David's Sling (22 page)
"No, I guess not. Did Nathan tell you why I came here?"
Hilan nodded. "To help me strategize ways to defeat the ban on telecommuting."
Kira shook her head; she had thought she was in charge. She pursed her lips, but reminded herself that it didn't make any difference who was in charge, unless they developed mutually exclusive plans. At the moment, she had no plans at all, though she had a few ideas. "Yes," she said, "I came to discuss the ban on telecommuting."
"Great. Why don't we start with a look at the congressional votes on the original bill. That's usually a good starting point for determining who has been pressured, and who has to be pressured, to overturn the decision."
Kira nodded, her throat tight with surprise. She had wanted to recommend starting with an analysis of the vote herself, but had rejected the idea, fearing it would lead to a nasty confrontation too soon. Now, he had suggested it himself.
Hilan reached into a cabinet and withdrew a pair of flat- panel terminals, revealing for the first time a familiarity with technology. The sight and touch of the beige plastic gave Kira a feeling of reassurance; the somber wood decor of this office felt stifling and lifeless.
Hilan's voice took on a bright animation as he spoke about the men and women whose voting records scrolled down the screen. "Porter voted for it because the UAW is very strong in his district; he didn't have much choice. Shepard must have been gotten by somebody; he's a follower. We'll deal with that later. Somebody got to Burrell, too, and that's more worrisome. Burrell's no wimp— there had to be heavy pressure to get him. Besides that, he's the leader of his own caucus; he's important."
Hilan went through the whole list of votes, cataloging the senators and representatives according to their allegiances, their beliefs, and their weaknesses. They very rarely looked into the data base behind the table of votes. Hilan carried a data base in his mind almost as detailed and reliable as the data bases Daniel Wilcox kept on-line.
Finally, the scrolling list crossed the name she had feared. As Hilan skipped over it without comment, Kira punched the PAUSE button. "Wait," she said. She pointed at the name of the missing person—one of the most powerful members of Congress, who had voted for the ban: HILAN FORSTIL. "You haven't told me why you voted against the Institute."
Hilan looked her in the eye, then looked away, the line of his jaw set in anger at forces beyond his control. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a swiss army knife, the kind often carried by backpackers. He rubbed the smooth surface as if it somehow reassured him. Kira remembered her mother's story of Hilan and the crevasse high in the mountains and she wondered about its effect on him. He spoke quietly. "I voted against the Institute because I didn't have a choice."
"Oh, really." Kira couldn't keep the sarcasm out of her voice.
"Oh, really. The unions did an extraordinary job of keeping me in the dark until they had enough votes mustered to push the ban through despite me. They knew I would oppose it." He described the sequence of meetings and agreements contrived by the unions to put the plan in place while still keeping him in the dark. His description of the events was spotty. He still didn't have a perfect understanding of how they had arranged it. "But I'm fairly sure they can't do it again—at least, not the same way." He smiled wolfishly. "I've acquired a few more spies since they put the ban into effect." He shrugged. "Anyway, when they brought me an accomplished fact, I was in no position to oppose it. Since the resurgence of the unions in the last decade, they're an important force in my state as well. I can't vote against them just on impulse."
When Hilan looked back at her after this speech, Kira had the feeling of being under the scrutiny of an eagle. He countered, "As far as working against the Institute is concerned, I might ask you why you've chosen to go into business expanding and improving Wilcox-Morris's advertising campaign. I've seen some of your ads. They're very effective."
The compliment felt like a slap on the face. Kira blushed, though Hilan's question was no different from the question she had asked herself. But now, at last, she had a powerful answer. "I went to work with Wilcox-Morris to find the missing pieces in the puzzle you just described. If you've been wondering how the unions were able to work completely around you, I know the answer. They did it with the help of the tobacco companies." Kira launched into an analysis of the ban, as seen through the viewpoint of the Wilcox-Morris political machine. She had collected a vast quantity of detailed information from the Wilcox-Morris computers since that fateful night when Wilcox had confronted her uncle. She even knew the status of the investigation of her own background—they had not yet traced her connection with the Institute, because her mother's role in Zeteticism wasn't common knowledge. Jan had never stood in the limelight. Nathan, as founder and president of the Institute, had always been the focus of publicity.
With short brushstrokes, Kira painted the details of the anti-telecommuting picture that Hilan had sketched from his own sources. As she spoke, Hilan nodded as connections fell into place. Again, for just a few moments, his face lit up with wonder. "Thank you," he said as she finished. "My worries are much lighter, since you've removed these ambiguities." He frowned. "Now that we know what happened, all we have to do is figure out how to undo it." And so Hilan went over the list again. This time it was shorter. They had thrown out all the people who were not critical—all the followers. Some of the critical men could be won over with persuasion. Some could not be won at all: they believed for their own philosophical reasons in the need to cripple technology.
