Getting Back (11 page)

Daniel removed his headgear, somewhat dazzled from the images of Australia's vastness. He was also visibly skeptical.

"So. What did you think?"

"A bit heavy-handed at the end there, Elliott."

His counselor, who was now sitting across from him, shrugged disarmingly. "You found the script a little corny? So do I. But there's truth in that corn, Daniel."

"I don't understand why I haven't heard more about this before. I mean, an entire continent? For wilderness recreation? And then you don't tell anyone about it?"

"To publicize it is to spoil it. We don't want the refugee community lobbying to go back; they have new lives now. We don't want pilgrims or mourners or looters. And United Corporations didn't set this up to make big money, or post big numbers. We did it to satisfy the craving for adventure among a select few, some of them frankly troubled, with the idea that this might help both them and society. Win-win! That this was the very best way to use the new Australia."

Daniel shifted uncomfortably. "How so?"

"Be honest with yourself, Daniel. Are you fulfilling your full potential at Microcore? Are you doing everything you could for United Corporations? Our superiors look at people like yourself and they wonder. He's bright. He thinks for himself. But he also has trouble fitting in. So. We can leave him at a Level 31 job and let him stop growing, becoming deadwood. Or we might find something that pushes him to the limit, that tests just what he is capable of, and thus which grooms him for future leadership in U.C. society. Outback Adventure is meant to be a transforming experience. Those allowed to go are an elite."

"But keeping it a secret…"

"To publicize the opportunity is to cheapen it. The next thing you know there'd be cyber underground guidebooks, secret maps, and so much speculation that the journey would contain as much surprise as Planet Disney. We live in a world of twelve billion people, and a continent's preservation as complete wilderness is both bold and somewhat artificial. The board's choice would be economically controversial, to say the least. As a result, continued concerns about plague serve our purposes. So does quiet. We can't really keep you from telling a few war stories to close friends, of course, but you'll sign confidentiality agreements if you go. And believe me, they are enforced. No books, no speeches. No fame. Key people will know what you accomplished, but only them. We're not going to sacrifice the unique experience of future adventurers to satisfy the ego gratification of their predecessors. You're being offered a chance to qualify for the fraternity that really runs things on this planet of ours. There's a lot of competition to get in, and admittance is tough. You have to prove yourself. This is one way. It works."

Daniel nodded slowly, intrigued despite his doubts. "So who can go?"

"Ah. You're beginning to realize how rare this offer is. The answer to your question, of course, is the fit. The smart. The committed. The daring. And the dissatisfied. The ones to whom ordinary life is for some reason not enough. The oddballs, the misfits. Do you recognize yourself yet?"

Daniel said nothing.

"You go only with what you can carry on your back. Maps are prohibited. So is any weapon beyond a knife. You can take electronic devices, but only receivers: take your solar-cell TV, if you must, but leave your satellite phone at home. Our promise is that if you go, you won't know exactly where on the continent you are. Or precisely where you're going. Or how long it will take. You'll be as blind as Columbus, as bold as Magellan. No other adventure company offers such realistic challenge. We guarantee it!"

"A year's salary for that?"

"Listen to me. Everest is old, routine. You know that. The Sahara has become a holiday junket. Both Poles have resort hotels. Every river has been rafted and every reef has been dived. There's only one place of mystery left on earth: Outback Adventure's Australia. That's what the money is for, Daniel: the ultimate challenge of the ultimate wilderness. You bet it costs dearly! You have to want it so bad you can taste it! Because that's the only kind of person who can make it there."

He took a breath. He could taste it. "How does it work?"

