The man nodded. "Good morning, General Wharington."

"h.e.l.lo," Thomas said. He noticed Spaulding standing outside his office door. The guard gave him a questioning look. Thomas raised his hand to indicate he was fine, and the sec-tech withdrew.

"Are you Bart?" Thomas asked the holo.

"Not exactly," the man said. "Though I draw on part of his code. Call me Steve."

His excitement stirred. This must be another of the EIs in Sunrise Alley. "Did you send me that mesh

address?""Yes. Can you come to Greenbelt State Park? Half an hour."Thomas blinked. "At this hour? What for?""You'll find out when you come."Sure. His cynicism kicked in. "You want me to come alone, right?""Bring your bodyguards.""Can't you talk to me here?""Face to face is better security.""Why should I trust you?"Steve regarded him steadily. "No harm will come to you. But you may learn a great deal. For yourself and for Alpha."

His pulse leapt, but he suppressed his reaction. Supposedly Sunrise Alley didn't know about her, but he

didn't believe it for a moment.

He said only, "Who is Alpha?"

"Half an hour." Steve vanished and the screen went grey.

"Hey." Thomas tried to bring back the holo, but nothing worked. His screen just showed a grey mesh

page. Finally he sat back, brooding. He had no desire to visit a deserted park in the middle of the night.

If he showed up, the payoff could be great-or he could end up dead.

Thomas got up and went into his living room. Spaulding was sitting on the couch and Hernandez stood posted by the window across the room. Spaulding rose to his feet as Thomas entered. "Good evening, sir."

Thomas nodded self-consciously to both of them. He pushed his hand through his hair, which he still hadn't gotten around to cutting. "I have to go to Greenbelt."

Spaulding came over to him. "Now?"

"Afraid so."

"Sir." Spaulding shifted his weight. "General Chang advised us that you were to stay home this week.""She didn't order me to." That was pushing their understanding, but she hadn't actually said he couldn'tleave.

"Your heart condition, sir."

Thomas scowled at him. "I'm in recovery. Not dead. I won't keel over if I go talk to someone."

"Yes, sir," Spaulding said. Just when Thomas thought he was done, the officer cleared his throat. "Sir."

Thomas wanted to groan. They called him "sir" when they knew he didn't want to hear what they had to

say.

"Go ahead," Thomas said.

"Doctor Enberg said for you to take it easy during the early morning. Particularly in cold weather."

"I am taking it easy. And it's not that cold."

"But, sir-"

"Spaulding!"

"My apologies. But, sir-" Spaulding paused. Hernandez had come closer and was listening intently.

Thomas made himself stop glaring at them. "Go on."

"This could be an ambush," Spaulding said.

"Yes, it could." Thomas spoke quietly. "I don't think it is. I can't give you proof; I only have my

instincts. But if I don't go, I may lose information that could affect our country."

After a moment, Spaulding said, "Yes, sir." He didn't look happy, but at least neither he nor Hernandez offered more protests.

Thomas went upstairs to change into jeans, sweatshirt, and under it all, a flex-suit of body armor. He got

his magnum out of his nightstand and put the gun into the pocket of his jacket.

The park gate was locked, but it was only a framework of orange pipes across the road. There wasn't even a fence; anyone could walk around the gate. Hernandez parked by the curb at the entrance. He got out and opened the back door for Thomas while Spaulding got out on the other side. They used no flashlights. Thomas's guards wore IR mesh-visors that allowed them to see the heat generated by an

object, that tracked Thomas's position, and that let them to talk by radio or communicate silently by blinking a code. Thomas had one, too, though for now he left it up on his forehead. The sky had only a few clouds, and the full moon cast a silvery light. After his eyes adjusted, he could see well enough.

In the distance, beyond the curve of the road, a vehicle hummed by on Greenbelt Road, probably headed to some job that started too early in the morning. The air smelled fresh, without pollution. Maybe some Sat.u.r.day he would bring Jamie here and they could learn plants. It could be fun. If he didn't get his head bashed in this morning.

He pulled his jacket tighter against the cold, and his flex-suit chafed under his clothes. Limping in his

cast, with his new cane, he stepped up on the curb with his bodyguards and walked past the gate.

