The White-Hole Situation

Private First Class

Just before dawn September was awakened by a persistent knocking on her front door. She was surprised to find Pisco standing there, still dressed in shorts and sandals as if he were still on a beach in the tropics, and carrying a flimsy overnight bag which probably contained his worldly possessions.

"She's gone," he said as she opened the door. He looked like he was going to cry. September wanted to ask him what are you doing here? but seeing that sad look on his face she thought better of it, and instead asked him 'how' and after he pointed to the shuttlecraft in the driveway, she reached out to grab him slightly by the elbow and pull him into the house. He didn't say another word until after she had him settled on a couch and had asked the I.B.U. ("we stand for you") to make him a strong coconut macchiato. Pisco sipped on it and slowly shook his head.

"I didn't think she would," he said. "After all this time, to just up and leave."

"It must be hard," September said. She had never known Pisco without Pagan, or Pagan without Pisco.

"Forty five years," he said. "forty five god damn years."

"Always together the whole time?" she asked. "Weren't there other times, other jobs, other missions?"

"I guess she'd tried a couple of times," he said, looking up. "But I never let her. I always tagged along. This time she said if I followed her she'd kill me, and I believe her."

"So you know where she went."

"Oh yeah, Jessup," he said. "That hell hole. God knows why. Just to get away from me?"

"Maybe we'll all have to get away," September said, and just as she was about to start telling him about the situation, Roddy walked in, Roddy in the flesh, and bellowed out a friendly greeting. September jumped up and barely had time to welcome him properly when she saw he had brought another visitor with him, a tall young man, dark and badly shaved, dressed in the grey-green outfit of an ancient recruit.

"What? Who?" she managed to stammer, a bit overcome. She was not used to being a hostess, could scarcely recall the last time she'd had any physical visitors at all in her home. Roddy assured her there was no need to get upset, nobody needed anything, they were all just fine as they were and anyway, this young fellow here is not really here, you can see for yourself. September went up to the youth and reached out to touch his elbow just as she'd done with Pisco earlier and her hand went right through.

"It's a good visage," she said, impressed with the artwork.

"Appreciate it," the young man said with a deep and confident voice. September realized she was partly flustered due to attraction, and here she was old enough to be his mother.

"Say hello to my father," Roddy said, laughing. "As he was before I was born. Hey, Pisco, I didn't see you there. Where's the Paganista?"

Now the tears fell for real and Roddy, who had no idea what was going on, looked at September for an explanation. She shrugged and didn't know what to address first.

"You'd better sit down," she said to Roddy, who obliged by sliding on to the couch next to Pisco. Young Gerard walked over to the huge plate glass window fronting the room, and peered outside at the transparent balcony hanging over the canyon below. He whistled softly. September sat down on the foot of her bed, facing her guests. The interior of the house was merely one room, about twenty feet long and fifteen wide, a bathroom off to one side. There was no kitchen and no need for one. The I.B.U. ("can I help you?") provided everything on demand, including dishes and utensils, which it recycled seamlessly back to the nebulous molecules from which its nodes formed any object, anything at all. She had her bed to the left of the front door, the couch beside it and a simple wicker rocking chair, both facing the balcony. A small oval carpet, which could cycle through patterns, lay between them and the great window. Overhead the sloping ceiling gave the home the feeling of a cave, a sensation enhanced by the faux cave paintings of hunters and their prey which adorned the sandstone-colored walls. All of this was all she wanted, the only place she really wanted to be these days.

"You can't even imagine all the work it took," young Gerard suddenly spoke, his back still turned away from the group. "So much work and so many years, and for what? For nothing?"

"He's been like this all day," Roddy said, inspecting Pisco's face for traces of more tears, but those were clearing up as the older man wiped them off his cheek and turned his attention to the new ghost.

"Commander Stern?" Pisco said, but Roddy shook his head and said,

"That's Private First Class Stern. Just entered the academy when he looked like that. I remember it from pictures he used to have. He hadn't even met my mother yet, had just come straight from Lake Heuristic, still wet behind the ears."

"That's not him," September said to Pisco. She wasn't sure how much Pisco knew about Roddy's parental haunting history, and she added in a whisper,

"He's the I.B.U. now."

"Do you even know what that stands for?" young Gerard asked, turning now to face them. "I doubt you do. It was all so long ago, a world you never knew."

"Wait a minute," Pisco interrupted, "I think I do know this. Intelligence Business Unit, am I right?"

"You are correct," Gerard said, nodding approvingly. "I'm surprised."

"I collect information," Pisco replied and this time young Gerard just laughed.

"Information!" he exclaimed. "Tell me this, then. How much information do you think I've collected?"

"Oh my," Pisco shook his head. "Are there even numbers that high?"

"All of it?" September guessed and young Gerard nodded again.

"All of it," he said.