Clockwork

Sol was born on a Monday, into a depressingly normal family. His dad worked in an office, and came home on Friday with fish and chips. His mum left work to look after him was a baby, got a part-time job when he went to play-school, and by the time he moved to the junior school was working full time again. Not that Sol minded, of course; it meant that there was no-one to bother him for a few hours each day after school. Some kids would've used the time to raise hell. Sol, on the other hand, just sat at home and read. Parents would describe this as studiousness, but the truth was he didn't have the courage to do anything more interesting. His was an uneventful childhood.

He went to a middle-of-the-road university, and while on his way to a middle-upper-second class degree had a middling amount of fun. He graduated, promised innumerable people he would keep in touch, and then never quite managed to do so. He moved to the city, and got a job that he enjoyed, in an office that he could tolerate. At first, his parents asked him what he did there, but whenever they did their eyes would glaze over, and soon they stopped bothering.

Although the office was mostly a chore, it did have moments of brilliance; it was there, for example, that he met his wife-to-be. If you'd told him that at the time, he would have stared at you in blank disbelief. When they first met, they barely noticed each other. Then they both, independently, became intrigued by each other, they circled each other like wary planets for what seemed like an age before finally colliding. When they did, they found out that their friends had thought they were together all along.

Life wore on, as life is wont to, and Sol and his wife had a daughter, moved to a bigger house, and grew happily older together. Then, one day, about fifty-four years after that Monday (which isn't long, by modern standards), Sol dropped dead. One minute he was walking out to his car, parked in front of the bigger house, and the next his body was laying on the gravel, it's eyes wide open and staring at the sun. The doctors said it was heart failure, but as doctors often point out when patients aren't around, you rarely see a corpse with a beating heart.

On a different, and entirely unrelated, Monday, Isabelle walked through the aesthetic and yet curiously unmoving landscaping of the business park. She examined the photocopied map, compared it to a sign, and then headed off around the beautiful, nondescript lake towards the squat glass building on the other side.

She was, she reflected, walking in an altogether inappropriate fashion, rolling her hips like a forties movie star. It was the price for wearing these shoes, which were unquestionably the best choice for the situation; not only did they look great, they added about two and a half inches to her height. At least she'd make an impression.

She reached the other side of the lake, pausing to note the generic sandwich shop sitting on stilts near the edge, and walked up to the front door. A polished brass plaque declared that the first floor was owned by Jupiter Inc.. There were spaces for company names for the other two floors, but they were blank, and there were brash To Let signs in the upper windows. This didn't matter, though; Jupiter was where she was going.

A last check of the map, and she strode (wiggled) towards the door, and pushed it open. Inside was a surprisingly small lobby, barely big enough for the receptionist's desk and two easy chairs. No-one was there. Isabelle waited for a couple of minutes, unsure what to do, and then sat down in one of the chairs and started to leaf through the old magazines and newer, glossier brochures.

She still hadn't found anything of interest a few minutes latter, when she was interrupted by a mechanical clunk. A short, thin woman with very straight, very black hair came in through a door next to the receptionist's desk. She dumped the pile of folders she was carrying, and then looked at Isabelle as if a stranger, sitting in the chairs and thumbing the magazines, was a hitherto unheard of experience.

"Oh, I'm sorry; have you been waiting long?"

"Not really; I'm Isabelle..."

"Isabelle Morgan; yes, we're expecting you. Hope you didn't have too much trouble finding us? Good. So, you're starting in Jerry's team? Well, if you just give me a minute to sort these out I'll show you through."

Isabelle simply stayed there, half standing, not sure what to do next, like a mute rabbit caught in verbal headlights. The other woman turned away and stared fixedly at the pile of folders on the desk for a moment or two, and then, apparently satisfied that she's sorted them out, turned back to the door and pushed a card into a slot above the handle (clunk).

"This way."

Behind the tiny lobby was a far more capacious open-plan office. Low fuzzy walls partitioned the space, just high enough so that someone sitting at their desk had to stand up to see across the room. In fact, this was exactly what people were doing.

Cliche compares such curious office-workers to meercats. However, meercats act with some kind of organisation, whereas the various employees at Jupiter were bobbing up and down at random, so much so that Isabelle was reminded more of the whack-a-mole games at the fairground. Her guide zigzagged through the maze, past the water coolers and pot plants, to an office on the back wall, and opened the door, giving a commentary as she went.

"This is admin; my desk is over there" (messy desk and boxes of folders everywhere) "Over there is accounts. These two run the computers" (they half-rise out of their seats, but Isabelle and her hostess are long gone) "These are the web guys" (one beard and T-shirt, one bottle-blond, one hoodie and combats) "Research, Forecasting, PR, Marketing, Jerry - this is Isabelle"

"Ah, thank-you. Come in..."

Isabelle was still craning her neck, trying to catch everything that had been pointed out to her, that she almost failed to notice her new boss for a second or two.

"So, you've met Heather then?"

Isabelle twisted round, but Heather was already slalomming away on some other errand.

"Yes. Is she always like that?"

"Only on weekdays. Come inside and have a seat."

The vast majority of Jupiter Inc.'s employees had little or no idea what the company actually did. There were branches dotted around the world, and all of them seemed to spend all of their time sending information to the others. It was a safe bet that they didn't manufacture anything; it's hard to miss factories, warehouse, distribution centres and the like. They also weren't traded on any of the stock exchanges, and didn't have anyone on any of the trading floors, though they did seem to be interested in what was happening in various markets. While they had a huge number of IT staff, they weren't in the IT business. Most of the staff started out curious, but soon became too tied up in their work to think about it much.

All of this put Isabelle in a slightly odd position. She wasn't one of the chosen few who knew the big picture, but she was part of the team that had to market it. Her boss, Jerry, didn't know the big picture either, but he did have a fair idea of the bits of it that related to marketing, which allowed him to do his job.

"I'm afraid I'm just about to head off for a client meeting; how about you come along and sit in? Should help you get an idea of how we do things."

Hence, Isabelle ended up in the passenger seat of Jerry's Audi (unlike Jerry himself, it was a sporty and youthful model), heading out into the brownish, flat countryside. For the first twenty miles or so, they'd made pleasant enough small talk, but now the conversation had petered out, and they were driving along in silence, save for the dull growl of the engine. Eventually, something occurred to Isabelle.

"Where are we going?"

"Oh, it's actually the client's house. And his office - he works from home."

"So, who is he?"

"Mr. Sherwood. He's one of our regulars. I'm not quite sure how he started out, but now he owns several quite large businesses."

Isabelle was hoping that this biography would lead in to a explanation of what she was expected to do, but apparently not. Jerry lapsed into silence again, and they drove on.

Eventually, they arrived at Mr. Sherwood's house. It was, almost literally, in the middle of nowhere; uncultured fenland stretched to the horizon in all directions. The house itself was huge; a three-story, boxy affair with an understated portico at the entrance. A large garage - easily enough for three cars (or four, if they were small, but that didn't seem likely) - stood slightly off to one side, it's modern construction conspicuous next to the house. The Audi pulled up to the front of the house, and it's occupants walked to the door and rang the bell. After a minute, the door was answered by a grey-haired man in a suit, who Isabelle took for the butler until Jerry shook his hand and introduced them.

Mr Sherwood lead them in to a large dining room, one wall of which was almost made up of large, tall windows that let in floods of the chilly winter light. The three of them sat at the end of the long dining table. Without any preliminaries, Mr Sherwood and Jerry began to talk shop. Most of it washed over Isabelle like a wave - it was largely to do with previous meetings, and they kept going in to details that Isabelle couldn't follow. She glanced out of the window, but there wasn't anything to look at for miles, so she turned her gaze back to the room and her attention to trying to follow what was going on.

"Well, what do you think?"

They were back in the car; evidently, the meeting had finished, although she couldn't remember quite how.

"It's a little hard to say."

"Why?"

"Well, I'm still not sure what we were doing there. Do marketing usually go out and visit clients? I thought it would be more, you know, advertising, and..."

"Have you ever seen an advert for Jupiter?"

"Well, no."

"It's not worth it; our services are so specialized that only a handful of people would ever want or need them. And those people don't pay a lot of attention to adverts. So, we go and visit them, and pitch the product face to face."

"We're sales reps?" Isabelle was disappointed; this wasn't what she'd hoped for.

"No. Well, sort of. We also design the product literature, have a say in who to sell to, and how to do it."

"I was meaning to ask; what is it that we sell?"

"If you have a look in my case, you'll find a couple of reports - that's it, the one's with the blue covers. Take them and have a read."

Isabelle spent the rest of the day sorting out her desk, getting a card for the door, and being given a user name, password and crash course by one of the Computer Guys, Ted. At six, most people had left, so she grabbed the reports and headed back to her car (which she now realized she had put in the wrong car park; at least she knew for tomorrow). By the time she'd changed, eaten and phoned her mother to tell her how the first day went, it was quite late. She slumped on the sofa, with a plate of french bread and taramasalata, and started to read.

She'd turned the TV on for background noise; News Night was rattling away in the background. She didn't notice until a civil war in Africa was mentioned; she'd read about it one of the reports a few moments before. The talking head briefly mentioned the effect that this would have on the world diamond market; the report devoted about twenty pages to the same question. What this has to do with Jupiter was still, however, anyone's guess.

She stayed up until the early hours, curled up on the sofa, reading through the reports. When she had finally finished them all, she was non the wiser. She went to bed, but didn't get much sleep; she kept trying to find some common thread that linked the reports, but she she couldn't. When she arrived in the office the next morning, she still had no idea what Jupiter did.

"Read the reports?" asked Jerry, as wandered past her desk on the way in.

"Yes. I still don't get what Jupiter's business is, though. They seemed to deal with anything and everything."

"I can't tell you what Jupiter's business is, because I don't know myself, but what we deal with here is reports; we compile reports for clients."

"Reports about what?"

"Anything and everything, like you said."

"How? I mean, we can't have experts on everything, can we? The company isn't that big."

Pause.

"Is it?"

"That," said Jerry, "is the trick to it."

Outside the generic sandwich shop were a few picnic tables; in the summer it would be nice to sit out by the lake, and get out of the office for a little while. The January weather, however, made sitting outside a distinctly unattractive proposition, and so people stayed indoors. The glass-walled meeting room was often co-opted as an unofficial break room, and it was here that Isabelle sat, munching a sandwich she held in both hands, and reading a newspaper that she had spread on the table in front of her.

"Have you got the Review?"

She looked up. Across from her sat a man who she'd seen around the office, but had somehow never met. She flipped through the sections of the newspaper, and handed him the correct one.

"I don't think we've met. I'm Isabelle."

"Sol. You just started?"

"Three weeks ago now; I'm still getting up to speed."

"You're on Jerry's team, right? How's the new promo material coming?"

"Not bad, although I have to admit it's a little frustrating being so vague. How about you; what team are you on?"

"I'm not on a team, as such. I tend to work with a couple of people in Bombay and Toronto, but mostly I'm just left to do my own thing."

"Which is?"

"I'm a holistic analyst."

This took Isabelle a little by surprise. She thought about asking him to repeat himself, but thought better of it. He was speaking perfectly clearly; she knew exactly what he had said, she just had no idea what he meant. She hazarded a guess.

"What, crystals and herbs and things?"

Sol smiled the smile of someone walking down a familiar and well-trodden path. Isabelle got the distinct feeling that everyone hazarded the same guess, and that that guess was way off the mark.

"No. Not 'holistic' in some New Age, flowers-in-your-hair way. It just means that I take everything into account when making an analysis."

"Oh." Isabelle didn't feel like pressing things further; she had enough to sort out without trying to work out what the hell this guy's job was; it sounded like Management Consultancy, or a Habit of Highly Effective People. She went back to reading her paper, and after a brief pause Sol opened his.

Mr Sherwood sat in his study reading a Jupiter report on his computer. He sat in a bulging office chair upholstered in aging maroon leather. The computer was in the centre of a huge antique desk which was topped with leather the same colour as the chair. There were no wires connected to it; Sherwood was an old man, but he kept up with things, and the latest thing was wireless, so wireless he had gone. The people who sell wireless technology invariably illustrate it with a library photo of a dentally-perfect, Gap-sporting twenty-something reclining on a beige sofa, gleefully tapping away at a laptop on their knee, more often than not with a colour-coordinated Labrador at their feet. Needless to say, this wasn't Mr. Sherwood's motivation; he just wanted to keep his desk tidy.

Occasionally, he would break off from reading the report, switch windows, and dash off a terse e-mail to some agent in a far-flung corner of the world. Ten years ago, he would've had to use the phone, or at least get someone else to, but now he could pull strings across the globe from the comfort of his antique, clutter-free desk.

Other than the e-mails, he rarely paused when compiling the reports; you didn't pay someone the amount of money that he was paying Jupiter and then expend extra effort trying to make sense of what they gave you; that would be like having a dog and barking yourself. Jupiter reports were designed so that they could be read and understood straight through, without stopping; the mental equivalent of fast food. This didn't mean they skimped on depth or accuracy, it's just that the information was presented in a way that allowed you to get what you wanted without fuss or effort; conveyer-belt sushi.

This report was unusual, though. Not only did Mr. Sherwood pause, he stopped completely and sat back. A couple of seconds latter, he leant forward, read the paragraph again, then opened another tab and started to check the news wires. After a little while, he mailed his agent in Columbia, and instructed him to find out anything he could about the Minister for the Interior.

It was Friday, and the staff a Jupiter were partaking in a fine British tradition, the Friday Pub Lunch. Of course, as they were on a business park in the middle of nowhere, the pub in question was a fair way away, and hence a convoy of cars was snaking it's way along country roads towards town.

Isabelle didn't drink at lunchtime, and so had volunteered to drive; she was chauffeuring Ted, who was sat beside her in the passenger seat, Sol, and Beth, from the web team. Everyone had just bundled into whatever car was nearest; they were all going to meet up at the pub anyway.

Sol and Beth weren't saying much, but Ted was talking animatedly, twisting round in his seat and gesticulating wildly. This continued throughout the journey, and into the pub, so the four of them ended up sitting together, abutting the marketing team on the long bench seat.

Sol was delegated to order the food and drinks; he got Beth to save his seat and went to the bar. When he was out of earshot, Ted leaned in towards Isabelle and whispered conspiratorially.

"Has he told you what he does yet?"

"Don't start," interjected Beth, "You don't know anything about it."

"Look, I'm just saying, it all seems like a bit of a con to me."

"Just because you don't get it..."

"I'm sorry," interjected Isabelle, "but what exactly is it? He told me the name, but that's about it."

Ted and Beth looked at each other, then both started to speak at once. Ted won; Beth shut up and let him go on.

"It's like reading tea-leaves, only with numbers."

"Don't talk shit; it's not voodoo or anything, and in any case, it seems to work. Now, shut up - he's coming back."

Moments later, Sol placed four glasses on the table (three pints, one Coke) and sat down.

"What's up?"

Silence. Beth was about to speak when Jerry leaned over.

"All ready for the big push, then?"

The "big push" was a drive to release a new product line. Jupiter, or at least the U.K. office, tailored their reports for individual clients. However, over the last few months they'd been working on a new way of getting the reports out; instead of buying the reports individually, clients would be able to subscribe to the service, and get reports that were updated continuously. Everyone had been working flat out to prepare, but no-one was harbouring any illusions that it would work smoothly first time. The official launch was on Monday, and everyone fully expected the next week or two to be hell.

"We've lined up enough subscribers," continued Jerry, "Just hope the system can live up to their expectations."

Beth and Ted both stared daggers at Jerry, who had obliviously turned back to the rest of his team. Sol just sat drinking his lager, with a look of beatific calm. Isabelle mouthed "I'm sorry," then quickly changed the subject.

"What, er, what are people up to tonight?"

"Film" Sol replied

"Oh, which one?" asked Ted, half turning in his seat. By the time the food arrived, the four of them had arranged to meet up at the cinema.

When they came out of the film, it was raining. The film had had quite an up-beat ending, so this was something of a contrast. At first, they barely noticed it, emerging from the cinema chattering about what they'd just seen. They became aware of the rain at the same moment that they realized they were all walking off in different directions. Ted invited everyone to his place, which wasn't far away, for coffee - he wasn't ready for the evening to end yet. Everyone else demurred; they had to get home, it'd been a long day.

Isabelle and Beth ended up sharing a cab (Sol decided to walk). They started off talking about the film, but soon the conversation drifted back towards their own lives. Isabelle asked Beth what she thought of Sol.

"I like him," replied Beth, after thinking for a while, "But I don't think I understand him."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"Well, I always get the feeling that there's more to him than I know."

"O.K., now I'm confused by you as well."

"It's just..." Beth paused. She couldn't find the right words. "He's..." She paused again. "I can't find the right words. You'll have to find out for yourself. Do, though. I mean, it's worth the effort."

The taxi pulled up outside Beth's, and she gave Isabelle a fiver, thanked the driver, and shut the door. Alone in the back of the cab, Isabelle found herself thinking of Sol. Perhaps Beth was right. Perhaps he was worth the effort.

On Saturday, Isabelle slept late, then spent too much of the rest of the day wandering around in her pyjamas. One of the things she did before getting dressed was to read everything the Internet had to say on holistic analysis. There wasn't much. Everything that there was seemed to be pitched at those who already knew the basics. It seemed to be part economics, part sociology, and part psychology, but it was impossible to work anything out without an idea of how it all fitted together. Eventually, she gave up on it and went back to reading comics.

"Today, we see a the dawn of a new day for Jupiter. Today, we see the launch of WorldPulse (trademark)"

Those were the words of Jules Naur, Vice President in charge of Something or Other. O.K., so he didn't actually pronounce "trademark", but he managed to somehow get across the capital letter in the middle of the name.

"Today, we will empower the world's decision-makers with the latest, most current information, information that will shape the decisions they make, and hence shape the world."

Everyone had turned out, and was dressed reasonably well. PR, marketing, IT and even Holistic Analysis were stood, holding champagne flutes and smiling politely, looking up to the podium where Naur was announcing a new product as if it were an eleventh commandment.

"We are not only changing the landscape in which the world does business, we are fundamentally changing the way business itself is done."

The pause probably meant it was time to applaud, so everyone did. As Naur stepped off the podium and began to mingle, people were already setting their glasses down and drifting away; they had to ensure that the product that was to shape the world didn't fall over ten minutes after the first subscribers logged on.

The servers that did the grunt work to make WorldPulse work were hidden away in various data centers around the world. The expertise that ran it, though, was all concentrated in this office. A dozen people were doing a dozen different things to ensure that everything was working as it should. Through this, Naur glided, trying to show that he was the kind of boss who didn't mind getting his hands dirty. This was all well and good, a standard charade, but he couldn't have timed it worse; at this point, everyone wanted the sort of boss who would sit in his office, ideally in another time zone, and let them get on with their jobs. Instead, they had to periodically pause and explain things that, to them, were glaringly obvious. When they had provided the tersest possible answer through gritted teeth, Naur just nodded sagely and moved on to the next desk.

At six p.m. UK time, they were meant to hand over to Bombay, who would keep things ticking over for their working day, then hand over to Toronto to fill in the remaining eight hours. Most people, though, stayed on. After an hour or so, when they were convinced that the handover had worked, they cracked open the leftover bottles of champagne and started to relax. Against all expectations, everything had gone smoothly; practically all of the subscribers had logged in in the first few minutes, and the system didn't even wobble under the load.

"Of course, we haven't really been updating it with much new information yet," said Sol, leaning on the edge of the desk with a full glass.

"True, but that's not likely to cause any problems; we stressed the aggregation code half to death and it didn't show any problems." Ted was reclining in his big mesh chair, still keeping half an eye on a screen full of statistics and logs.

"One problem."

"Yeah, but we know what causes that, and it can be avoided. We've done the hard bit."

"I guess. So," he looked up and addressed the room, "Anyone got a pack of cards?"

Someone had.

It was generally decided that, in lieu of his poker debts, Ted could get the drinks in on Friday lunchtime. He didn't mind this too much; the week had gone well, and everyone was in a good mood; there probably wouldn't be much done this afternoon.

Even so, some people (like Bill, the other computer guy, who had also lost at poker) drew the short straw, and had to stay in the office to keep an eye on things. As such, the group was a little smaller than it had been in the past, but the volume of chatter had stayed about the same.

It was a clear, bright day, but still too cold to sit outside. The brittle sunlight streamed in through the little windows, giving patches of the pub illumination that they rarely saw. Ted got back from this last trip to the bar, and sat down.

"Not a bad week, aside from the poker." he announced.

"Certainly seems that way," said Isabelle, "and your the guy who'd know. I mean, my bit's basically finished, now; we're only really treading water for a while until they figure out where we should be pitching WorldPulse."

"At the same people we've always aimed at, surely?" said Ted (still slightly flustered by the compliment).

"Not really. Most of the old clients have signed up already, and those that haven't aren't likely too. We're just seeing how things go right now, and see if we can figure out a new market to go for. Anyway, we shouldn't be talking shop," her face acquired a wicked grin, "we should be working out what to give Sol for his prize."

Sol, who was peripherally involved in another conversation and hadn't been listening to them, turned round in his seat.

"Don't worry about it," he said.

"No, fair's fair." put in Ted, "I've paid my debt, so you should get some sort of reward."

He looked back at Isabelle. "Any ideas?"

"Well," she said, then paused, and stared at Sol.

A few seconds passed.

"I could treat you to dinner."

Mr Sherwood was, of course, a WorldPulse subscriber; one of the first. He found it indispensable. An outside observer would be pressed to notice a change in his work pattern; he'd been reading the reports on computer for years. Anyone who knew what he was doing, however, would realise that sea change that had occurred; while Jupiter previously gave him a head start, it now put him so far in front that he couldn't even see the pack behind him. Only a few other people were even close, and he strongly suspected that they were also subscribers.

He was reading WorldPulse when his Columbian agent got back to him. The answer actually came in the form of two messages, both with the same subject ("Minister for the Interior"). The first one simply said:

"How did you know?"

The second one, sent a minute or two latter, apologized for the impertinence, and went on to explain that the minister had, within the last hour, been arrested on a charge of manslaughter - apparently, he had paid a man to rough up a business rival, and the beating had been a little too eager. In any case, this was obviously a serious problem for the government, who were at this moment in emergency session trying to decide on a course of action.

Mr Sherwood checked the news wires, but nothing had been posted yet; it would probably turn up in an hour or two. He sat back, and thought about the question. How had he known? Or, more accurately, how had Jupiter known in time for it to go in to a report a week ago?

"So," asked Beth, perching on the edge of Sol's desk and cradling a cup of coffee, "How was dinner?"

"Nice. Salmon."

"You know what I mean; how was Isabelle?"

"She was... nice too."

"Did the she wear those shoes?"

"What, the first-day shoes? Yes, I think."

"You think you'll be going out again?"

"It's not really something I'd thought about. Maybe."

Isabelle had become increasingly curious about what Sol actually did; she kept dropping by and asking him questions, getting him to explain things, and so on. Of course, the office gossip was that this was simply one element in a grand plan to romantically ensnare him, but that was only part of it; she was genuinely curious, too.

His initial description, it turned out, hadn't been too far off the mark. He did. indeed, seem to refer to everything, or a least a bewildering variety of things. Stock market figures, political events, weather reports, the migration of Canadian geese - it all ended up on Sol's desk. How he pieced it all together was still a mystery to her, but one thing seemed clear; there was a method, and he was particularly good at it. However it worked, the results were nothing short of uncanny. No wonder Jupiter's customers paid so much for the reports.

"It's changed a bit now, of course." Sol mentioned, as Isabelle was leaning on the back of his chair and reading over his shoulder. "Used to be that I basically drafted report sections that just got tidied up by the editorial team. Now, I enter stuff into this."

He brought up a window that contained an intimidating collection of tables, with arrows snaking between and around them. It was colour-coded but decidedly short on explanation. After staring at it for a while, Isabelle gave up.

"What is it?"

"That," replied Sol, with a hint of a dramatic flourish, "Is the entrance to perhaps the most important part of WorldPulse."

Isabelle just looked at him blankly.

"When I'm doing an analysis, instead of writing a report, I fill in the forms, here. WorldPulse squirrels all the information away. It could generate a report, just like it used to, but it can also do a lot more. We put some cross-referencing stuff in, so it can do a bit of analysis on it's own. The best bit, though, is that when it finds something potentially interesting, it can alert me, and I can incorporate that in to a new analysis. It's been great; the accuracy has improved no end. Apparently, we're getting great feedback from the clients, too."

"Oh, definitely. I've been going through it. You don't often get words like 'amazing' on those sort of forms. Oh shit; there's Jerry. I'd better get back to work. See you soon." She ducked out of Sol's cubicle and back towards her own desk. As Sol watched her leave, he caught Jerry eyeing him with a look of suspicion.

"It seems to have been a success." reported Naur.

"Well, we did enough preparation; if it hadn't been a success, you'd have had a lot more explaining to do."

"Of course, sir. Fortunately, that's not necessary. The key clients have taken the system on board, and we can begin to feed information into it in few days."

"You're sure that your people can make this work? Do they understand it well enough?"

"Professor Maxwell is the foremost expert in the field; if he doesn't understand it, then nobody does. He has also assembled the finest of teams; the only experts he's missing are the ones who work for us already. I have every confidence he will be able to meet, and exceed, your expectations."

"A simple 'yes' would have been sufficient. In any case, I think I'll visit the sites and get a feel for it myself. I don't like being this removed from things."

"I've already visited all three sites, sir; there's no need to trouble yourself with it."

"It's my damn company. If I want to visit the sites, I'm going to visit the sites. Don't you have some work to be getting on with?"

Henry was born into a privileged, but not rich, background. He went to a private prep school, then one of the smaller public schools, then to Oxford, where he got a degree in History. At the time, there were only two courses of action opened to Oxford historians; he didn't fancy academia, so he went to the City and took up a junior position at Lloyds, in the shipping department. Aside from the slight interruption of the Second World War, his ascent through the company was smooth and rapid.

Then, without warning, he surprised everyone; he left Lloyds, and sank all of his savings into a small import business. He surprised everyone again when, after little more than a year, he had doubled his money. He hired a manager, and then started a second business, then a third, then a fourth. By his late thirties, he was a millionaire. He took to managing his various assets over the phone, from home. He branched out, until he had interests in almost every conceivable field, and in every corner of the globe.

Occasionally, he wished that he'd found the time to get married; at times like this he confined himself to two or three rooms of his capacious house and buried himself in work. His biggest regret was never having children, so naturally he doted on his nieces and nephews - entire rooms of his house were full of toys, even though only he lived there.

He never lost interest or zeal for his work; on the contrary, as he approached then past the age where most men retire, his enthusiasm only grew. When his body eventually failed him, it did so quietly. They found him sat, upright, at his big antique desk, just as he had sat there almost every day for the last half century.

Ted arrived in the office early (well, quarter to nine, which was early for Jupiter), as he always did, and sat down at his computer. After going through the ritual of wiggling the mouse, logging in, going and making a coffee, he began to go through the previous nights logs from Bombay and Toronto. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but when he checked his mail there was a message from his counterpart in Toronto.

"From: srobin@jupiter.net To: emasters@jupiter.net Subject: Royal Visit

Just thought you might like to know that we had a surprise guest dropping in today; our CEO, no less. Not sure what he wanted - just seemed to be the standard walkround, but we usually hear about those in advance, Anyway, thought I'd pass it on in case he's doing the rounds.

(PS - System doing fine)

Well, at least WorldPulse was working. A visit from the CEO would be a pain - more politeness and slow explanations - but it could be worse. At least they had a bit of warning, unlike the poor sods in Canada. He always seemed to show up there first; Ted didn't know where head office was, but he guessed it was nearer to Toronto than here.

He passed the advance warning on to a couple of people, and soon the news had spread around the office. Ted, who hadn't been at all nervous about the visit, was starting to worry that it might not happen, and he'd look like an idiot for expecting it. Still, there was nothing that he could do about it.

At lunch, what seemed like a constant stream of people came up to Ted and asked him if the rumour was true. He told them all the same thing; that the Toronto office had been visited unannounced, and he usually comes here after going there. Despite this, people kept asking him, and by four o'clock it was starting to grate on his nerves, so when Isabelle approached his desk, he snapped without looking up.

"Yes, it's true. Piss off."

"What?"

"Oh, sorry," said Ted, looking up and recognising her, "didn't realise it was you. You can stay, as long as you don't ask me about the fucking CEO."

