Forewarning:  This story concerns adult fantasy topics, especially

in the area of (big surprise for this site) breast enlargement.  It

also hopefully contains characterizations and a plotline

interesting enough to make the reader briefly forget about where

the sex scenes went to.  (Answer:  later.  Honest.)  Since all of

the above are considered to be adult topics, especially the idea of

plot, you have to be over the age of discretion in your home country

to read further.  Sorry about that.



Comments and correspondence can be sent to sam_tuirel@nac.net, with

the understanding that the tone of the missive will be the tone of

the reply.



Minor note:  in the absence of text tricks, I use < > to indicate

thought and { } for typed communication.  _ _ underlines words in

between.  If this distresses you, go back to grading your fifth-

grade English papers.



For purposes of continuity, this is part V.  I don't know why I'm

using the Roman numerals, either.



Everyone else can consider themselves warned.  Hang on...







































                               In Sequence



                             25. 72:  New deal



    Pamela looked around the corner, gun ready.  The apartment had been

clear, but the lab was going to be harder to search.  Jason and Jasmine

followed her in, their own weapons drawn.  Pamela had given the Princess

a brief lesson in gunplay which, simplified, translated to "_This_ end

towards enemy."  Each one took a third and began the hunt.

    There was no one else in the lab, and no one had been there since

they had left.  They converged at the door.

    "Well," Pamela said, "all the data's on the computer, and no one

broke the hairs."  She'd used a trick dimly remembered from an espionage

novel:  taking small strands of her hair and invisibly taping them

across the keyboards and access ports (not to mention the doorways,

locks, Jasmine's facial powder spread on the floor to catch

footprints...), so that any attempt to use the computer would break

several.  She'd thought about hauling the entire system out with them,

but had concluded that if anyone stole the information, it would go to

Sadira, who needed it.  She'd made copies of everything important before

leaving the lab, in case they decided to take and erase.

    "Fine," Jasmine said.  "Now what?"

    Jason looked at the computer.  "We make a decision.  Do we try to

finish the virus -- and it's going to have to be or include the

metabolic brakes, to avoid possible burnout when the growth stops -- and

then try and get her, or do we head out immediately?"

    Pamela looked at Jason.  "Take a step."

    He shook his head.  "I'm moving more easily --"

    "-- and getting worse again.  You healed quite a bit overnight.  Any

time you're not moving, you heal.  When you move, you risk re-injuring

yourself.  You're still not up for a rescue operation.  And you're going

to need a cure first.  Sadira probably won't be able to work on it:  she

doesn't know about the burnout possibility, though she'll probably

deduce it fast enough.  But they'll make her focus on the growth stop

before they let her tackle her own problems."  Her brow furrowed.  "I

think.  I'm not sure.  Damnit!"

    "No, that makes sense," Jason told her.  "They'd probably want her

eternally hyper.  She could do more work."

    "Twin projects," Jasmine said.  "We work on the metabolism, she

works on the growth."

    "We hope."  Pamela turned to Jasmine.  "If you have any mystical

twin telepathic connection to Sadira, this would be a good time."

Jasmine briefly closed her eyes.  It was either frustration or she was

giving it a try.

    "So," Pamela decided -- tried to convince herself that it was the

right decision -- "Sadira stalls and works.  They'll probably put her

with a team:  she's got better equipment than we do right now.  We put

together the metabolic stop as fast as we can.  In the meanwhile, we

start finding out where she is.  And when we finish and get the Mouse

cured, we go after her."

    "Why not call the police?" Jasmine asked.  "This is a kidnapping:

they'll get involved."

    "Why not the FBI?" Pamela shrugged.  "They probably took her across

a state line."  The idea was enticing, but she knew the answer.

"Because we can't prove anything.  We tell the truth, they lie.  Get a

search warrant for the Helena building, she's probably somewhere else.

And in the meantime, with the barrage of legal investigations, denials,

counter-accusations, we lose more time.  Same thing for the media."

    She looked at Jason.  "You're right, Mouse -- again.  I can go

rushing off madly, but you could die.  Sadira's safe as long as she's

working -- but the instant we go after her, she's at risk.  And if we

spend time getting her before we have a cure, then we have to bring her

back and keep working -- we lose the time for two trips instead of one."

<They won't hurt her.  They can't.  I know that.  Why is it so hard to

believe?>

    Jasmine smiled.  "Hit him."

    "What?"

    "He won't 'burn out' as long as he's healing, right?  If the leg

gets completely better, hit him a few dozen times."  Her elbow nudged

Jason's ribs.

    Pamela stared at her, then started softly laughing, a low-pitched

funeral chuckle.  "It's an idea," she admitted.  "We just might have to

do that."  She looked up at Jason, who was wincing in anticipated agony.

"Kind of a variation on 'You always hurt the one you --"

    The intercom buzzer went off.

    They all looked at it.

    Jason went to the tinted window and tried to look straight down.  As

with most genetics labs, Pamela's windows didn't open:  one of the former

bathrooms had been converted into an closed environmental lab for

working with airborne viruses.  "I can't see anything," he said

regretfully.  "There aren't enough of them standing in line to reach the

edge of the sidewalk.  No police cars on the street, though."

    The buzzer sounded again.

    "It's nearly two," Jasmine said.  "There's lots of people around to

witness things, and even if they were that stupid, why would they buzz

first?"

    "Because they're that stupid," Pamela replied.  "It might just be a

desperate scientist looking for a little extra help.  I'm going to have

to say no..."  Another buzz.  They weren't going away and they might

decide to come in.  She looked at Jasmine.  "Follow me and stay in the

shadows." A quick glance towards Jason.  "Back us up from the stairway.

If things get weird, I'd rather not let people know you're alive."



    Pamela could hear the buzzer outside the door, sounding every twenty

seconds or so.  She couldn't see the person on the other side:  the

front door had no security port.  A ridiculously obvious oversight that

she was going to correct.  Later.  If there _was_ a police officer on

the other side, one who had decided to walk into Alphabet City without

benefit of a getaway vehicle, she was about to be in serious trouble.

    Pamela pulled the door open with her right hand, bringing it in

across her body as she took a step back, and thrust the left hand

forward, keeping herself well within the hallway, out of casual sidewalk

viewing range.

    The man in front of the doorway took a step back.  He was somewhere

between twenty and forty -- the face had too much time in it.  He was

wearing a Knicks sweater and carrying a small briefcase.  Possibly a

scientist.  "Hi," she said.  "And you are?"  The gun didn't waver.

    "You have to be Pamela Shaw."  He had recovered quickly.

    "Yeah, I have to be.  No one else wanted the job.  And you are?"

    "Somebody with information and a need for more."

     _Paranoid_ scientist who really needed help was _not_ an option.

She double-checked the safety:  it was off.  "No name?  Really?.  Let me

come up with something."  Pamela considered.  "Okay, _asshole_, what do

you want?"

    "I want to show you something."  He was a professional asshole:  he

opened the briefcase so she could view the contents, reaching around

from the back to lift out the envelope.  "It's rather important.  You'll

want to examine it closely."  He pulled out a single sheet of paper.

    Pamela watched it emerge:  a good fax copy of a photograph, taken

from a security camera, with time and date in the upper right corner --

    -- Sadira, in deep discussion with three other people.

    She reached for the paper.  He pulled it back.  "If I don't report

back, things happen," he said smoothly.  "And if you take this, I won't

report back."

    "Where --?"

    The look said <You know better than that.>  She did.  It had still

been worth a try.  "The status you see.  That's all the information that

I have.  However, I also have a proposal."

    She could see tendons standing out on the hand clutching the gun.

"Speak."

    "You were working on the project.  A certain party would be

interested in purchasing your data.  It could be helpful in the long

run."

    "And what happens if I don't?"

    "Nothing.  As long as you do nothing."  Pamela waited for

clarification.  "You have the potential to be competition.  You also

might be thinking of trying to recover lost data.  Neither option would

be beneficial to the long term survival of your business."

    "Or my survival?"

    "I wouldn't say that.  A mutual hands-off policy between our two

businesses might simply be the best course to pursue."

    Pamela gave up.  "I'm not wearing any recording devices.  I cannot

play back this conversation for anybody else.  Speak clearly."

    He shook his head.  "If you stay away from our territory, we stay

away from yours.  If you pursue your current line of interest, your

business could suffer, as could the value of --" he nodded at the photo

"-- your real estate.  It might crash through the basement.  It

certainly could if you attempted to recover full market value.  I

wouldn't seek consultants either.  You're better off doing something

else entirely.  It befits a small business."

    Pamela's mind translated:  <We're not sure how to keep you quiet.

We thought fear might do it.  So if you try to come after Sadira, we

think about hurting her.  If you go get help from the police, media,

anybody, ditto.  We also don't want you selling the viruses.  And by the

way, would you mind selling us your soul?>

    "If I give you the data, does it get put to good use?"

    "It results in maximum benefit for all parties."

    "Could you give me a moment to think this over?"  Good, nice and

calm.

    "Thirty seconds," he replied, voice oil-slick.

    She closed the door and walked slowly down the hall, trying not to

alert the man with rapid footsteps, then pitched her words low.  "No

questions.  Mouse, hide on one of the empty floors.  Princess, get up to

the lab fast and quiet, find a good place to hide, and _cover me_.  I'll

explain later."  A pause.  "And if he kills me, I _will_ haunt you."

She walked back to the door and opened it.

    "Deal," Pamela said.  "Can you come in?"



    He watched as she copied the files.  He'd brought an advanced zip

drive with him, and the data was being imprinted on the cartridges.

"Where's the second half of the project?"

    "We don't have it because it doesn't exist.  I'm giving you all the

avenues we were pursuing."  She was including the metabolic data:  maybe

Sadira would have a chance at it.

    "My employer isn't going to pay for partial results -- or for

deliberate withholding of information."

    Pamela straightened up and looked at him.  "Your employer seems

given to flights of fancy and illogic.  I want to help, so I'm giving

you every piece of information I have.  I feel it's essential that the

new team receives it.  I'll copy out the entire hard drive for you.

_You_ can copy out the entire hard drive.  But I can't give you what I

don't have."  She stepped away from the computer.  "Go ahead and look."

    "You could have taken out the essential data first --"

    "I'm not taking that risk."  She nodded at the briefcase.  "And when

would I have had the chance?  I didn't know you were coming."

    He made sure she was out of punch and kick range -- but still in

sight -- and took her up on the offer, examining the hard drive

carefully, checking for hidden directories and deleted files.  He was

good.  If there had been any, he would have found them.  He finally

looked up.  "'Flights of fancy and illogic?'  That sounds about right."

Her eyes were met.  "You really don't have the data, do you?"

    "No.  Would you like to tell him she didn't trust me with it?"

    "It's an option."  A twitch was twisting the left corner of his

mouth.  It might have been an attempt at a smile.  "Or you had bad

sectors.  I was given payment to get everything you had.  It's hardly

either of our faults if you didn't have everything desired."

    "You don't sound sympathetic."

    "I obey orders to the letter.  If I'm not provided with enough

letters, it's the fault of my employer."

    "Then tell what I need to know."

    "That was prohibited in the letter."

    <So much for bonding.>  They copied out the hard drive.  He reached

into the suitcase again, put in the zip drive and seven filled

cartridges, then opened a second envelope.  He gave Pamela the contents.

    She glanced at it.  Bearer bond, probably passed off through a

series of banks, completely untraceable.  Pamela put it on top of the

Mutator.

    "Thank you for your cooperation."

    Pamela looked at him.  "You're welcome, Citizen."  He didn't get it.

She hadn't expected him to.

    She escorted him out, and gathered the troops on the way back.



    "So now Sadira has all the data we had," Pamela said, "and we were

paid for it.  Nigilo seems to think he can either threaten or purchase

anyone he pleases.  This was a combination of the two."

    "How much?" Jasmine asked instinctively.

    Pamela blinked.  "I didn't even look."  She walked into the maze,

heading for the Mutator.  Jason and Jasmine watched her go.

    Twelve seconds later, they heard a very quiet "Jesus fucking jumping

joker Christ."

    Jasmine reached her first and looked at the bond Pamela was holding

in limp fingers.  "One hundred thousand..."

    "Yeah."  Jason limped up.  Pamela kept staring at the number.  "Wow.

When he buys silence, he goes for the expensive stuff."

    "So now what?" Jason asked.

    "Same thing.  We find a cure, find Sadira, and go get her."  Pamela

closed her eyes.  "I read between his lines.  She's safe as long as we

stay away.  Nothing will ever touch her again -- including fresh air."

    Jasmine shook her head.  "And if we screw up -- if they even know

we're coming -- they're going to kill her."

    "Maybe.  She's valuable, but they might try it."  Her hand crumpled

one corner of the bond.  "I know her, Princess.  So do you.  Given a

choice between slavery and death, what does she pick?"

    Jasmine didn't hesitate.  "Live free or die."

    Jason slowly, painfully, nodded.

    Pamela closed her eyes and let her heart fall apart in silence, then

opened them and looked at the bond.  "So we're going to do it right."

The snow leopard manifested.  "And Nigilo's going to pay for it in every

way possible."



    Temperi walked over to Sadira.  "You had this sequence, right?"  He

handed her a piece of printout.  She leaned it against the disposal oven

and made a few corrections.  "Thanks."  He left.

    Sadira watched him leave.  Temperi had been on the leukemia project:

 they'd shared data before.  She didn't like him.  Sadira had caught him

giving her odd, almost guilty looks before the accident.  She was

normally outside the rumor mill, but one had reached her:  Temperi

supposedly liked his women six to ten years short of the term.

    She hadn't believed it at the time, but it did explain the strange

looks:  Sadira had been as flat as the average eight year-old.  And

there hadn't been a single one of those looks since she'd walked in.  If

anything, he seemed to be avoiding her.

    Jonas was just creepy.  He was on the addiction project, so they'd

never met in the lab.  He would just flow through the cafeteria every so

often, the crowd parting for him, avoiding contact.  It had taken two

minutes of working with him to find the perfect description: _ghoul_.

    The third man was new to her:  small, strongly built, prematurely

bald.  He'd introduced himself as Calvin Menken in a voice that sounded

rusty from long disuse, and hadn't said anything since.

