Kyrgyz 
was blown up. Over four hundred people were drowned. And the fighting's still going on in Russia." 
"Let's not dwell on it, huh?” Mirim asked. 
"Just pointing out how lucky we are to live in the States." 
"I'd feel lucky if I could get something to eat,” Casper interrupted. 
"Good idea,” Cecelia quickly agreed. “Give me a hand, Cas?" 
"Sure.” Casper followed her to the kitchen. As soon as they were around the corner, he lowered his 


voice and asked, “Where'd Mirim find that ape?" 
"Shh. I don't know. He doesn't come by here very often. Mirim usually goes over to his apartment." 
"Probably just as well. What do you have for dinner?"


 "Chicken sounds good.” Cecelia pulled the instruction strip off the end of the box of a frozen chicken 
diner, put the box into the heat chamber of the oven, and fed the instruction strip into the oven's control 
panel. The defrost cycle began immediately. 


 "Have you got any plans for after dinner?” Casper asked.

 "Have you got any plans for after dinner?” Casper asked.

 "Not offhand, but tomorrow's Saturday—no work even if they get the mess cleaned up. It's a good night 
to stay out late."

 "Sounds like a good idea. I'll order a newspaper and we'll decide what to do after dinner.” She leaned 
back and kissed him.

 When they got back from the movie Cecelia decided that it was far too late to send Casper 
home—especially with the headache he had developed. Instead she demonstrated that she had some 
interesting ways to take his mind off the pain.

 Chapter Three

 A single window near the top of NeuroTalents LLC building showed a light long past closing. Behind 
that window five men and three women were holding an urgent meeting, called hastily that afternoon. All 
of these people were unhappy. Half were angry, and the other half were more than a little frightened.

 "You're sure it was our doing?” the man at the head of the table asked, glaring at one of the young 
executives.

 The executive replied unhappily, “We're still investigating, sir, but it does look that way. Yesterday the 
subject in question, Lester Polnovick, had an appointment for an ordinary pre-programmed imprinting to 
learn accounting, personnel management, and computer skills. This wasn't a corporate contract; he'd 
saved up for it himself, to improve his employment prospects. He showed up on time, and was handled 
according to normal procedure, but our records indicate that instead of the package he had requested, he 
received an optimization imprinting. One that had nothing to do with the skills he had wanted."

 "How didthat happen?” the man at the head of the table demanded. “Don't we have technicians 
watching for this sort of thing? My lord, what are we paying them for?"

 "Well, uh ... well, yes, sir, we do. They saw that there was an optimization in progress, but the 
technicians don't necessarily know what a particular client is in for. That's all supposed to be taken care 
of by the computer; when the contracts are drawn up the computer is told what's wanted, and from then 
on it's all up to the machines."

 "Nobody checked? After all, we don't do a lot of optimizations."

 "Nobody checked. The computer said it was following the contract, and the technicians believed it."

 "All right, then, was the contract drawn up correctly?"

 "Yes sir, it was, and the right information was fed into the computer at that time. We have a hardcopy 
record, with print-out time and date, and it was correct."

 "So it was changed? What this man was supposed to get changed somewhere along the line?" 


 "Yes, sir." 
"All right, then, why did the computer make the change? Who told it to?" 
"That's not my department, sir.” The executive looked with relief at the woman who sat across the table 


from him. She cleared her throat nervously.


 "Mr. Yamashiro,” she said, “it appears to have been a hardware failure. A bad disk sector, 
compounded by a previously-unknown bug in the error-handling code." 
The chairman glared. “How could that happen?" 
"Uh ... poor maintenance, apparently.” She looked embarrassed. 
Yamashiro stared at her for a moment, then demanded, “Who's responsible for that?" 
"We don't know yet." 
Yamashiro snapped, “Find out.” Then he sighed. “All right, what's the damage? What exactly 
happened? What did this bad disk do?" 
"Well, sir, when the client came in for his appointment, he was scheduled for a pre-programmed 
imprinting in small business accounting and management. The computer lost a variable, and defaulted to 
an optimization program.” She paused for breath. 
"Go on,” Yamashiro told her. “What sort of optimization?" 
"Well, that's the tricky part,” the woman said. She glanced at her notes. “The switch appears to have 
bypassed three entire levels of security—if I may say so, sir, whoever put together the unified software 
should be fired and blacklisted, because that shouldn't have been possible. The error-handling code 
apparently assumes that any lost variable should be assigned the maximum available value—I suppose 
the idea was to go for maximum flexibility, but the effect is to bypass limits and safeguards. That's bad 
programming."


 Yamashiro nodded. “We bought it from the lowest bidder,” he said. “Sometimes you get what you pay 
for." 
"Yes, sir."


 "Go on,” the chairman said. “What happened?" 
The woman nodded and continued, “The computer accessed highly classified files, material we 
developed jointly with ... with a certain client.” She looked up. “You will recall that transaction two years 
ago?"


 Yamashiro nodded. “You mean the black-budget government work. I don't think you need to be coy; 
we're all grown-ups here tonight."

 "Yes.” She continued, “The computer examinedonly these classified files as its available options, and 
finally chose the Godzilla File as the best fit for this particular subject." 


 "The Godzilla File,” Yamashiro said. His fingers tapped the table.

 "The Godzilla File,” Yamashiro said. His fingers tapped the table.

 "There's something in there called the Godzilla File?"

 "Yes, sir."

 After a second of angry silence, Yamashiro demanded, “Who thehell gave it a stupid name like that?"

 "Well, sir, the names are generally chosen to reflect the nature of the file. For example, the Ninja File 
programs the recipient as an assassin, the Houdini File..."

 Yamashiro interrupted, “I don't need the whole list. All right, they've all got cutesy names. So what, 
exactly, is this Godzilla File?"

 "Demolitions and other related skills, primarily—intended for sabotage and terrorism overseas, I 
suppose. It's mostly concerned with the destruction of urban areas. The title refers to the old-time movie 
monster, for obvious reasons. And it's a compulsory patterning—the recipient feels a need touse his new 
skills."

 Mr. Yamashiro said, with acid in his voice, “You're telling me that this client was imprinted with the urge 
to stomp on buildings."

 "Basically, yes.” She nodded, then added, “We were lucky in this instance."

 "Lucky?” Yamashiro stared. “We're liable for nineteen deaths and hundreds of injuries and billions in 
property damage! How the hell can you consider our situation to be lucky?"

 The woman flinched. “Well, sir, he was taken down before he didmore damage—it could have been far 
worse if he had been, say, a pilot rather than a crane operator. Also ... well, the method used with these 
files is a wetware flash. This involves the file being fed into the client's brain very rapidly. Optimization is a 
complex process, and we've discovered that slower methods can sometimes result in psychological 
damage from conflicts between the old and new patterns. A flash is so fast such conflicts don't have time 
to develop."

 "Yes?” Yamashiro demanded. “So?"

 "Well, sir, ordinarily, before receiving a wetware flash, the client is prepared by a medical technician, 
with medication and hypnosis. If this preparation is not made, the client can have very noticeable adverse 
reactions—migraine headaches, nausea, minor memory loss—as the brain readjusts to its new patterns. 
These can disguise the immediate changes to some extent. More importantly, without the preparation, the 
skills tend to become available a piece at a time, rather than all at once; compulsions and abilities may 
remain in the brain as untriggered potential for extended periods before they're accessed. Without the 
preparation, it may take months or even years before the skills become fully available, and some are lost 
entirely. We're very fortunate there was no significant delay in Polnovick's case."

 Yamashiro stared at her. “Do you mean to tell me that you consider itlucky that this man went berserk in 
only a day, instead of years?" 


 "Yes, sir,” the woman said, holding her head up. “This client was unusually fit physically, and apparently 
had very few old habit patterns that conflicted with the Godzilla File. He seems to have achieved fairly 
complete access to the imprinted file within twenty-four hours. Because of this very brief delay, we've 
been able to piece together what happened. Much of the pertinent information came from short-term 
data storage, which is kept only twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Now that we have these clues, we'll be 
able to go over the long-term records and see if this has happened before."

 "Yes, sir,” the woman said, holding her head up. “This client was unusually fit physically, and apparently 
had very few old habit patterns that conflicted with the Godzilla File. He seems to have achieved fairly 
complete access to the imprinted file within twenty-four hours. Because of this very brief delay, we've 
been able to piece together what happened. Much of the pertinent information came from short-term 
data storage, which is kept only twenty-four to forty-eight hours. Now that we have these clues, we'll be 
able to go over the long-term records and see if this has happened before."

 "Our technicians are completely overhauling the whole system."

 Yamashiro frowned. “That's not good enough. The system messed up once, it can mess up again. I want 
those files, the dangerous ones, taken out of the system and locked away in the company vault."

 There was a long silence around the table. The Assistant Executive Director, who had not previously 
spoken, rolled a pencil between her palms. “That might not be possible,” she said.

 "Why not?"

 "These files are, technically, not the property of NeuroTalents LLC. They belong jointly to our parent 
corporation and that client Ms. Valakos mentioned, and we have to be ready to provide immediate 
access to these files at any time. It's in our contract."

 "What contract?"

 "Sir, our contract with that client."

 Yamashiro considered that unhappily for a moment, then yielded. “All right, then. Find some way to 
make sure there aren't any more accidents. And find everyone that's been imprinted with one of those 
files. And don't let anyone else find out about any of this!"

 Yamashiro rose gracefully and left the room, leaving his subordinates to handle the details themselves.

 Chapter Four

 Despite being active until well after midnight Casper found himself wide awake at six o'clock the next 
morning.

 This was not customary for him; usually he needed half an hour before his eyes would stay open in the 
morning. He lay on his back and stared at the ceiling for ten minutes, simply enjoying the sensation.

 He had too much energy to contain it any longer than that; he got up and dressed. Cecelia stirred slightly 
beside him, then settled back to sleep.

 Casper slipped out of the apartment, went down to the lobby, and stopped at the security desk. The 
guard looked up from his magazine. “May I help you?” he asked.

 "Hi,” Casper said, “I'm staying in Four-Ten. I want to go for a walk. Will I have any trouble getting back 


in without waking the people I'm staying with?"

in without waking the people I'm staying with?"
s 
pass will get you in, then the lock will destroy it." 
"Thanks.” Casper took the laminated card and ambled out of the building.


 The morning was cool and crisp, and he trotted down the sidewalk. He gradually increased his speed 
until he was loping comfortably along, despite his uncomfortable shoes. He made it around the block four 
and a half times before he had to stop. Breathing heavily, he started back towards the apartment building.

 A police cruiser sidled up to the curb next to him. “Need any help, mister?” the officer riding shotgun 

asked. 
Ordinarily, any contact with the cops terrified Casper—and just about any other sensible citizen of his 
class. This morning, though, he couldn't bring himself to worry about it. He felt good.


 He didn't know why, but he felt good.


 "Oh, hi,” Casper said. He leaned casually against the side of the cruiser, catching his breath. “I was just 
out for my morning run." 
"You're not exactly dressed for it." 
"Yeah, I know, I spent the night with a friend and I didn't have my sweats." 
"Your friend lives around here?” the officer asked. 
Casper nodded and handed him the temporary pass from the apartment building. “Just the other side of 
this block,” he said. 
The officer turned to his partner for a moment, then handed the pass back. 
"You want a ride?” the officer asked. 
Casper knew that his normal reaction would be to recoil in fear, that henever wanted to be in the back 
of a police vehicle, that too many people never came back from such rides—but today it seemed more 
important to be friendly, to observe the cops closely. And acting nervous might make them suspicious, 
something he'd known since he was a kid but never tried to use; today, for the first time in his life, he was 
able to not act nervous if he chose.


 "Sure, that'd be great.” He gave them a broad, disarming smile. 
The rear door of the cruiser popped open, and Casper tumbled in. The cruiser quickly rounded the 
block and halted in front of Cecelia's apartment building. Casper thanked the officers as he clambered 
out, then ran up to the door. He noticed that the cruiser remained out front until he was inside.


 Careful, those cops, he thought to himself. Good procedure. They hadn't said a word while he was in the 
vehicle, either. Disrupting the city force could be difficult. 
Maybe they could be won over, though. 



 He stopped and shook his head. Won over towhat ? 
He didn't know. He went on up. 
Mirim was in the kitchen making breakfast, wearing a red and white striped robe, when he let himself 


back into the apartment. She looked up from her batter and smiled. 
"Where haveyou been?” she asked. 
"I had a lot of energy this morning,” Casper said, smiling back. “I was out running around the block. 
What're you making?" 
"Waffles. Want some?" 
"Sure.” Casper leaned on the opposite side of the kitchen's central island from where Mirim was 
working. “Celia still asleep?" 
"As far as I know, yeah." 
Casper nodded. “Where's Leonid?" 
"He went home early last night." 
"Oh. I saw the bedroom door closed and I ... oh, never mind." 
"I won't. What's the matter, jealous?" 
"Of him? No. I just don't see what you see in him." 
Mirim stirred vigorously for a moment, then looked up again. “I'm not real sure any more, either." 
Casper met her eyes for a moment, then dropped his gaze to the countertop. “So when's breakfast going 
to be ready?" 
"Have a little patience, huh? I just started. Go take a shower or something." 
"I'll take the shower. I don't think I'm up to ‘or something’ right now." 
Mirim threatened him with the spoon, and he fled, laughing, to the bathroom. 
The day passed without incident. Casper took Cecelia to the art museum; they left Mirim reading at 


home. 
The news that night reported that the investigation of the “Polnovick Incident” was progressing well, and 
that the clean-up of the wreckage was under way. All the buildings in the affected area had been 


inspected, and all but the Takeuchi Building had been declared safe; the evacuation was over. That meant 
that Casper, Cecelia, and Mirim could return to work on Monday. 
The streets were still a mess Monday morning, with masonry and broken glass strewn across the 


sidewalks and into the street, and the police were allowing only pedestrians into the area. Motorists 



stopped at the barrier honked and shouted constantly, but Casper had problems of his own which kept 

stopped at the barrier honked and shouted constantly, but Casper had problems of his own which kept 

 Between the time he had taken off for the imprinting and the ensuing recovery, and the lost time due to 
the evacuation, Casper's workload had become nearly unmanageable. What's more, the new software 
had been installed, despite the disruptions, and Casper found it virtually incomprehensible. He felt a 
growing certainty that the imprinting had not worked, which meant he would probably be fired. He had 
gone through all that agony for nothing.

 He stared at the screen on his desk for several minutes before he even tried to sort things out. He was 
tempted to just forget about the whole thing and spend his day staring out the window, but even if he 
could get away with it the windows were covered with black plastic sheeting, and probably would be for 
quite some time. That rather limited the view.

 Finally, he began to sort through the job list, ordering it according to priority and skill requirements.

 When he had everything in order, and it was time for him to begin work on a file, Casper quickly 
discovered that he was simply unable to perform his job. As he looked at the information available to him 
his mind seemed to be filled with half-remembered tricks and shortcuts, but all were for use with the old 
software, and none of them applied to the new package.

 By mid-afternoon he had not completed a single trace job; he could not get the software to doanything 
he wanted it to. When he got what he thought must have been his thousandth error message he gave up 
and blanked the screen.

 The imprinting had not worked.

 He leaned back in his chair, trying to think what he could do. While he thought he picked up a handful of 
thumbtacks, and without paying any attention to what he was doing he tossed the tacks at his bulletin 
board, one by one. When he finished, a dozen tacks were all stuck into the surface of the bulletin board, 
forming a nearly straight line, each tack about the same distance from the next. None had taken more 
than a single casual toss.

 It occurred to him in a vague sort of way that that was good throwing for someone as uncoordinated as 
himself.

 He got through the rest of the day somehow without anyone else realizing anything was wrong, and 
somehow, despite the imminent and inevitable disaster he faced, he didn't feel particularly depressed. 
Unemployment loomed ahead, probably followed by bankruptcy, confiscation, and a life on the streets, 
begging for hand-outs or eating in soup kitchens, maybe minus an organ or two—but somehow it didn't 
bother him.

 In fact, he felt full of energy. A nervous, uncomfortable sort of energy.

 He needed more exercise, he decided.

 After work he found himself walking the city streets for no particular reason, studying the people passing 
by, noting how they reacted to each other, to him, to the occasional cop car that prowled by.

 He knew he should be worrying about his job, worrying what he could do about the faulty imprinting, 
but somehow it didn't seem as important as studying lines of sight through Rittenhouse Square. 


 Finally, around ten, he headed home—a bit uneasily. Travel at this time of night was not always a 
pleasant experience, even in the best neighborhoods.

 Finally, around ten, he headed home—a bit uneasily. Travel at this time of night was not always a 
pleasant experience, even in the best neighborhoods.

 The worst part, he thought, was the wait at the station, staring at the spray-painted concrete walls 
layered with gray dirt. He waited on the platform, fidgeting nervously, looking in every direction 
constantly, until finally his train roared into the station and he allowed himself to relax.

 Unfortunately, four street toughs, resplendent in chip-studded silver jumpsuits, stepped off the train right 
in front of him. Casper stepped back to let them pass, but they formed a semi-circle blocking his path.

 Purple glowtubes on their suits spelled outSOULSUCKERS ; Casper had heard of that gang. What he 
had heard was not encouraging.

 "Hey, man, gimme fifty,” said the one just right of center, who might have been a pale black or a tanned 
white; he was tall, with black hair shaved bald at the top and worn long at the sides, and a laddered scar 
drawn on his cheek in purple glowpaint. Electrodes protruded from his scalp, but Casper was unsure 
whether they were connected to anything or were just for show.

 "Sorry, friend,” Casper said nervously. “I haven't got it."

 "I'll take twenty,” the youth said, bantering, trying to sound reasonable.

 "I haven't got anything to give you,” Casper insisted.

 "I think he's lying,” one of the other gang members said belligerently. “What's he got on him? Don'cha 
think we oughta search him?"

 "Yeah,” the spokesman agreed. He reached towards Casper while his three companions moved to more 
completely surround their intended victim.

 Beech wasn't sure what to do, and afterwards he wasn't sure what he had done. He brushed his hand 
against the gang leader's arm, with an impact that seemed much harder than it should have been; the gang 
leader stumbled to the side, knocking into the shortest member of the gang, and they both fell to the 
platform. Casper ran past them and jumped aboard the train.

 The doors started to close, but one of the toughs grabbed them and held them open. While the gang 
boarded the train Casper ran into the next car, slammed shut the door between cars, and braced himself 
against the door to keep it closed.

 As he pressed up against the warm metal he realized for the first time that back on the platform he had 
somehow knocked down two of the hoods. He marvelled. He had absolutely no idea how he had done 
it.

 The train started to move again. Above his head, Beech heard the door begin to fracture as the gang 
pounded on it.

 There were several stops before Casper's destination, but station after station was empty. Fortunately, it 
didn't occur to any of his pursuers to get off the train and go around to the next car. 


 When the train finally reached Casper's stop, he abandoned the car and raced for the exit.

 When the train finally reached Casper's stop, he abandoned the car and raced for the exit.

 Beech had difficulty believing his eyes. A cop? In his neighborhood? But there he was, as big as life. 
“Am I glad to see you!” Casper gasped.

 "Is there something wrong?” the officer asked suspiciously.

 Casper gestured towards the entrance to the subway as the first of the gang members emerged. Seeing 
the officer, the gang turned and raced back the way they had come, their metal-heeled boots clattering on 
the steps.

 "I'll take care of this.” Grinning wolfishly, the officer reached for his holstered shotgun as he started down 
into the subway.

 Casper watched him go. He felt no inclination to follow, or to see what was going to happen—he wasn't 
interested in revenge, and his curiosity wasn't that morbid.

 Or that reckless.

 Party hacks on TV sometimes still talked about criminals being coddled, but Casper had never seen any 
evidence of it, not since the Crisis and the emergency decrees. Criminals weren't paroled when the jails 
got crowded any more; they were “shot while trying to escape."

 Sometimes the cops didn't bother with the intermediate steps of arrest, trial, and jail.

 And sometimes witnesses got “caught in the crossfire” if they saw the wrong thing. Casper had no desire 
to see anything that might be wrong. Feeling shaky, he walked the rest of the way home without incident.

 It was after eleven, but he was more keyed up than ever. After a few moments of uneasy pacing around 
his apartment he decided he needed still more exercise. Just running or walking wasn't enough, and he 
didn't want to risk damaging himself, so he sat down at his computer and pulled up a webfeed, entered a 
few search terms, and found a catalog of exercise videos. He chose a few almost at random, and 
downloaded them.

 As soon as the first download was complete he shifted the others to the background, and began playing 
this new acquisition in fullscreen video.

 The title wasBasic Stretching , and he followed the lead of the girl on the screen carefully.

 It was fortunate that he started with this file, because the next three,Aerobics for a Better Life, Modern 
Dance at Home , andCalisthenics , had no warmup period, and he probably would have injured 
himself. As it was, none of the programs did more than tire him out.

 He ran through all of them without stopping.

 The last file, however, was different.Self Defense for the Common Man struck a chord within him. 


Watching the first demonstration he felt an electric excitement. He followed along, clumsily at first, but 
with rapid improvement. It was as though this was what his body was waiting for, and when he had 

Watching the first demonstration he felt an electric excitement. He followed along, clumsily at first, but 
with rapid improvement. It was as though this was what his body was waiting for, and when he had 

 He ran the file through again, and burned all five to disk.

 It was just after four a.m. when he finally stumbled into bed and fell into an exhausted sleep.

 Chapter Five

 Once again the NeuroTalents executive boardroom was the scene of a late night meeting. This time, 
however, Mr. Yamashiro, looking somewhat subdued, sat halfway down the table. At the head of the 
table, in Yamashiro's usual seat, was an angry man in a black suit and old-fashioned red tie.

 "I can't believe you people screwed up like this,” the man in black said. “Those files are classified!"

 "Yourpeople ordered us to keep them available,” Yamashiro protested weakly.

 "But not in with the everyday business!” the man in black said. “You could have kept the disks to one 
side, ready to plug in when we told you to!” He glared for a moment, then said, “Oh, hell, it doesn't 
matter any more—the damage is done. I hope you realize that your carelessness may have endangered 
not only NeuroTalents, but the very existence of the entire parent corporation. This could get us kicked 
out of the Consortium!"

 "I think you're making too much of this,” Yamashiro replied uneasily.

 "I don't doubt you think that,” the man in black said, his tone flat and deadly. “That opinion is just 
another example of your incompetence.” He frowned. “I'm afraid that extraordinary measures are called 
for, Yamashiro—there is simply no longer a place for you in this organization."

 "What?” Yamashiro stared in disbelief.

 "Your services are no longer needed, Yamashiro.” The man in black spoke with quiet intensity, more 
effective than shouting would have been. “You're fired."

 Yamashiro pushed his chair back and rose unsteadily. “You can't do this to me,” he said. “I have friends, 
contacts—I'm a major stockholder! I'll make trouble for you. I'm not someone you can treat this way."

 "I'm afraid you are. You're not active in the Party, and this is a political case.” The man in black touched 
a button on his wrist unit, and two silent men in impeccably tailored suits entered; they had obviously 
been just outside the door, awaiting their signal. They walked silently down the length of the table and 
stood behind Yamashiro.

 "These gentlemen will be escorting you out of the building,” the man in black explained calmly. “You will 
not be allowed back. Your personal effects will be sent to you by courier."

 Yamashiro tried to protest as the two silent men seized his arms and led him from the room, but the 
others all sat utterly motionless, totally ignoring him, until the sound had been cut off by the closing of the 
heavy conference room doors. 


 The man in black looked at the woman who had been seated next to Yamashiro. “Ms. Kendall, 
henceforth you will carry out the duties of the executive director. We can regularize the title later, if you 

 The man in black looked at the woman who had been seated next to Yamashiro. “Ms. Kendall, 
henceforth you will carry out the duties of the executive director. We can regularize the title later, if you 

 The woman nodded.

 "Good,” the man in black said. “Now let's see if we can find a solution to this problem.” He turned to the 
man seated to his left. “I appreciate your coming up, sir, especially considering the short notice you were 
given."

 The man he addressed nodded. “My pleasure, Mr. Chairman."

 "Ladies and gentlemen,” the chairman explained to the others, “this is a representative of the Homeland 
Security Department, knowledgeable in covert activities and a coordinator of the programs NeuroTalents 
has undertaken in that area. You may refer to him as Mr. Smith."

 Smith nodded. “Thank you,” he said. “Of course you all realize that, officially, the Covert Operations 
Group has no involvement in this affair, any more than any other branch of the federal government or any 
part of the Democratic-Republican Party does. Officially, those optimization files do not exist, 
NeuroTalents has no connection with Covert or any other part of Homeland Security, and I am not here. 
That's official, and you'd all do well to remember it. However, on a practical level, we must keep on top 
of this matter."

 The chairman nodded his agreement. He looked at NeuroTalents’ new executive director. “A team of 
ours has been working with your people. You have a report from them?"

 "Ah, yes.” The woman shuffled nervously through pages on her PDA.

 The others eyed her expectantly. She cleared her throat and began, “First, the technical failure. It 
appears that when the system was installed, no one bothered to arrange a maintenance schedule; instead 
it was left up to the users to judge when to check over the system. It appears...” She hesitated, then 
continued, “It appears that the users, the technicians running the system, were unaware thatany 
maintenance was called for,ever . The system has been running non-stop, uninspected and unmaintained, 
for more than six years. It's a miracle we haven't had a breakdown before this—or at least, as far as we 
know we haven't. Steps are being taken to ensure that regular maintenance will be done from now on."

 She paused, then went on. “The next question is the classified files themselves. The current software uses 
a single master program to access everything in the system. Until this can be altered, we have removed 
the files in question from the system. New software is being written that will handle this all in better 
fashion, requiring human intervention at certain critical points in any non-standard procedure."

 The new executive director took a sip of water as her display brought up the next page of her report. 
“The next item is the identification of those individuals who were affected by this operation. We were 
very fortunate; as far as we can determine from the records, only two people were inadvertantly 
optimized—other clients who were imprinted while the faulty instructions were in place were not found to 
be suitable subjects for any of the available optimization packages, and the program reset the missing 
variable accordingly, which allowed it to proceed properly.” She frowned. “The second of the two was 
Lester Polnovick, who received the Godzilla File. The other, imprinted the day before, was a man named 
Casper Beech; my people have prepared a report on his optimization.” She handed a document to 
Smith. 


 He glanced at it, and his veneer of absolute calm cracked. “Damn!” he muttered.

 He glanced at it, and his veneer of absolute calm cracked. “Damn!” he muttered.

 Smith folded the document and tucked it into an inside pocket. “We've got a problem here,” he said. “A 
real problem. This man was imprinted with the Spartacus File."

 "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with all the material involved; is that bad?"

 "Verybad. It's probably the most dangerous of all the files in the series."

 Smith looked at the Chairman as if expecting instant comprehension; irritated, the Chairman glared back 
and said, “Suppose you explain that a little."

 Smith glanced at the others. “I don't want to go into explicit detail here,” he said.

 "Then don't. But give ussome idea."

 "You're familiar with the historical Spartacus?” Smith asked.

 "You mean the old movie?” the Chairman asked, puzzled. “I think I saw it on video once."

 "No, sir,” Smith said, “I mean the slave who rebelled against ancient Rome and repeatedly defeated 
vastly superior armies sent against him. He was a superb gladiator, rabble-rouser, and general.” He 
looked about, but saw only blank faces. He continued, “Well, the Spartacus File is modeled on what we 
assume his abilities were, and as I said, it's probably the most dangerous optimization file we've ever 
devised. It was created exclusively for use in nations not friendly to the United States. In a person with 
the capability of accepting it—and such people are extremely rare; we've never yet found a healthy one 
ourselves—it creates an individual of immense charisma and superb military ability, across the whole 
range from strategic planning down to personal combat, and with a compulsion to resist authority at all 
levels and to organize against that authority. The theory was that by programming a single individual in an 
unfriendly state with the Spartacus File, we could cheaply and easily cause a popular revolt that, even if it 
failed, would occupy that state to the exclusion of all other activities. Most of the other files are 
non-compulsive, or compulsive only under certain circumstances—that is, they give the recipient high 
ability, but they don'trequire that those abilities be used. Someone optimized as an assassin, for example, 
won't kill people at random—he'll wait until he's assigned a target. The Godzilla File is compulsive, but 
it's also unsubtle, very much out in the open—it's intended more as a nuisance than anything else, and 
without support the optimized individual is easy to dispose of, just as the city police disposed of 
Polnovick. The Spartacus File, however, is both subtle and compulsive—the recipient is programmed to 
hide, to work from concealment, and is irresistibly compelled to overthrow whatever government he finds 
himself subject to. And now anAmerican has been programmed with the file, right here in Philadelphia.” 
He looked at the Chairman expectantly.

 The Chairman looked doubtful. “Philadelphia isn't some African backwater or ex-Soviet hellhole, you 
know,” he said.

 "Yes, I know,” Smith answered, annoyed, “but there are always malcontents and trouble-makers who 
can be stirred up—street people, romantic youngsters, intellectuals, people who wouldn't be satisfied 
withany government. A man imprinted with the Spartacus File would be able to stir up their discontent 
very efficiently; even if he fell short of fomenting actual revolution he would almost inevitably trigger 


rioting, renewed terrorism, and a great deal of other unpleasantness. As I said, it's a time bomb."

rioting, renewed terrorism, and a great deal of other unpleasantness. As I said, it's a time bomb."

 "It's not going to be easy,” Smith continued. “We must be careful. This man is now programmed to 
identify government agents, and to react negatively and often violently to them; he's conditioned to resist 
all authority and stir up as much trouble as possible. Remember, everything we knew we put into this; we 
didn'twant our Spartacus to be stopped. This was our top-of-the-line file."

