TWELVE
At 8:55 Sunday morning, Christopher Lash pushed through a revolving door and entered the lobby of Eden Incorporated, surrounded by dozens of other hopeful clients. It was a crisp, sunny autumn day, and the pink granite walls blazed with light. Today he’d left the satchel at home. In fact, other than his wallet and his car keys, the only thing in Lash’s pockets was a card Mauchly had given him at their last meeting reading simply: Candidate Processing, 9 a.m. Sunday.
As he walked toward the escalator, Lash mentally reviewed the test preparations he’d been coached on at the Academy, over a decade ago. Get a good night’s sleep. Eat a breakfast high in carbs and low in sugar. No alcohol or drugs. Don’t panic.
Three out of four, he thought. He was tired, and despite the mammoth Starbucks espresso he’d had on the drive in, he found himself craving another. And though he was far from panicked, he was aware of feeling uncharacteristically nervous. That’s okay, he reminded himself: a little tension kept you alert. But he kept recalling what the man said at the class reunion he’d observed: If I’d known just what was in store for me, I don’t know if I’d have had the cojones to take that evaluation. It was a brutal day.
He put this aside as he approached the escalator. Amazing to think that demand for Eden’s services was so great it had to process its applicants seven days a week. He stepped on, looking curiously at the people ascending the twin escalator to his left. What had been going through Lewis Thorpe’s head when he rode this same escalator? Or John Wilner’s? Were they excited? Nervous? Scared?
As he watched, he saw two people on the adjoining escalator — a middle-aged man and a young woman, a few riders apart — exchange a brief glance. The man nodded almost imperceptibly at the woman, then looked away. Lash thought of what the chairman had said: security was subtle but ever-present. Were some of these would-be applicants really Eden operatives?
Reaching the top of the escalator, Lash passed beneath the wide archway and entered a passage decorated with cheery promotional posters. Faint parallel lines had been etched into the floor, creating a series of wide lanes leading down the passage. They had the effect of making the applicants — of their own accord, or through subtle orchestration — spread apart and walk side by side. Ahead, each lane terminated in a door. A technician in a white coat stood before each. Lash could see the person at the end of his lane was a tall, slender man of about thirty.
As Lash approached, the man nodded and opened the door behind him. “Step inside, please,” he said. Lash glanced around and noticed attendants at the other doors doing the same. He stepped through his doorway.
Ahead lay another hallway, very narrow, unrelievedly white. The man closed the door, then led the way down the featureless hall. After the airy lobby and the wide approach corridor, this space felt claustrophobic. Lash followed the man down the passage until it opened into a small, square room. It was as white as the hallway. Its only features were six identical doors set into the surrounding walls. Instead of a handle, each door had a small white card reader bolted to its face. One door in the far wall had a placard designating it a unisex bathroom.
The man turned toward him. “Dr. Lash,” he said. “I’m Robert Vogel. Welcome to your Eden evaluation.”
“Thanks,” said Lash, shaking the proffered hand.
“How are you feeling?”
“Fine, thanks.”
“We’ve got a long day ahead of us. If at any time you have questions or concerns, I’ll do my best to address them.”
Lash nodded as the man slipped a hand into his lab coat and pulled out a palmtop computer. He plucked a stylus from its groove and began scrawling on the pad. After a moment, he frowned.
“What is it?” Lash asked quickly.
“Nothing. It’s just—” the man seemed surprised. “It’s just that you’re showing up as pre-approved for the evaluation. I’ve never seen that before. You had no initial screening?”
“No, I didn’t. If it’s a problem—”
“Oh, no. Everything else checks out.” The man recovered quickly. “You do understand, of course, that you won’t be formally accepted as a candidate until after today’s evaluation?”
“Yes.”
“And that if you are not accepted, your application fee of $1,000 is nonrefundable?”
“Yes.” There had been no application fee, of course, but the man didn’t have to know everything. Lash was relieved: clearly, Vogel didn’t know his real purpose in being here. Lash had told Mauchly emphatically that he wanted to be treated as a real candidate, see everything the Thorpes and the Wilners had seen.
“Any questions before we begin?” When Lash shook his head, Vogel drew a card from around his neck, strung on a long black cord. Lash looked at it curiously: it was pewter-colored, with an iridescence that did not completely hide the gold-green of microprocessing inside. Eden’s infinity logo was embossed on one side. Vogel ran the card through the reader by the nearest door, and it sprang open with a click.
The room beyond seemed little wider than the hallway. There was a digital camera on a tripod inside, and a painted X on the floor beyond the camera.
“Please stand on the cross and look at the lens. I’m going to ask you two questions. Answer them as completely and as truthfully as you can.” And Vogel took up position behind the camera. Almost immediately, a tiny red light glowed on its upper housing.
“Why are you here?” Vogel asked.
Lash hesitated for just a moment, remembering the tapes he’d watched in the Flagstaff house. If I’m going to do this at all, he thought, I should do it right. And that meant honesty, avoiding easy or cynical answers.
“I’m here because I’m searching for something,” he replied. “For an answer.”
“Describe one thing you did this morning, and why you think we should know about it.”
Lash thought. “I caused a traffic jam.”
Vogel said nothing, and Lash went on.
“I was on I-95, coming into the city. I’ve got an E-ZPass unit for the windshield so I don’t have to pay cash at the tunnels and toll roads. I get to the bridge leading into Manhattan. It took a little time, because one of the three lanes at the toll plaza was down. The reader scans my card. But for some reason, the wooden gate doesn’t lift. I sit for a minute until an attendant comes. She tells me my E-ZPass is invalid. That it was revoked. But that’s not the case, I’m fully paid up. The thing had worked fine half a dozen times just this week. Clearly their system was messed up. But she insists I pay the six dollars to get across the bridge in cash. I say no, I want her to fix the error. Meanwhile, now there’s only one good lane onto the bridge. The line behind me is growing longer. People are honking. She insists. I stick to my guns. A cop takes notice, starts to walk over. Finally she calls me an unpleasant name, opens the gate manually, and lets me through. I give her my most endearing smile as I pass.”
He stopped, wondering why this of all things had come to mind. Then he realized it was, in fact, in character. If he’d been here for himself, for real, he’d have said something equally mundane. It wasn’t like him to cough up a teary-eyed story about how he’d embarked on a quest for the woman of his dreams.
“I guess I mention this because it reminds me of my father,” Lash went on. “He was very combative over the little things, as if it was a personal grudge match between him and life. Maybe I’m more like him than I realized.”
He fell silent, and after a moment the red light went out.
“Thank you, Dr. Lash,” Vogel said. He stepped away from the camera. “And now, if you’d follow me, please?”