"Oh." Isabelle turned to leave.

"He visited Toronto," said Ted to her back, "so he's probably on his way here."

"Thanks," she replied as she walked back across the office.

The last three pins went down with a clatter. In case anyone missed the significance of this, an animated bomb on the video screen destroyed three animated pins, and the cloud of smoke formed the word "SPARE".

"That's your fourth in a row. You never told us you were any good at this," chided Isabelle. Ted just grinned sheepishly and sat back down next to her.

Beth was next; she got up, picked up the lightest ball, and took a few steps towards the lane and released. It looked promising right up until the last minute, when it veered off towards the gutter and only knocked down one pin. "I shouldn't be drinking; it's affecting my game."

"You're drinking Coke," replied Sol.

"Oh. Well, maybe I should be on something stronger, then."

The outcome of the game had been obvious from the second or third ball, but everyone was still having a good time. After the first game had finished, Isabelle went to get a round of drinks in before the next one, and Ted went with her. Beth leaned over to Sol and asked in a low voice, "So, did you ever go out again?"

"How do you mean?"

"With Isabelle. Did you ever go out with Isabelle again?"

"No. Well, not just the two of us."

"Why not?"

"Don't know. Nothing ever really happened. I mean, it's not that I don't like her, I just couldn't see us together, um, in that way."

Beth smiled. "This isn't something you've had much practice at, is it?"

"What, talking about Isabelle?"

"No."

Beth straightened up as Ted and Isabelle got back.

"Been conspiring?" he asked.

"Yeah," replied Beth, "We've been trying to work out how we can even the odds a bit. Sol was all for breaking your fingers, but my money's on slipping a vodka chaser into your pint."

"Wouldn't help; it's all just blind luck, I'm afraid."

"No such thing." said Sol.

Throughout the rest of the evening, Sol kept catching Beth smiling at him; once, she even winked. He was driving home; he picked a route that dropped Ted off first, then Isabelle. When they were alone in the car, he asked, "What was all that about?"

"What was what about?" asked Beth, in a studiously innocent voice.

"You know perfectly well; the winking and the smiling and whatnot."

"There wasn't any whatnot; if there were, I'd have remembered."

Silence.

"Oh, don't be like that; I'm only teasing. I just think it's sweet, that's all."

"What's sweet?"

"You being all embarrassed. I bet you've never had a girlfriend."

"Don't be daft. Of course I have."

"What? Since school?"

Sol laughed, "School? I didn't have a girlfriend in school. Most girls in school wouldn't come within a hundred yards of me. But yes, I've had girlfriends. Proper, adult girlfriends who aren't imaginary or inflatable."

"You don't have one now, do you? Is that why you're giving Isabelle the brush off?"

"No. Not for quite a while. No, it's like I said, I just can't see the two of us together."

"Oh. O.K., I'll drop it."

After a few minute's they got to Beth's.

"I'd invite you in for coffee, but the place is a bit of a mess..."

"No problem; I should be getting home anyway."

"'Kay - thanks for the lift. 'Night."

Heather was rushing again. She had enough work without new arrivals. Despite this, someone was due to start today, and indeed there was someone sat, quietly waiting, in the tiny lobby. He was older than most new recruits, but they'd been hiring in some odd places recently. Showing him around was unavoidable, so she strode to the door and hit the switch.

"Hi; Mike, right? Good. If you'd like to come with me I'll show you the office. You're reporting to Jerry in marketing, who you've talked to. Through here - we'll get you a card latter."

The bemused stranger got up and started after Heather, who was already moving at speed through the office. She had begun her usual running commentary:

"Admin" (desk almost invisible under a mound of papers) "Accounts; Ted and Bill - not too bad when you get to know them." ("Hey!") "Sol; don't ask" (usually they had started to look confused by now; this one was doing well) "Financial over there, meeting rooms, kitchen, and here's Jerry's office" (knock knock) "Jerry, I've got someone to see you."

Jerry looked up, did a double take, and got to his feet. "Mr Faraday!"

Heather looked at him as if he were going mad. "No, this is Mike McDonald, the new starter. Mr Faraday is, like, the head of the company or something."

From behind her, someone called out, "Heather, there's someone waiting in reception for you."

She paused, then, quietly and carefully, said "Oh."

"I can't begin to apologize," began Jerry.

"Don't bother. Heather, if I recall your name correctly, has given me a refreshingly unusual tour. Certainly a lot less staid and formal than I'm used to. Well, as I'm here, I may as well start with your department. How're are things in marketing?"

How could she have known? thought Heather as she made coffee for Mike McDonald (not strictly part of her job, but Jerry had asked her to do it while he talked to the boss, and she wasn't in a position to split hairs). Whenever Naur arrived, he brought along a retinue that would shame the president of a small country. You couldn't tell by the accent either; Faraday didn't sound like an American (although, come to think of it, she wasn't certain that the CEO was American). And he wasn't dressed like a CEO; he looked just like everyone else. Musing on these thoughts, she handed Mike his coffee.

"So, anything I should know before I get dropped head-first into the office?"

"Not really; you'll work out where everything is quickly enough, and you'll meet people as you go. Jerry's first on the list, when he's finished in there." She gestured towards his office. Jerry and Mr. Faraday were visible through the venetian blinds.

"Who's that he's talking to?"

"The CEO."

"Ah, state visit, is it? Does that happen often?"

"No," said Heather, very deliberately, "In fact, I've never seen him before today."

One of the advantages of being the first department on the tour was that you got it over with. After a little polite small talk, Faraday had moved on, and Isabelle had been left to get on with her work.

What she was in fact doing was surreptitiously watching the rest of his rounds. Some people got the most perfunctory of introductions ore greetings, and that was it. Others got far more attention; Faraday would talk to them at length, or lean over their shoulders and gesture at their monitors. At the moment, he seemed to be spending a lot of time with Sol. Both of them were talking animatedly, and it looked like Sol was showing him how to use the cryptic WorldPulse interface; why the CEO would need to know that was anyone's guess.

She was watching this when Ted wander over.

"Looks like someone's in line for promotion."

"Either that, or they're just trying to work out what he does so they can decide whether or not to fire him."

"Nah, look at him. He's lapping that stuff up."

"Don't know what you're complaining about; he talked to you for quite a bit, too."

"Nowhere near as long as this."

"More than I got. All I ended up with was 'Hi. You're new here? Good, good, keep up the good work,' and that was it. Hang on, that means I got off lightly."

"Good point. Almost makes you feel sorry for Sol, doesn't it?"

"Nah. He seems to be enjoying it."

At that moment, Isabelle's phone rang. She answered it, listened for a second, and then wordlessly shooed Ted away, mouthing "Sorry" as he left.

Mr Faraday took Jerry and the other team managers out to lunch; everyone else bought sandwiches as usual and congregated in the meeting room. People were all talking about the visit, but Sol seemed to be the only one who'd actually enjoyed it.

"Believe it or not, he seemed genuinely interested." he was telling Beth, "Not only that, he also seemed to know what he was talking about. He must've read up on it beforehand."

"You're obviously the rising star of the company. Just promise me one thing; you won't forget us when you're rich and powerful."

"I think you're jumping the gun a bit there. He was interested in the work, that was all."

"Isabelle reckon's it was because he's looking to fire you." was Ted's contribution.

"No I do not!"

"That's what you said. 'They're just trying to work out what he does so they can decide whether or not to fire him."

"It was a joke! Don't listen to him, Sol."

"I'm not worried. In any case, I'll have company in the dole queue; he was talking to Ted for quite a while as well."

"Good point," conceded Ted. "Know anywhere that's hiring?"

As they were going back to work, Isabelle caught Sol by the arm.

"Can I have a word?"

"What is it?"

"I've been asked out to dinner."

"Oh." Sol was slightly baffled by this announcement. "Good?"

"Not really. Do you know a guy called Sherwood?"

"Don't think so. Who is he?"

"He's a client. In fact, he was one of the big targets for WorldPulse. Anyway, he says he wants to ask something about the reports."

She paused.

"Erm, you wouldn't come with me, would you?"

"Why? I'm not very good with clients."

"It'd just be nice to have some backup. I don't really know much beyond the sales pitch, so if he asks anything technical I'm screwed. Also, he said it was purely business, but in case it's not, it'd be good to have you there."

"OK," said Sol, after a short while, "but it all sounds a bit weird."

"It is. I've no idea what he wants."

"He's not complained about something, then?"

Isabelle paused, then a sheepish look came over her face.

"It never occurred to me to check. I'll go and have a look now - I can get to the feedback from my account."

She started out towards the door. As she left, she turned around and said, "Thanks for this Sol. You're a star."

She turned at Sol's house earlier than expected. When he answered the door, her heart fell.

"Hi," he said, "What's wrong?"

"You're not wearing that, are you?"

He looked at her for a few seconds.

"Apparently not."

She squeezed past him into the hall, looking at her watch. "We've got a bit of time. Lets see what we can do."

Sol nervously followed her into his bedroom. On the plus side, the trepidation he was feeling about the meeting paled into insignificance when compared to the prospect of Isabelle picking out his clothes.

By the time he'd caught up with her, she was already going through his wardrobe, looking at his shirts with a critical eye. (It was amazing how she homed in on it; she'd never been inside the house before, and yet there she was, straight up the stairs and to the bedroom, rifling through his clothes before he'd even closed the front door.)

"Is this really," Sol began.

"Necessary? Yes. Have you looked at that outfit in a mirror." She pause, and then looked around the room. "You do have a mirror, don't you?"

Sol gestured towards a picture-sized mirror hanging on the wall.

"I mean a full length mirror. Please tell me there's one inside here or something." She opened the other wardrobe door and looked on the back; nothing. "Well, I know what I'm getting you for your birthday. When is that, by the way?"

"Monday."

She stopped going through the shirts and turned to face him.

"You daft thing, Why didn't you say anything? What've you got planned?"

"Nothing, really. I don't like to make a big fuss."

"Bullshit. We'll organise something for you. Anyway," she picked out a shirt and passed it to him, "Put this on; it'll go a lot better with those trousers. And don't tuck it in; it's not that formal a place."

When they pulled up to the restaurant, it turned out that it was what Sol would have considered a fairly formal place. It was a large, beautiful country hotel, with myriad windows that had glittered in the night as they approached. Isabelle's car looked small and shabby next to the Jaguars and Mercedes. It was still quite early, so couples and knots of people were still arriving and wandering in.

"Well, I guess this is it." said Isabelle as she turned off the engine. "Any last requests?"

"That sounds final." said Sol, finally. "Let's go."

They walked up to the large front door, and Sol held it open for Isabelle. "Where are we meant to meet him?"

"In the bar," she said, craning her neck and looking around. "I can't see him yet."

"Do you want to go in and have a look round? I'll take the coats."

When Sol returned from checking their coats, he saw her sat at the bar, being talked to by a man a fair few years her senior. He was leaning in and talking confidentially; she was sitting up ramrod straight and nodding politely.

Sol stopped in his tracks in the doorway, unsure of what to do. As he watched, the man passed her something. Was this meant ot be happening? Maybe he should leave her to it; she seemed to be doing O.K.

On the other hand, she did ask him to come, and he was meant to be there to back her up. Decided, he walked towards them. He was about halfway there when Isabelle turned and saw him. She waved, and the man got up from his bar stool, said a few final words to Isabelle, and wandered off with his drink.

"Who was that?" Sol asked when he arrived.

"Oh, I don't know. Some guy. He gave me his card." She brandished a glossy, overly designed business card, and then casually dumped it in the ash tray. "So, are you going to buy me a drink then?"

"I thought tonight was your treat." She took him seriously, and was reaching into her bag right up until the point he leaned over behind her and ordered drinks (he got her's right; must have been a lucky guess), then moved around and sat on the bar stool facing her.

"So, does that happen a lot?"

"Does what happen?"

"Strange men coming up to you in bars."

"Occasionally. It's never anyone interesting, although they're usually trying to be; they think of a witty line, then don't realise that they don't have any more conversation until it's too late. It's sort of like wandering into the OK Corral with only one bullet, and then firing it into the ceiling to get everyone's attention. Everyone's staring up at you from behind upturned tables, the outlaws are pulling out their six-shooters, and you've just realized that you left all your ammo in your other gun. It's painful to watch people squirm like that."

Something seemed to occur to her.

"Doesn't that ever happen to you? With women, I mean?"

"Not been known to, no. I reckon it's probably the mis-coordinated shirts; when you buy me that mirror, I'll be fighting them off with a stick."

"I'll tell Beth to buy you a stick, then. Seriously, though, people never approach you? I can't believe that."

"Trust me; I've put in the field work. School, University, my life to date, I've observed thousands and thousands of strange women not hitting on me. Which is a shame, because I never have the confidence to approach anyone myself. The few relationships I've had started more by accident than by design."

"I'm sure there was design on someone's part," she smiled, "maybe you just didn't notice."

It was at this moment that Mr Sherwood arrived.

Sol was half-expecting Mr Sherwood to resent his presence, but it seemed to him that nothing could be further from the truth. Once he found out that Sol worked in analysis, he started pumping him for information. Sol, of course, had signed a particularly vicious and labyrinthine Non Disclosure Agreement when he started at Jupiter, so couldn't say anything of any significance about his methods, but the old man seemed to be very interested in the little bits that he could reveal.

The conversation wasn't entirely about work, however. Mr Sherwood seemed determined to make this a social occasion as well, and was achieving a fair amount of success. He talked about his brother's kids, who had apparently been round that weekend, asked Isabelle how she was settling into her new flat (she'd moved a few weeks ago), and sundry other matters. It was pleasantly diverting, and it wasn't until he'd nearly finished his main course (duck in ginger and orange; very nice) that he realized that they still had no idea why they were here yet - Isabelle hadn't found any complaints, and Sherwood hadn't mentioned anything.

He didn't feel it was his place to mention this; after all, Isabelle was the one that had been invited. He was here to make up the numbers. However, it seemed strange that Isabelle hadn't asked yet. He looked at her pointedly, but she didn't even seem to notice, let alone understand what he was trying to communicate.

By the end of dessert, she still hadn't said anything, so he decided to speak up.

"Mr Sherwood, I don't mean to be rude, but I got the impression that this wasn't merely a social occasion. Was there something you wanted to ask?"

Isabelle looked daggers at him, but Mr. Sherwood simply shrugged. "There was something, but from what you've said about your contract you wouldn't be able to tell me anyway. Don't worry about it; enjoy the coffee."

"There might be something we could tell you; it wouldn't hurt to ask." suggested Isabelle.

Mr. Sherwood paused momentarily, then leaned forwards. "Very well; as you say, it can't hurt. A couple of weeks ago, there was a report that highlighted the effects that the arrest of the Columbian Minister for the Interior would have on the global markets."

Isabelle glanced over at Sol, who had put down his coffee and started to listen very, very intently.

"The thing by which I am confused is this; the Minister was only arrested four days ago. I was simply curious as to how you knew about these events more than a week before they happened."

He sat back and watched their reactions. Isabelle looked at Sol, who for a long time didn't say anything. Eventually, he looked at Mr. Sherwood and said, "I'm afraid that we must protect our sources, especially in areas like Columbia. I'm sure you understand. There isn't much more I can say; however, if anything more comes up, I'll be sure to pass it on to you."

Sherwood studied his expression; "I understand. Well, as we said, there was no harm in asking. I suggest that we move off the subject and enjoy what remains of the meal."

Mr Sherwood had paid for meal, and had then been picked up by a limousine. Sol and Isabelle walked back to the car in silence.

After driving for a little while, Isabelle began, "So, do you know what happened with this Columbia thing?"

"It shouldn't have been in there." replied Sol, after a short pause.

"Why not? Endangering your sources or something?"

"No!" Sol laughed shakily, "Nothing like that. We don't have any agents or informants or anything in South America; we get all of our stuff from public sources. The whole Columbia thing was a forecast."

Isabelle stamped on the brakes, and slewed the car on to the side of the road. She turned to Sol.

"Your telling me that you predicted that this guy was going to get arrested just from reading the newspapers? You can't have! I read about it; that guy had covered his tracks. Only a handful of people knew about it. It came right out of the blue."

"I know. I've not been reading the news much lately, what with the new system and all, so I didn't know that the Columbian had been arrested until Mr. Sherwood mentioned it just now. I can assure you, though, that at the time of the report, I wouldn't have even guessed at that happening."

"But you said it was a forecast. You said..."

"It was," he interrupted, "But not really one of mine. The reason it shouldn't have been in the report was that it was never intended to be published. It was the result of one of the tests of WorldPulse."

Isabelle stared at him in the dark for a few beats. A car, it's headlights on full beam, sped past, momentarily bathing their faces in cold light. Isabelle looked lost; Sol looked like he was being chased. After what seemed like hours, Isabelle turned back round in her seat, started the car, and carried on driving them back to town.

Beth had got into the habit of stopping around at Sol's desk on the way back from the kitchen with her mid-morning coffee. The morning after the dinner was no exception, but the reception she got was a little colder than usual. When she approached, Sol barely looked up.

"How's it going?" she asked. He answered with a vague-sounding monosyllable, so she decided to take a different approach.

"Whatca up to?"

"Nothing. Just checking something."

She didn't believe him; it was the way he didn't look at her when he said it. It wasn't important, so she moved on.

"Isabelle told me about the dinner last night." was thrown casually into the conversation, as if it were as innocuous as a comment about the weather. Sol stopped typing and looked straight at Beth.

"She did?"

"Yes. That guy, what was his name?"

"Sherwood"

"That's it. Anyway, he sounds a bit odd.He could've just asked her over the phone, couldn't he."

"Possibly," said Sol, guardedly studying her reactions, "Maybe he thought we'd be more inclined to help him if we met him in person."

"Maybe. Did it work?"

"How do you mean?" (Still guardedly.)

"Did you help him?"

"Well, he seemed nice enough, but we still had to give him the brush off - the NDAs and everything."

"Right."

"The test data shouldn't have been there anyway; if it gets out..." he trailed off as he noticed the way Beth was looking at him.

"She didn't tell you that bit, did she?"

Beth smiled and shook her head. "Nope."

She moved around to Sol's side of the desk, crouched next to him, and said, "So, tell me about this test data."

A look of panic crossed Sol's face. He grabbed Beth's arm and pulled her towards him.

"Not so loud!"

Beth started to say something, but stopped short when she saw the panicked look on Sol's face. He let go of her arm, and took a deep breath as she shrank back and stood up.

"No need to be so touchy about it; I was only kidding."

She turned and briskly walked off, her head down. She wasn't looking where she was going, and hence it was almost inevitable that she would bump into somebody; it turned out to be Ted.

"Hey!", then, as he saw that she was upset about something, "Are you O.K.?"

"Yes," she said, sniffing. "Sol's just being a prick."

"Right. I'm sure he didn't mean it," said Ted, as if reciting from a dimly-remembered script, "he's been under a lot of pressure lately."

"You're probably right. Thanks."

Sol watched this, then turned back to chasing up the Columbia forecast.

Generic sandwich shop had sundries like crisps and drinks arranged in racks around the doors, and a large, featureless expanse of tiled floor leading up the refrigerated cabinet and counter opposite the entrance where you ordered the main bit of your lunch; sandwiches, chiapatas, whatever. Anyway, there were no markings or barriers to suggests that the customers should behave in any way other than an outright melee. However, despite this, at around noon every day, dozens of busy, stressed people, each only thinking about their own agenda, would flock to the shop, and jostle around, Boid-like, each pursuing their own goals. Miraculously, order would spring from this chaos, and the potential scrum never failed to spontaneously organize itself into a neat, civilised queue zigging and zagging from the door to the till, leaving a little path at one side to allow people to exit.

That day, like most days, Sol put himself into this system, and never really thought about what was going on. As it happened, the human-scale Brownian motion resulted in him being directly behind Beth in the queue. He didn't realise it for a while, but when it did he felt like he had been dumped without warning into social quicksand, with no bullwhip, and no handy low-hanging branch to grab on to.

He'd already been there a while; wouldn't it look odd if he stood here and didn't say anything? Maybe she hadn't noticed him. If she hadn't, then he could get away with it. But, what if she had? Would she think he was ignoring her? On the other hand, she'd not said anything; that meant that she hadn't noticed him. Or maybe she was ignoring him. In that case, he definitely shouldn't say anything. But what if that wasn't it? Wouldn't it look odd if he stood here and didn't say anything?

Fortunately, Sol was shaken out of this unproductive cyclic reverie fairly quickly. Beth had turned around to speak to him, which moved them into a whole new and far more acute uncomfortable situation. It was like grabbing a sturdy vine that you hadn't noticed before, only to realise that it is in fact a large and poisonous snake.

"Oh, hi - didn't see you there."

That was plausible. She hadn't noticed him until now. At least that eliminated the possibility that he was being deliberately ignored. Good. Now, all that he needed to do was come up with a response. Something that would break the tension, and make it easier to deliver the apology that was hanging in the air like an axe. Better make it good.

"Hi. Um."

Beth looked at him, as if she were expecting him to continue. Given the circumstances, this wasn't unreasonable.

Pause.

It looked like the "breaking the ice" plan wasn't going to pan out successfully. Oh, well - it looked like he'd just have to go ahead and apologize straight out, without preparing the ground first. Sol bit the metaphorical bullet.

"Look, sorry I was a little curt with you earlier. It's just, I, there's something weird going on at the moment, and I'm not used to dealing with this sort of thing."

Beth looked at him stonily for a second; during that second, which seemed much, much longer, Sol couldn't breathe. Then she smiled, and Sol let out his breath in a long sigh of relief. He could tell from the smile that the danger had passed.

"Don't worry about it; I was being too nosy. I shouldn't have pushed you about it. Friends?"

"Yeah."

"Great. You can buy me lunch then."

"Don't push your luck."

It was a bitterly cold day, with the wind whipping the trees in the grounds of the hospital, when Edward was born. He was a little premature; not enough to cause the midwife real concern, but enough to scare the hell out of his parents. As a result of this, his mother always tended to be over protective, bordering on (and frequently becoming) overbearing. His father saw this, and quickly realized his son was being stifled by all of the attention. He was a quiet man, and given to acquiescing to his wife's suggestions before they became demands, but he founds ways. He would distract Edward's mother in order to give the boy a bit of time to himself, and latter, when Edward was a little older, he would conspire with his son to go off and doing some wholly unsuitable activity together. Of course, on the occasions that Edward's mother found out about these expeditions, she would smother her little boy with attention, then when he had gone to bed, berate his father for his recklessness. He, of course, took it all without a word, smiling inside; at least Edward had had some fun.

Another obsession of his mother's was illness; her baby always had whooping cough, or scarlet fever, or measles, or something else entirely. As it happened, Edward was far from sickly; he never had anything more severe than a cold throughout his entire life. His mother didn't make any friends at their local GP, where she would turn up in the waiting room on a monthly basis, dragging Edward along and scolding him if he went anywhere near the other, presumably highly infectious, children, only to be told that he was fine. At first, the doctor would prescribe something harmless, then she started suggesting some standard over-the-counter remedy, until eventually she gave up doing even that, and began telling Mrs Masters, in increasingly unsubtle terms, to go away and stop wasting her time. When Edward moved away from home, he saw the doctor when he registered, then never went again. He didn't need to; he didn't feel ill, and years of conditioning had taught him that he couldn't even play with the toys.

When Edward moved out, his mother fretted constantly (day and night - she couldn't sleep) for a fortnight. After that, she stopped. His father, watching events unfold with his usual air of silent contemplation, was slightly surprised by this, but after another week or so, decided not to worry; she was largely back to how she'd been before Edward was born, and that was fine by him. She got a bit broody when he phoned, and even more so when he visited, but that was all. Edward and his father both breathed a sigh of relief. Secretly, so did she.

Despite his father's efforts, while he was at school Edward didn't really get the chance to get properly involved in anything where he might get wet, or bruised, or have objects fly at his head. Hence, he turned to computers at an early age; these being a safe, indoor activity, with minimal chances of serious injury, there was little his mother could object to. It turned out he had an aptitude with them; by the age of 16, he knew more than a lot of professional knew in a lifetime. It seemed obvious, given this, that he should go on to study the subject at University, so was what he did.

There, however, he hit a snag. While he had a lot of talent, and he knew a hell of a lot (more than the people lecturing him) about certain very useful things, his knowledge was dotted around the place, unstructured and wild. Worse, according to his tutors, he didn't really want to improve the situation. While they were trying to rigorously teach him the fundamentals, in preparation for the more advanced stuff, he would dismiss it with a wave of his hand and go off on some highly technical, highly specific, tangent. From an academic perspective, there would be huge problems with his approach, but these were the sort of cracks you can paper over, at least in the situations that Edward had met so far. They tried to explain this to him, but he wouldn't listen. He was having a great time, making friends and enjoying the utopia of technology that the university provided, and getting barely-passable marks despite his practical ability.

He didn't have much luck with girls; he did have a girlfriend at home, but they were always paradoxically distant, and when he went back home after his first term away he found out that she was sleeping with the guy who used to beat him up a school. This sent him off on a series of doomed infatuations, none of which resulted in as much as a dinner date. After a few months, things improved a little, but he was still a fish out of water around women; he never knew what to say, and he always seemed to say or do something that seemed like a good idea at the time, but in retrospect (even a few seconds latter) was obviously unbelievably stupid. He persevered, though, and by the time he graduated with a lower second (that didn't bother him, although his mum was a bit disappointed) he could hold a conversation with a woman for minutes at a time without making himself look like an idiot.

His confidence grew, and he was feeling quite good about himself, until one day at work he had a vision. More accurately a vision turned up. He fell head-over-heels in love with her in an instant, and he was straight back in the world of unattainable infatuation. His confidence was shot; there was no way he could approach her, and tell her how he felt. So, he took the route taken by men in that situation since the dawn of time. He ignored it. They became good friends, he watched as she fell for someone else, and he said nothing.

Edward died in a freak accident, but an accident that he could have avoided. He was twenty seven. His funeral was well attended; his friends and his family mixing and talking. His mother, got on well with the woman he had been in love with.

Sol put Beth's coffee down on her desk, and wheeled up a spare chair up next to her. He'd been making her coffee for a week; she called it his penance. The week was up, though; that was the last cup. Next week she'd have to make her own coffee.

"Thanks" she said, cupping the cup in her hands, "What would I have to do for you to do this all the time?"

"I'll tell you what; I'll carry on doing it, you can owe me."

"Sounds like a bit of a risk. O.K., why not?"

"You going to the pub for lunch?"

"'Fraid not. I've got to try and get this finished up and published before tonight."

"Something important?"

"So I've been told; can't see it myself. It's new layout for the dynamic reports. I guess they've got their reasons."

"Guess so."

"So what are you up to at the moment? You've been staying late."

Sol was surprised that she'd noticed, and said so.

"Why? It's not a secret, is it?"

Sol said nothing.

"I see. How about you make me coffee for another week, and I'll not pester you about it."

Sol thought about this for a little while. "Sounds fair to me."

They wandered onto other subjects, until eventually Beth had to tell Sol to go, as she had to finish the layouts.

"Have you got a minute?"

Ted's morning had gone well, so he had. It was Sol who had requested the time; he was holding half a dozen single-page printouts.

"What is it? Not more tests, is it? I thought WorldPulse was working fine."

"It is," Sol replied, "better than fine. I just want to run a couple of tests, and I was wondering if you could set up a dummy installation so I don't foul up the live version by accident."

"Sure thing," said Ted, "We couldn't have test data released into the wild by accident, could we?" Sol had told him about half of the problem; he knew that some test data had been inadvertently been included in a report, but he didn't know the details.

After lunch, Ted came over to Sol's desk.

"I was doing some performance profiles on those test you're running, and they're giving some very odd results. What the hell are they?"

Sol looked up from his monitor, and shrugged, "Just some ordinary forecasts; I'm trying to fine-tune things."

"Oh, come on. They're nothing like normal forecasts. What's going on?"

Sol looked at Ted for a minute, then shook his head.

"I'm probably going to regret this, but O.K. Just promise that you keep it to yourself."

"This is starting to sounds interesting. Tell me more."

To give Ted a bit of context, Sol related the whole story of the extraordinary Columbia forecast, the uncannily specific prediction that had come true. He then went on to explain what he was doing at the moment; testing to see if they could do it consistently. He'd assembled a larger-than-normal corpus of information, and had set up the tests to do as much automatic cross-referencing as they could, just like they'd been doing on the original test. Once he'd done that, he just had to find something that presented a simple question he could try and answer, but where the results where unpredictable using conventional machines.