Others could not be won for practical reasons. The representatives from North Carolina, for example, had no choice but to follow the tobacco line, and the men from Michigan had no choice but to follow the unions. "They're puppets," Hilan explained, "and we can't cut the strings." He brightened. "I'm a puppet, too, of course, and so are the rest of the people on this list who didn't really want to vote for this ban. But we couldn't fight it because there were too many people pulling our strings. Now we have to find a way for
you
to pull our strings."
Kira laughed. "I already know how to pull your strings," she said. "I'm going to use a pressure group—a voter block of such size and power that you can't wiggle without our consent."
Hilan chuckled. "Delightful! Where will your voter block come from?"
"From the networks. I'm going to assemble the biggest conference in history—an electronic one—and we're going to show the unions, and the tobacco companies, and the politicians who's got the biggest, toughest, meanest organization in the valley!" Her eyes blazed.
Hilan sat entranced, watching her. "Kira, I intend to help you."
Kira relaxed suddenly, surprised to find she had clenched her fist. "Anyway, we have a lot of supporters available. "
"Ah, but are your supporters in the right places?" They matched up the members of the Zetetic networking community with the key members of Congress.
When they were done, they had composed a plan that would give them a majority vote in Congress. Hilan shook his head. "I don't see a way of getting a two-thirds majority, and Jim Mayfield will veto our repeal in an eyeblink. He trembles every time the lobbyists come to visit." His voice grew cold and bright at the same time. "Kira, how soon can you hold your conference?"
"When do you want it?"
"The Congressional elections are a week away."
Kira looked puzzled, then realized what that could mean. "If we can form a constituency fast enough, we can overturn them."
Hilan smiled.
Kira shot up in her seat. "We can show them just how dangerous our lobby can be, with just a week of organizing. Well teach Mayfield to tremble, all right." She laughed—the tense laugh of a race car driver before the opening gun. "You know, the unions are against telecommuting because they're afraid it'll make it more difficult for them to organize. Well, they're about to find out that the networks—the same systems that make telecommuting possible—make organizing easier."
Hilan shook his head. "Being a puppet will never be the same. Even I tremble at the thought of dangling at the end of your strings, Kira Evans."
She twitched her nose. "I promise to be gentle," she replied, rising from the table.
"Your mother would be very proud," he whispered as she departed.
January 8
To predict the future, you must first successfully predict the past
—Zetetic Commentaries
Black lettering blinked against white blankness. LET ACCURACY TRIUMPH OVER VICTORY. The words melted, then returned at the top of the wall-sized decision duel display. For just a moment Nathan hated the words, though he himself had penned them. He had too many emotional attachments in this duel—attachments to the survival of the Sling project on the one hand, and to the survival of the Institute on the other. The beat of his own heart outpaced the slow beat of the black letters. As more letters appeared beneath the cautionary words, Nathan could feel them printing, not upon the screen, but upon his eyes, as though he himself were the display screen upon which they would etch this duel.
Nathan slumped into the left-hand duelist's chair. Briefly, his hands slid across the smooth-worn surfaces of trackball and keyboard in a caressing touch. Never before had he dueled for such high stakes; never before had the Institute faced the danger of fading into oblivion.
The new words listed the duel topic and positions. On the left was the position Nathan would defend: CONTINUE THE SLING PROJECT, USING THE INSTITUTE'S OPERATING CAPITAL. On the right glared the opposing stance: STOP WORK ON THE SLING PROJECT.
As president of the Institute and the largest single stockholder, Nathan had the power to enforce his own opinion. There was nothing in the Zetetic viewpoints that argued against such unilateral action: in every decision, a single individual ultimately makes the choice. But the very intensity of Nathan's desires bound him to the decision duel analysis; this decision had to be the best possible. If he concluded that the duel had produced the wrong answer, he would disregard it—but that was the least likely possible outcome.
Duels did not always produce accurate decisions, of course. The Institute recognized three broad classes of decisions, and three broad methods of decision-making: engineering decisions, political decisions, and unresolv able decisions. Engineering decisions were made by finding the correct, or best, answer. This was the best decision-making methodology whenever possible, but often, human affairs proved too ambiguous for this wholly rational analysis.