    She hadn't given much thought to recruiting help from her co-workers

on the way in.  She'd completely discarded the idea within three minutes

of entering the lab.

    They had equipment, at least, top of the line and plentiful.  Sadira

had access to the central computer -- but the modem was passworded:  if

Sadira wanted data from another source, she had to ask one of the others

to get it.  Her partners had even made some progress on the stop virus.

They'd managed to eliminate several possibilities that the New York team

hadn't gotten around to examining.

    Still, according to Temperi, they had been working with ninety-five

percent of her original data, and they hadn't been able to recreate

BE-1.  She'd filled in the missing pieces with a glance, but she hadn't

put them to use yet.

    Sadira wasn't sure how to go about playing for time.  Nigilo was

convinced that she had finished both viruses, and was trying to recreate

her work from memory.  It therefore made sense to finish BE-1 quickly

and take more time on BE-2, for which she had no data to build on --

but how much time could she take, if she was waiting for a rescue?  (If

her rescuers were alive...)  Every day was another four inches.

    And if they did complete the second virus, and she used it on

herself, then Nigilo would begin manufacture and outside testing almost

immediately.  Some of the samples would be out of reach.  And if she was

allowed to live, she'd be shifted to another project, something with

deadlier implications...

    If it was a game, then her life was serving as ante.  And there were

some victories that would result in everyone forfeiting the pot.

    Sadira worked and plotted, rejecting dozens of scenarios, trying to

find the foolproof way out of the fort.

    Some of those plans turned into fantasies, where she broke out,

cured and triumphant, to find an eager biohazard agency, ready to dive

past her and arrest all of GenTree, and friends and family right behind,

waiting to hug her.

    And some of those fantasies turned into nightmares, as Nigilo

stepped out of the wreckage and shot them all.

    She kept revising the plans, editing the contents of the fantasies.

Sadira was going for a happy ending -- or a tragicomedy that would bring

down the house.



                          26. 81:  {Dear Kay,}



    Sadira looked at the notebook and thought hard.

    They had, after a quick session with Carmody, put a computer

system in her room, but it was what used to be called a dumb terminal.

Sadira had thought of several worse things to call it.  It connected to

the central computer, but the only thing it would let her do was work

within the database.  No modem line, no access to building systems,

nothing.

    Given a few minutes to learn a program, Sadira could warp it in

interesting ways, but hacking wasn't a skill she possessed -- and she

didn't see any real way to get into the other systems from the database

even if she _had_ the skill.  The computer just didn't have the

capacity.

    She had also asked for, and gotten, a large supply of pillows, which

was the reason she was able to write comfortably:  she was on her

stomach again -- on her breasts, really -- diagonal across the bed,

breasts lying comfortably between columns, pillows taking the weight.

It had taken a lot of awkward arranging and a lot more pillows than

Pamela had used.  It also wasn't as effective -- there was a larger

center area to compensate for -- and she wasn't looking forward

to moving again.

    They still hadn't given her bras.  They had given her painkillers,

but they watched her take them.  No overdosing allowed.  It had been

hard to convince them that the amount she was taking _was_ a normal

dose.

    And she had the notebook.  And she couldn't think about BE-2

anymore, because she'd been working on it for nearly fifteen hours

straight, and whenever she tried to focus on the sequence charts, they

rearranged themselves and became dancing stick figures.  She'd pleaded

exhaustion and tried to go to sleep.  She couldn't do that, either.

    If she thought about something else for a while -- if she got all

the thoughts out of her head and on paper -- then she might clear out

enough space to let sleep come in.

    Sadira looked up at the cameras.  "Notes," she told them.  "If I

come up with anything interesting, I'll let you know."  But the project

was out of reach.  She was going to write a letter -- a letter that

would probably never be mailed.



    {March 27th}

    {Dear Kay,}



    {I want to start this letter with two apologies, one minor, one

major.  First, I'm sorry I can't come to your wedding.  I appreciate the

invitation -- it's nice to get good news from family once in a while.

But it was really a formality for both of us:  you can't afford too many

guests, and I could never get time off from work to come -- especially

now.  I hope you and Rick are doing well.

    {Second, I'm sorry for the way I acted when you started developing.

    {I know you noticed, even though you never said anything.  You just

looked hurt that last time we visited, just before I went to college.

Before that happened, I looked forward to those occasional summer weeks

in England, visiting family.  Visiting you.  You were a wonderful

alternative to Jasmine, open and loving, and you never resented me for

being smart.  I thought of you as a little sister for a while there --

God knows you were preferable to the real one.

    {And then you started growing, and I stopped talking to you, and

writing those seasonal letters.  I cut you out.  I couldn't stand the

thought of another "true" Archer blossoming while I stayed at zero

forever.  And with me on top of everyone else at that stage -- believe

me, I'm learning about it now -- it must have hurt.

    {I started writing again after Pamela (you remember her) adjusted my

attitude for me, and you picked up the correspondence without a word.

But I never apologized, and this might be my only chance -- even if you

never see this...}

    Sadira stopped and wiped away the tear that had splattered on the

page.

    It took several pages, even in summary, to tell Kay everything that

had happened from the fifteenth up to Monday, with some background

information added.  Sadira held nothing back, including the more

embarrassing details.  After all, Kay was probably never going to read it

-- and if she did, then Sadira had gotten out alive, and embarrassment

didn't matter.

    {You never really said why you retreated to working at home, or that

you wanted a reduction -- although I just guessed:  I read between the

lines a little.  Everyone knows I go nuts when someone says "surgery."

I would have tried to talk you out of it.  And then a few months ago,

in your last letter, just before the wedding announcement I got on the

fourteenth, the tone changed.  You were at peace with yourself.  You'd

found someone who loved you -- and you were getting support from new

friends, and this new source of income you found -- I think you were

avoiding telling me _exactly_ what it was because you know how I feel

about Jasmine.  If I've guessed right (took me long enough), you're

forgiven.  Nothing to be sorry about.

    {You didn't say much about Charlotte, but I'd like to meet her one

day, and Rick.  Anyone who could turn you around is someone worth

talking to.  I could probably use some time listening to them myself.

    {Not that I'm going to get a chance.

    {Well, judging from your last picture, I've passed you in size

now, and I've been getting first-hand lessons in how I can expect to be

treated from now on...}



    Sadira recognized the woman delivering lunch:  Lisa, from the

Accounting department, who always took so much pleasure in her (lack of)

social life.  She was built along the _Cosmopolitan_ lines:  rich blond

hair, a classic figure, long legs, a sculptured face, and an attitude

which projected eight feet from her actual body.  It begged the question

of how she'd wound up in Accounting in the first place.  Most people

thought she just liked rejecting things: budgets, raises, all of her

co-workers...

    "Lunchtime," she said distastefully.  "Aaron snagged me in the

corridor and force-fed me this.  Come and get it."

    Sadira, whose movement was still slowing (especially without the

bra), got there last.

    Lisa looked down at her and indulged herself with a long, satisfied

smirk.

    Sadira reached out for the bag.  Lisa lifted it over her head, well

out of Sadira's reach.  Jumping wasn't an option.

    "Drop it," Sadira spat.

    "Why?" Lisa teased.  "I didn't listen to you when you were the

Flatty from Flatbush.  Why should I listen when you're the Bovine from

Brooklyn?"



    {...and I was standing in front of her thinking <When I was flat,

this woman made fun of my chest.  And now look at me.  And what does she

do?  _Right_.>  Pamela had it called to the last pitch.}



    Sadira prepared to kick Lisa in the shins, hoping she didn't lose

her balance --

    "Give her the food, Trevor," the passive voice said.  "Mr. Nigilo

would be very upset to learn that Ms. Archer isn't receiving proper

nutrition."

    Lisa glared down at Sadira, and handed her the bag.



    {Saved by Carmody.  She was, anyway.

    {He's been my go-between with Nigilo.  I ask him for something, he

goes and gets it -- within reason.  I don't think I can get a gun.  I

wish I could get bras, but no one's thought of it, and I keep missing

chances to bring it up.  Figures.  Whenever Carmody shows up, I think of

a million other things to complain about -- and they're so important

that the pain in my back gets forgotten.  I've been seeing him twice a

day:  you'd think I'd manage to remember.  It's just that the work

always seems to take priority.  (And I think Nigilo would tell him to

make the answer _no_.)

    {Maybe they're afraid I'll hang myself with the straps.  They'd

certainly be strong enough.

    {We have been making some progress, and not just in eliminating

things.  Temperi of all people proposed a new avenue that we've been

chasing down, and this one doesn't seem to be heading for the usual dead

end.  It's complex -- a lot more complex than the start sequence, so

it'll take longer to find out it's not going to work.

    {Or maybe it will.  Temperi is very dedicated.  Glance back at the

rumor I gave you:  I think he's afraid of any woman who doesn't look

like she just came out of the uterus, and I'm getting farther from that

every day.  He has to work in the same room.  I think he's getting

desperate.  It's pushing him to new levels.

    {I've seen some of that from other people.  There aren't a lot of

women in here -- there weren't a lot in GenTree, period.  Nigilo,

probably.  Some of them look away.  A lot of them stare.  One licked her

lips.  The men are pretty much the same.  The best I get is quiet

acceptance, like I found in the club -- or, from Carmody, disinterest.

    {I've seen Nigilo twice, briefly.  The first time, he popped his

head in and looked around for a second.  Today, he came all the way in

and asked me if I thought my metabolic rate could be imposed on someone

else separate from the breast growth.  I told him I thought it was

possible.  I didn't tell him that I already had the sequences.

    {He went over to the computer and called up some new files -- but

I'd seen them before.  They were from Pamela's computer.  He said a team

had been sifting through the wreckage and reconstructed some of the

data.  He sounded mad about it, like he'd been expecting a lot more, and

then he looked at me and said, "You don't trust anyone, do you?"

    {It didn't make sense.  But not much about him does.  He left after

reminding the others to double-check my work.  And the metabolic

enhancer is officially our next project.  I'm glad he didn't decide to

shelve BE-2 in favor of it.  This one could go into general testing

without much fuss from the government.  The hospitals, the military --

everyone would love it.

    {So I have some more data, and I have to wonder how they got it.  I

never heard of someone getting files after a computer had been shot.  If

Jason, Pamela, and Jasmine are still alive, they may have abandoned the

lab.  I don't know where they could have gone.  Maybe they're looking

for me.  Maybe they're still working on a cure...}



    Pamela examined Jason's leg.  The scar, a thick, bright red on

Tuesday, had faded to a quiet pink.  "Take a few steps."  He did.  His

motions were becoming increasingly natural:  there was hardly any limp

now.  "Put your pants back on."

    Jason recovered the jeans and pulled them up over the boxer shorts.

"That bad or that good?"

    "Both.  You'll be completely healed in another day or two.  After

that, I don't know where the energy's going to go."  She gave him a

small, wry smile.  "Maybe I should start beating you now."

    "Maybe Jasmine knows a professional attacker."

    "Dominatrixes and feature dancers don't mix," Jasmine called out

from her desk.  "And you're too innocent to know about that stuff!"

    Jason blushed.  "Heracles had a magazine."  He looked at Pamela.

"How's your end coming?"

    "Not well."  They walked over to Jasmine's desk.  They'd both

learned a lot about the dancer's intelligence level over the past two

days.  While Jasmine couldn't master the full field in forty-eight

hours, she'd picked up the basics from her reading.  Her eclectic

perusals had given her a little knowledge in a lot of fields, all of

which she put together to make suggestions, ask questions, and provide

more help than nuisance.  Her specialty was spotting whatever they'd

overlooked, such as the idea for a solo metabolic slowdown.

    At the moment, she was reading over a file full of pregnancy data

with a huge dictionary at her elbow, looking up every third word,

struggling through the text.  She glanced up as they approached.  "Back

to work, you two.  If I find anything, I'll let you know."

    Pamela snapped off a salute.  "Yes, your royal highness!"  She

quick-marched back into the maze.

    "I want to go out to one of the Internet cafes," Pamela told him.

"We should give your idea another try:  find a hacker and get into

GenTree's systems.  You don't think they're keeping her in the main

building?"

    <Good.  That'll get _you_ out of the lab.>  They'd switched roles:

Jason now had to remind Pamela about eating.  She got up too early,

worked too late, and slept too little.  "A branch operation," Jason

replied.  "I know about one in Kansas -- the agricultural labs -- and

there were rumors of a few others.  Michigan, Mexico..."

    "So we need to find out exactly where she is, and plan an attack.

Download the blueprints if they're available, get the security codes --

whatever's available.  A good hacker could do it."

    "And you think we can find one this time?"

    "Whatever it takes."  She grinned.  "We're going to give some of

that excess energy a new outlet.  And my other idea might come through."

    "You heard from him?"

    "The number was a message service:  someone forwarded it.  He'll be

in town on Friday.  If we finish before that, we find a backup and leave

without him.  But Sadira said she liked him, and I think she'd like my

throwing him a very big bone.  Even if I had to lie to get him here."

    "I still think you should have gone with a professional."

    "He is a professional.  I've seen his work --"  Pamela stopped.

Jason was giving her one of _those_ smiles again.  "At least he'll get

the lighting right."



    {...if what I think is happening _is_ what's happening, then --

    {I love Pamela, as a friend and something more than a sister.  And

as a lover.  She reverts a little in bed, becomes a big playful kid

who's basically interested in how _fun_ this is -- but there's a lot of

tenderness there, too.  And now I finally know why she was so sad that

last night on campus, beyond roommates separating after four years

together.  She's in love with me, and it took the first remembered dream

of my life to figure it out.  Some genius, huh?

    {Jason is a good friend -- you couldn't ask someone to go through

what he has for me.  (If Rick's like that, then lucky you!)  That's the

way Pamela started out, and I think -- I think he's in love, too.  I'm

starting to believe that Jasmine can't get to him, and I can keep

believing that until I see evidence to the contrary.

    {And, adding all up, I think they both know about each other.

There's some sort of truce drawn up, to keep from upsetting me -- that

might be why Pamela avoided touching me again.  She honors her promises,

no matter what.