"Horse races?" asked Ted, open-mouthed.

"Uh-huh."

"You think you've found a way to predict the future, and you're using it to call horse races?"

"Only as a test. It's ideal; the result depend on a massive array of factors - form, weather, psychology, dozens of other things - and you can't predict the outcome ahead of time. At least, you can't by conventional means."

It sounded insane, but Ted had to agree that it made a certain kind of twisted sense. He nodded.

"So," he asked after a while, "How much have you put on?"

"What?"

"How much have you bet on the outcome?"

"I haven't. It's only a test."

"Yeah, but where's the harm in making a little bit of money on the side?"

Sol just looked at him.

"You can seed the system, right?"

"That is correct, yes."

"So, the predictions could be manipulated to give a particular answer?"

"Within certain parameters. We can't manipulate the predictions directly, of course, and it's impossible to determine what the answer will be ahead of time. However, I'm confident that we can manipulate the inputs in such a way that we can constrain the system to only give answers within a certain range,"

"Excellent."

"There is one potential problem, however."

"Oh. And that is?"

"Someone sufficiently knowledgeable may be able to determine that the system has been manipulated. It would not be easy, but an expert may be able to detect that something was amiss."

"That's not acceptable."

"If I may be more specific, they would not be able to determine the range of outputs that the manipulation was designed to achieve, only that manipulation of the input had occurred. Also, if we took sufficient care, then it would be exceedingly difficult for them to determine which inputs had been manipulated. A final point is, of course, that experts in our field are not unacquainted with coincidence. Any manipulation may be put down to mere coincidence. Do these facts make the proposal any more acceptable?"

"A little, but I'm still not happy. How many people would be, how did you put it, sufficiently knowledgeable?"

"A couple of dozen. Thirty at the most."

"Can you make me a list?"

Ted had set up a live audio stream on his workstation to listen to the midweek racing results. He and Sol were sat, leaning forwards, listening intently. Sol was clutching a printout, and Ted a betting slip. Both leaned even further forward as the horses reached the final furlong.

There was a breathless couple of seconds, then the race was won by a relative unknown, "Strange Attractor" (Sol had laughed himself silly when the name turned up in the forecast, then when he had calmed down he had to explain the joke to Ted, who was the only other person in the office at the time.)

"Yes!" cried Ted, leaping up and punching the air, before self-consciously sitting down again. He leaned towards Sol, who was sat stock still, sporting an expression more suited to a rabbit caught in headlights, and whispered conspiratorially.

"That was fantastic! You know what this means, right? We can clean up!" He got up and grabbed his coat. "I'm going to collect our winnings."

Sol just sat there as he walked away. After a minute or two, he just said, "We can do it again. We can do it again."

"Why so generous?" Isabelle asked.

"I'm always this generous." replied Ted.

"No you're bloody well not," said Beth, emphatically. "The last time you bought a round was when you lost your shirt at poker."

"Well, I've had a bit of luck."

"Go on..."

Ted looked at Sol, and said nothing.

"Oh, I see," said Beth, looking annoyed, "it's part of the conspiracy. You two aren't having an affair, are you?"

Sol looked at her for a long while. "O.K. We'll let you in on it. Not here though." he waved his hand, a gesture that encompassed the usual mass of pub-lunching Jupiter employees.

"What are you doing tonight?"

"Nothing I can't cancel."

"We can go for a drink after work, then, and all will be revealed."

"Can't wait." said Beth.

Isabelle and Ted both had to leave early to meet friends (different groups). Sol and Beth were getting hungry, and didn't fancy pub food twice in one day, so they decided to go for pizza.

The particular pizza restaurant that Beth lead them to wasn't your usual fast food delivery place with a couple of tables added as an afterthought. This was a far more classy affair. The first thing Sol noticed was the entrance; it was flanked by two huge mock-classical pillars. There was a double door of featureless glass - the designer had obviously thought that a handle would sully the pure line or something - which led into a waiting area filled with low sofas. A perky, blonde waitress with a perky, blonde pony tail gave them a perky, blonde smile, and showed them to one of these, and took an order for drinks. As he sat down, Sol noticed something else that marked this out as distinct from Domino's or Pizza Hut - a baby grand piano. It wasn't just there for decoration, either; a man in a black shirt open at the throat was playing light jazz that was all but drowned out by the rattle of conversation as people pored over their menus and caught up on each other's days.

"I don't think I've ever been to a pizza restaurant with a piano before." said Sol.

"Great, isn't it?"

"It's certainly different."

They ordered drinks, and sat back to wait for a table.

"So, what was it you were going to tell me?"

"D'ya know, I'd almost forgotten about that. Must be the piano. Soothing."

Beth laughed. "You're trying to wriggle out of it, aren't you? It's O.K.; you don't have to tell me."

"No; I want to."

So, there, amongst the chattering office dwellers and students suffused with light jazz, Sol explained everything. Beth sat there, dangling her bottle of foreign lager by the neck between her fingers, and listened as he talked. Eventually, when he had finished, she sat back.

"That's fantastic." She concluded, eventually.

"It is?" That wasn't the response Sol was expecting.

"Fantastic in the sense that it sounds like pure fantasy to me."

Now, that, that was one of the responses that Sol had been expecting.

"I promise you it's the truth. What can I do to convince you?"

Beth put her beer down on the low glass table and looked him straight in the eye.

"Assuming that I took everything you say at face value, which I don't, there are huge chasms in your story. How come nobody else has noticed? You send those reports out to dozens of people. Why has no-one done this before? For that matter, why haven't you done it before now? And if you can do it, why haven't you just won the lottery and retired to Bermuda?"

"Hold on; we only place the first bet today. And I've got serious reservations about using it gamble in any case."

Sol paused, and took a deep breath; he wanted to organize his thoughts, and make sure this came out right. He wanted Beth to believe him.

"Well, to begin with, this sort of stuff doesn't go in to the live reports; it's only off a test system Ted and I are running that's set up in a special way."

"Hold on - you said that that Sherwood guy saw the Columbia thing in a report."

"That was a mistake; the forecast shouldn't have been in there. Anyway, the reason that no-one else has done this is because no-one's got a computer-aided forecasting system lke WorldPulse - except for the guys in Bombay and Toronto, and we've not heard anything from them. You not only need that specific sort of system, you also need it set up in a highly specific way. I only stumbled on it by accident when we were testing the things to see what the limits were. The other thing to bear in mind is that there's no reason to expect that particular setup to behave like that - in fact, nothing should behave like that, and I have no idea how anything does - so there's no reason to go looking for it. The only reason we noticed was the slip-up with the Columbia forecast."

After that lot, Sol needed to take another deep breath. "So, that covers why we didn't do it before. Was there anything else?"

Beth's expression had softened. "Well, I still don't take everything you say at face value, but there's nothing you can do about that." She picked up he bottle and drained it. "Let's forget about it for tonight, enjoy the pizza, and you can tell me about it in the morning."

A couple of minutes latter, the perky blonde waitress returned to show them to their table. This involved weaving through an obstacle course of sofas, pillars and pot plants, and eventually lead to a sumptuous, high-ceilinged room that looked even less like a typical pizza place than the waiting area had. The walls were tastefully patterned maroon, and hanging on them were gilt-framed oil paintings of terribly dignified, slightly portly men in grey suits. A shelf ran around the room a few feet below the ceiling, and this was lined with old looking books with cracked leather bindings. More books filled shelves in the numerous alcoves. Tall plants in heavy pots broke up the vault-like room into smaller, more intimate spaces.

It took a moment for Sol to place what the whole things reminded him of. Eventually, he realized it fit almost exactly into his conception of a London gentleman's club. It was a little odd that he had such a strong impression of what such clubs looked like, as he had never seen the inside of one, but nevertheless he did. After the waitress had given them menus and hurried off to deal with other customers, Sol mentioned his club theory to Beth. She told him that the building had indeed been a gentleman's club in the past, and the current owners were trying to recreate the feel. She leaned forward and whispered that it was mostly fake, though ("Look at the books; a load of them are fairly recent. I bet they just got them in a job lot from OxFam or something.")

That was enough to move them off contentious topics like WorldPulse and horse racing; they started to talk freely about other things, and against his expectations Sol found that he enjoyed the evening immensely.

The following morning, Sol picked Beth up from home as they had arranged, and the two of them drove to Jupiter. Along the way, they chatted about unimportant things, as they had been doing the previous evening, and it wasn't until they where at the office that they even mentioned the reason they were there.

Sol used his key to open the front door, and his card to get them into the office proper. As it was Saturday, the place was deserted. It seemed a lot bigger than it did when it was full of people.

"Hang on," said Beth, looking around, "What happened to constant vigilance? I thought we had to keep things running 24/7."

"It's Bill's shift today, I think." replied Sol, who was already sat at his desk starting up the interface to the WorldPulse test system. "He can monitor everything from home. It's all handled remotely anyway - this place could be hit by a bomb, and Jupiter would be able to set up a fully functional office somewhere else within a couple of hours."

"Really? You've thought about this?"

"Somebody has. Haven't you read the disaster plan?"

"Disaster plan? I think that one passed me by."

"It was in that big pile of papers everyone get's given on the first day." He was still tapping away at the keyboard.

"Oh. In that case, I've probably got a copy somewhere. I've just not read it."

"It's not all that vital; you get emailed the important stuff at the time, so as long as you can check your mail from home you'll be O.K."

There was a pause. Beth shuffled he feet.

"Do you want me to come round and set it up?"

"You do know what I do for a living, don't you? I'm perfectly capable of setting up a bloody e-mail account. I've just never seen the need to before. I've got my personal one at home, and I'd rather keep the work stuff firmly within work hours."

"Might be a good idea to set it up, just in case."

"I suppose so."

Beth moved up behind Sol, and leant over his shoulder with one hand on the desk, and the other on the back of his chair.

"Is it ready, yet?"

"Just about." He tapped out a few more commands, and after a brief pause the window began to fill with a slow stream of cryptic stanzas. "There we go."

Beth studied the text for a few seconds. "I have no idea what any of that means."

"It's not important - I don't understand half of it myself. Ted's your man if you're interested in that. The useful bit is this." He brought up the analysis window. "I can enter the details of a search here, and I can also enter my opinions or interpretation of the results."

Beth looked at him. "So, it's not just the computer, then? You're still a part of it?"

He turned to face her. "Yes. In the regular setup, I'm still doing most of the actual analysis; the system just provides me with material. In this version, the computer does a lot more, but I still need to guide it."

"So, what are you going to show me?"

"Well, what do you want to know? Horse races?"

"Been done. How about," she looked at her watch; it was just before half past eleven. "How about the top three items on the lunch time news? That gives you half an hour."

"Top three?" Sol smiled. "I'll give you all of them."

Beth sat staring in disbelief at the tiny window on the screen. Sol had been as good as his word, and had predicted every single item on the news. As people are wont to do in such a situation, she started looking for a trick.

"It's a recording." she said, without much confidence.

"Nope; it's the live stream - look." Sol showed her where the stream was coming from.

"Well, it's..." she trailed off as Sol watched her.

"You know someone at the BBC?" she lamely concluded.

Minerva Consulting had been formed two weeks ago, and had moved into it's premises in the centre of London a few days latter. As such, the building had a half-finished quality to it. Some of the light fittings were still dangling from the ceilings, wires all over the place (the electricians assured them they weren't live). An area at the back of the main office space was partitioned off behind a huge white expanse of translucent white plastic sheeting, and thick bundles of cables snaked there way across the floor. It was obvious to anyone that the building that a large team of technicians were still transforming into a modern, antiseptic office had until recently been the remains of something much more blue collar - in actual fact, a small printing works. However, there was heating, and light, phones and networking, and enough desks for everyone, so there was no reason not to start moving in.

Professor Maxwell, a grey-haired and slightly tweedy man of about sixty, had arrived early that morning with a cardboard box full of various photographs, souvenirs and gadgets, and had spent a little time making his desk his own. One by one, his new staff drifted in, until by ten o'clock they were all there. Maxwell called them to the large open space in the middle of the old factory floor, and began to speak.

"To begin with, I'd like to welcome you all on your first day at work for Miranda Consulting. As you can see," he gestured at the plastic sheeting, "our surroundings are less than luxurious at the moment, but I am assured that that will change in the near very future."

There were a few smiles, but no laughs; nobody was confident enough that he had meant it as a joke.

"You all know me, and you've all met Mr. Johnson, our operations director." As he said this, large man in a dark suit nodded and half raised his hand. "Many of you also know each other. Practitioners of our particular field are few and far between, and in such a small community people are bound to get to know each other. However," he paused, and looked around the assembled group, "I must ask that, from now on, you do not discuss your work here with anyone outside this room. The first project that we have been hired to undertake is of a particularly sensitive nature, and I have assured the client that their privacy is certain. I am confident that I can trust everyone here to maintain the required level of professional discretion."

His audience shuffled uncomfortably. This wasn't the standard welcoming speech; he'd actually said something important. While it wasn't something that any of them were particularly bothered by, it wasn't what they were expecting.

"Before we begin the work proper, we have the usual raft of administrative trivia to go through. On the desk by the door you will each find an envelope with your name on; this contains the usual litter about health insurance, your employee handbook, details of your network accounts, and so on. Get that, find a desk (it doesn't matter which - I'm sure you're mature enough to sort it out amongst yourselves), and get yourselves settled in. I've booked tables at a restaurant for one; that should give us a chance to get better acquainted."

He clapped his hands together and got up from the desk on which he'd been leaning. The group broke up and made a bee-line for the front desk to pick up their envelopes. As it happened, Maxwell estimate of their maturity was slightly high; even though the youngest was in their late twenties, the squabbling for desks would not have been out of place in a primary school. They eventually settled down and got on with the boring necessities of starting a new job.

After Sol had dropped her off on Saturday, Beth had spent the rest of the weekend reeling around in a daze. She would sit in front of the television, not watching it, and drinking a bottomless up of tea, and then get up and wander aimlessly around her flat, then go back to watching TV. By the time she drifted to bed on Sunday evening, she still hadn't quite assimilated everything.

Monday morning was busy, as all Mondays mornings tended to be, so she hadn't had a chance to talk to Sol. He was in a meeting when they would usually have their coffee break, so she made her own coffee and drank it alone at her desk. At noon, she went to Generic Sandwich Shop as usual, and then repaired to the now-vacant meeting room. She hoped that Sol would turn up there with his lunch.

She was reading the paper, trying to pay more attention to the details than she usually did, when a familiar voice suddenly interrupted. Isabelle had sat down opposite her.

"How's it going?"

Beth looked up, but didn't say anything. Realization dawned on Isabelle's face.

"Oh; he told you, didn't he? Pretty weird, isn't it?"

Beth stared at Isabelle for a long time before speaking, and when she did her words were tinged with the slightest hint of vitriol.

"Weird? Is that all?"

Isabelle ploughed on, seemingly oblivious to the frosty reception that her previous comment had received.

"Yeah, don't you think? I mean, it's not the sort of thing that happens every day."

"No. You're right. It doesn't happen every day." Beth folded the newspaper, cooly and deliberately, and pushed it to one side. Then she started bellowing at Isabelle at the top of her lungs.

"Weird? Weird! Sol discovers a way to predict the future, the actual future, and all you can describe it as is weird? Don't you have any fucking idea how much the world has changed since he showed me that bloody machine?"

Isabelle shrank back in her chair and looked around her for reinforcements. There weren't any; they were alone in the room. Beth leaned forwards, and dropped the volume of her voice, although she was still speaking with the same baleful force.

"Don't you have any conception of what this means?" She didn't wait for an answer. "No, of course you don't. Nobody does yet. But you've not even thought about it, have you? The consequences haven't even begun to trouble your tiny little mind, have they? Jesus, you make me sick."

Isabelle was a hair's breadth away from tears, but she was still looking Beth in the eye. Beth threw her chair back and tried to make her way to the door. She literally ran into Sol, who had been standing behind her.

"What's wrong?" he said quietly.

She looked at him, then turned and walked away, towards the other end of the room, ranting as she went. Sol glance at Isabelle, and then followed her.

"Not you as well! The entire world had been turned upside down, and nobody seems to realise it! I've been trying to understand what this all means, and I've no idea where to start. It's just too big."

Sol put his hand on Beth's shoulder and gently turned her around.

"Imagine. One minute, I'm sat there, happily working away, and the next minute I realise that I'm part of a machine that predicts the future. How do you think I feel?"

Professor Maxwell sat at his desk, reading a research paper. He couldn't stand reading things off a screen, so he printed everything longer than a page out on the Minerva's single, small laser printer, stapled it at one corner, and read it in comfort. Once he finished reading a particular document, he squirreled it away in one of the subtle crevices of his intricate filing system in case he ever needed to refer to it again; he loathed the thought of printing anything out twice.

From his desk, he could survey the entire office. Just over a dozen young and middle-aged men and women were either scurrying from desk to desk, or sat in swivel chairs reading and typing. Those that were sat down all had headphones on; Maxwell fully understood that this was a perfectly reasonable things to, given the noise of the contractors finishing things off behind the plastic sheeting, but it bothered him for some vague, nebulous reason.

They had been here for almost a week now. Everyone was settled in, and all were set on the first real order of business, doing the groundwork to prepare for their first (and, to date, only) client's request. Professor Maxwell had claimed ignorance of the exact nature of the client (this was only partly true), and had only given his team the vaguest details of the task they would be carrying out for them. As it happened, he only had the vaguest of details at the moment, but he was confident that, sooner or latter, they would call, and he would be able to start the real work. Until then, the groundwork would keep everyone more than busy enough.

Such were Professor Maxwell's thoughts as the phone on his desk rang. He picked it up, answered with his name, and then listened. Before answering, he took a quick look at his staff.

"Yes. I believe we're ready."

He listen for a little while longer, and then reached across the desk for a spiral bound reporters pad and pen, and started to make terse, neat notes.

Ted scanned down the forecast that Sol had mailed him; it was a little disappointing. All of the winners for this afternoon were favourites, or near-favourites. There weren't any outsiders with huge odds. They'd still win a substantial amount for a modest outlay, of course, but it seemed to be a little pedestrian. In any case, his experience over the last week had taught him that he'd be a fool to bet against the forecast. He reached over to the phone, intending to call the bookmakers, then stopped.

It had occurred to him that you could place a bet on practically anything. Placing a bet on something unusual and highly specific (like the Pope dying on a particular day) would attract attention, and they probably weren't ready for that yet. There were still dozens of other sporting events, though. They'd be sure to find one that gave better odds.

He was on the point of ringing Sol to suggest this, but then he decided to try a little experiment. He fired up the WorldPulse forecasting interface for the test system. He'd seen Sol do this dozens of times; how difficult could it be?

Ted didn't let the complexity of the interface through him; he could split it up into sections, and just about follow what was going on in each. He thought for a minute, then decided on premier league football - there was bound to be a surprise sooner or latter, and that would mean good odds for the underdog. He tapped out a few details, then started off the system; things seemed to be going well. Auxiliary forecasts started lining up in a list at the bottom, vying for his attention. This wasn't so hard.

He picked the first auxiliary forecast off the top of the list, and examined it; it looked fairly straight-forward, though he couldn't see how it related to his original proposition. He shrugged, guessing that that was the point, and fed it back into the system. He did the same for the next three auxiliary forecasts on the list. Then he we back to his original query, and tried to see if it had advanced any. It hadn't.

Ted sat back, frustrated. By this stage, Sol had usually made more progress; he usually only had to use seven or eight auxiliaries before the answer popped out. Maybe he just wasn't selecting the right ones. He plunged back into it, and coaxed it through more and more auxiliary forecasts.

This went on for hours, with Ted trying this and that, but failing to make any noticeable progress. Eventually, he had to give up and concentrate on his actual work. After a few minutes, he stopped, and looked at Sol's original forecast again. He'd missed all of the races. This didn't do anything to improve his mood.

Mr Sherwood had become one of the most ardent users of WorldPulse. While Isabelle and Sol hadn't been able to tell him anything concrete, their silence had spoken volumes, and he wanted to know what was going on.

Of more immediate and practical interest were his business rivals. WorldPulse continued to give him the jump on all but a few of them, and from the way that these few acted, he guessed they were getting their information from the same place. Of course, all of the information was tailored to specific clients, but by placing himself in his competitors shoes, and asking the right questions, he could get a fair idea of what WorldPulse was telling them. He had no doubt that his rivals were all doing the same for each other, and for him.

Unlike some of the other WorldPulse subscribers, he was careful to bear this in mind when deciding how to use the information it provided. For example, the information coming in today was suggesting to him that he should buy into a particular company on the NASDAQ. Of course, the first thing was to verify that the information came from public sources, so he couldn't be hauled in for insider trading; however, he had become almost perfunctory in performing this step as his confidence in the system had grown. More importantly, he realized that, if the information suggested to him that he should buy into the company, it was probably also suggesting the same thing to a couple of dozen others around the world.

He though about the ramifications of this for a few minutes, and checked a few details via the public internet and other, less obvious, sources. As far as he could tell, all that would happen would be that the sudden run on the shares would cause the price to spike briefly, then settle down to a level that was nevertheless substantially more than he had paid. What possible harm could there be in that? He picked up the phone and called his broker.

"All of the subjects have taken up the offer? Excellent. Well, it seems that the seeding at least produces sufficiently convincing results."

"Yep. It also means that, assuming there aren't any problems we don't know about yet, we can proceed to something less prosaic."

"I'll be most interested to hear what you have in mind."

"Patience. You've got a little while to regroup yet. You'll probably be hearing from me again in a couple of weeks." He hung up.

Professor Maxwell hung up at his end, and looked across the office. A couple of members of his small staff were busily monitoring the information feeds, and diagnostic data from the live WorldPulse system, but most were fairly relaxed; they were more or less treading water until the results of their efforts were came through. He grudgingly admitted to himself that he probably should announce them; he got up from his seat and clapped his hands to gain their attention.

"If I could just have your attention for a minute or two," he said, and then paused. All eyes were looking at him; he never liked speaking to groups like this. Years of practice had enabled him to deliver a lecture adequately, but in circumstances such as these, where he hadn't written one jot in preparation, he was still next to useless. Nevertheless, he had their attention; there was nowhere to go except forwards.

"I have just received a phone call from out client. He informs me that the first attempt at seeding the system has succeeded with flying colours; the desired forecasts were made, and were indistinguishable, as far as we can tell, from, um, real ones."

An uncertain cheer went up from the audience; Professor Maxwell waited uncomfortably until it had died down. When it had, he continued.

"What we have achieved is unprecedented; it has never been done before." He was getting into the swing of things now, and, while not enjoying it, was not actively hating every second. "However, now is not the time to rest on our laurels, tempting as that may be. Now is not the time to celebrate our past achievements with not thought for the future. No," he looked around the audience, "now is the beginning of the next phase of our important and unique work; we must knuckle down, and ensure that, when our next assignment arrives, we are ready to do even better. I know that each and every one of you will rise to the challenge and exceed every expectation."

To his great surprise, there was a smattering of applause. Maybe he was getting better at this (or maybe, said the voice at the back of his mind, you're their employer and you look like you're expecting applause).

"Well," he said, raising his hands in what he hoped was a gesture of magnanimity, "show me that my confidence is not misplaced."

Sol arrived at work the following morning to find something unexpected on his desk. It was a large, thin rectangle, covering most of the desk (his keyboard had been moved out of the way). It was wrapped in dark blue wrapping paper with shiny swirls that caught the light, and tied with a wide blue ribbon. There was no card, so he shrugged and tore a strip from the paper. He saw his own face looking back at him.

He felt a light kiss on his cheek, just below his ear, and heard a whispered "Happy Birthday". He turned to see Beth, who had been on tiptoes, drop back to her normal height, but kept her hands behind her back.

"Well, you didn't think we'd forget, did you? I know it's a bit late, but..." she trailed off. After a moment's pause, she began again. "Anyway, the mirror's from Isabelle; she had to take a call, but she'll be here in a minute. She said I should get you this."

Beth presented him with the contents of her left hand, which was a three foot long branch with a ribbon tied around it. She looked a Sol quizzically; he shook his head and said, "It's a long story. I'm not sure I'll have occasion to use it, I'm afraid."

"I didn't think it's be much of a present," said Beth, "So I got you this as well." She reached around with her right hand, and gave Sol an oddly-shaped package which turned out to be oddly heavy. He put the stick down, and unwrapped Beth's other present to reveal a large, polished crystal ball and a velvet-covered stand.

"It's... It's great. Thanks. You shouldn't have, really."

Sol leaned over and gave her a peck on the cheek.

"Don't worry about it; just promise you'll remember my birthday."

Sol laughed. "I will."

"Do I get a kiss as well?" chimed in Isabelle, walking across from the meeting room door.

"Oh, I don't know. It might set an inconvenient precedent."

"C'mere"

Sol leaned over his desk, slightly awkwardly, and kissed her chastely on the cheek.

"Thanks for the mirror. Now I'll be able to dress myself properly."

"Don't jump the gun. You still need female advice. Doesn't he?"

"Oh yes. Definitely." agreed Beth, looking him up and down appraisingly.

"Hey; it's my birthday. You have to be nice to me."

"You're birthday was two weeks ago." Isabelle pointed out.

"Damn."

"Oh, and I should tell you," she continued, "we're going out for a meal tonight."

"What?"

"It's your birthday. We have to do something."

"My birthday was two weeks ago."

"I don't care; we're taking you out."

Sol looked unconvinced.

"Oh, go on," said Beth, "It'll be good to get out and have some fun. Things have been a bit morose since we found out about", she lowered her voice, "you know."

Sol looked at her for a moment. "O.K. Nothing big, though. Just dinner. And don't go inviting the whole office."

Isabelle sprang up on the balls of her feet. "Yay! I knew you'd come round." She turned, and called out "Hey, Ted, have you got a minute."

"For you, I've got five." he came over.

"You got any plans for tonight?"

"Not really, no."

"Great; we're going out for Sol's birthday. Meet up in town about 8:00 at the Cow."

Isabelle and Beth wandered off, discussing places in town to eat. Ted surveyed the wrapping paper and presents on the desk.

"So, it's your birthday, is it?"

"Two weeks ago, but what with everything we never got round to doing anything for it then."

"OK. Well, happy birthday. I'll buy you a drink tonight."

"Cheers," said Sol, without a hint of sarcasm. That was a nice, simple transaction. He didn't have to wrack his brains trying to think what to get Ted for his birthday.

The four of them sat at a round, dark, beer-soaked wooden table in the Cow, slurping at pints of beer and animatedly discussing possible restaurants. They'd all got a little dressed up; even Sol had made the effort, and selected one of his few decent shirts. This, of course, lead to Isabelle and Beth making a string of comments about the mirror, which only ended when Sol threatened to hit them with the stick Beth had got him.

Eventually, when it became apparent that a consensus would never be reached, or at least would not be reached before closing time, Sol declared that it was his birthday (or it had been, as the others pointed out, two weeks ago), and therefore he got to decide where to eat. He picked a Turkish place the other side of town, so they had a bit of a hike ahead of them.

Winter was almost over, but it was still cold, so they were all wrapped up in scarves and long coats. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, which made it even colder, but at least it wasn't raining.

Sol and Beth lead the way, with Isabelle and Ted following. The former pair were walking fast, chatting as they went, and soon put a bit of distance between themselves and the others. The slower pair walked along in silence for a minute or two, and then Ted turned to Isabelle.

"Why'd you organize this?" he asked her.

"Sol's birthday. Shit, you've only had one pint. I'm not going to have to carry you home, am I?"

"You can if you want. Anyway, what I meant was, why now?"

"You've seen how those two have been lately, ever since they found out about the forecasts. I just thought they could use a little cheering up."

"How about us?"

"I'm always cheerful. I have a naturally sunny disposition." She turned and treated him to a broad, Barbie doll grin. "And you seem fine." She turned to look at him again, this time with an expression of concern. "You are fine, aren't you?"

"Uh-hu."

There was a brief, uncomfortable silence.

"I think," Isabelle declared, to the world in general, and, judging from her breezy tone, apropos of nothing, "I think that, if you weren't fine, that you wouldn't tell me."

Ted said nothing.

"I think that I'd have to do something very rash to find out."

Still nothing. Isabelle stopped and turned to him.

"I'm not going to have to jump on you in the middle of the street and tickle you till you talk, am I?"

Ted stopped and looked at her in disbelief. "You wouldn't."

