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the other side of the coin? If there's a single factor that consistently shows
up on your psych evaluations, it's the frustrations
Banshee creates in you—the stress of seeing disasters you can't do
anything to prevent. Denials:
anyone?"
I glanced around the table even as I realized that, for me, all further
arguments were moot. The chance to save a life that would otherwise be
lost—a life whose loss was filling an entire nation with grief and
pain—was all the motivation I needed.
Besides which, Griff happened to be right. All of us hated the helplessness we
felt during Jumps; hated it with a passion. If we really could do something
about the disasters we had to witness...
"So," Griff continued after a moment. "Then consider what we've got here: a
chance to see whether or not the past can be safely changed. Doesn't that seem
like something worth taking a little risk to find out?"
"And if it leads to disaster?" Hale demanded. "What then? It doesn't matter a
damn how pure or noble our motives were if we screw things up royally. I say
we just forget the whole idea and—"
"Mr. Fortness, you're relieved of duty," Shaeffer said quietly.
The words came so suddenly and with such conviction behind them that it took a
moment for me to register the fact that the man giving the order had no
authority to do so. An instant later everyone else seemed to catch on to that
fact, too, and the awkward silence suddenly went rigid. "Someone die and
leave you boss?" Hale growled scornfully.
"That's enough, Hale," Griff said quietly. "Go back to your room."
From the looks on the other's faces it appeared they were as flabbergasted as
Hale was.
"Griff—you don't mean—" Kristin began.
Griff looked at her, and she fell silent. The awkward silence resumed as Hale
got up from the table, face set in stone, and left the room. I half expected
him to slam the door on his way out, but he apparently was still too stunned
by it all to be thinking in terms of theatrics. Griff let the silence hang in
the air another couple of seconds before looking back at Kristin. "I believe,
Kristin," he said, "that the next Jump is yours. I know it's getting late, but
I'd appreciate it if you'd try anyway. If you feel up to it, that is."
A muscle twitched in Kristin's cheek as she threw a glance at Shaeffer's tight
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face and stood up. "I'll try, Griff. Sure. Shall I go downstairs and start
getting prepped?"
"Please. I'll be there shortly to set the tether and slot coordinates and see
you off."
She nodded and left the room. Shaeffer watched her go, then turned back to
lock Morgan, Rennie, and me into a searchlight gaze. "I realize that in a
tight-knit organization like Banshee strangers like me are not especially
welcome," he said, his soft voice underlaid with steel. "But at the moment I
don't give a nickel damn about your feelings. We have less than sixty-six
hours to get President Jeffers off that plane and into temporary hiding; and
the longer it takes us, the greater the danger of exactly the sort of thing
happening that you've all voiced concerns about." He paused, as if waiting to
see if any of us would follow Hale's lead. But we said nothing, and after a
moment Shaeffer turned to Griff. "All right, Dr.
Mansfield. Let's get started."
—
"Now remember," Shaeffer said, leaning close to Kristin as if she were asleep
or deaf or both. "You go right up in front of the President's face and hover
there where he can see you—
don't get out of his sight. If he doesn't seem to see you, or else ignores
you, come back and we'll try again. Under no circumstances are you to stay
long enough to see him climb up the steps to the plane. Understand?"
I half expected Kristin to remind him that this was the third replay of these
same instructions and that she'd caught them all the first time around. But
she merely nodded and closed her eyes. Griff gave the high sign, and with the
usual flickering of lights she was gone.
Taking a deep breath, I moved away from Griff and Shaeffer, lingering by the
two-foot model of Air
Force One and the tiny model limo that now sat on the table beside it. The
tether lead's alligator clip was attached to the limo; Shaeffer was pushing
this contact as far back as he reasonably could, all the way back to the
President's drive to the landing field. Passing the models, I kept going,
heading for the rows of equipment cabinets at the building's west end. My
father had always gone for a walk in the woods when he needed to think through
a particularly knotty problem, and during my two years at Banshee I'd
discovered that the maze of gray cabinets back here was an adequate
substitute. I hoped the magic still worked. Upstairs, half an hour ago, I'd
made my decision... but with Shaeffer's pep talk beginning to fade, things no
longer looked nearly so clear cut. The greatest good for the greatest number,
and attention paid whenever possible to the individual; those were the rules
I'd been taught as a child, the standards against which I'd always measured my
actions. But to make such judgments required information and wisdom... and I
could find nothing in past experience that seemed to apply to this case.
How was I supposed to weigh the pain and suffering that could be caused by
changing the past?
"Hello, Adam."
I jerked out of my reverie and spun around. Rennie stood there, leaning
against one of the computer cabinets, arms crossed negligently across his
chest. Blocking my way out.
I made a conscious effort to unclench my teeth. "Rennie," I said with a curt
nod. "You taken to wandering the Banshee room, too?" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]