    {It's funny.  I never thought I'd have anyone love me like that, and

two of them were right in front of me the whole time.

    {In my defense, it's becoming very hard to see things which are

right in front of me.

    {If I got out, and they were waiting for me, what would I do?  Can I

make that choice?  Because I do _love_ them both, in different ways --

but those ways are converging.  I don't know what to do:  this isn't

something I have any experience with.

    {I don't think I'm gay:  I chased boys in school with too much

devotion for that.  Bisexual, probably, although Jasmine wouldn't be

surprised to find out that I'm still a virgin with men, and I've never

felt this way about any woman _but_ Pamela.  So that's no help.

    {So what do I do?

    {I wish this was a chat room, and you could write back to me within

seconds of reading this, because I have no ideas...}



    Carmody looked at the screen.  Sadira continued to write, all her

attention focused on the paper.  The hand movements were too regular for

formulae:  she was working on something else.  A diary, possibly.  She'd

arranged the pillows as a blockade, gaining a measure of privacy -- but

the camera could zoom in and magnify:  even with the awkward angle, he

could try to read some of the words if he wanted to --



    {I tried to suck my nipple last night.  (Even though I'll probably

never get to mail this, I still can't believe I just wrote that)

    {It was the best thing to come out of this.  My nipples got a lot

larger, and they also seemed to acquire more nerves than size.  I had a

nipple orgasm:  I thought that just existed in woman's magazines, too.

    {Last night, I was in the bathtub, and I was looking at the cameras.

I can't tell you how much I hate them:  bad enough that they have to

follow my every movement, even worse that those movements include the

bowel variety.  They watch me at every moment:  nothing is private.

They might even be able to read these words, but I used the pillows

pretty well:  none of the cameras are directly over the bed.  My

thoughts are safe for the moment, even outside my head.

    {Anyway, I was washing, looking at the camera, and having it there

was, right then, being naked in a crowd.  I'm stared at all the time,

every second -- and I just thought <So watch _this_, assholes!> and

tried to orient my right nipple for sucking.  I don't know what I was

really thinking.  Maybe I just wanted to shock them.  Nigilo already

thinks I did this to myself deliberately:  I don't mind him thinking I'm

a bit deranged.  If he saw this, he'd probably think I was writing it to

mislead him.

    {Well, I tried to get my nipple to my mouth, and I couldn't.  My

breasts are too big now, and too firm.  Maybe if they were more floppy,

I could do it -- but there's too much flesh between me and the nipple,

and while it compresses, distorts, and jiggles, it doesn't really _bend_

very well.

    {I must have been a hilarious sight.  I did everything I could to

get to it.  I tried to slide one breast under the other...  I even

lifted my breast up as far as I could -- I thought that if I just tilted

my head back far enough, my mouth and the nipple would meet eventually

-- and I wound up realizing that my breast is a lot bigger than my head.

(I didn't really think about it until I had a direct comparison going.)

    {And they thought I was attempting suicide by suffocation and broke

in on me.

    {You would have enjoyed hearing me try to talk my way out of _that_

one.  I was very creative.

    {My breasts have reached past my waist now, but they're projecting

forward faster than they're descending at the moment.  I don't know why:

maybe there's some sort of automatic change in the genetic program that

triggers at this size.  My nipples are about two inches long erect, and

an inch across.  I don't have any Band-Aids here, and the muu-muu isn't

much of a help.  Taken on a straight line, I'm out past my elbows even

without the bra -- and any bra is going to have to be very interesting

to let me do much with my arms in front of my body at all.  Pamela's

keyboarding lesson becomes more important every day:  I'm doing a lot of

things sidesaddle now.

    {Jason told me that if my genes had triggered naturally, I would

have been pretty big -- maybe to Jasmine's scale, maybe even to yours.

It's hard to believe I would have gotten this big, though.  Still, I'm

starting to realize even if this isn't normal for me, it's closer to the

normal I would have been than the normal I was --

    {I _think_ what I mean is what Pamela said earlier:  I got ten extra

years of sleeping on my stomach, but that's not how I am now.  I was

supposed to be large breasted, but now I've caught up and passed that

level.  I think I'm officially at huge, or somewhere past it.}



    Sadira stopped and stared at the paper for a long time, using the

whiteness as a blank screen, watching the movie play again.  Eventually,

she resumed writing.



    {When I was eleven, they operated on me, after the bone marrow

transplant.  All the treatments were working, and the leukemia was going

away.  I don't even remember why they took me into surgery.  It might

have been exploratory, or some small tumor that they wanted to examine,

the disease running off-course -- I've blocked that out.

    {What I remember is the eyes of the anesthesiologist as he lowered

the mask over my face.  They were very, very bright.

    {He had access to the hospital pharmacy.  He used most of it.

    {The anesthetic wore off in the middle of the surgery.

    {I woke up on the table.  They'd strapped my limbs down to keep my

position stable, so no one would brush against an arm against me and

knock another doctor's scalpel off course.  That was the first thing I

realized when I woke up.  The second thing was that those scalpels were

cutting into me.

    {Everything else was pain.

    {The hospital admitted what had happened -- they didn't have a

choice:  they were working on me with students watching.  One of them

freaked, ran out, and found my parents.  Mom and Dad sued, and won, but

awards weren't so big back then, and we didn't exactly get a sympathetic

judge.  The hospital offered to pay for all the bills plus a million

more.  After all, I'd lived, and they'd fired the anesthesiologist:

what more did he want them to do?

    {Nothing, as it turned out.  So we got the million, and Dad lost all

but a hundred thousand of it in the S&L scandal, tried to invest the

rest, and lost that.  So the scholarships were all I had.

    {I know where my phobia comes from.  It doesn't help me deal with

it.  I start shaking when I think about reduction surgery -- any

surgery.  If I do live through this, then, as Jasmine said, I'm stuck

wherever it leaves me.

    {So it helps to think that I was always supposed to be this way --

maybe even to this degree.  And if I get out, I'll write more to this

letter, and send you the happy ending, and maybe even come visit to

compare notes.  I owe you a hug along to go with that apology, and

Pamela taught me how to do it, although I'm not sure how much longer

it'll work.

    {But if I don't, then maybe someone will find this and take pity on

me by sending it.  And if that doesn't happen, it still felt good to

write to you again, and let someone in on what I was really feeling.

    {I wish I was with you right now, free.  But I'm with you in spirit,

always.

    {Don't forget me.}



         {Love,}

            {Sadira}



                   27. 83:  Plots, plans, parallels...



    Jason woke to find Pamela coming out of the bathroom, already fully

dressed, absently munching on an apple -- from the stem down.  She saw

him and stopped moving.  "Good," she said.  "Bathroom's yours.  I'll

wake up the Princess."  All the words were uncertain, as if she had to

concentrate to string them together.

    Jason sat up and got a good look at the clock.  Four hours of sleep.

"Wrong."

    Pamela stared down at him.  "Fine, if you don't have to go, the

Princess can use the bathroom first.  Frankly, though, you could use a

shave.  Get in while it's free."  The apple fell from limp fingers.  She

didn't notice and brought her left hand up to take another bite, then

stared at the empty appendage in confusion.

    Jason slowly stood up, letting the blankets fall to the floor around

his feet.  Jasmine stirred, becoming aware of the noise.  "We worked

past midnight yesterday," he reminded her.  "We never went to the

Internet cafe.  You barely ate.  And now you've barely slept, and you

haven't gotten much sleep over the past three days.  Neither have we,"

he added, indicating Jasmine.  But he was dealing with it fairly well,

and Jasmine was napping at her desk.  Pamela -- her jacket was on

backwards --

    "I'm up," Pamela argued.  "I can work.  I'm going to --"

    Jason took a step forward.  "Bed."  He took her right hand and

started pulling her forward.  She was too tired to resist.

    _Physically_ resist, anyway.  "We have to work.  We have to finish

the virus.  I can go to the lab and wait for you if you're tired.  No

one's chasing us now."  Pamela tried, and failed, to fight off a huge

yawn.  "I'm fine."

    A few steps took brought them to the bed.  Jason pulled back the

sheets, then began lowering Pamela onto the mattress.  "No, you're not.

You're exhausted.  You've been pushing yourself too hard.  You'll burn

out before I do, or start making mistakes."

    "But --"  Another yawn just as her head touched the pillow.

    "No argument.  Now close your eyes, and I'll wake you up in three

hours."

    "I can't."  Her eyes were open, but they didn't seem to be seeing

him.  "It's my fault, you see.  I didn't kill the man in the park.  If I

had, they wouldn't have found us."

    And she'd been pushing herself, working extra hours while the belief

built and festered...  "You don't know that," he argued.  "We could have

been spotted by someone else."  It was possible, after all.  Not likely,

but possible.

    Still, he forced belief into the words.  _Pamela_ had to believe it,

even if he didn't.

    "No," came the tired voice, beginning to fade.  "My fault...  want a

second chance..."

    Jason was out of words, except for the one that she still might

respond to.  "Ivory --"

    Pamela's eyelids flickered as she whispered, "Sadira calls me

Ivory --" then slowly fell shut.  Jason pulled the covers over her and

went back to his makeshift bed.  Jasmine's movements slowly subsided as

the silence closed in.



    Sadira stepped into the bathtub, and looked over her shoulder at the

mirror.  There was definitely more flesh showing past her sides than

there had been.  Was there a focused side expansion occurring, or was

she just now noticing it?

    She kept looking.  Her back wasn't showing any real signs of the

strain it was under.  Judging from the feel of it, she'd almost been

expecting a harsh red streak, or a deep tear --

    -- there was an indentation.  It wasn't all that deep, but it ran

down the center of her back, following the spine.  It was from --

    <Now how did that happen?  And _when_?>

    Sadira had always been in good shape, and had worked to maintain it

-- with her love of chocolate, it was called "staying thin."  Her

workouts had been designed with that goal in mind.  They were never

meant to produce _this_ result.

    Fresh layers of muscle were just starting to become visible, forming

on her back, shoulders, and pectorals.  She looked down to the side --

_straight_ down hadn't been an option for well over a week -- and tilted

her right leg out a bit, bracing herself on the wall.  Her calf muscles

were somewhat better defined.

    She wasn't stronger just because there was more energy available to

power her efforts -- an nuclear adrenaline burn whenever she needed one,

as long as the calories held out.  She was stronger, period.

    It only took a second to figure out.  As long as the virus was

active, injured cells would be replaced by healthy tissue at a highly

accelerated rate.  Muscle development through exercise was the ongoing

process of causing small injuries to the tissue so that when it healed,

it would be stronger than before, with additional cells forming at the

damaged site.  With all the extra weight she'd been acquiring, most of

the muscle groups in her body had been stressed, injured -- and thus, new

tissue.

    <If I didn't know better, I'd think my body was trying to

compensate.  But it's just a side effect of a side effect.>

    The injuries were still occurring faster than the repairs -- but the

repairs had been taking place.  If she was careful, the pain might even

level off.  It was now a race between muscle and breast development --

but her breasts had a huge head start.  The gap couldn't be closed until

the growth ended:  she had to keep the lead from getting wider.  With

her metabolism _and_ her increasing resistance to the medication, she

was up to thirty pills a day.

    <Why didn't I notice this before?>  That one was easy:  she'd had a

lot on her mind, no one at GenTree would bother to point it out, and it

hadn't been visible the last time Pamela had seen her naked.  Also,

she'd (and probably everyone else) spent a disproportionate amount of

time focusing on her _front_.  <If I can find some way to work out my

arms, it might help me fight my way out if an escape plan goes wrong.

But if I try to deliberately work out my back beyond what Pamela taught

me, I could _really_ hurt myself.>

    But the arm workouts were still an idea, one more thing that might

help her escape.  All she needed was something which she could lift

repeatedly in a short period of time without arousing suspicion.  And

she had to start testing things, working on plans...

    Sadira turned to the shower controls.  She'd been examining herself

for about two minutes:  she hoped none of the people watching the

screens had picked up on her discovery.  <Probably not.  They'll just

think I'm vain.  And they never saw me naked before I came here.>  She

turned on the water.



    Pamela handed the bond to the bank teller and waited.  It was

visually examined, held to the light in a search for watermarks, and

taken to the back room for further identification.  Eventually, she came

back.  "And how did you want that?" she said with new respect.

    "Cash," Pamela replied, giving her the slip.  "Twenties, fifties,

hundreds, thousands, a fourth for each."

    Jasmine watched as the money was counted out, unconsciously licking

her lips.  Pamela spotted it and glanced over.  Jasmine stopped.  Pamela

shook her head.  "What is it with you and cash?"

    "Did you see _Indecent Proposal_?"  Pamela nodded.  "Remember the

scene in the bedroom where they're lying down in the middle of a million

dollars?"  Jasmine grinned widely.  "It feels pretty good with a few

thousand, too."

    Jason looked around, noted that the people who were currently

staring at Jasmine had been staring at them since they'd walked in, and

turned his attention back to the teller.



    The cliche was true.  The bank really did give out briefcases when

someone was removing a large amount of money.  It wasn't a very

expensive briefcase, though:  Pamela resisted the urge to swing it back

and forth.  The handle wasn't attached very well.  "Nigilo will pay for

everything," she said gleefully.  "This is the insecurity deposit."

    "At least we got that done," Jason said.

    She nodded.  "I _was_ preoccupied."  She had woken to the smell of

frying bacon, sat up, given Jason one long nod, then had breakfast.

"And we will knock off work at ten and go looking for hackers tonight."

Pamela glanced over to Jason as they approached the car.  "And maybe a

dominatrix.  You're moving too well."

    Jason glanced at his leg and nodded.  "I really don't feel like

being beaten, though -- even by a professional.  If it's the only

solution, fine, but isn't there something else we could try?  A high-

energy activity that would drain the excess?"

    Jasmine looked up at him.  "Well, unfortunately, you've eliminated

_one_ source of energy use.  One good --"  Jason was blushing.  She

smiled, goal accomplished, and waited by her door.

    "Watch it, Princess," Pamela told her.  "You're backsliding."  There

was only a little malice in the words.  "Besides, I saw him first.