Isabelle smiled.

"O.K.," Ted said, turning and starting to walk again, "You win. I'm not one hundred percent fine, if you must know. I don't know what to make of everything. I mean, obviously, I know what we're doing in the short term, but it seems like it should be more than just a get-rich-quick scheme. You know what I mean?"

"Oh, don't you start. I have enough with those two over there," she nodded at Beth and Sol.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to go all angsty and guilt-ridden on you. It's just that I get the vague feeling that there might be consequences to this that we don't know about. We definitely don't understand it, not even Sol."

"I thought he had a fair idea of what's going on?"

"He has theories. There are still big gaps though. I mean, he understands it way better than I do, but I still don't think he really knows what's going on."

"Oh."

They walked on in silence for a couple of minutes, hands in pockets and eyes on the ground. After a while, Isabelle snapped her head up.

"This was meant to be fun! We're not meant to be talking about all that shit. Look, even Mulder and Scully seem to be enjoying themselves." She waved a hand at Beth and Sol, a long way ahead, who were laughing more than they were talking.

"O.K.," said Ted, turning to face her, "I'll drop the subject for the rest of the evening. There are much better things we could be talking about."

He looked away again, and they quickened their pace to catch up with the others.

The restaurant itself was in the cellar of what had probably once been a shop. The low ceiling was liberally hung with a variety of trinkets - baskets, jars and such - that could all at least pass for Turkish, at least to the untrained eye. They sat at a long, low table, and had to lean over to talk; the noise of the kitchen, the waiters, and the other customers bounced off the low ceiling and mingled to produce a rich cacophony.

"How're you enjoying you're birthday so far?" asked Isabelle

"What?"

"I said," she repeated, leaning in closer, "How are you enjoying your birthday so far?"

"Oh, it's great," Sol answered, "Thanks for organising all of this. You didn't have to."

"I wanted to. Now shut up and enjoy your meal."

Sol laughed.

After the noise and heat and light of the restaurant, the night outside seemed all the more dark and quiet. Beth shivered involuntarily, and wrapped her coat around herself more tightly.

"Are you going to be O.K.?" asked Sol.

"Oh, I'll be fine. Don't worry."

Sol seemed to consider this for a little while, then piped up. "Does anyone want to share a taxi?"

"I'm not too far away," said Isabelle, "Ten minutes, tops; I think I'll walk."

"I'll probably walk too," announced Ted, "I could do with the fresh air to sober me up a little."

"Just you and me then." said Beth, after the others had said their goodbyes and left in different directions.

They found a cab, and were at Beth's far quicker than either of them was expecting. "Want to come up for a coffee?"

Sol looked uncertain. "I should probably get back home."

He began to close the door, and then stopped, and opened it again.

"Oh, what the hell. It's not a long walk home from here. Why not?"

He paid the taxi driver, giving him a larger tip than he intended but not having the presence of mind, or the directness, to ask for it back. They went up the stairs, and Beth fumbled with her keys in the lock. She eventually got the door open, ushered Sol into the lounge, and went through to the kitchen to put the kettle on. Sol started to idly look at the bits and pieces dotted around the lounge, as he tended to when left in an unfamiliar home.

"Coffee O.K. for you?" Beth called from the kitchen.

"Actually, tea would be better, if you've got it." There was a small photo of Beth in a mortar board and gown. It was in a big frame, surrounded by snapshots of a younger Beth with people of about the same age, sitting on grass in untidy groups.

"Yup. Milk? Sugar?"

"Yes and no." A print of a London tube map; on closer examination the names of the stations have been replaced by other things. It probably deserves closer study, but there's more to look at.

"I enjoyed tonight; we'll have to do it again."

"Yeah. Well, I have a birthday every year at about this time." Bookshelves. Books are always interesting. You can tell a lot about a person from looking at what books they have (and which ones they choose to display).

Sol was standing next to the bookcase, reading the spines, when Beth came back in with two mugs of tea.

"Thanks." Sol said, taking one and cupping it in his hands.

"I was thinking of doing it a bit sooner than next year."

Beth raised he tea to her lips, and blew across it to cool it down, watching Sol over the rim of the mug.

"You never did tell me when you're birthday was." he said with a slight smile, after a little pause.

"5th of November"

"Really?"

"Mm-hm," she took a sip of her tea, "So you've got no excuse to forget."

"I'll make sure I don't. We'll have to go out, do something special."

Beth watched his expression for a while. "Yes. That would be nice."

Sol glanced at his watch. "Oh shit, I didn't realise it was that late. I should be heading off."

Beth looked at her own watch. "God, yes. You going to be in tomorrow morning?"

"Tomorrow, yes. Morning, don't know. Anyway, thanks for the tea. And thanks for coming tonight; it's been fun."

"It has. Well, goodnight."

She walked Sol down to the front door, and then came back up and looked out of the window, where she could see him walk down the street. After a while, she closed the curtains, and pinched the bridge of her nose. She was beginning to realise just how much she'd had to drink.

"So you've finally made it in, then?" asked Ted, as Sol approached his desk.

"Yeah; wrote this morning off completely, but I feel just about fine now. Anyway, I was wondering if you could go over some of the logs from the last couple of days with me. They don't look quite right, but I'm not sure why."

Ted and Sol spent the next couple of hours poring over the diagnostic information that WorldPulse continually spewed out, concentrating on the logs for the previous three days. As Sol had said, there was definitely something strange with them, when they were compared with, well, all of the rest of the logs WorldPulse had produced since the day they switched it on. It was a fairly subtle change, though - although Ted wouldn't admit it, he doubted that he would have noticed anything was amiss without Sol pointing it out.

After a while, Ted sat back heavily in his chair and declared, "We've ruled out most of the system problems that could be causing this. Could it be bogus input?"

"Not likely," said Sol, "We made sure during testing that the system could cope with the occasional fictitious report."

Ted thought about this for a little while.

"We did test, but we assumed that bogus reports would be rare, random occurrences. What if there's some systematic problem with the reports?"

"The sources are all the same as they were last week. Why would it suddenly appear like this?"

"It..." started Ted, then he stopped. "You've got me. I'll look into it, see if any of the sources have changed. See if there's anything you can spot."

Sol nodded, and went back to his own desk. A little while latter, he returned with a smile on his face.

"Looks like you were right," he announced, "I found about a dozen sources that have all developed subtly different patterns of use in the last week - I mailed you the list."

"Hold on a sec," Ted turned back to his computer, and brought up Sol's mail. He scanned down the list of sources, then turned back to Sol.

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure, yes."

"There's nothing that connects them. As far as I can see, they're just thirteen source picked at random from the list."

"I know. It doesn't seem to make any sense. There must be some sort of link, but I'm buggered if I know what it is."

"What do we do about it? Do we remove them from the system?"

"Not yet; Bombay and Toronto use it too, and I'd rather not have to explain to them why we've reduced the corpus until we know a bit more ourselves."

There was a pause.

"We could remove them from Crystal, and see what happens." Ted suggested. Crystal was their new name for the WorldPulse test system; someone had made a comment about the crystal ball that Beth had got Sol, and the name had grown on them.

"I can't see the harm in that." said Sol, cautiously. "Just don't put on any more bets until we're sure that it still works."

"What's that?" asked Beth, peering over Sol's shoulder as she handed him his coffee (they had decided to take turns; she would make the coffee one week, he the next).

"Screen saver," said Sol. He was sat back in his chair, leafing through a sheaf of printouts, stapled at one corner.

"I can see that. What's it doing?"

He put the printouts down and swiveled in his chair to face her.

"Langton's Ant."

"What? Whose Langton, and what's his ant doing to your screen?"

Sol laughed. "I have absolutely no idea who Langton was. Or is, maybe. A mathematician, I guess. Anyway, his ant is, well, it's sort of a thought experiment. Imagine an ant."

Beth sat on the edge of the desk and smiled. "O.K.," she nodded, then took a sip of her tea.

"Right. Now imagine that the ant is standing on an infinite black and white tiled floor. And the ant has two pots of paint, one white and one black."

"Why?"

"It just does. Anyway, what the ant does, is it looks at the tile it's standing on. If it's black, the ant paints it white, and turns left. If it's black it, paints it white, then turns right. When it's done that, it moves one square forwards, and then starts again."

Beth looked at him expectantly. When he didn't say anything more, she said, "Is that it?"

"Yes."

"So what's the point?"

By way of answer, Sol waved his hand at the screen, which was strewn with small black and white squares, and a dot that was skating about, changing things as it went. Beth leaned forward and peered at it.

"It's just random." she concluded.

"No, it's not, and that's the point. It looks fairly random, but it's actually completely deterministic. For any particular starting pattern, the ant always produces the same changes; it's doing everything according to the rules, it can't do anything else."

"So it's predictable then."

"Not really; you see, the only way to work out where the ant will be after a specific number of steps is to do those steps. There's no shortcut."

"What's it doing now?" Beth interjected; the ant had started to make slow but determined progress in one specific direction, diagonally out towards the edge of the screen.

"Oh, it does that. Eventually, no matter what the starting grid is, it'll get itself into a state where it strikes out in one direction like that; it'd do the same hundred or so moves forever, if we let it carry on."

When the ant got to the edge of the screen, everything blanked out, and the simulation started again, this time in red and black, with a different pattern of squares in the centre of the screen. After a second, it started to mutate. Beth watched it change.

"And all this comes from that ant? Oh, hang on!" she exclaimed, "I think I get it - the complexity doesn't come from the ant at all, it comes from the terrain it's moving across. Right?"

"Different ant, I'm afraid. Even if you start with a completely featureless terrain - all white tiles, or all black, it'll still do something as complex as if you give it a black and white Mona Lisa."

"So where does the complexity come from, then?"

Sol shrugged. "Beats me. I only work here."

The anomalous sources had been kept out of Crystal for almost a week now, and it was still making startlingly accurate predictions about whatever they decided to throw at it. Sol still had his reservations, but he finally gave in to Ted's constant badgering and worked out a forecast for the Saturday racing. In exchange, Ted agreed to limit the stakes to something small; twenty pounds a race, or there abouts.

"Split two ways, of course."

"Four ways," Sol reminded him, nodding at Isabelle and Beth, who were chatting over their Friday afternoon coffee, "They're in on it as well, remember."

"O.K., four ways, then. As long as they chip in to the stake."

Ted was reticent to dilute the winnings, but he grudgingly admitted that he didn't have much more of a claim on the system than they did; it was Sol who had made the discovery, and it was Sol who knew how to work the damn thing. In any case, it wasn't as if there was a shortage. When they were sure that things were working as they should, they could start betting serious money, and all four of them would be rich beyond the dreams of avarice. Hence, being magnanimous didn't really cost him all that much.

As usual, Ted collected the money and phoned the bookie, and this time invited the others around to his flat to watch the results come in. Normally, all of them would have zoomed past Channel Four on their way from Saturday Kitchen to Popular, but today they sat watching it for hours, drinking weak Belgian beer from fun size bottles and talking about nothing in particular.

Ted had printed the forecast out in large type (late at night, so nobody saw it come off the printer), and taped it to the edge of the T.V. Whenever a winner was announced, there would be a moment of silence as everyone squinted at the printed list, then they would cheer and clink bottles together. Race by race, it became evident that the prediction was good, and they became less and less preoccupied with checking it. As the last race came home, they had comfortably increased their money eight- or nine-fold, and went their separate ways with a quiet, almost indefinable, sense of victory.

Saturday racing became a regular fixture; they took a little out of the winnings each time for pocket money, but most of it was fed back into the pot for further stakes. They were amassing a sizable amount, and started to use different bookmakers at different times, so that none of them saw the entire winning streak and got suspicious. Sol even suggested that they start using some of the money to place bets on horses they knew were going to lose, just to throw anyone watching them off the scent, but the others derided this idea as paranoid in the extreme, so he let it drop.

During this time, Professor Maxwell's staff at Minerva were drawing together the information need to fulfill their client's latest request. In particular, they needed to work out which information sources to tweak to get the desired result. After a few weeks of analysis, they presented Maxwell with a list. He read it, nodding sagely, and then told them to continue as planned.

Sol and Ted noticed that some of the anomalous WorldPulse sources had returned to normal, and others had started behaving strangely. After a brief discussion with Beth and Isabelle, everyone agreed that the best thing to do would be to update Crystal's shit list, but leave the main system alone until they'd figured out what was causing the problem. Sol resolved to find this out as soon as humanly possible.

Mr. Sherwood had an increasing amount of confidence in the WorldPulse system. It had lived up to, and indeed exceeded, all of his expectations, and breezed through every demand he placed on it. He was becoming far more relaxed about the information it provided, and diverted resources that he might have used checking up on it to other, more productive, ends. It had proved it's usefulness, and it continued to do so on a daily basis.

Hence, when WolrdPulse suggested that a particular former Soviet republic was heading for a period of economic and political turmoil, he began, without hesitation, to make arrangements for his various companies with interests in the area to move their operations elsewhere. He didn't bother to check to see what the other WorldPulse clients would do with the news. If he had, he might have been surprised at the number of them who had operations in and around that particular small, barely significant, state.

The daughter of James and Catherine Shelby was born on a bright, clear day in the middle of spring. She was a grew into a quiet child with thick, curly brown hair, and intense dark eyes, who always had the appeared to be thinking very hard about something. When she was three and a half, her baby bother was born. At first, she was excited about this, and fussed around him endlessly. Soon, however, she began to notice that everyone was paying less and less attention to her. She went to her room (which she now, of course, shared with her little brother), and thought very hard about what to do about the situation.

Her first attempt was, predictably, to cause trouble. She started to break things, to throw tantrums at the slightest provocation, and to disobey here parents when they told her to eat of or get ready for bed. This plan backfired spectacularly; they only seemed to pay attention to her when they wanted to tell her off, and still lavished their affections on her brother. Soon, she gave up on this strategy, went back to her (their) room, and thought about the problem some more.

She decided that she simply wasn't interesting enough. She was sure that if she made herself more interesting, she would get more attention, so that is precisely what she tried to do. She started asking about things, helping around the house, talking to people. This sudden sea change in her behaviour confused her parents no end - they considered taking her to a child psychologist, until his mother pointed out that the psychologist would either say she was fine, or fix her back the way she was, in which case she'd start breaking things again.

Hence, the quiet child with curly hair became something of an extrovert. This helped her make friends when she started school, and as she progressed through the years she became the centre of an ever-growing circle. Sometimes, this bothered her - some of the other members of her particular clique could be, to be frank, real bitches when it came to people outside their own social circle. By the end of her A-Levels, this was driving her nuts, so she made a conscious decision not to replicate the situation when she moved away to university. To some extent, she achieved this, but she was always tagged as one of the Beautiful People (it didn't help that, in fact, she had grown into quite a beautiful young woman).

After university, she went on to spend a short time in a string of jobs, and made friends at each. A select few of these she kept in touch with throughout the rest of her life. She had a string of relationships that were far from unpleasant, but were never anything special and petered out sooner or latter. Maybe her standards were set too high. It didn't really bother her; she'd rather settle for no-one than settle for someone. She lived in a succession of spacious, airy, one bedroom flats, content on her own.

Eventually, she bought a little house in the country. She got on well with the neighbours, and although their children irritated her she had the composure not to show it. She tended her small garden, called her diminishing numbers of friends, and was happy. As she got older, she spent more and more time sat in a big, worn, wicker chair in her front room, alternately reading and looking out of the window, over the hills.

At the ripe old age of eighty-five, she died in her sleep. As she was dozing in her chair by the window, an articulated lorry, taking a short cut, it's driver wired on Pro-Plus, careened off the road and ploughed into the front of the house, killing her in an instant. This was, when you think about it, an astonishing coincidence.

The conversation stopped. All four of them watched the screen as it reiterated, in expensive and beautifully crafted graphics, the winner that they had just seen come in. The reason that Beth, Sol, Isabelle and Ted were staring agog at the T.V. was, of course, that the horse that had crossed the line ahead of the others should not have been the winner.

Sol was the first to move; he got up off the floor and tore the cheat sheet from the side of the T.V. After he had briefly examined it, he handed it, without a word, to Beth, who read it in turn and then handed it on to the others.

"I don't understand." said Ted in disbelief. "I mean, how could this happen?"

Sol shrugged and sat down heavily in an armchair.

"I don't know."

"I thought it was infallible."

"Well, obviously, it isn't." snapped Beth irritably.

Sol sighed heavily. "I'll go through the forecast when I get in on Monday; maybe the inputs where wrong or something."

"Maybe you made a mistake; as you keep reminding us, it's not just a computer. You're part of it as well." put in Isabelle, glaring at Sol viciously.

Beth leaped to Sol's defence. "Leave him alone. It's not his fault!".

"Why not?" said Ted, "He's the one making all of the predictions."

"You weren't complaining when you were getting all the free money!"

"Money that we've just lost!"

"That wouldn't happen if I made a mistake." Sol said quietly. The others stopped shouting at each other and turned to listen to him.

"If I make a mistake, I'll not get an answer; the forecast just goes off down a blind alley and never terminates. At least, that's what's always happened before. False predictions just don't hang together; Crystal just can't produce them."

They sat there in mute contemplation for a moment, then Sol piped up again.

"How much did we lose?"

"That was the big one; we had almost a third of the pot on that race."

"Shit."

"Yeah. Well, I guess we can carry on. This just means that the predictions aren't 100%. We can still call most of the races." suggested Isabelle. She was answered by a chorus of non-committal monosyllables. "Oh, come on. Show a little enthusiasm."

"I'll be enthusiastic when we've won back that money." Ted glumly announced.

Their fortunes did not improve for the rest of the races. They lost the next one, and the one after that. The one after that matched the forecast, but it was the favourite, so the odds weren't high, and consequently they only had a token amount riding on it. By the time the winner of the last race, not the one they had predicted, was announced, they were utterly dispirited. Nobody said much as they collected their coats and dispersed.

"At least your off the hook." Beth suggested as she and Sol walked home (they shared the first part of the route).

"Why?" Exoneration had been the last thing on Sol's mind.

"Well, I can just about believe you made one typo - although, like you said, this isn't the sort of thing that happens when you do - but half a dozen? All in the same forecast?"

"I might have been having a really, really bad day." he suggested mirthlessly.

"Seriously, I don't think anyone can blame you, given what's happened. It must be a fault with the system somewhere. Hang on," she stopped and turned to him, "Didn't you take a load of sources out of Crystal a week and a bit ago? Could it be that?"

"I thought of that," said Sol, "But it doesn't seem likely. I mean, I ran a load of tests when we took them out, and everything seemed to be working fine. I mean, last week's predictions were spot on. Pity we didn't bet more on them really. We could've used the winnings"

"We'd have only lost those too."

"I suppose. Anyway, I don't think it's the sources that have caused the problem. It's something else, something that's changed."

They walked on in silence for a couple of minute, then reached the bottom of Sol's road.

"Well, I'm going to go and watch some crappy Saturday evening television, take my mind off things. I guess I'll see you Monday."

"'Kay. See you Monday."

They struck off in their separate directions, heads bowed.

For no reason that anyone could fathom, international companies had suddenly started to up and leave. Maybe it was like an avalanche; one company got jittery, and moved it's operations elsewhere, and then the others saw it, and this in turn made them jittery, and so on, until foreign dollars were flooding out of the region like oil spilling from a stricken tanker.

Whatever the cause, the effects were catastrophic. Since independence, when the internationals had started to move in, the country had become steadily wealthier. Say what you like about globalization, it did have it's up side. Sure, the kids were all wearing Levi's and drinking Coke by the gallon, but fewer people were starving, fewer people froze to death during the winter, and everyone was, in general, healthier and happier. The internationals provided people with jobs, and soon these people even had a little of something they'd never really encountered before - a disposable income, which they naturally spent on aspirationally promoted western products. This, of course, was the point. The western companies got cheap labour and new markets, the locals got money, healthcare and Nike. Everybody wins, apart from the occasional curmudgeon claiming that the international influx was an even greater threat to their traditional culture and way of life than the Soviet tanks had been. Still, you can't please all of the people all of the time.

Everything came crashing down around their ears, though, when the internationals started to leave. The first announcement came in the spring; many more followed in the next couple of weeks. Of course, few people lost their jobs immediately - they would be employed for a few more months, to finish orders of washing machines and t-shirt, and make sure the factories were closed down tidily. For a few weeks, everyone wandered around in a kind of daze, stunned by the sudden withdrawal of the thing they had staked their lives on. Nobody knew quite how to react.

Soon, though, people began to look for a target, something to lash out at, something to blame for the sudden and catastrophic collapse of their young prosperity. The internationals were too nebulous to make a good target; they were vague, formless entities that seemed to be from another world. In any case, jobs were getting hard to come by, and anyone who had one, even if they only had it for a few more months, didn't want to jeopardize it by rocking the boat. The curmudgeons, many of whom could barely keep themselves from sporting "I told you so" smirks as they strode around their villages, were tempting, but it was obvious to everyone that they weren't the problem. Most people grudgingly conceded that they might have had a point, after all.

That left the government. They had come to power when the Soviets withdrew, and the leadership was still made up of the dock workers and steel workers that had lead the revolution. These men of the people had kept their enormous popularity, and it was inconceivable that they would be removed by a democratic election any time soon. In recent years, however, a new class of individual had been working their way up the hierarchy of government. These professional politicians had far more aptitude for the day to day workings of state than the dockers and steel workers, and far more ambition. The old guard, the revolutionaries, often expressed a certain weariness with office, and the new breed of politician would be only too happy to take their place.

Such politicians were viewed with deep suspicion by the people at large. While they were, to the man, capitalists and free marketeers through and through, they were too reminiscent of the old, Communist rulers for comfort. Hence, when the people choose to direct their anger and frustration at the government, they became a convenient and emotive target. There was a mood of tension in the air that spring, and everyone whispered that Bravikstahn was heading for another revolution.

It was friday lunchtime, and as per usual the majority of the Jupiter staff were in the pub. Ted and Sol had volunteered to go to the bar to get the drinks and order the food. Ted looked quickly about, to check that no-one was within earshot, and then quietly asked, "Have you done the sheet for tomorrow?"

"Mm-hm." Sol was still a bit subdued after last weeks failure.

"Any luck tracking down the problem?"

"Not yet," This was the main reason Sol wasn't his usual happy self; he had spent a frustrating four days trying to find the cause of the bogus predictions, but had so far come up with nothing. "I've found one thing for sure, though. It's nothing to do with the bogus sources."

"Oh? How're you sure?"

"I wound Crystal back to the state it was in last Friday, when I'd done the forecasts, then reinserted the sources and tried again. The results were practically the same. It's got to be something else."

"What, though? Nothing's changed."

"I know. I'm going to go into the office at the weekend and have another go at it."

Sure enough, after watching the racing on Saturday (they only predicted half of the winners; they'd changed their betting pattern, though, and managed to make a little profit), Sol did not head home but instead drove to the Jupiter offices. He worked through until the early hours, when the screen began to swim in front of his eyes and he could no longer focus on the letters. He drove home - fortunately, at that time, there was no-one about on the roads - and then returned to the office at about noon on Sunday.

He tried everything he could think of, leaving his desk occasionally to pace around nervously, thinking, or to go and get titbits of junk food from the nearby village shop. The problem with Crystal still made no sense. At about half past nine, when his stomach had begun to ache (he had not had a real meal for a day and a half) and his eyes had started to tear up, inspiration struck. At first, he dismissed his idea as fancy, but his mind kept drifting back to it, and the more he thought about it the more sense it made.

He took a break, and made himself a strong, black coffee to wake himself up again, then returned to the computer to implement his idea. It turned out to be fairly simple; he had it working in a little under an hour. He tested it on the racing from last week. As he watched the forecast take shape, he breathed a long sigh of relief. Crystal predicted all of the races successfully.

He tried it on various other things, until he got up to the previous days racing. The forecasts were flawless.

He considered calling Ted to let him know, but then he realized that it was almost midnight. In any case, he wanted to run a couple of live tests to be sure, tests that weren't just predicted events that already happened.

Tomorrow was Monday, and off the top of his head Sol couldn't think of any sporting events that would make good candidates. On a whim, he decided to try and predict what would happen in this very office tomorrow - with the modifications he'd made, Crystal should be more than up to that. He tapped in the initial query, and started selecting and refining as he had done hundreds, if not thousands, of times before.

As it became clear where the forecast was heading, he started to worry, and his typing became more frantic and desperate. As the final answer appeared, Sol just stared at the screen in shock, the blood draining from his face.

"Hi, you've reached Ted Masters." pause, two, three, "Or rather you haven't; this is his answering machine. Please leave a message after the tone."

Beep.

"Oh. Uh, Ted, this is Sol. I've found out what was..." Sol's paranoia kicked in; he didn't want to discuss this over the phone. "Um, I'll explain when I see you. Anyway, the important thing is that you really, really should call in sick tomorrow. Do not come into work. Got that? Right. I'll see you latter."

Click.

Ted looked at his answering machine, confused, and not sure what to make of the message. Sol had left it at quarter to one, and he sounded rough; he'd probably been working on Crystal non-stop since they'd seen each other on Saturday. Still, he sounded really agitated by something. Maybe there was something in it - Sol was usually pretty calm, and it took a lot to throw him.

On the other hand, it was a slightly odd request. Also, it had been made by a sleep-deprived fortune teller at one in the morning. Ted thought about it for a moment, then glanced at his watch, and realized he was going to be late. He hit "erase" on the answering machine, and stepped out into the Monday morning sunshine.

When Ted arrived in the Jupiter office, he noticed that Sol wasn't in. His mind flitted briefly to the message, but then he shrugged and forgot about it. He'd take the morning off himself if he'd been working all weekend.

He sat down and started to work. He checked that the live WorldPulse system was running smoothly, which it was (they hadn't had serious a problem with it since the day it started). He then turned his attention to Crystal. It looked fine, although he noticed that Sol had reinstated the shit list of bogus information sources. Maybe that was part of what he was doing yesterday. Ted resolved to ask him about it, when he finally showed up.

A little latter, Bill got up from his desk. "You want a coffee?" he asked Ted as he went by.

"Yes, please."

"O.K. - be with you in two ticks."

While Bill was gone, Ted heard a strange noise. He got up and checked the server that ran the WorldPulse front end, which was sat next to him (they'd been intending to move it to the machine room for a while, now that they were sure that it was working, but they'd never got round to it.) That wasn't what was making the noise. He turned around with the intention of asking Bill if he could hear it, but as he did a dark shadow passed across his window.

Everything seemed to slow down. As he turned back, he saw the window crack and then shatter. For a fraction of a second, which seemed to be much longer, he couldn't identify the thing that was crashing through the window towards him. It was a tangle of metal and glass and lights, with a face peering out from somewhere in the middle. It was careening straight towards him, dragging bits of window frame and venetian blind with it. These fragments of architecture got caught under the wheels and dragged out of sight, and Ted could finally identify the object; it was an the cab of an articulated lorry.

"What the hell is that doing in here?" Ted thought, as it careened towards him. This was understandable, given that artics aren't often to be found in offices, but didn't provide him with any solutions. It wouldn't have made any difference, anyway, as his body was moving as slowly as time was. He mutely watched as the runaway vehicle smashed a couple of desks out of the way, sending people diving for cover, and then hit him square on.

Time seemed to stretch out to infinity as he was pushed across the office, smashing into furniture (he noticed that he'd hit Sol's desk - good job he wasn't in today). His legs broke, then his back, but he felt a curious detachment from the pain. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that they were heading for one of the broad white pillars that supported the roof. As the approached it, time slowed and slowed and slowed, and it seemed that they would never get there.

To everyone else, all of this happened in an instant. One minute it was a normal day at the office, then there was a cacophonic noise and suddenly an enormous lorry was had appeared, right in the middle of the office, sat in the midst of a cloud of plaster dust and shattered furniture.

Nobody said anything for a second or two. Bill, who was stood at the entrance to the kitchen, dropped the two cups of coffee he was holding and walked around the trailer, which had overturned and spilled it's contents - reams and reams of paper - across the floor. He peered at the driver, who had been thrown through the windscreen and was lying motionless a few feet away, and Ted's smashed and bleeding body. He wiped his hand over his suddenly dry mouth, and was about to say something when he was interrupted by an ominous creak from the ceiling. He looked up questioningly for a moment, then the penny dropped.

"Holy crap. That's a supporting beam," he had turned and was already running for the exit, "Everyone get out!"