Political decisions were made by building an answer of consensus. In difficult cases, the consensus decision might be to let one particular man make a decision, but that was a form of consensus nevertheless. Because political decision systems could generate decisions in more situations than engineering decision systems, political systems typically gained preeminence over engineering. For the most part, this arrangement worked well—except that too often, the politicians made political decisions in situations where engineering applied, usually with tragic consequences. The key question was, how do you decide whether to use engineering or politics to decide? Politicians all too often decided to use politics.
Zeteticism had recognized an important truth: the choice between politics and engineering is always an engineering decison. The decision duel technique made its most important contributions on issues that looked and tasted political, but which were actually engineering issues at heart.
Even politics, weak though it was, could foil as a decision-making system. In cases where bitter opponents could not achieve consensus, unresolvable decisions went to the last, least accurate, decision-making method: selection by force. Ultimately, any problem could be addressed by warfare. It was inefficient, but it was also effective. All one had to do was pursue the combat fiercely enough. Too often in human history, military leaders had forgotten that the decision to use force must be made politically, just as politicians had forgotten that the decision to use politics must be made through engineering.
Nathan adjusted the sound level of his earphone. As in all well-designed engineering discussions, the primary proponents welcomed good ideas from all sources. Anyone in the Institute could participate in this duel by communicating with the duelists, who were moderators for their respective viewpoints, not stand-alone combatants. Nathan could receive recommendations verbally through the earphones, or digitally through the small displays that accompanied his keyboard.
He knew the duel had attracted a large audience. The two rows of observer chairs beneath the dueling stations had filled before his own arrival. Behind him, on an even higher tier, Nathan could sense the neutral moderator's anxiety as he counted the number of nationwide taps coming into the room. The boy had just received his duelist's certification, and he was one of the brightest and youngest graduates. Nathan hoped fervently that he would receive many third alternatives from the audience, for Nathan disliked both of the official alternatives. Of course, he disliked the opposing viewpoint even more than the viewpoint he himself defended.
Though the oversize display held his gaze, Nathan caught a movement from the corner of his eye as someone took the right-hand dueling chair. He looked to see who had been chosen to be his opposing partner. Some of the older certified Zetetic duelists had been reluctant to duel with him. On the other hand, some of the younger ones had shown an exuberant enthusiasm to oppose him—the modem equivalent of facing down a famous gunslinger.
With a small shock, Nathan saw that none of the exuberant gunslingers had gotten the chance—his dueling partner was Leslie Evans.
Les gave him a quick laugh. "Boo, Nathan."
Nathan stared, speechless, and Les continued. "Let accuracy triumph."
Nathan smiled, and nodded. They turned to the main display and started listing their assumptions, then their opening remarks.
Nathan summarized his position in the opening: The sacrifice of the Zetetic Institute could make sense if the alternative were the sacrifice of the United States. The United States was indeed in danger of sacrificing itself; it was in danger of sacrificing all of Western civilization.
This danger resulted from the rising risk of war. The Soviet Union had, in the past several years, repeatedly used violence as a successful tool in global politics. It had become confident of both its own strength and of the efficacy of war. Meanwhile, the United States had withdrawn psychologically from the world, but it had not withdrawn physically: it still had vast though ineffectual numbers of troops stationed around the world. This combination was explosive. America's nuclear Sword of Damocles was all that caused aggressive nations to move cautiously in their dealings with it. And many people, notably the Soviets, had started to believe that America dared not use its nuclear weapons: a sword so powerful that it would destroy the wielder as well as the intended victim.
Yet the U.S. had not forsaken that too-powerful sword. It had created the worst possible combination of circumstances. The people of America knew that they would have to resort to nuclear weapons in a military crisis, but no one outside the U.S. really believed the Americans would do so. Any rational analysis suggested that the United States could no longer rely on nuclear threats—it had to achieve a consistent global position without them.
The question of whether America should bring its troops home from all over the world and return to isolationism was interesting but not relevant: the Institute could not force the country to isolationism even if it was a good idea. But the Institute
could
, through the development of the Slings Hunters, guarantee that America remained strong enough to fight a victorious war without nuclear weapons.
Leslie's response granted most of these points. He made two other observations, however. First, whereas the failure to complete the Sling
might
be important in saving America's future, failure to reinvest the Institute s funds in its own business would
certainly
destroy the Institute.
They popped open spreadsheets on both sides of the screen and projected the cost of continuing the Sling Project. The directive that had eliminated the FIREFORS program office had fortunately allowed for graduated shutdown. Currently, the Sling Project still proceeded under government funding, but that funding would end in one more week.