_I'm_ the one that gets to make him blush."  She unlocked the door, hit

the release for the other locks, and they all got in.  "High-energy

activity, sure, but remember what happened to Sadira on the train?  If

you exhaust yourself _too_ completely, you'll slip to a level where

hunger won't wake you up."  She looked across at Jason, who, after days

of fiddling, finally had the passenger seat where he wanted it.  "And

believe it or not, I really don't want to see you hurt.  So what do we

do with --"

    They waited for her to finish, realized she wasn't going to, and

followed her gaze.  She was looking across the street, at the entrance

to the World Gym.



    Sadira opened the notebook and jotted down a few symbols.  She had

decided that if she kept it with her, there was less chance of having

the letter discovered.  She didn't think anyone would hesitate at

searching her trash.  A quick glance at the clock:  1:38 p.m.  They'd

already had lunch.

    She put a puzzled look on her face and stared at the notebook for

about thirty seconds, feigning confusion, then picked up a folder and

feigned a little more.  Finally, she looked at Temperi.  "Can I go down

to Chemistry?  I need some hormone samples."

    Temperi looked up from his workstation.  "What do you need?  I'll

send someone down for them."

    Her brow furrowed with carefully-faked thought.  "I'm not sure.

I've got an idea, but it's not quite coming through.  I'll know it when

I see it."

    To Sadira's concealed relief, he did not start reading off a mental

list of human secretions, send out for a book of protein structures, or

examine her motives closely.  Sadira had guessed correctly:  he was

nervous around her, didn't particularly like being in the same room with

her, and was happy to do anything which would get her out of the area

for a few minutes.  "I'll call for an escort."

    "Okay.  I just have to use the bathroom first."



    Sadira was accompanied by three guards.  She'd made sure her entire

team was deep in work before proceeding.  It was now a question of how

many guards went in the chemical storage area with her, and how closely

they watched her.

    She was also trying to memorize the layout of the floor.  She

thought she had only seen a fraction of the building, but her money was

on _underground_.  There were no windows anywhere.  Air vents in a

genetics lab always sounded a little odd -- it all had to go through so

many filters -- but this was louder, more forced.  On Wednesday, she'd

rapped on what she'd thought was an outer wall, pretending to beat her

fists in frustration.  (Not much of a stretch -- and she did want them

doubting her sanity)  Although it was probably too thick to get an

accurate sounding, Sadira thought there was solid matter beyond.

    And if she was underground, the question became just how deep she

saw.  She'd have to work her way _up_ and out, instead of just making a

dash for the front door.  Guards on each floor, security systems

everywhere...

    <Call the gaming companies.  _This_ is a dungeon crawl.>  And she'd

better work it out before crawling was the only motion she was capable

of.  If her arms even reached the floor at that point.  Her breasts

might occupy all the space in between...

    They continued moving through the halls.  There were no real

landmarks to pick up on, just the occasional researcher passing through.

Sadira continued to utilize the smile-and-wave theory -- the freak-out

effect on the staff was increasing.  One man waved back as he wheeled

himself past the group.

    "How much farther?" Sadira asked the guards.  They said nothing.

They were just large, silent, practically omni-present.  Sadira had

spotted six of them, taking different shifts.  They also seemed slightly

annoyed, because Sadira was walking very, very slowly.  It was partially

deliberate:  more time to memorize the walk -- and she wanted them

bored.  She occasionally glanced at her folder in an attempt to

forestall suspicion.  The notebook was tucked inside.

    She'd made some adjustment on her standard belt pattern while

getting dressed.  Her breasts were now very tightly tied to her body --

too tightly:  she could acutely feel the straps cutting in.  But for

what she was planning, she had to try and eliminate _any_ possible

shifting.  Anyone watching would hopefully decide she'd just been trying

a new arrangement -- and perhaps even be inspired to buy her some bras:

Carmody had yet to show up.

    Eventually, they reached a door with smoked glass and embossed

silver letters:  {Chemistry Supplies}.  Sadira waited while the

smallest guard used his handprint -- <All the exits are probably

handprinted.  Can I take another hostage?> -- and then tucked the file

under her left arm and walked in, hoping no one followed her --

    -- wrong.  Two guards stayed outside.  The largest came in on her

heels.  Sadira mentally groaned.  If she hadn't hit Carmody in the

office, they might have given her some time alone...

    <Don't worry.  They might let me come back.  If I can't find what I

need, this is a scouting trip.>  Maybe.  Nigilo might chew them out for

not bringing one of the scientists along.

    She looked around quickly as they entered, getting an idea of the

contents.  GenTree was at heart a genetics lab, but no science can stand

alone.  The chemical supplies were extensive, rivaling what a pure

Chemistry lab might have on hand.  Besides extensive collections of

hormones and biological reaction agents, the room also had a good

selection of basic elements arrayed in small vials and other containers,

and a wild assortment of oddball chemicals.  Some of the scientists at

GenTree had very esoteric specialties, and there was no telling what a

virus might be asked to react to or survive in:  the proposed oil-spill

cleaners had to exist in a very hostile environment...

    What it meant to Sadira was that there was a lot of stuff available,

some of it very useful -- but the problem was in taking any of it with

her.  Most of the really good chemicals were locked away.

    <One guard inside, two outside, and they can watch what's happening

in here.  Possibly a central surveillance area with more people watching

monitors.>  The guard, keeping her in sight, was unlocking the hormone

storage area, which was right next to the door.  Sadira pretended to be

bored and wandered away, looking at the rest of the room.  Other locked

cabinets held the drugs for the addiction-break project, accompanied by

various agents to which the body reacted badly and the labs were trying

to produce immunities to.  All very handy.  All very inaccessible.

    The only things in the open were the elements.  Sadira glanced at

them.  Vials of the liquids and gases, containers for the solids,

multiples of everything nicely arrayed on a large rack which took up

most of the center table.  It was a holdover from a seventh-grade

science class:  practically every chemistry lab had one, a cherished

memory that, even in a building dedicated to genetics, saw a fair amount

of use.

    She took a closer look.  Hydrogen, helium, lithium, and so on across

the periodic table.  A basic assortment, no radioactives.  Standard glass

or plastic vials according to the element.  The setup was a virtual

duplicate of the one at GenTree's main building.  She hadn't expected

looser security here: the element rack was all she had to work with --

but she still hadn't thought of a distraction, and this might be her only

shot.  No one paid much attention to the basics: they probably weren't

even counted.  She'd taken a vial of silicon for the joke she'd played on

Jason in January: no one had ever missed it.  None of the cameras could

directly scan the interior of the rack.  Still a chance...

    The observations had only taken a few seconds, and the lock was

being stubborn -- but the guard would have it open soon enough.

    <Think.  This is a game.  I caught a break from the lock.  If Pamela

gave me this scenario, I'd already have the treasure.  There's nothing

at stake but a few admiring glances from the other players when and if

they show up.  The only difference is that there's no dice to roll.

What's the answer?>

    Another glance at the rack.  <Distraction.  They all know I'm

clumsy.  I dropped a few things this morning in case they'd forgotten.

These might be shatterproof -- but I can 'accidentally' knock something

across the room pretty hard.  They might get suspicious -- but I do have

that reputation.  One vial without pushing my luck too much.

    <Lithium:  no good unless I got it in skin contact, and that

container looks secure.  Chlorine:  that might be a good concentration --

dangerous to both of us if it breaks.  Sodium:  I don't have any

water -->

    And there it was, a flash of inspiration combined with the small

touch of insanity that goes with genius, and a frantic defiance of

odds...

    The guard almost had the lock open.

    Sadira prayed her dexterity had improved as much as she needed it

to.

    Her arm eased away from her body, letting the folder tilt back and

out -- and it fell, scattering papers across the floor.

    Sadira felt acute irony.

    The guard didn't notice:  he was still having trouble with the lock.

This was for the benefit of the people outside.  Sadira stepped away

from the mess so that she could see it more clearly.  The scatter wasn't

too extreme.

    There were no women on staff who even came close to approaching

Sadira's size, and all of the guards were male.  With even more luck, no

one would know (or deduce) that the best way to pick something up for a

woman carrying a guestimated forty-plus extra pounds on her chest was to

step back, then kneel.

    This part could really, _really_ hurt.

    Sadira, in a display of imperfect logic, took a visible look at the

rack.  She'd already seen that it was bolted to the table, but she

_noticed_ it for public view.  She grabbed onto one of the lower

shelves, using it as a brace, and began to bend over, reaching out with

her other hand.  After all, she'd need help to straighten herself out.

    Lower, lower -- the straps were holding -- her back began to throb

almost immediately -- the next part was going to be easy to fake.

    Sadira yelped in pain, and partially lost her grip on the rack,

clutching for a handhold before she went down completely, trying to

brace herself against the floor with her right hand, her left trying to

find purchase --

    Dexterity, and agility, and luck.

    She grabbed a vial and flung it, forward and down and _hard_, just

over her head, got a solid grip on the rack, and pulled herself up and

back with every bit of energy she could channel --

    -- and screamed, long and loud, as her back, stressed beyond

endurance, went out again.

    The guard spun just in time to see the vial break on top of the

papers.

    The phosphorus, exposed to air, ignited immediately.  The paper

quickly followed.  Smoke began to billow up.

    The guard, working on instinct, ran towards the fire extinguisher, as

Sadira braced herself on the rack, for real this time, trying not to fall

over as the pain cascaded across her body, making it hard to think...

    The guards outside would be _inside_ at any second, but at the

moment, she couldn't hear them moving, they were probably looking at the

fire on their screens.  It was the nature of flame:  people were taken in

by it, almost hypnotized, firefighters had been known to give in to the

sensation -- <Concentrate, they won't stare for more than a few seconds

at most...>

    She clutched at the rack, the pain which she'd hoped to fake all too

real, and got two small vials concealed in her hands, then straightened

up, another scream of pain escaping, fists closed with need and agony.

    A yell of "Fire!", inside and outside, and the other two guards

rushed in...

    Sadira put her hands at her sides, where she'd left the muu-muu

hanging loose after her visit to the bathroom, and slid them under, up,

and in, trying to get them in a position to push on vital muscles,

either insanely clutching at the source of the pain or making a

desperate attempt to reset her back, moving wildly under the garment --

    -- and then she withdrew and put her hands behind her back, pushing,

eyes tearing from the pain, biting back the screams, staggering back --

    -- just in time to get out of the path of the flame suppressant.  It

was designed to deal with almost any kind of fire -- including small,

focused ones, so that it could put them out without damaging the lab.

    The chemical foam landed on top of the fire -- and the guard with

the extinguisher, who had just reached it.

    He sputtered and dived back, but the white foam had already covered

his head and shoulders.  It was designed to be harmless to the eyes:  he

didn't know that.  Neither did the other two guards:  they helped him

over to the eye wash.

    Sadira didn't think she had another distraction:  anyone in a

central monitoring room would be watching her again.  Even if they

weren't, she couldn't take advantage of it:  the pain was still

increasing, no longer suppressed by the need for action, and while she

still had plenty of storage space left, she didn't think she could push

her luck any further in reaching it.  So she braced herself against the

table, gasping in pain, and waited for the guards to get around to her.

    They were too busy helping their partner wash his eyes and

explaining the accident they'd seen on their screens.  He didn't take it

well.

    "Goddamn clumsy bitch!" cursed the doused guard, shaking the water

out of his eyes.  There was brown hair dye running down his forehead:

the chemicals had broken the bond.  "I could have been _blinded_!"   He

turned and took a step towards her, hands clenched and shaking --

    -- Carmody got to her first.  He ran into the room -- including the

disaster at Helena, it was the first time she'd seen him in any kind of

hurry -- and rushed to her side.  "Are you all right?"  The guard's fists

fell open, and he stepped back to the sink.

    She managed to push a look of pure disbelief past the pain.  "_No._"

    For a fraction of a second, his face said that he was aware what a

stupid question it had been, and then the neutrality was back in force.

"What do you need?"

    "Pills, and rest."  She tried to give equal emphasis to both, but it

was getting harder to think, the pain was still increasing -- "I can't

work like this..." She risked a quick glance at the guards' faces:  there

was no suspicion there.  Just plenty of anger.  If no one thought to

check the rack -- if -- <The damage is worse this time.  I hurt so

much...>

    Carmody took a walkie-talkie from the guards and began quietly

speaking into it.  The wheelchair showed up three minutes later.



    Carmody pushed Sadira down the hall, flanked by two of the guards.

(The third was cleaning out his locker:  he had been reprimanded for

poor conduct and transferred.)  The scientist she'd seen in the hall

apparently kept a backup on the premises in case something went wrong

with the one he used.  This one wasn't motorized, but it was sturdy, and

came with an detachable desk, which Sadira momentarily wished she could

rest her breasts on --but the straps were doing their job, and once she

got in, her lap provided plenty of support (even though her breasts were

starting to overflow it).  It didn't lessen the pain.

    The scanner beeped as Carmody opened her door.  She heard someone

push a tray up behind her.  "I'll take that," Carmody said.  "You two

wait out here." Sadira looked up, startled.

    The guards immediately focused on their screens, and Carmody pushed

the wheelchair into Sadira's cell, then went out and brought in the tray

before closing the door behind him.

    "Going to take revenge for that punch?" Sadira asked, trying to keep

the fear out of her voice.  Would the guards break in if Carmody tried

to do something?

    "No," Carmody replied, pushing the chair next to her bed, then

stepping in front of her.  "I am, however, going to try and help you

into bed.  You're too badly injured to do it on your own.  This means

that I have to touch you.  I won't proceed without your permission.  Do

I have it?"

    Sadira thought it over.  "At least you asked this time."  He nodded.

She considered the risk.  "Watch where you put your hands."  She held

out her arms, giving him a subtle encouragement to work with them, and

waited.  He took the folder from her and put it on the nightstand, then

began to help her up.

    Carmody went out of his way to avoid unwanted contact -- literally:

 Sadira was so large that trying to get any leverage while standing in

front of her almost _guaranteed_ contact.  There were some very awkward

moments, and he wound up on the bed twice -- but eventually, she was

lying on the mattress, the covers pulled down to her feet.

