Jack paced in his suite, asking himself what else he would have to sacrifice, besides his sense of privacy and self-respect. Possibilities tumbled around noisily in his head like rocks in a polisher.

Eventually, his capacity to control his mind triumphed. There was just one good reason to persevere here at CIRAS, and he let it sustain him like an air tank sustains a diver. If he could keep other kids from having to go through what his brother Jeremy had experienced, nothing else mattered. Not really. What was personal privacy when compared with saving children from pain or death? Jack would have given anything to keep Jeremy alive. He would have made a pact with the devil. I might be getting ready to do just that.

Jack sunk into the chair in his office. The gleaming walls felt like they might fall down and crush him. With a determined blink and a soul-deep sigh, he opened his mouth to speak the fateful words, the words that would sign away his freedom. He held his mouth open, procrastinating. His tongue could dry out before he capitulated. No, I will do this thing, he thought. Then – It better be damned worth it.

"Computer."

Screens blinked on. "Yes, Jack."

"I want to sign the agreement. Get it up for me."

"Of course." The page appeared instantly.

Seeing it froze him up. His jaw felt locked.

"Jack?" the computer inquired.

His shoulders shuddered. "How do I do it?"

"Just sign with the pen on the tablet."

Jack looked down and picked up the electronic pen. He held it above the signature line, where it wavered, just like his will. Jeremy, his conscience reminded him. He brought the pen down and signed his name, Dr. Jack Kerwin. It was done. Now he could get to work.

Except some force within him objected. He found himself heading to the gym, where he commenced a very sweaty two-hour workout. After that, he caught up on the latest news from CNN and Fox. Then he indulged in a one-and-a-half-hour-long lunch at one of CIRAS's restaurants. Post-lunch, he took a long walk through the manicured grounds and returned inside for a visit to the in-house bar.

Each step he took toward the bar summoned an admonishment. He should be working. He had no business drinking and relaxing. Had he forgotten about Jeremy?

Jack answered the voice: Yes, he should be working. No, he shouldn't be drinking. He hadn't forgotten Jeremy. But he did need some time to recover. The way he felt was similar to what it was like when he lost a soccer match. It took time to recoup before he could start concentrating on his next game.

He turned the next corner and ran into Ellen Standis. Literally. He had been looking down at his shoes and didn't see her.

"Hey," he said. She looked hot. There was no other way to put it. She wore snug jeans and a silky black top, and he thought she looked even better than she had in that sexy white dress.

Ellen slipped a hand into her right pocket and tilted her head to the side. "Hi, Jack. I was looking for you, but you weren't in your room."

Jack looked around the hallway like she might be talking to a different Jack. "Who, me?"

She threw her head back and laughed. "Yeah, you."

He ran a hand through his hair. "Well, here I am."

"Yes, here you are. I wanted you to take me for a drink."

Jack was confused. He liked Ellen, and he liked sex. He really liked sex. But he never mixed sex with work. Not to say that was what she was offering. But his work at CIRAS was very important. He couldn't afford to screw things up or to get distracted. Besides, why was she interested in him when she could have anyone she wanted?

Drawing strongly upon his self-discipline, he said, "Sorry, Ellen, I'm busy. Maybe another time." He held his breath.

"Oh, that's a pity."

Jack pushed his hands into his pockets. He didn't meet her eyes. "Another time, I promise."

She regarded him for a long moment, as if she were solving a complex math problem in her head. "Okay, Jack. But next time I won't accept any excuses." She turned to go back the way she'd come. Jack couldn't resist watching her backside as she left. He sighed.

He opened the door to the small bar on the top floor of CIRAS. His eyes widened when he saw Dr. Elvis Vitali seated on a futuristic metallic cylinder – CIRAS's version of a barstool. Jack tapped him on the shoulder. Dr. Vitali turned around and smiled warmly. "Dr. Kerwin."

Jack found a hint of a smile. "Call me Jack."

"Sure, Jack. Call me Elvis, okay? Join me for a drink?" Elvis motioned to the seat beside him.

Jack remained standing with one hand steadied on the bar. "Yeah, that sounds good."

"What'll you have?"

Jack didn't answer the question right away. He peered around, distracted by the ultra-modern shapes and materials dispersed throughout the room. The heavy-handed décor felt forced and antagonistic, as if representative of other things that were dark, cold, and unfeeling. "Everything around here is so space-age." Jack gestured to the odd triangular glass that Elvis held.

"Yeah, sort of cool but creepy at the same time."

Jack snorted. "Exactly."

He sat down on the metallic cylinder next to Elvis and squirmed uneasily as he tried to adjust to its unusual smoothness. "I would love to sit on a good, old-fashioned bar stool right about now." He remembered he'd never answered Elvis. "I'll have whatever you're having."

"Gin and tonic with a twist," Elvis ordered from the young, skinny man behind the bar. He was dressed in black.

Jack joked, "Seems crazy they have an actual human bartender here. I would expect a robot or a synthesizer."

"Yeah, you would think that, compared with the rest of the crazy shit they've done here, creating androids–or at least highly functional robots–would be a piece of cake." Elvis looked down at the bar. "And you know what? How many people even use this bar? They probably could have made it self-serve in some funky way. Like you said, a synthesizer."

