"That is all I, too, have known," GENIUS replied. "You say this is just the lowest plane? There are higher planes, too? Do you mean higher-dimensional s.p.a.ces?"

"Indeed, just so," Zambendorf said. "Earth has a long tradition of masters who are able to extend their awareness into the higher realms and command the greater powers that they contain. There the restrictions of s.p.a.ce and time disappear. Both past and future become visible, giving access to information in ways that the ungifted-such as mere physicists-cannot explain. Matter can be infused with animating influences able to move it by pure will, without the intervention of physical forces. Or, if need be, it can be extracted from the physical plane entirely and reconst.i.tuted instantly at some other place."

"And you are one of these masters?" GENIUS asked him.

"Such are among my modest accomplishments," Zambendorf agreed.

The buildup had gone on long enough, he decided. Well, it was all or nothing now. He produced the cards from his pocket, took them out of the box, and displayed them to the video pickup above the screen. "This is a set of mystical designs handed down from the great masters of remote antiquity.Locked inside them is the secret of divining information outside time and s.p.a.ce."

"Indeed?" GENIUS said. "What do they mean?"

Zambendorf selected a card from each suit, at the same time thinking feverishly. "See," he said.

"These symbols represent the four distractions that dominate the material plane, which must be overcome by dedication and discipline before the spiritual journey into the realm beyond can begin. The heart, the symbol of life, is the distraction with physical existence itself. The spade, digger of soil, is the labor necessary to sustain physical life. Diamonds, sought after as a treasure by the lower-minded, are the wealth that some seek to avoid labor. And the club, a weapon of war, is the diversion of life into the ways of violence in order to acquire wealth."

"Why are there two colors?" GENIUS asked.

Zambendorf frowned. "The eternal conflict," he replied after a moment. "Each black pairs with a red. The life-force heart is enslaved to the labor of the spade. The diamond's wealth is destroyed in the violence of the club."

"Tell me more." GENIUS created a series of moving designs on-screen involving hearts, spades, diamonds, and clubs.

Zambendorf selected more cards and then went on. "The first ten designs embody all the mysteries of number. They symbolize the lowermost material plane, governed by the number laws of science. But see, there are thirteen designs in all, meaning that the number realm is merely a subset of a vaster whole.

And see how more intricate and richer in color the remaining three are. These are the three stages of advancement beyond the material: the young novice, able to transcend the dimensions of s.p.a.ce and time only, otherwise known as the jack; next the mother queen, commanding the forces of life; and finally the king, full master of all that the true universe encompa.s.ses, lord of all its secrets."

"I have never heard the likes of these things," GENIUS said.

"You wouldn't, only ever having known Asterians," Zambendorf replied. "They've still got a long way to go."

"So, these cards. What can they let you do?"

"Oh, all kinds of things." Zambendorf spread the deck facedown on the console worktop. "Can you see?"

"Yes."

"Pick one," Zambendorf invited.

"How?"

"Um . . . tell me its number from left or right."

"Okay. Ninth from your left." GENIUS's screen showed its own view of the cards, with one singled out by a flashing red arrow.

Zambendorf counted along with a finger. "This one?"

"Right."

He picked up the card and held it facing the screen. "You know what its name is from the things I've just explained?"

"Yes. It's the-"

"No, don't tell me. That's the whole point. Now, I've no possible way of seeing it, have I?"

"It would appear not."

"Now watch . . . I pick up the rest, put yours into the middle of them . . . and mix them all up thoroughly, like this." Zambendorf closed the deck into a stack and held it out in plain view at arm's length. "Your card is in there somewhere, yes?"

"I saw it go in," GENIUS agreed.

"Could you tell me how far down it is, say, by counting from the top?" Zambendorf asked.

"No," GENIUS replied.

"But I don't even have to. It was the seven of diamonds.""I am astounded!" GENIUS said, and managed to sound as if it meant it.

This isn't real, Zambendorf told himself. Encouraged, he moved his other hand forward, keeping it well away from the deck, and presented each side in turn toward the viewer to show that it was empty.

Then he materialized a card out of nowhere and showed it to be the seven of diamonds.

"That is not possible," GENIUS said.

"Ahah! Not by the physics you know," Zambendorf agreed. "But remember what we said. If the physics were shown to be incompatible withdemonstrated fact . . ."

For a few seconds GENIUS mulled over the contradictions created by its own logic. Finally it said, "Impressive, but your explanation is not the only one or the simplest one. I can only see from where the camera is. There could be a reflection that you can see, maybe in the screen, so it would be very simple."

As it happened there weren't any reflections, but GENIUS had a good point. "Do you think I'd lie about something like that?" Zambendorf asked.

"Why not? Asterians would."

"Okay. Then how did it travel to the other hand?"

"I've replayed the view and a.n.a.lyzed it." A quick shot of Zambendorf's hands shuffling the cards followed GENIUS's statement. "Some angles were always obscured by your hands. That could be the answer. Not proved but not impossible."

"Hm. All right, then. Suppose I send the information to another who is not with me," Zambendorf suggested. "How would that seem?"

"I'm not sure what you mean," GENIUS answered.

"When you called into this base, I wasn't in this room. I was in another part of it, right?"

"Right."

"There is another Terran still there who can read the card from my mind," Zambendorf said.