    She looked to the left and finally saw the tray.  It had two IV poles

and two attached bags -- one ridiculously-huge, filled with calorie

solution, and one small, unlabeled.  There were some sterile pads,

rubbing alcohol, a blood pressure monitor, and a large, filled syringe.

The fear rose, and it started to verge into panic.  She could still swing

her feet out and try to kick him, but she was on her back, which was

still screaming, and sitting up was going to be a problem...  "What is

that?"

    "Morphine, with a sedative mixed in.  As I understand the reports,

if you're asleep and provided with a constant supply of energy, you heal

very rapidly.  This will take away the pain and let you rest.  This

provides the energy.  This should maintain the sleep for about eighteen

hours.  You're not doing any more work today."

    "And you're going to give it to me?"  She was starting to wonder

about the consequences of that punch again.  <IV bags.  Needles.

Monitors.  Like an operation.>

    "While we have a formidable number of doctorates on the staff, we

have no actual doctors.  I have some experience with needles.  The data

we acquired on your metabolism was used to calculate an effective dose.

Without that data, Mr. Nigilo would not have approved your pill

consumption.  May I administer the medicine?"

    "I can stop you?"  Just barely deadpan:  the pain was surging again

and the fear was approaching the surface.

    "You can say no, and I will leave."

    Sadira thought it through very, very carefully.  Given her normal

state during sleep, it might be possible to search her without waking

her, and if she was drugged, it was a guarantee.  But the pain was much

worse than before, and if she didn't get a chance to partially heal, she

wouldn't be able to escape.  And if she was asleep for eighteen hours,

the straps were going to get even more uncomfortable.  And if she

loosened them...

    "Sadira," Carmody said, the neutrality of tone even more perfect

than usual, "I am not a doctor.  No one is going to operate on you, and

this decision is entirely under your control.  I will not inject you

without your express consent.  There is nothing to be afraid of."

    It was too close to be a guess.  She stared at him, looking for a

change of expression, and found none.  "How do you know so much about

me?"

    "Mr. Nigilo asked me to investigate your background before he gave

you the proposal."

    <He's not a doctor, anymore than I am.  I can inject myself -- no,

he'd never allow that:  what if I tried to put an air bubble in the

vein?  I need the medicine.  But he's putting me to _sleep_...>  "I'll

just rest like this," she said.  "I can undress myself in the morning.

Could you look away for a second?  I have to adjust the belts."

    He turned away.  Sadira did all the work under the muu-muu, letting

the belts out a few risky holes.  Her breasts slid to the sides:  she

moved her arms away before they were pinned.

    "No one will touch you without your consent.  I will personally

change the needles before your skin heals around them," Carmody assured

her.  "May I administer the medicine?"

    She looked at his eyes.  There was no shine to them.  All she found

was an infinite supply of patience.

    He wasn't a doctor.  She had to remember that.  They didn't want her

dead yet.  She was being monitored.  It was just needles.  There were no

scalpels.

    She was shaking.

    She wanted to scream.

    She had to escape.

    She couldn't escape if she couldn't move.

    The words were weak, barely audible, but somehow, when they were

needed, the effort was made, taking more energy than anything the virus

had done.  "Permission granted."

    Carmody rolled up her sleeves.

    He had some expertise:  she barely felt the needles.  Or maybe the

back pain and fear were drowning out the lesser sensations.  He fastened

the blood pressure cuff and stepped back, waiting.  "I'll take the

folder back to the lab.  They can continue working while you sleep."

    The panic began to rise --

    Carmody extracted the notebook, put it on the nightstand, and tucked

the folder under his arm.

    The morphine and her metabolism began to do their work.  Sadira felt

a wash of pleasant numbness moving in from her right arm.  It was like

warm water was supporting her from all directions, and the fear dissolved

in it, she was under the sea and breathing normally, and she was

beginning to lose her body, it was drifting away from her, somewhere off

to the left, but she didn't care, she could always get it back later, the

pain had gone with it, that was the important thing, and maybe while they

were adrift, the pain would be lost at sea...

    One clear thought:  <The drugs are working.>  She looked up at

Carmody, who was still waiting.  For what?  Well, he was the liaison,

and as long as she was awake, she might request something.

    That was a good idea.  What could she ask for?

    "Carmody?"  Her voice was soft, and seemed to be losing cohesion,

but he nodded.  "I need some bras.  I can't keep goin' like dis.  It's

gonna happen again, an' worse, unless I've got some support..."

    "Mr. Nigilo had forbidden it," Carmody replied.  "He was saving it

as a reward for good work.  He is meeting with the investors tomorrow,

and has already left.  However, given the circumstances, I will attempt

to contact him there.  You can't be expected to work with this kind of

pain."

    "T'anks..."

    "He may not agree."

    "T'anks anyway..."  Her sight went away, came back.  She blinked up

at him.  "Carmody?"  Another nod.  He was still there.  Good:  that made

_one_ of them.  "I wanna go home..."

    But the warmth was everywhere, washing away all pain and thought,

and she went with it.

    Carmody watched her face as the pain slowly faded into artificial

peace, then checked the monitor before pulling the covers over Sadira

and leaving the room.



                       28. ???:  ...and passwords



    The Casual Link had been designed with the hope of building an

Internet cafe with a homey atmosphere, the sort of place you could leave

your kids for an hour while you went shopping.  A computer playground,

the electronic equivalent of the crawl tubes and slides found outside

classier fast food restaurants.

    It had been a valiant effort.  It just hadn't worked.

    People liked to surf in private -- they would call sites from the

Link that they wouldn't call from home.  So the computers had to be

shielded.  And they didn't want to be interrupted, either.  The result

was a imperfect grafting:  a diner in the middle, and cubbyholes filled

with computers and users around the perimeter.  The two halves mostly

ignored each other, but it was like looking at the graft points on

Frankenstein's monster:  you knew this was supposed to work together,

but it was hard to see how it could.

    At ten-twenty on a Thursday night, the center section was almost

deserted.  But the little nests were full of birds, and the rat-a-tat of

woodpeckers on keyboards filled the room.  If there was any feel of home

about the place, then the home had been broken, and the residents needed

therapy.

    Pamela walked in, took a look around, and was tempted to give up on

the spot.  Anyone who would frequent this sort of place might barely be

able to manage electronic contact, let alone human.  The flip side of

the argument was that if they found a hacker in this place, he would

almost _have_ to be extraordinary.

    No one looked at them.  They were all lost in the Net worlds.

    "Want to go to the next one now?" Jason asked.  "This doesn't seem

like a place any self-respecting hacker would work from."

    "I know," Pamela replied.  "That's why it's perfect.  No one would

look for a hacker here.  So there's one here, because he doesn't want to

be found."  She grinned.  "It'll make sense if you think about it long

enough.  Ready?"

    Jason began to shrug -- then stopped.  By his estimation, his leg

was up to about ninety percent of normal capacity:  the intense workout

Pamela had signed him up for might have come just in time to prolong his

life.  The excess calories were now going to repair the damage he'd done

to every muscle in his body.  Pamela had gotten that one right.  But

this one felt a little crazy.  It was the exact opposite of everything

sensible.  That was why Pamela thought it would work.

    However, it was Jasmine's idea.  Pamela had just agreed to give it

one shot.  For some reason, that worried him.

    Then again, his idea hadn't worked the last time...

    "Ready," Jason said.  "But if this fails, I'll die heroically

defending the two of you, go to Heaven, and I won't be able to haunt

you..."

    Jasmine shook her head.  "Sometimes the best thing to do is the

stupidest one.  People don't know how to react to it -- so they act

exactly the way you want them to."  She took off her jacket, handed it

to Jason, and walked to the center of the room.  Both of the people

eating there watched her.  She looked around, making sure she could see

everything with a quick rotation, checked the nearest table for surface

strength -- then climbed up on it.  Jason and Pamela flanked her from

ground level.  The waiters stopped moving.

    "Your attention, please," Jasmine called out, then "Hey, over here!"

at top volume.  A few people looked away from the screens.  They kept

looking.  The reaction began to run around the circle.  More people

turned their chairs, staring at the center of the room.  They might have

been reacting to something pheromonal, just beyond the senses they knew,

but most of them were turning to look -- and once they were looking,

they didn't look away.  It might have been the tightness of the blouse,

the woman filling it out, or the legend {Free Eats!} printed on the

front, but for the moment, she had their attention.

    "I need a hacker," Jasmine told the group.  "A great one, the best

available.  If any of you qualify, or know someone who does, please step

forward."

    Jason and Pamela waited.

    A young black man with closely-shaved hair, wearing a dark sweater,

faded jeans, and a backpack, stepped away from a occupied cubicle and

took a step towards the center.  "Lady," he observed, "you are nuts."

    "And that would make you a hacker, then?" Jasmine replied.

    He stood still.  "You're too stupid to be Feds --"

    "We wanted to make that clear from the start," Pamela interrupted.

"Answer the question."

    The young man considered.  "Outside," he said, and they followed him

to the sidewalk.  Once they were all clear, he took a long look at the

trio.  "What the hell are you three doing in the Link looking for a

hacker?  Why not just go down to the computer room at Bronx Science like

everyone else?"

    "If you're not what we're looking for, we'll go there tomorrow,"

Jason assured him as he internally groaned.  <We should have checked the

colleges...>

    "You know I could be lying," came the reply.  "I could say I knew

someone and be setting you all up."

    Pamela unzipped her jacket and let it fall open just enough to

reveal the handle of her gun.  "You could," she agreed.  "We could be

doing the same thing.  But neither of us are, right?"

    He looked at her for a long moment, then took one step towards Jason

and put out his hand.  "The name's Cypher.  And you three are either

crazy, desperate, or brilliant."

    Improbable, impossible, and it might have just worked.  "Three for

three," Pamela said.  "You're a hacker, then?"

    He dropped his hand away from Jason's rising arm.  "No, they call me

Cypher because my parents love cryptic crosswords.  Of course I'm a

hacker.  Man, white --"

    "-- wait."  Pamela restrained herself.  The hacker was just feeling

them out...  "You're about to make some joke about how white people are

dumb, and how that must make me the biggest idiot around.  Right?"

    Cypher winced.  "I shouldn't run the dozens in front of someone who

knows the grosses.  Especially when they might pay me."

    Jasmine smiled.  "It's possible."

    "It had better be."  He shrugged.  "Okay.  Let me go inside and

finish my shift.  I'm off in six minutes."



    They wound up at his apartment, which he shared with three

roommates, one of whom was out, and two of whom were passed out.  Pamela

suffered an envy attack when she saw the computer system:  it was worth

more than the apartment.

    Cypher grinned.  "You like it?"  She nodded.  "Had to build most of

it myself.  Computer science scholarships don't leave a lot of free

money.  I work at the Link teaching people how to surf.  Occasionally,

people get sent there looking for me.  No one ever approached it like

that before."

    Jasmine smiled.  "It worked, didn't it?"

    "Yeah.  The boss couldn't believe it, though.  He thought I was just

showing you out.  Wasn't too happy when he figured out I was admitting

my reputation."  Two patrons had come outside to chide them for making

Cypher blow his cover -- and at the same time, had confirmed his

abilities.  He turned on the system.  "But for three thousand, I'll go

anywhere you need and get a new job." They had discussed terms during

the walk over.  Jasmine had done the negotiations, an expert, almost

vicious job:  three grand for everything they asked for -- whatever that

might be, less money for weaker results.

    "You'll get it if you deliver," Pamela promised.  "We need you to

break into the main system of a research firm in Montana called

GenTree."

    "We need you to look at their Email system," Jason told him, "and

get into the database.  We're looking for information on one of their

genetics projects.  We're also going to need blueprints, and security

passwords for the buildings."

    Cypher twitched, a surge of nervous energy that never managed to get

anywhere.  "Genetics!"   More softly, "No one ever asks for anything

legal..."

    "It's for a good cause," Pamela told him.

    "How do I know that?  It might be some kind of medicine -- but you

could be stealing some bug that'll wipe out the country just as easy.

Most people just want me to change their work history, or get them on

Welfare."  He turned and started at Pamela, conviction overriding the

fear in his eyes.  "Pull any weapon you want to, but I'm not going to

help you with that shit."

    The trio spent some time looking at each other.  Cypher broke up the

stare session.  "Look, I usually don't make judgement calls.  You three

want to do a little industrial raid, fine by me.  You don't want to tell

me that much about it, I can understand:  less I know, better off I am.

But this stuff can kill people, and _I don't do that_."

    "And I always thought 'ethical hacker' was a contradiction in

terms," Pamela said softly.  She looked at Jason.  "How much do you want

to tell him, Mouse?"

    Jason smiled wryly.  "How much would _you_ believe?"

    "Don't look at me," Jasmine said.  "I still don't believe any of

it."

    Cypher stared at them.  "You guys into cloning?  Like that sheep

thing?  That I'd be willing to do."

    "No, thanks," Jasmine answered.  "I've already got a twin."

     More looks.  All three had experience with computers -- and knew

the nature of the Information Age:  knowledge was a virus.  It spread.

What one person knew, everyone else could find out, because it all got

posted eventually.

    Pamela had run him through a few technical questions outside the

diner, based on what she knew of her own system, and Jason had presented

some dimly-recalled problems his roommate had dealt with.  Cypher had

solved the problems before they had finished detailing them.  They had

all been so excited about finding an expert, they'd forgotten that he

would have to be trusted -- and for all three, it had become hard to

think of trusting anyone.

    Cypher wouldn't be able to recreate the work -- but if he really

wanted the money, he could contact someone who could.  Or call Nigilo

and tell him someone was making inquires.  They would have the same

problem with every hacker but Jason's former roommate, who was working

somewhere in Tokyo.

    They had to trust someone.  They couldn't afford to trust anyone.

But Sadira needed them...

    "Oh, hell," Pamela said.  "You're not going to believe a word of it,

anyway."  She left the room -- then came back dragging a chair behind

her.  She sat down.  "Want to hear a really weird story?"



    Pamela originally thought it would take five minutes to work through

the details.  It took almost half an hour.  Cypher was dubious at first,

then outright disbelieving, which wavered into skeptical, and finally,

convinced.  There was something in the _starkness_ of her voice...