On the way, someone triggered the fire alarm. This was somewhat redundant, as several of the occupants of neighbouring buildings had already called 999.

The Jupiter staff were milling around in the car park when the fire engines and ambulances arrived. Most of the rest of the business park seemed to have turned out to silently stand and watch; after a few minutes, though, the gawkers began to drift off back to work, leaving only the stunned and disoriented Jupiter staff.

The ceiling didn't collapse in the end - the fire crew managed to secure it - but it was a close thing. The paramedics met with mixed results; aside from a few minor cuts and bruises, the only casualties were Ted and the driver. The former was rushed off to hospital immediately by one crew, and the other crew tended to Ted while the firefighters extricated him from the wreckage. When they finally freed him, he was by some miracle still alive, although only barely. They sped him away in the ambulance, and Isabelle went with him.

Half an hour later, the staff of Jupiter were still milling around outside the office - the fire crew had told them to stay out of the building. Some had bought coffees from Generic Sandwich Shop, and were sat drinking them by the lake. Most people were holding muted, directionless conversations; the rest were simply sat in silence, alone or in small groups.

Beth's mobile rang. She answered it, and listened for a little while. Then she put the phone away and looked up.

"That was Isabelle." She announced in a small, quiet voice. "He's dead."

Beth and Isabelle turned up at Sol's front door in the middle of Monday afternoon. He answered the door, and wordlessly lead them inside. There was a bottle of whisky, half finished, and a glass, on the coffee table. On the T.V. was the local news; they were reporting about the freak accident that had killed an office worker and an HGV driver earlier today. Beth could see herself in the background, leaning on the bonnet of her car.

"So, you've heard, then?" she asked, although she already knew the answer.

Sol picked up a remote control and, pointing it at the T.V., pressed a button. The local news disappeared, and was replaced by Quincy. He had obviously taped the lunchtime news bulletin.

"I didn't need to hear about it," he said, handing her a printed sheet of paper, "I already knew."

The three of them sat around Sol's small living room. Beth had related exactly what happened, with Sol nodding every so often, and occasionally referring back to the forecast. Isabelle hadn't said a word since she arrived.

Beth had offered to make tea, and the bustled off to the kitchen to do so. When she'd left, Sol turned to Isabelle.

"Are you O.K.?" he asked.

Isabelle said something that he couldn't make out.

"Sorry? I didn't catch that."

"I said," she repeated, looking up, "They couldn't do anything to save him." Sol noticed that her eyes were filled with tears. "They tried and tried, but he was too badly hurt. Oh, Sol, you should have seen him when they cut him out. He was limp, like a rag doll." She looked down again, unable to continue.

Sol moved over to perch on the edge of her chair, and put one arm around her shoulder. She collapsed into loud shaking sobs and buried her face in his chest. Her held her like this for a minute or two. When he looked up, he noticed that Beth had arrived with the tea. He caught her gaze, and they looked at each other for a moment. Then, Beth put the mugs down on the coffee table, then sat on the sofa and patiently waited.

After a short while, Isabelle composed herself, and Sol joined Beth on the sofa.

"I tried to warn him, you know. I left a message on his machine. He must not have listened to it before he left." Sol said, staring into his tea.

Isabelle looked up. "I thought Crystal was broken." she stated, flatly.

"It could still..." Beth began, but Sol interrupted her.

"I fixed it. I figured out what was wrong on Sunday night. In fact," he smiled grimly, "I might have improved it."

"What was the problem?" asked Beth.

"Some other time." Beth nodded. "Anyway, it's not important. The important thing is that Ted died, and I knew about it," He got up. "And I couldn't do a fucking thing about it. What's the use of knowing the future if you can't change it?" He stormed off into the kitchen.

"We don't know that." Beth called after him. She glanced at Isabelle, who was sat in introspective silence, and then got up and followed Sol into the kitchen.

"We don't know that we can't change things. Maybe it was just bad luck."

"I wish I could believe that." replied Sol. "It's just that it fits too well. I mean, the forecast even said I'd warn him." He leant against the worktop and buried his face in his hands. "God, it said I'd warn him, and that he'd do it anyway." He looked beseechingly up at Beth. "What else could I have done?"

She put her arms around him. "Nothing. There was nothing else you could have done."

He hugged her back, and held her for a long while, not crying, or saying anything, just standing there.

"What do you mean you've lost control?" the voice thundered down the phone.

"As you know, one of the three sites has been put out of commission, at least for the time being. The Canadian and Indian sites can compensate in terms of producing reports, but all of our analysis is based on the three sites operating. We would have to go back to the drawing board, quite literally. By the time we could construct a new plan, the British site could be up and running again in a new facility. Hence, I believe the best strategy would be to continue with the current plan, adjusting it to account for the change in circumstances. However, while we are running on two facilities, we will not be able to manipulate the forecasts."

Professor Maxwell waited for the reaction. When it came, it came like an explosion.

"Don't you realise how much of a problem this is?" his client screamed. "The vice-president of Bravikstahn was accosted in the street yesterday. A mob took him to a football stadium and shot him in the head. The government is holed up in the parliament building, and there are tanks on the streets!"

Maxwell said nothing; he knew all of this already. If he didn't, he wouldn't be doing hsi job, and his client knew that.

"This is the time you choose to tell me that we've lost control of events?"

"This is the time we've lost control of events. The events in question were, as I hear it, beyond anyone's control. We can only try and minimize the damage they do. That is what I am attempting."

"Not good enough."

The client slammed the phone down. Professor Maxwell held the dead receiver for a moment, then shrugged and put it down. The course of action he was taking was the correct one, and the client would realise that, when he had calmed down. Maxwell carried on with the paperwork he had been doing before he had been interrupted.

"Pitr! Pitr, where are you?"

The courtyard was heaving with bodies. The New Revolutionaries, as they had started to call themselves, dressed in denim jackets and work boots, had stormed through the barricades. Earlier that day, General Epanchin had issued an order for the army to stand down. Many of the troops, seeing the way the tide was turning, had quietly defected days ago, but now it was official. The army was no longer and impediment to the revolution. Flushed with this knowledge, the New Revolutionaries had stormed the Parliament Building, with every intention of bringing the nascent coup to fruition.

"Nikolay! Over here!"

Pitr and Nikolay fought through the crowds towards each other. They had been together as the mob stormed through the doors, but then had been separated by the crush of bodies as they had entered the wide courtyard.

"Where is Lyov?" Lyov was the leader of the New Revolutionaries, an ugly, ungainly man with a thick accent. Despite these setbacks, he was an unassailable charisma, and nobody would even think to challenge his position. Right now, he was climbing onto the pedestal of the statue in the center of the courtyard, a modern bronze of some figure from Bravikstahni history on a horse. Pitr pointed him out to his friend.

"Brothers!" shouted Lyov, silencing the crowd. "We are on the cusp of victory. Within hours, Bravikstahn will be ours again. We will remove the self-serving fat that has grown up and is suffocating our nation. We are at the start of a new era."

A cheer went up. On the roof behind him, one of the few loyal policemen sighted his high-powered rifle at Lyov's head, and pulled the trigger.

Jupiter head office sent out an e-mail that offered deepest condolences to the staff of the U.K. office, and in passing mentioned that they should take the next few days off, at full pay, while a new premises was found and an office set up. Very few people had been planning to go to work that day anyway.

Beth and Isabelle had stayed at Sol's house, Beth in the spare room, Isabelle on the futon in the lounge. The day after the accident, they had spent most of the day moping around the house, listlessly watching daytime television, and not saying much of consequence. After lunch, Sol decided to check his mail; this was when he received the message from head office. As well as it's photo-fit sympathy, the message mentioned that the WorldPulse front end was down for the site. "Shit." Sol stated flatly.

"What's wrong?" asked Beth, coming over to the corner of his lounge that housed his computer.

He pointed at the message. "WorldPulse is down. We can't get to it."

"How about Crystal?" she asked.

"I guess that went down as well."

"Didn't..." she paused, "Isn't it run on a separate server? I thought," pause again, "I though Ted mentioned that he'd moved it."

Sol looked at her as though she'd said something strange. That wasn't it; it was a perfectly reasonable thing to say, and something Sol might have said himself. He just hadn't expected Beth to say it.

"You're right. He moved it to another box when the load got too big, so that we wouldn't attract too much attention. I think it was in the server room, which means it's probably still working."

He turned back to the keyboard and started to type furiously. Beth watched over his shoulder. After a half a minute, he sat back and breathed a sigh of relief.

"It's still there." he announced, "Crystal's still up and running."

"Great" replied Beth.

Sol turned to look at her. "Is it?"

After Lyov had fallen, the courtyard had descended from everyday disorder into utter pandemonium. A small proportion of the New Revolutionaries had had the foresight, the resources and the hostility to acquire firearms before storming in, and they returned fire. The police on the roof responded in kind, and soon both sides were shooting indiscriminately. More humanitarian souls had rushed to the fallen Lyov, but anyone who got a chance to see him lost any hope they had; his face had been reduced to a bloody smear by the bullet.

Said bullet had, after eliminating the people's choice from the unscheduled presidential race, buried itself in Nikolay's shoulder, spinning him around like, well, like a man who's been shot in the shoulder by a sniper. He was almost crushed under the rush of feet where he fell, but his friend picked him up and half supported, half dragged him to the partial shelter of the cloister that encircled the courtyard. It was from here that Pitr and Nikolay watched the history of their country unfold.

New Revolutionaries - mostly unarmed - were falling left, right and centre. There was a little cover in the cloister and near the statue, but the vast majority of the crowd were standing in the open courtyard, exposed, and easy targets for the well-concealed snipers on the roof. As Pitr and Nikolay looked on, a group of New Revolutionaries, waving revolvers and shouting slogans, broke down one of the sets of heavy double doors leading into the building proper, and the crowd streamed through.

They heard shots from inside; there were evidently more police inside. Pitr turned his attention to Nikolay's wound, which could have been a lot worse. The bullet had stopped inside his shoulder, so there was no messy exit wound, and relatively little bleeding. It hurt like hell, and there would be complications latter, but that was something for medical professionals to worry about when the time came. Right now, what Nikolay needed was first aid, and half a lifetime working on cost-cutting construction sites and badly managed warehouses had given Pitr plenty of experience in that.

After a couple of minutes, he felt well enough to move again. Pitr suggested that they get out of the Parliament Building and find somewhere safer, but Nikolay, in his makeshift sling, insisted that they at least try and join the others.

"What would you say when your grandchildren ask what you did during the Glorious Revolution? Do you want to tell them that you hid in a coal cellar?"

"You've heard the shots. If we go in there, we may not live to tell our grandchildren anything."

"If we leave now, we may still not live to see our grandchildren. For pity's sake, Pitr, show some backbone. Do you not want to be there at the start of Lyov's 'new era'?"

"Lyov is dead! I do not want to follow him!"

"Nor do I, but I believe in that we are doing the right thing here." He got to his feet. "And I'm going to see it through."

Nikolay cautiously towards the doors, and Pitr followed him grumbling. They entered the building with the intention of following the noise to wherever the action was, but they soon abandoned that plan; they could hear shots from all over the building. The action, it seemed, was everywhere. They wandered around, but for a long time failed to find anyone. The gunshots bounced off walls and echoed along corridors, which meant that it always sounded like there was a gun battle around the next corner. There never was.

They were on the point of giving up, when Pitr turned to Nikolay and raised a finger to his lips. Both fell silent, and Nikolay realized what his friend had been indicating; there was movement behind the door they were next to. Slowly and cautiously he opened the door, then peered around the corner. He was greeted by the sight of the President, pointing a dark automatic handgun at him.

Nikolay raised his good arm above his head and edged gingerly into the room. The President kept the gun trained on him. Pitr watched from outside the room; he could only see Nikolay, and decided that the best plan for the moment was to stay quiet and hidden.

The President began to speak. "So, you're here. Of course, if I had done a better job, you wouldn't even exist - as revolutionaries, I mean. Well, if this is the way things must be. I wish you luck, and hope that you are favoured with more success than I have been."

With that, he put the gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

"Sol," shouted Isabelle from the sofa, "Do you know where Bravikstahn is?"

"Why?" Sol shouted back from the kitchen.

"It's on the news. There's been a coup or something."

Sol came through. "Has there? When?" He sat down and started to listen to the report.

"So, where is it, then?" Isabelle persisted.

Sol was still trying to listen to the news, so he answered her halfheartedly.

"It's a little ex-Soviet state somewhere in Eastern Europe." Sol reeled off. His particular occupation primed him as a source of facts and figures about all manner of things. "It had a bit of a steel industry, and quite a few international companies have factories there - textiles, big electronics, that sort of thing. I think it had some sort of strategic importance during the cold war - a sub base or something. Oh, hang on."

Isabelle turned to look at him, "What?"

"Isn't that the one that still has those nuclear weapons that nobody's sure what to do with?"

A few days latter, they got another message from Jupiter headquarters. An new office had been found and fitted out, and they were all to report to the new address tomorrow to finish setting it up, and start catching up on work. The new address was slightly obscure; it seemed to be in the middle of nowhere.

Isabelle offered to give the others a lift; that way, if they got lost, at least they'd have some company. Beth sat in the passenger seat, reading the map. They wound down country roads, Beth squinting at signs and barking directions, and Isabelle barking back when the directions came too late. Sol watched all of this placidly from the back seat.

When they got there, they looked at the sign uncomprehendingly. Beth checked the map; this was the right place. It looked deserted though. It was a business park, a crowd of two- and three- storey buildings, all in the same two shades of brown brick, winding roads between them, much like the one on which the old office had been in. A couple of things marked it apart though. On was the location; while the other one had been abutted to a fair sized village, with a few shops and even a pub (though it didn't do food), this one was literally in the middle of nowhere. A short access road lead straight on to a minor A road, and there was nothing else for miles around.

More prominently, it seemed to be deserted. The tall sign with places for a stack of a dozen company names held nothing but blank brass plates, and the windows were all empty. There were no cars in the car park, and nobody could be seen.

"Well, maybe we're the first here."

"Then how do we get in?"

There was a pause.

"Well, we should at least find the front door before turning round and going home."

"O.K." Isabelle sighed, putting the car into gear and pulling into the park, "Which number was it?"

They drove around for a little while, going down a couple of dead ends, before they found the correct building. When they did, they finally found signs of life. A few cars were parked in the car park, and there was a light on in the doorway. Neither the doorway or the car park could be seen from the road, which is why nobody had seemed to be around. They parked and walked to the door.

It was locked. Sol turned around. "I don't suppose either of you were sent a key in the post or anything?"

"It's a card lock." pointed out Beth, "And no, before you ask, I didn't get one of those in the mail."

"Would the old ones work?" suggested Isabelle, stepping past Sol and swiping her I.D. card through the reader. The light above the lock changed from red to green, and they heard the bolts slide back. Isabelle beamed at the other two, and walked into the new office; Beth and Sol followed.

For a new office, on what was probably a new business park, it was remarkably well finished. Desks, filling cabinets, computers, even pot plants and water coolers, had all been moved in. Isabelle looked at it for a moment, then stopped and put her hand to her mouth. They had reconstructed the old office exactly. They even had Ted's desk.

"What's wrong?" asked Sol, as he almost bumped into her.

"It's exactly the same." she replied shakily.

"As what?"

"As the old office!"

Sol looked around again. "No it's not. Look, there was a row of filing cabinets against that wall in the old place. You had two aisles down the middle instead of three. And this place doesn't have that whole area separated off at the front, where admin used to be."

Isabelle stared at him, then turned back around and re-examined the room. Sol was right; it was no more like the old office than any other office. She must be going mad.

It was a slow, ponderous day. Nobody did any real work; they were all simply trying to set up their own personal environment the way it had been in the other office, before the accident. In one of the empty rooms at the back of the building were piles of disembodied filing cabinet drawers, salvaged from the other site. There was a steady trickle of people meandering in and out, emerging with armfuls of folders and trays awash with paper clips, Post-It notes and other desk drawer shrapnel.

People started to call it a day earlier than normal, about five o'clock, and began to drift towards the car park. Soon, only a few people remained. Beth, Sol and Isabelle were amongst them.

Beth looked over her desktops, real and virtual, once more; everything seemed to be in place. It should be; she had been listlessly fiddling with them for most of the afternoon. She switched off her monitor and her lamp, grabbed her coat, and walked over to Sol's desk.

"I'm about ready to go; how 'bout you?"

"There's just a couple of things I want to sort out first."

She grabbed a chair and rolled it over, sitting down on a level with Sol. "What're you working on?"

Sol lowered his voice. "I'm trying to sort out Crystal; they moved the server over here today, and I didn't want to say too much about it in case they asked why it was so important."

He ran his fingers through his hair, a gesture that Beth recognized as telegraphing severe, protracted frustration. "I'm not sure I can get it going again. There was a lot of stuff that Ted sorted out, and I only had a vague idea of how it worked." He hunched forwards again and resumed typing.

"Do you want me to have a look at it? Maybe I can sort it out." Beth offered.

"It's technical" said Sol without looking up. After a moment, he stopped typing. He could feel something burrowing into the back of his neck. He turned around to discover that it was Beth's glare.

"Just why do you think that's a problem? What do you think my job is?"

Sol sensed that it would be a really, really bad idea to smirk right now, so he tried his utmost not to. He almost succeeded. "It's a bit different to the web stuff..." he started. Beth cut him off.

"Zach and I wrote 'the web stuff' from scratch. It has to scalable, it has to be robust, and it has to be maintainable by three people per site, 'cause Jupiter is to tight to spring for more. We've designed and implemented a full distributed application platform, and a bunch of very complex software to run on top of it."

"The holistic evaluation stuff has a lot of fairly involved maths in it..." Sol ventured quietly.

"My degree is in maths. And in any case, I thought you handled all that. I got the impression that Ted, God rest his soul, probably thought that Topology was all about that guy from Fiddler On The Roof."

Sol could tell when he was beaten. "O.K. I'm sorry. I'll add you to the WorldPulse test group; we can say you're helping me set up test runs for the live system, if anyone asks. The source tree is kept here..."

Beth pulled up her chair and peered at the screen as Sol gave her the lightning tour of Crystal inner mysteries. After a while, Isabelle came up and announced that she was going home, so if they didn't want to spend the night, they'd better finish up pronto. They did, but Beth went back to Sol's for dinner, and there they finished off the tour at a more relaxed pace, lubricated by a glass or two of wine. Beth, to her guilty surprise, realized that she was having quite a good time. It must've been the novelty; she'd not worked on something new in a long, long time.

Mr Sherwood was not happy. He liked to feel that he was in control of his many businesses, which is why he amassed such diverse technology, and spent such copious amounts of money, to ensure that he was in constant touch with everyone who mattered, and was kept informed about everything important. Right now, holding the phone in a big knuckled hand and listening impotently to a recording telling him how important his call was, he did not feel the slightest bit in control.

Eventually, with a click, the line was taken up by a human operator.

"Hello my name is Julie how may I help you?" The operator, who had a warm Scottish accent, managed to merge the statement and the question into a single utterance, devoid of any pause or meter.

"I have been waiting for almost twenty minutes." Mr Sherwood replied in calm, measured tones. An alert listener would have detected an undercurrent of malice, but Julie missed this entirely.

"I'm sorry your call is very important to us." Obviously, her supervisor had told her that breaks in between words made an unacceptable dent in some sort of quota.

"I do not pay your company the considerable amount that I do in order to sit around listening to an utterly appalling rendition of The Four Seasons."

"I'm very sorry sir I will pass on your comments now what was it you were calling for?"

"I am concerned, to say the least, about the notice that has appeared atop all of the WorldPulse pages in the last day. It mentioned 'technical difficulties', without going into specifics. I would like to know exactly what these difficulties are."

"Due to unforeseen circumstances one of our sites has been temporarily relocated this may result in some breaks in service although we will do all we can to minimize disruption."

"Are you in a position to provide me with any more detail than that?"

"I'm afraid that is all the information that I can provide at this time would you like me to put you in touch with one of our technical support staff?"

"No, that will not be necessary, thank you."

"Very well was there anything else sir?"

"No."

"Thank you for calling."

Mr Sherwood hung up the receiver with a look of disgust. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. He hadn't been able to contact Jerry, which was why he had to endure the general customer services number. However, Jerry wasn't the only person at Jupiter he knew.

Professor Maxwell looked at his watch; it was getting late. Most of his staff had gone home hours ago. He couldn't blame them. It had been a long day, and they had been working hard to get their analysis back in line with the current state of WorldPulse. In fact, they'd been working flat out for the last week, preparing. Everyone was drained and deflated, but they had gone home happy. They'd done it.

Maxwell had just tied up the last few loose ends; their model was now, at last, ready and working again. They had a script for tweaking the input sources to achieve the client's desired results. All he had to do was to start it going, and then they would simply have to monitor it's progress over the next couple of days to ensure that nothing went wrong.

He took his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose. It really was getting late. Still, he didn't have much more to do. He was tempted to just go home and collapse into bed, without starting the script off. However, his conscience kept reminding him that the script was based on a start some time this evening, and the later they left it the more time it would take for it to take effect. He reached for the phone, in order to get final confirmation from the client.

He paused. Should he call at this time of night? It was late, but then again, the client had been very insistent that he be kept up to date with everything, and time was of the essence. He decided to give it a try. In all likelihood, he wouldn't get an answer and they would have to start in the morning anyway.

He dialed the number, and listened to the phone ring a couple of times. There was a pause, then the ringing resumed - must've been redirected. After a couple more rings, somebody picked up. "Hello?"

For a second, he didn't recognize the client's voice. Normally, he spoke in sharp, clipped tones with the merest hint of an unidentifiable accent. Now, he was muffled and indistinct, and was not speaking with his usual verbosity or vitriol.

"It's Professor Maxwell, sir. I'm sorry to disturb you at this hour."

"Maxwell, hi. Um. Yes. I was, um, asleep." There was a pause. Maxwell waited. "Sorry. Yes, what is it?"

"We've just completed the script to enact changes you requested, sir. I'm calling to obtain final confirmation that you want us to set it in motion. As I explained, once we have done so, reversing the effects may prove costly."

There was another, longer pause at the other end of the phone.

"Yes. Start it." came the terse reply, eventually.

"Very well. Well, good night. I apologize again for disturbing you at this hour."

"No. You did the right thing. I'll talk to you tomorrow." With that, he hung up.

The last comment rattled Professor Maxwell slightly. He did not appreciate being treated like an unworldly academic who needed to be cosseted from the big, bad world like some southern belle on a cotton plantation. His particular line of work made him more acutely aware of the workings of the world than most people, and he had been seen the underbelly of almost every industry you could name, so it jarred when people talked to him like a graduate fresh out of college, with no idea of the way things happened. Still, there were compensations. Working for the arrogant buffoon gave him the freedom to put into practice many of the ideas he'd been researching for years, and get paid handsomely for it. He smiled at this thought as he shrugged on his coat and walked to the door.

The following day was friday, the day of Ted's funeral. Everyone meet in their best black clothes, skirts and ties whipping in the unseasonably cold wind. Isabelle wandered up to the small crowd hesitantly, and after a few half hearted greetings and small, awkward conversations, found it easy to simply hang around the periphery, blending into the background. To avoid eye contact, she gazed fixedly at the ground, where she saw little drifts of confetti, sodden and mangled, a remnant from a happier occasion.

"Hi." said Sol, walking up slowly. "How're you doing?"

"Not too bad, considering." She was relieved to be speaking to someone she actually knew, and didn't have to make generic funereal small talk with. "It's just a bit," she tried to describe it, but couldn't, "you know."

"Yeah." agreed Sol. (He wasn't humouring her. He actually did know.)

Isabelle got a tissue out of here small, dressy bag, and dabbed at her eyes. She looked up. "Beth about?"

"I talked to her a little while ago. I think she'll be arriving in a couple of minutes."

They stood in silence as people milled around them, muttering generic banalities like some awful chorus. Soon, Beth arrived. They said brief hellos, and then moved into the church. The service was about to begin.

After they had sat in the dim church, uncomfortable on the rigid pews, and listened to the service (Ted had, it seemed, been a fine man, who touched the life of everyone he met), after they had stood silently, heads bowed, in the wind and the rain, watching Ted's body being lowered into the ground, after they had filed somberly back to their cars, they converged on a nearby hotel for a buffet lunch. Everyone sat around, eating polite little sandwiches and drinking stewed tea.

Beth, Sol and Isabelle sat at the edge of the group of work friends. The rest of the Jupiter lot seemed to be giving them something of a wide berth, as people who were actually Ted's friends, as opposed to those who merely worked with him. That's not strictly fair; most of them were his friends, it's just that some friends are closer than others. In any case, they didn't mind, particularly. None of them were really in the mood for talking all that much.

Isabelle went up to get another cup of tea. As she waited patiently in line, a short woman in a simple black dress and a hat with a veil came up to her and touched her one the elbow. She turned around; it was Ted's mother.

"Oh, hello, Mrs. Masters." Isabelle said. She was unsure of how to continue, so she left it at that.

"Hello, erm, Isabelle, wasn't it?" Isabelle nodded, "You were a good friend of my sons?"

"Yes." she said, without hesitation. "I've been missing him."

Mrs. Masters nodded. "I hear you were with him when he died."

Sol and Beth watched from their table. Isabelle chatted with Ted's mother as they waited in line, then as they got their drinks, then as they walked back to another table.

"Do you think we should rescue her?" asked Sol.

"I think she'll cope." said Beth, without elaborating. Now that Sol looked again, he was inclined to agree. Judging by her expression, and the way she was moving, she wasn't uncomfortable or awkward. She was just having a conversation. He hadn't seen Isabelle open up this much since the accident.

"You're right. She looks like she'll be fine." He turned to Beth, "Will you? You've haven't said much about all of this."

Beth smiled. "I'm coping. You don't need to worry. It's still all a bit overwhelming, especially with," lowered voice, "you know...," normal voice again, "But I'll be fine."

After she got back from the funeral, Isabelle kicked off her uncomfortable black shoes and sat down heavily on the bed. It was only five o'clock, but the only thing she felt like doing was curling up in bed an going to sleep. Talking to Ted's mother had helped, but she was still numb with shock and a weird, emotional disbelief. She wondered how long this was going to last; she hoped that it wouldn't be forever.

She sighed, got up, and dumped the contents of her little bag on the dresser. Along with an assortment of tissues, her purse, and emergency make-up was her phone. She realized she'd not switched it back on after the service, so, more by habit than for any rational reason, she switched it on now, then put it down and started to take off her suit.

As she was hanging up her jacket, the phone beeped a terse snatch of Morse code at her. She closed the wardrobe (again, more out of habit than for any reason) and went over to see what the message was. Turned out someone had tried to call and, when they failed to get through, left her a voicemail. She considered ignoring it, but then habit kicked in, and she dialed the voicemail number. After all, it might be important.

As it happened, there were two messages. The first was from her mother, asking why she hadn't called, and wanting to know what was wrong. Isabelle had called her a week ago, a little before the accident, but didn't have the energy to return the call right now. The second was a little more unusual. It was from Mr Sherwood, asking if she and Sol would meet him again (this time, he suggested drinks in a hotel bar). Isabelle hung up as the recorded voice told her that she had no more messages, wondering what Sherwood wanted. She decided that, again, she didn't have the energy to phone him back now. He said ring at any time - she'd call him tomorrow.

She tossed the phone back onto the dresser, and carried on getting undressed. She thought a long, hot shower might make her feel a bit bitter, but it didn't. She sat around in her big, fluffy dressing gown for a little while, then dried her hair and had a very early night.

Monday was the day that everything was meant to get back to normal. Prior to this, they had just been setting up test runs and making sure everything tied together, but today they had to start putting information back into the WorldPulse system again. (The static reports, which still made up a fair amount of the business, had been put on hold indefinitely. When WorldPulse was working again, they could be brought up to speed in a day or two.)

Naturally, the day was fairly hectic for everyone. Isabelle, and the rest of the marketing team, had been frantically preparing press released and information packs, and today they started to call around clients, apologizing profusely for the confusion and patching relationships up. Isabelle volunteered to handle Mr Sherwood, largely because she had already called him on Sunday to arrange a meeting. When she'd got on top of the rest of her paperwork, she'd try and find a moment to mention this to Sol.

Beth was occupied with the web interface to WorldPulse; the teams in India and Canada had managed to maintain it, but the designers of the system - Zach and herself - still knew more about it, and they'd been patching holes and fixing leaks for a while. There was still a little of this to do, but it was more important to keep at least one eye on the running system. In theory, it should be fine, but it had been made clear that this would be a very, very embarrassing time for it to fail.