 "He's still only one man, and I understand that the optimization was done without the proper preparation, 
so it may not even be complete; surely he can be stopped."

 "Oh, I think he can be stopped, but it won't be all that easy. Remember how difficult it's been to bring 
down certain terrorists.” Smith considered. “Whatever we do to him, we can't make any obvious moves 
to apprehend him—he'd spot it, not to mention that if he's already started gathering followers we don't 
need to make any martyrs. And we've got to be sure that whatever we do works the first time. A failed 
attempt will alert him, and may well trigger more of the Spartacus File—exactly what we want to prevent. 
And we have to keep it all quiet—if the File's working the way I was told it would, the man has the 
capability of winning over mobs, or recruiting individual converts to his cause. As long as he's alive he'll 
be able to turn anything we do to him, however benevolent, into anti-government propaganda—if we 
give him the chance by drawing attention to him."

 "I'm sure something can be arranged.” The Chairman shrugged.

 "Sir,” NeuroTalents’ new executive director asked, “are you saying this man Beech is to be killed?"

 "No, I'm sure that won't be necessary,” the Chairman replied. “We can have him taken into custody and 
neutralized by less drastic means, I'm certain."

 "I'm not,” Smith replied. “Optimization can't be reversed, you know—nothing short of a lobotomy will 
get the Spartacus File out of his brain now. I think we probably will need to kill him, just as Ms. Kendall 
says. And the sooner the better, before he can turn it into a martyrdom."

 The Chairman tapped a pencil on the table, then looked up at Smith. “NeuroTalents doesn't kill people,” 
he said.

 "Covert does. With the proper authorization."

 "What sort of authorization are you talking about?"

 "Executive order. We can get one tonight, if we have to."

 The Chairman glowered. “Let me see that report,” he said, holding out a hand.

 Smith hesitated, and then replied, “No, I think we at Covert will handle this ourselves from now on.” He 
patted the pocket that held the report. “Thank you for your assistance, Mr. Chairman, but NeuroTalents 
is no longer concerned."

 Chapter Six 


 The radio clicked on on schedule the next morning; Casper lay, still half-asleep, as the regular list of 
catastrophes was recited. The Russian civil war was still raging, more complicated than ever, and the 
Fringers were still causing trouble out-system, claiming they could use non-Consortium contractors and 
install non-Party officials.


 Then he snapped awake.


 "Four youths were killed late last night in the tunnels near the City Hall subway station,” the announcer 
said. “The youths, whose names have not been released by the police, were walking along the tracks 
between City Hall and Race/Vine Station when they were struck and killed by a train as it returned to the 
yard for the night. A corporate spokesperson for the Philadelphia police said..."


 Casper rolled away from the radio and blocked out the sound with a pillow over his ears. The last thing 
he needed was a reminder of the previous night's events. He remembered them all too clearly.


 Except, that is, exactly how he had knocked those two hoods down. His body had acted on its own, 
and he had somehow caught two alert young men off-guard.


 He didn't understand that at all. He had never done anything like that before. And it had happened 
before he watched the self-defense video. Watching the file hadn't been like learning something new, it 
had been like re-learning a beloved childhood ritual.


 That made no sense at all. He hadn't knownanything about self-defense as a child. His parents hadn't 
even let him watch the Power Rangers or other popular shows.


 When the radio's drone of speech was replaced by music Casper uncovered his head. Hoping this start 
was not an omen of how the rest of the day would go, he rolled out of bed and prepared for work—not 
that he thought he would be able to accomplish anything on three hours sleep and with the imprint not 
working.


 The subway station showed no evidence of what had occurred the night before. Casper glanced around, 
looking for signs, and saw none. Later, when the train passed through the City Hall station, he didn't even 
think to look out the window.


 He left the subway and climbed the stairs to the street.


 At the top he stopped, blinked in the sunlight, and without knowing why he quickly scanned the 
neighborhood, noting rooftops, obstructions, and who was where. The morning commuters were 
marching to their duties; a leftover drunk from the night before lay against a building.


 He took a step back down, unsure just why. Something had sparkled somewhere, but he had no idea 
why that should mean anything.


 Still, it bothered him. He turned and trotted back down the steps, and went out the opposite entrance. 
Then he detoured around the block.


 Just for variety, he tried to tell himself. He was taking a new, longer route just to be different.


 In the elevator he found himself thinking that he would have to buy a gun, or at any rate acquire one 
somehow. It would be expected, and he might need it. 



 He blinked. Expected bywhom ? Needed for what? 
At his desk he looked at the job list and first despaired, then grew defiant. 
What kind of a man did they think he was, giving him all this shitwork to do? 
Mirim stepped up behind him and said, “Boo!" 
He didn't react immediately; then his lips pulled back and his teeth showed in an expression that was 


only technically a smile. He turned. 
"Do you respect yourself?” he demanded. 
"What?" 
"I said, do you respect yourself?" 
Mirim blinked, puzzled. “Of course I do,” she said. “Is this a gag, Casper?" 
"A joke?” He waved an arm at his computer screen. “No, Mirim,” he said, “that'sa joke! Expecting a 


human being to waste his time on this nonsense! It's fit only for lawyers and computers, not a so-called 
free man!" 
She laughed. “You gotthat right!” she said. “But hey, it's a steady paycheck, right?" 
"Not any more!” Casper cleared the screen. “Not for me, it isn't!" 
Her smile vanished. “Cas, do you feel all right?" 
"I feel fine, Mirim. I feel better than I have in years. I'm setting myself free, and it feels good!" 
"Cas..." 
"You think I'm being a reckless fool, don't you?"


 "If you're serious, yeah, I do, Cas. Are you..." 
Casper laughed, not his usual high-pitched, nervous giggle, but a solid, powerful laugh. “Mirim,” he said, 
“we were meant for better things than this. We've had our birthright stolen, and I mean to..."


 "What's this, Beech?” a new voice demanded. Quinones appeared at Mirim's shoulder.


 Casper looked at his boss's broad, hostile face, and the feeling of power and certainty suddenly faded. 
There were times to retreat and regroup, and this was one of them. 
"Nothing, sir,” he said.


 "Then let's get back to work, shall we? You and Ms. Anspack both. I must say, that imprinting you took 
doesn't seem to have kicked in yet, from what you've done so far." 


 "I'd have to agree, sir,” Casper said boldly. “I think NeuroTalents screwed it up somehow, and you 

 "I'd have to agree, sir,” Casper said boldly. “I think NeuroTalents screwed it up somehow, and you 

 Startled, Quinones stared at Beech. The man was a doormat, and could always be relied on to accept 
blame for anything—since when would he suggest that somebody else might be at fault? 
Since when would he suggestanything ? 
"I think you're right,” Quinones said slowly. “I think I might just give NeuroTalents a call myself." 
"You do that, sir,” Casper said. “Thank you."


 "Right. Well, Beech, you'd better get some work done, imprinted or not." 
Quinones turned and marched away. Mirim watched him go, throwing quick little glances at Casper and 
trying to suppress the urge to giggle. The whole exchange had been bizarre.Casper talking to Quinones 


that way? Sweet little Casper? 
"Casper, what's happened to you?” she asked. 
He shrugged. “I don't know,” he said. “I really do think the imprint must have been screwed up 


somehow. I can't do a damn thing with this new software, but I'm getting all these other weird reactions. 


And you know, Mirim, they might be just what I've needed to jar me out of my rut." 
Mirim nodded, eyeing Casper. For the past year, maybe longer, she had been watching Casper, joking 
with him, watching how Quinones and the other people around the office treated him, watching how he 
treated Cecelia and how Celia bossed him around, and thinking what a fine man he could be if he had a 
little more backbone, if he weren't afraid to step out of his timid little groove—but that had been 
daydreaming. If it was really going to happen, she wasn't sure how to handle it. “I think I better get back 
to work myself,” she said, and she turned away.


 From the door of his office Quinones watched her emerge from behind Casper's partition and go back 


toward her own desk; he was just stepping inside when his phone rang. 
Annoyed, he glanced back out the door; yes, his secretary was working the phone. Why hadn't she just 
called to him? He picked up the receiver and said, “Yes?" 
"Arturo Quinones?” a cold voice asked. 
"This is Quinones." 
"Are you private?" 
Puzzled, Quinones leaned over and closed the door. “Yes,” he said. 
"You have a man named Casper Beech there? Recently received an imprint at NeuroTalents?" 
"He works here, yes. Who is this?" 
"My name is Smith,” the voice replied. “I'm with the government. Is Beech there now?" 



 "Yes, I just spoke to him. What's this about?"

 "Yes, I just spoke to him. What's this about?"
y 


reason. Just call this number, 445-304-0011—did you get that?" 
"No,” Quinones said, groping for a pen—most people would have used a PDA or keyboard, but 
Quinones was proud of his old-fashioned insistence on hardcopy. “Hold on a minute.” He found a pen, 
fished an old envelope from the trash, and said, “Ready."


 The number was repeated.


 "Call that number,” Smith told him. “You don't need to wait for an answer, but let it ring at least twice, to 
make sure Caller ID gets your number. Don't call until Beech leaves. You understand?" 
"I understand, but what..." 
Smith hung up. 
Quinones stared at the phone for a minute, then muttered, “Shit. Crazy feds,” and dropped the receiver 


on the cradle. 
He supposed, though, that he had better do what he was told. 
He opened the door and tried to peer through or over the maze of partitions, but there was simply no 


way to see Beech from where he stood. He returned to his desk, sat, and grabbed the phone. 
Mirim's cubby was in a corner where she could see the office entry, and if she turned the other way she 


could see Casper. She was sitting there, marveling at the sight of Casper Beech leaning back with his 
hands behind his head, not even pretending to work, when her phone beeped for attention. 
She snatched up the headset and plugged it into her ear. “Anspack,” she said into the mike. 
"Mirim, this is Mr. Quinones,” she heard. “I've got something I'd like you to do for me." 
"Yes, sir?” she replied, puzzled. 
"I want you to tell me when Casper Beech leaves the office—even if it's just to use the men's room. Just 


give me a buzz."


 Mirim hesitated. “Uh ... yes, sir,” she said at last. She fought down the impulse to ask why; she knew 
that Quinones didn't take kindly to questions from his subordinates. 
"Good. You just call the minute he sets foot out the door, then." 
He hung up. 
He hadn't even said thank you, Mirim thought, pulling off the headset and glaring at it. He hadn't given 


any reason.


 He was probably mad at Casper about some stupid little infraction that poor Cas didn't even know he'd 
committed. Maybe he'd heard Cas's stillborn speech about self-respect. 


 But why would he want to know when Cas was out of the office?

 But why would he want to know when Cas was out of the office?

risking her job.


 Then she got a look at Casper's face—thin, long-jawed, pale, framed by brown hair in need of trimming, 
and watching her intently from deep-set brown eyes. 
He didn't look drugged or wired. He looked sincere, attentive, and almost ... almost noble. 
"I think Quinones is on your case,” she said. “He wanted me to tell him the minute you stepped out of 


the office." 



 Casper blinked once, slowly, coolly. Then he turned and looked over his cubby.

 Casper blinked once, slowly, coolly. Then he turned and looked over his cubby.
k 
Casper's files—though he should be able to access those from his own computer. Perhaps he wanted to 


set up some little surprise.

 Or ... ?

 "I think he's decided you're a vicious drug fiend, and he wants to ferret out your stash before you can 
pollute the rest of us,” Mirim said, perching herself on the edge of Casper's desk.


 Or that, Casper thought.


 There weren't any drugs to find, of course, nor anything else suspicious; Casper's life was dreary and 
utterly innocent of any wrongdoing. Even his debts weren't his own, but inherited.


 However, sooner or later, Quinones would discover that Casper wasn't working. Maybe he alreadyhad 
discovered it, and wanted to see if he could discover the reason. Quinones wouldn't believe that the 
imprinting had screwed up, and that instead of adding to Casper's liability-tracing skills it had apparently 
wiped them out.


 Even if he did believe, it wouldn't do any good. Casper had signed that stupid waiver at NeuroTalents, 
and Data Tracers, Inc. wasn't about to waste their time and money fighting NeuroTalents on his behalf. A 
second imprint might not do any better; Casper's brain might have indetectable quirks. Much easier to 
just throw him out and find a replacement whose brain was still virgin and imprintable.


 He was going to lose his job.


 Well, screw that. He didn't want the lousy job anyway. He was sick of kowtowing to that fat fool, 
Quinones. A person had to stand on his own two feet.


 Better to go out now, rather than waiting to be fired.


 And there was no reason to go quietly.


 While he ran through all this he had been gazing mildly up at Mirim. Now he smiled broadly, reached 
over and took her hand and squeezed it gently. He did this without knowing why; it went against all the 
habits he had always had, but it felt right. He had never touched Mirim before, and he felt her start slightly 
at the first contact.


 "Thanks for telling me, Mirim,” he said. Then, to Mirim's utter astonishment, he stood, climbed up onto 
his desk, and shouted, “Listen, everybody!"


 The normal hum of the office faded slightly as faces turned toward him. Most of the workers couldn't see 
him, because of the partitions, but they could hear him.


 He looked across the partitions and saw that the door to Quinones’ office was closed.He wouldn't hear 
anything.

 "Some of you know me, some of you don't,” Casper called out. “I'm Casper Beech; I've worked here 
for nine years now. Nine lousy, boring, painful years!" 


 A few voices tittered nervously.

 A few voices tittered nervously.

 "Because last week they sent me for a neural imprint—they were too cheap to train me properly, or buy 
software a normal human being can run. They sent me for a neural imprint—theyordered me, a free-born 
American, to take it. They sent me to have my brain rewired. They sent me to be force-fed skills I'll 
never be able to use anywhere else. They sent me to be programmed like one of their infernal machines!"

 Casper couldfeel the people listening. He heard a chair scrape as someone stood up for a better view.

 "Well, I'mnot a machine to be programmed. I've been living like one for nine years, but I'm not a 
machine! I've been taking their orders for nine years, but I'm not a machine! But I didn't rebel—after nine 
years, I think evenI thought I was a machine! I did what they wanted, I took the imprint—but mybrain 
rebelled! The imprint didn't take. I was sick as a dog for a week, my memory's fouled up, I can't 
work—but I didn't rebel. I came in here and tried to work anyway, like a good little machine...” He 
paused again, and then bellowed out, “And theyfired me! Becausetheir imprint screwed up, they fired 
me !"

 A murmur of sympathy—probably more feigned than genuine—ran through the room.

 It wasn't sympathy Casper wanted, though. It struck him suddenly that he had no idea what hedid want, 
or why he was doing any of this, but he knew he had to do it, he knew he had to carry on, he knew what 
to say next.

 "And you know what, folks? I'm glad. Because at least I'm out of here, and the rest of you aren't. But I 
won't be the last to go—no, I'm just the first! Because do you know what our dear Mr. Quinones told 
me, when he sent me to have my brain reprogrammed, my mind tampered with? I'll tell you what he told 
me. It seems software that runs in people is cheaper than software that runs in computers, because we 
can do our own debugging. It seems that dear old Data Tracers intends to do alot of imprinting from now 
on—I was just the first! And do you know what the failure rate for neural imprinting is? Do you?"

 He waited, but nobody replied.

 "Neither do I,” he announced. “Because I'm damn sure it's not what they've published. Most of you 
work with data all the time, bend it around to suit management, to suit the customers’ whims. You think 
any of the data we get hasn't been tampered with? Ha!"

 He waved in dismissal, and his tone changed from anger to false joviality.

 "Well, boys and girls, I'm out of here, and glad to be free. I'll leave you all to enjoy your imprints—or if 
they don't take, I'll see you on the streets, with the other unemployables. Stop by and say hello, and 
remember—my name's Casper Beech."

 Then he jumped down, grabbed Mirim by the hand, and said, “Come on."

 "Come where?” she said, startled.

 He stopped in mid-stride, turned, and smiled at her. “Wherever you like,” he said, “but back to your 


desk for a start. You don't want anyone to tell Quinones it was you who warned me, do you?" 
The room was buzzing; several people had emerged from their cubbies and were approaching Casper 


uncertainly. 
Mirim hesitated. 
Casper abruptly leaned forward and kissed her, taking her head between his hands—and as he did, he 
whispered, “I need to leavenow , or it'll ruin my exit.” Then he released her and strode toward the door. 
Mirim blinked, then ran after him. She detoured just far enough to grab her purse. 
Together, they marched out the door. A crowd gathered in the doorway, watching them go. 
When Mirim and Casper had vanished into an elevator, the crowd gradually dispersed. It wasn't until 
almost five minutes later that somebody thought to tell Quinones that two of his subordinates had just 
walked off the job.


 Chapter Seven 
The man dozing on the rooftop heard the buzz; he rolled over and looked at the read-out on his phone. 
It was Quinones’ number. He didn't know that; he only knew that the number matched the code he had 
been given. The target was on his way out of the building—or at least, he might be. 
The man really hadn't expected anything for hours yet, but that was fine; he was eager to get it over with. 
He picked up the Remington 700 in one hand, the binoculars in the other. 
The damn phone kept buzzing. That wasn't in the plan. He was supposed to get the code number on the 
read-out, the target was supposed to come out the front door, and then the sniper was supposed to put a 
bullet through the target's head. Then the cops and paramedics would go to work, and make sure the 
target was securely dead and that everyone was convinced it was the doing of some unknown crazy or 
terrorist. 
He didn't see the target. He put down the binoculars and took another glance at the holo. 
The phone was still buzzing. Annoyed, he reached over and flicked it open, but didn't say anything. 
After a few seconds of silence, a worried voice said, “Mr. Smith?" 
The sniper grimaced. His name wasn't Smith; nobody involved with the operation was named Smith, so 
far as he knew, but then, he wasn't supposed to know any names. “What is it?” he whispered. He 
whispered to keep his voice from being recognized, not because he expected anyone else to hear him.


 "I'm sorry, but Beech left early, and I missed it; he's been gone almost ten minutes." 
"Damn!” The sniper slammed the phone closed, grabbed the binoculars, and began scanning the 
neighborhood. 



 No one fitting his target's description was anywhere within a hundred meters of the door where he had 
been told the target would appear. The target was supposed to head for the Race/Vine subway station; 

 No one fitting his target's description was anywhere within a hundred meters of the door where he had 
been told the target would appear. The target was supposed to head for the Race/Vine subway station; 
. 
And there, descending the steps, he spotted a man and a woman, walking together and talking. 
Nobody had mentioned anything about a woman, and it would be a long, difficult shot; he hesitated, and 


then it was too late. 
"Damn!” he said again, as he reached for the phone. 
The contact man, whom the sniper did not know by the name Smith, took the news calmly. 
"You didn't fire?” he asked, after he'd heard the sniper's report. 
"No." 
"Good. Then he still doesn't know that anyone's taking an interest in him. Pack it in, cover your tracks, 


and report in—full pay, and half the usual bonus if your story checks."


 Smith hung up the phone, thought for a moment, and then called Quinones to ask what had happened, 
and who the woman with Beech was. 
"Where are we going?” Mirim asked, as they stood on the empty subway platform. 
"Um ... well, I thought I'd go back to my apartment, I guess,” Casper replied uncertainly. He was 


scanning the station, not looking at her. 
"You guess?" 
"Well, I don't know—is there somewhere you'd rather I went?" 
Mirim stared at him. A few minutes ago Casper had been a commanding, self-confident orator; now he 


was a wimp who couldn't even look her in the eye. “You don't know?" 
"No. Hey, I just lost my job, I'm a little thrown, you know? Whereelse should I go?” He shook his head. 
“And my mind's been playing tricks on me." 
"What kind of tricks?” Mirim asked, puzzled. 
"Like that speech I gave. I mean, what was I doing standing on my desk? That was crazy!" 
Mirim stared at him. 
"I thought you were great,” she said. 
"But it'scrazy ,” he said. “It's not me. It cost me my job." 
"I thought you were going to lose your job anyway,” Mirim said. “Yousaid you were." 
"Well, yeah, I was,” Casper admitted, a bit puzzled. “Maybe, anyway. No one had actuallysaid I was 



fired yet, but I wasn't doing my work." 
"So you were going to be fired." 
"I think so." 
"So what harm does it do to tell them what you think?” Mirim challenged him. 
"None, I guess,” Casper admitted. “Unless they blacklist me and keep me from getting another job." 
"You think you have a chance of ever getting another job in the same field?” Mirim asked. 
Casper thought for a moment, then said, “No. Not really." 
"So what harm did it do?" 
Casper had no answer for that. He was busy studying the pillars and tracks. 
"What are youlooking at?” Mirim asked, puzzled. 
"Oh,” Casper said, “Well, see there, I was checking whether you could set up a crossfire over the end 


of the tunnel, but I don't think the niche in the far wall is deep enough..." 
"A crossfire?” Mirim stared at him. “Casper, what are you talking about?" 
He turned and stared back at her with a haunted expression. “I don'tknow , Mirim,” he said. “I don't 


have any idea, and it scares the heck out of me." 
Mirim hesitated, about to say something, but just then they heard the screeching of steel wheels as the 
train neared the station, and she decided it could wait. For awhile there she had thought that Casper was 


at last coming out of his shell, but now he seemed to be retreating again, and she didn't want to force 
anything, not yet. Something strange was happening to him, presumably brought on by that stupid imprint. 
She wondered if he would be willing to see a doctor. 
She wondered if he couldafford to see a doctor. 
There was no point in berating Quinones; the important part was where Beech was now. Smith didn't 


need to think very hard about that; the obvious place for Beech to go was home. 
That he had the Anspack woman along didn't change that; he might take her home with him, he might 


drop her off at her own home first, he might stay at her place awhile, maybe even until morning, but 
sooner or later, unless he had somehow been alerted, he would go back to his own apartment. 
If hehad been alerted ... well, even with the Spartacus File, Beech was a beginner. The file wouldn't be 


running properly yet. He would make mistakes. Even if he had somehow realized that people were 
pursuing him, Beech might go home. 
Or he might go to Anspack's place; Smith would want to cover that possibility, too. 
He picked up the phone. 



 Ten minutes later he hung up, reasonably satisfied. There wasn't time to set up anything fancy, or even to 
get to the apartment before Beech did, so it wouldn't be as neat and tidy as he might have liked. Still, the 

 Ten minutes later he hung up, reasonably satisfied. There wasn't time to set up anything fancy, or even to 
get to the apartment before Beech did, so it wouldn't be as neat and tidy as he might have liked. Still, the 

 When they emerged from the subway the sky had clouded over, threatening thunder and rain, and the 
two of them hurried up the block, against wind that was suddenly cold. Casper almost reached out a 
sheltering arm for Mirim, then thought better of it.

 "Here we are,” he said a moment later, pointing.

 "You livehere? ” Mirim asked, looking up at the building's gloomy facade.

 "Sure,” Casper said. He shrugged. “It's not so bad."

 Mirim shuddered.

 "You didn't have to come,” Casper said. That sounded more hostile than he had meant it to, though; to 
soften it, he added, “But I'm glad you did. Would you like to come up for a bite to eat?"

 Mirim shrugged. “Sure, why not?” She followed Casper past an overflowing trash dumpster up to the 
door.

 "Careful on the steps,” Casper said. He unlocked the door and ushered Mirim through ahead of him; 
when they were both inside the dim hallway, behind thick panes of dirty glass, he flicked the light switch a 
couple of times, but the only illumination came from outside.

 "Oh, hell,” he said. “The damned lights are out again. You'd better take my hand—the stairs can be 
tricky.” He offered his hand, and she took it, neither delicately nor grabbing, but just holding. They 
started up the steps.

 "What do you mean, the lights are outagain? ” Mirim demanded. “Can't you do anything about it?"

 "Afraid not. Look out, that one's broken. No, I can't do anything about the lightsor the stairs, because 
my lease—everyone's lease who lives here—has a no-liability clause. We can't sue, all we can do is 
withhold rent, and at what we pay, the owners don't much care."

 "Hmph. That's a hell of a thing. Have you got a tenant's union?"

 Casper laughed. “Not inthis building. The people who live here tend to keep to themselves. There's no 
clause in our leases to keep us from suing each other, after all. We have to pay for our low rent 
somehow. Here's my floor."

 They left the stairway, and Casper unlocked his apartment door while Mirim waited uneasily in the hall.

 Once they were inside he carefully located Mirim next to the door, where she would be safer, before 
locking it.

 He tried to keep his own windows reasonably clean, so the apartment wasn't as dim as the halls, but 
since his only view was of the building next door to the north the place had a certain gloom about it. He 
flicked the light switch, but nothing happened. 


 "Power's out for the whole building, same as usual,” he said. “Sorry if the place is a little untidy,” he 

 "Power's out for the whole building, same as usual,” he said. “Sorry if the place is a little untidy,” he 
. 
"I can't see well enough to notice." 
Casper smiled. “Wait right there, and I'll get some light." 
He stumbled into the kitchen, and returned a moment later with a candle in each hand. He set them both 


on the dinner table, saying over his shoulder, “I've got wine, milk, and diet cola." 
"Wine would be nice." 
"It's just cheap California white,” he warned. 
"That's fine." 
"I'll be right back. The stereo is over there. It's on the UPS, and the backup battery should be good for 


a couple of hours if we don't use the computer for anything else, so feel free to put on some music. Your 


choice." 
When Casper returned with the glasses of wine, he found Mirim sitting on the couch, the stereo playing 
softly. The music was Beethoven. He handed Mirim her glass and sat down beside her. 
There was an embarrassed silence as they sipped their wine. Casper put his glass on the end table. 
"I'm not entirely sure why you came back here with me,” Casper said at last. “I mean, I'm very glad you 


did , and it was good of you to warn me about Quinones, but you didn't have to come with me. You've 
probably just thrown away your job, and it's not like it's easy to find work these days." 
"Well, you'd thrown awayyours ,” Mirim pointed out, “and you gave some very convincing reasons why 


the rest of us should, too."


 "I did?” Casper asked. Mirim thought she heard a concatenation of unhappiness, confusion, and pride in 
those two simple words. 
"Yes, you did,” she said. “I was impressed." 
"But why?" 
Mirim started to speak, and Casper cut her off. “I don't mean why were you impressed, I mean why did 


Ido that? It's ... it's not like me." 
"Oh, I don't know,” Mirim said. “I always thought you had it in you somewhere." 
He stared at her, his hand on his wine glass, not moving. “You did?" 
Mirim nodded. 
"But..." 



 Casper was interrupted by a knock on the door. Startled, he turned. 
"Who could it be at this time of day?” he asked. “I'd be at work, ordinarily." 
"Maybe whoever it is tried there and they told him you'd gone home,” Mirim suggested. 
"But who...” Casper got to his feet, puzzled. Then he looked at Mirim, understanding dawning. “A 


process server,” he said. “Who else could it be?" 
"Data Tracers couldn't have one herethat fast,” Mirim objected. 
The knock sounded again. 
"You're right,” Casper said. “I don't knowwho it is.” He stepped toward the door, then froze. 
Part of him, the part he thought of as himself, the normal old Casper Beech, wanted to go ahead and 


open the door, put an end to the mystery, get it over with—but something else, something unfamiliar, 


something strange, held him back. 
He rationalized; this was not a good neighborhood, and he wouldn't ordinarily be home now. It might be 
a burglar looking for vacant apartments.


 It was probably a salesman or a Jehovah's Witness or something, but just in case ... ?


 "Who's there?” he called, and without knowing why, or even that he was doing it, Casper stepped to 
one side, behind the door, out of the line of fire. 
And the door burst in, the doorframe shattering as the latch and lock were kicked in; splinters flew, and 
then the stuttering roar of automatic gunfire began—only to be cut off short as Casper kicked the door 
back, hard.


 Mirim yelped and dove for cover under the coffee table. 
The gun roared again. Bullets tore through the thin wood of the door, stitching toward Casper—but 
Casper had already dropped below them, and as the window shattered noisily, as plaster puffed from the 
walls, he rolled away from the corner, reaching for a weapon.


 The letter opener was too far away, the knives in the kitchen drawer out of the question; he snatched up 


an eight-inch splinter torn from the broken doorframe, and lay still. 
The gunfire stopped; Mirim lay motionless beneath the table, hands clasped protectively over her head. 
Casper lay on the floor, on his belly, muscles tensed, splinter in his hand.


 The ruined door opened, and Casper sprang; his empty fist took the stranger in the belly, and as the man 


started to double over the splinter rammed through his left eye and into the brain. 
He dropped instantly, and Casper fell on top of him, grabbing for the weapon the downed man had held 
and scanning the corridor.


 He didn't have far to look; the second man was close behind, pistol ready. His first shot went high, as 
Casper dropped below it; the second took his own companion in the back as Casper rolled aside. 



 He fired no third shot; by then Casper had the first attacker's Uzi and was muttering, “Acquire target and 

 He fired no third shot; by then Casper had the first attacker's Uzi and was muttering, “Acquire target and 

 The pistol-wielder had not bothered to take cover; instead, he took a stream of bullets in the chest as 
Casper emptied his weapon.


 Casper ran, crouched low, into the hall; he slammed one foot onto the second man's neck to make sure 
he was down to stay, then switched the Uzi to his other hand and snatched up the pistol while he made a 
quick turn, 360 degrees, checking for further attacks. He pointed the pistol down the stairs, but found he 
was aiming at empty air. 
"Mirim,” he called, not looking back, “are you okay?" 
"I think so,” she said unsteadily. 
"Then get out here. Now." 
"But there's ... in the doorway..." 
"Step over it,” Casper commanded. “Move! We have to get out of hereright now! " 
"But..." 
"No arguments! Before any more come!" 
That did it; Mirim came, and together they hurried down the stairs, not running, Casper told her you can 
trip if you run, people hear you coming; they moved quickly down the stairs and down the hall, Casper in 
front with the pistol held ready.