Steve hadn't said where to go, and years had pa.s.sed since Thomas's last visit here. He remembered the park as a huge gra.s.s field with some beautiful old trees and a playground. Woods bordered it and a road went around the perimeter. The road they were on now wound up to the one that circled the park.

They continued on, but no humans named Steve or anything else showed up. Their walk had an insulated feel, as if they were alone with the darkness and the brooding silence. The night seemed to be holding its breath.

It took about twenty minutes to reach the hover lot of the park. No vehicles were in sight, and if anyone was here, he wasn't showing himself. A huge gra.s.sy field stretched out beyond the lot. Silvered by the moonlight, it rolled down in a long slope until it faded into the shadows of a distant woods. On the left, the field extended out to a closer bulge of the forest, and a playground lay to the right. Chill breezes bit Thomas's cheeks and nose.

"We have company," Hernandez said, and stepped in front of him.

Thomas peered where Hernandez indicated, on the left, and saw a figure in dark clothes coming toward them from the woods. Spaulding moved closer to Thomas's side. Both men had drawn their guns,

Spaulding with his staser and Hernandez with his revolver. Thomas put his hand in his pocket. His magnum felt cool and solid.

When Thomas pulled down his visor, the figure became a red blur in the shape of a man. A message

from Hernandez appeared on the lower edge of Thomas's visor screen: no weapons found. Probes in the visor could detect materials, signals, even b.u.mps in clothes that suggested weapons. It wasn't foolproof, but the person approaching them also had none of the tics or mannerisms Thomas had come to a.s.sociate with a potential threat. The man made no attempt to conceal himself, and he walked with his hands in the open.

Thomas blinked in a code the visor translated as words. His response replaced the message from Hernandez, as it would also be doing in the visors of his guards: Don't shoot.

Yes, sir, Hernandez answered. Neither he nor Spaulding put away their guns, however.Thomas felt exposed even with all these precautions. It was fortunate their visitor came alone; he doubted his sec-techs would have let more than one person near him.

The figure resolved into a leanly built man, tall, with dark hair. Thomas pushed up his visor so he could get a more natural view of his face. "Steve?" he asked, startled.

The man stopped a few yards away. "h.e.l.lo, General."

Thomas nudged Hernandez, who was in front of him. "I'd like to talk to him."

"Yes, sir." Although the sec-tech stepped aside, he kept his gun trained on the man.

"How did you get out of the computer?" Thomas asked.

Steve smiled slightly. "It's more, 'How did I get in?' The EI you met used to match my neural patterns."

"You mapped your own brain?"

"Something like that."

Thomas had wondered about the origins of the other EIs in Sunrise Alley, but he had never expected one

to be human. Nor could he figure out why Steve looked familiar."Are the other EIs in the Alley like you?" Thomas asked. "Copies of a person?""We're all unique."That was vague. He wondered if Steve would tell him anything. And Thomas recognized him. What was it . . .

A chill went through him. He had seen images of this man. On the mesh. But Steve looked no older than pictures that were thirty years old."G.o.d Almighty," Thomas said. "You're Steve Hughes."The man inclined his head. "Pleased to meet you."Thomas stared at him, the namesake of the Hughes arch and numerous other innovations. No one had seen the reclusive genius in decades. Many questioned whether he even existed. "You're a forma," he said slowly. "Sunrise Alley designed an android and downloaded one of its EIs into it. Into you. That's why no one has ever seen you. Your forma self couldn't exist until technology reached its current levels." He hesitated. "Though your EI must have evolved along with the tales."

Hughes's face was shadowed. "Those tales started over thirty years ago. EIs didn't exist then."

"The rudiments did."

"Barely." His smile was a ghost of white in the dark. "A fanciful idea, General."

"Is it a true idea?"

"Truth is relative."

Relative, indeed. Thomas hoped he didn't end up dead because of it. But his roller coaster life these past

few weeks was worth it for these incredible meetings with . . . with what? People or formas? Alpha, Bart, Turner and now Hughes: in combining both human and synthetic aspects, did they become more than their sum?

"You wanted to see me in person," Thomas said.

Hughes indicated the dark field. "This is more private than any mesh, no matter how secured."

And less safe. "You want privacy." Thomas could guess the rest. No guards.