    "No shit?" he said at the end of the story, the last shreds of doubt

emerging with the words.

    "Only the people running this thing," Pamela said.  "Will you help?"

    Cypher nodded once and turned to the computer.  "Got a main number?"

Jason gave it to him.  "I'll take out every file in the system and gift-

wrap it for you.  Any back doors I should know about, worked once and

needs to be avoided?"  Jason didn't know of any.  "How about key words,

things to search for in the text documents?  Archer, breast,

enlargement..." He turned, waiting for suggestions.

    "Enhancement," Jasmine said quickly, showing off her recently

acquired knowledge.  "Metabolism, metabolic, ATP carriers."  Her brow

furrowed.  "CTGX27..." Jason and Pamela looked at her.  She shrugged.

    "The science files would be from Sunday on if Sadira was working on

them," Pamela said,  "But there might be memos in the system about the

plot, things we can use as evidence."

    "Kind of hard to do that if you steal them," Cypher pointed out as

he began tapping keys.  "Windows, Unix, other?"

    "Windows," Jason replied.

    "Who said it has to be _legal_ confrontation?" Pamela asked

rhetorically.

    "All right.  Let me send out a scout."  Cypher frowned.  "Let's see

how paranoid these guys really are..."  His fingers seemed to blur as he

began typing, occasionally switching to a little mouse control that

looked like a pencil eraser embedded in the keyboard.

    Letters, numbers, and symbols flashed across the screen, too fast

for any of the three to make out, but Cypher could read them:  he

processed the information and used it, inventing new avenues of attack

and defense.  He said nothing as he typed, and the increasing chatter of

the keyboard was the only sound in the room.

    The border of the screen began to pulse through colors, black, then

up through the spectrum, a fresh hue every five seconds, then went past

violet to white --

    -- and stayed there for a second before the screen went black --

    -- a single word with prompt appeared on the monitor:  {Ready>}

    Jasmine saw the reflection of Cypher's smile in the glass.

"Security Clearance Ultraviolet," he said proudly.  Pamela's spine

straightened in surprise.  "And we are _in_."  A quick shrug.  "Tough

stuff.  Might keep out the casual visitor, but I had a need.  So what's

first?"

    "First," Pamela said slowly, "if I ever put another Paranoia gaming

group together, you've got a standing invitation."

    "Second," Jasmine said, "let's search those files."



    Good news and bad news.  Mostly bad.

    They were able to quickly confirm that GenTree still had control of

Sadira -- not that they'd had much doubt.  Sadira was never mentioned

by name, but it was easy enough to read between the lines.  All of the

memos were signed with an initial:  they all read the ones signed "N"

very, very closely.  No one saw Pamela's fists clench.

    There were blueprints available for every GenTree installation --

security maps, really.  There were also security override codes, some of

which could be used at the handprint terminals, and a few that had to be

entered through direct system access.  Each building had its own codes

-- but they were all kept on the central system for backup.

    Jasmine looked at Cypher.  "We'll buy you a beeper -- no, a really

good cell phone, one of those systems that can get anywhere.  When we

get to the site, we'll keep you updated, and you turn everything off and

on when we need it."

    Cypher nodded.  "It's a plan," he said.  "But first we have to

figure out which site it is."

    GenTree was a lot bigger than Jason had ever seen or imagined.

    There were three buildings in Montana, the state for which the

corporation held citizenship.  One each in Mexico, Kansas, Michigan,

Hawaii, and Nevada.  Two apiece for Texas and Canada.  Not all of them

were called GenTree, and some of them weren't visibly connected with the

company -- but they all worked for the same people.

    One of the sites had Sadira under close guard.  It was not mentioned

by name anywhere on the system.  They got the addresses and phone

numbers of the sites through a central address directory -- but in all

memos, the sites were referred to as Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and so on.  No

direct links, and there weren't enough Greek letters to account for the

number of sites on the master list.  Someone was keeping things quiet.

    "I can't match the computer addresses to real places."  Cypher

groaned.  "No active communications, and the phone lines are shielded.

Everything is computer to computer, and it passes through about a

hundred links on the way.  It's a new kind of program, using a modified

phone phreak system to keep their bills down, can't run a trace through

that..."  He clenched his teeth.  "I can't tell where she is!"

    Pamela was equally frustrated, but for once, was hiding it better.

"We've got the gateway in," she said.  "We can keep looking at the

memos as they go up:  they're sharing information with us now, and

someone might let the location slip.  We've got the maps and codes.  And

put those numbers together with the memos, and that's some powerful

evidence."

    The financial picture was on the system:  GenTree made money hand

over fist -- but they were small hands and tightly closed fists.  The

company was surviving, but needed a major financial boost _soon_ if they

wanted to expand again.  Thus, the interest in what Nigilo had at first

termed the Broken Arrow project.

    Pamela had seen a movie where Broken Arrow had been the code for a

stolen nuclear bomb.  She thought the term was a little ironic.

    The current project was called Esteem, and the next one was Sixth

Gear -- Jasmine guessed they were going to work on the accelerator --

and both of them were going to make the company millions of dollars.

The accelerator was by far the more lucrative project, according to the

profit projections, but they were going to solve the breast enlargement

problems first anyway.  Several sequences were mentioned by name.  Jason

automatically wrote down everything that had been eliminated.

    The search word "enhancement" led them into another project -- and

Jason and Pamela found out what GenTree really was.

    They asked Cypher to leave the screen up for a while,  and they all

read through it, until Jason covered his eyes in pain, and Pamela simply

focused on a single word.  "Expendable," she said clearly.  "They were

testing things on poor people, pregnant women, drug addicts because

Nigilo thought they were _expendable_."

    Jasmine's eyes closed, and Cypher stared at the screen in fury.

"Free," he said.  "You get this for free.  Anything I can do --"

    "No," Pamela told him.  "You did the work, you get paid for it."

    "You can't keep me out of this.  I want them taken _down_."

    "Welcome to the club," Jason said, the pain reaching his voice.

"Look at the building plans again.  What's secure?  Where could they

hide someone without people asking questions?"

    "Anywhere," Jasmine said softly.  "They're all corrupt minus two."

    Jason shook his head.  "There's some good people at Helena to go

with the scum.  So she's not there:  they all know her.  Someone might

ask questions."

    Pamela glanced at him.  "With that 'purchased bond and left' memo

Nigilo distributed?  He could just stick her in the basement."

    "They still can't take a risk on having one of them see her.

Eliminate the Helena site.  Which of the buildings is good for hiding

someone?"

    The group looked at the blueprints, and reluctantly concluded that

all of them could be used as a prison with varying degrees of success.

The memo post times were no real clue:  the time between "Retrieval

begun" and the first new piece of data on the system was sufficient to

allow air travel to any of the sites.

    "Those four -- Mexico, Texas, the second Montana site, and Nevada --

are mostly underground," Cypher pointed out.  "That would make things

easier.  Nobody jumps out a window."

    "A lot of genetics labs don't even have windows," Jason told him,

"but you're right.  Montana makes some sense:  keep her close to

Nigilo."

    "Who would relocate to keep an eye on her," Jasmine argued.

    "We only get one shot at this," Pamela reluctantly agreed.  "We need

to be sure."

    More searching, and files were saved.  And then they found Sadira.

    Jason knew Sadira always initialed her work, written and typed, just

to make sure the feedback came to the right person.  Pamela knew she'd

almost had a project stolen by the Tri-Delts in her junior year, and

that was when the practice had started, special ink that soaked in like a

watermark.

    There was a series of notes in the computer, calculations and

eliminations, and at the end of all of them was {S.S.A.}  No one had

deleted it.

    They didn't know where she was.  But at 12:30 p.m. Thursday, she had

been alive.

    "I'll keep running the tap," Cypher said.  "I'll look at the new

stuff as it comes through, send it over to your system, hope for

locations, and ask my friends about running phone traces through that

kind of system.  I'll kept it general and quiet."  He turned to Pamela.

"Too much risk for her if too many people know about this shit."  She

nodded.  "You've got yourself a hacker."



                      29. 86:  Further developments



    Sadira woke up to find the tubes removed, her back in somewhat

better repair, her breasts larger and again pushing against the straps,

and her bladder uncomfortably full.  She carefully eased herself into a

sitting position and looked at the new wheelchair sitting next to the

bed, accompanied by a very large board for her lap, to rest her breasts

on.  There was a folded note on the nightstand, and a large bottle of

pills.

    She considered the amount of damage she would do to herself if she

gave in to her impulse and ran for the toilet -- then suppressed the

urge and picked up the note.  The handwriting was smooth, even and

easily legible.



    {Sadira,}



    {I attempted to contact Mr. Nigilo at his hotel, but was unable to

reach him directly.  He has not returned my calls.  I have taken some

measures which did not require his permission.

    {I was able to procure this wheelchair.  I will understand if you

are reluctant to use it, but your back will heal faster if you put less

strain on it.  It is motorized, and the chair lifts up two feet from the

base so you can reach shelves.  It may inconvenience your work, but it

will reduce your pain.

    {The pill bottle contains procaine.  It is a prescription drug that

interacts well with over-the-counter medications.  It does not influence

or inhibit thought.  Your body should have no resistance to it.

    {While you are out of your rooms, technicians will be installing

rails in the bathroom, similar to those in handicapped stalls.  You are

a very sound sleeper.  My replacement of the needles did not disturb

you.  However, even with the drugs, I felt the noise of construction

would have woken you up, and you needed your rest.  You will find

temporary measures in the bathroom to aid in its use.

    {I have also bought an exercise machine that will allow you to

gradually build up your strength once the growth ceases.  This will also

be installed in your rooms while you are on shift.

    {I will continue my efforts to contact Mr. Nigilo and obtain

permission to purchase bras.

    {My extension number is 832.  Call me if you have further needs.}



         {Carmody}



    The wheelchair could be adjusted for width, and had drop-down

armrests for easy access:  Sadira carefully worked her way into it, spent

a cross-legged minute becoming familiar with the controls, then rolled

for the bathroom.  There was just enough room inside to drive and rotate

the wheelchair.  She boosted herself with the temporary grips Carmody had

glued to the walls and used the facilities, for once too desperate to

notice the cameras.

    The tricky part came when she took her bath -- but her back injury

actually aided in the deception.  She couldn't use a normal range of

motion:  anything that looked unusual would be attributed to her pain.

    She ran the bath first and dumped in a liberal helping of bubble

solution, letting it run until the white foam reached the top of the

tub, then turned off the water and removed all her clothing but the

belts.

    Sadira pushed her breasts inwards a bit, deepening her cleavage and

centering the mass -- then removed the belts from the bottom up, working

slowly, fingers slightly hesitant as they worked the last strap.  She

stepped into the tub as it started to come loose, using the handles to

slowly lower herself towards the bubbles, arching her back slightly,

trying to ignore the pain, dropping the strap on the floor as her ribs

reached the water --

    -- she was in, and while the bubbles weren't high enough to conceal

the apex of her breasts, the bases were hidden when she leaned back.

Sadira stroked them, a little deception for the cameras (and she could

still _reach_ her nipples (barely):  the momentary contact felt good),

then moved her hands towards the bases, sliding them between breasts and

torso, right at the contact point.

    Slowly, hands out of sight beneath the white foam, she removed the

vials and slid them down her body to the base of the tub.  Her breasts

had pinned them to her torso without crushing them.  The straps had kept

her breasts from swinging forward and releasing them -- decidedly

dangerous, considering the chemicals she had grabbed.

    However, the vials were leakproof and waterproof:  they would be

safe enough in the bathtub while she washed.  She'd just have to keep

renewing the bubbles, and if the vials rolled to another part of the

tub, she could drop the soap and feel for them.  It might look a little

odd when she tried to put them back, but another caress should take care

of it.

    Sadira smiled, and began to wash her breasts -- then had an idea.

<There's no reason to wait for tomorrow to start arm workouts.  I've got

something heavy right here.>  She lifted her left breast, did some

cleaning -- lowered it, rested, lifted again --



    This time, Nigilo was in the presentation area.  The people he was

talking to knew better than to shine lights in his eyes.  However, he

had learned from Archer's performance:  there was a pair of sunglasses

in his jacket pocket.

    "Most of you have been willing to come here based on my reputation,

without asking for many details." he began.  No one had been told

anything solid in those calls, and he'd borrowed the funds for the bond

from them:  good faith money.  Most had simply been told to prepare for

a pleasant surprise, and, knowing him, they'd come to the San Francisco

hotel for the conference -- but he'd used up all his good faith in

doing so.

    Still, while the project wasn't finished, he had to start laying the

groundwork for the next stage.

   "I'd like to thank you for that before we begin."  He turned on the

computer and screen.  "This is Sadira Archer, our youngest geneticist.

The photograph is from our company newsletter, taken in June of last

year, on the day she joined us." It was full length:  she was smiling,

leaning against the sign in front of the Helena building.  "This photo

was taken March 16th."  From the building security cameras, which that

fool Stan had been too busy blowing his nose to watch.  The first photo

moved to the side as the second image went on its right.

    One of those who had initially refused to provide funds immediately

said, "So she had an enlargement.  Big deal."

    He was the exception in the room:  a man who held his position

through family ties and nothing else.  Most of the others were starting

to see it:  Nigilo wouldn't call them to view plastic surgery...

    Nigilo smiled.  "I regret that I have no photos of the intermediary

stages -- but this one is quite convincing.  It was taken March 27th."

The second photo vanished, and the third was placed in direct comparison

with the first.

    Dead silence.

    "This is also from the 27th."  A surveillance photo of Archer in the

bathtub.

    "Morphed," one of his regulars said, too fast, trying to make

himself believe it -- but he wanted to believe it was real, Nigilo could

hear it in his voice.  "A computer enhancement.  Tons of those photos on

the Internet."

    Nigilo shook his head.  "The amount of memory required to produce

quality computer animation is considerable -- even if the image doesn't

look realistic.  Any change of a human body that requires maintenance

throughout the film needs a thousand-fold increase in memory and

processing power -- especially considering the flexibility of breasts."

