The Medusa Encounter by Paul Preuss Read Free Book Online Page A

he’d been a great conspiracy theorist in his day, but for his own part, he had come to the conclusion that the Free Spirit—the prophetae , the Athanasians, whatever you wanted to call them—while admittedly a bunch of dangerous nuts, had made so many mistakes they were on the verge of putting themselves out of business. Now that the Board of Space Control obviously knew all about them, why should Ellen continue to risk her life?
    She humored him, agreed with him, did everything except promise to do what he asked—resign from the Board of Space Control. On the other hand, she didn’t say she wouldn’t. Her love and affection for him seemed steady. But for all his passion and argument, some cold part in the center of her was untouchable to his reasoning.
    That night they stopped outside her bedroom door and Blake moved impetuously to kiss her. She responded, pressing her taut dancer’s body to his hard frame, but broke off when he tried to go farther and push past her into the room.
“I’ve told you, there are cameras and microphones in there,” she said. “In your room, too.”
     
“I almost don’t care.”
     
“I do.” She said, “Until tomorrow, darling,” then closed the door firmly and locked it behind her.
    In the cold dark room she stripped and went naked to bed. In this century and culture, modesty hardly noticed nakedness—and certainly her body had often been rendered transparent, inside and out, to anyone who might be peering at her now. It was not because of Blake that she cared about the watchers; it was because of what they watched while she slept.
She did not want him to share her visions—her nightmares—as she knew they did.
     
With the aid of a private mantra, what some might call a prayer, she forced herself to fall asleep.
    Blake shoved the narrow casement open just enough to let night air enter. He hung his clothes carefully in the walk-in closet; he was a bit of a dandy, some said, and it was true that he liked to look his best, whatever part he was playing. And with the cameras watching, he liked to keep every-thing neat.
    He hopped naked into the bed and stretched out under the cool sheets. He lay there bursting with hope and fear and love— she loves me! —and stiff with renewed, frustrated lust.
A long time ago they had been children together in the same school, a special school for ordinary kids who were being taught to be something more than ordinary. The SPARTA project, it was called— SPARTA stood for Specified Aptitude Resource Training and Assessment—and it had been created by Linda’s parents . . . Ellen’s parents, that is . . . to demonstrate that every human is possessed of multiple intelligences, and that each of these intelligences may be developed to a high degree by stimulation and guidance. SPARTA vigorously contested the prejudice that intelligence was one thing, some mysterious ectoplasm called “I. Q.,” or that I. Q. was fixed, immutable, or in any meaningful sense real.
    Not all the children in SPARTA were equally capable in every area—people are rather less like each other than are pea plants—but every child blossomed. All became competent athletes, musicians, mathematicians, logicians, writers, artists, social and political beings. In one or more of these fields, each excelled.
    But for Linda and Blake, growing up, this extraordinary education was just school, the school they went to whether they wanted to or not, and to each other they were nothing more than schoolmates. Later, when it came to sex, the experience should have made them treat each other as casually as siblings.
Not in their case. She’d been slower to realize it—or more reluctant to admit it—but they were in love with each other. And, evidently, very much in the physical way.
    It occurred to him that there is something about making love to the person you love that cannot be mimicked by any other experience in life; no amount of intelligence, no amount of sexual