Nathan had weaseled the mid-January cutoff from Charles Somerset in November, during a meeting that had left Nathan feeling sorry for the FIREFORS director. The dismantling of FIREFORS was destroying Somerset; he had seemed disoriented and lost. In semi-coherent sentences, Somerset had revealed that he had no job prospects, either government or private. He could not keep up his mortgage payments; he was selling his house. The woman whom he sometimes dated had left him permanently. Nathan had urged him to enter the Institute, to find a new orientation for his life, but Nathan doubted that Somerset had even heard his words, much less considered them.
Numbers filled the cells of the spreadsheets, and with each entry, the dusky red digits in the bottom line turned more grim. Leslie was right: full-scale development of the Sling would bankrupt the Institute within a year, despite Kira's and Hilan's repeal of the ban on telecommuting.
Nathan paused a moment and smiled at the way the Institute and the networking community had flexed their political muscles for the first time. They had held their million-person conference two days before the Congressional elections. In those last two days, the pollsters and the politicians fell, flattened by the steamroller of votes that shifted across party lines, all in districts where stubborn proponents of the ban held seats. The networking community overthrew two sure-to-win incumbents, and after the elections, the entire American political machine understood a new force had arrived. Some politicians bowed with horror, some bowed with pleasure, but all bowed.
Had that political power play failed, the Sling Project would have bankrupted the Institute in three months. It was a sobering vision.
Now Nathan described his plan for salvation of both the Sling and the Institute: they would sell the Sling System to the government after they had completed development.
Here Leslie drew up a scathing collection of counterexamples, drawing reams of data from the nationwide data bases cross-connected to the duelists' network.
In peacetime, the American military almost never accepted advanced technology from outside the DOD's own bureaucracies. His most devastating example came from the 1980s. During that decade, the Northrop Corporation had spent millions of dollars to build the F-20. The concept was that the F-20 should be operationally comparable to the F-16, yet far cheaper. Northrop had succeeded.
But Northrop had failed. For years thereafter, the Air Force had successfully fought off all arguments to buy even a handful of F-20s. Northrop, and the rest of the industrial world, had learned the lesson: never try to develop a product for the DOD unless the DOD paid for it up front.
This was a lesson the Zetetic Institute could not ignore. The United States government simply could not be trusted to buy a better idea; indeed, it could be trusted to reject a better idea.
The debate continued, but Nathan could not circumvent Leslie's objections. They explored the reasons why particular projects and ideas died while waiting for the bureaucracies to recognize them. They developed part of a theory of institutional blindness. But Leslie forced Nathan to reject all strategies based on victory through bureaucratic manipulation: the lesson of Northrop struck too deeply. Nathan returned to the spreadsheet windows, developing scaled-down rates of Sling development that allowed the Institute to hold steady in the face of the tobacco companies' continued guerrilla warfare. The most reasonable Sling Project plan slashed the software development team in half and left no money for ongoing hardware prototyping. It would take years, perhaps a decade, to complete the project.
Nathan felt feverish. Though he had no engineering explanation for his suspicions, he feared that the final clash between the United States and the Soviet Union would occur before the Sling could be ready. He tried to resign himself to living with that fear.
The thick gray band running like a seam down the center of the dueling screen split, as though the seam itself had a seam. The split opened into a window of reasonable size. The neutral moderator, who entered third alternatives onto the display when he received them, must have gotten a good idea from the audience.
The third alternative read, "Though the president has banned all development of smart weapons, he has not banned all regular research and development throughout the Defense Department. Many key men know how important it is to develop better methods of defending ourselves."
Nathan heard Leslie chortle with delight as the names of some of those key men rolled down the window. Following each name came a synopsis of the person's official charters, and of his private agendas. "We can sell parts of the SkyHunter development as research for recon planes. We can sell parts of the HopperHunter as studies of advanced personnel carriers. We can sell most of the HighHunter as a new pop-up satellite launch vehicle."
The third alternative continued: "Most of the men who fund these efforts will know our purpose. But they will, through every act of omission possible, conceal the real purpose from others. And even if enemies of the project find out about our activities, they will be powerless to stop us—every one of these small contracts will be perfectly legitimate in its own terms."
Nathan raised a last objection, though he was confident the creator of this third alternative could address it. "We have no one who knows how to maneuver through these political circles with the needed dexterity." Leslie made the same point on the right half of the screen.
"Of course the Institute has the right person." The response appeared on the center section.
Nathan shifted his attention to the front row of the audience, where a balding man rose suddenly. He turned to Nathan with a maniacal smile pasted across his face—a smile of defiance, of vengeance. Seeing him, Nathan returned the defiance with a smile of his own.
The man stepped around the audience, and Nathan and Leslie both rose to greet him. Nathan offered a nod of gratitude—a salute of sorts—to this newest member of the Zetetic Institute: "Welcome," he said. "Welcome to the team."