Sol was back doing active analyses, and entering them into the live WorldPulse system. He was a little rusty, as he hadn't done them for a bit. In fact, now that he thought about it, the last one he had done had been the one that had foreseen Ted's death. This thought made him freeze at his keyboard for a moment, but he pressed on, and soon he was lost in his work, producing forecasts (not the hyper-accurate Crystal ones, merely the extremely useful and insightful ones that Jupiter's customers relied on to do business) and shipping them off in clumps down the production line.

The three of them met briefly at lunch. They no longer had a Generic Sandwich Shop sitting on stilts outside the front door (there was a likely looking building, but it was currently unoccupied), but Jupiter had had the forethought to arrange for Generic sandwiches to be delivered. The new office even had a real break room, with easy chair and low tables, so they didn't have to co-opt a meeting room for the purpose.

"How's it going?"

"Busy. You?"

"The same. I'll be glad when we've got today over. Hopefully we'll get back to normal."

"Yep. I'm run off my feet as well. I guess it can't last for all that long."

As they filed out of the door, throwing their paper bags and cardboard boxes into the bin as they went, Isabelle caught Sol on the shoulder. "What're you doing later this week?"

Beth looked back, then carried on to her desk. After a little discussion, Sol confirmed that he would be happy to accompany Isabelle again, and they both returned to their desks at opposite ends of the office. The more he thought about it, though, the less convinced he was that it was a good idea. It seemed to Sol that they were treading a very fine line. Still, last time they met, Sherwood had seemed to understand the precarious position that they were in, and hadn't pushed for more information than they could give him. It couldn't do any harm.

Sol got back to his desk, and got back to work. He did a couple of more forecasts, but something seemed to be wrong. He couldn't put his finger on what, so he stopped, got a cup of coffee, and sat down to go through the forecasts one by one. He started with the one's he'd just done, then went back to the ones he'd done this morning. He couldn't find anything amiss, and he was on the point of giving up, but something made him look again.

Eventually, it occurred to him to look at the sources. Sure enough, something was up with a small number of them, as it had been on previous occasions. This time, Sol was determined to try and work out what was going on.

He looked at each of them in turn, then tried to find a connection between them, but he couldn't see any. Dead ends and ideas that went nowhere took up too much of his time; eventually, he had to give up and go back to filing WorldPulse forecasts. This distracted him for the rest of the day, but he was determined to sort it out, so he stayed on after hours to work on it.

As Beth was leaving, she came over to his desk and stood behind his monitor. "Still at it?" she asked, "They don't pay you enough."

"Mm-hm. You know we mentioned the problem with the duff sources." He looked around. Nobody else was in earshot. "The ones on the Crystal shit list."

"Yeah."

"They've turned up again. I'm determined to find out why it keeps happening."

Beth moved around to Sol's side of the desk, and put down her bag and coat. She rolled up on of the chairs next to Sol's, and started to read the various bits and pieces on his monitor. "Show me."

Sol looked at her searchingly for a second, then with an air of decision launched into an explanation of the problem. Beth listened, and asking the occasional question. Soon, her questions were less to do with how things worked, and more to do with possible solutions. They bounced ideas off each other for an hour, but didn't make any progress.

Beth stood up and stretched. "I'm gonna get a coffee. Want one?"

"Mm-hm." Sol replied, not taking his eyes off the screen. Beth took his answer to be an affirmative, and walked off towards the kitchen. As she left, Sol tried one more thing, then slid the keyboard across the desk in frustration and sat down heavily in his chair to stare moodily at the collection of windows that should be giving him the answer.

Beth was making the coffee when she heard Sol come up behind her.

"I've had a thought," he announced, "Is Crystal working again?"

"Not as such, but we could get it going fairly easily. Why?" she looked at him for a second, then "Oh! You're going to use it to try and predict the answer!" She grinned broadly for a second, then her face fell into a look of slight confusion. "Will that work? I mean, can it do that?"

"It's not really a straight prediction, but yes, I think I can write it."

"Won't it have a problem predicting what WorldPulse is doing? Isn't that too complex?"

"It used to have a problem, but not any more. I gave it the ability to do reflexive forecasts, so it can factor it's own actions into the forecasts. That's why it started to give duff results on the horse racing."

"I don't follow." said Beth. The change of direction had taken her by surprise, and she was still trying to get her footing.

"By that time, we were placing fairly large bets on outsiders. We did it in such a way that any one bookie wouldn't notice, but it was still affected things in subtle ways,..."

"And that's exactly what holistic analysis deals with." finished off Beth. She was beginning to see where this was heading.

"Precisely. However, the old Crystal, and indeed the normal WorldPulse software, has a blind spot when it comes to self-examination. It just doesn't consider the effects it's own predictions have. In this case, that effect was to make us place very unusual bets, which in turn indirectly influenced the winners. Hence, as Crystal didn't consider the effects of the prediction, it got the winners wrong. Once I'd figured out that this was what the problem was, I added the ability for Crystal to factor itself into the forecasts, and it suddenly got more accurate."

"Right," said Beth, drinking her coffee and trying to figure out what all of this meant. Something occurred to her. "But aren't you in danger of getting into a loop, where predicting something one way causes it to happen another, so the system predicts it the other way, and then because of that it actually happens in some other way, and so on, forever?"

"Yes. That's why it wasn't done in the original system; we wanted to avoid that happening. It turns out that there are still certain circumstances in which it can happen, but we just make sure that those never happen."

"How?"

"Basically, there's a check in the interface; it looks for dangerous values, ones that would cause a divergent cascade,"

"Divergent cascade?"

"That's what we call it when the system would keep modifying the prediction forever."

"O.K.; I guess that make sense."

"Anyway, values that would cause a divergent cascade are screen in the interface, and never get through to the software proper."

"What if they did?"

Sol shrugged. "Well, the system would go haywire. It would use up an increasing amount of memory, and make more and more candidate predictions, until we stopped it. Of course, the system only has a finite amount of resources, so what would actually happen would be that the spurious predictions would take up more and more of them, leaving less and less room for real predictions. So, we wouldn't necessarily spot it immediately."

"Why doesn't that happen for the new stuff, for Crystal?"

"Data screening, again. We just make sure it doesn't see anything that might alarm it. There's a far greater risk of a cascade when you have reflexive forecasts, but as long as you know about it you're fairly safe. There's always another way to approach the forecast so that it doesn't create a cascade."

"Always?" Beth sounded skeptical, and with good reason. The mathematician in her was deeply suspicious of that statement, which sounded awfully like the halting problem in disguise.

"As far as we know." Sol confirmed confidently.

"Hmmm." Beth hadn't been convinced.

"Anyway, could we get it working tonight, do you think?"

"Sure, as long as you don't mind putting in a couple of extra hours."

Sol smiled. "I think I can handle that, if I've got you to keep me company."

They both needed computers to work at, and their desks weren't within comfortable shouting range, so they decided to grab two company laptops ("It's O.K.; you only need to sign the book if you're taking them out of the office." Beth reassured Sol) and set up in the break room, which was in any case more comfortable. The sun was already setting by the time they started. Soon, the outside world was pitch black, save for the lights of the cars and lorries careening back and forth on the road, at far more than seventy miles an hour.

They worked into the night, mostly silently tapping away at the laptops on their knees, or muttering to themselves. Occasionally, one would ask the other a question about some specific, or they would need to stop and synchronize with each other in order to run a test or try something out. At about nine, they both, simultaneously, noticed that they were hungry, and went out to buy snacks from the village shop. They returned, and ate while they worked.

Eventually, a few minutes after ten o'clock, Beth announced that she thought everything was done. Sol looked at his own screen for a second, then agreed that they hadn't missed anything. Beth took a deep breath, and issued the command to start up the system. There was an agonizing pause, then the terse, single line of text appeared, indicating that everything was working fine.

As Beth let out her breath in a long sigh, Sol fired up the interface. He tried a couple of operations, then nodded, satisfied.

"Looks like everything is fine." he confirmed.

"That's a relief. If it'd failed after all that, I'd have had to throttle somebody."

"I'm glad it didn't then," chuckled Sol, "I'm the only one here."

They both laughed, then looked at each other in the dim light of the break room (they'd put on a couple of desk lamps - the overheads seemed too harsh). For a moment, everything was absolutely quiet, and absolutely still. Sol shook his head, and looked back at his laptop, typing a handful of characters at random, and deleting them.

"Um, do you think we should test it?"

"How?" Beth was still watching Sol's face.

"Well, there's only on real way to test it properly, and that's to generate a prediction."

"Right. So," At that moment, Sol looked up and caught Beth's gaze again. "What do you want to predict?"

Sol was momentarily lost for words. This time, he was confused by the sudden change in direction. In fact, he wasn't entirely sure what direction they were going in. He decided that the safest way was to forge ahead in the same way that he'd been going anyway, and hope for the best.

"Um," he said, "How about, er, horse racing?"

Beth smiled, and then suggested football instead. They threw ideas back and forth, until eventually, they decided to pick some random, obscure and insane event from EuroSport. Both of them new that it wouldn't make a particularly good test - horse racing would have been easier to compare to what had gone before - but they were reasonably confident that the system was O.K., and so were happy to have a little fun with it.

"How about Equestrianism?" suggested Sol, leafing through the T.V. section of the newspaper.

"What is it with you and horses?"

"Well, there isn't much else... Football, Rally, Sailing...."

"How about Sailing? That's about as far away from horse racing as it's possible to get."

"They have stages that go on for days; I don't even know if there'd be a winner tomorrow."

"If only there were some way you could predict the future, you could find out." said Beth, with a wicked grin. Sol threw the paper at her, and hunted around for the previous day's Review.

"Ah, here's an idea," he declared, "Weight Lifting."

"Weight Lifting? Isn't that just a load of sweaty men rubbing oil on each other? How do you bet on that?"

"Apparently, it's a proper sport. Look," he proffered the paper, "there it is."

Beth leaned forwards and squinted at the page. "Dear lord, it's on twice. Well," she sat back, "that settles it for me. Weight Lifting it is. Want to put any money on?"

Sol shook his head somberly. "Probably not."

"Why?" asked Beth, momentarily taking things seriously, "You think it might not work?"

Sol's face cracked into a grin. "No. I just don't want to go into a bookies and put a bet on professional Weight Lifting."

The break room had satellite T.V., ostensibly for the news channels. However, it also received all of the free channels, so Sol and Beth could check that the forecast was accurate. They told Isabelle about it over lunch, and the three of them timed their afternoon coffee break to coincide with the end of the weight lifting coverage. They got a few strange looks, but Beth explained everything succinctly when somebody actually asked them about it.

"We put a bet on."

Sol looked incredulously at her, as did the enquirer. She continued.

"Oh, yes. It started off as a joke, but we've all got money riding on this."

Sol relaxed a little, but the enquirer just look more baffled, and, after a little interlude of Beth smiling cheerily, left to find a more sane conversation. Beth turned to Sol.

"You thought I was going to spill the beans, didn't you?"

"Well, erm..." he replied, hesitantly.

"Go on. Admit it."

"O.K., for a moment I didn't know what you were going to say."

Beth tutted, and turned back to the T.V. "I don't know. The lack of trust you have in me is terrible."

"Will you too stop it," asked Isabelle, "I'm trying to watch."

They stared at the screen for a second, captivated by the jerk and snap.

"I can't believe I'm watching this." said Isabelle flatly, without taking her eyes off the screen.

Professor Maxwell had taken to wandering around the office every morning, just checking on people's progress. He tried to make it informal, but he didn't do informal very well, and it seemed more like a general inspecting his troops than anything else. A lot of what Maxwell did took on a stereotypical military tone, which was odd, as he hadn't done a day's military service in his life. In any case, although he did his best to put his staff at their ease, they always stiffly and self-consciously presented their work for approval, and glossed over any problems they might be having.

This morning was no different. Although there were several problems, everyone told him that they were fine, everything was going great, would you like to have a look? They showed him demonstrations, potted examples that they knew worked, and he nodded and asked questions. Maxwell wasn't stupid enough to be even remotely convinced by any of this, but he thought he could spot any major problems, should they occur.

He thought he spotted one this morning. One his more junior recruits - fresh from his Master's degree - had been assigned to monitoring the take-up of the doctored information. Of course, he said that everything was fine, that there was nothing unusual, but Maxwell could see that he was squirming more than usual, so he pushed him a little further.

"There is one thing that's a little unusual." he admitted uneasily.

Thought so. "Go on."

"Well, it seems that there had been an unusual level of activity on the sources in question. It appears that one of the reporting sites has noticed that there is something unusual about them, and is monitoring them closely to find out exactly what it is."

"I see. Well, I doubt it is a cause for much concern; even if they've noticed that the sources are unusual, it would be highly unlikely that they will be able to find out what is happening to them. The only thing that may cause a problem would be if they chose to remove them from their model. However, if they chose to do that, they would have to involve the other sites, and I doubt that they could get a consensus without knowing the cause of the problem."

The novice nodded, still sporting the expression of a rabbit caught in headlights. Maxwell took pity on him, although he secretly wished he could find people with more backbone.

"Very good; excellent work. Keep it up, and if anything else unusual happens, be sure to let me know."

"Certainly, sir."

He breathed a sigh of relief as Maxwell turned and returned to his desk. Maxwell, on the other hand, was slightly more worried about this than he had let on. It all depended on who was the analyst at the site in question. Fortunately, the client had provided Maxwell with access to the Jupiter personnel records, so he could find out. As he tapped away at the keys, he vaguely wondered about the legality of accessing the records of another company, but concluded that it was probably O.K.; Minerva was, after all, a wholly owned subsidiary of Jupiter , so it was practically and internal matter. As he thought this, the staff list for the U.K. site appeared on the screen. He scanned down to find the Holistic Analyst, and read the name.

"Solomon Davies," he mused to himself, "He might present a problem."

Maxwell thought about this, and then shook his head to dispel the idea. The chances that anyone could connect the changes they had made with the goal they were seeking, and hence the client, were infinitesimal. There was nothing to worry about.

Sol decided to run the Crystal test from home, mainly so he didn't need to spend another late night at the office. He'd still not figured out what he was going to do when he found out. He could hardly tell people that he knew what the problem was because his magic machine that predicted the future told him so. Whenever he thought about this, he quickly decided to bank on it being something he could fix on his own, and move on to more practical matters, with which he was far, far more comfortable.

When he got home, he changed out of his work clothes, made himself a quick dinner, then sat down at his computer with a large, steaming mug of tea. Within a couple of minutes, he'd logged in to the server that housed Crystal, and checked that everything was in working order. It all seemed to be O.K., so he brought up the query interface and started to type.

Even though he had quite a speedy, and pricey, internet connection, things were still slow when compared to working at the office. He made a mental note to talk to Beth about this. Maybe she could change something and speed it up a bit. After all, they were probably going to be using it from home quite a bit.

He paused as he realized that that was the first time he'd thought of Beth, and not Ted, when he needed help with something technical. He wasn't sure what to make of this, so he employed his usual strategy of ignoring it and pressing ahead with the job in hand.

Trying to use Crystal to determine what was going wrong was substantially different to using it to make forecasts. The only reason it worked at all was that both tasks involved sifting through massive amounts of interconnected possibilities, all pulling in different directions. Despite this underlying similarity, the surface details of the problems had little in common, and Sol had to build up a lot from scratch just to get started. This made it long and tiring work.

Halfway through, he got up to make another in the long line of cups of tea. While he was stood in the kitchen, leaning on the work surface and waiting for the kettle to boil, his mind drifted. Why was he doing this? Did it really matter that a few of the sources were a little off? It didn't seem to be harming the WorldPulse predictions - they were the same, aside from a few minor, unimportant changes - when those sources were used as when they weren't. It was probably a glitch in the system. Than again, it would be useful to know what effect, if anything, those sources would have on Crystal if they were included.

His thoughts drifted away from work, and alighted on Beth. They'd been spending a lot of time together recently, and they seemed to enjoy each other's company. He certainly enjoyed being with her, and she appeared to feel the same way. However, before he could take this line of enquiry any further, the kettle boiled, and he was distracted by the mechanics of making tea. By the time he was back sat down at his desk, he had forgotten that he'd been thinking about anything other than WorldPulse.

He spent a little longer hacking away at the edges, then, when he thought he'd laid enough groundwork, he plunged into the task proper; finding out the root cause of the abnormalities in the sources. After a few minutes, he realized the he'd missed out some important parts of the preparation, so he swore, went back, and filled in the gaps.

After a cup of tea, the second attempt went far better, at least initially. He sped along, and the system showed every sign of this being the right direction. However, things started to go awry. The paths down which Crystal was taking him looked a hell of a lot like dead ends, aside from the fact that they showed no sign of ending. He went back and checked his working, and then double checked it. Everything was fine, as far as he could tell.

He sat back, literally, and tried to step back from the problem, figuratively. Why was it sending him down these paths? He was fairly sure that he'd got all of the preparation right, which meant it was something to do with the prediction itself. He'd checked for cascades, and found nothing. There was no good reason that the prediction should be wrong. He shrugged, and started to follow the paths, working on the assumption that they were, in fact, correct. The worst that could happen was that he would waste a little time, and he might, if he was lucky, find out a bit more about what was going wrong.

At first, it seemed like he was being led off on a wild goose chase, but then the paths began head in predictable directions, and Sol thought he could see the beginnings of a pattern forming. His confidence bolstered, he continued, quickening his pace but taking care not to make mistakes. He hadn't got this far to have the whole thing thrown out of kilter by a typo.

The system finally told him that he'd reached an answer. This startled him slightly; it hadn't seemed that he was anywhere close. He read through the text of the prediction, presented in a tab that had popped up to obscure the list of outstanding auxiliary queries. He read it through again, and scratched his head. He had absolutely no idea what it meant.

He got up, and paced around the room, thinking. He sat back down, and worked through a couple of the remaining auxiliaries, just to be sure. They lead him to exactly the same, nonsensical conclusion, as they always did (when Crystal had got an answer, it didn't change it's mind). Frustrated, and still baffled, he decided to call it a night. He logged out, switched off the computer, and went upstairs.

After he'd cleaned his teeth, got undressed, and got into bed, just before he turned out the light, he had a flash of inspiration. He leapt out of bed and ran downstairs, stark naked, slamming the lounge light on as he passed. He sat down, and jabbed the computer back on, and impatiently watched the seemingly interminable boot process. He hurriedly rushed through logging in and connecting to the Crystal server, then stabbed at a few keys to bring up the prediction.

He quickly skimmed the text, then made a conscious effort to calm down, and read through it again more slowly. It looked like his hunch may have been correct. However, now that he thought he understood it, he wasn't sure that he believed it. Leaving aside the small matter of how someone could do it, it was scary to imagine that anyone would even try it, let alone succeed. He read it though one more time, to make sure, then reached for the phone and dialed Beth's number. After a few rings, she answered.

"'Lo?"

"Hi. It's Sol."

"Sol? It's late." she stated, obviously. "What's up?"

"I've found out what's wrong with the sources."

"Is that all?" she sounded, not to put too fine a point on it, pissed off. "Can't it wait until morning?"

"No." Something in his voice made her take him seriously.

"O.K.; I'll be there in about quarter of an hour."

She hung up, and Sol dialed Isabelle. After an almost identical conversation, he put the phone back and started to head towards the kitchen, then paused. It occurred to him that, if he was going to have company, he ought to put some clothes on.

Isabelle shook her head. "Sorry, I didn't quite follow that, You're going to have to explain that again."

Sol had thrown on jeans and an oversized sweatshirt, and was sitting in the armchair, leaning forward to address Beth and Isabelle, sat on the futon. As always happened in this sort of situation, Beth had made tea, and they were all nursing warm, cooling mugs.

Beth sat back, and looked at Sol through narrowed eyes. "Let me see if I'm getting this right. You're saying that the information sources that feed WorldPulse are being manipulated deliberately?"

Sol nodded.

"By who? Why would anyone want to do that?"

Sol shrugged. "'Who', I don't know. 'Why' is a question I can begin to answer. All of the changes were done to achieve a specific end result. Someone is tampering with the inputs in order to change what goes into the reports."

"Sounds like it would be difficult." suggested Isabelle.

"Difficult?" Sol laughed, "It would be impossible."

"Nevertheless," said Beth, "someone is doing it?" She thought for a second. "Would it have to be someone at Jupiter?"

"Not necessarily," said Sol, "In fact, it probably isn't someone internal. Given how difficult..."

"Impossible," Isabelle reminded him.

"Yes, impossible doing this is, it would seem that someone who had privileged access to Jupiter would have far easier ways to achieve the same result."

"But why would the be going to all this effort?" asked Isabelle, "Changing a report or two isn't going to take over the world, is it? I mean," she glanced at Beth, "It doesn't even sound important enough to come haring round here at one in the morning for."

"Not going to take over the world? I told you what they changed, didn't I?"

"No." said Beth and Isabelle simultaneously.

"Oh." Sol looked a little sheepish. "Well, the first thing they did, as far as I can tell, was to affect the assessment of the political situation in a little republic called Bravikstahn."

"Doesn't sound like the end of the world." opined Beth.

Sol was starting to get irritated, and it was showing in his voice.

"Most of the WorldPulse subscribers had substantial investment there - factories and stuff, mostly. That's not a coincidence, by the way. They all read positive assessments of the region in Jupiter reports. In fact," he laughed dryly, then had a mouthful of tea, "that was one of the reasons for introducing WorldPulse. Personalised reports were meant to reduce the incidence of concerted action like that.

"Anyway," he continued, "When they read the modified reports, that suggested that the country was on the brink of revolution, they all pulled out. This started off a mass exodus of foreign money from the region, everyone lost their jobs, and - Bam! - revolution."

"Oh yeah," said Isabelle, "We saw that on the news. Hang on, didn't you say they were the ones with the..."

"Nuclear weapons." Sol finished. He sat upright and looked from Isabelle to Beth. He was pretty sure he had their attention now.

"So," said Beth, speaking slowly and levelly, "I'll try again. Someone's manipulating the inputs to WorldPulse, and they're doing that to get their hands on nuclear weapons?" Sol nodded.

"Well," she said, levelly, "That's the sort of news that it's worth getting out of bed for."

"Hang on," said Isabelle, "We don't know that they can get the weapons. All they've done is destablise the region. The weapons could go anywhere."

Sol hadn't thought of this. "Good point."

"These are people who've managed to overthrow an entire, bona fide, government. I think we can assume they've thought it through." Beth pointed out, then turned to Sol. "Have they done anything else?"

Sol jumped; he'd been in a world of his own, trying to imagine what would happen to the dozen or so inter-continental ballistic missiles, complete with high-yield warheads, that Bravikstahn was thought to possess. "What? Oh, yes. They've been manipulating the sources - and it's not all the same ones - for quite a while. I've not been able to work out what they're aiming for, yet, though. I'd only just worked out about Bravikstahn when I called you."

The three of them sat in silence, momentarily cowed by the enormity of Sol's discovery. Eventually, Beth quietly voiced the question that they had all asked, but individually failed to answer.

"What do we do about it?"

"Could we go to the police?" asked Isabelle.

"And tell them what?" replied Sol, "That our fortune telling computer told us that person of persons unknown is subtly manipulating information passing through out company, in order to obtain nuclear weapons?"

"We don't need to mention Crystal," interjected Beth, "You're an expert on WorldPulse; we can just say that you'd done the analysis..."

Sol cut her off. "And then they'd ask any of the other WorldPulse experts, or any other holistic analyst for that matter, and they's confirm without hesitation that I was stark, staring mad. Anyway, even if we could convince the authorities that this is going on, which seems highly unlikely, then what could they do? What crime have they committed?"

"Obtaining nuclear weapons via deception must be against some law or other."

"But they've not done that yet. All they've done is make some incredibly innocuous changes to a handful of data streams. It's only my word - and Crystals - that they're going for nukes, or anything else. As far as the authorities are concerned, they might as well be vandalizing things, trying to scupper the reports. Come to think of it, they've probably set it up so that, if anyone calls them on it, they can claim it's an accident - noise on the line, or something."

Sol finished his rant and looked at the others. Nobody said anything.

Beth was the first to break the silence. "We have to do something."

"We don't even know who they are. It could be anyone doing this." Sol said in despairing tones.

"We know a little. We know it's someone who knows a hell of a lot about this sort of thing. And, like you said, we're fairly sure it's not someone from Jupiter."

"Actually," Isabelle piped up, "It might be. Maybe their trying to cover their tracks. Doing things this way would be a lot less obvious than bribing a couple of people and changing the reports directly, right?"

Beth and Sol looked at her.

"Yes," said Sol, caught by this new idea. "I mean, it was practically undetectable. Ted and I only found out about it when we were running extra tests because of crystal. Even then, it's lucky that I noticed it; I could've missed it entirely."

Sol got up, and paced excitedly, heading towards the kitchen, then turned back towards them (they had to twist round and look at him over the back of the futon).

"In fact, that makes a lot of sense; I was trying to work out how they could get access to all of the sources they need to. If they were internal, it would be easy to do, and fairly easy to hide the evidence that you'd done it."

Beth and Isabelle just watched him as his train of thought careened along, externalized in the form of wild gestures and quick words that almost fell over each other as he spoke them.

"Yes, it's got to be an insider. Who could do it though? Loads of people had access to the computer systems, but it would have to be someone who also understood a hell of a lot about analysis."

"Who would that be?" asked Beth, as he pause momentarily.

"In Jupiter? There's Sanj and Meera in Bombay, and Doug, Yanis and Sophie in Toronto. They all do holistic analysis, but I'm not sure any of them are anywhere near smart enough to pull this off. Yanis and Sophie are just out of college, they can barely work out WorldPulse forecasts, so it's not either of them. Doug is quite smart - he did a PhD in H.A., but it was mostly theoretical stuff. Sanj is good enough, but I don't think he has the imagination. Meera," he paused, "Meera is probably the best out of all of us. She was the one that helped with the development of the WorldPulse prediction engine. I say helped, she had most of the good ideas." He stopped, and relaxed visibly.

"So," summarized Beth, "It's probably either Doug or Meera."

"Not necessarily," said Sol, apparently getting a second wind. "It doesn't have to be someone in Jupiter working alone, does it? I mean, it could be someone else, who knows how to manipulate the data, conspiring with someone who had access to the Jupiter computers."

"I guess so." said Beth, "So, where does that leave us?"

Sol began to say something, but stopped, and deflated. "I don't know" he said, without a trace of the excitement that had been infecting his voice. "I do know that we've got to do something, though."

"Well," asked Isabelle, "Lets start at the top. How many people in the world would know how to do what's been done?"

Sol laughed. "In the entire world? That's asking." He paused. "It's hard to say. Remember, by all conventional wisdom, doing what we're talking about is impossible."

"So is predicting the future." Isabelle pointed out.

Sol snapped his head around and looked at her. "Say that again!"

"So's predicting the future."

Sol stared at her.

"What? What did I say?"

Pitr straightened his tie. He was dressed up in the one suit he owned because he was about to meet with the new President. Technically, of course, he was still the President Elect. The inauguration ceremony wasn't for a few days, and it had been a rush to get it that early. This didn't have any bearing on the importance of the meeting, though. The last time Pitr had seen him was along with every other New Revolutionary, when he stood on the balcony overlooking the courtyard in the parliament building, and mde his hesitant speech. Pitr smiled at the recollection. He had made a faltering declaration that, with the death of the former President, the old regime had ended, and the new era had begun. The people massing in the courtyard had whooped and screamed, and their new leader had looked on in bemusement. It was plainly obvious that he did not want a position of power, and it was equally obvious that, given their recent problems and their attitude to politicians, that this was exactly the attitude the people wanted in their president.

One of the tall men in dark, expensively cut yet ill-fitting suits turned around as someone opened the door a crack and whispered though it. Pitr eyed them suspiciously; he was sure they were Mafioso thugs, or at the very least had been at some point. The President would have to be careful, or his presidency would be short and troublesome.

"The President Elect will see you now." The besuited heavy informed him, opened the door for Pitr to walk through.

The President looked up from behind his desk as his visitor walked in past his secretary, seated at her own desk. "Ah, Pitr, my friend." he said warmly, "It is good to see a familiar face."

Nikolay stood up and offered his good hand for Pitr to shake. His other arm was still in a sling to support his injured shoulder, but instead of the makeshift one that Pitr had fashioned, it was a tidy affair of black silk and hidden pins. It almost looked like part of his suit.