 Chapter Eight


 "They've almost certainly got a car waiting out front,” Casper said, “and if they know what they're doing 
there's another in back. We go out the side." 
"But there isn't...” Mirim began, looking along the narrow ground-floor hallway. 
"We make one,” Casper said, as he made a sudden whirling movement, bringing his foot around 


incredibly fast, kicking at an apartment door just below the doorknob. 
Wood cracked, and the door burst open. 
"How...” Mirim began. 
"If they could do it to mine, I can do it to someone else's,” Casper explained, as he pulled her through a 


dingy living room. 
The window was nailed shut, but Casper didn't worry about that; he used the butt of his 
newly-appropriated pistol to shatter the glass, then kicked out the screen. A moment later he had 



lowered Mirim to the alley below and jumped down after her.

lowered Mirim to the alley below and jumped down after her.
e 


he'll be expecting us less, and the alley's less exposed than the street." 
Mirim started to run: Casper caught her and held her back. “Not yet,” he said. “Just walk. Look as 
casual as you can. Look for other people; if we can get in a crowd somewhere we'll be safer."


 At the back of the building Casper steered Mirim down an alleyway along the back of the next building 


over; she didn't dare look at the parking lot at all, but he took a seemingly-casual glance. 
The dark blue late-model car with the man behind the wheel was blatantly obvious to him. It was also 
clear that the man was watching the back door, and hadn't even noticed the man and woman slipping 


away down the side. 
"Amateurs,” Casper muttered. 
Mirim glanced at him, but kept walking without saying a word, and Casper flushed. 
After all,he was an amateur—at best! A week before he hadn't even been that. 
What the hell was going on? How had he learned all this stuff? Those videos didn't account for it—even 


the self-defense one hadn't covered the moves he had made, it didn't say anything about using guns, and 
he had acted without conscious thought, as if the result of long training. 
And why had he downloaded those files in the first place?


 And what was that he'd said about acquiring a target and squeezing? 
He looked down at the gun in his hand. It feltright there, comfortable and familiar—but he'd never used 
a handgun in his life. He knew at a glance, though, that this was a Browning Hi-Power, a good, solid 
weapon, perhaps a bit old-fashioned, but still very effective.


 To use it, or any handgun, you focused on the front sight, not the target. You squeezed the trigger, you 


didn't pull it or jerk it. 
That hadn't been in the video. How did heknow that? It was almost as if he'd been imprinted with the 
knowledge ... ? 
"Damn,” he muttered to himself. Mirim glanced at him. 
They'd reached the end of the alley; he turned, heading for the subway station. 
"Where are we going?” Mirim asked, and Casper could hear a slight tremor in her voice—which was 


understandable, under the circumstances. A moment earlier he'd have been amazed at his own coolness 
under fire, but now he'd figured it out. Why hadn't he seen it sooner? 
Only one explanation made sense. 
"NeuroTalents,” he told her. 



 "What?" 
"NeuroTalents,” he said. “They screwed up somehow—it's the only explanation." 
"Only explanation ofwhat ?" 
"Of how I could do all that stuff,” he said. “Of how I know how to use this.” He hefted the pistol, then 


realized that he shouldn't be showing it in broad daylight, and tucked it into the waistband of his pants, 


under his shirt. 
Mirim still looked puzzled, and he explained, “They must have screwed up my imprinting, when I went in 
to learn the new software,” he said. “I didn't learn it—I couldn't do a thing with it at work this morning. 
But I knew what to do when that man attacked us. And I knew what to do when some gangbangers tried 
to mug me last night."


 "What?You were mugged? You didn't..."


 "I wasn't mugged,” Casper corrected her. “I said theytried . I stopped them, same as I stopped those 
men back at my apartment." 
"Those men ... Yeah, Casper, whowere they?" 
"I don't know,” he admitted. “I haven't figured that part out yet. But I must have learned this stuff at 
NeuroTalents." 
"NeuroTalents teaches people to fight? They have imprints for that?" 
Casper shrugged. “They must,” he said, as he led the way down the steps into the subway. 
As they waited on the platform, Mirim asked, “So what are you going to do at NeuroTalents?" 
"I'll tell them they screwed up and that I want it fixed...” Casper began. His voice trailed off as realization 
sank in. He looked at Mirim and blinked. 
"You can't undo an imprinting,” Mirim said. “It's like learning any other way—you can'tunlearn 
something." 
"But I...” Casper hesitated. 
He had signed the waiver; he couldn't sue NeuroTalents. The most he could do would be to demand 
that they give him theright neural imprint, on top of whatever this was they'd done to him—and what 
good would that do? Was Data Tracers going to take him back after that little farewell speech he'd 
made? 
Somehow, he doubted it. 
And something else occurred to him. There were people coming after him, trying to kill him. 
Data Tracers wouldn't have done that; they'd have destroyed him financially and socially if they decided 
to seek revenge, they might have had him arrested, had his bank account confiscated, his net accounts 
shut down, his apartment “searched” to destroy all his belongings, rumors spread—but they wouldn't 


have sent gunmen toshoot him. 
And they couldn't have acted so quickly, in any case. 
The credit firm he was paying for his parents’ debts wouldn't want him dead; he couldn't pay any more if 


he were dead. He didn't have enough of an estate to be worth confiscating. Even if they already knew 


he'd lost his job, they'd want him to find another, they wouldn't kill him. 
So someone else had sent those men. Not Data Tracers, and not Citizens’ Legal Credit. 
And no one had ever had any reason to kill poor, inoffensive Casper Beech—until now. 
The only thing different about him now, other than his lost job, was the imprint, so that had to be why 
they were after him. They must have caught the mistake at NeuroTalents.


 So wouldNeuroTalents send gunmen after him? 
Maybe they would—it didn't seem likely, but maybe they would. And in that case, he sure didn't want to 
walk into NeuroTalents’ offices and give them a sitting target.


 Would they try to kill him just to cover up their mistake? That seemed pretty extreme. Consortium 
members were generally assumed to have disposed of troublemakers on occasion, but only as a last 
resort.

 Maybe there was something else.

 Maybe there was something about the imprint that made him dangerous—something more than the fact 
that it proved they'd screwed up. 
He grimaced. Well, yes, there was something dangerous, he thought. He'd just killed a man with a 


splinter , for Christ's sake! That was pretty goddamn dangerous, to have someone running around who 


could do that. 
He'd killed a man with a splinter—he felt suddenly ill at the thought. It hadn't bothered him at the time, or 
when he wasn't thinking about it, but now he remembered the feel of it, the fluids spilling from the 
ruptured eye ... ? 
He leaned against a pillar, waiting for the nausea to pass; Mirim glanced at him uneasily. 
Just what the hell had they imprinted him with? 
What did they have an imprint like that for in the first place? NeuroTalents’ business was imprinting 


people with job skills—what kind of job called for the sort of fighting ability he'd learned? 
He'd heard stories about corporate assassins, killers kept on the regular payroll, but he'd never really 


believed them—he'd assumed that any corporate killings were done by freelancers. But even if therewere 
corporate assassins, would it be worth creating an entire imprint to manufacture them? 
How could there beenough corporate assassins to make imprinting economically feasible? There'd be 


bloodbaths in every research lab or corporate penthouse in the country if that was going on. 



 That just didn't make sense. So that wasn't what he was. That was something of a relief. 
But then, whatwas he? A soldier? 
The army used imprinting for part of their training, certainly, but by all accounts that was for things like 
driving tanks, not unarmed combat. And they did their own, they didn't contract it out to NeuroTalents. 
But maybe someone else in the government had hired NeuroTalents. Maybe one of those organizations 
in the Department of Homeland Security, the ones the public wasn't supposed to hear about, had 
decided to use NeuroTalents to train their people.


 Thatmade sense. All too much sense. 
It would do as a working assumption, then—he'd been imprinted with the training to be a spy, a secret 
agent. And maybe his brain hadn't been ready for it—maybe that was why he'd had such a bad reaction 
to the imprint. He wasn'tmeant to be able to kill people.


 But on the other hand, he was certainly good at it now. Wouldn't those two men have had the same sort 
of imprinting? 
Maybe he'd gotten something special. Maybe that was why whoever was responsible was after him. 
Spies, assassins—it all sounded like something out of an old video. 
"So where are we going?” Mirim asked, as the sound of an approaching train reached them. 
"Your place,” Casper replied.


 Mirim nodded. 
By the time they actually boarded the subway car, however, Casper was having second thoughts. If the 
government was trying to kill him—and ofcourse it was the government; who else but the Party would 
have the arrogance to set assassins loose on the streets of Philadelphia?—then they'd probably already 
done their research. They'd probably know he was dating Cecelia. They might know that Mirim had left 
the Data Tracers offices with him.


 And Mirim and Cecelia shared that apartment. 
If they had any brains at all, the people who were after him would be watching the apartment. They 
might be holding Cecelia hostage, as bait for him.


 He shook his head. No, he thought, Cecelia wouldn't be home at this time of day, she'd be at her office. 


He glanced at his watch—she'd be going to lunch soon, he judged. 
Maybe they could arrange a rendezvous; somehow, he didn't thinkanyone should be going into that 
apartment. 
Instead, he got off at City Hall, pulling Mirim after him. 
"Where are we going?” she asked for the third time. 



 "We're going to meet Cecelia,” Casper told her. “Your apartment's probably being watched."

 "We're going to meet Cecelia,” Casper told her. “Your apartment's probably being watched."

 The agent who'd been waiting out front had eventually realized that something was wrong, that the 
pick-up wasn't going as planned; if Beech had been there he should have been taken care of quickly, and 
if he wasn't, either Lambert or Finch should have come out and said so, so the man in the car would 
know it was a stake-out.


 He'd heard gunfire and breaking glass, he was pretty sure, and that should have been the end of it, but 
he waited and waited and Lambert and Finch did not emerge.


 So he'd gone in, and he'd found Finch with bullet holes in his chest and Lambert with a chunk of wood 
rammed through his eye, and he'd gone back out, quickly, with his pistol ready, to warn Eberhart out 
back, and then he'd returned to his car and called in.


 Smith was not happy at all.


 This should have been easy. Beech shouldn't be ready for them yet—the file should still be fragmented, 
working in fits and starts. Lambert and Finch should have polished him off in seconds.


 Maybe it hadn't been Beech at all, maybe Lambert and Finch had stumbled into a drug deal or some 
other illicit activity and been mistaken for cops—the neighborhood was bad enough, certainly.


 But in that case, where the hell was Beech?


 He wasn't at his apartment. He wasn't at the woman's apartment. He wasn't at Data Tracers. Where else 
would he go? Smith accessed the file on Beech and skimmed through it.


 He saw three more possibilities.


 First, Beech might have figured out what had happened and gone to NeuroTalents to complain.


 Second, he might have headed to his girlfriend's law firm—either to see her, or to discuss filing suit 
against NeuroTalents or Data Tracers.


 Third, he might have decided to take shelter with friends or relatives—only his records didn't show any 
living relatives, and the only friend mentioned was Cecelia Grand.


 Those would all want attention. It meant calling in more manpower, but that was better than letting 
Beech stay alive and loose with the Spartacus File gradually integrating itself in his brain.


 And that brought up the question of just how good, how dangerous, Beech already was. It would take a 
neurophysicist and an imprint programmer with a complete scan of Beech's brain to predict that with any 
accuracy; the theory was that he would need weeks or months to absorb everything, but Polnovick had 
begun his rampage within twenty-four hours. The theory might well be wrong.


 Beech might be a rank beginner who got lucky, or he might already be the equivalent of an experienced 
rebel leader, or he might be anywhere in between, and Smith didn't know which it was. Could Beech 
spot Covert agents reliably, or had Lambert and Finch just been sloppy? Was Beech wary now, alerted 
by the attempt on his life? Would it be possible to get near him? 


 A sniper didn't need to be near him, of course, but the sniper that morning hadn't managed to dispose of 
Beech. Had that been merely coincidence, or had Beech somehow already been alerted?


 Or was the Spartacus File simply making him very, very cautious?


 If Beechwas on the lookout, for whatever reason, how could Smith get at him? Smith kept half his mind 
on that question as he issued orders to cover Grand's office.


 Chapter Nine


 Mirim followed along, watching in puzzlement as Casper zigged and zagged through the city streets. He 
paused now and then to stare up at certain buildings or vehicles, though Mirim could never see anything 
special about them.


 They went past the entrance to Cecelia's law firm four times without going in.


 At last Casper stopped, a block away from Cecelia's office, and ushered Mirim into a coffee shop.


 "I'm pretty sure they're here, but they're still setting up,” he said, leading her toward an ancient landline 
pay phone at the back. “They won't have had time to monitor all the phones—I hope not, anyway. 
They'll have your cell covered, and of course mine, not that it works, but they probably don't have Celia's 
phones yet, so I want you to call her, arrange to meet somewhere for lunch."


 Mirim nodded, and started to pull her calling card from her purse. Casper's hand on her wrist stopped 
her.


 "Use cash,” he said.


 She glanced at him, then fished out a dollar coin instead. As she punched in Cecelia's office number and 
waited for an answer, Mirim looked uneasily at Casper.


 This was all so strange and horrible. She had always liked Casper, thought he was sort of cute—she'd 
often thought that if he'd had any backbone and hadn't been dating her roommate, she'd have been 
seriously interested in him.


 She hadn't known then that he lived in a slum, or that he was capable of killing two armed men in a 
matter of seconds.


 Of course, maybe hehadn't been capable of it—but didn't they say that imprinting couldn't teach you 
anything you wouldn't have been able to learn? It was justfaster —if you weren't able to handle 
something, imprinting wouldn't change that.


 Could an ordinary man learn to fight like that? Or was Casper something special?


 That speech he'd given at Data Tracers had been wonderful, and he was still charming, but he'd been so 
ruthless . And all this cloak-and-dagger rigmarole—was he being paranoid?

 But they reallywere after him, whoever they were. 


 What was goingon? Casper said he didn't know, either, but he still seemed to know what to do—could 

 What was goingon? Casper said he didn't know, either, but he still seemed to know what to do—could 

 Then Cecelia's voice said, “Grand speaking,” and Mirim concentrated on sounding normal, as if she 
were still at her office, as if she hadn't seen two men killed about an hour before, as if Casper weren't 
standing behind her with a loaded handgun in his pants.


 Itwould have to be lawyers, Smith thought. With most people he could have bullied the manager into 
letting them monitor the landline phones in a matter of minutes, just as he'd bullied that oaf Quinones at 
Data Tracers. The cells had all been tagged already, not just Grand's but everyone in the office, but 
Beech might expect that—or he might just use a landline anyway. Smith needed access to the office 
phones, and the easiest way to get it was courtesy of someone who already had it. 
Usually that just took a flashed set of credentials or a few words of warning, but lawyers were harder to 


intimidate—so even while he was negotiating with Mr. Arnold of Jackson-Arnold-Perez, Smith had his 
men tapping into the building's central systems. 
And a good thing, too, he thought, as one of his assistants signalled to him. 
"Just a moment, Mr. Arnold,” he said. He flicked off the microphone—just covering the mouthpiece 


wasn't certain enough.


 "The Grand woman is on the phone right now ... no, she just hung up,” the assistant said. “She's meeting 
Anspack, we think for lunch; we didn't get the location." 
"Follow her,” Smith snapped. “Anspack's probably still with Beech.” Then he turned the microphone 


back on. “I'm sorry, Mr. Arnold—something came up here. If you insist on a court order, we'll get one. 
I'll get back to you. Thank you for your time, Mr. Arnold." 
He hung up and pocketed the phone. 
A court order—ha! Arnold was stuck in the last century somewhere. 
He turned to his assistant again. 
"Make sure whoever's going after Beech knows he's dangerous—use whatever it takes to take him 
down. This is a national security matter. Collateral damage is acceptable." 
"Yes, sir.” The assistant began relaying orders. 
"They'll follow her,” Casper said. “We'll have to lose them somehow." 
Mirim blinked at him, startled. 
"You really think they're going to be that thorough?"


 "They were watching her office—I spotted two cars on stakeout, one man on the sidewalk, and a man 
on the rooftop across from Cecelia's window,” Casper replied. “If they're watching her, they'll follow 
her." 


 Mirim stared at him, and Casper thought he saw fear in her expression.

 Mirim stared at him, and Casper thought he saw fear in her expression.

 The fear faded to uncertainty—and it occurred to Casper that he'd never been able to read Mirim's face 
so easily before.


 Had the imprint taught himthat , too?


 What sort of an imprint could that be? The fighting, the weapons, spotting traps, outthinking opponents, 
that all fit together—but reading faces?


 And what about that speech at the office?


 It didn't all fit with the idea of an assassin very well; he was fairly certain now that whatever he had been 
programmed with wasn't just assassination. Face-reading might suit a spy, someone who had to be able 
to tell truth from lies and know who to trust—but how did his speech fit with that?


 "How do we lose them?” Mirim asked. “If they're really there, I mean."


 Casper shrugged—and realized that he didn't know; he wasn't just dodging the question to save time. 
He had no idea at all how one could escape pursuit.


 He had known a moment before, and he'd lost it.


 What thehell kind of imprint was this? How could he forget something he'd known just seconds earlier? 
That wasn't how it was supposed to work! Once something was imprinted it was supposed tobe there 
whenever it was needed—Casper had read enough on the nets and spoken to enough people who had 
been imprinted to know that.


 Once they had Cecelia away from those bastards, the next step would be to track down just what it was 
that he'd had stuffed into his head—what it was for, what it did, everything. Once he knew what it was, 
maybe he could figure out how to deal with it.


 Maybe the knowledge would come back when he needed it—he sure hoped it would.


 "Come on,” he said.


 Mirim had told Cecelia to meet her at a restaurant and bar on Rittenhouse Square, but Casper had no 
intention of actually entering the place—he'd be too confined there, too easy to trap. Instead, moving 
easily through the lunchtime crowds, dragging Mirim behind him, he spotted Cecelia on Walnut Street 
and waved to her.


 She waved back, and a moment later the three of them were moving side-by-side down the sidewalk, 
Casper uncomfortably aware of the two men following Cecelia.


 "Casper!” Cecelia began, “I didn't know..."


 "Shh,” he told her. He looked around for a way to escape. So far the two men hadn't opened fire, 
presumably because of the bystanders, or perhaps because they weren't yet certain of his identity—or 


maybe they just weren't close enough. He was fairly sure they'd move soon. 
He would have, in their position. 
"This way,” he said suddenly, turning north on the west side of 19th. 
Startled, the two women obeyed. 
He then turned again, onto Moravian—and here he didn't have any crowds to help; Moravian wasn't 


much more than an alley. 
"Run!” he said, reaching out with both hands and swatting both women forward. 
Mirim ran—she'd been there at his apartment, she was already on edge. 
Cecelia, though, stopped dead and turned to face him, hands on her hips. “Casper, what the hell..." 
"Run, damn it!” he shouted. “I'll explain in a moment!” And he ran himself, after Mirim. “Turn left!” he 


called.


 He glanced back. The two men had pushed right past Cecelia, leaving her standing there, looking 
confused and angry; one man had a pistol in his hand. 
Mirim wheeled left onto 20th Street, Casper close behind. 
Another short block brought them back onto Walnut, where at Casper's signal Mirim turned left again. 
Pedestrians turned and stared as the two of them charged through the crowd, half a block ahead of their 


pursuers.


 Casper was considering options as he ran. Something in his brain was working again; he was running 
through possible courses of action, rather than simply fleeing. 
He could call for help, but these people didn't know him yet, they wouldn't want to get involved, and the 


natural tendency would be to side with the pursuers rather than the fugitive. 
He could make a serious effort to lose the two men—but there might be others he hadn't spotted, lurking 


in the crowd as back-up. And besides, he couldn't see any way to bring Mirim and Cecelia with him 
safely if he were to try any serious dodging; they weren't ready, wouldn't read signals in time. 
But there was a third alternative. 
He turned north again on 19th, Mirim close on his heels, and a moment later they were back on 


Moravian, having circled the block. Cecelia was still there, halfway down to 20th; Mirim ran toward her, 


shouting, “Run, Cecelia!" 
Casper didn't; Casper stopped dead the moment he'd rounded the corner and threw himself back 
against the brick wall. He pulled the Browning Hi-Power from his pants.


 And as each of the two men rounded the corner, chasing Mirim, Casper snapped off two quick shots. 


 "Double tap,” he said, as he fired at the first man's chest; the recoil kicked the pistol upward slightly, and 
Casper fired again without pulling it down. That put a bullet through the side of the man's head. Then he 
dragged the gun back down into line in time to do the exact same thing to the second pursuer. 
Blood and brain sprayed across the pavement and the side of an illegally-parked car. Both men dropped 
in mid-stride, one after the other. Cecelia screamed. 
So did another woman, on 19th Street, who had seen the two men fall. 
Casper ignored the screams; he ran, grabbed the two women by the arm in passing, one on either side, 
and dragged them to 20th Street, where he turned right this time. 
Mirim ran with him; Cecelia didn't resist, but didn't help much at first. 
"You want to stay with those two?” Casper whispered to her. 
After that, she ran. 
They dodged through the streets of Center City for several minutes—running at first, then trotting, then 


walking.


 "Catch your breath,” Casper told the women. “After the next corner we want to look natural, to blend 
in." 
Mirim nodded; Cecelia didn't, but Casper didn't worry about it. 
The next corner put them on Market Street, and Casper began looking for somewhere to sit down, 


somewhere they could eat the lunch they had promised Cecelia. 
He was, he realized, really hungry. He'd worked up an appetite. 
"We have a problem,” Smith's assistant said. 
"Why?” Smith asked. 
"It's Dominguez and Groves." 
"What about them?" 
"They're dead,” the assistant said. “Beech blew their brains out." 
"Did they get Beech?" 
The assistant shook his head. “No. And their back-up lost him." 
"Damn!” Smith smacked his fist against the wall. “What the hell happened?"


 The assistant relayed the back-up's report—how Dominguez and Groves had seen Beech and Anspack 
meet Grand, how they'd followed the three of them for a block and then Anspack and Beech had started 
running, how they'd all gone around the block and Beech had ambushed them. 


 The back-up had seen most of it, and had tried to pick up the pursuit herself, but she'd guessed wrong 
somewhere about which way her quarry turned and lost them. She hadn't had a chance to get off a shot.

 The back-up had seen most of it, and had tried to pick up the pursuit herself, but she'd guessed wrong 
somewhere about which way her quarry turned and lost them. She hadn't had a chance to get off a shot.

 "Crowds,” the assistant said. “At least, that's what the back-up thinks."

 "I said collateral damage was acceptable!” Smith glared. “For Christ's sake ... next time, if there is one, 
tell whoever we send to go ahead and shoot on sight. And give ‘em something heavier—shotguns or full 
auto, something with real firepower. Something that'll take Beech down no matter how good he is."

 He wondered just how good that was. Beech seemed to be absorbing the Spartacus File pretty 
goddamn fast.

 "Yes, sir,” the assistant said. “Uh ... the city police are on the scene of the shooting; should we contact 
them?"

 "No, of...” Smith stopped and reconsidered. “Yes,” he said. “Give them Beech's description and basic 
history. Tell them we think he's a terrorist. Tell them Dominguez and Groves were FBI, tell ‘emwe're 
FBI—let ‘em think we're going to be really pissed if anyone else gets Beech, you know, the whole 
‘Untouchables’ bit. That should motivate them. These city contractorslike pissing off the FBI."

 "Yes, sir.” The assistant reached for the phone.

 Chapter Ten 
"The government's after me,” Casper told Cecelia. “Those two were feds." 
The three of them were seated at the counter of a small coffee shop on the north side of Market Street; 


bright sunlight gleamed from chrome and Formica on all sides, and half a dozen screens were showing 


various news, weather, and sports reports. 
It was hard to imagine that ten minutes earlier they'd been fleeing for their lives; Casper's words sounded 
bizarre and paranoid to Cecelia.


 She put down her sandwich and stared at him. She hadn't yet taken the first bite. “Why?” she 


demanded. 
"I'm not sure,” he said. “Something to do with the imprinting I got, I think—someone screwed it up 
somehow.” He saw her expression, and continued, “I don't knowwhy , but they're definitely after me, 
and they're trying to kill me, not arrest me." 
"How do you know?" 
"Because they shot first, without asking me to surrender or saying who they were." 
Cecelia glanced at Mirim, who nodded confirmation. “They just opened fire, back at his 


apartment—never said a word." 



 "Those same two men?" 
"No, of course not,” Mirim said. “Casper killed them."


 "But you were at his apartmentbefore he ... what were you doing at Casper's apartment?” Cecelia eyed 

her roommate suspiciously. 
"We walked off the job together this morning,” Mirim said, a bit nervously. 
"But ... oh, never mind. So these two men he just shot came to his apartment?" 
"No, twoothers . Casper killed them, too." 
Cecelia blinked. “He's killedfour men?" 
Mirim swallowed, and nodded. 
Cecelia looked at Casper, who tried very hard to look blank; he didn't know what else to do. 
He supposed it must be a shock for her, to hear that her harmless, timid lover had committed not one, 


but four murders in a single morning—or four killings, anyway, as they were all self-defense.


 It couldn't be as much of a shock for her to hear that as it was for him to have lived through it, though; 
she at least had the option of not believing it. 
"None of them identified himself?” Cecelia asked, turning back to Casper. 
"Nope,” he said. “Shoot first, ask questions later." 
"Then how do you know they're feds?" 
"Who the hell else could it be?” Casper said, suddenly angry. “Those bastards are always trying to run 


everyone's lives...” He was almost growling. 
"Casper,” Cecelia said, and he stopped. She stared at him and picked up her sandwich again. She took 


a bite, chewed, then said, “You never seemed to have a problem with the government telling you what to 
do before." 
Casper blinked at her, and tried to think. 
Was that true? 
It seemed as if it must be, really—after all, he'd put up with everything all these years, put up with the 


taxes and orders and rules and security checks, whereas now the mere thought of anyone telling him that 
he had to do something, or mustn't do something, was enough to make him tremble with rage. 
The imprint again; it had to be. 
What thehell had NeuroTalents done to him? And why?


 "You don't know why they're trying to kill you?” Cecelia asked. “Do you think it's a case of mistaken 


identity?"

identity?"

 "Let's hear it."

 Casper recognized her tone and grimaced; she'd slipped into lawyer mode. Hardly surprising, under the 
circumstances. 
"I went to NeuroTalents for that imprinting a few days ago, remember?" 
Cecelia nodded. 
"Well, I got the wrong one. I've been programmed with some kind of combat imprint—or maybe it's 


meant for spies or assassins, I don't know, but that's how I was able to take out four of them." 
"I saw how you ... how you killed those two,” Cecelia said. “You caught them by surprise, ambushed 
them." 
"But how'd I know to do that?" 
"People can do amazing things under stress,” Cecelia said. “You see a lot of it in my line of work." 
"And what about the others?” He shook his head. “Besides, I've been having all kinds of weird 
experiences—I chased off a bunch of muggers the other night, and I'm constantly finding myself watching 
for booby-traps or planning raids. And there was the speech at the office. No, I got the wrong 
imprint—and the government must have found out, and wanted to cover up." 
"Seems to me they'd be more likely to want torecruit you than to kill you,” Cecelia remarked. 
Casper blinked in surprise. 
"I hadn't thought of that,” he said. 
"Maybe they didn't either,” Mirim replied. 
"Oh, right,” Cecelia said. “You've got someone programmed with some sort of super-soldier neural 


imprint that you've had made up to your own specifications, and it never occurs to you to see if you can 
use him for whatever you wanted the imprint for in the first place?" 
"I hadn't thought of that,” Casper repeated. “Itwould be the sensible thing to do, wouldn't it?" 
"Then why haven't they tried?” Mirim asked.


 "Maybe they know it wouldn't work,” Casper said slowly. “Maybe it's inherent in the imprint that it 
wouldn't work.” He thought about his speech at Data Tracers that morning, about his automatic negative 
reaction to mention of the government much of the time. He thought about the Party and the Consortium 
and he realized he hated them both, where before he'd always considered them something of a necessary 
evil, the unpleasant cure for the terrorist wars and economic crisis of his childhood years. 


 Now he wanted to destroy them both, whatever the cost.

 Now he wanted to destroy them both, whatever the cost.

from within. 
That was just the sort of lousy trick that the government would pull. 
Or was the imprint making him think that? 
"So what are you going to do?” Cecelia asked, breaking his train of thought. “Could you turn yourself in, 


tell them youwant to be recruited?"


 "No,” Casper said immediately. “They must know what's in my head better than I do—they'd assume it 
was a trick, that I was going to turn on them.” He smiled wolfishly. “They'd be right, too." 
"Imprints aren't supposed to control your actions!” Mirim protested. 
"This is no ordinary imprint,” Casper said. “I'm sure of that." 
"What the hellis it, then?" 
"I wish I knew!"


 "Okay,” Cecelia said, “You don't turn yourself in—though as an officer of the court I am required to 
advise you to surrender. But speaking hypothetically, let's say you don't—whatdo you do?" 
"Well, I can't just ignore it,” Casper said, “though that's exactly what half of me would like to 


do—probably the half that's not imprint. I can't ignore it, because they'll kill me if I do." 
"They haven't managed it so far,” Cecelia pointed out. 
Casper snorted. “If they're serious about it, they will eventually.” He glanced at the coffee shop 


windows, suddenly uncomfortably aware that he'd been in this same place rather longer than was entirely 
wise, and that he was visible from the street. 
"So what's left?” Mirim asked. 
"Run,” Cecelia said. “That's obvious." 
"Run?” Casper said. “Maybe." 
"Well, what else?" 
"Fight back,” Casper said, and he felt a warm surge of satisfaction at the idea. 
"Fight against the entire United States government?” Mirim asked. 
"Why not?” Casper asked. “They're just people." 