"We have a meeting where you'll meet your fellow adventurers. Many decide to go in groups, something we recommend to both enhance your own survival chances and lower our transportation costs. We give you training. We have experts on the continent and books or tapes you can review on its ecology and geology. You'll go prepared. We'll give you a list of suggested equipment but it's up to you to prepare and equip yourself. You'll survive on your brain and your back. You make your preparations, train for six weeks, wait, and then we call without warning to inform you it's time to come to the Departure Port. Ready or not, here you go: we feel that edge adds to the experience, and weeds out the last few with secret doubts. You quietly quit your job in advance- don't worry, come back and you'll be wanted for something special- and fly to Departure. All volunteers are drugged to sleep for shipping."

"Like export cargo."

"Exactly. We transport you at night to a point somewhere in the continent's interior and set you down to awaken at dawn. Your goal is to trek to Australia's east coast and find its exit port, Exodus. Then you return to United Corporations' world, renewed and toughened. An eighteenth-century man of action in a twenty-first-century world! Survive this and you can kick corporate butt anywhere you go. But you have to survive it. There's no hospital, no rescue, no emergency food or water. We don't come get you. You're on your own."

"Jesus." He drummed his fingers, a nervous habit. "What's the risk?"

Coyle pushed a button of the chair-file under his cushion. Liability forms slid out of a desk chute and he plunked them in front of Dyson with a thump. "Some people don't make it. A lot of people, actually." He nodded as Daniel's brows lifted. "The risk is higher than high-altitude climbing. Sky diving. Hang gliding. Free diving. You name it. This is the riskiest thing on earth. And yet competition to participate is fierce. Only risking life, after all, makes you feel truly alive."

"Worse than climbing?"

"Worse than many wars."

He took a breath. "All right, Elliott. Have you done this?"

Coyle looked at Daniel a long time without expression. "Yes. Once."

"And survived."

Coyle smiled thinly. "Living proof."

"And were you transformed?"

The counselor had a faraway look in his eyes. "Oh yes."

"And now?"

"I became a believer, Daniel. A convert. An apostle. So now I'm employed explaining all this to people like you. That's what I wanted to do when I got back. It was what I was put on earth to do, I'm sure of it."

"And you recommend it?"

"No. Never. It's so hard that I just give you a choice. You have to choose yourself. It's the choice that determines whether you're ready to go."

"How many choose not to? Don't they spill your secret?"

He smiled. "Frankly, few who learn this much turn us down. We're careful what we reveal, to who. Those who do say no recognize the need for discretion. We explain it to them."

"So I can walk out of here right now?"

"Absolutely. And I'd understand perfectly. I wouldn't go now. I've got a wife, kids. I'm too old now, too soft, too content. I like this world. That's what I learned in the Outback. So I'll shake your hand and pat you on the back if you want to quit right now." He waited.

"Quite the salesman, aren't you?" Dyson picked up the liability forms and examined them. Leave his job? Give up his savings? Go wander in the desert and maybe die out there? Was he that crazy? That unhappy? That unfulfilled?

"Don't go unless you're absolutely sure, Daniel. Don't go unless you need to find something you can't find here."

He thought of Raven. "Like why do I do?"

"Yes. Like that."

He took a breath. "Got a pen?"

Coyle handed him one.

Daniel looked at it, rotating in his fingers. Are you brave? Dr. Chen had asked. I've never had to find out.

He bent to sign his name.

"I want to test myself."

"You've given notice?" Sanford asked, mystified.

"Quitting," Daniel confirmed to his workmate. "You have to keep quiet about it until after I'm gone."

"They're just letting you go?"

Indeed they were, Daniel thought. Luther Cox had expressed neither surprise nor interest at the news: I hope it's for the best, he'd said remotely. We'll fill in for you whenever they call. "Didn't even feign regret, I'm afraid."

"But why?"

Why do you do? Daniel thought to himself. Because it committed himself. Because it cut his ties. Go, go, go. "I'm going away," he replied.

"An opportunities transfer?"

"I'm going to the wilderness, Sanford. Taking a break from the routine."

"You're quitting your job to go on vacation?"

"It's sort of open-ended. Unclear when I'll get back. It's not really a vacation, it's… a kind of lifestyle change. I want to do something different."