"Power is treating you well," Pitr said, taking Nikolay's good hand with both of his and shaking it vigorously. "You look every inch the President. How is your shoulder coming along?"

"Luckily, the bullet remained almost intact. The doctors were able to remove it." Nikolay winced at the thought. "I will recover, though I will never have much strength in that arm again."

Pitr laughed. "I don't think you need to worry yourself about that. Your days of heavy lifting are over." He gestured at their surroundings with both hands. "From now on, you work in the best office in the country, no?"

"It is not all it's made out to be. I have been meeting all day with people who think that the revolution was for their cause and their cause alone. Everyone knows that things will be better under the new President, but nobody has considered how. They need a real leader, not someone like me."

"Nonsense. What the people need is a good man to lead them, and you, Nikolay, are a good man."

Nikolay looked him bleakly in the eye. "So was the previous President."

"How could you let this happen?"

"It was an unavoidable, given the break in control."

"This is going to make it very difficult to continue, isn't it?"

"Rest assured, things are in hand. We will be able to achieve our long term goals, within the allotted time frame."

"In case you hadn't noticed, we have the wrong President! This is, I guess, not going to be an easy mistake to correct."

"As I said, matters are in hand. Although we have not installed out first choice of candidate, we should be able to use the current encumbant in much the same way."

"I wish I shared your confidence. Uncertainty makes me uneasy."

Faraday hung up abruptly, and slumped back in his chair. Uncertainty was exactly what he was trying to avoid. The really annoying thing was that he'd seen this all coming, but hadn't been able to prevent it. Still, things seemed to be getting back on track. There would be a couple of bumps along the way, but Maxwell seemed to have things pretty much under control. He tended to rant at the old boy, but that was merely because he knew that he had a tendency to get complacent.

He opened up his computer, and started to check the days reports. When he'd finished with that, he'd move on to the more interesting stuff.

"Someone else must have beaten us to it."

"You mean that Crystal isn't the only system that can do this?"

"It's the only explanation!" Sol enthused. "They've got a setup like Crystal, and they're using it to work out how to steer WorldPulse from the back!"

"Hold on a sec. This isn't the only way they could do this, right?" Beth said. All three of them had got to their feet, and they were standing around Sol's small dining table.

"It's the only way I can think of." said Sol.

"But a few minutes ago, you were saying it was impossible."

"And Crystal is the only way I know to do impossible things!"

"Oh, for fuck's sake." said Beth, exasperated "That doesn't follow at all. All we know is that Crystal is one possibility,"

"It makes perfect sense." insisted Sol. "Crystal can be used to analyse complex systems. That's what it does. That was how I was able to find the connections between the sources and the events they were creating. It could also be used to work out what changes to make to the sources in the first place."

Beth stared at him. "How?"

"It's..." Sol started, then lost confidence in the face of Beth's glare. "I'd have to think about it. But I'm convince it could be done."

"Couldn't you use Crystal to find out who was doing this, then?" Isabelle said.

The other two stopped and looked at her, dumbstruck. Eventually, Sol found the words he was looking for.

"Would you stop doing that, please."

"Doing what?"

"Not saying anything for ten minutes, then coming up with a brilliant idea. It really ruins the dynamics of an argument."

Isabelle smiled innocently.

Professor Maxwell had arrived at work that morning with a positive outlook; everything was going as well as could be expected, and he didn't have any outstanding work to do. He greeted the receptionist cheerily as he walked into the office; this confused the hell out of her, as she was usually lucky to receive a grudging grunt. He made himself a coffee, sat down at his desk, and started checking his e-mail.

In a moment of self-examination, he noticed his unusually happy manner, and wondered about it. He initially put it down to a good nights sleep - last night had been the first one in a long while - but realized that that probably wasn't all. He concluded that it must be due to getting everything finished up by the end of the previous day, and being able to relax in the evening with David Starky and a glass of single malt. He resolved to aim to do this every day.

Given this, one might perhaps expect that the next electronic message he opened would contain some revelation or declaration that would sink this plan as it sailed out of dock. As it happens, it did. The message in question happened to be from Calvin, the new recruit who had, eventually, drawn his attention to the potential problem stemming from Solomon Davies' perusal of the logs. Apparently, Solomon's curiosity had not abated. To the contrary, it had intensified. Calvin did not think this was anything to worry about, but thought that he should, as he had been asked, inform Professor Maxwell.

At first, Maxwell was inclined, despite his far greater knowledge of the situation, to agree with Calvin. Solomon would eventually tire of sifting through the logs, looking for a pattern that he could not possibly find, and move on to other things. Maxwell knew him, although they hadn't spoken for a couple of years, and while his considerable talent for the field would occasionally lead him to pursue intellectual titbits for the sheer hell of it, these rambles never lasted for long. Give him a few days, and he'd be bored of it and chasing after something else.

Maybe he'd better check with Calvin, though, and find out exactly what Solomon was doing. He looked up, searching for Calvin' desk. He found it, but the curved mesh swivel chair was empty. He silently cursed the liberally working hours policy that his operations manager had insisted upon. It may well be what the modern knowledge worker expects and demands, he reflected, but it plays havoc when you actually wanted to speak with someone face to face.

He rattled off a curt mail to Calvin, saying that he wanted a word when he arrived in the office, and got on with the rest of his paperwork. His good mood had been shot down in flames, and he now worked uneasily, with the spectre of discovery looming on the horizon. If his suspicions bore out, the client would most definitely not be pleased.

When Calvin rolled in at about ten, Maxwell discreetly watched him amble over to his desk, greeting people as he went. He sat down, logged on to his computer, and read through his mail. Maxwell smiled to himself as Calvin stopped short, and the slightly dazed expression on his face was replaced by a look of concern. He got up and nervously walked over to Maxwell's desk in it's commanding position at the head of the office.

"You, erm, wanted to see me, sir?"

"Yes." Maxwell let the statement hang in the air for a while, enjoying watching the younger man squirm. It serves him right for waltzing in in the middle of the morning. "It's about monitoring of the logs."

"Oh, yes." Calvin answered hastily, perhaps relieved that he wasn't being fired. It's been increasing, sir, or at least it was until last night; I haven't had a chance to check this morning."

"Yes. You said that in the mail you sent me." Maxwell fell silent again.

Calvin shifted uncomfortably. Maybe he was being fired, after all. "Is there a problem?"

"No," said Maxwell, after another sadistic pause, "But I would like to know more about it."

"I could prepare a report..." began Calvin.

"Actually, I'd rather you show me exactly what you've found." said Maxwell, before he could finish. "I'd like to get an understanding of what's been happening first hand."

Calvin looked at him and gulped. He wasn't sure what to make of this. Maxwell had never shown this much interest in the finer details of his work before. He'd always seen him as a fairly hands off type. Still, it looked like his job was safe, at least for the moment.

"Certainly, sir. Um, where should we...?"

"We can use your terminal. That will be all right, won't it?" Maxwell smiled in what one might've taken to be a welcoming grin, but Calvin saw as a threatening mouthful of teeth, and Maxwell knew that he would.

They migrated to Calvin's own desk, amongst the throng of other Minerva staff busily coaxing WorldPulse towards the results that their client demanded, and began the explanation. Calvin went through the logs with Maxwell, pointed out the unusual features in shaky, broken sentences. Maxwell watched over his shoulder, not saying much, but guiltily enjoying the fact that he was unnerving his underling unbearably. Eventually, the tour of the logs was complete, and Calvin turned to Maxwell expectantly.

"Very interesting." said Maxwell after a second, when he realized that it was his turn to speak. "Yes, I appreciate you bringing this to my attention."

Calvin looked pleased, but qualified with uncertainty - he plainly didn't know what to expect next, but suspected that it might be unpleasant. "Do you, erm, have any idea who might be doing this, sir?"

Maxwell reluctantly decided that he'd probably had enough, and let him off the hook. He leaned in, and said in a low, conspiratorial voice, "We have a fair idea. Obviously, I'm not at liberty to tell you who it is, but rest assured that you've been very helpful."

We left Calvin, bolstered and beaming, and returned to his own desk. What he had seen had done little to reassure him; it definitely looked like Solomon thought he was onto something, which he couldn't possibly be. Of course, Solomon could have made a mistake, be going down a blind alley. That wasn't like him, though; he was too smart for that.

Something occurred to Maxwell. Was Solomon smart enough to do what he'd done himself? Maybe. He could, of course, check. With a surreptitious glance around the room, he started up a program that was only on his machine, and started to work.

A few hours latter, when he was sure of the results, he picked up the phone, and called his client.

"Mr. Faraday," he began, "We may have a problem, or at least some competition. A former student of mine seems to have stumbled upon our discovery."

Beth stopped off at Sol's desk with a coffee. This was the routine, but nevertheless she glanced around furtively, and bent low before talking.

"Any luck yet?" she asked.

"Not yet. And don't be so sneaky about it. People will notice." Sol hissed.

Beth stood upright quickly, sloshing coffee over Sol's desk.

"Oh, shit! Sorry, sorry..." she grabbed a tissue and started to mop up the mess.

"The best thing we can do is act normal until we know exactly what's going on. Try and relax." Sol went on in the most reassuring voice he could manage. He was, if anything, even more jittery than Beth, but his natural paranoia lead him to keep it hidden lest anyone notice.

"Easier said than done," said Beth, coming around to Sol's side of the desk and throwing the tissue into the waste paper basket. "It could be someone who works here."

"For all I know it could be you." Sol answered. Beth stared at him, aghast. "Don't worry. I'm joking." He smiled for a second, then caught sight of the look on Beth's face.

"Not funny." she said.

"Sorry. Anyway, I'll have this sorted out in a little while, and we'll know exactly who it is. Then all we need to do is work out what to do about it."

Beth nodded, then, with a quick glance around, made her way back to her side of the office. Sol watched her go, then turned back to what he was working on.

He had spent the morning interleaving WorldPulse reports (if they stopped flowing, people would start to ask questions) with working on a Crystal query to find out who was manipulating the sources. It was another big job, involving a whole new framework distinct from both the prediction one, and the one he had constructed to find the cause of the problems in the first place. His experience with the latter meant that he could go a little quicker, and made fewer mistakes, but it was still an uphill struggle.

Not only did he have to stop periodically to catch up on the work he was being paid to do, but he had to hide the Crystal window whenever anyone else walked past, for fear that they might ask what it was. Of course, most people wouldn't be able to tell it from the regular WorldPulse interface, but a few would, and these were, give or take, the people he was most worried about. It seemed to him that people were being especially talkative and sociable today, popping round for a quick chat or to ask him something far more frequently than they usually did. Because of this, his progress with Crystal was agonisingly slow.

About half way through the morning, a worrying possibility occurred to him. If the enemy - he had started to think of whoever was modifying the inputs as the enemy - also had a Crystal system, then they could also be doing what exactly what he was doing right now. They could be using their system to divine who exactly was trying to track them down. He started in his chair, then, completely irrationally, looked around him. He suddenly had a intense, claustrophobic feeling of being watched. Of course, nobody was watching him, so he turned back to get on with his work. He almost jumped out of his skin; someone was standing in front of his desk, waiting for him. He calmed down a little when he saw it was Isabelle.

"How's it going?" she asked.

"Slowly. People - not you - keep coming up and asking me things, so I have to stop." he sighed. "And Beth's a nervous wreck." He paused. "How about you? How're you holding up?"

"Not too bad." she smiled, "In fact, I've found out something you might be interested in." She came around the desk and crouched down next to Sol.

"It seems that your friend Meera hasn't been at the Bombay site for quite a couple of months now."

"Oh? I'd not noticed."

"No. It wasn't flagged by a management-speak memo, like most transfers are, which is a bit unusual in itself. Anyway, after a little bit of digging, I managed to find out that she was transfered to another part of the company by and order from the CEO himself."

"Which part of the company?" Sol leaned forward, listening with interest.

"That's the strange bit. It isn't really a part of the company at all; it's a wholly owned subsidiary. Minerva Consulting. Heard of it?"

Sol shook his head.

"Not surprising. It's only existed for a little over three months. And it only has one client. Jupiter."

Sol didn't say anything for a while, then "How did you find this out?"

Isabelle grinned. "Old-fashioned detective work. You don't need to everything with the magic box, you know."

"Will this do?" Sol looked up anxiously.

"It's not ironed very well." Isabelle said, eyeing him critically. Then she smiled. "You look fine. We're only going to a bar. Now come on, we'll be late."

What with everything else, Sol had completely forgotten about the meeting with Mr. Sherwood. When Isabelle, on her way out of the door, said that she'd pick him up at about eight, he sat, baffled, staring into space, until he remembered their plans. He'd closed down the things he was working on, and hurried out of the door. When he got home, he'd made himself a sandwich, bolted it down in front of Star Trek, and rushed upstairs to pick out clothes that wouldn't get him mercilessly mocked. He'd just got to buttoning his shirt when Isabelle had knocked on the door.

Mr. Sherwood had invited them to an upmarket bar in the center of town. Sol had aimed not to be underdressed again, and when he got there, he feared he'd gone too far the other way. However, he soon saw that people were wearing anything and everything, the entire spectrum. Three piece suits stood shoulder to shoulder with jeans and spaghetti strap tops along the bar. It was still quite early in the evening, and the floor was relatively empty. Latter, it would be heaving with people, and they would have to fight their way through. Now, though, they could just wander through and order drinks, which they did.

"I can't see him yet," said Isabelle, craning her neck and looking around, "Maybe we're a little early."

"What are we here about, again?" Sol asked, sipping on his overpriced, bottled beer.

"Not sure." Isabelle replied. "He was fairly vague when I talked to him on the phone."

"Shit!" exclaimed Sol, loudly enough for a couple of people to turn around and look at him. "You don't think he's found out about the manipulation, do you?" A panicked look washed over his face, and he lowered his voice. "Maybe it's him. Maybe he's the one doing this!"

"Shut up shut up shut up Hi!" said Isabelle. Sol looked at her quizzically, then saw Mr Sherwood approaching them across the floor. He turned around and attempted to smile politely.

"Isabelle, Sol, it's good to see you. I have a table, it's this way..." He gestured towards a far corner, and they followed him to it. A thin, sharp featured woman was sitting there, drinking mineral water from a bottle. As they approached, she stood up.

"This is my driver, Miss Grayson. I trust you don't mind her sitting in on the meeting? She has my complete confidence, and I would hate for her to have to wait in the car."

"Of course not," replied Isabelle (Sol was still busy trying to find his social bearings). They sat down around the table, Sol and Isabelle on overstuffed stools, and Sherwood and his chauffeur on the bench seat.

"So," Isabelle began, when it had become obvious that no-one else was going to start, "What did you ask us here for?"

Mr Sherwood looked slightly taken aback by her directness. He sipped at his drink - something amber coloured with ice, that left a transparent coat on the glass as he tipped it - and licked his lips.

"Well, as you ask, I was wondering what has been up with WorldPulse as of late."

He studied their reactions, and noted that they were both studiously unmoved by the question. He continued.

"A few days ago, there were 'technical difficulties'..."

Isabelle interrupted him. "There was a problem at the office." She glanced at Sol, then carried on. "I know you're a man that follows the news, but this particular story didn't make it to the headlines in any big way. I think someone took steps to ensure that it wasn't covered much. Anyway, there was a freak accident that destroyed a big bit of the building, and several important computers, and killed a friend of ours." She looked at the table, awash with a cocktail of spilled drinks.

"I'm sorry." said Mr Sherwood, "I didn't realise."

"There was no way that you could." put in Sol, "As Isabelle said, efforts seem to have been made to keep it out of the news. It certainly hasn't been mentioned to the clients. Anyway," It was dark, but Sol fancied that he could see Isabelle's eyes beginning to tear up, and he thought he'd better take over. "I don't imagine you asked us here to pump us for information about down time."

"That was a big part of it, as it happens," said Sherwood, "When a service is as important as WorldPulse to your day to day business, you tend to get very interested in what happens to it. That's really the meat of the other matter, as well."

"Oh?"

"In addition to WorldPulse, I have other sources gathering information - field agents dotted around the globe. They're not nearly as organised as Jupiter, or as regimented, but I find it reassuring to have a check, so as not to rely on the reports entirely. Recently, I've noticed a worrying trend. There seems to be an increasing amount of discrepancy between what the field agents tell me, and what the reports suggest. Now, this could simply be a difference in interpretation. The two sources certainly have very different perspectives on events. However, I am reticent to believe that it is just a coincidence that it has been happening so much more recently. Tell me, have there been any changes to WorldPulse that might have caused this? Should I be worried about them?"

He sat back and fixed Sol in a penetrating stare. Sol stared back.

"There is something, but I don't know how much I can tell you." he said, finally. "I wouldn't worry about it too much - the reports are still as accurate as anyone could expect them to be."

"I see. Well, of course, the non-disclosure agreements and all. It's not important. Will you stay for another drink?"

Noticing that Isabelle was still visibly shaken, Sol demurred. "I think we should probably be heading off."

"I understand." said Sherwood, looking from Sol to Isabelle and back again. "Well, it was a pleasure seeing you again, albeit briefly.

"And you. It's been most..." Sol tried to think of an appropriate word, "Interesting."

The left and walked the short distance to the car in silence. When they were there, in the dark multi-storey with it's pools of light and strangely shaped shadows, Isabelle went for the driver's door, but Sol stopped her.

"Are you sure you're O.K.?" he asked, concerned.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." Then, after a pause, "It was just, when he asked about the accident. It took me right back." She trailed off.

Sol took her hand. "I'll drive." he offered.

"You're not insured" Isabelle protested, weakly.

"And you're not in a fit state to drive. I'm covered by my insurance. Give me the keys."

Seeing that it was hopeless to argue, she handed them over. They got in, and Sol set off towards home.

"What did you make of that?" asked Sol, once they were on the road.

"Hm?" Isabelle had been thinking about Ted, and hadn't been paying attention.

"Sherwood. He's noticed something's up. Of course, if it's him that's behind all this, then maybe he was just trying to find out how much we know."

"I don't think so. He seemed trustworthy enough to me." Isabelle said. "In any case, why would he bother if he has Crystal?"

"Good point." They drove for a short while without saying anything. "Do you think we can trust him, then?"

"What?" Isabelle was genuinely surprised; it seemed to take a lot for Sol to trust anyone.

"Well, he might be a useful friend to have. He's got considerable clout, both in terms of money, and in terms of the people he knows, and he's got a vested interest in WorldPulse."

"I'm not sure." said Isabelle uneasily.

"What's more," continued Sol, "He doesn't strike me as the type of man who would be happy that he'd been manipulated."

"Good point," Isabelle replied, although her voice still held traces of doubt. "I'm too tired to decide this now." She rubbed her eyes. "Shall we talk about it in the morning?"

They drove on, and arrived at Isabelle's. Only then did the problem occur to her.

"How're you going to get home? It's too far for you to walk."

This hadn't occurred to Sol, either. "Erm, I guess I'll call a taxi."

"Don't be daft. Stay the night. I don't have a spare room, but you could sleep on the sofa."

"You sure?"

"Yes. I could do with the company, at the moment. I can drop you off at your place on the way tomorrow so you can get changed."

"O.K."

They walked up to the building, and Isabelle unlocked the door.

Sol had wiped his hand across his face. He was getting tired. At least he had got all of his WorldPulse work out of the way in the morning, so he could get away with working give or take non stop on Crystal, trying to track down just who was fiddling with the sources. He'd been bashing his head against it all day, but it seemed that he was still only advancing at a snail's pace. He got up, snatched his empty mug from the desk, and stalked off to the kitchen to make a bad-tempered coffee.

"How's it going?" asked Beth, sneaking up behind him and whispering in his ear.

"Not bad, I guess" said Sol, as his bad mood abated and his body language relaxed. He turned, mug in hand, to face her.

"I've incorporated the stuff that Isabelle found out about Meera, and it seems that it's speeding things up a bit. Still slow going, though."

"I thought so. You look like shit."

"Thanks."

"I mean, you look tired. Strung out. You need to relax. Go home! Take the night off!"

Sol smiled. "Is that an order?"

"Yes! Now snap to it!"

Sol laughed gently and started to walk slowly in the direction of his desk. When Beth slapped his bottom on the way past, he sped up, but only a little.

Sol got home, and decided to take Beth's advice and relax. He changed out of his work clothes, and cooked himself a slow, laborious, and indulgent meal. His resolve held while he was eating it, but started to falter as he slumped, watching decoration on the T.V. After quarter of an hour, it dissolved completely, and he switched off the T.V. and wandered over to the computer.

He'd started to make a little progress when the doorbell rang. He answered it to see Beth, and noticed that she was carrying a bottle of wine.

"I thought so," she said, leaning past him to look into the computer corner, "you're back at it, aren't you?" She walked into the house, and Sol closed the door behind her, shaking his head. "I can see I'm going to have to force you to take a break. Got a corkscrew?"

"Why all the sudden interest in my well-being?" asked Sol as he rummaged through his kitchen drawer. He found a corkscrew, and went back to the lounge to hand it to Beth, who had taken off her coat and sat herself down.

"Aren't I allowed to worry about my friends?" Beth asked as she opened the wine, "You've been working away, and worrying about everything, every hour you're awake for, well, I don't know how long. You need a break. I don't want to see you turn into a burnt out, nervous wreck."

"In case you haven't noticed," Sol passed her two glasses, and she started to pour, "Some pretty worrying stuff has been going on."

"And it'll still be going on in the morning. You need to have a rest. Unwind. We both do."

"And how do you suggest we do that?"

"Hmmm..." She looked around the room, then Sol watched as she suddenly jumped to the floor and stretched out, so that she could examine the spines lined up below the T.V. "What video's have you got?"

She ran he finger along them, and picked one out. "Is this any good?"

"Thomas Crown Affair? You've not seen it?"

"I've seen the new one."

"Oh, the original is far better."

They ended up watching it, and drinking wine, and sitting on the sofa. As the evening progressed, Sol did indeed relax, and found himself sitting closer and closer to Beth. She didn't seem to object to this egregious invasion of personal space. On the contrary, halfway through the film she swept her legs up onto the sofa and snuggled up to Sol's shoulder. Usually, this would've thrown him completely, but now it just seemed like a perfectly natural and normal thing for her to do.

At the end of the film, and the end of the bottle, the pair of them just sat their, comfortable and content for a moment, before Sol sighed and flicked off the T.V.

"Well, that seem to have worked," Sol smiled down at Beth, who still had her head on her shoulder. "Any other suggestions on ways to unwind?"

Beth sat up, cross-legged, on the sofa, and thought for a moment, they a wicked glint came into her eye.

"D'you play chess?"

Beth woke up and smiled, but then reached across and found that Sol wasn't there. The bed was still warm where he had been, though, so he obviously hadn't been gone long. She slipped out and found Sol's big, toweling dressing gown. Snug and shapeless, she wandered down the stairs to look for him.

She found him sat at the computer, dressed in the same baggy sweatshirt and jogging bottoms he was wearing last night. She crept up behind him, then slung her arms around his neck and nuzzled his neck.

"What do I have to do to stop you working?" she asked.

"I'm sure you'll think of something." Sol said, craning his neck and kissing her, "You seem to have a lot of good ideas about that."

"Why'd you get up? It's Saturday."

Sol turned around and put his arms around her.

"You were sleeping. I didn't want to wake you."

"I wouldn't have minded."

"I know. Still, you looked so beautiful there."

Beth punched him lightly on the shoulder. "Shut up. You'll make me blush."

Sol smiled. "I didn't realise you were that easily embarrassed." Beth blushed a little, but still smiled back. "So, you're up now. What do you want to do?"

Beth thought about this. "I think I'd like to go back to bed."

Sol turned round and switched off his monitor. As he did, he had a last, wistful look at the screen. He'd just started to make some decent progress. Still, there were more important things.

They went back to upstairs via the kitchen, making tea and grabbing yoghurts and fruit for breakfast in bed. They ended up staying there until noon, then pottering around the house for the rest of the day. After they had eaten a late lunch, curled up together on the sofa, Beth decreed that Sol was probably relaxed enough now, and let him back on the computer.

He was not only relaxed, but also had a kind of silly, happy glow. He kept stopping work to turn around and look at her with a daft grin on his face. Luckily, he usually caught he looking back, her face sporting a matching grin.

Not that he was really worrying about it, but he was also making good progress with Crystal. He'd got all of the donkey work out of the way, and had actually started on the query that they wanted and answer to. It was still a large and complicated query, mainly because it wasn't what the system had been designed for, but at least it was going somewhere.

Early evening, Beth mentioned tea (by which, Sol had learnt, she meant dinner). They briefly suggested going out, but Beth only had the lounging around clothes she'd arrived in last night. They decided to cook, and Beth went off to the kitchen to see what Sol had got. While she was going through his cupboards, and being pleasantly surprised, and a little intimidated, by the propensity of ingredients and the lack of ready meals (Beth tended to stick with sauce in a jar most of the time), Sol turned back to finish off the auxiliary query he'd been working on, intending to go and help.

When he finished that auxiliary and submitted it, there seemed to be a sea change in the system; he'd made a breakthrough. This wasn't unusual, but it was rarely annoying; this time, though, he really wanted to leave this and go and join Beth. Another part of him, though, wanted to see where this would lead, and that part won over. It would only take a minute, it said, coaxing. Just a couple more queries.

Of course, once he got started, he was drawn back in. Barriers seemed to topple down, and he was tearing through things at a terrific speed. Everything started to fall into place. Within a couple of minutes, he thought he was at the point of getting the final answer. He pause, took a deep breath, and hit enter. Sure enough, the result popped up on the screen before him.

He read it, and the grin dropped off his face.

"Beth," he called, "come and have a look at this."

Beth could tell from his tone that something was wrong. She came through and joined him in the corner. "What is it?"

He gestured wordlessly at the screen. She read the contents of the forecast panel there, and then didn't say anything for a long time.

"Shit." she muttered eventually.

"I know."

Isabelle came over as soon as they called her. She hadn't had any distraction from events, so it hadn't come as a surprise when Sol told her that he had something he wanted to tell her, and she hadn't been phased by the worry in his voice. When she arrived, she noticed that Beth and Sol were being far more touchy-feely than usual, but she didn't mention it.

"You've found out who's doing this?"

Sol nodded.

"Well, who is it?" asked Isabelle, taking off her coat and throwing it over a chair.

"Faraday."

Isabelle looked at him blankly. Sol looked back expectantly as Isabelle wracked her brains. Then, realisation dawned.

"Faraday? Mike Faraday?"

"Uh-huh."

"The C.E.O.?" She sat down heavily in an armchair, facing Sol and Beth on the futon. "No wonder he wanted it untraceable."

"So," said Beth, "What are we going to do."

Isabelle summarized. "Let's see. Faraday has immense resources, he can predict the future, and he's trying to take over the world. What can we do?"

"We can try and stop him." said Sol, flatly.

"We don't actually know he's trying to take over the world," pointed out Beth.

"Why else would he destablise a nuclear power?"

"He..." Beth paused, then thought of something. "He might be trying to cause economic unrest. I don't know how these things work, but I guess he could be trying to rig the stock market or something." She turned to Sol, somewhat redundantly, as their faces were only a couple of inches apart. "Could he do that?"

"From what we've seen, yes. In any case, we still need to stop him. In fact, it's even worse if he's not planning to secure the weapons himself. I'd rather he had them than some random terrorist or mafia don; he has a lot more to lose by using them."

"That still doesn't answer the big question. How do we stop him?" Isabelle was plainly not going to let this one go.

"We've got to play him at his own game."

"How? He's got Crystal, and on top of that he's got millions of dollars to play with. We can't hope to match that."

"We've got Crystal as well," Beth said, then her face lit up, "And he doesn't know that!"

Sol shook his head wearily. "We don't know that he doesn't know. We found out about him, so he could find out about us."

The other two didn't say anything. The possibility that Faraday could be using Crystal in the same way that they were hadn't occurred to either of them, and, what's more, it was giving them the same feeling of being watched that Sol had had when he first realised.

"Wait," said Beth, turning to Sol again, "He'd have to think to look, right?"

Sol nodded. "Yes. He'd have to think to look. Same with anything; Crystal's useless if you don't know how to ask the right questions. On the other hand, that's what they have Minerva for."

"But doesn't necessarily know?"

"We have to assume he does. So, basically, on the prescience front, that leaves us equal. He's still got a lot more money than us. Remember, non of us are millionaires."