 "They'rethousands of people, with guns and tanks and bombs and organization, Casper,” Cecelia 

 "They'rethousands of people, with guns and tanks and bombs and organization, Casper,” Cecelia 

 "So I'd recruit myown people, get myown guns."

 "How?"

 Casper shrugged.

 A second before it had seemed natural and obvious, and he still thought it could be done, but right now 
he didn't know how. The imprint was playing its tricks again.

 "That might be fine in the long term,” Mirim said, “but forright now , the idea is just to stay alive—how 
do you plan to do that?"

 "You'll need to run,” Cecelia said. “I can try for a court order to stop the attacks—even with the 
emergency decrees in effect, I think I can plead that you're entitled to due process as long as you aren't 
actually taking part in subversive or terrorist activities."

 Casper shook his head. “No, Celia,” he said, “you're missing something here."

 "What?"

 "You're coming with me."

 Cecelia blinked at him.

 "Don't you see?” he said, the words coming in a rush. “If you go home they'll know you were with me, 
they'll take you in for questioning, they'll keep you locked up while they pry out every word I've said to 
you, they might just decide to lose you completely. If theydo let you out, it'll just be as bait for me—you'll 
never have another moment's privacy, they'll be spying on you every second of the day. And you, Mirim, 
they'll do the same to you—you know they will, when you think about it you'll know it's true!Listen to 
me,think about it—even if youcould go back, become good little drones again, do youwant to? Is that 
any life to live? Is that a government that deserves your allegiance? What right does the government have 
to kill anyone who causes trouble? What right do they have to order everyone around? Who gave the 
Party and the Consortium and the whole stinking power structure the right to run our lives this way, to 
grind us down? Who said they could suspend someone's civil rights indefinitely just by labeling him a 
security risk? Who said they could exempt the Consortium from anti-trust and environmental laws and all 
the rest, and leave them in place for everyone else?Think about it—theysent me to have my brain, my 
very identity, tampered with, so that I could serve the Consortium better, so it could keep the Party 
strong.They screwed up and put in the wrong instructions, so now they're going to killme for it. No 
apologies, not even an offer of a quick, painless injection—they do that much for serial killers, for God's 
sake, but forme , it's a spray of bullets through my apartment door, it's hunting me down on the city 
streets..."

 He had risen to his feet while speaking; now he threw his arms out theatrically.

 "How can you continue to serve them?” he shouted.

 For a moment the two women stared up at him, and Casper stared back, meeting Cecelia's gaze. From 
the corner of his eye he saw the counterman watching him suspiciously, but the man wasn't taking action 


to quell the disturbance. 
Not yet, anyway. 
"He's right,” Mirim said. 
"He's right about them locking us up, anyway,” Cecelia agreed. She looked up at Casper. 
"All right,” she said, “so all three of us run, and we might as well do it together. Where do we runto? " 
Casper looked at both women. He dropped his arms to his sides and seemed to shrink. 
"I wish I knew,” he said.


 Chapter Eleven


 The first step was obvious—and for that matter, so was the second. If they were going to run, the first 
thing they needed was transportation, and the second was money.

 Where to go after they had transportation and money wasn't so simple, but as Casper led the two 
women into the parking garage he'd chosen he made a suggestion. Neither of them had any comment on 
it, at least at first.

 "Maybe we should take a train,” Mirim said nervously, as Casper looked over the silent rows of vehicles 
on the second level of the parking structure.

 Casper shook his head. “Too easy to search,” he said. “And a train goes in a straight line, you can't turn 
off and get lost on the side roads. If they decide to search the trains for me, and I'm on one, I'm dead.” 
He looked over a brown Toyota, then moved on.

 "They can stop cars and search those, too."

 "Some of them, yeah, but do you have any idea how many roads there are out of Philadelphia?” He 
zeroed in on an old blue Honda four-door and looked it over for any sign of a security system. There 
was no thumbprint scanner on the car's computer, no warning lights or labels beyond the usual required 
safety notices. He noticed the clutter of old maps and empty fast-food wrappers on the back 
seat—exactly what he was looking for, signs of a disorganized owner.

 "I don't like this,” Mirim said, her arms folded across her chest. She looked about nervously as Casper 
ducked down, got on his back, and peered under the Honda.

 Cecelia watched Casper with interest. “What are you doing?” she asked.

 "I'm checking to see if there are any wires that don't look like they belong,” Casper said. “I figure that if 
there's an added security system, there'll be wires."

 "Some of them are subtler than that,” Cecelia said. “I had a few clients who tried this sort of thing when I 
did my year as a public defender." 


 "It's aHonda , Celia, not a Ferrari or something,” Casper said as he got to his feet.

 "It's aHonda , Celia, not a Ferrari or something,” Casper said as he got to his feet.

 "So be ready to run,” he said, as he made a sudden whirling movement and kicked out the driver's side 
window. The safety glass buckled, and dropped inside in a single large sheet—the glass was shattered 
into bits about the size of teeth, but the fragments were still held together by the layer of plastic.

 "Jesus, Casper!” Mirim said. She looked about, waiting for an alarm to sound, for cops to jump out of 
nowhere with guns drawn.

 No sirens wailed, no horns beeped; the only sound was the normal buzz of traffic outside. Casper 
ignored her as he reached in, tossed the ruined window away, and opened the door. He slid into the 
driver's seat, leaned across and fished through the glove compartment, checked the storage 
compartments and sun visors—and found the spare key in the ashtray. The clutter in the back seat had 
made him optimistic that such a stash existed.

 A few seconds later the engine roared to life.

 "Get in,” he said, as he used the power-lock button to unlock the other doors.

 The two women hastened to obey; Cecelia took the front passenger seat while Mirim ducked into the 
back, shoving the trash aside.

 Casper backed the car carefully out of the space, then asked, “Either of you have any idea where the 
nearest ATM is? And have you got your cards? They may have stopped mine already."

 Both women began digging through their purses as Casper headed down the ramp. Cecelia found her 
card first, Mirim a moment later.

 "I didn't know you knew how to steal a car,” Cecelia remarked, as Casper pulled out of the parking 
structure onto the street.

 "Neither did I,” said Casper, as he scanned the traffic. It wouldn't do to get into a fender-bender or get 
stopped by the cops. The broken window was going to be risky enough in that regard without doing 
anything else to attract attention, like speeding or any sort of hot driving. “I was guessing—it seemed like 
something this stupid imprinting ought to include, and sure enough, once I started looking, I knew what to 
look for."

 "I'm still not sure this is a good idea,” Mirim muttered from the back seat.

 "What, stealing the car?” Casper shrugged, then ducked his head to get a better look at the traffic light. 
“Maybe it wasn't. I mean, taking it from the middle of a commuter garage, I figure no one will notice it's 
gone until 5:00 or later, and we'll have ditched it by then. And except for the window we aren't going to 
hurt it. If you want, we can leave a couple of hundred bucks for the gas and the repairs. I mean, once 
we've got some more money."

 "I didn't mean that,” Mirim said. “I meant going to Leonid's place."

 That had been Casper's suggestion; this was the first feedback he'd gotten on it. 


 "Oh, that.” Casper turned the corner. “Well, no one had abetter idea. If you think of one while we're 
getting money, you know, while we're at the ATMs, let me know, okay? But I didn't know what else to 
suggest. They'll be watching all my friends and relatives, they're watching your apartment, and Cecelia's 

 "Oh, that.” Casper turned the corner. “Well, no one had abetter idea. If you think of one while we're 
getting money, you know, while we're at the ATMs, let me know, okay? But I didn't know what else to 
suggest. They'll be watching all my friends and relatives, they're watching your apartment, and Cecelia's 

 "But if they're beingthat thorough, they must know I'm with you,” Mirim protested.

 Casper hesitated. “Well, yeah,” he admitted, “but ifyou were after a man and a woman who were 
running away together, wouldyou expect them to hide out with herboyfriend ?” Cecelia threw him a 
suspicious glance. Casper saw it from the corner of one eye, but ignored it. If he once started trying to 
allay Cecelia's suspicions about something going on between himself and Mirim, he'd never be able to 
stop. Best to just ignore the obvious, as if he were so innocent that he didn't even realize she had doubts.

 A few days ago he wouldn't have thought that way; he'd have been telling Cecelia how there wasn't 
anything between himself and Mirim and saying it so badly that he'd be stuffing his foot further into his 
mouth with every word.

 Now, even though he felt pretty much like himself at the moment, he knew better.

 Had he figured it out for himself, or was the imprint telling him this? What thehell kind of imprint would 
include advice on keeping a girlfriend from being jealous, on top of everything else?

 "Why not?” Mirim answered. “After all, we picked up your girlfriend—what's the difference?"

 Casper didn't have a ready reply to that; he was sure therewas a difference, but he couldn't put it into 
words. The imprint didn't offer any help on this one. “They probably think I took you hostage or 
something like that,” he said at last.

 "Why would they?” Mirim asked.

 "I don't know. I just think ... I mean ... Look, we'll get the money first, and when we get to Leonid's 
place I'll check for a stake-out—you know I can do that, right? You'll trust me on that? I managed okay 
back at Celia's office, didn't I?"

 "Yeah, but back there you were...” She stopped in mid-sentence, not sure how to say what she 
meant—or at least, not sure how to say it without offending Casper.

 Back then, he had been calm, controlled, efficient, in charge—the imprinting had been telling him what to 
do, she supposed. Now he was being, at least intermittently, timid and confused and whiny and 
unsure—his old self, in other words. He'd been the new Casper when he kicked out the window and 
started the car, but his voice now was back to his former personality.

 It was hard to explain just what the difference was, but she could sense it instantly. Sometimes Casper 
was on, was the new assertive Casper, and sometimes he was off, was the old, timid Casper.

 She had heard stories about how movie stars could turn something on—without it they were ordinary 
people, but when it was on they werestars , they drew stares, they were always the center of attention. 
Charisma, star quality—she wasn't sure what to call it.

 She'd never really believed the stories—until now. She'd never met a movie star, but she'd seen Casper 
turn on, turn into this irresistible force, thispresence she couldn't resist. He'd done it with his speech at 


Data Tracers, he'd done it when he killed those two men at his apartment, again when they had arrived 
outside Cecelia's office, when he'd killed the two men in the street, and in the coffee shop when he'd 
convinced them to join him. 
But right now it was off, and he wasn't a leader of men, he was just Casper Beech, liability analyst. It 
was hard to take him seriously, hard to trust him with anything important. He was a nice guy, fun to talk 
to, but no more than that. 
Could he turn it back on, whatever it was, when he needed it?Could he spot people watching Leonid's 
apartment? 
Well, they'd find out soon enough. 
She just hoped they'd survive it. 
"So after he took out Groves and Dominguez, he spotted their back-up? Spotted the tail?” Smith said. 
"Maybe,” his assistant said. “We don't know if he spotted her or was just getting loose on general 
principles. She didn'tthink he'd made her." 
"He probably had, though. This son of a bitch is good. He's spotted and dealt with everything we've 
done—dodged it if he could, killed if he couldn't dodge." 
"Yes, sir,” his assistant said. 
"So we have to assume he'll spot any of our people, no matter what we do,” Smith said. 
"Yes, sir." 
"So he won't approach anyone we have covered." 
The assistant hesitated. He wasn't any too sure of anything about what this Casper Beech would or 
wouldn't do. 
"Yes, sir,” he said at last. 
"But he has to gosomewhere . He's got the women with him—he's not going to just sleep in the street, 

Data Tracers, he'd done it when he killed those two men at his apartment, again when they had arrived 
outside Cecelia's office, when he'd killed the two men in the street, and in the coffee shop when he'd 
convinced them to join him. 
But right now it was off, and he wasn't a leader of men, he was just Casper Beech, liability analyst. It 
was hard to take him seriously, hard to trust him with anything important. He was a nice guy, fun to talk 
to, but no more than that. 
Could he turn it back on, whatever it was, when he needed it?Could he spot people watching Leonid's 
apartment? 
Well, they'd find out soon enough. 
She just hoped they'd survive it. 
"So after he took out Groves and Dominguez, he spotted their back-up? Spotted the tail?” Smith said. 
"Maybe,” his assistant said. “We don't know if he spotted her or was just getting loose on general 
principles. She didn'tthink he'd made her." 
"He probably had, though. This son of a bitch is good. He's spotted and dealt with everything we've 
done—dodged it if he could, killed if he couldn't dodge." 
"Yes, sir,” his assistant said. 
"So we have to assume he'll spot any of our people, no matter what we do,” Smith said. 
"Yes, sir." 
"So he won't approach anyone we have covered." 
The assistant hesitated. He wasn't any too sure of anything about what this Casper Beech would or 
wouldn't do. 
"Yes, sir,” he said at last. 
"But he has to gosomewhere . He's got the women with him—he's not going to just sleep in the street, 
l 
their cards." 
"He's getting cash from ATM machines,” the assistant pointed out. “We can't cover all of them, and we 


can't reach them in time when his card registers." 
"Freeze his accounts—haven't we done that?" 
"Uh ... no. You just said to flag them, not to freeze them." 
"Well, do it, idiot! And the women's accounts, too. How much have they already gotten?" 
"Uh ... about two grand. His own account's cleaned out; they've been working on Ms. Grand's." 



 "Well, freeze what's left. And have you ever tried to get a hotel to accept cash? No respectable one will 
take it any more. Besides, put out a notice, in case they try—if any hotel has a customer pay cash, we 

 "Well, freeze what's left. And have you ever tried to get a hotel to accept cash? No respectable one will 
take it any more. Besides, put out a notice, in case they try—if any hotel has a customer pay cash, we 
" 
"Yes, sir." 
"So we're covering Beech's friends and relatives?" 
"Of course." 
"And Anspack's?" 
"Yes, sir." 
"And Grand's?" 
"Yes, sir." 
"You said Anspack's got a friend who works in security?" 
The assistant glanced at his computer screen. “Yes, sir,” he said. “Leonid Chernukhin, senior operative 


at Spartan Guardian Services." 
"He's covered?" 
"Yes, sir." 
"Pull ‘em off, right now—and get him on the phone for me." 
"Sir?" 
"I said to phone this Leonid Whatsisname. If Beech can spot all our people, we'll use someone else. And 


if he won't touch anyone we have covered, we'll leave someone open." 
"Yes, sir,” the assistant said. 
Leonid hung up the phone and gazed out the window as contemplatively as he was capable of. 
So the feds wanted a hit. He could handle that. 
He'd never done a hit before. He'd killed a couple of guys once who chose the wrong place to try to 


rob, and he'd put some others in the hospital, but he'd never deliberately set out to kill anyone before, let 


alone someone he knew. 
He didn't know Beech well, but he'd met him the other night—and that made it easier, actually, because 
Leonid didn't like Beech much. Beech was a snotty little wimp, thought he was smart. He'd be no loss to 
the world.


 And the son of a bitch had been screwing Mirim, if the fed's hints meant anything; that made it 
personal—and a lot more fun, too. 


 Beech had been imprinted with some sort of combat file, the man said—but Leonid grinned. 
Beech was a wimp. Combat imprint or not, he was still a wimp. 
This was going to befun . 
"Anyone there?” Cecelia asked testily. 
Casper hesitated. 
"I don't think so,” he said. 
He'd driven the stolen car around the block twice now, and hadn't seen anyone suspicious—but it didn't 
look right, somehow, and he wasn't sure whether the stupid unpredictable imprint was working properly. 
But he couldn't see anyone, and where else were they going to go? No respectable hotel would take 
them unless they used their charge cards, and even if the cards had still been good—which they weren't, 
as they knew from the last ATM they'd hit—they'd have been like waving a red flag for the government 
to see. 
Besides, Cecelia was suspicious that something was going on between him and Mirim, he knew she was 
suspicious despite his innocent act, and if Mirim's lover was around maybe she'd realize there wasn't. 
Not that Casper was sure he'd mind if therewas something going on. 
He pulled the car into the lot and turned off the ignition. “Come on,” he said. 
No one shot at them as they left the car and entered the building; no one followed them, or came 
anywhere near them. Some kids were playing a game a block or so down the sidewalk, and a woman 
was walking a dog, but that was all. It was almost 4:00; rush hour had started back in Center City and 
would be reaching this neighborhood soon, but right now everything was quiet.

 Beech had been imprinted with some sort of combat file, the man said—but Leonid grinned. 
Beech was a wimp. Combat imprint or not, he was still a wimp. 
This was going to befun . 
"Anyone there?” Cecelia asked testily. 
Casper hesitated. 
"I don't think so,” he said. 
He'd driven the stolen car around the block twice now, and hadn't seen anyone suspicious—but it didn't 
look right, somehow, and he wasn't sure whether the stupid unpredictable imprint was working properly. 
But he couldn't see anyone, and where else were they going to go? No respectable hotel would take 
them unless they used their charge cards, and even if the cards had still been good—which they weren't, 
as they knew from the last ATM they'd hit—they'd have been like waving a red flag for the government 
to see. 
Besides, Cecelia was suspicious that something was going on between him and Mirim, he knew she was 
suspicious despite his innocent act, and if Mirim's lover was around maybe she'd realize there wasn't. 
Not that Casper was sure he'd mind if therewas something going on. 
He pulled the car into the lot and turned off the ignition. “Come on,” he said. 
No one shot at them as they left the car and entered the building; no one followed them, or came 
anywhere near them. Some kids were playing a game a block or so down the sidewalk, and a woman 
was walking a dog, but that was all. It was almost 4:00; rush hour had started back in Center City and 
would be reaching this neighborhood soon, but right now everything was quiet.
.


 Mirim led the way and rang the bell, Casper and Cecelia hanging back. Casper could hear a TV going in 
one of the other apartments. 
The door opened, and Casper tensed, but it was only Leonid, in jeans and tank top. 
"Hi,” he said. “What's up?" 
His tone didn't sound right to Casper—and what was he doing home at this hour, anyway? 
Well, security people didn't all work the day shift, Casper told himself, and he was probably just being 


paranoid. 
"May we come in?” Mirim asked. 
"Um ... sure,” Leonid said, stepping aside.


 Mirim turned and beckoned to the others, and the three of them trooped into Leonid's apartment. 


 "What's going on?” Leonid asked, as he closed the door behind them. “Why aren't you guys at the 
office?” He looked from one to the other—but something made Casper think he was acting. 
"Someone's trying to kill Casper,” Mirim said. 
Leonid glanced quickly at Casper, then back at Mirim. “Who?” he asked. 
That wasn't right, Casper thought; he should have said “What?” rather than “Who?"


 "We don't know,” Mirim said. 
Casper didn't contradict her, but he watched Leonid's expression closely. He thought he saw Leonid's 
lips twitch slightly, as if he were thinking, “Yeah, sure you don't."


 Paranoia, he told himself. Yes, someone was after him, but that didn't meaneveryone was. 
But something was clicking away in his head. Leonid worked in security, he was known to be 
acquainted with Mirim, the feds knew Mirim was with Casper.


 "Tell me about it,” Leonid said. 
"Two men broke down his apartment door,” Mirim said. “He managed to get away out a window, and 
came back to Center City to talk to Celia and me, and when we were on our way to lunch two more 


men came after us with guns." 
Leonid turned to Casper. “Men with guns?" 
Casper nodded. 
"You don't know who they were?" 
Casper shook his head. “Not for sure,” he said. “I think it has something to do with the imprint I got 


from NeuroTalents last week, though. For Data Tracers." 
"Shit. Any chance they followed you here?" 
Casper shook his head. 
"No,” he said. 
"You seem pretty definite about that." 
Casper shrugged. “I'm sure,” he said. 
"So why'd you come here?" 
"They were watching Celia's apartment and office." 
"So you came to me for help?" 



 "Well, if there's anything you can do...” Mirim said. 
Leonid considered. 
Mirim thought he was thinking over Casper's situation, but what he was actually thinking about was 
whether he should take out Mirim, too, and say it was an accident. The bitch was lying—the Covert 
contact had said she was at Beech's apartment, not in Center City with her roommate. She was lying 
because she'd been fucking Beech. And she hadn't mentioned that Beech actually managed to kill two of 
his pursuers—Covert had told him that.


 If she was lying for Beech like this, she was never going to be any good to him, to Leonid, again. And 


she'd be a witness, a witness with a grudge. 
The other woman would be a witness, too, but that was no big deal—she was a lawyer, Covert could 
get her to stay quiet. Lawyers could be bought or intimidated.


 Besides, she looked nervous. She'd probably be glad to be rid of Beech, to not be mixed up with him 
any more.


 The first bullet for Beech, then, but the second for Mirim. 
"You know, I have access to a lot of information on criminals,” he said. “Part of my work, y'know—I'm 
on the closed law enforcement nets, got access to all the secure sites. Maybe I could find out something 
about this. You three wait here."


 He turned, and ambled down the passageway into the bedroom, and the instant he was sure he was out 


of sight he headed directly to the drawer where he kept his .357. 
In the living room Casper watched Leonid go, and then, without consciously thinking about it, moved 
swiftly across the room and took up a position beside the entrance to the little corridor, his back to the 
wall. He drew the Browning and checked the magazine. 
Nine rounds left. 
He rammed the clip back into place, chambered a round ... ? 
"Casper, what the hell do you think you're doing?” Celia asked. She had her hands on her hips, and was 


glaring at him. 
He held a finger to his lips. Then he pointed toward the front window. 
Cecelia blinked, and turned to see what he was pointing at. 
"I don't...” she began. 
He said, “Shhh!” and pointed again, more urgently. 
As Leonid came down the passage, his revolver in the hand behind his back, he noticed both women 


staring toward the far end of the room. 
That must be where Beech was, down by the window. 



 He stepped out into the living room and started to bring the pistol around ... ?


 And Casper stepped up right beside him, the Browning ready in his hand, catching Leonid totally 
off-guard. Casper pointed the weapon at Leonid's chest. 
"Drop the gun,” Casper said. 
Leonid could see that the safety was off on Beech's 9mm, that Casper's hand was steady, his finger 


tightening on the trigger. 
Beech was smaller than he was, a nebbish, a nothing—but he had the gun in his hand pointed at Leonid's 


heart, and Covert said he'd had a military imprint of some kind. He knew how to use a gun, knew how to 
fight, knew how to kill. 
And when Leonid saw the look in Beech's eyes, any doubt he'd had that Beech would shoot vanished. 
Maybe Beech wasn't quite such a wimp after all. 
"Shit,” Leonid said. He tossed his .357 away and raised his hands.


 Chapter Twelve 
Leonid glanced at the women—and Casper, he noticed, didn't; Beech's gaze never wavered. 
Mirim and Cecelia were staring, shocked. 
"Casper, what the hell...” Cecelia began, but Mirim shushed her. 
Leonid took his cue from that. 
"So this is a scam?” he said. “You planning to clean me out?" 
"Just defending myself,” Casper replied, and his voice was calm, confident, commanding. “You came out 
with a gun, you work in security, this place is the only place we might have gone that's not under 
surveillance—I think that it's a set-up. I think theyshould have been watching here, and they weren't 
because theywanted me here. I think that you got a call telling you that I'm some kind of dangerous 
fugitive." 
"Hey, yousaid you were a fugitive!” Leonid protested. “I shouldn't try to protect myself?" 
"Maybe I'm being a little over-cautious,” Casper conceded. “So explain why you came out with a gun." 
"Well, I thought maybe you were holding the girls hostage,” Leonid bluffed. “I was going to get the drop 


on you, and ask them what wasreally going on, why the feds are after you." 
Casper smiled, a smile that Leonid really didn't like at all. “Who said it was the feds?” he countered.


 Leonid's mouth opened, then closed. 


 Cecelia's expression changed from angry confusion to outrage, and her gaze shifted from Casper to 

 Cecelia's expression changed from angry confusion to outrage, and her gaze shifted from Casper to 
. 
"You said it was,” Leonid said. “You told me the government was after you." 
"No, I didn't,” Casper replied. “I was very careful about that. I did my best to make it sound like either 


organized crime or corporate espionage. You said yourself you were going to check on criminals." 
"Yeah, but...” Leonid stopped in mid-sentence. What more could he say? He was caught. 
"So the fedsdid call?” Casper asked. “Did they tell you why they want me dead?" 
"Not really,” Leonid admitted. “Something about you being a terrorist." 
"You believe that?" 
"No." 
"But you were going to kill me anyway?" 
Leonid shrugged. “The feds asked me to. I'm going to argue with them?" 
"Who was it called? FBI?" 
Leonid shook his head. 
Beech waited, but Leonid didn't answer further. 
"You probably know I don't want to kill you,” Casper said. “Not only do I not want to kill anybody, you 


can still be useful to me, and you know it. I wouldn't mind shooting you in the leg, though, and do you 
really want me to do that? I'd try to break the bone if I did, and that could be messy." 
"Covert Operations Group,” Leonid said. 
Casper gestured at the women with the hand that wasn't holding the Browning. 
"I never heard of them,” Mirim said. 
"I have,” Cecelia said. “When they eliminated all those conflicting agencies at the beginning of the 
century, after they set up Homeland Security, they put all the above-ground ones in the FBI, and all the 
secret ones in Covert.” She frowned. “But I thought they were like the old CIA, not supposed to operate 
in the U.S. in peacetime." 
"They make exceptions,” Leonid said. 
"So that's who's after me?” Beech asked. 
Leonid nodded. 
"Why?" 



 "I don't know.” He didn't bother to swear to it, or try to explain—he didn't think it would make any 


difference to Beech. 
How could he have ever considered this guy a wimp? Beech hadn't made a mistake, hadn't 
wavered—and his eyes ... ? 
Casper nodded. 
"Let's see if we can find out,” he said. 
"You want me to call them?” Leonid asked. 
"No. Too easy for you to warn them I'm here—hell, just calling might be enough to let them know. But 


you said you're on the law enforcement nets? Was that just an excuse to get your gun, or is it true?" 
"It's true." 
"Maybe we can do something with that." 
"What the hell is taking so long?” Smith demanded. “Why hasn't Chernukhin called in to confirm the kill? 


We know Beech went in, right?" 
"The lobby security camera shows him going in, yes, sir." 
"So what the hell happened?" 
"I don't know, sir." 
Smith reached a decision. “Call Chernukhin,” he said. “Find out what happened. If he doesn't answer, 


we'll know Beech killed him." 
Mirim and Cecelia watched as Casper navigated the net on Leonid's computer. This was similar to the 
sort of work he'd done at Data Tracers, and he didn't need any imprint to tackle something as simple as a 


standard web search, even on a specialized closed network. 
He'd had Leonid boot up the system, but not much more than that—it would be too easy to slip in some 
sort of signal. Once the browser was up and running, and Casper had satisfied himself that Leonid, like 


almost every user, had the system set up to remember all the necessary passwords, he had wrapped 


Leonid up in bedsheets, tied him with electrical cords, and shoved him in the bedroom closet. 
Casper had grinned wryly at discovering that the log-ons were completely automatic. Everyone did that, 
of course—who wanted to carry around a list of passwords in his head? And ordinarily, no one else 
would be using one's own personal home computer—most people had all manner of private business on 
their systems, and never worried about what might happen if someone got access to them.


 For someone who worked in security, though, it was sloppy and careless. 
Convenient, though; Casper was able to search through the law nets for his own name, to track back 
any mentions he found, and to cross-reference them. 



 He had already done exactly that, and had moved on to other things, when a phone rang. 
Casper glanced up from the screen.


 Leonid thumped against the closet door, but the others paid no attention to the pounding as they looked 

at one another. 
"I could answer it,” Mirim said. “I've been here before, after all." 
Casper considered that, then shook his head. “No,” he said, “Leonid stepped out for awhile. Let his 
voicemail get it.” He tapped a few keys. “And I'd say that's our cue to get the hell out of here, while we 
still can—if that's Covert calling to check up, no answer will mean trouble.” He logged off, then popped 
out a disk and pocketed it. “Come on,” he said. 
"Where?” Cecelia asked. “I thought we came here because we didn't have anywhere else to go." 
Casper tapped the pocket with the disk. “I've learned a few things,” he said. “I think we can find 
somewhere better now." 
Cecelia seemed inclined to argue, but Mirim took her by the arm. 
"Come on,” she said, “let's get out of here. Leonid's going to be really pissed when he gets free." 
Cecelia glanced at the closet, then shrugged. 
The phone rang again and again as Casper, Mirim, and Cecelia gathered up their belongings—and some 
of Leonid's—and departed. 
Behind them, Leonid kicked viciously and pointlessly against the closet door. 
"There's no answer,” Smith's assistant said. “How do you want it handled?" 
Smith growled. 
"I want a fucking SWAT team, is what I want,” he said. “I want them to go in there and get that son of a 
Beech bitch ... I mean, son of a bitch Beech. And I don't care who gets in the way—if they take out 
Anspack or Grand or Chernukhin or half a dozen innocent bystanders it's just fine with me!" 
"Yes, sir.” The assistant turned away. 
"And when you've got that started,” Smith called after him, “I want you to find me the asshole whowrote 
this goddamned Spartacus File in the first place, and get him in here! I want to know just what the hell is 
in it, in case this Beech gets away again!" 
"Yes, sir." 
"So where are we going?” Mirim asked.