"Bet this guy's here to spy on us." Jack jerked his head toward the bartender, even though the man stared right at him. Jack didn't care. This place was screwed up, and his patience was wearing thin.

Elvis wrinkled his nose, frowning.

"Guess that wasn't funny. Too close to the truth."

"Yup." Elvis was a nerd, but he didn't seem naive. He and Jack were the same in that respect. Elvis took a deep swallow from his glass and placed it back down on the bar carefully—too carefully. How much had he drunk before Jack arrived?

The young bartender set Jack's drink in front of him, seemingly unconcerned with their conversation. The glass created a peculiar reflection on the strange surface. It was disorienting, like being on acid. Jack tried to blink away the image.

Jack gave the skinny man a quick nod. "Thanks."

The bartender nodded and walked toward the far end of the bar. He turned his back to them and occupied himself with the computer monitor located there.

As Jack picked up his glass the triangular shape pressed against his hand, making it awkward to grip. He lifted it in Elvis's direction. "To successful research."

"Successful research." Elvis's tone was flat. He looked like he wanted to say something but held back. Finally, he said, "It's weird how they do it, isn't it?"

"How who does what?" Jack slanted his eyes toward the bartender, but he was far away, and his back was still turned away from them.

"How TR does your research for you, like they don't even need you at all. You know, they display all their work on those damned computers and tablets while you sit back and twiddle your thumbs. It isn't much of a collaboration, if you ask me."

Jack didn't comment, so Elvis went on.

"I mean, they're coming up with some pretty awesome shit." Elvis heaved out a breath. "It's quite brilliant. I wish it didn't feel so weird." Elvis slugged down a large portion of his cocktail in one gulp as he squirmed around on his stool. "I hate to admit it but I don't feel like the work is mine. They're looking at the problem in a way I would've never considered. Too damn blinded by my own beliefs, I guess." He took another chug from his gin and tonic. "That's what they said they would do, but . . . I'm rambling. How's your research going?"

Jack pressed his lips together and peered down at his drink. "I, um, haven't started yet." He poured the rest of his drink down his throat and slammed the empty glass on the bar.

"Why not?"

"I don't think my self-esteem has quite recovered. That agreement was quite a fucker."

Elvis coughed. "Yeah, well. I don't think your ego is going to like how it feels when you do start working with your TR group, if your research goes anything like mine has. They don't need us, so why do they want us? Why bother? Seems to me like that godforsaken think tank could solve all the world's problems if they wanted to. It's pretty emasculating." He leaned back as much as the strange stool would allow, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Tabula Rasa isn't trained to think about the problems we bring, just the solutions. They need us to give them problems so they can have something to which they can apply their intellect."

Elvis glanced at him peripherally. "You're not making me feel any better, Jack."

Jack frowned. Elvis should have known all this already. "No, but you know of Dr. Jameson's research, right? The work that was the basis for CIRAS?"

"Yeah." Elvis sounded uninterested. "Train the mind to be free of professional prejudice by rigorously avoiding the work of previous researchers. Then use the mind like a human computer–completely unbiased, but with all the beautiful ability that is unique to humankind. Then you can make that quantum leap in thought that computers can't manage. Honestly, it's all blah, blah, blah to me. Don't be offended, Jack, but I don't particularly care about the theory CIRAS was based on." Elvis stared at the bottles lined up against the back of the bar. "Even if it does mess with me now and again."

"It's worth understanding."

Elvis smiled indulgently. His eyes weren't quite in focus. "Go 'head," he slurred.

"Seems to me that if you really wanted to keep your mind blank, it would be intensely difficult to ever do any research yourself, because you would become too influenced by it. Jameson always used the example of Einstein. After Einstein developed his special and general theories of relativity, he was never truly creative again. He just kept trying to jam the discoveries of others down the throat of the special and general theories. And like stubborn children told they should 'take their medicine,' they wouldn't swallow. Remember the whole EPR fiasco with his mysterious hidden variables?"

Elvis nodded woozily.

"Who knows what Einstein would have discovered if he could've continued to look at things with the unprejudiced imagination of his youth?" Jack inhaled an impassioned breath. "If Einstein could have persisted in the mindset that nature gave him, he could have helped discovered so much more." Jack was getting worked up, and he felt annoyed with Elvis's ignorance. "Were you aware that the members of Tabula Rasa are trained in all methods of mathematics, deductive reasoning, and probably other things we don't even know about? They have methods of analysis that are unique to CIRAS and highly advanced."

Elvis arched his eyebrows. "You seem pretty excited for someone who hasn't even accessed TR yet." He turned away and cleared his throat to get the attention of the bartender. "I'll have another."

"Me, too," Jack said. How many drinks would he need to get through this year? That was an algorithm he didn't want to construct. He looked back at Elvis. "Yeah, well, my feelings on the subject of TR and CIRAS are mixed, to say the least."

"That, my friend, I completely understand." Elvis made a toast in Jack's general direction.

They stayed at the bar for hours. Their conversation dwindled, and after a certain point, the only words they used were "one" and "more."