He inserted the videotape:  the bathtub footage played out in full color.

Archer was washing, lifting, moving, shifting...  "Thirty seconds of full

human motion, and I have another two hours for you to view if you wish.

How many gigabytes does that take?  This is _real_, gentlemen.  A virus

that produces a controllable increase in breast size."

    He looked at all twelve men in turn, and found fetishes in the

expressions of two.  "Ms. Archer has a small mental problem," he said,

interrupting the tape.  A few more key taps, and a nude picture of the

dancer was up.

    "While she can stop her growth," he lied -- maybe, who knew with that

crazy woman, she was probably delaying finishing the second virus on

purpose "-- she wishes to surpass her sister to an insurmountable

degree.  She doesn't feel she's there yet."  He smiled.  He'd felt a

need to explain her dimensions:  it wouldn't do for the men to think

that her size was _mandatory_.  "A perhaps regrettable flaw in an

otherwise brilliant scientist."

    The faces of the Japanese and Spanish men said they found that quirk

to be an admirable trait.

    "I have the inventor.  I have the viruses, one to start, one to stop.

I will soon be ready to begin testing.  Ms. Archer worked out the initial

formula on her own genetic code," he lied, "and we are about to move from

the specific to the general."

    He looked around the room.  None of the people there were

geneticists, none of them had any in their employ.  They mostly

distributed drugs.  They might have access to geneticists, but they

wouldn't bother.  Nigilo had discovered that criminals were often lazy:

they wouldn't try on their own what they could buy from others.

    These men might have a touch of laziness, but there was also an

unquestionable ability to gather and delegate authority.  They were so

powerful that the law enforcement agencies didn't suspect their

existence:  they could gather in safety.  Twelve years before, Nigilo

had met one, partially through research, mostly by accident, and today

was the cumulation of all his efforts.

    "I'm selling distribution rights, gentlemen," he said.  "What do you

think an initial payment should be for the right to keep one-third of

the profits from your local sales in perpetuity?"

    And the oldest, an Italian man, stood up.  "Nothing."

    Nigilo kept his reaction internal.  "The floor is open at zero," he

said, inexpertly trying to turn it into a joke.  "Do I hear ten

million?"

    "Nothing," the man said firmly.  "You see, while it is very

difficult to make a woman appear so buxom with a computer, it is easy to

make your extremely busty scientist look more normal for a brief photo."

    Nigilo stared at him.  He felt his hands begin to clench, fought it

back.

    "While it is rare for a woman to be so well-endowed," the man

continued, "it is certainly possible.  You have shown us no real proof

that your virus works.  Always in the past, you have come to us with a

completed project.  I can see no proof of your success here, only

possible deception."  He stared back at Nigilo.  "What is your plan,

Kyle?  To collect millions from each of us in advance, then use the

money to hide from all of us?  Even your ten million multiplied by us

all could not let you run that far."  He pointed around the table.

"Your game with us is always fragile, and you have only what powers we

wish to give you.  Are you so tired of this life that you choose such a

means to leave it?"

    Another man stood up, the Russian distributor.  "He is right," came

the heavy voice.  "This is not proof.  Bring me a girl, let me watch her

grow.  That will be proof.  This young woman is nothing to pay for --"

he smiled "-- though I suspect Carlos would pay your ten million for a

night with her."

    Carlos laughed.  "My wife would extract that and more from my hide,"

he said.  "And she is beautiful enough for me."  The others laughed:

one of the central crime figures of the world was known to be terminally

henpecked.

    "Mikhail is right," the old Italian said.  "If you had brought us a

test subject, with your -- "generic" virus, let us see the process from

beginning to end, we would have believed you, and invested.  Now..."

Nods around the table.  "Perhaps this is real -- but you know better

than to approach us without truth." He turned his back on Nigilo and

slowly walked to the door.

    He turned back just before he put his hand on the knob.  "You all

know me," he said, taking a long look around the table.  "You all

survive on my tolerance.  I say that Kyle has lost our trust today --

and for that, he pays a price."  He examined Nigilo's unblinking eyes.

"We will no longer associate with you, Kyle Nigilo.  Nor will anyone

else, for they know that price well.  This plot has failed -- and there

will be no further plots from you."  He met the eyes of the other eleven

in turn.  "Do any of you wish to challenge my authority?"  He opened the

door and stood aside.

    It seemed to happen very slowly to Nigilo, each frame of the film

flickering, freezing in his vision, all of them but the old man walking

out, their backs turned, never looking at him, their minds already

dismissing his existence from their world.  He had lost it.  Everything

was gone, and it was Archer's fault, Archer had done it to him, the damn

woman had brought him down, the fucking bitch had --

    Only the old man was left in the room, and he turned to look at

Nigilo.  "You may have your viruses, if they are real, and time to pay

the money back," he said.  "You have lost more than that today.

    "But tell me, Kyle," he added softly.  "If she is so insane, so

happy to conquer her sister, why does she look so sad?"

    He left.

    Nigilo never heard the last words.  He was listening to his own

inner voice, and he finally gave it free rein.

    "DAMN YOU!  I'LL DO IT MYSELF!"  The scream echoed through the room

as he drove his fists into the keyboard, shattering it.  "I'LL HAVE ALL

THE MONEY!"  Somehow, there was a chair in his hands, and then it was in

the screen as sparks hissed around him.  "I'LL --"

    He felt the eyes, and turned to see the bellhop staring at him.

"I'll pay for all the damages," he hissed.  "Send the bill to my room."

He stalked out past the stunned young man, full-length, straight-legged

strides, anger driving his limbs, fury blinding his vision, rage

drowning his thoughts.  Only one thought penetrated the storm, drove the

winds faster and whipped the waves against the fractured shore.

    <Her fault.  Her fault.  Her fault...>



    It was a wonderfully cloudy day, so Pamela got to enjoy the walk

through the parking lot at Newark Airport.  She was even able to ignore

the looks focused on her breasts, and the other stares, the ones

directed at her face...

    Sometimes Pamela thought of it as a successful paradigm shift,

the ability to enjoy the grey clouds as much as other people loved to

see blue sky.  Albinism extremis:  she could take the rays of the sun,

at least for a few hours at low strength, but then the burns would

begin, and the sun poisoning soon after that.  Generally, she gave

herself no more than the minimal exposure needed for health, and took

Vitamin D supplements.  She had _adjusted_.

    And there were other times, mostly in the summer, when she looked

towards the beach, at the laughing people frolicking in the waves, and

wondered what would happen if she applied every sunblock known to man,

went out there with them, stopped hiding in the air conditioning, her

layers too hot to wear, dashing from shadow to shadow when she needed to

venture outside, just put chemicals all over her body and joined them,

at least for a few hours...

    She had never tried it.  She knew she probably never would.  She

knew how people would react.  Her strength had a limit.  The

realization had hurt.  She couldn't fight the whole world at once,

not like that, not _alone_.  Pamela went to the beach, and basked on

cooling sand in the moonlight.  That was her life.

    One day, perhaps, with all the luck in the world, Sadira would rub

those lotions across her skin, and they'd run into the water, laughing

and splashing each other and not caring about the eyes...

    She looked up at the sky, and the thick grey blanket that shrouded

her from the sun.  There was a strong chance of rain.  It was going to

be a beautiful day.



    He saw the sign, saw her -- and his face immediately lit up.  He

hurried up to her, dragging his bags behind him.  "Ms. Shaw!  A name

highly honored in my field!"  Douglas Pollota put out his hand, and she

found herself taking it.  The handshake was warm and firm.  "I must say,

my chance meeting with Sadira has led me to more beauty than I had ever

thought possible!"

    Pamela _knew_ how Sadira had felt on the train:  the man was

positively infectious.  His words might be as florid as his ruddy face

-- but there was the sense that he _meant_ every word of it.  He was

looking at her without shock or ridicule, but with frank admiration:

his face was that of a Van Gogh lover discovering a lost painting.

"Thank you," she said, a little overwhelmed by sheer force of

_personality_.  "Are you ready to go?"

    "I am ready, eager, and woefully unworthy of my subject."  They

began to make their way out of the terminal.  "When you called and told

me Sadira was prepared to pose, it was one of the most pleasant shocks I

have received in years.  Quite frankly," he said, sotto voce, "even with

my persuasions and beggings, I had not expected to hear from her again."

    Pamela stopped moving.  Douglas immediately froze.  "Has she changed

her mind?"  Pamela remained quiet, trying to find the right words to

explain the unwanted action.  "Ah, the fickleness of fortune!  Even Lady

Luck must be prepared to compensate for such a cruel blow..."

    "I'll tell you the details in the car," Pamela said, wondering how

much she could say without driving him away -- but if she said nothing,

he might leave.  "Sadira does need you, but not to pose."

    He smiled, but part of the heartiness was forced:  something of

Pamela's tone had gotten through.  "I wasn't aware that I had made such

a connection to inspire romance.  Not that I would be unhappy with that

situation --"

    "Outside," Pamela said more softly, and started moving.

    Douglas followed.



    She told him in the car, all the way through the traffic jam around

the airport, onto the Turnpike and its own delays, and finished as they

reached the line leading to the Holland Tunnel.  He quietly listened

without interruption until she ended with their session at Cypher's.

    "Why me?" he asked quietly, all bluster gone.

    "Sadira told me about you," Pamela replied.  "I recognized your

name.  She liked you.  She _really_ liked you -- and I trust her

judgement.  I found your card in her jacket pocket:  she carries

_everything_ around...  You already know her, a little.  I thought you

might care enough to help."

    "But what can I do?"  Even softer:  he almost seemed to shrink.

    "You didn't always photograph nude women," she reminded him.  "You

used to be a war correspondent, one of the best.  I've got a book of

your work at home."  <And some magazines with your other work...>

"We need someone who can record what's going to happen -- news quality

photographs, and protect himself at the same time.  We'll be too busy to

do it -- but you have the experience, and --" <I hope> "-- the

motivation."

    "I quit because I was tired of looking at dead bodies," Douglas said

softly.  "There's only so much blood a man can see.  And who would have

thought that the children had so much in them?"  A long pause.  "And now

I look at live ones, and it's all I could have wanted.  To record life

instead of death."

    "So --"

    "Wait."  He met her eyes.  "I want to preserve life, and beauty.

That is my work now.  And I will not allow beauty to vanish from the face

of this poor Earth."  A slow nod.  "I will go back into harness for her,

and return to the battlegrounds.  You have my support." Pamela started to

turn towards him, and he raised a hand.  "But media exposure is not the

best thing for her, even afterwards.  If the knowledge of creation was to

escape --"

    "I know," Pamela said quietly.  "I was thinking of faking it."  Her

smile leapt back eighty million years.  "To have them think there was the

possibility of revelation, the connections to expose GenTree..."

    "And how do you propose to keep it from turning on you?"  Pamela told

him.  Douglas smiled.  "Ambitious," he said.  "If we can find the site

where they had done their testing on the project --" the anger came

through in the word:  Pamela had told him about the "expandable" memo

"-- it would go better.  And I can do one other thing.

    "You are in a war.  I have some expertise in warfare, if only from

proximity.  I can advise you."

    "I'm a gamer --"

    "I know the term.  It will be helpful.  But imagination and practice

seldom bear resemblance, unless your dreams turn to disaster as a matter

of course.  I can teach you how to minimize that possibility."

    Traffic started moving again, and Pamela gently pressed the gas

pedal.  "Thank you."

    "Oh, I am motivated by extreme self interest," Douglas assured her,

his normal joviality returning.  "I still wish for her to pose, and this

is the only way I can assure that she will be available.  The tradition

of the Archer family must be maintained."

    "Tradition?"

    "I cannot reach my bags at the moment.  I will show you when we

reach our destination."  He smiled widely.  "I wonder how the Princess

will feel about my presence?"

    "She accepts it," Pamela said.

    "I am glad to hear that."  They moved forward another ten feet.

"Tell me; should I ask you --"

    "-- you can ask.  But I'm going to say no.  I can believe a Net

newsgroup for an albino fetish, but I wouldn't go there unless I was

telling them to get a life."  Which sounded a little weird to her:  she

could sympathize with some of the breast fetishists, but not with skin

tone interest?  "And there _can't_ be a magazine."

    "What albino fetish?  You are lovely on your own merits."

    Pamela internally groaned.  There was something about the man that

made it impossible to get mad at him.  "I may have to roll down a window

to let some of this stuff out --"

    "-- ah, you taught Sadira that trick."

    "No, she taught it to me."  Another few feet.  "I modified it a

little, though.  I usually throw the source with the window closed."

He laughed, merry and booming, and Pamela allowed herself a single

mental sigh.  She'd found someone else she couldn't intimidate.



                30. 91-92:  Construction work (column #6)



    "Shit!"  The file went flying across the room and nailed Temperi in

the side:  the weight was negligible, but the impact carried more force

than it had been thrown with.  He jerked upright as if he'd been shot --

 and there was suddenly a guard in the room.  Their response time had

been improving.

    Sadira turned to him as if pleading to the only sane authority

available.  "This _idiot_ finds an avenue that we spend _four days_

running down before we find out it won't work!  MORON!"  She pushed the

wheelchair four feet towards him.  The guard pulled his trank pistol.

Sadira ignored it.  "_Think_, ya fuckin' idiot, or we're gonna be stuck

in the same room until I can touch ya from _dis_ distance!"  Temperi

recoiled, fear taking over his face, and Menken showed an emotion for the

first time:  amusement.  She spun the wheelchair around and fumed her way

back to the computer.

    The guard stayed in the room for a few minutes until he was

convinced it had been a momentary outburst, then left.  Sadira furiously

typed.  Only part of the outburst had been faked.  <Four days,> she

thought, looking at the clock in the lower right of the screen:  11:00

a.m. Saturday, March 30th.  <Sixteen inches.>  She looked down.  The

board was still helping, but she was going to overlap it in a few days.

At which point, Carmody would bring her a larger board.

    There had been no word from Nigilo on the bras.  According to

Carmody, there had been no words from him at all:  he had been out of

contact since reaching California.  Sadira wished him a plane crash from

which he was the only fatality, with everyone else landing softly in an

unclaimed gold mine -- but she knew her luck wasn't that good.  If it

was anywhere near that level, she never would have wound up here in the

first place...