 She was riding shotgun in Leonid's antique Mustang—Casper had wanted to have something intact, with 
all its windows and the keys and remote, in case he got stopped for speeding. It wouldn't be safe for very 
long, of course—there'd be an APB on it as soon as Covert's people got Leonid out of the closet, if not 


sooner, and it was a very distinctive vehicle. 
But it was fast and handy and Casper hoped he wouldn't need it for long. 
"New Jersey,” Casper said, his eyes locked on the highway. 
He had been very much in his high-intensity mode ever since disarming Leonid, and Mirim was getting 
tired of it. It was wearing, being around Casper when he was “on.” Besides, since they were headed 
northeast on I-95 and the Delaware River was maybe a mile ahead, it was not exactly surprising 
information that they would be crossing it. 
"Where in New Jersey?” she demanded. “Stopping in Jersey, or just passing through?" 
"Stopping,” Casper said. 
"Casper, would you mind being a bit more informative?" 
Casper glanced at her and smiled crookedly; his ferocious intensity vanished. 
"Sorry,” he said, in a voice that had neither the tight, hard command of the fighter, nor the rich tones of 
the orator, nor the uncertain quaver of the old Casper, but a warm confidence. “I haven't exactly been 
talkative, have I? I think I was afraid we might be separated, and if that happened and you were 
captured, the less you knew the better. But that isn't fair, is it?"


 "No, it isn't,” Mirim said, somewhat mollified. 
"Well, it's like this,” Casper explained. “This Covert Operations Group has posted warnings all over the 
nets that I'm a dangerous terrorist in possession of stolen software of theirs, which fits the old definition of 
a good lie, because it's pretty damn close to the truth—I can't deny being dangerous when I've killed four 


men in a single day, and Ido have Covert's software in my head, even if I didn't want it there. So every 
law enforcement agency in North America knows that Covert's labeled me as such, right?" 
"I guess,” Mirim said. 
"If they read the nets, they know,” Casper said. “And of course they read the nets." 
"Okay, so?" 
"So, who else would read the law nets?" 
Cecelia, resting as well as she could in the cramped back seat, suddenly leaned forward. 
"Casper...” she said warningly. 
Mirim glanced at her, then back at Casper. “I don't get it,” she said. 
"Well, think about it, Mirim,” he said. “Who else would want to know everything that's going on in the 


world of cops and robbers, besides the cops?" 
"The robbers,” Mirim replied automatically. “But I still don't ... oh, no." 



 Casper grinned. “Nowyou've got it,” he said. “Every cop in the country thinks I'm a dangerous terrorist 
in possession of government secrets—and so does every terrorist organization with half a brain. Andthey 

 Casper grinned. “Nowyou've got it,” he said. “Every cop in the country thinks I'm a dangerous terrorist 
in possession of government secrets—and so does every terrorist organization with half a brain. Andthey 

 Chapter Thirteen

 "So just which terrorist organization are you trying to contact?” Mirim asked. “And just how do you plan 
to do it?" 
"Well, I've got a list of possibilities on that disk I took from Leonid's place,” Casper answered, as he 
studied the road signs and checked them against the car's map computer. “There's an underground group 
called People For Change that sounded promising—they're sort of semi-legitimate, not entirely a bunch 
of morons or terrorist loonies. They aren't believed to have blown anything up for three or four years 
now, but they're still active, sending out news releases and the like. And the lawyer who's represented 
their people whenever they get caught at something lives here in Princeton—somewhere. Not that I can 
find the place. I wish Leonid had had amodern computer in this car!"


 "He didn'twant to haveany computer,” Mirim said. “He only added it because his boss insisted; this car 
was pre-computer, originally." 
"Figures,” Casper said. Then he spotted the name he wanted. “Yes!” he said, turning the car.


 Ten minutes later he pulled up in front of a large brick house and contemplated it for a moment. 
The sun was just below the western horizon, the sky a deepening blue; the streetlights came on as 
Casper thought, and there were already lights on in the house.


 "Celia,” he said, “you're a lawyer—youtalk to him. We'll wait here in the car."


 Cecelia hesitated, then said, “Give me ten bucks, Cas—I may need to give him a token retainer on your 
behalf, to make what we say privileged communication." 
Casper fished out a bill and handed it to her. 
Cecelia accepted it, then climbed out of the car, squeezing awkwardly past Mirim. 
"Good to be out of there,” she said, stretching. “That back seat was never meant for human beings.” 


Then she leaned back in and said, “You two behave yourselves, now." 
"Sure thing,” Casper replied. 
"See that you do, or Mommy will spank." 
"I'd like that,” Casper said with a grin. 
Cecelia gave a quick, unconvincing laugh, then closed the door and started toward the house. 
Mirim snorted. “What does she think we're going to do out here?" 



 "I don't think it's here and now she's worried about,” Casper replied. “And I can understand her 
feelings—you were with me all morning, and you sided with me against Leonid. That's suspicious enough 

 "I don't think it's here and now she's worried about,” Casper replied. “And I can understand her 
feelings—you were with me all morning, and you sided with me against Leonid. That's suspicious enough 

 "No,” Mirim said. “Leonid's a jerk, and I didn't really side with you against him anyway, did I? You had 

the guns; what was I supposed to do?"


 "I had the automatic,” Casper said, “but the revolver was lying there on the floor. You could have gotten 
it while I was using the computer and come up behind me, and ordered me to let Leonid out." 
"Why would I do that?” Mirim asked. “I'm not a Hollywood hero, going around grabbing guns and so 


on. And besides, he'd have shot you!" 
Casper shrugged. “You didn't do it,” he said. “I don't think the reasons matter, as far as Celia is 


concerned; you were choosing me over Leonid, and even if you weren't interested in me, it was pretty 
clear after that that whatever there was between you and Leonid was over." 
"Well...” Mirim couldn't really argue with that. “Well, I'd have to be a moron not to prefer almost anyone 


to Leonid—I don't know what I ever saw in him in the first place." 
Casper grinned. 
"Bob Schiano,” the man in the rumpled plaid shirt said, holding out a hand. 
Smith ignored the hand. “I'm using the name Smith,” he said. “You wrote the Spartacus File?" 
Schiano shoved his hand in his jeans pocket. “I put it together,” he said, “but I didn't write the whole 


thing, or anywhere near it—it was a team project, and that's not counting all the previous art we used." 
"Whatever,” Smith said. “You know what's in it, right?" 
"As much as anyone does,” Schiano agreed. “Why? Is someone thinking about using it?" 
"Someoneis using it,” Smith said. 
"Wow,” Schiano said, taking his hands out of his pockets. “Really? Where? I figured they'd call me in to 


trouble-shoot the installation." 
"There was a screw-up,” Smith said. He glanced at his assistant, and at the two operatives with 


computers and headsets who served as his link with the outside world. He hesitated, and Schiano 
misread that. 
"They forgot to tell me? Lost my number, or something?" 
"No.” Smith sighed. “I mean the installation was a screw-up. We had the program on file at 


NeuroTalents, so that we could use it on foreign nationals who came in for imprinting as part of our 
regular aid programs, and the computer glitched." 
Schiano frowned. “Glitched how?"


 "It optimized an American with the file. A man named Casper Beech came in for a routine imprint, and a 


disk-sector failure made the computer feed him the Spartacus File, instead."

disk-sector failure made the computer feed him the Spartacus File, instead."

slowly onto a chair, then looked up at Smith again. 
"Jesus,” he said. “And he lived through it?" 
"Oh, he lived, all right." 
Schiano nodded thoughtfully. “So you want me to help patch him up?" 
"No,” Smith said. “We want you to tell us what the hell todo with him." 
"What do you mean? I don't know anything about the medical end." 
"I'm notworried about the medical end,” Smith said, exasperated. “I'm trying tocatch the son of a 
bitch!" 
Schiano's mouth fell open. “You mean he'sloose ? And the File'sworking ?" 
"Yes, damn it!” Smith shouted. 
"But ... oh, my God, we never found anyone who couldtake the Spartacus File—I didn't think therewas 
anyone. I figured we'd tried to put too much into it, and we'dnever find a brain that could handle it." 
"Well, the NeuroTalents computer found someone—this man Beech. It didn't just choose the 
optimization at random, it picked the file that suited him best out of the entire list." 
"AnAmerican? ” Schiano asked, incredulous. 
"Yes, an American!" 
"But ... excuse me, sir, but in order to be optimized with that file the way I designed it, the subject would 
have to have been oppressed almost his entire life—kicked around, abused, tormented, and he'd have to 
have justtaken it. Spartacus was a rebelslave , after all—I structured it so that it would seem as if the 
subject had finally reached breaking point naturally, after years of mistreatment." 
"So?" 
Schiano stammered. 
"Look, Bob,” Smith said, “this may be the land of the free and the home of the brave, but there are 
losers in America, all the same, and this Beech must have been one of them." 
"Yeah, but..." 
He stopped. There wasn't any point in arguing any more about it; if it had happened, it had happened. 
But Schiano wondered about it, all the same. The Spartacus File required a person with an incredible 
and totally unrealized potential, and he had always assumed that that meant a member of the lowest 
classes in an oppressive society, someone who had never been given any chance at all by virtue of being 


born into the wrong family. 
How could there have been an American who was able to accept it? 
"So it's a long shot,” Smith said. “Even if it is, it's one that's come in—this Beech is out there, and we 
think he's doing what the Spartacus File has programmed him to do, which is to try to overthrow the 
government, and we want him stopped." 
"So shoot him,” Schiano said—and even as the words left his lips, he wished he hadn't said them. 
Shoot Spartacus, who only wanted freedom and equality? 
Shoot a man who had never done anything wrong except to be the victim of a computer error, a man of 
amazing potential? 
Worst of all, shoot the only living manifestation of Bob Schiano's masterpiece? 
"We tried,” Smith said. “Several times. He dodged a sniper, took out one hit team at his apartment and 
another on the street, and when we recruited an amateur Beech knew, so our guy wouldn't be spotted, 
Beech left the bastard tied up in a closet where our own SWAT team nearly blew the guy away." 
"Oh,” Schiano said. He blinked. 
"After that last one, we lost him—he got out about five minutes before we went in after him, and at last 
report he was headed north on I-95 in an antique Mustang.” Smith leaned over Schiano and pointed 
angrily. “Youwrote that damn program,” Smith said. “You tell us where the hell he's going!"


 Cecelia had gone inside five minutes before, and Mirim was getting nervous. 
"What if someone spots the car?” she asked. “Or what if he's called the police? Or what if Celia turns 
you in?"


 "Celia won't do that,” Casper said, “but maybe we should stretch our legs a bit." 
Mirim wasn't so sure about her roommate's trustworthiness—despite her earlier protests, she knew 
Cecelia was feeling jealous that Mirim and Casper were spending so much time together, and in that 


condition a brief malign impulse might get out of hand. Mirim had seen Cecelia get out of hand. She didn't 
think Casper had; a non-resident boyfriend didn't get the same treatment a roommate did. 
She didn't say anything, though; she just climbed out of the car. 
Casper got out on the other side, and the two of them stood, looking about at the gathering twilight. 


They could hear the hum of distant traffic, and the chirping of crickets. 
"Peaceful here,” Casper remarked. 
"Yes,” Mirim agreed.


 The street curved, and there were mature trees everywhere, so they couldn't see very far; perhaps half a 
dozen large homes were in sight, each with a few lights on. 


 "Nice neighborhood,” Casper said. 
Mirim made a noise of agreement. 
"Shall we walk a little, see how the plutocrats live?” Casper asked. 
Mirim nodded. 
Together, they strolled down the sidewalk, admiring the houses. The predominant style was English 
Tudor; the trees were mostly oak. 
"How'd you ever get a name like Mirim, anyway?” Casper asked, as he looked up at the trees. 
Mirim glanced at him, startled by the question. It was one she was asked frequently, of course, but 
Casper had never brought the subject up before. 
And there was something odd about the way he was looking at the trees, as if he were checking for 
snipers. 
He probably was. 
"It was supposed to be Miriam,” she explained, “but it was typoed on the birth registration, and by the 
time anyone caught it it had gone into the Social Security files as Mirim. It was easier to change what I 
was called than to convince the government to change anything." 
Casper grimaced. 
"Typical,” he said angrily. “We're supposed to have government of the people, by the people, and for 
the people here, and you have to change your name to suit the damn government. The government should 
change to suityou , not the other way around!” He turned around. 
They were almost out of sight of the Mustang, and theywere out of sight of the lawyer's house. 
"Come on,” he said, “we better get back." 
As they drew near the house they saw the front door open, and Cecelia stepped out. Casper picked up 
the pace, and Mirim hurried after him. 
Cecelia spotted them. 
"Oh,there you are!” she said. “Come on, I've got a rendezvous set up." 
She headed for the car, and stopped at the door. She looked from Mirim to Casper and back. 
"This time,you ride in the back,” she told Mirim. 
Schiano looked over his designer's notes one last time—Smith had arranged for him to retrieve them 
from government storage, to aid in the pursuit of Beech, and Schiano had happuly accepted without 
mentioning the highly illegal back-up he had always kept on his PDA at home. He then flipped to the 
report Smith had given him on Beech's actions so far. 


 "That poor son of a bitch,” he said. 
"Why?” Smith demanded. He didn't bother asking who Schiano was talking about. 
"Because he's gotta be incredibly confused,” Schiano replied. 
"Why?" 
Schiano sighed. “Look,” he said, “the Spartacus File was designed to be used against anti-American 
governments, right?" 
"So?" 
"So it's got values and ideals built into it, something for our Spartacus to be preaching, something for him 
to replace the anti-American government with if he succeeds. And since we didn't know exactlywhich 
governments we might want to turn a Spartacus loose on, only that they'd be anti-American, the basis for 
all those values and ideals is right here around us—the good ol’ U.S. of A.” He waved an arm, taking in 
the entire room. “Our Mr. Beech is now programmed to rebel against any and all authority, and to 
attempt to overthrow the government—but at the same time, he's programmed to admire the U.S. and to 
consider the Constitution the most perfect document ever created. So if hedid overthrow the 
government, what would he replace it with? Exactly the same thing!” He shook his head. “That'd be 
enough to drive a guy nuts, I'd think." 
Smith stared at him silently for a moment, then said, “Beech doesn't seem to be having any problem with 
the idea so far." 
"How do you know?” Schiano asked. “I'll bet he is." 
"So maybe he is,” Smith said. “Just tell us how to find him." 
Schiano sighed. “Okay,” he said, “it's simple enough. It's in the options path right here.” He turned the 
screen back to his notes, scrolled quickly, and pointed. “He knows you're after him, right? And that you 
were on to him before he was able to assemble an organization?" 
Smith nodded. 
"And you've tried to assassinate him?" 
"Yes." 
"Well, then he'll go underground, disappear as completely as he can—there's no point in watching his 
family or friends; he won't have any contact at all with his old life until he's got a secure position to recruit 
from."

 "That poor son of a bitch,” he said. 
"Why?” Smith demanded. He didn't bother asking who Schiano was talking about. 
"Because he's gotta be incredibly confused,” Schiano replied. 
"Why?" 
Schiano sighed. “Look,” he said, “the Spartacus File was designed to be used against anti-American 
governments, right?" 
"So?" 
"So it's got values and ideals built into it, something for our Spartacus to be preaching, something for him 
to replace the anti-American government with if he succeeds. And since we didn't know exactlywhich 
governments we might want to turn a Spartacus loose on, only that they'd be anti-American, the basis for 
all those values and ideals is right here around us—the good ol’ U.S. of A.” He waved an arm, taking in 
the entire room. “Our Mr. Beech is now programmed to rebel against any and all authority, and to 
attempt to overthrow the government—but at the same time, he's programmed to admire the U.S. and to 
consider the Constitution the most perfect document ever created. So if hedid overthrow the 
government, what would he replace it with? Exactly the same thing!” He shook his head. “That'd be 
enough to drive a guy nuts, I'd think." 
Smith stared at him silently for a moment, then said, “Beech doesn't seem to be having any problem with 
the idea so far." 
"How do you know?” Schiano asked. “I'll bet he is." 
"So maybe he is,” Smith said. “Just tell us how to find him." 
Schiano sighed. “Okay,” he said, “it's simple enough. It's in the options path right here.” He turned the 
screen back to his notes, scrolled quickly, and pointed. “He knows you're after him, right? And that you 
were on to him before he was able to assemble an organization?" 
Smith nodded. 
"And you've tried to assassinate him?" 
"Yes." 
"Well, then he'll go underground, disappear as completely as he can—there's no point in watching his 
family or friends; he won't have any contact at all with his old life until he's got a secure position to recruit 
from."
" 
"Well, he's got multiple options there,” Schiano answered, looking at the flowchart, “but first choice is to 
contact any existing rebel groups."


 "Rebel groups?” Smith asked. “Jesus, Schiano, this is Pennsylvania, not some damn banana 
republic—we don't have rebels here." 


 Schiano hesitated, then shrugged. “Okay,” he said. “Second choice is to take shelter in the underclass 
and start assembling his own organization, working through organized crime and charitable organizations."

 Schiano hesitated, then shrugged. “Okay,” he said. “Second choice is to take shelter in the underclass 
and start assembling his own organization, working through organized crime and charitable organizations."

 "In the biggest city he can get to, of course,” Schiano said. “The best place to hide is in a crowd, and it's 
in the big cities that you find the underclass, and organized crime, and organized charity. In most countries 
that would be the capital, so Washington would have been a possibility, but you said he was headed 
north, so he must be going to New York."

 "Unless he doubled back, to throw us off,” Smith said.

 "Unless he doubled back,” Schiano agreed. “Which he might have; I deliberately left that random, to 
make him less predictable. Remember, when I wrote this I was assuming he'd be onour side—I wanted 
him to succeed."

 "So he's in either New York or Washington,” Smith said.

 "Probably,” Schiano said. “Remember, though, he's not a computer, and this is an optimization program, 
not a set of fixed instructions—he's still got free will."

 "Fuck free will,” Smith said. He turned and stamped away.

 As he walked, he marveled to himself at the blind naivete of that stupid programmer. Didn't he realize the 
difference between ideals and reality? The Constitution had been increasingly irrelevant for at least a 
century, and downright dead ever since the Crisis; if Beech really believed in the American dream, he'd 
find plenty to rebel against.

 Behind him, at his workstation, Bob Schiano stared after the departing spymaster.

 Smith was an idiot. Didn't he realize that “rebel groups” didn't necessarily mean a bunch of yahoos with 
guns running around in the mountains or jungles? The U.S. wasfull of rebel groups; they were all over the 
web. Terrorism wasn't as bad as a few years back, but there were still terrorists, and weren't those 
rebels? The fundies and militia groups had been reduced in the campaigns of the early ‘20s, but did Smith 
really think they wereextinct ? And there were groups that hadn't resorted to violence but were just as 
rebellious in other ways. Some of them were labelled “subversive organizations,” others were “lunatic 
fringe,” a few were “cults” or even recognized churches, while others didn't fit any handy label, but to the 
Spartacus File they'dall qualify as rebel groups.

 And that wasn't even counting all the little whacko political parties that the Party hadn't bothered to 
outlaw. The Spartacus File would see any party that had never been in power or at least held a seat in 
Congress—which was to say, just about any party except the Democratic-Republicans and the 
Greens—as either a present rebel group or a potential one.

 Of course, Schiano could have pointed out Smith's error—but why should he? He didn't have anything 
against this Casper Beech. And Smith was an asshole.

 Besides, Schiano thought, he wanted to see just what the Spartacus File could actually do. 


 Chapter Fourteen

 Chapter Fourteene 
temptation to shield his eyes. 
The light moved on to Cecelia, then to Mirim, then went out. 
"I don't believe I'm really doing this,” Mirim muttered from the back seat. “I mean, why am I sitting here 
in a deserted parking lot in the middle of New Jersey meeting a bunch of crackpot revolutionaries?" 
"Because the government is trying to kill me to cover up their own mistake,” Casper said, “and you've 
got the guts and the morals to join me in trying to stop them." 
"Christ, Cas, you sound like a video hero,” Cecelia replied. 
The van door slammed; a thin young man in black, wearing a black ski mask, had climbed out. He came 
over to the Mustang; Casper rolled down the window. 
"You're Beech?” the man in black asked. He did not bend down to bring his face closer; that, Casper 
knew, would make him too easy to grab. 
"Yes,” Casper said. 
"Which one's the lawyer?" 
Casper jerked a thumb at Cecelia. “Ms. Grand,” he said. 
"And the other? The phone call wasn't real clear." 
"Her name's Mirim Anspack,” Casper said. “She's just a friend who got caught in the crossfire." 
The man in black considered that. 
"I'll vouch for her,” Beech said. “If that's worth anything." 
"It isn't,” the man in black said. He looked around at the empty parking lot—a church lot on a Tuesday 
night. The van and the Mustang were the only vehicles in sight. 
"Get out of the car,” he said. 
Casper obeyed promptly. Cecelia and Mirim were slower, but eventually all three were standing. 
"You armed?" 
Casper nodded.


 The man in black held out a hand, and Casper handed over the Browning 9mm—the .357 was in the 
glove compartment.

 "I'd like it back later,” Casper said. 


 The man didn't answer. “What about the car?” he asked.

 The man didn't answer. “What about the car?” he asked.

suggest running it up to New York and ditching it somewhere in the city."

 "Leave the keys,” the man said.

 "They're in the ignition."

 "Get in the van.” He opened the back door of the vehicle.

 "Casper, are you sure about this?” Mirim asked.

 "Get in the van,” Casper said.

 Reluctantly, Mirim got in the van.

 Casper was fairly certain that at least half the subsequent twenty-minute drive was just misdirection and 
doubling back, but he didn't try to keep track. He had no intention of escaping from these people.

 He'd been doing some thinking on the way here. He couldn't just hide out until the heat blew over, not 
after killing four feds; the heat wasn't going to blow over, ever. And he couldn't lose himself forever and 
create a new identity—his fingerprints and voiceprint and retinal patterns were on file, and sooner or later 
he'd be spotted somehow, his voice recognized on a random phone check or his style spotted on the 
nets.

 Not to mention that he'd have to open new online accounts, and a standard background check might nail 
him.

 So he didn't intend to hide; he intended to take the offensive, and he couldn't do that alone. These 
people he was meeting weren't just a temporary refuge; they were his hope for the future.

 He intended to recruit them.

 Bob Schiano gulped his personal caffeine-sugar mix and studied the screen.

 Smith wanted him to locate Beech so that Covert could kill him, and Schiano was indeed doing his best 
to locate Beech, but he wasn't at all sure about this killing stuff.

 It wasn't that anything in Beech's file from before the optimization made him sound especially appealing; 
he'd been a corporate nonentity, working at a dead-end job for an obscure member of the Consortium, 
with nothing of particular interest in his background. He was an orphan who had inherited his parents’ 
massive debts—they'd lived just long enough to be covered by the revised bankruptcy laws and 
Enhanced Creditor Recovery Act, so that half Beech's after-tax income went toward paying the interest 
on their decades-old medical and legal bills. His work performance evaluations were inconsistent—his 
superiors consistently rated him as “marginal,” while the actual productivity figures were well above 
average, and Schiano knew that that meant he was a loser, a scapegoat, someone his bosses felt free to 
dump on.

 There were no files on his personal life—no one had cared about him enough to start one, he'd always 


managed to stay out of any government aid programs that would have called for evaluation of his mental 
or social state, and he'd never had the money for any sort of private therapy. Schiano noticed, though, 
that Beech had never married and had no acknowledged offspring, and had never been named in any 
divorce action or custodial suit. Apparently he wasn't much of a success with women, either—though he 
hadn't struck out completely, since he did have this lawyer, Cecelia Grand, he was seeing.

managed to stay out of any government aid programs that would have called for evaluation of his mental 
or social state, and he'd never had the money for any sort of private therapy. Schiano noticed, though, 
that Beech had never married and had no acknowledged offspring, and had never been named in any 
divorce action or custodial suit. Apparently he wasn't much of a success with women, either—though he 
hadn't struck out completely, since he did have this lawyer, Cecelia Grand, he was seeing.

 Beech didn't own a car—he had once, but lost it in an insurance scam.

 In fact, Beech had been dragged into court an average of once every sixteen months for his entire adult 
life on one petty complaint or another, and had always either lost or settled out of court, though Schiano 
could see no evidence that he'd ever actually been at fault.

 The man was a complete and classic loser, beaten down by fortune and society, with no known talents 
beyond some minor skill with computers and, according to interviews with his co-workers, a decent 
sense of humor.

 But then had come the imprint session and the subsequent optimization. For a few days nothing had 
changed—he'd called in sick, but that was about it.

 And then Tuesday he had killed four trained assassins and escaped a government dragnet, taking along 
two women; he had used another assassin's own computer to get onto the net.

 That last was something Smith didn't seem to have paid any attention to, but Schiano did. Beech hadn't 
just tied up Leonid Chernukhin and fled—or easier still, shot him and fled. Instead Beech had spent 
precious time on the computer, even though, from Chernukhin's account, Beech knew that Covert was 
after him.

 He must have been after something important to him, and Schiano could guess what it was. He'd told 
Smith that Beech's first choice would be contacting an existing rebel organization, and Smith had 
dismissed the idea, but Schiano had gone through the access log for Chernukhin's machine—getting 
through Leonid's cheap firewall had been absurdly easy.

 He couldn't tellexactly what Beech had and hadn't read, since he'd had the sense to dump the cache and 
erase the user log, but it certainly looked as if he'd gone through the latest information on subversives and 
terrorist groups.

 And after that he'd headed north out of Philadelphia.

 Schiano guessed that he did, indeed, plan to contact some rebel organization, somewhere in New York 
or New Jersey—and take it over.

 That was very interesting indeed.

 Schiano had never intended the File for use in any country as big and complex as the United States, and 
he was fascinated watching it in action.

 Smith wanted Beech killed before he could do anything—but Schiano, who had compiled the Spartacus 


File, wanted to see how far Beech could get, and what, if anything, he'd do about the apparent conflict in 
his programming between pro-Americanism and the need to overthrow the government. 
Schiano was beginning to suspect it wasn't that much of a conflict, actually. After all, sending asssassins 
after him hardly reflected the highest ideals of American society, or any great respect for Constitutional 
rights. 
Not that he'd ever say anything like that to Smith. If Smith had any ideals, Schiano doubted they 
resembled anything in the Constitution. The entire Covert Operations Group didn't much resemble 
anything in the Constitution. 
And Schiano already had a sneaking admiration for anyone who could elude Covert this long. Beech 
might have been a loser, but he also had the potential to be a new Spartacus. 
Of course, Spartacus wound up crucified. 
Schiano took another gulp of mix and wondered whether Beech knew what had happened to him. 
And whether someone should tell him. 
"So you're Casper Beech,” the redheaded man said. 
"Sure am,” Casper agreed. 
"The word on the net is that you stole some fancy government files. Are you trying to sell them? Because 
if that's it, why did you come to us, rather than the Iranians or the Germans? They've got a lot more 
money."


 "You believe what the government says on the nets?” Casper asked. 
The redheaded man smiled. “No,” he said. “So suppose you tell me why they're really after you—if they 
are, and this isn't all a sting of some kind."


 "Suppose you tell me first who all you people are, and how I'm supposed to be sure this isn't all a 


government trap,” Casper replied. 
The redhead glanced at his companions—two women and three men, seated around a battered kitchen 
table. One of them had been the man in the ski mask who picked up Casper, Mirim, and Cecelia; 
another had driven the van, and one of the women had been aboard, as well. 
"We are the executive committee of People for Change,” the redhead said. “We are dedicated to the 
overthrow of the corrupt rule of corporate America and its political lackeys, and the destruction of the 
military-industrial complex." 
"I didn't ask for a speech,” Casper snapped. “How am I to know I can trust you?" 
The redheaded man frowned at him for a second; then the woman who had not been in the van 


interjected, “You aren't. We can't test your statements, you can't test ours, so either we can agree not to 
trust each other and we can take you out and dump you somewhere, or we can get on with it." 
Casper grinned. “Fair enough,” he said. “Just wanted to make sure we understood each other." 



 The redheaded man threw the woman an angry glance.

 The redheaded man threw the woman an angry glance.

 "Whatkind of secret government imprint?” the redhead demanded.

 "I don't know yet,” Casper said, shrugging. “All I know is that it's important enough that they tried to kill 
me, and the imprint was good enough that they couldn't do it. I survived at least three attempts in a single 
day."

 The members of the executive committee glanced at one another.

 "I don't know,” said the man who had driven the van. “Sounds pretty unlikely."

 Casper shrugged. “If I were lying, wouldn't I have come up with something more convincing?"

 "Oh, Christ,” muttered a bearded man. “Notthat old argument again—that we have to trust anything that 
sounds stupid because the feds know better!"

 "Good point,” Casper said. “Yeah, I'm sure the feds can be stupid, or sometimes they can be smart 
enough tolook stupid. I withdraw my question; instead, I'll just say that I know I'm telling the truth, but I 
don't have any simple way of proving it to you."

 "So suppose it's true,” the redheaded man said. “You got this top secret imprint, and the government 
decided to kill you, because you can't erase an imprint any other way, and you managed to survive three 
tries at killing you. Okay, fine. But what are you doinghere ? What do you want from us?"

 "I want to stay alive,” Casper replied. “I want a place to hide, for now. And I'm not interested in 
betraying my country to the Iranians or the Germans or anyone else; I wanted to find Americans who 
would be willing to protect me from the feds."

 "And what's in it for us?"

 Casper smiled. “I could get idealistic and argue that my enemy's enemy is my friend, and all foes of the 
oppressive machinery of the oligarchy should join in common cause, but you know that's bullshit. Instead, 
I'll just point out that the government must think whatever they put in my head is dangerous to them, or 
they wouldn't be so eager to destroy it—and if they're right, and itis dangerous to them, then you people 
want it on your side."

 "And suppose,” the bearded man said, “that this is all a trick, that what theyactually imprinted you with 
is instructions to betray us, that the attempts to kill you were faked, and that you honestly don't know 
this, but it's true, and at the right time you'll turn on us."

 Casper smiled. “Could be,” he said, “but I didn't just escape from those feds—I killed four of them. And 
the word's on the net that I'm to be shot on sight. Isn't that a bit drastic, just to get at you folks?"