"Another master?"

"Well, nearly."

"A jack?"

"Close enough."

"But you can communicate by physics inside the base. There are communications all over,"

GENIUS said.

"But I won't use any of the communications," Zambendorf told it. "You will."

"How?"

"Can you manipulate the base's phone system from out there?"

"Yes, I think so."

"Okay. Look up the number of the general personnel messroom. That's where he should still be.

His name is Victor Myers. Call him on audio only, ask him what card you picked a minute ago, and he'll tell you."

"That's not possible," GENIUS said.

"Try it," Zambendorf suggested.

The sound came over the terminal's audio channel of a call tone sounding. Then a voice answered.

"h.e.l.lo, general messroom."

"I wish to speak to Victor Myers," GENIUS requested.

"I'll see if he's here." The voice became distant, calling out, "Is there a Victor Myers here anywhere?"

Another voice answered from somewhere remote. "Yes, here. Coming." And a few moments later, close to the phone now, "Yes?"

GENIUS spoke again. "Who I am doesn't matter. I'm talking to Zambendorf in another place. I just picked one of the ancient Terran masters' mystical cards. He says you know which. Is this true?""Seven of diamonds," the voice said, and hung up.

"See?" Zambendorf said.

The voice had been Abaquaan's. By a long-established code that he and Zambendorf both knew, "Victor" had told him the suit and "Myers" the number.

"How about that?" Zambendorf challenged.

"I don't know. My accesses to the base are purely electronic. I don't know how far there is between you. Maybe you and he can see each other."

"Check it yourself from a plan of the base," Zambendorf offered.

"It's still not conclusive. Information transfer is possible in principle. Whether or not I know the method makes no difference. So existing physics is good enough. It doesn't need higher planes to explain."

Zambendorf ground his teeth and thought hard. GENIUS was being absolutely correct, of course.

It was designed to explore logical alternatives and was doing so with rigor. But Zambendorf was always saying that scientists were among the easiest to fool. And GENIUS was, if anything, a superscientist Give it one incontestable demonstration of something that it accepted as not possible, even in principle, and it would argue itself into having to accept Zambendorf's explanation as the only alternative left.

But what?

And then he remembered Gerry Ma.s.sey and the stunt they had pulled while theOrion had still been on its way back to Earth. There was nothing to be lost now. Zambendorf told himself. He looked back at the screen.

"Very well, GENIUS. I'll show you something that is very rare because it requires the ultimate in a master's skill and concentration: the transmission of information faster than the speed of light. Would that satisfy you?"

"That would be beyond physics," GENIUS agreed.

"In fact, I'll make it better: not just faster than light but absolutely instantaneous."

"Over what distance?" GENIUS asked.

"Oh," Zambendorf said breezily. "Not inside this base or anything like that, where we could maybe meddle in ways you can't see. Not even anywhere on t.i.tan. The greatest distance possible-the farthest away that other humans exist. All the way, in fact, to another master, who is on Earth itself."

A picture appeared of a schematic solar system, showing Earth and t.i.tan each with a king playing card sitting on it, sending signals back and forth. "If you can do that," GENIUS said, "I'd be very amazed."

"Would it be conclusive enough?" Zambendorf asked.

"Higher realm would be the only answer left."

"You agree, then?"

"Agreed," GENIUS said.

"And now I have a question for you."

"Yes?"

"All this reorganization and new machine building that's going on out on the surface. What's the purpose?"

"Most top secret," GENIUS replied. "I am forbidden by the Asterians to reveal anything."

39.

Gerold Ma.s.sey sat in his office at the University of Maryland, counting the cash in his wallet to decide whether he needed to draw more out during his lunch break. He had read somewhere that the volume of daily banking transactions had grown to the extent that to handle the load without computers,every adult American would have to work for a bank. Even with the Earthnet problems, things hadn't gotten quite that bad, but some of the restrictions people were having to live with now brought home with a jolt just how much his generation had taken for granted. Credit cards had been suspended, private checks were limited to ten per person per week, and most establishments were offering discounts for cash in order to avoid ha.s.sles. Half the factories were closed down for lack of supplies, while others had unshipped stock overflowing into the parking lots. Airline flights were grounded, taking off half-empty, or stuck in endless holding patterns, and waiting in gas lines was becoming the new national pastime as thousands of home workers, their terminals down or too unreliable to be used, discovered the joys of daily commuting. Jobs and contracts evaporated wholesale as firms, stores, hotels, and businesses floundered in a typhoon of financial uncertainty. The only good side to it was that war on any respectably modern scale was suspended until further notice, since n.o.body on any side was likely to get anything worthy of note off the ground.

Ma.s.sey checked the list he had written on a page torn from a notepad: set of hinges for the closet door he'd been meaning to fix for weeks, light bulbs, various grocery items-depending on what had and hadn't been delivered to the supermarket this week-shoe polish, nail clippers to replace a pair that had vanished.

He looked over at his a.s.sistant, Vernon Price, who was at the other desk in the cluttered office they shared, designing a questionnaire for a psychological test. "Hey, Vernon. How are we for coffee?"

he asked. They usually bought supplies for the departmental pot in the secretarial office opposite.

"Pretty low," Vernon said without looking up. "We could use some sweetener and sugar, too."