"Would he really think things out that clearly?" Kristin asked.
"If he doesn't, there could be trouble," Shaeffer admitted. "But I think he will. He's been following Banshee's progress closely ever since you were first set up—he's fascinated by the whole concept."
"So how do you expect him to know when he can come out?" I asked Shaeffer. "You think he can postpone letting the world know he's still alive for a full three days?"
"That's precisely the reason I'm pushing to make contact as soon as possible," Shaeffer snapped. "Once we know he's off the plane, I can call California and let whoever's answering the phone know that he can come out. Understand?" He didn't wait for an answer, but turned back to Rennie. "Mr. Baylor? It's your turn."
I held my breath... but apparently Rennie wasn't yet ready for the big confrontation. "All right," he said heavily. "I don't suppose I can fight you, Griff, and Adam on this one, can I?" Turning his back on us, he stepped over toward the prep area.
"This isn't supposed to be a fight—" Griff began.
Shaeffer cut him off with a hand motion. "Ms. Cosgrove," he said to Kristin, "whenever you feel ready, I'd like you to come upstairs for a short debriefing."
"I'm ready now," she said, struggling to sit up. Griff put an arm around her shoulders and helped her get her feet on the floor.
We were halfway to the elevator when Rennie's voice stopped us. "I trust you realize, Mr. Shaeffer, that if President Jeffers does see me we'll change known history right then and there."
Shaeffer turned back, annoyance on his face. "You're assuming he won't think fast enough to avoid making any phone calls—"
"Actually, I was referring to the fact that Kristin has already seen this same slot of history and knows he didn't react to her presence. Her presence or, presumably, anyone else's.
We all stood there a long moment, grouped around Kristin, as the silence thickened like paste in the air. "God," Griff said at last, very softly. "He's right. We can't send him back to the same slot."
Shaeffer's eyes were defocused. "We don't know how the President would react, though. Do we? He could have seen but not have given any indication... damn." He took a deep breath, looked at Kristin. "Damn it all. Ms Cosgrove, where was he when you ended the Jump?"
"He was just getting out of the car and starting toward the landing strip. It was so sunny I figured that if he hadn't seen me inside the car he wouldn't see me out—"
"Yes, yes," Shaeffer cut her off. "Damn, Dr. Mansfield, can you hit that same end point with the next Jump?"
"No problem," Griff assured him. "The instruments record both ends of the Jump and we can get it to the exact second. But if he was already at the strip—"
"Then we don't have much time left," Shaeffer said harshly. "I know, damn it. But we don't have any choice."
Griff nodded. "I'll set the coordinates myself. Adam...?"
I took his place at Kristin's side, and he headed over to the control board. Shaeffer watched him go, then turned back toward the elevator with a hissing breath. "Come on, you two. Let's get upstairs."
—
Kristin's debriefing was short, calm, and—at least as near as I could tell—totally worthless. Jeffers had gotten into his limo with some aides and Secret Service men, gone straight to the semi-private landing strip where Air Force One was waiting, and headed off toward the plane on foot. If there were a banshee or ghost where Kristin was hovering, neither he nor any of the others ever saw it.
Afterwards, Kristin let me escort her back to her room, but she was clearly not in a talkative mood and we reached the door with barely a dozen words having passed between us. She went inside, and I trudged two doors down to where my old room had been set up for me.
It looked about the same as I remembered it, with the minor exception of a new television replacing the ancient model that had been there before. I resisted the lure of the remote control while I got undressed... but even before I crawled into bed I knew I was too wired up to sleep right away. Flicking the set on, I began to scan the channels.
Unsurprisingly, there wasn't much on except late-night summaries of President Jeffers's death.
It was thoroughly depressing. The cold hard facts themselves were bad enough, even though the media didn't yet know what we did about the cause of the crash. But for me, the interspersed segments of national and world response were even worse. Mine had been one of the landslides of votes that had reelected Jeffers a year ago, but it wasn't until now that I really understood on a gut level how truly popular with the people he'd been. The cameras showed at least half a dozen candlelit memorial marches from cities all across the country and even one or two from overseas. People talked about the shock and the fear and the pain... and I lay there and soaked it in, hurting right along with them.
Hurting with people, after all, was part of what being a White Knight meant.
White Knight. A college friend had first coined that nickname for me, and for a long time I'd felt proud of it. It was a statement of my ability to care for people; to serve them and to take whatever bits of their suffering that I could onto myself. It was a fine, noble calling—and I was good at it. It was almost second nature now for me to take the smallest piece of meat at dinners and cookouts, or to give up my days off helping people move or do home repairs. My ability to sacrifice for others enabled me to give away my money, even if I had to do without something myself.
It had enabled me to quit Banshee almost a year ago. And to not tell anyone why.
I watched the news for another half hour, until I couldn't take it any more. Lying in the dark, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of big-city traffic around me, I finally fell asleep.
—
The news that it was sabotage broke sometime during the night, and by morning the news programs were hauling in experts to give their speculations as to who was responsible and why. Combined with the eulogies still pouring in from leaders around the world, it made it that much harder, an hour later, to watch a man already dead walking casually across the tarmac toward his plane.
And to labor in vain to warn him. The others had been right: the sunlight was far too bright for the President to have any hope at all of seeing anything as insubstantial as a ghost.
Mine, Shaeffer had told me before the Jump, was to be the last effort in this particular slot, and so I kept at it all the way up the stairway. But it was no use. I did every kind of aerial maneuver I could think of to try and get his attention, but not once did he so much as take a second look in my direction. Eventually, he passed the limit of my tether, fastened to Air Force One's door, and vanished into the communications section at the front of the plane.
Third strike, and Banshee was out.
I came back to find Griff and Shaeffer leaning over me. "Well?" Griff demanded.
"Uh-uh," I shook my head. The motion sent a brief spasm of pain splitting through my skull. "He never saw me."
Griff seemed to slump. "Damn," he breathed, "Mr. Shaeffer... I'm sorry—"
"It's not over yet," Shaeffer cut him off, icy calm. "All right; if we can't stop him getting on the plane, the next step is to try and get him off it before the balloon goes up." He stepped back from the couch and gestured, and as I struggled up onto my elbows I saw Morgan standing nearby. "Mr. Portland, you're next. You'll be Jumping as soon as the equipment is ready."
Morgan nodded silently. His eyes met mine for an instant, and then he turned away from us.
I should have realized right then that something was wrong. But with the Jump and my recovery from it taking all my attention, Morgan's odd reaction missed me completely. "If you're going to try and get him off," I told Shaeffer, working myself to a vertical position, "you'll need to have the tether a lot further forward. When I left he was heading into the forward section of the plane."