 They didn't like that one; Casper could see it in their expressions; the bearded man in particular looked 
annoyed. Casper had thrown their own ineffectuality and insignificance in their faces. They'd like to 


believe that yes, theywere important enough that it would be worth the lives of four G-men to infiltrate 

believe that yes, theywere important enough that it would be worth the lives of four G-men to infiltrate 
. 
They had to recognize the truth, though. 
"We'll want to check you out, verify as much of your story as we can,” the redhead said. 
Casper shrugged. “Of course,” he said. “I'm in no hurry; as long as I'm safe for the moment, whatever 


you want is fine."


 The redheaded man considered, then gestured. “Tasha will show you to your room,” he said. “We'll let 
you know." 
The shorter, plumper woman, who had guarded them in the van, led the way out of the crowded kitchen 


and up the stairs of the old house, and Casper followed cheerfully. 
Tasha, they called her. A revolutionary named Tasha ought to be tall and thin and seductive, with straight 


black hair and a beret; this woman was about five-one and fat, wearing jeans and a baggy black 
sweatshirt and with frizzy blonde hair that could use washing. 
Casper liked that. This Tasha was real, not just a Hollywood stereotype. People For Change was real. 


They were real Americans, fighting against the corrupt power structure. 
Maybe they didn't look like much, but according to the reports on them they had taken credit for 


blowing up a precinct station in New York four years ago, saying the police had been torturing suspects 
there, and they had killed a cop in the process. They apparently weren't as ineffectual as they appeared. 
They weren't exactly friendly yet, but they hadn't just shot him, either. They hadn't even questioned 

Mirim or Cecelia—he wondered how long it would be before they noticed that little oversight. 
It was a perfectly satisfactory start. 
He wished he had a better idea just what he was starting; the thing in his head hadn't told him that yet. 
But he could guess.


 Chapter Fifteen


 "I can't believe this,” Smith said. “We've been searching the streets for a week, and we haven't found a 
trace of Beech!" 
Schiano shrugged. “New York's a big city,” he said. 
"Notthat big,” Smith retorted. “You sure about what you told me?"


 "Sure I'm sure,” Schiano said. “First choice in his situation is to link up with rebels; second choice is to 
go to ground among the poor and make connections with the organizations poor people deal 
with—charities and organized crime." 


 "You're sure?" 
"I wrote it, didn't I?"


 "So they tell me. You don't seem terribly eager to prove it by helping us stop this son of a bitch, though."


 "I'm not in any hurry,” Schiano said with a shrug. “Not so long as you're paying me a thousand bucks an 
hour." 
"You might want to earn some of that!" 
"I've tried." 
Smith glared at Schiano. 
Schiano looked back calmly. 
He wasn't bothered by Smith's anger; Smith was an asshole. Schiano kept telling him that first choice 


was to join with some group trying to do what Beech was programmed to do, that is, to overthrow the 


government, and Smith kept missing it. 
He had, at one point, asked whether Beech would sell out to some foreign power, and Schiano had told 
him no, which was quite true—that option was specifically avoided in the Spartacus File because it would 
lead to too many potential complications if the optimized agent went looking for outside allies. Covert had 
wanted their Spartacus to run an entirely home-grown operation, so no one could complain about 
international meddling. 
But Smith still hadn't hit on the idea of terrorists or subversive organizations. It was really quite an 
amazing blind spot. To Smith, Schiano had long since realized, those weren't rebels—those were nuts. 
Dangerous criminal nuts. Rebels were something else, something the U.S. didn't have. 
Schiano had to struggle sometimes to keep from giggling at Smith's absurdity. 
"Okay,” Smith said, “so we haven't been able to find Beech directly; we've just wound up with a bunch 


of dead derelicts and complaints from human rights groups. You say he'll try to link up with organized 
crime?" 
Schiano considered that. 
Technically, a lot of the subversive organizations qualified as organized crime; certainly, any that had ever 


used terrorism did, and plotting to overthrow the government was conspiracy to commit treason, wasn't 
it? 
"Yeah,” Schiano said. “He's probably already contacted someone." 
"Who?" 
"I don't know,” Schiano said. “What do I know about organized crime? I'm just a computer jock." 
That was the closest to an outright lie that Schiano had come yet in his dealings with Smith, because 


while he didn't actuallyknow , for the last day or two he'd begun to suspect just who Beech had joined 



up with. There were messages on the net—messages asking readers if they were unhappy with the way 

up with. There were messages on the net—messages asking readers if they were unhappy with the way 

 That was hardly anything new, but the wording of these particular messages sounded eerily familiar to 


Schiano. 
If Smith phrased his questions properly, Schiano would have to admit that he was pretty sure Casper 
Beech had linked up with a group of suspected terrorists called People For Change.


 But so far, Smith hadn't phrased his questions correctly.


 And Schianowas unhappy with the way the country was run—especially the piece of it Smith was 
running. 
Giving up a thousand dollars an hour to join a bunch of crazy revolutionaries was a bit more than he was 
ready to do—but he was thinking about it. 
"I don't understand what you're doing,” the redheaded man—Colby, the other members of PFC usually 
called him, though he also seemed to answer to “Rob” or “Perkins"—said as he leaned over Casper's 
shoulder and looked at the computer screen. He was tall enough that he had to stoop slightly to see the 
display. 
"Several things,” Casper said, still tapping keys. 
"Name one,” Colby said, straightening up. 
"Well, first off,” Casper said, hitting ENTER and leaning back, “I'm trying to raise the general level of 
discontent. While it's true that you don't need to have the backing of the majority in order to win a 
revolution, youdo have to know that the general population isn't going to come out in support of the old 
regime. There are going to be hardships and displacements in any change of government, and you want 


to make sure that the people don't consider them an intolerable price to pay, or you get a 
counter-revolution." 
Colby considered that. 
"I thought you just wanted to stay alive,” he said. 
"That's right,” Casper said. “And the best way to do that is to make sure the government that's trying to 
kill me hasn't got the power to do so." 
"So you seriously plan to overthrow the Party?" 
"Yeah, I guess I do." 
"That woman you brought with you says she can keep you alive by making you acause celebre ." 
"Celia?” Casper blinked. “She's probably right." 
"Then why bother with the rest of this?" 
Casper suddenly looked blank. 



 "I don't know,” he admitted. He looked back at the computer screen in puzzlement. 
"You said you had several reasons for this stuff." 
"Yeah,” Casper said, still puzzled. “I'm trying to gauge the depth of existing resentment, and to make 
indirect contacts with any organizations that can be recruited to help us." 
"All in service to the revolution?" 
"I guess so." 
"I think you're wasting your time." 
Casper looked up. “Oh?" 
Colby nodded. “I've studied Mao and Lenin and the rest—maybe you think they were wrong about 
how to run a government once they'd succeeded, we don't have to agree on that, I don't necessarily 
agree with them myself, but you'll admit they understood how to stage a revolution, won't you?" 
"I suppose so,” Casper said—not so much because he agreed, since he had not actually read Mao and 
Lenin, as to see where Colby was leading. 
"Well, they agree, and anyone can see, that the peasants—the common people, they don't need to 
literally be peasants—will obey whoever is in power; as Mao put it, the masses need not be educated in 
the new thought until after the revolution. If you seize the centers of power, the existing power structure 
will yield." 
"Uh huh. Sure. Seize the centers of power. And how are you planning to do that?" 
Colby frowned. “We do need a solid cadre, ready to die for the cause, before we can take control of 
the communications and command centers. But you don't recruit true revolutionaries by posting frivolous 
complaints about government abuse; everyoneknows the government is corrupt." 
"Oh, I see—and you've been able to recruit these loyal troops we need? Like Ed, the guy the rest of you 
watch nervously because he blew up that cop four years ago? Or wasn't I supposed to notice that?" 
Colby stared angrily at him. 
"Look,” Casper explained, “you're right that I'm not going to suddenly convert anyone; I'm mostly just 
planting seeds that may or may not yield something later. But I'malso providing encouragement for 
anyone who'salready on our side to join us."

 "I don't know,” he admitted. He looked back at the computer screen in puzzlement. 
"You said you had several reasons for this stuff." 
"Yeah,” Casper said, still puzzled. “I'm trying to gauge the depth of existing resentment, and to make 
indirect contacts with any organizations that can be recruited to help us." 
"All in service to the revolution?" 
"I guess so." 
"I think you're wasting your time." 
Casper looked up. “Oh?" 
Colby nodded. “I've studied Mao and Lenin and the rest—maybe you think they were wrong about 
how to run a government once they'd succeeded, we don't have to agree on that, I don't necessarily 
agree with them myself, but you'll admit they understood how to stage a revolution, won't you?" 
"I suppose so,” Casper said—not so much because he agreed, since he had not actually read Mao and 
Lenin, as to see where Colby was leading. 
"Well, they agree, and anyone can see, that the peasants—the common people, they don't need to 
literally be peasants—will obey whoever is in power; as Mao put it, the masses need not be educated in 
the new thought until after the revolution. If you seize the centers of power, the existing power structure 
will yield." 
"Uh huh. Sure. Seize the centers of power. And how are you planning to do that?" 
Colby frowned. “We do need a solid cadre, ready to die for the cause, before we can take control of 
the communications and command centers. But you don't recruit true revolutionaries by posting frivolous 
complaints about government abuse; everyoneknows the government is corrupt." 
"Oh, I see—and you've been able to recruit these loyal troops we need? Like Ed, the guy the rest of you 
watch nervously because he blew up that cop four years ago? Or wasn't I supposed to notice that?" 
Colby stared angrily at him. 
"Look,” Casper explained, “you're right that I'm not going to suddenly convert anyone; I'm mostly just 
planting seeds that may or may not yield something later. But I'malso providing encouragement for 
anyone who'salready on our side to join us."
. 
"And if you succeed,” he said, “you plan to replace the corrupt so-called Party with true representives of 
the people, and redistribute the stolen wealth of the capitalists to the workers?"


 Casper stared up at him.


 "Jesus,” he said, “what rock didyou crawl out from under? No, I'm not going to do anything like that! I 


want a proper, democratically-elected government, and a free-market economy—I'm anAmerican , for 

want a proper, democratically-elected government, and a free-market economy—I'm anAmerican , for 

 "Isn't that what we havenow ?” Colby asked sardonically.

 Casper blinked.

 Colby waited for a reply, but Casper could not come up with anything to say, and at last Colby snorted 
in disgust and turned away.

 Casper watched him go.

 And finally, the words came to him, too late to be spoken aloud.

 No, they didn't have a democratically-elected government, they had a one-party state. Even in the 
primaries, when therewere primaries, the only choices the voters were offered had been selected for 
them from the class of professional politicians by other professional politicians. And they didn't have a 
free market economy because the Consortium and the other government-granted monopolies had, with 
the help of the Party politicians, taken over the marketplace and rearranged it to suit themselves.

 But was that enough to justify a revolution? The politicianshad been elected; even if people weren't 
happy with them, they'd voted for them. The two old parties had been merged into the Party to deal with 
the Crisis, and the Party had done what it promised. The Crisis was over, but the people still voted for 
the Party; the Greens held a few West Coast seats in Congress, but not enough to matter, while the 
Libertarians and Socialist Workers and the rest couldn't get more than one or two percent of the vote.

 And that meant that those people were hardly likely to march in the streets in protest, let alone take up 
arms and assault the power stations and communications centers.

 Casper frowned.

 There was something wrong here. There was something in his thinking that didn't match the real world.

 If it washis thinking, at all.

 He'd never really hated the Party before; he'd considered it a sort of necessary, or at least inevitable, 
evil. A divided, two-party government had been inefficient and wasteful, unsuited to the complex modern 
world, and had brought on the Crisis, when the American economy virtually collapsed—that's what the 
propaganda always said, and most of the American people believed it. George Washington's warning 
against political parties was a favorite theme in Party literature, and the countries of eastern Europe, with 
their dozens of parties and unstable coalition governments, were held up as bad examples—better by far, 
the Party said, to have one organization providing the candidates. And everyone agreed that the little 
parties, with their extremist views, were all just eccentrics and crazies, relics of an earlier era. No one 
wanted them in power. The Greens were useful as a prod, but nobody wanted a Green government.

 Casper had always gone along without really thinking about it. He'd been too busy with his own 
problems to care about politics.

 But now he was thinking about it. He thought about it constantly. He was obsessed with politics, with 
strategies and tactics, with theories of government and constitutional rights, all of it stuff that had never 
concerned him before. 


 This wasn't anything a spy would need, let alone an assassin—but it wasn't, Casper realized, his own 

 This wasn't anything a spy would need, let alone an assassin—but it wasn't, Casper realized, his own 
. 
Just what had NeuroTalents put in his head?


 Chapter Sixteen


 "If you look at history,” Casper said, “you'll see that a revolution can only succeed if the military either 
supports it or remains neutral. The final Soviet coup failed because the military came out for Yeltsin; 
Napoleon succeeded where Robespierre failed because he had the army behind him."

 "You think you can subvert the military, then?” Colby asked. He, Casper, and Ed, the bearded member 
of PFC, were seated around the kitchen table, talking.

 Casper considered that question for a long moment, then admitted, “Probably not. Not as it's presently 
constituted."

 "Then how can you expect to win?” Ed demanded. “Maybe now you're beginning to see why we've 
used terrorism—there isn't much hope in historical models, but we have to dosomething ."

 "But it won't work,” Casper insisted. “Terrorists can't overthrow a government. The only times terrorism 
has been at all successful have been in driving out an occupying army, by making it too expensive to stay; 
that's not the situation here. An occupying army has somewhere else to go home to; the 
Democratic-Republican Party doesn't."

 "We know it doesn't work,” Colby said, glaring at Ed. “That's why we stopped. But what other choice 
do we have?"

 "You have to take the long view,” Casper replied. “Build up discontent, use non-violent civil 
disobedience, force the government to crack down—that makes the people in power appear as 
oppressors."

 "Theyare oppressors."

 "Of course, but you have to make them look the part."

 "Which is what you're doing,” Ed said. “Well, I don't have your patience.” He stood up.

 Casper watched as Ed walked away, then turned to Colby, who shrugged and sat silently in his chair.

 Casper was thinking over what he had just said to Ed, and trying to match it against reality—the reality 
of the history of the United States.

 Since 1865, no revolutionary group in the U.S. had ever gotten very far. There had never been a serious 
coup attempt in all the hundred and fifty years since. Every assassination had resulted in a peaceful 
transfer of power to the designated successor. Even the most disputed elections hadn't led to violence.

 Casper wanted to think that no revolutionary in all that time had had his own abilities, and that the 


government had never before been so corrupt and unpopular, but he had to admit to himself that he was 
probably being optimistic about that. Hell, before his imprinting he hadn't hadany knowledge of 
subversion or rebellion, and the stuff in his head now couldn't be any better than the abilities of the people 

government had never before been so corrupt and unpopular, but he had to admit to himself that he was 
probably being optimistic about that. Hell, before his imprinting he hadn't hadany knowledge of 
subversion or rebellion, and the stuff in his head now couldn't be any better than the abilities of the people 
.


 And the government had been corrupt or unpopular during Reconstruction, under Hoover, in the 
Vietnam era—there had been revolutionary movements and mass demonstrations sometimes, but nothing 
had ever come close to actually overthrowing the system.


 Revolutions and counter-revolutions in the U.S. had come about at the ballot box or in the courts, not in 
the streets. Cecelia had been telling him that, telling him that the way to defy the power structure was to 
become part of it, but he had been resisting.


 He had wanted to find some way to bring the whole thing down from the outside, but looking at it, he 
didn't think it could be done. Seizing power stations wouldn't do anything but piss people off.


 The communications networkcouldn't be seized—there was far, far too much of it. Two thousand TV 
networks, transmitting by satellite; the internet supplying information through a system designed to 
withstand anything up to and including a nuclear war; the multiply-redundant cellular phone systems; 
thousands of radio stations ... ?


 And that wasn't even considering such alternative, semi-obsolete forms as faxes and newspapers.


 Taking over the military ... well, first off, Casper doubted it could be done; the military was so 
thoroughly integrated with the civilian population and power structure that he couldn't see any way to 
detach it. But even if he did, he didn't think a military coup would work. There were three million people 
in the military—and three hundred million guns in civilian hands. The army would not necessarily bring the 
National Guard with it, and almost certainly wouldn't carry the police.


 And it wouldn't carry the media, or the people.


 Besides, the idea was to set up a better, more democratic government, a multi-party government, not a 
military dictatorship.


 Atemporary military government might not be a disaster; it had certainly worked in other countries. 
Casper could use it to root out the most corrupt elements of the government, then stage new elections. 
But the military-backed candidates would lose in the elections, and the military might refuse to step aside.


 It might be worth a try if nothing else worked, but it didn't look like a very appealing course of action.


 And if you looked at history ... ?


 Maybe, Casper thought, leaning on the kitchen table, he was going about this wrong. He wanted to get 
the Party out of power, and replace it with people of his own choosing. He'd been looking at revolution 
as the way to do that—but maybe that wasn't the only way, or even the best way.


 He wanted to get his own people into power. The government said he was a terrorist. Well, where had 
one-time terrorists wound up in power?


 Soviet Russia. Nazi Germany. Israel. The Taliban's Afghanistan. Palestine. 



 Those were not very cheering comparisons.

 Those were not very cheering comparisons.

 Having been a terrorist apparently didn't make one unelectable.

 Of course, this might not apply in America—but elections were definitely the way to transfer power 
here. A political party had a much better shot at overthrowing the government than a revolutionary cell 
did.

 So where could he get a political party? He looked around at Colby, who was still silently watching him, 
and at the dingy little kitchen.

 People For Change consisted, so far as he could determine, of about twenty people, of whom half a 
dozen, not counting himself, Mirim, and Cecelia, lived right here. There were another hundred or so 
people who supported PFC at least to the point of knowing about it without turning anyone in for that last 
string of bombings in New York four years ago. Not even Ed, the unrepentant cop-killer who made 
everyone nervous, had been ratted out.

 That wasn't much to start with in founding a political movement, but it was better than nothing.

 He had an organization, at least a minimal one. He had a charismatic leader, in himself—for a moment he 
marveled at his own arrogance in describing himself that way, but he dismissed that; thanks to whatever 
the government had put in his head, hewas a charismatic leader, or at least could become one. He knew 
it.

 What else did he need?

 Money. He needed money to buy access to the networks, more access than an ordinary citizen could 
get—nobody actuallywatched the public-access stuff where the loonies raved, and political discussions 
on the net just degenerated into endless arguments that sensible people filtered out. To attract mass 
attention, you needed to be in the mass media. That was how the whole system had gone bad in the first 
place—only millionaires could afford to run for office, and millionaires weren't going to screw around 
with the corporate structures that had made them rich, other than to make themselves even richer.

 If he could talk to people with money, he knew he could raise the funds he'd need—but how could he 
do that? Not through public-access channels or the public nets, that was certain. Maybe if he could get 
onto talk shows? But how could he do that while he was still a fugitive?

 And he would also need a front organization that people could donate to—it didn't have to be elaborate, 
a box number and a bank account should just about cover it. He'd need an employee, someone who 
wasn't wanted by the feds, to sign all the papers—but PFC ought to be able to provide that.

 He wondered how much of this he was figuring out on his own, and how much had been programmed 
into him. He had no way of telling.

 But did it really matter? However it got there, it was there, and he might was well get on with it. He 
needed to build up a political organization; that was more important than a military one in the U.S. There 


was something in him that was very, very unhappy with that idea, but that he was fairly sure was part of 

was something in him that was very, very unhappy with that idea, but that he was fairly sure was part of 

 To build a political organization he needed access to people—but it didn't have to be live, did it?

 "So,” he asked Colby, “is there a vidcam around here?"

 "A vidcam? You mean a webcam?” Colby glanced over his shoulder.

 "I was hoping for something a little better, but a webcam would do."

 "I don't know. Probably."

 Annoyed, Casper got to his feet and marched into the next room; Colby watched him go without 
comment.

 The unattended computer in the next room had no webcam attached, so far as Casper could see, but as 
long as he was there he logged into the local network to see whether one might show up. None did, but 
as long as he was online he took a moment to check his e-mail log, the replies to the messages he'd 
posted on the nets under various pseudonyms.

 Most of it, judging by the subject lines, looked like the usual junk—people agreeing with him, people 
arguing with him, people trying to sell him things.

 One entry on the list caught his eye, though.

 "32: From: R.S.CHI Subject: C'PR BCH"

 Casper recognized his own name in the subject line immediately—but he also saw that the government 
watchdog programs wouldn't. A human being might, but the volume of e-mail traffic was far too great for 
the government to use human watchdogs.

 So unless it was some bizarre coincidence, not only was someone calling him by his real name, but 
whoever it was didn't want the FBI to know about it.

 Casper sat down and clicked on item #32.

 After the usual headers, he read, “Dear Mr. B.: If I'm mistaken about your identity, I apologize, but I 
assume it's you. If you really are who I think you are—friendly ghost tree—I think you'll be very 
interested in the attached file, SPXPTA.DOC—it provides the basic working specs for an optimization 
program that was accidentally run at NeuroTalents’ Philadelphia facility not too long ago, as well as some 
other relevant information."

 Casper was very interested indeed. “Friendly ghost tree"—he'd heard of Casper the Friendly Ghost 
when he was a kid, though he'd never seen the movies or any of the old cartoons, and he certainly knew 
what a beech tree was. There couldn't be much doubt that this R.S. Chi had identified him correctly. He 
opened the file.

 It was gibberish. Casper stared at it for a moment, then realized that it was encrypted—and as was 
obvious at a glance, it wasn't the standard legal encryption. 


 That wasreally interesting.

 That wasreally interesting.

 He went back to the message to look for clues. The document name was the first thing that caught his 
eye—what the hell did SPXPTA mean?

 Well, he didn't know about all of it, but PXP was an illegal encryption program, Pretty eXtreme Privacy, 
that had been around for years. People For Change used it sometimes; so did about a million other 
people. The FBI would occasionally pick a user at random and come down on him, but the volume of 
traffic was too great for serious policing, especially since most of the messages they caught and 
decrypted were things like, “Bet we're ticking off the feds with this one!” FBI complaints against such 
users tended to get thrown out of court—the users were usually the kids of Party members or 
Consortium executives.

 The FBI could break PXP encryption if they had to, but there was too much of it on the nets for them to 
get all of it, and it would keep the automatic watchdogs from spotting key words and calling the file to a 
human being's attention.

 One of the key words they watched for was PXP, of course—to slow its spread. Nesting it in the name 
of the file like that might keep it from being spotted.

 So the file was encrypted with PXP. Fine. Except now Casper needed the two keys, which would each 
be a long string of more or less random characters.What strings of characters?

 Well, there was the obvious one, the only other thing the mysterious R.S. Chi had sent him. Casper 
brought up PXP, and listed the first key as: “DearMr.B.:IfI'mmistakenaboutyouridentity, 
Iapologize,butIassumeit'syou.IfyoureallyarewhoIthinkyouare—friendlyghosttree—Ithinkyou'llbeveryintere 
stedintheattachedfile,SPXPTA.DOC—itprovidesthebasicworkingspecsforanoptimizationprogramthatwas 
accidentallyrunatNeuroTalents'Philadelphiafacilitynottoolongago,aswellassomeotherrelevantinformation."

 That was presumably the private key; now he needed the public one. He had an idea how to find that; 
he googled on newsgroup posts by “R.S. Chi."

 768 articles were listed; he picked one at random and opened it, and sure enough, the signature file at 
the bottom included a public PXP key. He plugged it in and clicked on “Display."

 The decrypted file immediately began to scroll across the screen in plain English. Casper leaned forward 
and watched. When it was completed he read it through carefully, then read it again.

 When he had finished he sat back in his chair and stared at the screen.

 If Casper's guess was right, “R.S. Chi” was really someone named Robert J. Schiano, whose name 
turned up all through the notes in the file. And this Schiano was proud enough of his handiwork that he'd 
wanted Casper to see some of it clearly—because Casper Beech was intimately involved in it, whether 
he liked it or not.

 At least, Casper thought, he now had a name for the thing in his head, and a pretty good idea of what it 
was supposed to do.

 The thing in his head was the Spartacus File. And he, Casper Beech, was supposed to be the new 


Spartacus, the slave who would lead an army of slaves in a rebellion against the oppressive republic that 

Spartacus, the slave who would lead an army of slaves in a rebellion against the oppressive republic that 
. 
Spartacus, the gladiator. Spartacus, the rebel. Spartacus, the great general. 
Casper Beech smiled as he thought that over. It wasn't anything he would ever have asked to be, it 


wasn't anything he had ever imagined becoming, but here it was, thrust upon him whether he wanted it or 
not. 
And he had to admit to himself that he rather liked the idea.


 Chapter Seventeen 
Rose didn't like her assignment. She didn't like it at all. 
Casper wished Colby had asked Tasha or Ed or one of the others to help him instead, but they weren't 
around or weren't willing, and Rose had been agreeable right up until Casper had explained where he 
wanted her to go.


 Now, though, she wasn't happy. 
"When Colby said I should help you out, I thought you just wanted me to, like, put things in the bank, or 
sign checks, or stuff like that,” Rose said. “Nobody said anything about talking to reporters."


 "You don't have to talk to any reporters,” Casper assured her. “You just drop this disk off at the station, 


with the note. You don't have to talk to anyone. In fact, the fewer people you talk to there, the better." 
"Well, how do you know they'll put it on the news, then?” she demanded. 
Casper just smiled. “Don't worry,” he said. “If they don't we'll try again." 
Rose wasn't crazy about that idea, either, but she didn't want to be unreasonable. She picked up the little 
pouch with obvious distaste, and left. 
Casper and Cecelia watched her go. 
"Just what are you trying to accomplish, Casper?” Cecelia asked. 
"I'm trying to take over the country,” Casper said, quite sincerely. Cecelia snorted derisively. 
"I thought you just wanted to stay alive,” she said. 
Casper shrugged. “They programmed me to overthrow the present regime and set up an American-style 
democratic government—areal one, not the oligarchy we have now. I'm trying to oblige them." 
"You do anything like that, and theywill kill you,” Cecelia retorted. 
"They're going to kill me anyway, if I let them." 



 "They've lost track of you, haven't they? Why can't you just stay underground?"

 "They've lost track of you, haven't they? Why can't you just stay underground?"

 "Then don't you have to rebel against your programming, too?"

 Casper smiled. “I am,” he said. “They programmed me to stage a violent revolution—armies, battles, 
death and destruction. I'm not going to do it that way, because it won't work here."

 "But you're still trying to take over the country?"

 Casper nodded.

 "You're nuts."

 "Maybe,” Casper agreed. “Or maybe I'm as sane as anybody. Sure, I'm following the programming 
from the Spartacus File, but why is that any crazier than following the patchwork programming we all 
build up from our parents, and our genes, and our schools and friends and jobs?"

 "Because it's going to get youkilled ."

 "Not if I can help it."

 "And what makes you think youcan ?” she demanded angrily, her hands on her hips. “Casper, you say 
they've programmed you to be the new Spartacus—has anyone pointed out to you that Spartacusdied ? 
The Romans crucified him! He died on a cross on the Appian Way—I looked it up. So areyou planning 
to wind up nailed to a cross somewhere on the Jersey Turnpike?"

 Casper blinked at her, surprised and pleased by her anger. He took it to mean that she still cared for 
him; he'd begun to wonder. Since his optimization he and Cecelia had been drifting apart; they shared a 
bedroom upstairs, courtesy of Colby's housing arrangements, but they hadn't done much but sleep in it. 
Cecelia didn't seem to like the new, more assertive Casper Beech as well as she'd liked the wimpy 
original.

 "More likely a bullet-riddled corpse in the Schuylkill River,” he said. “And no, that's not what I 
want—but Celia, it's too late to stop now. They'realready determined to kill me."

 "Are yousure? ” she asked, and he thought her eyes looked moist. “Are you sure that's not their damn 
program, telling you that, making youassume they're after you, when they aren't?"

 "They did try to kill me,” he said. “They started it. They came after me before I'd done anything, before I 
had any idea what they'd put in my head. Why would they stop?"

 "I'llmake them stop,” she said. “I can do that, Cas—I'm a lawyer, and a damn good one. It's a matter of 
political economics, a P.R. problem and a legal problem. If we make it too expensive for them politically, 
they won't kill you. You don't have to take over the fuckingcountry , Cas! If you do that theywill kill 
you."

 He stared at her thoughtfully. 


 "You know,” he said, “I think we may have come up with the same answer to two different questions. 
The first step in my campaign is to make it too politically expensive to kill me. After all, dead men don't 

 "You know,” he said, “I think we may have come up with the same answer to two different questions. 
The first step in my campaign is to make it too politically expensive to kill me. After all, dead men don't 

 She stared back. “Isthat what you meant when you said that video is the first step in taking over the 
country?" 
He nodded. “It's the next step in my campaign to stay alive,” he said. 
"But it's just a bunch of ordinary loony-fringe rhetoric, half socialism and half libertarianism." 
Casper grimaced. He didn't think his speech was “loony fringe rhetoric"; he'd thought it was fairly 
reasonable populist stuff. Boring, but reasonable. 
That wasn't the point, though. “That's just cover,” he said. 
"What are you talking about? You put some sort of coded message in there?" 
He shook his head. “No. Look, you know there's no way they're ever going to put that whole video on 


the news, right? Maybe on C-SPAN 4 or something, but not on the news, not even on CNN." 
"Of course not,” Cecelia agreed. “They'll maybe pull a soundbite or two." 
"Exactly. And I wrote that speech so there's only one soundbite worth pulling. Maybe one or two of the 


networks will miss it, but sooner or later it'll go out." 
Cecelia gaped in astonishment. “You mean you made the speech boringon purpose ?" 
"Sure." 
"So what's the soundbite?" 
"You didn't catch it?” For the first time since making the vid, Casper looked worried. 
Cecelia looked embarrassed. “The speech wasboring , Cas; I didn't watch it all the way through." 
"It's only ten minutes." 
"I lasted about two, okay?" 
Casper shook his head in amazement. 
"Okay, okay,” Cecelia said. “What's the soundbite?" 
"You'll hear it on the news, I hope,” he said. 
She had to be satisfied with that.


