"I came down to study your haptics, actually." Robert explained his interest in distanced interactive touch.
"Hey, that's great! Both groups have been beating on me to extend our reach. But at a higher level, what did you think of what they're doing to the library experience?"
"um, the Librarian Militants look the same as before, I guess. It's an amusing interface, if you like that sort of thing. The Scoochis… I tried to see what they're doing, but it doesn't make sense. It's so scattered, almost as if each individual book is its own consensual reality."
"Almost. The Scoochis have always been eclectic. Now that they have a librareome, they're building game consensus down to fine-grained topic levels, often down to individual paragraphs. It's much more subtle than the Hacek stuff, though children pick up on it very quickly. Their real power is that Scoochis can blend realities. That's what's happened with them and the Hacekeans. The Scoochis come from all over, even from the failed states. Now they're feeding the digitizations back outwards. Wherever it fits, the Hacek people are running things. Other places, other visions — but all with access to the entire body of the library. If you can crack the problem of remote interactive touch, it should make their attraction even greater." Carlos looked around his office, where the cabal had plotted for such very different ends. "An awful lot has changed in just two months."
"What do you think really happened that night, Carlos? Was the riot intended to distract from what we four were doing — or was it the other way around?"
"I've thought about that a lot. I think the riot was a diversion, but one that got way out of hand and ended up causing immense — what's the opposite of collateral damage? Collateral benefit? Sharif-whoever — he was more often a rabbit to me — was a merry madman."
Rabbit. That was what his interrogators had called the Mysterious Stranger. It was also what the Stranger had called itself there at the end. "Well, our part of the business was darker. Rabbit manipulated all of us, each according to our own weaknesses."
Carlos nodded. "Yes."
"Rabbit promised each of us our secret wish, then defaulted after we had committed the necessary treachery." Though to be honest, Robert was pretty sure the critter was kaput. Maybe things would have been different if it had survived. His burning hope in the Stranger's promise had powered Robert's treason. That was cold ashes now. Thank God.
Carlos leaned forward. Behind the bottle-glass specs, his eyes looked skeptical.
"Okay," said Robert, "maybe Rabbit didn't promise everyone something. I think the power-assisted scheming was its own reward for Tommie."
"That's probably so." But the librarian did not look convinced.
"Look, we'd know if any of the promises came true. It would be spectacular. I'll bet Winston wanted to — Where is Winnie these days?" He was looking up the answer, but Carlos already had it:
"Dean Blount was hired by the university last month, in the Division of Arts and Letters."
Robert's gaze skittered across his search result. "But as an entry-level administrative assistant!"
"Yes, it's bizarre. The current Dean of A and L is Jessica Laskowicz. She's another medical retread. Back in the oughts, she was a secretary in the division. Nowadays, the career track for admin assistants doesn't have any ceiling, but Winston is starting awfully far down — and the best gossip is that he and Laskowicz never got along."
Oh my . "I guess maybe Winston finally made peace with his dreams." Like me . In any case, it meant the Mysterious Stranger was really gone, his extravagant promises dead. He looked up at Carlos Rivera. And felt the stirring of a vast surprise. Robert had very little of his old people-sense; nowadays, the obvious had to beat him over the head with a club. "What… what about you? ."
"Do you notice anything different about me, Professor?"
Robert gave him a close look, then glanced again around the real-plush office. Carlos had done well for himself, but Robert had never thought that worldly success would be his demand of the Stranger. "You seem happier, more confident, more articulate." Bingo . "You haven't said one word of Mandarin. Not a single JITT slip!"
Carlos's reply was a smile of purest joy.
"So you've lost the language?"
FIXME: Get this right.
"No. Qishiwo hdi keyishuo zhongwen, bugud buxidng yiqidn name liuli le . And I haven't had a seizure in more than six weeks! The JITT doesn't rule me. Now I can enjoy the language. It has been a great help in working with the Chinese Informagical people. We'll be merging their capture of the British Library with what came out of Huertas's default."
Robert was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "Your cure, it could be coincidence."
"I've… wondered. This is a medical breakthrough that came out of groups in Turkey and Indonesia. It had nothing to do with the Veterans Administration or institutional research programs. But that's the way of most medical breakthroughs these days. And I've had no gloating messages from Rabbit. Everything is in the open, even if the news hasn't got much traction. You see, this treatment for JITT syndrome isn't effective for most victims. They contacted me through Yellow Ribbons because I'm smack in the middle of the likeliest genotypes." He shrugged. "I guess that could be a coincidence."
"Yes." The heavenly minefield.
"But it's an awfully big coincidence," Rivera continued. "I got what I asked for, just a few weeks after I did my part of the bargain. And some of my Scoochi progress has been strange. I've made agreements in weeks that should have taken a year. Somebody's helping me along. I think you're wrong about Rabbit. Maybe he's just lying low. Maybe he can't do all the miracles at once — Professor? Are you okay?"
Robert had turned away, and pressed his forehead against the cool window glass. I don't need this. I am happy with the new me ! He opened his eyes and looked out through tears. Down below was the familiar footpath, the snake of knowledge wriggling up the hillside toward the library. Perhaps the Mysterious Stranger really was a god, or had grown to be one. A trickster god.
"Professor?"
"I'm okay, Carlos. Maybe you're right."
They chatted a few minutes more. Robert wasn't quite sure what they said, though he remembered that Carlos seemed a little worried for him, perhaps mistaking Robert's raw confusion for some kind of medical emergency.
Then he was down the elevator and back on the sunny plaza. And hovering immanent all around him were the worlds of art and science that humankind was busy building. What if I can have it all ?
The End
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Vernor Vinge is a four-time Hugo Award winner (for novels A Deepness in the Sky and A Fire Upon the Deep , and novellas "Fast Times at Fairmont High" and "The Cookie Monster") and a four-time Nebula Award finalist. He's one of the bestselling authors in the field and has been featured in such diverse venues as Rolling Stone, Wired, The New York Times, Esquire , and NPR's "Fresh Air."
Highly regarded by scientists, journalists, and business leaders — as well as readers — for his concept of the technological singularity, Vinge has spoken all over the world on scientific subjects. For many years a mathematician and computer-science professor at San Diego State University, he's now a full-time author. He lives in San Diego, California.