    Carmody had kept his other promises, though:  her cell now had

handicapped adaptations, and the exercise machine had been put on

Thursday, during her work time.  She'd made immediate use of it.  The

exercise increased her energy needs -- and didn't seem to divert calories

from the growth -- but she had plenty of Powerbars.  <Joy.>

    Another line of pursuit:  she had to find something else to track

down.  Her partners were useless, worse than useless, they were in the

way...  Sadira wanted the metabolism data:  she'd happily switch to four

inches a _year_ if she could find the brakes by themselves -- but she

wouldn't be allowed to have it until BE-2 was finished --

    -- and what happened if she stopped the breast growth without

slowing her metabolism?

    Why hadn't that occurred to her before?

    The thought was laced with sarcasm.  <Right:  focused effort is so

easy right now.  I have so little to worry about...>

    The acceleration had been a side effect from the combination of the

macromastia gene and leukemia damage (disease _and_ treatment).  She'd

discovered a way to produce it without those factors.  She'd thought that

disabling the growth would slow her back to normal -- but it wasn't a

guarantee.  <'think things through...'>  Where would all the energy go,

if it wasn't being used for growth?

    The realization hit her.  <More testing.  Shutting down the growth

on _my_ body might bring my metabolism back to normal -- but might leave

me as a portable fireball, and eventually, I'd crash and burn.  Stopping

the metabolism without the growth buys me time.  I need the metabolic

data, and they won't let me have it.  My only hope is another

brainstorm -->  But they never came at her command:  she beat mental

fists against the barrier between levels, trying to get through -- and

nothing happened.

    <Maybe there is no solution.  Maybe I'll just grow until I die.>

    She stared at the screen.  <Don't be an idiot, Sadira.  Teenage

girls don't grow forever.  Jasmine didn't, even if it looked like it for

a while.  There's a solution.  It just has to be found.  If I stopped

now, I could live like this -->

    The thought was startling.  She couldn't have surgery, she'd need

extensive physical therapy, expensive clothes, all the stares -- but it

beat the alternative.  If only for one second, she'd _accepted_ it.

    And maybe there was that good side, the feelings from her nipples,

that stupid petty part of her brain that was happy to be bigger than

Jasmine, the way she was intimidating Temperi --

    <Wait.>  She looked across at him.  He sensed it and scurried away.

<That's probably how Jasmine got started.  Remember what Pamela said.

How you look is part of who you are.

    <I have to be Sadira Archer.  With very, very, very big breasts.>

    She glanced at the phone, and got her thoughts back under control.

<Breast size isn't going to solve this.  Brains are.  Maybe if I tell

Carmody the metabolic data ties directly into the breast data -- he'd

believe that, the proof is right in front of him -->  She wheeled over to

the phone and placed the call.



    Pamela absently listened to the grunts as Jason did push-ups in the

hallway.  His leg was completely healed, and all the energy had to go

_somewhere_.  She had held a tiny hope that his metabolism would

automatically drop back to normal once the healing was over, but that

had been dashed against the sit-ups he had done the previous night,

repeating the motions until he collapsed in near exhaustion, just awake

enough to eat two Powerbars before falling asleep -- and doing it all

again four hours later when the alarm rang.  After those sessions, he was

calm, focused -- but without them, hyperactivity sped in, and then

shaking, as his body tried to expend the energy.  They were careful not

to let him get past that stage.

    If he didn't keep burning the calories, his cells would accumulate

more energy then they could process or store, and then that energy would

be released -- consuming the cells.

    She never should have given him the virus --

    -- but had she been shot, she would demanded it.  And he would have

given it to her, for the same reasons she had given it to him.  For love.

Crazy, wonderful, insane, stupid, unreasoning love.

    Pamela wondered what would happen if <no, when, believe _when_> they

got Sadira back and told her the truth...

    The grunts stopped:  she heard Jason get up and start walking, coming

towards her.  She looked up from the Mutator to see him toweling the

sweat from his forehead.  "Any luck?"

    "Some."  She glanced at the screen.  "This looks like the right

area, and _this_ looks like it might affect it.  I'll be doing the test

runs soon.  You might have guessed right on the location."

    "You found a possible way to reach it," he pointed out.  "We'll see.

If this doesn't work out, at least I'll be in great shape."

    <You'll be the best-conditioned corpse in the morgue -->  Some of

the thought had made it to her face.  Jason looked at her, about to say

something --

    -- Douglas and Jasmine came around the corner.

    "'Girls of the science labs?'" Jasmine quoted.  "How many people

were you planning to find for that one?"

    "A minimum of three," Douglas smiled.  He was carrying a rolled-up

magazine under his arm.  "Ah, Pamela!  I promised to show you that

Archer tradition once I dug through my bags.  I was recently in Britain,

speaking to one of my occasional paycheck distributors.  It seems --" he

glanced at Jasmine "-- that another member of your family has joined the

ranks."

    Jasmine perked up.  "Another Archer?  Coincidence.  I've got _one_

sister -- England?"

    Douglas nodded.  "This is the magazine," he said, taking it out from

under his arm.  "_Humungous_.  Published in Britain, but it's only

distributed in the States.  Makes things easier on the local girls, I

imagine."

    "Kay."  Jasmine, quietly, as if she hadn't used the word in some

time.

    Pamela concentrated.  Shortly after she and Sadira had cemented

their relationship, Sadira had started writing a cousin --

    "Kay Archer," Douglas confirmed.  "Here, take a look."  One swift

movement unrolled, opened, and marked the proper place in the magazine.

    All of them automatically, in spite of themselves, and in honest

curiosity, any one or combination, looked, at least for a moment.

    Jason's eyes flickered away almost immediately.

    Jasmine and Pamela kept looking.

    Pamela, attention focused on the third picture -- the one where

Kay was sitting and leaning over, legs apart, breasts dangling between

-- softly murmured "I suddenly feel very small..."

    Jasmine glanced at her.  "No fair."  Pamela looked up.  "I called

first dose back at Al's Barn.  When this thing is perfected, it's

mine --" she paused, considering the physical consequences of matching

Sadira "-- for thirteen inches, enough to put me ahead of the other

dancers.  Why go _artificial_ when _natural_ is available?"

    "I _like_ my size," Pamela protested.  "All my _clothing_ is for

this size."  She looked at the picture again.

    <Yeah, that's a breast fetish.  Wonderful.  Actually, _two_

fetishes.  Either nothing at all, or plenty and to spare.>  Pamela was

comfortable with her body, it had taken years to reach that state, and it

wasn't constant -- but looking at the picture, she still wondered.  What

_would_ it be like to be that large, or larger -- or, like Sadira, still

growing, reaching for triple digits, becoming bigger than anyone had ever

been...

    She pictured it.

    Several desperate breaths later, she managed to stop laughing.

    Everyone was looking at her, confusion and concern in equal doses.

"Nothing," she gasped.  "A funny thought, that's all."  She straightened

up.  "I've got to get back to work.  Thanks for the comic relief."

    They kept looking at her, but dispersed.

    Once they were gone, Pamela allowed herself a few last giggles.

<Larger...>  Still...  She looked at the screen and went back to work.

    Forty minutes later, the new sequences were grafted to the

proto-virus.  Three hours later, she'd replicated enough to test with.

    An hour after that, the simulations were finished, and completely

inconclusive.  It might work.  It might not.  It seemed to depend on how

bright the monitor was.  Coin toss.

    "Cell samples," she muttered, heading for the refrigerator.  Test it

on them, see what happened.  She gathered them up and took them to the

microscope.

    Jason's samples were holding up well, drawing their nutrients from

the container -- but the food supply was being used quickly.  Pamela

guessed that the three-year tin would be drained in two months or less.

Instead of burning out, they were using the energy to fight the slow-down

effects of the extreme cold.  (She'd had the freezer section upgraded so

that it could reach -70 Celsius.  The stall tactic wasn't practical for

the Mouse)  She took off a bit of food with the samples: no point in

having them die of starvation while she looked at them.  They would stay

chilled long enough.

    <Okay,> Pamela thought.  <Test the muscle tissue first.  Get in close

focus.>  She could almost see the energy transfer taking place.

<Information is flowing:  the computer knows what the calorie burn rate

is.  Add the virus.>  Just a drop, just enough to affect the sample --

and there it was, coming in from the right.  <Cell wall contact.

Invasion.  Interaction.  Reprogramming.  Watch it.  One eye on the data.

The dial is at ten.>

    Nine.  Eight.

    Pamela realized she was holding her breath, let it out, took another

one and held that.  Seven.  Six.  It paused.

    <It's not an arithmetic progression.  There's a hell of a jump

between nine and ten.  If it stops here, Sadira's down to an inch a day.

We'll have bought her time.  The Mouse gets the first dose, and we go

get her, she'll work out the rest -->

    Five.  Four.  Three, human-normal rate.

    <Stop.  Stop right there.  Please...>

    Two, and she pulled back from the screen.  One, and she didn't want

to watch, but she had to, she couldn't stop --

    -- zero.

    "MOUSE!"

    He was there, standing at her left, looking at the screen, reading

the data flow...

    "Oh my God," he breathed softly, and then Jasmine was there.

    "Did you find it?  Is that the cure --" she saw their faces.

    Douglas came up, spotted their reactions, and didn't say a word.

    "Three minutes," Pamela whispered.  "Three minutes from infection to

total metabolic shutdown.  The cells weren't programed to slow down,

they _completely stopped processing energy_.  The dial went from ten to

_zero_."

    "Fatal," Jasmine said, her voice even softer.

    "It's progress," Jason rallied.  "It's a matter of degree now.  We

can move the dial, now we learn to set it."

    Pamela sterilized the sample area, then made sure the virus tin was

sealed shut.  "Blood agent," she told them.  "I don't screw around with

airbornes unless I have to.  Non-contagious:  sends message and dies.

We're all safe.  And if we got a dose by accident, we'd use the

accelerator to counter it."  She knew that, they all knew that.  It still

needed to be said.  "The Mouse is right.  We can move the dial in either

direction.  We've got to figure out how to stop it where we want it."

    But she looked at the screen, and suppressed the need to shudder...



    Carmody almost didn't recognize his superior:  Nigilo was wandering

through the corridor, clothes disheveled, unshaven, posture off-line,

almost staggering along.  "Sir?"

    Nigilo focused tired eyes on Carmody.  "The good news, Carmody, is

that we get to keep all the money.  The bad news is that we have to

spend all of it, too."  His gaze drifted.  "They turned me down.  They

said it was being faked, that I'd doctored the photos downwards.  I

went around the waterfront trying to find new connections, but no one

would listen to me.  Isn't that funny?  They thought I had made her

_small_."  He laughed, one sharp bark of false mirth.  "I find that very

funny."

    "Sir --"

    "I'm going to my office to pick up the budget reports and find a way

to pay back that bond," Nigilo said absently.  "Then I'll go home.

Maybe I'll work on it at home.  You work on it, too.  Find projects to

cut, find a way we can do this on our own.  They won't interfere either,

you see.  We have it all to ourselves."

    Carmody said the only thing he could say.  "Yes, sir."

    "Good."  He began to walk down the hall, then stopped and said, "Is

there anything else to report?  Anything urgent?  Progress?  Requests?"

    "Ms. Archer severely injured her back on Thursday.  She is currently

in a wheelchair, recovering.  She is still working."

    "Oh."  The tone was as neutral as his own.  "Is she."  A statement.

    "Yes, sir.  However, unless we procure appropriate garments, this

sort of injury will occur again, perhaps at a completely disabling

level.  She cannot continue working with her current materials."

    And the voice was cold, arctic wind over glaciers.  "You want to buy

the fucking bitch bras."

    Carmody saw the fingers curling, the eyes snap to dangerous

awareness, and somehow stood his ground.  "She needs them, sir."

    Silence.

    Nigilo took several slow breaths.  "Then go buy them.  Get her every

fucking bra she could ever need.  Blow the budget.  Fill the room.  See

to her goddamn pain.  Make sure she's perfectly comfortable for as long

as she's with us.  Got it?"

    "Yes, sir."

    "Good."  And Nigilo walked away.



    Carmody looked at the computer screen.  It had taken some amount of

hunting, but he was beginning to run down possibilities.  The task wasn't

hopeless:  there was a supply for every demand.  He had found several

expert corsetieres, but they all needed to do custom fitting.  He could

neither bring them to Sadira, or Sadira to them.  Somewhere in the

world...

    He didn't take a deep breath.  He wanted to, but he repressed the

instinct.

    Nor did he look at the files he had carefully compiled on Sadira's

companions, research on their lives, skills, loves, and families,

information that only he had seen while working in Helena.  There were

cameras in his office, and someone might glance at his screen and wonder

why he was consulting that data.  He was Mr. Nigilo's second, above

reproach and blameless -- to all but Nigilo.  He could never be sure...

    He noted with some wonder that somewhere in the last thought, he

had lost the "Mister."

    Carmody leaned in close to the computer screen, blocking it from the

camera's view, and typed.

    His memory was correct.  And the information on the screen was

everything he could have hoped for.  _Everyone_ had a web site these

days...

    A phone number for direct access, although Email orders were

accepted, and he had credit cards under different names for supply

purchase -- but he couldn't wait for someone to check their mail.  He

looked at the clock:  one p.m. Montana time, which meant it was eight

p.m. at the main branch, and he _had_ to speak to the owner.  Would the

shop still be open?  Did he have a chance to make the connection?

    He left the Web page, wiped his link record, picked up the phone, and

dialed.

    The phone rang, once, twice -- and was picked up.

    He put a false cheer in his voice, creating the character and the

lie as he spoke -- and he spoke quickly, wishing for more skill at

deception, because the call might be recorded, and the cameras had audio

pickups.  The woman on the other end couldn't be allowed to fully

introduce herself.

    "Susan?" he asked with badly-faked heartiness.  Confirmation.  "I'm

happy to find you still open!  I've got an order to place for overnight

shipment, and I'm told you're the only one who might be able to help."