 Bob Schiano looked up suddenly when the newscaster mentioned “wanted terrorist Casper Beech." 


 What had they been saying? He hadn't been listening. Had Covert finally nailed Beech, despite Schiano's 
lack of help? Despite, in fact, his active assistance to Beech in the form of the file he'd e-mailed?

 What had they been saying? He hadn't been listening. Had Covert finally nailed Beech, despite Schiano's 
lack of help? Despite, in fact, his active assistance to Beech in the form of the file he'd e-mailed?

 And there was Beech's face on the screen, and by the quality of the picture it was a home project, not 
anything there at the studio.

 "The government says I'm an escaped terrorist,” Beech said, and his voice and manner carried intensity 
and conviction as he spoke, even with the poor reproduction. He hadn't looked anywhere near soalive in 
the old interview files Schiano had seen. “I say they lie,” Beech continued, “and I say that I'd surrender if 
I thought I'd live through it."

 Then it was cut short.

 Schiano stared at the screen. “What the hell wasthat about?” he wondered aloud. That wasn't anything 
he'd programmed, so far as he could see. Oh, the attitude was from the charisma subroutines that he'd 
incorporated, the stuff from Behavioral Sciences and Psychwar, and it was good to see that it seemed to 
be working, since Schiano himself didn't understand how any of that functioned; the delivery was great, 
but the words were wrong. Saying the government lied was fine, but Beech should be looking for recruits 
at this point; he shouldn't be talking about surrender, he should be talking about inevitable victory.

 What was he doing?

 "Goddamn it!” Smith said. He turned to his aide. “Get a dozen men down to that stationnow —I want 
that disk. I want to know everything there is to know about how it got there. And I want to know what 
idiot put it on the air without clearing it—either that, or who cleared it!"

 "Yes, sir."

 "And get Schiano up here! I thought Beech was supposed to be recruiting the bums and winos we've 
been rousting, not making video speeches!"

 "You think that'll do it?” Cecelia said. “Just that? I didn't see anything like that in the file you showed us."

 She was seated at one end of an old couch, Mirim at the other, with Casper in the middle holding the 
remote control.

 "No, of course not,” Casper said, hitting the MUTE button. “It's just a start, something to get people 
interested in my case. The next step is a rally."

 "Awhat? ” She turned to stare at him. “Casper, are you crazy? You can't go out in public yet! The next 
step is alawsuit ."

 Casper shook his head. Just like a lawyer—if all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a 
nail, so lawyers always wanted to use the courts. “No, Celia,” he said. “If we try to do it that way, I'll be 
shot resisting arrest, or trying to escape, or maybe I'll just have an unfortunate auto accident. Theyhave 
to kill me, just the way Romehad to kill Spartacus. The idea that a slave could rebel and live was too 
dangerous for Rome to ever let Spartacus live; he had to win or die. It's not quite the same for me; 
they're big enough they could let a mere rebel live. But I'm not just a rebel, I'm the rebel leaderthey made 
, and they can't let me live. I have to win or die. And I'm not going towin with a lawsuit!" 


 "Whynot? ” Cecelia insisted. “If we get a court order..."

 "Whynot? ” Cecelia insisted. “If we get a court order..."

dead ." 
Cecelia subsided unhappily and slumped back on the couch; then, abruptly, she stood up. 
"Do it your way, Casper,” she said. “You think you know it all now, you believe everything that 
programmer put in your head and you won't listen to me, and you've got Mirim there acting like your 
damned cheering section, oh you big strong male, she's always liked ‘em tough and stupid, like Leonid, 
so she'll go along with you without stopping to think. Well,I'm not ruled by my hormones,or by some 
Covert Operations programmer grinding out software that's never supposed to get used in the first place, 
so he doesn't care how good it is!I'm not going to throw away everything I know and do what this 
miracle file says! I read your ‘Sparta-doc’ file and what that Schiano said you could do, and I don't 
believe it. They can't imprint that much. You suit yourself, Casper Beech, but it won't work. It's insane, 
holding a rally and trying to take over the country! It can't be done, but youcan make a deal to save your 
own sorry ass, if you'll let me set it up. And when you realize that, if you're still alive, when you realize 
you've been an idiot, if you ask me nicely, thenmaybe I'll do my best to save you." 
She stamped away. 
Mirim and Casper watched her go. Casper frowned. 
"I think I'll be sleeping on the couch tonight,” he said. Then he turned to Mirim and said, “and if you 


were thinking of inviting me intoyour bed, thanks, but not yet. Let her cool down first." 
Mirim's mouth opened, then closed. She stared at him for a moment before she found her voice. 
"And what if I wasn't thinking of inviting you?” she said. 
Casper smiled wryly. “Well, then I've misjudged the situation and by bringing it out in the open now I 


may have just saved everybody some later embarrassment." 
Mirim smiled back at him. “You didn't misjudge,” she admitted. 
"Well, good. Thank you. But I'll still sleep on the couch for at least two or three nights. We're going to 


need Celia's help later, after the rally." 
"After the rally?” Mirim asked. “You really plan to hold a rally?" 
"Sure do." 
"How the hell are you going to do that? Isn't that justasking for a sniper to take you down?" 
Casper smiled at her again, a big surprised smile this time. “Of course it is,” he said. “That's the point. 


We have to taunt them, make them act stupidly, and make them do it in front of an audience." 
"But Cas..." 
"The real trick here,” he said, interrupting her, “is to live through it." 



 Chapter Eighteen 
Smith waved the print-out at Schiano. “Is he reallythis crazy?" 
Schiano shook his head. “I don't know,” he said. “I didn't think he was crazy at all, but this isn't anything 
I put into the program." 
"So you don't know if it's a trick?" 
"It isn't anything I programmed,” Schiano repeated. 
He didn't need to read the print-out; he'd seen the messages himself. They were all over the nets. 
Posters were all over New York and Philadelphia as well, pasted on walls, utility poles, trashcans, 
everywhere. Schiano figured that everyone who had ever been involved with PFC at all must have been 
called in to help put them up.


 Smith was probably trying to track down the printer responsible, but that wasn't likely to work. Schiano 
doubted a print shop had been involved at all. Anyone could have run off a few thousand posters on his 
home printer easily enough, and if that was what they'd done then even if Covert was able to identify the 
make of printer, that wouldn't tell anyone anything useful. It was probably some model that was common 
as dirt.

 "Are you going to let him hold the rally?” Schiano asked.

 "You tell me,” Smith said. “You're supposed to be the expert on this guy—what's happening here? Is 
this some kind of diversion? Or is he really going to show up at this thing and give us a clear shot at him?" 
"I don't know,” Schiano repeated. 
"Suppose we clear the streets, cordon off that block, don't let anyone in—then what?" 
"Oh, he won't showthen ,” Schiano said confidently. “He's notstupid ." 
"But if we let a crowd form?" 
Schiano shrugged. “Maybe he'll show,” he said. “I just don't know." 
"Damn,” Smith said. “You aren't a hell of a lot of good, are you?" 
"Hey,” Schiano protested, “this isn't my job! I'm an imprint programmer, not a goddamned counterspy.I 


didn't know I was ever going to have tostop my Spartacus!" 
"Yeah, well...” Smith flung the print-out aside. “Let's just hope your Spartacus is doing something stupid 
here.” He turned and marched angrily away.


 Schiano watched him go, then picked up the print-out. As he had expected, it was one of the notices 
from the nets. 


 "Rally!” it said. “If you saw me on the news, here's your chance to find out what it's all about." 
It went on for a few lines, and then it gave time and place. Down at the bottom it was signed, “Casper 


Beech, People For Change."

 What the hell was Beech up to?

 Should he warn Beech that Covert knew about the rally?

 He shook his head. No, he told himself, that would be putting his own neck in a noose; he didn't dare try 
to contact Beech again. Even sending that one message had been incredibly risky. He'd routed it through 
dummy accounts and six layers of anonymous remailers, done everything he could to keep it from 
tripping any alarms, but anything in a non-government encryption could be snagged, and any encryption 
could be broken if someone good wanted to work at it. And he hadn't dared do anything subtle, for fear 
Beech wouldn't be able to read it himself.

 And Beech was too smart for this rally to be as stupid as it looked. Beech had to know he'd be 
exposing himself to Covert's snipers if he showed up. He must have some sort of plan in mind.

 Schiano wished he knew what it was.

 Casper leaned against the oily brick and looked at his watch for the hundredth time, more grateful than 
ever for the illuminated display.

 7:58. Almost time. He reached down and picked up the first sheet of heavy, rigid plastic, then looked 
up. Tiny circles of light showed through the airholes in the manhole cover. That was reassuring; it meant 
no one had covered it over. 
It had been a long, unpleasant wait down here, with his kevlar jacket and his plastic shields, but it was 
almost over, and the government hadn't found him.

 He leaned the plastic shield against the ladder rungs, then looked down at his vest. Time to put in the 
ceramic inserts; he'd left them out until now to save weight, but he'd need them in place before he 
emerged from the manhole.

 As he tucked the ceramic plates into the vest pockets he wondered if hiding down here had really been 
necessary. Then he smiled at his own foolishness; ofcourse it had been necessary. Once those posters 
had gone up and the messages had gone out over the net, there was no way the feds would ever have let 
him just walk up to the appointed corner of Washington Square.

 They'd letother people come, so as to lure him out, but if he'd shown his face above ground he'd have 
been dead meat, he knew it.

 Just then the manhole cover shifted, with a heavy grating sound; grit sifted down onto his hair. Casper 
looked up as he smoothed down the last Velcro fastener on his vest; he stepped back further into the 
shadows and waited, just in case the feds had caught on.

 "Cas? Are you okay?"

 It was Mirim's voice. 


 "I'm fine,” he said. “Get it open and clear."

 "I'm fine,” he said. “Get it open and clear."
t 
have a permit, but they haven't really tried to get rid of us." 
The manhole cover slid aside, and light poured in; Casper blinked as his eyes adjusted. 
"I expected that,” he said. “What about the rooftops? See anything?" 
"We aren't sure.” Casper could see Mirim now, as a shadow blocking part of the light. He could see 
others around the manhole, as well. 
"Is the sound system set up?” he asked. 
"Yes." 
"Good. Here.” He handed up the first of the bulletproof plastic panels. Someone grabbed it and lifted it 


away, and Casper handed up the next, and the next. 
When he finally climbed the ladder out of the manhole he emerged into a booth of clear plastic shielding, 


each panel held by a trusted member of PFC. Each of them wore a helmet and heavy vest—lined, 
Casper knew, with kevlar and with ceramic shock absorbers like his own. 
Together, the little clump of revolutionaries moved across the street to the sidewalk and up onto the 


platform set up there for Casper's use. Once he was on the platform someone handed him a microphone, 


passing it between two of the plastic panels. 
Then the people holding the panels all sank down, sitting on the platform, ducked down low, and Casper 
looked out at the crowd.


 The street was packed—as he had hoped. Most of them were just curiosity seekers, of course, but 


there might be several potential recruits, all the same. 
Police were scattered around, as well. That was to be expected. There were also reporters, and a dozen 
or more videocameras. That was excellent. Casper wanted this as public as possible.


 And somewhere out there, he was sure, there were assassins in the pay of the Covert Operations 
Group. 
"Hello, New York!” Casper called into the microphone. “My fellow Americans, thanks for coming!"


 A cheer went up. 
"I'm Casper Beech, a member of People For Change, and I have a few things I want to tell you 
tonight—a few things about People For Change, a few things about our present government, and a few 
things aboutyou !"


 Another cheer. Casper heard it, but didn't pay much attention. He was listening for other things, and 
scanning the surrounding buildings.


 "Our government has told you that I'm a terrorist, and that People For Change is an organization of 


terrorists, and I've come here tonight to tell you not to listen to their lies! People For Change is a peaceful 
political organization—we want change, all right, but we're Americans, and we believe in democracy, and 
in the Constitution that made this country great. We want to bring about change through the ballot box, 
not through terror or crime in the streets! 
"Andthat's what scares the Republicrats!" 
And the shot came. 
The timing couldn't have been better if Casper had scripted it himself. 
The shot itself wasn't loud. Casper wasn't even sure he'd really heard it. Its effect, though, was 


unmistakable. The bulletproof plastic to his right shattered spectacularly, and shards sprayed around him. 
He immediately dropped and rolled, pushing aside some of his supporters. The others dropped their 
own shields and dove from the platform. People were screaming.


 Casper still had the microphone as he clambered back down to the sidewalk. 
"That'swhat scares them!” Casper shouted. “People, they've been fixing the elections for decades! Who 
oversees the elections? The Republicrats! Why haven't any of the other parties ever gotten a foothold, no 


matter how unhappy the voters were? Why has the Dem-Rep Party dominated this country for..."


 He'd gotten that far when someone tripped over a wire and disconnected him; there was a burst of white 
noise, and the sound system went dead. 
And then an automatic weapon somewhere opened fire. There were more screams. 
The rally collapsed into chaos, and the police started moving in, moving toward Casper; he saw them 


coming, and shouted, “Look! They can't let me speak the truth! They've sent the police to stop me 


before I can tell you any more!" 
"Stop them!” someone else shouted, and a moment later a wave of angry citizens overwhelmed the 
police. 
Casper didn't even look back. “Head for the subway,” he said. 
Police ran past them, paying them no attention as they rushed to deal with the riot the rally had become. 
Moments later, Casper, Colby, Ed, and Mirim dropped, exhausted, onto adjoining seats on an uptown 


train. For a few seconds they sat silently, catching their breath; then Mirim sat up abruptly. 
"I thought that plastic shielding was bulletproof!” she said angrily. 
"They must have used armor-piercing shells,” Casper said wearily. “I thought they might. That was why I 


got to talk as long as I did—they had to change their ammunition.” He turned to Colby. “Where'd you tell 
Rose to meet us?" 
"Canal Street." 
"We'll need to switch trains, then—we're headed the other direction." 



 "Cas, you could have been killed!” Mirim said.

 "Cas, you could have been killed!” Mirim said.

a second one—but yeah, we're in this for keeps, Mirim." 
"Why?" 
"Because they're going to keep on looking for me, Mirim, and they're going to keep going until they kill 
me, because they consider me a threat." 
"Because they think you're going to try to take over the country." 
"That's right." 
"Well, why don't you just getout of the country, then? Then you wouldn't be a threat any more! Colby 
could arrange it—couldn't you, Colby?" 
"Maybe,” Colby said noncommittally. “Ed might know more than I do on this one." 
Ed grunted. 
"But remember Trotsky,” Casper said. “Stalin's men got him in Mexico, halfway around the world. I'd 
still be a threat. Besides, Mirim, I'm an American—I don'twant to leave, and I don't want to spend the 
rest of my life in hiding, with the Covert Operations Group looking for me. So I'm taking some risks to 
avoid it." 
Mirim stared at him. “You're ‘taking some risks',” she said. 
"That's right."


 "Casper, you spent thirty-six hours down a manhole waiting, so that you could stick your head up and 
get shot at?" 
He shrugged.


 "I can understand the thirty-six hours—back at Data Tracers you were always good at enduring crap, 
and that apartment you lived in, well, I guess you could put up with anything. But deliberately letting them 
shoot at you—I can't believe youdid that!"

 Casper looked at her with interest.

 "You think the file's responsible?” he asked. He had to admit, thinking about it, that it did seem unlike 
anything he had ever done before his optimization. 
"Ofcourse it is! Casper, it's going to get youkilled !" 
"It hasn't yet—hell, it's saved my life." 
"But therisks you're taking—sooner or later, the odds are going to catch up with you." 



 Casper gazed at Mirim for a moment, then glanced at Colby and Ed.

 Casper gazed at Mirim for a moment, then glanced at Colby and Ed.

observation.

 Casper leaned back, his head against the window behind him, staring at the off-white metal ceiling as the 
car swayed.

 "Spartacus died,” he said, to no one in particular. He frowned, and chewed on his lower lip. “I don't 
want to die,” he added a moment later, as the train began to slow for the next stop.

 "Well, if you keep up like this, you'regoing to,” Mirim said angrily, reaching for the pole to pull herself 
upright.

 Colby leaned across the space where she had been and said, “So you made your speech and they took 
a shot at you—now what?"

 "Now we've got our Boston Massacre, our Kent State,” Casper said, standing. “There's still a way they 
could get out of it—but I don't think they'll do it in time."

 Mirim stared at him. “You mean you took that risk, and whatever you were doing might notwork ?"

 "Oh, I think it will,” Casper said, pushing her toward the open door, as Ed and Colby hurriedly rose and 
followed. “The only way they can get out of it is if they turn in the shooter and say he's one of us, that we 
set the whole thing up. Then it'll be our word against theirs, and they'll be able to manufacture all the 
evidence they need. If they don't do that, and quickly, we'll be able to make the truth stick—that the feds 
shot at me. That'll get us a lot of sympathy, and a lot of attention, and when we put out a call for 
volunteers we should get them. Then we turn PFC into a genuine political party, and we make sure that 
they can't rig the elections against us the way they have against everyone else."

 "And then what?” Colby said, as the four of them emerged onto the platform. “You get elected president 
next year?"

 Casper shook his head. “Not hardly,” he said. “We won't be able to take the presidency for at least 
twelve years, at the very best—probably twenty, maybe as long as forty-four. But if it's that long, it'll be 
because they've cleaned up their act, and that's what I really want."

 "You intend to be elected president?” Mirim asked.

 "Probably notme ,” Casper said. “Too much political baggage. I did kill those men back in Philadelphia. 
But someone from PFC. And I'll be rehabilitated along the way."

 "If you don't get killed first."

 "If I don't get killed first,” Casper agreed.

 Chapter Nineteen

 The news coverage was perfect. Casper watched intently as the networks played the images over and 


over—his face, looking strong and wild and noble as he spoke; the plastic shield shattering; the 
screaming crowd; the slow pan across the wreckage and the ambulance crews covering the bodies 
before hauling them away. 
"Seven dead,” Mirim said, horrified. 
"Were any of them ours?” Colby asked. 
Tasha frowned. “We don't know,” she said. “We still have three people missing." 
"They're stonewalling,” Casper said, his eyes still locked on the video. “They're dead. They can't 
stonewall this and get away with it. They're just denying everything." 
"What?” Mirim asked. 
"They're mishandling it,” Casper said. “Don't you see? The government, I mean—the Party. They 
haven't even denied that it was a fed who shot at me! They've let the networks transmit their coverage, 
they've let my speech—what there was of it—go out. It's been so long since they've faced a real 
challenge that they've forgotton how to spin the facts."


 "You're right,” Cecelia said thoughtfully. “We can tie ‘em in knots now—wrongful death suits, civil rights 


violations, everything." 
"We can put out a call on the nets for volunteers and donations,” Casper said. “When the money starts 
coming in we can hire spokesmen, turn PFC into a real political party. We'll put candidates up in every 
little election we can find—once we're in office a few dozen places people will take us seriously. Run a 
populist, anti-status quo platform, long on rhetoric and short on specifics. The Republicrats have never 


bothered rigging the small elections—they never had to. And then we can demand oversight on the bigger 
ones." 
"People werekilled out there, and you're talking about elections?” Mirim burst out. 
Colby, Ed, Casper, and Cecelia all turned to stare at her. 
"Of course,” Casper said calmly. “That's what this is all about." 
"I thought it was about keeping you alive, Cas!" 
"That, too." 
"And what makesyou any more important than those seven people who died?"


 For a moment, there was an uncomfortable silence. The TV babbled quietly in the background. 
Casper didn't think Mirim was in the mood to hear the truth—that Casper thought he was the most 
important person on Earth because he was the one who could fix the country, get it back on track, make 
the lives of millions of Americans better, and the lives of millions more people in the dozens of countries 
the U.S. dominated. She didn't want to hear that.


 "Nothing,” he said at last. “Not in absolute terms. But Mirim, I'm more important tome , and I thought I 
was important to you, that you cared about me. And with this thing the feds put in my head, maybe I'm 


more important to the country. If we can get the oligarchs out of power and re-establish a government 
that's answerable to ordinary people, and not just to corporations and lawyers, there will be fewer of 

more important to the country. If we can get the oligarchs out of power and re-establish a government 
that's answerable to ordinary people, and not just to corporations and lawyers, there will be fewer of 

 "It'll be more of the same, Cas, it'll just beyou and the PFC in charge instead of the Party, instead of the 
people running things now. And there'll probably be hundreds of deaths along the way, won't there?"


 "I hope not.” Casper got up from the couch and knelt before Mirim, holding her hand. “Listen,” he said, 
“I think I'm doing the right thing—but maybe I'm not. I can't tell any more what's me, and what's the 
Spartacus File. At first I knew, at least sometimes—it was the File that got me out of Philadelphia alive, I 
knew that—but the lines have all blurred. You read the notes Schiano sent; you know he said that the 
optimization had to fit the recipient's brain perfectly, that I couldn't have taken the Spartacus File if I 
wasn't suited for it, and I guess he was right, because it's blended right in. I thought it was just telling me 
how to do what I wanted to do, but maybe it's done more. Maybe it's changing my idea of what's right 
and what's wrong. Maybe there's no real difference any more between Casper Beech and the Spartacus 
File—that idea scares me, but maybe it's true. I can't tell. You and Cecelia are my only external 
connection to the original Casper Beech now, and I can't trust the internal links. So you tell me—am I 
just doing what I'd always thought should be done, but I didn't have the nerve or the knowledge to do it? 
Or am I doing something I would have known was wrong, before?"


 Mirim stared at him, at the familiar face of her co-worker that had become something more. There was a 
gleam in his eyes and a strength in his jaw that had never been there in their years at Data Tracers; she 
had always thought he had a certain charm, but now that had become an irresistible charisma, like a 
spark fanned into a roaring blaze.


 How could she tell him he was wrong?


 Andwas he wrong? She didn't know what the old Casper's political convictions had been—if he'd had 
any. He had griped about the government, like anyone else, but he'd never gone into specifics of what 
should be done about it. He had never wished anyone ill—and as far as she could tell, hestill didn't wish 
anyone ill, except perhaps the people who ran the government, and even them, she thought, he just 
wanted out of power, he didn't want them harmed.


 After all, the Spartacus File was supposed to enable him to lead a violent revolution, a guerrilla 
war—she'd seen Schiano's notes talking calmly about massacres and riots, and here Casper was 
transforming that into a relatively peaceful political reform movement. He wastrying to reshape the 
Spartacus File to fit his own beliefs.


 But people were dead, all the same. Only seven so far, but who knew how many more there might be if 
Casper went on with his plans?


 "Cas,” she said, “if you were to succeed tomorrow, if you were suddenly appointed dictator of North 
America, what would you do? How would you be any different from any other power-hungry politician?"


 "I'm not power-hungry,” he said. “I'd do my best to restore the Constitution as originally written. I'd kick 
out the bureaucrats who really run everything, the staff people, the paper-pushers, the lobbyists, 
everyone tied to the Consortium, and then I'd hold elections. I haven't worked out the details yet..."


 "And you never would,” Mirim interrupted. “Reformers have taken office before with great plans, and 
it's always just been more of the same." 



 "I'd try very hard not to be,” Casper said. 
"And you think you could be different." 
"Yes, I do,” Casper said earnestly. 
"And you think it's important enough that you have your chance to reform the government that it's worth 
people dying?" 
"I think that if we had a new government of the kind I want that there wouldn't be any more Covert 
Operations Group killing people, that there wouldn't be any Consortium immune to half the laws, that 
there wouldn't be any corporate cops who can get away with killing troublemakers, so yes, I do think it's 
worth risking a few deaths." 
"It's worth people dying so you can be president?" 
Casper shook his head. “I don't want to be president,” he said. “I just want a new government." 
"So you say." 
"I mean it!” He stared into her eyes. “Listen, Mirim,” he said, “I'm not doing this out of personal 
ambition, I swear it. If it'll make you give me your support, I'll make you a promise—I won't ever be 
president. Or dictator, or whatever. When our reforms succeed, when PFC takes power, it'll be with 
someone else in charge. I'mnot doing this to put myself in charge." 
"You're serious?" 
"Absolutely." 
And he was.


 The Spartacus File required him to overthrow the present government and replace it with a more 


democratic one; it never specified that he, personally, had to have any role in the new one. 
In fact, the idea of actually having to run a country as big and complicated as the U.S. was terrifying. He 
didn't want to do anything of the kind. They'd find a figurehead somewhere. Maybe Colby—he would 
clean up better than Ed.Much better than Ed—in fact, Ed could be a problem in the long run, a problem 
that might need to be eliminated.


 Or maybe instead of Colby or any of the other long-time PFC people they could use Cecelia, or even 


Mirim herself. 
Of course, Casper might still be running things behind the scenes. He wouldn't be president, he'd be 
chief of staff, or just an advisor with no official title. And it wouldn't be permanent.


 Just until everything was settled.


 Chapter Twenty 

No one gave any names, and while many Americans would have thought the tall man's face was familiar 


they wouldn't have been able to say who he was.

they wouldn't have been able to say who he was.

He straightened a little further. 
This was the White House Chief of Staff—the current administration's hatchet man. 
The two men stared at each other, Smith stiff and nervous, the other relaxed but angry. 
"So,” the tall man said at last, “you're the asshole who started a riot in New York." 
"Sir,” Smith protested, “I don't feel that's a fair description." 
"You don't." 
"No, sir." 
"You're the one who ordered a bunch of hit men to shoot someone who was giving a speech in 


Washington Square, right? Right out there in front of the crowd, like something from a goddamned 


Hollywood movie?" 
"I...” Smith caught himself. “Yes, sir,” he said. 
"And you didn't think that would start a riot?" 
"I ... Perhaps I hadn't thought out the consequences,” Smith admitted. 
"And why hadn't you?" 
"Sir, I considered it essential that we dispose of Casper Beech as soon as possible. I was too concerned 


with that to worry about collateral damage."


 "Collateral damage,” the other man said. “An anti-government riot in the middle of New York—you call 
that collateral damage?" 
"Yes, sir." 
"I seem to recall that collateral damage is a euphemism for what we used to call ‘overkill.’” 
"Ah, well ... I don't know, sir." 
"You ought to. If you're going to use a term like that, you ought to know just what the hell you're saying. 


And if you're going to do something like shoot people in front of a crowd in the middle of New York, 
you ought to know what the hell you're doing." 
"I was trying to prevent a catastrophe, sir!" 
"By killing this Casper Beech." 
"Yes, sir." 



 "And did you kill him?"

 "And did you kill him?"

 The chief of staff stared at Smith for a long moment, then asked, “Did you ever read Macchiavelli?"

 Smith blinked. “No, sir."

 "You should. Anyone in government should. If you had, you might've remembered that he said, ‘if you 
strike at a king, you must kill him.’ Well, you've struck at this son of a bitch, and you haven't killed him, 
and you're in deep shit."

 Smith swallowed, then said, “I gathered that, sir."

 "That all you've got to say?"

 "No, sir.” Smith swallowed again. This was his chance to present a defense, and he didn't want to blow 
it; he hadn't been sure he was even going to get one, and he was pretty damn sure he wouldn't get 
another. “Sir,” he said, “Casper Beech has been programmed with the Spartacus File. That's considered 
the most dangerous of all our imprint weapons; we puteverything into it, everything we knew how to do. 
A man who's been optimized with the Spartacus File is driven to overthrow the government of his 
homeland—it's an irresistible compulsion, and nothing short of death will stop it."

 "There are probablythousands of people in this country who are obsessed with overthrowing the 
government, Mr. Smith,” the chief of staff said drily.

 "Yes, but the Spartacus File also gives him the knowledge and skills necessary todo it. He had to be 
stopped, by any means available."

 The chief of staff sighed, and seated himself on the edge of the desk. “So you've been trying to kill him."

 "Yes, sir—of course. That's theonly way to stop him."

 "And you didn't worry about who or what might get caught in the overkill."

 "No, sir. You can't make an omelet, and all that."

 "Smith, you're an idiot. You and your guns and bombs and computers ... look, if weseriously had 
wanted to take out this Beech, if you'd brought this up to my level to begin with, we could have done it. 
We could have fucking nuked New York if we thought it was important enough. If youreally don't care 
about the overkill you can take out anybody, any time you want. If this Beech ever gets to bethat much 
of a menace, we can goddamn welldo that. But we haven't. You know why?"

 He waited for a reply, but Smith simply looked blank.

 "Because wedo care about the overkill, goddammit!” He slammed his fist on the desk. “A lot of good it 
does to take out one revolutionary if the political damage creates a hundred more! So this Beech is 
dangerous, he's a goddamn Spartacus who's going to turn the whole goddamn underclass into a slave 
army, he's going to turn every city in the country into a war zone if we let him, until someday he and a 
bunch of ghetto punks come riding into Washington on a hijacked Greyhound and string us all up on the 


Mall and declare the People's Libertarian Republic or some such crap—that's what you're worried 

Mall and declare the People's Libertarian Republic or some such crap—that's what you're worried 

 "Ah ... yes, sir."

 "Fine. Let's say he gets every single American who's living below the poverty line to sign up in his army 
and pick up a gun. You know what he's got, then, out of three hundred million Americans?"

 "No, sir."

 "He's got a hundred million troops—most of ‘em women and children. They've probably got handguns 
and homemade explosives at most and they aren't trained for shit. And you know what we've got?"

 Smith didn't bother to answer.

