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Dataset card Data Studio Files
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"Scanned them on the suborbital from Jakarta. Lucky thing you reached Junction in time to handle Riordan's retrieval personally." Corcoran moved toward his se...
"Physically, yes. Psychologically-well, Riordan is less resilient this time."
Corcoran frowned. "Less resilient? To what?"
"To the neural and mental traumas of being rapidly processed-again-out of long duration cryo-suspension. His recent experience of time is not as a steady flow...
Corcoran avoided Downing's gaze: he looked at the floor, then out at the Lincoln monument. Downing had the distinct impression that Nolan would not have been ...
Downing continued. "Clinically, Riordan's reorientation was normative, but one thing puzzled me: do you have any idea why the psychologists inserted so many p...
Nolan glanced up from under his hand. "What? No, no idea; frankly, I didn't notice."
And indeed, maybe Nolan hadn't noticed-but then again, maybe he had. It was as if the measurements of Caine's memory had been designed to surreptitiously asse...
Downing stopped: steady, old boy. Look very carefully at where these inquiries are taking you: toward the notion that Nolan not only took premeditated steps t...
Nolan's voice severed that troubling line of thought: "While we're on the topic of Caine's cold sleep, I've been wondering if his memory loss might have been ...
Downing managed not to flinch: so has Nolan started reading my mind, now? "That shift-is that why they held Caine for about a month after cold-sleeping him on...
Nolan nodded. "The pharmacology of the pre-toxification approach is radically different from ours. They had to purge their chemicals out of him before ours co...
"Ah." Nolan's comments about Taiwan's controversial pre-toxification cryotechnology were accurate, and Caine might very well have spent two weeks having his f...
Nolan leaned forward, his smile a little wider but less relaxed. Downing knew what that signified; the admiral wanted to get off the topic of Caine's memory l...
Downing folded his hands. "Riordan has every reason to hate us-and to distrust us. I'm uncomfortable with our decision to let him present his own findings at ...
Nolan smiled. "We anticipated this risk from the first day we reanimated Riordan. Face it, Richard: the part of him that is a polymath is impossible to predic...
"You mean like Caine."
"You said it, not me."
"So how do we make sure he stays in line?"
"By appealing to the part of him that is the Boy Scout, the straight arrow. By reminding him what's at stake and then bringing him inside-all the way inside."...
"Nolan, if we do that-"
"If we don't, he'll only resent us more. And it's the least we can do. Besides, as a purely cultural operative, he'd be invaluable. Once the publicity surroun...
Downing shrugged: there was no arguing that point. Riordan had a future-if he wanted it-on the lecture and book-signing circuit. He'd be sought after, but not...
Nolan smiled broadly. "You named him pretty well."
"Pardon?"
"Odysseus-the code name you hung on Riordan. Odysseus was no coward, but he always looked before he leaped."
"Yes, I suppose, but that has nothing to do with how Riordan got his code name. It came from a play on words-on names, actually."
And suddenly, Downing was reliving the moment now one year past. . . .
Caine was recovering from drowning himself during the circuitry training exercise: Richard brought him a towel and sat down.
Caine shook his head. "This whole scheme of yours is nuts, you know. I've only written about the military and intelligence work-and now you think you can teac...
Downing made sure his nod was relaxed. "We're simply asking you to collect information, just as if you were researching another book. And don't think of me as...
"Mentor, huh? And that makes me who? Odysseus?"
Downing smiled at the Homeric pun. "If you like." He leaned back. "We need a code name for you, anyway. Would 'Odysseus' suit you?"
Caine shrugged. "Sure: I'm 'Odysseus.'"
Nolan's voice startled Downing out of the recollection. "Anything else on Riordan?"
"Just this footnote from the psychologists: this time, his recovery may also be complicated by feelings of guilt."
Nolan frowned, turned his face back toward the darkening windows. "How so?"
"Over the loss of the Tyne."
"Has he said anything about feeling guilty?"
"No, but he does seem a bit distracted . . ."
ODYSSEUS
Caine took another sip of water to rinse out the faint fish-and-glycol aftertaste that followed reanimation. It was no good: the foreign tastes and smells kept ...
Downing laid his dataslate down on the black wire-frame table. "I think that's enough for today. You're doing very well."
What a lovely lie. "Great. So when do I get to ask a few questions?"
Downing shrugged. "You may do so now, if you wish."
"When am I going to get my short-term memories back?"
"So far as I can tell, your short-term memories from the Tyne are quite complete. In fact-"
"Cut the bullshit: you know what I mean, Richard. I'm talking about the memories from fourteen years ago, on Luna: when am I going to get those one hundred ho...
"Difficult to say. The loss may be permanent. The doctors speculate it was the duration of your suspension. Some speculate that the particulars of your deanim...
"What do you mean, 'the particulars'?"