Sanford thought about this. "When do we fight over your scanner and disk repository?" he asked, ever practical, scanning Daniel's desk for other valuables.

"I'm on staff until the expedition starts. Then it's yours."

"So when's that?"

"I don't know. We're not allowed to know."

"What?"

"The surprise departure is part of the wilderness experience. You prepare, wait, they call, bang. You're off."

"That's weird. Off where?"

"To the desert."

"Really?" Sanford had a fondness for Nevada.

"To a wilderness desert, not a casino desert."

"Oh. Which one?"

"I can't say. I'm not allowed to say. I don't really know, actually. It's all set up by an adventure company. Some new outfit you've never heard of. Neither had I."

"Jesus, Dyson, this is pretty offbeat. For what?"

"To explore."

"Explore what?"

"I don't know. Nobody does. That's the whole point."

"What's the whole point?"

"To have an adventure. To go do something risky where the end isn't preordained. To trade security for excitement, comfort for experience, entertainment for self-exploration."

"You sound like a commercial. Or somebody who's been brain-scrubbed. Let me get this straight. You're leaving Microcore to go on some expedition that starts who knows when, going to who knows where, for who knows how long, for who knows what reason?"

Daniel shrugged. "It's not for everyone."

"It's not for anyone with common sense. Have you totally lost your mind? You're going to give up a good job…"

"Oh, please…" He looked amused.

"… to go to some desert you can't even identify? And pay money to do it? Why, because you don't like the looks of Harriet Lundeen? Because you can't make it with Mona Pietri?"

"Because I'm being buried here, Sanford. Buried alive. You are too."

"Better than being buried dead out in some desert."

"You paid to go down the Mekong…"

"That was different."

"How was that different?"

"I didn't quit my job. They set up camp, set down camp chairs, and set out the booze. We had an itinerary, not to mention sonic-guard to keep out the insects. Women came along. It was fun, dammit. That's what was different."

"Different? Or predictable?"

"Here's a news flash for you, Dyson. I like things predictable. Most people do."

"Such as this job?"

Sanford glanced around the monotony of Level 31 and nodded solemnly. "Such as my pay. Predictable as clockwork."

"There's got to be more."

"There isn't any more. That's what you don't get, or won't admit. You're a romantic and life isn't. Life is just… life. You want green, go to the park. You want animals, go to the zoo. You want sunstroke and snakes, go to the desert."

"No. I'm going to find more. I'm going to find it, and bring it back, and show you. Shove it in your face."

"A rattlesnake?"

"Freedom. Self-discovery."

His workmate rocked back in his seat. "You'll discover things all right. Discover that hunger and fear don't make you free."

"Maybe that's the point."

"Suffering?"

"To overcome it."

Sanford laughed and threw up his hands. "Go! Wander in the desert. Have visions. Bring back a prophecy; my last fortune cookie was a bore."

"I'm just tired of being safe."

"Well, I predict you'll get tired of being unsafe in about fifteen minutes." He shook his head, looking at Daniel speculatively. "There's some other reason, isn't there? Something that pushed you into this. What? Some kind of trouble? A woman?"

"There's no woman."

"Some muscle-thighed rock spider with breasts the size of coconuts?"

"There's no woman. It's just me. For me. I mean, don't you ever get tired of the routine here, Sanford?"

"Of course I do. Everybody does." He stood up and gazed across the top of the cubicles. "And I'll tell you the one thing you'll get for your money. It will make Level 31 look pretty damn good."

That night he called her again. Not because this was about Raven, of course, but because… because he wanted her to know. That he'd signed up. That they'd taken the man she thought they wouldn't take. So there.

On the sixth ring the circuit transferred and a voice came on line but the video picture was grayed out. "Hello?" A man's voice. Damn.

"Is Raven there?"

"Who's calling?"

"A friend."

"Your name?" He could hear clicks on the line.

"I'm just a friend. Look, could you put her on, please?"

"I need your name."