 "We've got two hundred million loyal Americans, including the whole goddamn army, and against a 
bunch of kids with rifles we've got 3,000 nuclear warheads. We putone of those warheads on Beech's 
headquarters, and his army falls apart overnight. They don't come marching down the Mall. We don't 
negotiate with them. We don't need to. We just blow ‘em away."

 "Yes, sir."

 "You don't look convinced, Smith—and I think I know why. Because if it comes to dropping a nuke on 
Americans, we're in rough shape. Damn right we are. But Smith, that'sworst case . That's if we do 
nothing until this Beech has his whole army up and running.Best would have been if someone at 
NeuroTalents had been paying attention, and when Beech got that brain flash and was lying there out 
cold from the zap, this helpful person had quietly cut his throat. That didn't happen, and you've been 
trying tomake it happen ever since."

 "Yes, sir, that's it exactly!” Smith said, perking up. “We need..."

 "You need to shut up and listen. Smith, it'stoo late for that. Timing is everything in politics, and this is 
politics. It was too late once Beech went underground and linked up with the PFC and started putting his 
propaganda out on the nets. You can't just cut his throat now."

 Smith fought down the urge to demand, “Why not?” Instead he said, “Yes, sir."

 "You've been looking at this wrong. Our goal isn't to kill Beech. That's not agoal , it's just a means to an 
end. You have to look at what wereally want . It's not that we want Beech dead; it's that we don't want 
him screwing up the country."

 "But..."

 "But killing him would be one easy way to make sure he doesn't screw up the country. Right. No 
argument. But you haven't managed to kill him, have you?"

 "No, sir."

 "And he's on guard now, he's got helpers, he's got a whole goddamn organization, he's got some public 
support." 


 "Sir, if we could just shut down..."

 "Sir, if we could just shut down..."

 "Yes, sir."

 "Now, if you'd had any brains, or anyone in your department knew shit about PR, we wouldn't have had 
any problem, because we could have said the snipers weren't ours, and then we could have investigated 
and said that Beech staged the whole thing, and he'd look like an asshole and we could track him down 
at our leisure and blow him and his buddies to hell with an explosion we'd put down as them setting off a 
bomb they were building. Butyou didn't do that. You didn't deny anything. You didn't tell the cops to 
keep their mouths shut, and they'd been told not to interfere with the feds on the rooftops."

 "That hasn't been widely reported, sir. We could still deny it, say that was all rumors..."

 The chief of staff shook his head. “No, we couldn't, asshole. You don't understand how PR works, do 
you? It's all timing. I told you,all timing . If we deny itnow , everyone will scream cover-up, and we'll 
have another goddamn scandal dragging on for years even if Casper Beech walks in here in ten minutes 
and blows his own brains out. We should have had a spokesman there covering our asson the scene 
—once the story's out on CNN and Fox and all over the net it's too late."

 Smith wanted to protest, but the other man was right—hedidn't know anything about PR. That wasn't 
part of his job description. Covert wascovert ; they never admitted or denied anything.

 "You beginning to see the situation, Smith?"

 "Yes, sir."

 "Now, what we want is to make sure that this Beech doesn't start a revolution. We want to dump the 
blame for the riot. Right?"

 "Yes, sir."

 "And the direct approach hasn't worked with Beech—and you can be proud of that, if you want, 
becausethat's exactly what you programmed him for , asshole. He'ssupposed to be able to handle 
any kind of direct attack, isn't he?"

 "Yes, sir."

 "So why the hell did youuse them? Chrissake, man..." 


 Smith swallowed uneasily.

 Smith swallowed uneasily.

eventually. 
"Like what?" 
The chief of staff smiled. “Why, it's obvious. You heard his speech, saw the vids?" 
"Yes, sir." 
"He says he's not a revolutionary,” the tall man pointed out. “He says he wants peaceful political reform." 
"That's just propaganda, sir,” Smith said. “It's in the Spartacus File. It's all just talk, for public 


consumption. He's still programmed for violent revolution."


 "Of course,” the other agreed, nodding. “But what if we take it literally? What if we invite him to 
Washington for talks?" 
"What?" 
"What if we apologize, say it was all a misunderstanding, and invite him down here to meet the 
president?" 
"Sir, he'dassassinate the president!" 
"Okay, then, to meetsomebody , some geek from State maybe. It doesn't matter who he talks to. The 
point is, we get him out of the underground, out where we can see him, keep an eye on him." 
Smith blinked. “And then we can get him with his defenses down and kill him?" 
"Oh, God,” the chief of staff said, leaning back and staring at the ceiling in disgust. Then he leaned 
forward again and hammered the desk with his fist. “No, asshole! We don't kill him. We co-opt him. 
How the hell is he going to recruit an army if he's here talking to the Under-Secretary for Urban Affairs? 
Hell, we could even appointhim Under-Secretary for Urban Affairs if we have to! We make himthink 
we're taking his reform talk seriously, and tie him up in red tape until everyone justforgets him, until he's 
just one more former radical giving speeches no one listens to!"


 "But ... he won't do it. He'scompelled ." 
"That's fine, too. Then we can point and say, ‘Look, we tried,’ and we can send the SWAT teams after 
him and blow him away right out in public and people willcheer for us instead of starting riots! And we'll 


take our time about it and do itright , with bombs or serious firepower, no more half-baked crap with 
snipers using armor-piercing shells ... Jesus, Smith, where'd you come up with that, anyway?" 
"It seemed ... we wanted to be ready for everything, and we thought he might wear a vest..." 
"Right.” He grimaced in disgust. “You thought."


 For a moment the two men were silent; then Smith asked, “So you'll issue a pardon for him, then? And 


after that Covert's out of it?"

after that Covert's out of it?"

surface." 
Smith felt a sudden cold dread. 
The chief of staff smiled. 
"You got it, Smith. Seems there's a small covert unit gone rogue, went after this Beech character without 
authorization, but of course we've caught them now. We'll have a nice show trial, you and maybe three or 
four others will be convicted and given twenty years, and then we'll quietly lose you on the way to prison, 
and next thing you know you'll be in the Witness Protection Program somewhere." 
"But ... my work ... my career..." 
"So you'll have a two-year vacation. It'll be about that long before this blows over. A sabbatical, 


Smith—you can do some studying, brush up on your practical politics. Maybe when you come back 
you'll have a better handle on the way the real world works." 
Smith shuddered.


 Chapter Twenty-One 
"Cas! C'mere, quick!” Mirim shouted. 
Casper was out of his seat at the kitchen table before he even realized he'd heard Mirim's voice—the 
Spartacus File, as he'd discovered right from the first, had its own reflexes, faster than his own natural 
ones. 
"'Scuse me,” he said to Cecelia and Ed, as he hurried into the living room. 
Mirim was watching Headline News; a government spokesman was on the screen, half a dozen 
microphones shoved into his face. 
"...responsible for this regrettable incident are under arrest,” the spokesman was saying. 
"What's happening?” Casper asked, as he settled onto the couch. 
"I repeat,” the spokesman said, “their actions were completely unauthorized, and a thorough 


investigation is under way."


 "The sniper at the rally,” Mirim said. “They're saying he was part of a rogue cell within the national 
security structure, acting illegally." 
Casper threw her a quick glance, then locked his attention on the screen.


 "Sir!” a reporter called, “does this mean that Casper Beech, the speaker at that rally, is in factnot a 


terrorist?"

terrorist?"

 Cecelia had followed Casper from the kitchen, without rushing; now she stood in the doorway, listening 
to the speech.

 "Pretty good,” she said, leaning against the doorframe. “Notice how he left everything open. If they 
decide you're trouble, Cas, they can still hit you with failure to get that permit, and wrongful death suits by 
the relatives of the four feds in Philly, and a lot of other shit."

 "Yeah,” Casper agreed, “it's a nice recovery. I hadn't thought of this. If I surface, they can keep an eye 
on me and tie me up six ways to Sunday, and stage an accident if they decide it's necessary. But if I stay 
underground, I'll be discredited—they'll be able to ask everyone why I'm still hiding if I'm not a terrorist."

 "So what do you do?” Mirim asked.

 "For now,” Casper replied, “I stall.” He reached into his pocket and extracted his wallet, then pulled out 
a bill. “Here, Celia,” he said, “take this as a retainer, would you?"

 Cecelia didn't move. “Why?” she asked.

 "Becauseyou're going to surface, of course, and start negotiating my surrender."

 "I am?"

 "Sure. Weren't you saying that keeping me alive was just a matter of the right P.R. and legal 
shenanigans? Well, here's your chance to prove it."

 "You're going to give up? The Spartacus File hasn't got some clever way to twist this around again?"

 Casper shrugged. “Hey, Celia, they'vegot me—the File doesn't cover anything like this. Schiano and his 
people couldn't think of everything, and besides, this is really outside what Schiano had planned on. He 
was figuring on guerrillas and battles, not political duels. The Party's got the real political pros here, and 
they're finally using them. I'd hoped they wouldn't catch on in time, but they have. They've 
outmaneuvered me by giving up those Covert guys and saying they were acting alone, out of control. I 
don't have a power base to argue that from. If I stay underground now, it'llprove I'm a terrorist, as far as 
the public is concerned, so I've got to surface pretty soon—but I'm not about to just walk into the local 
cop shop. I could have an accident, or commit suicide. So I want you to stall until I'm sure I'll be safe."

 Casper noticed that Mirim was staring at him doubtfully. 
Cecelia, too, clearly wasn't quite ready to accept this sudden acquiescence. 



 "I thought the Spartacus File was compelling you to rebel,” she said.

 "I thought the Spartacus File was compelling you to rebel,” she said.

 "You don't still think they'll kill you?"

 "I don't know—that's one thing I want you to find out for me."

 "You don't think they'll killme ?"

 Casper shook his head. “Not until they've gotme ,” he said. “You'll be their best link, and they'll know it. 
You just tell them that you were kidnapped, make whatever connections you need to keep yourself 
safe—that's another reason I want to stall, to giveyou time.” He pressed the bill toward her.

 Reluctantly, she took it.

 Casper smiled at her.

 He knew why she was reluctant—he was doing exactly what she had wanted him to do all along, but he 
wasn't whining about it, wasn't putting up a struggle, and she didn't trust that. She thought there had to be 
a catch.

 She was right, of course—therewas a catch.

 That was the next step in his plan.

 The fact that his identity was known right from the first, and that he was too heavily outgunned to set up 
a guerrilla force in the wilderness somewhere, had made most of the preferred options in the Spartacus 
File impossible—Schiano hadn't compiled it with the U.S. in mind. Casper's promise to Mirim not to 
openly take power himself limited his choices still further. The government's disavowal of any ill intentions 
toward him narrowed it down even more.

 He couldn't stay underground without ruining his position, and if he tried to operate in the open he could 
never succeed—they'd find a way to kill him if he started to get close. He had to find a third way.

 And of course, the Spartacus File provided one. Schiano and the hundred other programmers who had 
worked on the File hadn't been able to think of every possible contingency, but they'd included every 
general case they could think of, and provided guidelines for choosing which model to follow.

 It was pretty clear what to do in this situation. When presented with two unacceptable options, find a 
third choice even if it looks even worse on the surface. And here there was definitely such a choice, one 
that lookedreally bad at first:

 Martyrdom.

 Not suicide, of course—he had no intention of killing himself, and if he let himself be killed, who would 
lead the revolution? Who would guide People For Change into power? And he didn't want to die. 


 Spartacus had died for his revolt, and the revolt had died with him. Casper didn't want that, didn't want 
either part of it—he wanted to live, and he wanted his revolution to continue and grow. Martyrdom was 
a matter of public perception, not reality; all he had to do wasappear to die, at the hands of a 
treacherous government.

 Spartacus had died for his revolt, and the revolt had died with him. Casper didn't want that, didn't want 
either part of it—he wanted to live, and he wanted his revolution to continue and grow. Martyrdom was 
a matter of public perception, not reality; all he had to do wasappear to die, at the hands of a 
treacherous government.

 He hadn't yet worked out the details, though, and until he did, he wasn't about to let Cecelia in on his 
plans. 
"Go on,” he told Cecelia, “go turn yourself in, or whatever." 
She stared at him a moment longer, then nodded. 
"Okay,” she said. “I'll turn myself in to ... let's see ... CNN, I guess. Or maybe ABC would be better." 
He smiled wryly. “Not the cops?" 
"Don't be an idiot, Casper. Hasn't that thing in your head taught youanything ? They aren't going to 


shoot me live on TV; in private, though, who knows?" 
Casper nodded. She was exactly right. 
He wondered—if Cecelia had gone for one of Covert's optimizations, wouldshe have gotten the 


Spartacus File? She seemed to have half the tactical knowledge already. Certainly, she had more of what 


it took to fight a revolution than he had had before his visit to NeuroTalents. 
"Colby,” Cecelia called up the stairs, “could Rose or Tasha or someone drop me somewhere? And I 
need to make a shielded phone call.” She turned and headed back for the kitchen.


 Casper watched her go, then settled onto the couch beside Mirim.


 The news was still running, but had moved on to the financial report. Casper watched it, not really 
paying attention. 
Mirim stared at him. 
"Are you really giving up, Cas?” she asked at last. 
He looked at her, startled, then smiled at her, a big, warm smile. 
"Nope,” he said. “Come on, let's get the vidcam; as soon as Celia's gone I want to record some more 


speeches. And I need to check the nets, see if we've got some volunteers. After that we'll talk to Colby 
and the others about setting up maildrops and bank accounts for contributions." 
"So you're still going to try this political stuff?"


 "Absolutely!” He stood up and reached down for her hand. “Come on,” he said. “We've got a campaign 
to launch." 


 Bob Schiano stared at the screen in amazement. A dozen security men were shielding Cecelia Grand 

 Bob Schiano stared at the screen in amazement. A dozen security men were shielding Cecelia Grand 

 "Ms. Grand, a lawyer representing alleged terrorist Casper Beech, announced that she had come to 

negotiate Beech's surrender,” the off-screen reporter announced. 
"But he can't,” Schiano said. “Hecan't surrender. The file won't let him.” He smacked a fist onto the 
table in front of him. “Iwon't let him!" 
The scene cut to Cecelia addressing the press. 
"Mr. Beech is understandably wary,” she said. “Government agents openly tried to kill him on the streets 
of Philadelphia and again in New York, and while the administration may now say that those agents were 
acting without authorization, Mr. Beech feels that he needs greater assurance of his own safety before 
turning himself in." 
Schiano leaned back in his chair, staring at the screen. 
Beechcouldn't surrender. And especially not now, when he'd scored a victory and forced the 
government to disavow their attacks on him! Smith and his chief aide and two triggermen were packed 
away somewhere, being prepared as scapegoats; Schiano had been briefly concerned that they might 
even sacrificehim , but in the end they hadn't done anything that desperate. Good imprint programmers 
were hard to find. 
He was, however, out of work for the moment, while they looked for somewhere else to put him. That 
meant he could stay home and watch the news. 
He hadn't expectedthis , though. 
Was the Spartacus File breaking down? 
Or ... He relaxed somewhat as the thought struck him. 
Or was Beech up to something? 
That had to be it. Beech wasn't going to surrender at all. 
Schiano tried to remember more of what had gone into the File. He'd overseen the whole thing, but of 
course it had been far too much for one person to do single-handed; if he'd been able to write the whole 
Spartacus File by himself, he'd havebeen the new Spartacus. 
Then he had it. He knew what was coming. 
He wondered how Beech would set it up. 
"I'm here representing Casper Beech and People For Change,” Cecelia told the interviewer. 
"And are you a member of People For Change, yourself?” he asked her. 
"People For Change is a legitimate political organization, seeking recognition...” she began. 


 "Yes, Ms. Grand,” the interviewer interrupted, “but areyou a member of People For Change?" 
For a moment, Cecelia hesitated. On a living room couch somewhere in New Jersey, Casper Beech 
looked up from his laptop and waited. 
Cecelia had surfaced two days before, with much fanfare. The government had apologized to her, the 
media had feted her, and everyone had listened to her tale of desperate flight from crazed renegade feds. 
There had been various denunciations of the “rogue” operation, and several editorial comments about the 
need for a political reform movement like People For Change. 
But until now, no one had asked her much about her own politics. 
No one—not even Casper. 
And Casper needed to know. He had plans for Cecelia and for PFC. 
"Yes,” she said at last. “Yes, I am." 
Casper thrust a fist in the air and said, “Yes!"


 Chapter Twenty-Two


 "Tell them I want to surrender at the U.N., in front of the international community,” Casper said into the 
phone. 
"Do you?” Cecelia asked. 
Casper smiled. “It's a possibility,” he said. 
"The U.N. should be okay,” Cecelia said thoughtfully. 
"See how it would work, then, and I'll get back to you. I should have that speech ready for you soon, 


too.” He shut off the phone and stuck it in his pocket. 
"I thought...” Mirim said. 
"What?” He looked up at her, startled. 
"Didn't you just ask Rose to book you on the train to Kennedy Spaceport? I thought maybe you were 


heading out to somewhere on the Fringe." 
"Where I might get a more sympathetic hearing?” Casper shook his head. “It wouldn't be the Fringers 


themselves who'd be listening to me out there, it would be the authorities, and they're heavily into 
suppressing rebellion." 
"But then why did ... isn't that what you told Rose?" 
"Don't worry about what I told Rose,” Casper said. “You just be ready to go." 



 "Casper,I don't want to go out to the Fringe! Space travel scares me." 
He looked up at her with interest. “Have you ever done any space traveling?" 
"No, and I'm not going to!" 
He held up his hands. “Okay, okay, that's no problem! You don't have to. I promise." 
"You're going without me?" 
"Look, Mirim, just trust me, okay? It'll all be fine, just wait and see." 
She looked down at him uncertainly. 
"Ipromise ,” he said. 
She turned away. 
He watched her go, then picked up his laptop and booted it up. He had things to do. There were a lot of 


arrangements to make. 
It was a good thing that PFC had at least one or two serious terrorists as members; he was going to 
need some of Ed's skills, and other specialists, as well. He'd need a bomb, and for some reason he hadn't 


been getting much help from the Spartacus File with the specifications on that. Maybe part of the imprint 
hadn't taken properly, or maybe one of Schiano's programmers had been faking it. 
He'd need some specialized equipment—equipment Ed probably couldn't provide, but he might know 


someone who could. Fortunately, the equipment didn't actually need towork .


 And he wanted some way to remove a person without anyone knowing it; poison, perhaps, or an 
engineered bug of some sort ... ? 
"Sir,” the aide said. 
The Chief of Staff looked up. “Yes?" 
"It's about Casper Beech,” he said. 
"What about him?" 
"It seems we have conflicting reports about him, sir. That lawyer of his says Beech is going to turn 


himself in at the U.N., but the word on the net is that he intends to head out to the Fringe." 
The Chief of Staff sat up straight and looked the aide in the eye. 
"The Fringe?" 
"Yes, sir. Probably to the L5 colony."


 "And once he gets there, is he planning to surrender, or to join the rebels?” He had talked with Smith 
and Schiano; he remembered that Beech was supposed to join a rebel group. They'd assumed that PFC 


was that group, but maybe Beech had decided it was time to try starting over somewhere else.

was that group, but maybe Beech had decided it was time to try starting over somewhere else.

 "Countermand them,” the chief said immediately. “We want him alive, if at all possible. If he gets 
off-planet ... hell, it ought to be that much easier to spot him and corner him out there. Everything's so 
much smaller. And if hedoes get killed, we can blame it on the radicals, we don't have to take the heat 
ourselves.” He gazed thoughtfully at the wall. “I wonder ... do you suppose he'll surrender out there? 
Maybe he thinks the radicals will back him up, or that we won't dare harm him for fear of open revolt."

 "The programmers say hecan't surrender, sir."

 The chief nodded.

 "If he's off-planet, he's less of a threat to us, alive or dead—we can always destroy the whole damn 
colony and blame the radicals."

 "Yes, sir."

 "You sure about this, Casper?” Ed asked again, holding up his ticket and freight receipt.

 "Absolutely,” Casper replied. “We've got to hurt them, force them to negotiate."

 Ed nodded. “Damn straight. I've gotta give you credit, man—I didn't think you had the balls for 
something like this. Youtalk a good line sometimes, but I wasn't sure you had what it takes to be a real 
revolutionary, any more than the rest of these wusses. For four years they haven't dared do squat, and 
then you show up with this super-imprint in your head, and I think we'll finally get somewhere, thenyou 
start talking about peaceful change. If you'd stuck with that public surrender crap, I might've been 
tempted to put a knife in your back myself—the only thing the fat cats understand is violence, and that 
might have stirred some up. It's good to see you understand that you can't make an omelet without 
cracking some eggs."

 Casper looked at Ed, the man who had deliberately waited until a cop was leaning over the planted 
bomb in the New York precinct before detonating it four years before, the man behind virtually every act 
of violence PFC had committed before Colby had taken charge and moved the group away from overt 
terrorism.

 Ed was a loose cannon, someone who couldn't be rehabilitated because he didn'twant to be 
rehabilitated, someone who would always be in the way of any attempt to turn PFC into an effective 
political force.

 Casper clapped him on the back. “Whatever it costs, Ed. I know that now, same as you do."

 Ed winced; the slap had stung. But then, everyone at PFC knew that Casper had a tendency to misjudge 
his own strength. “I thought you were serious about all that ‘peaceful means’ and ‘win at the ballot box’ 
crap,” he said. 


 Casper just smiled. He twisted a ring on his finger; Ed noticed that. Casper was definitely changing, Ed 

 Casper just smiled. He twisted a ring on his finger; Ed noticed that. Casper was definitely changing, Ed 

 "You can't go that way, man,” Ed said. “You have to compromise too much if you play by their rules. 
You can't play politics that way and keep your ideals." 
"I know,” Casper said. “Listen, good luck, Ed—and thanks for doing this." 
"You, too,” Ed said. Then he turned and boarded the Florida train. 
Casper watched him go. 
He felt a surge of guilt over what he had just done—over both parts of it. He knew that before his 
optimization he would never have done such a thing, never even haveconsidered it. 
Now he couldn't help it. 
At least, he told himself, this should be the last of it, the end of the violence. He would never do it again. 
And it was better than the guerrilla war that the Spartacus File kept urging him to lead. 
Cecelia Grand looked at her watch. She frowned. She'd heard the rumors about a flight to the Fringe, 
and intended to give Casper a piece of her mind. The U.N. would be much better for a surrender, and he 
damn wellbetter intend to surrender! If he couldn't control that damned software in his head ... ? 
Well, he had plenty of good ideas, and she liked the whole idea of getting into politics, but she wasn't 
going to let some damn piece of spy fiction runher life. 
Her phone beeped; she snatched it up and opened it. 
"Grand,” she said. 
"Celia?" 
It was Mirim's voice, not Casper's. 
"Yes? Where's Casper?" 
"He told me to apologize, said he couldn't help it." 
"Couldn't helpwhat ?" 
"He's heading for the Fringe." 
Word went out on the net before Freight 2105 was even off the ground—Casper Beech was aboard, 
tucked in a crate in the cargo hold with his own oxygen, water, and food supplies. The passenger flights 
were too closely watched, and he'd wanted to get to the Fringe, so he'd had himself smuggled aboard an 
unmanned supply ship.

 All along Florida's northern Atlantic coast, people looked out their windows at the line of flame that was 
Freight 2105's launch from Kennedy and ascent toward space. 



 Most of them, thanks to the rumors on the net, knew that Casper Beech, already something of a folk 

 Most of them, thanks to the rumors on the net, knew that Casper Beech, already something of a folk 

 And hundreds of eyes saw the sudden flash and knew instantly what it meant.

 "The guy gave his name as Thomas Paine,” the security guard read from the screen. “It's apparently 
phony—we aren't getting a description match on any real Thomas Paine, so it set off the security check, 
a bit late. He's already left the port. Whoever he really is, we think he might be connected with People 
For Change."

 The spaceport's traffic manager asked, “People For Change—isn't that the group Casper Beech runs?"

 "Sure is,” the guard agreed. “Rumors on the net say Beech is being smuggled off-planet, and this guy 
checked some freight aboard 2105—a goddamn big crate, according to the shipping people. Big enough 
to hold a man and three days’ supplies. We thought you might want to hold the launch until we've 
searched it."

 "You're a little late,” she said. “2105 took off for the L5 colony five minutes ago."

 That was when the alarms went off. The flash hadn't been visible in the windowless office, but there were 
plenty of other reports of the explosion aboard Freight 2105.

 "Goddamn it,” the White House Chief of Staff said, “I thought I told you to countermand those orders."

 "Idid ,” his aide said. “Someone must have gotten the word late."

 "Shit. This'll mean another show trial; it makes us look really bad.” He sighed. “Well, at least Beech is 
out of the way."

 Cecelia appeared before the cameras with tears on her cheeks, her make-up smeared.

 "Casper Beech was aboard that ship,” she said, “and the Covert Operations Group, a branch of the 
government of the United States, shot it down to make sure that he was not able to bring his message to 
the people of America. Idemand that those responsible be brought to trial for murder!"

 The White House spokesman was visibly ruffled, though nowhere near as distraught as Cecelia, when he 
said, “This was an unfortunate accident. The orders to destroy any ship Casper Beech boardedhad been 
countermanded, but apparently word had not reached everyone. We're still trying to locate whoever was 
responsible."

 Casper smiled as he watched. Even the feds thought they'd done it, and that he was a burnt corpse on 
the bottom of the Atlantic.

 The wreckage ought to be so far down that no one could recover it and find out that there weren't any 
corpses, or at least none that had Casper's DNA.

 If they everdid find it, of course, they'd guess the truth—that he was safe in a cabin in the Poconos, and 
Mirim would be joining him as soon as she could get away.


 There were still other loose ends to be dealt with, as well. He had to make sure that Ed was out of the 


way, that the genetically-engineered virus he'd injected with that slap on the back had done its job and 
erased his memory—otherwise, the possibility that Ed might reveal the fraud would always be there. Ed 

way, that the genetically-engineered virus he'd injected with that slap on the back had done its job and 
erased his memory—otherwise, the possibility that Ed might reveal the fraud would always be there. Ed 

 He hoped the virus wasn't fatal; the black market gene tailor hadn't made any promises. The thing had 
originally been developed with the idea of erasing outdated or proprietary imprints, but had never been 
used—it ate out huge chunks of the user's memory, along with the imprinted skills, and the developers 
hadn't been able to find a way to target it more precisely.

 Casper was trying to resist the Spartacus File's ruthlessness. He hadn't simply killed Ed, though that 
would have been the easiest way to cover his tracks and remove an embarrassment from PFC—but Ed 
was going to lose so much of his past life and personality that death might almost have been preferable. If 
the virus performed as advertised, the old-line revolutionary would never be able to tell anyone that 
Beech was still alive, or that the crate that had supposedly held Beech and his life support system had 
actually held the bomb that destroyed Freight 2105.

 That would take care of most of the loose ends, but there were other things he still had to do. Casper 
knew he'd have to find some way, working by proxy, to convince Cecelia to let Mirim act as her 
speechwriter, so that he could supply Mirim with the words to keep PFC on the right track.

 But all in all, everything was going just fine. The revolution would continue, without violence, andthis 
time no one was going to crucify Spartacus.

 He'd beaten them to it.

 Epilogue

 It was snowing in Washington, but nobody seemed to care; the crowd listening to the new president's 
inaugural address applauded enthusiastically at every opportunity.

 Maybe, Casper thought cynically, as he watched the spectacle on his screen, they were doing it to keep 
warm.

 For himself, his enthusiasm had worn away over the past seventeen years—along with his control over 
the PFC. He listened to Cecelia delivering her speech, and could not find a single sentence of his in it.

 The populist ideals were gone; instead, she was mouthing platitudes about compromise and 
reconciliation. The Democratic-Republicans on the dais behind her were applauding as loudly as the 
PFCers.

 The PFC might have taken control of the government, but it was plain that the government, in turn, had 
taken control of the PFC.

 Had taken it away from Casper.

 The PFC was just more of the same old authority.

 For sixteen years, Casper had appeased the demon in his head by exercising regularly with elaborate 
martial-arts routines, by keeping in practice with every weapon available, by planning campaigns for any 


PFC candidate who didn't look like a sure winner, by writing speeches for Cecelia and a dozen others, 


but now, as he watched President Grand, the Spartacus File was active again, and unsatisfied. 
He watched Cecelia's every gesture, listened to her every word, thought over everything Mirim had 
relayed of late.


 The PFC was the government now. They had the presidency, they had two hundred thirty-eight seats in 
the House and forty-three in the Senate.

 And the Spartacus File compelled him to rebel against the government—anygovernment. 
That son of a bitch Schiano had never bothered to put in any end to the program; he and Covert had 
always assumed that their Spartacus would wind up dead, one way or another.


 Covert was under Cecelia's command now. They'd tell her anything she wanted to know about the 


Spartacus File. 
Casper knew that she had figured out, long ago, that he was still alive. She'd never said so, never told 
anyone else, he was sure, but she'd read those speeches, seen those campaign plans, and Mirim's name 
at the top or bottom wouldn't have fooled her.


 And she hadn't forgiven him for lying to her, or she'd have sent him a message. She wouldn't have cut his 


every word out of her inaugural. She'd have mentioned her party's martyr during the campaign. 
She had probably stewed constantly over the image of Casper and Mirim holed up somewhere, cozy 
and safe, while she fought her way up step by step through the political nightmare of the past sixteen 


years. 
And when she talked to Schiano and the others, she'd know what would have to be done. 
And Casper already knew whathe had to do. 
He wondered, as he packed, whether the Spartacus File had planned this all along, whether it required a 


constant cycle of revolutions, or whether this was a bug in the program. 
In the end, it didn't matter whether it was a bug or a feature, so long as it was there. 
When the SWAT team arrived two days later they found the cabin dark and empty. A note was pinned 


to the door with a knife.


 "The battle continues,” it said.


 It was signed “Spartacus."


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