"No," agreed Isabelle, "But I know a man who is."

Mr. Sherwood put down the phone, puzzled. The call from Miss Shelby had taken him by surprise. The very fact that she had called him was unusual, but the content of the call was even stranger. She wanted to meet with him, and had hinted that they would be able to impart more information than they had on previous occasions. As much as he disliked losing control, and doing things on someone else's terms, he was intrigued. Also, she had said it was urgent, and she sounded like she thought that it was. That was what tipped the balance.

He reached out to pick up the phone again, to dial Grayson (it was her day off, but she usually wasn't averse to a little overtime), but something stopped him. He got the feeling that they might clam up if he had company, and he'd be back to square one. He looked at his watch; he had a couple of hours yet before he had to set off.

When the time came, he walked out the garage, and selected a low key, but comfortable, dark blue Mercedes. He got in, started the engine (Grayson had ensured that all the cars were in good working order, and had a full tank of petrol; he really should give her a raise), and keyed the electric door opener. The ponderous mechanism began to move the wide door into the roof, and Sherwood set off when it was at half height. He was under it and away before it had even finished opening, and watched with satisfaction as it juddered to a halt and started to close again.

He'd forgotten how satisfying driving was. He let himself go a little when he got out onto the dark, empty country roads, letting the powerful engine carry the car up to within a cat's whisker of 100mph, and gliding through the corners. The fens around him, and the road in front and behind, were entirely free from the clutter of human life, and devoid of lighting; he almost seemed to be traveling through a void, inside a moving bubble of hedgerow and tarmac.

Eventually, he began to see signs of civilization, other cars at first, but then small villages, and then towns. He slowed to a more sensible, and legal, speed, and carried on until he reached his destination.

Isabelle had asked to meet in an out-of-town pub, more of a restaurant. It was far smaller and less grand than the hotel that they'd met in before, Sherwood reflected as he drove through the gates and into the car park, but it was pleasant enough. More importantly, judging by the handful of cars outside, it was all but empty, and so they could expect a little privacy.

He wandered in, and was momentarily thrown by the lack of a doorman. He saw Isabelle waiting with Sol at a table in the corner of the bar, talking in hushed voices. Another woman was with them, sitting close by Sol. Isabelle looked up and waved as he approached.

"Hi. I'm, well, we're very pleased that you could come." The three of them stood up, and they all shook his hand.

"This is Beth," explained Isabelle, "She's the only other person who knows what we're going to tell you."

"A pleasure," said Mr Sherwood, politely. They all sat down, aside from Sol, who asked around and then went for a round of drinks.

"If I may ask you a question," Sherwood began. Isabelle nodded, and he went on, "What made you change your mind? I mean, you've previously been very reticent to tell me anything at all, and now you're about to tell me something only known to a select group of people. What precipitated this shift of heart?"

The two women glanced at each other, then Isabelle answered. "You'll see when we tell you. Before you were asking questions about WorldPulse, and we couldn't really answer them. Now, the circumstances have changed, and, well, wait until Sol gets back and then we can explain."

Sol returned, and he and Isabelle took turns as they explained everything to Mr Sherwood. Sol knew more of the details, but tended to get carried away on technicalities, and would have lost Sherwood had it not been for Isabelle filling in the gaps. She was by far the better communicator, and could get across the big picture in a few well chosen words. Between them, they made a fairly good job of laying out the situation. Mr Sherwood sat and listened to them, occasionally asking for clarification on some point or other, but never raising any disagreement. When they had finished, he put his now-empty glass on the table and sat back.

"Well," he began, "This is a fairly fantastic story you've spun."

Sol began to speak, but Sherwood raised his hand to silence him.

"You've had your chance, so please allow me mine. As I was saying, what you have told me is fantastical in the extreme - it beggars belief." He glanced from Sol's face, to Isabelle's, to Beth's. "Now, I'm not saying that I don't believe you, merely that I'll need more to convince me than an earnest conversation over a couple of Cokes in a country pub."

The three of them looked cowed; one thing they hadn't counted on was skepticism. Actually, Sol reflected, now that the matter had come up, it could have been a lot worse. Sherwood could have laughed in their faces, and left. He was still here, and he seemed intent on giving them every chance to back up their claims.

"We can provide you with evidence." he offered. "Come back to my house and I can show you Crystal in action."

Mr Sherwood nodded. "I'll be glad to take you up on that offer. In the meantime, I suggest we get another drink, and discuss the ramifications of this revelation, assuming for the moment that it is genuine."

Mr Sherwood got up and went to the bar to get another round (he was very sprightly for a man of his age, Beth thought). The three left at the table leaned forward and held a brief, whispered strategy meeting.

"That went well, I thought." Isabelle said.

"Yeah; he seems open to the idea, at least." Sol answered.

"Why did you have to offer to take him back, though? He'll find out where you live. What if he's working with them?"

Isabelle and Sol stared at her.

"Where does your payment advice thing arrive every month?" Isabelle asked, irritably.

"Oh. Yes. Sorry." Beth replied.

They sat back up as Sherwood arrived back, carrying the four drinks on a tray. When they were all sitting again, he continued.

"One question I've still not been able to answer," he announced, after taking a sip from his Coke, "Is why you chose to involve me in all of this."

Beth and Sol both looked at Isabelle, and from this she guessed that the ball was in her court. "As you might imagine," she began hesitantly, "Mr Faraday is a rich and powerful man. While we can match him in terms of technology - we have a Crystal system, as does he - we can't compete with him on resources. We were hoping that you, would, well..."

Mr Sherwood jumped into the gap that she left. "You were hoping that I would provide the missing link in this chain, namely resources."

"Erm, yes," said Isabelle in a guilty voice, as if she were confessing to some embarrassing but ultimately minor misdemeanor.

Sherwood smiled. "Assuming what you say is true, then it is most certainly a cause for concern. It is dangerous, in my opinion, to have so much power concentrated in a single individual, especially one who is given to obtaining power by surreptitious and underhanded means. That being the case, you could certainly count on my full support, just as I would count on yours."

He paused, and let his offer sink in.

"Assuming," he repeated, "That what you say is true. Mr Davies, I recall you mentioned something about a demonstration?"

It said a lot about Mr. Sherwood's composure that he was in the smallest building he'd been in in years, if not decades, and he hadn't batted an eyelid. He was currently sat on a dining chair beside Sol, working the computer. Sol's explanations had started at a very basic level, but he soon upped the pace as it became apparent that Mr Sherwood was not in fact a doddery, half-senile old fool, but every bit as bright and quick as his young companions, and just as comfortable with technology. In fact, the computing aspects seemed routine to Mr. Sherwood; he was more interested in the details of Holistic Analysis techniques themselves.

"You mean you predict people's decisions?"

"Give or take, yes." said Sol, impressed; Sherwood had cut through the layers of crap that tended to mire most people, and immediately grasped the point.

"What if they act unpredictably?"

"People never act unpredictably."

"Never?"

"Very rarely. Civilization is, or at least can be seen as, a huge mechanism for ensuring that nobody does anything unexpected. There are huge dampening mechanisms that channel events into the standard, predictable path. What that path is, however, isn't obvious. The trick that holistic techniques revolve around is spotting this path, and extrapolating it."

"So what would happen if someone did something truly unpredictable?"

"They'd get locked up."

Sherwood laughed. "No, seriously."

"Seriously, they'd get locked up. Society is so intensely geared towards things working the way they're supposed to that any attempt to do otherwise is viewed as insanity. The surprising thing is that you can usually predict the people who are going to act unpredictably."

"And then what do you do?"

"More often than not, you can safely discount their actions. Society has a tendency to ignore people like that in the long term."

"But surely there are things that happen at random, bu that affect decisions. What about coincidences?"

"There are no coincidences."

Nikolay looked over the clothed laid out on the bed - sombre tie, white shirt, dark suit - and grunted in satisfaction. They had wanted him to wear some ridiculous, antiquated dress uniform, but he flat out refused, on the basis that he was, bar a technicality, the President, and as such he could wear what he damn well liked.

He looked over everything one last time, to be sure he hadn't forgotten anything, and then went to the door. He knocked on the inside, and the body guard on the other side opened it a fraction.

"Yes, sir?"

"Everything is prepared."

"Including the clothes?"

Nikolay stepped backwards, made a sweeping arm gesture, and said in a weary voice. "Yes. They're on the bed, as you asked."

"Thankyou, sir." He looked at his watch. "Now, if you'd like to gather your things together, we should be setting off."

Grumbling, Nikolay gathered everything he would need and headed out of the door.

It was a cold day, the cottony clouds weaving together to form a solid grey mass that occasionally spattered half-hearted rain down on the streets and building below. The roof of the Grand hotel was puddled with water, and exposed to a bitter, shifting wind that whipped every loose item and rippled the surface of the dark pools. This was the reason that the sniper had chosen to book a room on the fifth floor, and was currently standing on his balcony looking down on the street.

His client had paid him to kill the President Elect before the inauguration, and so he had positioned himself along the route that the motorcade would take on it's route from the Parliament Building to the cathedral where the ceremony was to take place. He had vaguely worried that they might change the parade route at the last minute, to derail any attempt such as this one, but now he was satisfied that that wasn't going to happen. As he looked down from his balcony, he could see that the street was thronging with people for a mile or two in each direction, straining against makeshift barriers, and watched by uneasy police. If they announced a route change now, they'd have a riot on their hands.

Other people were watching from balconies beside and across from him, leaning and waving paper flags. In this situation, some people would be worried about being seen, but he wasn't concerned. He would have been more concerned had he been the only person on a balcony; in that case, they would know exactly where to look. In the current situation, he was confident that he could be through to the back of the hotel, using the route he'd planned this morning, down the fire exit, and away, before they'd even thought about sealing off the area.

He went back inside the room, hung the "Do Not Disturb" sign on the outside door handle, and wedge the door closed with a chair for good measure. The last thing he wanted was for the maid to come in halfway through to change the towels. He reached into his holdall, and pulled out a rectangular metal case, the sort you might use to hold a camera. He sat on the bed with the case in front of him, and flipped open the catches. There, nestling in a grey foam bed, was his rifle. He began to remove the parts, one by one, from the case, and assemble it with practiced ease.

He could hear the noise from the crowd rising from a murmur to an excited chatter, which broke into a cheer. The motorcade was obviously near. He moved towards the balcony, gun in hand, and crouched down as he went through the french doors. This particular balcony had copious plants growing in window boxes around the edge, and these spilled over and provided adequate cover from him to work behind. There was little chance of anyone seeing him, even from one of the other balconies close by.

He lay down on the foam mat that he had placed on the balcony beforehand, and got comfortable. When he was, he sighted down the powerful telescopic sight at the head of the motorcade. As expected, there were dozens of police outriders, but there were also a surprising number of open topped cars, full of minor dignitaries (the sniper, a visitor to this part of the world, didn't recognise any of them). No matter; he knew exactly what his target looked like.

As it happened, wouldn't have made a difference if he hadn't. The President Elect's car was at the back of the motorcade, separated from the rest of the pack by a pair of police motorcycles. Sitting in it was Nikolay Ardalionovitch himself, smiling grimly and waving. The assassin sighted for his upper chest - less flashy, but far more reliable, than a head shot - and squeezed the trigger. He was up, the rifle stashed, and out of the fire exit while the crowd were still in the process of moving from cheers to screams.

Nikolay sat in the basement of the Interior Ministry building, next door to the cathedral. He was protected by a thick metal door that had armed guards posted on each side. He had been there for a couple of hours, drinking bottles water and watching a small, portable T.V. He had thought that they'd overestimated the danger to his person, until the news coverage of the motorcade had descended into chaos. After a couple of frustrating minutes, he got sick of watching the Bravikstahni news service anchor man babbling incomprehensibly into the oblique camera, and grabbed the remote control. He flipped to CNN, where one of their minor foreign corespondents was standing calmly, filmed against a backdrop of running crowds, explaining the situation to camera. Even though this was clearly some junior reporter who had just been in the right place and the right time, and had a major story land in her lap, she was exuding assured professionalism.

His English wasn't great, but it was clear that there had been an attempt on the doubles - actually, on his - life. He was watching the foreign journalist explaining events in his own country when there was a knock at the door. The guard opened the door, listened for a moment, then turned around an solemnly informed Nikolay that his lookalike was dead.

For a second, Nikolay didn't quite believe it. Then, the reality sank in and he slumped down heavily into his chair. When they had told him that they had reliable information that there would be an attempt on his life, he had scoffed. He had only agreed to go along with this ridiculous deception under protest, but it had saved his life.

"I don't think I'm cut out for a life in politics." he muttered to himself.

Sol flicked off the television and turned to the others.

"Well, that seems to have worked." he declared morosely.

He was sat, along with Beth, in one of the large lounges of Mr Sherwood's mansion. They had both called in sick (it was a Monday); Isabelle had gone in to work. All three of them had, at least temporarily, moved into the mansion's various rooms. Sherwood had wanted the Crystal work close too him, and they agreed out of fear of losing his patronage. They had initially worried that Mr Sherwood wouldn't have the appropriate facilities for them to work effectively, but as it happened, nothing could be further from the truth. Sherwood had all the technology they needed to work with, and much more besides.

"Somebody still died." Beth pointed out, equally listlessly. She was stretched out on one of the big leather sofas, her head resting in Sol's lap, and he was absent-mindedly stroking her hair. He nodded in response to her comment, but said nothing.

Beth had spent the day working on moving the software parts of Crystal to another computer, one of Sherwood's as opposed to one in the Jupiter offices. She'd just about got everything working. Sol had spent his time working on queries, trying to find out what would happen to the Bravikstahni nuclear weapons. This was how he found out about the plot to make an attempt on the President Elect's life. He had immediately run through the vaulted, echoey corridors of mansion to find Sherwood, and they had agreed to warn the President Elect via one of the latter's field agents. However, they hadn't heard anything since, and Sol had suspected that their warning would be ignored. After all, Crystal had predicted the shooting, so it was bound to happen. He knew nothing of the plan to use a lookalike until he heard the whole story explained on the evening news, and was immeasurably relieved to see footage of Nikolay making a hastily rewritten inauguration speech, stressing the need for calm in these turbulent times.

"I take it you've heard the news." Sherwood said from behind them. Beth sat up, and they both turned round; they hadn't heard him come in.

"Yes." said Sol, simply.

"It seems that our efforts were not wasted, and that Faraday's plans have been set back." He was beaming, obviously pleased that things were going well.

"Somebody still got shot." Beth repeated for Sherwood's benefit.

"Yes, yes, but in any struggle here are always casualties." He seemed not to notice Beth's hardening expression, "The important thing is that the situation in Bravikstahn is far more stable than it was a couple of hours ago."

"Surely this will make everyone paranoid in the extreme?" protested Sol.

"And that means that they'll all be on their guard, and it will be far harder for Faraday to do whatever it is he planned to do with that country."

"But he's still got Crystal," burst Beth, "He's probably been planning for this all along!"

"It's a good point," agreed Sol, turning to Sherwood, "How can we stop him, given that he can predict the future as well as us. We've probably only won this one because he made the same mistake at us in interpreting the forecast."

It was evident from the look on Sherwood's face that he hadn't got an answer for this. He was about to say something in any case, but before he could he was interrupted by the ring of Sol's phone. Sol apologized, grabbed his phone from the table, and started to walk from the room, punching the green button as he went. Halfway out of the room, he froze, and turned round.

"Mr. Faraday. This is unexpected."

Beth and Sherwood snapped there necks around and looked at him intently. On the other end of the phone, Faraday continued.

"Don't play the idiot with me, Solomon. We both know that you have a prediction engine, just as I do. What bothers me most is that you're using it against me."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Denial was the best strategy that Sol could come up with off the top of his head.

"Look," Faraday growled menacingly down the line, "your really trying my fucking patience. Maxwell said you were a bolshie little shit. Now, are you going to stop bullshitting and listen to me?"

Sol hadn't been ready for that; "Yes" was all that he could manage.

"Good. Now, the way I see it, you've got a prediction engine. I, on the other hand, have a shitload of money and contacts all over the world." Sol remained silent, but made a mental note that Faraday, or maybe Maxwell, should be asking better questions of their prediction engine. "I could crush you like a bug. But I'm a reasonable man, so I'm going to offer you an alternative. Come and work for me. You obviously know a hell of a lot about this, and you could be useful. Well?"

"Give me a minute. I have to ask..."

Faraday cut him off. "Other people know about this? They're there with you, though? Good." He paused. "You can ask them."

Sol fiddled with his phone for a second, then figured out how to put Faraday on hold. He turned to the others.

"He's offered a deal; he wants me to go and work for him. If I don't, he's threatened to crush me like a bug."

"How about the rest of us?" Beth asked.

"He didn't seem to know about you, until I let it slip." Sol grinned. "He doesn't seem to be using the prediction engine as well as he might. In fact," he turned to Sherwood, "he doesn't seem to have figured out that you're involved at all. He seems to think that Crystal is the only advantage we have."

They all considered this for a moment.

"I think we tell him to take a running jump." Beth said. Sherwood nodded in agreement, and Sol, smiling, took up the call again.

"About time." complained Faraday, "I'm a busy man. Well?"

"We've talked about it, and I'm afraid we will have to decline your kind offer."

There was a pause, then Faraday spat "Fine by me." and hung up.

"Well? What did he say?" asked Beth impatiently, as Sol hung up his phone and returned it to the table.

"Nothing much."

"What? No threats? No 'I'm going to get you'? Nothing?"

Sol shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you."

Before any of them could say anything else, Sol's phone rang again.

"That'll be the threat now," he predicted as he reached for the phone. "Oh," he said looking at the screen, "It's Isabelle." He sounded almost disappointed that he wasn't about to be told that his life was in terrible danger.

"Hi, Isabelle. What's up?"

"Sol, I was just going to... there's been some sort of... I think you're life's in terrible danger..."

Sol sat bolt upright. "O.K. Calm down. What's happened?"

("What's wrong?" asked Beth, but Sol waved her into silence.)

Isabelle took a deep breath, and looked out of the windscreen at the bedlam of gawkers and firefighters had rapidly coagulated a few hundred yards away.

"I was on my way back to Sherwood's from work, and I was going to pick up some clothes from your house like you asked. I was on the way, and I heard this huge bang, and when I turned into your street, your house was on fire, and it had a huge hole in the front." She stopped for a second. "Shit, a minute or two latter and I could've been inside."

"Are you O.K.?"

Isabelle made a little noise of assent.

"Good. What's happening now?"

"There are a couple of fire engines, and firemen all over the place. What should I do?"

"Just get back here. We can work out what to do then. The important thing is that the house was empty; nobody got hurt."

"Yeah. Well, I'll see you in a little while. Bye." Isabelle hung up, took a moment to pull herself together, then started the engine and set off.

At the mansion, Sol put the phone down and ran his fingers through his hair, and then noticed that Beth was looking at him expectantly.

"There was an explosion at my house; Isabelle says that there's a lot of damage."

"Shit! Is she O.K.?"

"She's a bit shaken, but she wasn't hurt. Look, I'm a bit thrown by all of this; I'm going to go and take a shower, and try to relax." He wandered off to one of the mansion's many bathrooms, with Beth watching him go, unsure what to do.

Sol returned in baggy clothes, with damp hair, and slumped on the sofa next to Beth. She looked up from the newspaper, and smiled at him wanly. "How're you feeling?" she asked.

"Better."

"Oh," Beth glanced at the time, then switched the T.V. on. "From what they said in the trailer bit, it looks like you might be on the local news. Well, your house might."

The article was just being earnestly, if clumsily, announced by the local anchor when Isabelle walked in. Greetings were warm but brief, and then everyone's attention returned to the news. Apparently, there had been a gas explosion in a residential area. Fortunately, nobody was in the house in question at the time, and surrounding buildings escaped with minor damage."

Beth switched off the television with a derisory snort.

"Maybe we're being a little paranoid about this whole thing." said Sol, "After all, it could have been an accident, a gas explosion, like they said."

Beth and Isabelle stared at him incredulously, struck dumb. Beth was the first to regain the faculty of speech.

"Are you insane! Don't you think it's a little odd that on the day some millionaire megalomaniac threatens you're life, you're house blows up."

"What?" asked Isabelle, swinging round to look at Beth. "Faraday threatened his life?"

"Yep. He phoned up today. Sol's mobile."

Isabelle gulped, then turned back to Sol. "He must have thought you were at home! You've got to take this seriously; it's obvious he was trying to kill you."

Sol shifted uneasily; they were beginning to persuade him.

"Look," said Beth, leaping back in like the other half of a tag team, "We know that he's already arranged for at least one assassination. What makes you think he'd have any qualms about having you bumped off if you were getting in his way?"

"Well," he began, then hesitated under the steely stares of Isabelle and Beth. "Maybe it's just a coincidence." he finished lamely.

"You told Sherwood yourself, there aren't any coincidences!" Beth shouted, frustrated beyond belief that Sol wasn't taking this more seriously. "Things don't just happen at random!"

Sol sat there, not saying anything under Beth's glare.

"Well?"

Slowly, a smile crept onto his face. "You just gave me an idea. I think I know how to stop him."

Sol explained his idea to Beth and Isabelle, and the three of them went to find Sherwood, and Sol explain the idea again. Sherwood was sceptical at first, but they managed to convince him, and he began to put the plan into action.

Around the world, the managers of Sherwood's companies began to receive signed and encrypted e-mails, giving them very, very strange new orders. Each and every one of them phoned Sherwood on his private line, for use only in emergencies, and checked that the message was genuine. he assured each and every one of them that it was, and that there was a perfectly good reason for it, and that their jobs were perfectly safe, assuming they followed the instructions to the letter. He would be sending somebody to check. They all hung up, shook their heads in disbelief, and looked around for some suitable prop that would allow them to carry out the orders.

In Buenos Ares, the floor manager in a paper mill owned by Sherwood popped his head around the door of the boss's office. Shouting to make himself heard over the noise of the machinery, he explained that one of the machines had gone haywire, and chewed up most of a shipment that was due out the next day. He wanted to know if they should stop work and repair the machine, or try and fill the order using the machines they had left.

The boss grunted, then, as the floor manager watched in amazement, picked up a coin that was lying ready on the table, and flipped it, plucking it out of the air and slapping it onto the back of his hand. He examined the result. Heads. "Repair 'em." he told his baffled subordinate.

"Well," declared Sherwood, as he hung up on another in the long stream of confused managers, "I think that's the last of them. You're absolutely sure that this will work?"

"Yes," confirmed Sol, "As long as your companies keep running completely at random, then it should provide enough disruption to render Faraday's prediction engine completely useless. Of course, it will also affect WorldPulse and Crystal in exactly the same way. In fact, the whole field of holistic analysis will be, not to put too fine a point on it, completely buggered.

"Come to think of it," he concluded, "I'll have to start looking for another job."

"I don't think our positions at Jupiter are exactly safe." pointed out Isabelle, laughing.

"So," asked Beth, "when does it start to kick in? When will Faraday start seeing the effects?"

"In theory," Sol said after thinking about it for a moment, "The forecasts should start to diverge from reality give or take immediately."

Sat in his office, in the penthouse of a skyscraper overlooking the lights of a vast city, Faraday was watching the stock market with a smug expression. The prediction engine brought many benefits, and a preternaturally healthy portfolio of shares was one of them. He sipped his coffee and watched the two parallel windows, one displaying the current values of his shares, and another showing the values according to the projection. Both were moving in immensely satisfying synchrony. He took another sip of coffee, then sat back, smiling the satisfied smile of the cat that got the cream.

Then, something unimaginable happened. The two windows began to disagree. Faraday stood up and leaned on the desk, examining the screens. It was probably a glitch. However, as he watched, the values didn't return to conformity, but instead diverge all the more. With an inarticulate scream, he picked up his coffee cup and threw it against the window. The strong, thick glass held firm, and the cup shattered, spraying coffee all over the window and the floor.

Almost blind with rage, he set punched one of the speed dial buttons, then the speaker button. He paced the room, waiting for it to be picked up, and then there was a click and a voice appeared on the other end of the line.

"Hello, Mr. Faraday. I imagine this is..."

"Maxwell!" Faraday cut him off with a scream from the far side of the darkened office. "What in the name of hell is going on with the forecasts?"

"I'm sorry, sir, I didn't quite catch that."

"I said," shouted Faraday, running over to the desk and leaning over so that his mouth was inches from the microphone. "What the hell is happening to the predictions? Why are they suddenly going to shit?"

"I'm not sure yet; I've only just noticed the problem myself."

"Davies!" bellowed Faraday, "This is him! He's done this!"

"Possibly," conceded Maxwell, "Solomon might be responsible, but I don't know how he would achieve these effects. Now," he went out on a limb, "if you would just calm down, we can..."

With a final, deafening scream, Faraday swept everything off the table with both arms. Expensive computer equipment, executive toys, and the phone crashed to the floor. Standing, hunched and alone, breathing heavily in the otherwise silent office, Faraday muttered to himself. It was something about Solomon Davies.

Sol, Beth, Isabelle and Mr. Sherwood stood, wrapped up against the wind, next to a small, but perfectly formed, jet. Aside from this select group, the small airfield was deserted.

"Well, I guess this is it."

"There really is no other way. Faraday may have lost his prediction engine, but he's still a very dangerous man, and I imagine that he will be non too pleased when he realises what has happened. It's safest for you to disappear, at least for a while."

"What about you? Aren't you in danger too?" asked Isabelle.

Sherwood laughed. "I'm well protected enough. I doubt that he would try anything against me. In any case, I have to stay, in order to make sure my business are run correctly." They all smiled at the thought of managers rolling dice and cutting cards, all over the world.

"I'll be fine. In any case, I doubt I'll be around for very many more years." (He silenced the protests with a wave of his hands. "It's true. I've set up trusts for the businesses, though, so there shouldn't be any cause for concern on that front for quite a while."

"We'll be O.K. to keep in touch with each other, won't we?" asked Beth.

"I don't see any harm in that; try to limit the contact you have with your families, though, to avoid them becoming a way for Faraday to find you. The less they know, the less danger they're in."

They finished off saying their goodbyes, and then three of them got onto the private jet and flew off to start the new lives that Mr. Sherwood had kindly provided for them. Sherwood himself watched the plane until it was out of sight, and then turned and wistfully walked back to his car, He had to get back to work.

Beth was born on New Years Eve, at the stroke of midnight. When she grew up, this would give her an added excuse to have even more fun than everyone else at at least one party a year, but until then, all it meant was that her birthday was near to Christmas, and hence (she believed), she ended up getting fewer presents.

Her father died when she was young, but she grew up surrounded by a loving extended family. She always remembered how the house was constantly bustling with cousins, grandparents, friends and neighbours. There was always something to do. Sometimes, she wished she had a bit of quiet, or a bit of privacy (especially as she grew into a tomboyish teenager), but for the most part she wouldn't give it up for anything.

She eventually flew the nest to pursue a degree in Maths, by far her favourite subject at school. The university she chose was only an hour's drive away, and her grandparents clubbed together and bought her a car for her eighteenth birthday, so she could come back at the weekends. Still, it was a wrench, but she slowly got used to being away from home.

She fell into working with computers after she had graduated; it was indoor work, the pay was good, and everyone else was doing it. She had a couple of jobs in companies she loathed, then she found somewhere she fitted in. She made friends, and for the first time since she had moved out of her mother's house she felt truly happy.

Over time, she realised that she was falling in love with one of these friends. At first, she was reticent to act on these feelings, as she didn't want to ruin the friendship they already had. However, she soon decided that they were both mature enough to deal with it should things not work out, so she began to make subtle advances. He completely failed to notice, and hence the advances became progressively less subtle, until at last he got with the programme and fell into her arms.

After their run-in with Faraday, Beth and her closest friends had to move away from their homes, and begin new lives. This was an almost intolerable wrench for Beth, given how close she was to her family, but with the help of her new boyfriend she learned to cope. As the months and years rolled by, her boyfriend became her fiance, her fiance became her husband, and her husband became the father of her child.

Then, one day, Sol was suddenly taken away from her. Nobody could ever tell her why. At the funeral, she saw Isabelle for the first time in years, and she learned that Mr. Sherwood had died. That was sad, but at least he had had a full life; her Sol was barely fifty, and he shouldn't have left her for a long time yet. It wasn't fair.

She stood by the graveside, looking down at the dirt-strewn coffin, for a long time, until her daughter, and her friend from years ago, came and gently led her away.