He didn't feel anything. He ought to have -- he had nanos lodged in every cell, a price to pay for a xeno's education -- but he never did. He watched Thi Loan bend over and touch her own fingers to the pad -- and for a split second, he wanted to wrap his arms around her and take her away, to prevent her assignment from being downloaded. But she was looking straight at him and shaking her head. "It won't change anything, Alex."
The computer said, "Bui Thi Loan," then paused -- for a much longer time than it had done for Alex. "Nanos reprogrammed for assignment on planet designated 'Horizon.'"
Thi Loan withdrew her hand from the pad, very slowly -- stared at it as if unsure of what to do next. That was it -- she had the timebomb now, the insidious nanos within her were starting to rewrite her DNA, and he'd done nothing to stop it.
He watched her, already wondering where the changes were going to show, which parts of her anatomy would be modified first -- and he knew he'd ask himself the same questions over and over on the three-week journey to Horizon. They'd lead nowhere; but he couldn't help it.
The first thing you saw on Horizon was the sea.
It stretched, endless, around the small landing pad and the even smaller research centre: a heaving mass of iridescent water, exhaling brine and the acrid smell of oil -- all meeting the grey-green hues of the sky in a haze of foam. In the distance, swimming beyond the algae-covered waters, were the elusive, serpentine shapes of the hatirkas, their song mingling with the roar of the waves. Between the research centre and the hatirkas were the darker, bulkier shapes of the forage boats, anchored to their platforms. They weren't moving.
Of course there would be no answer, not from hatirkas. What did the Federation hope for? That Thi Loan could somehow mediate between mankind and a wholly incomprehensible species?
On the sands, Thi Loan had stopped. She took one, two halting steps towards the waiting waves, her fingers clenched into fists. Her face was tense -- filled with a longing Alex knew all too well: that bitter need for the beaches of her childhood.
And he knew, too, that there was no going back to that time, that Earth's rising sea had drowned every inch of the Mekong Delta she'd grown up in. "Thi Loan," he called.
She didn't turn. The wind ruffled her hair; her arms stretched, like sails to catch the brine. In the background, a tirka triad was swimming out of the water, pushing themselves up with their stubby hands. They didn't look at the humans. They never did.
At length, her arms fell; but she still didn't move. Alex walked to her in silence.
"It's so big," Thi Loan said. Her voice was already taking on the singsong accents of the tirkas: an inescapable reminder of why they'd come here.
"I know." He squeezed her shoulder, briefly -- aching to take her in his arms, to tell her that it was going to be all right, even though it was a lie. But she'd never been that demonstrative; not in public. Alex added, "But it's not our sea."
Thi Loan didn't speak for a while. "No. It's not the same smell, is it?" Her hands unclenched. She stared as the foam exhaled over the horizon line, just long enough to open a hollow of fear in Alex's stomach. "Let's get to work. The nanos won't wait for us."
Meghan, the senior xeno on Horizon, welcomed them into the research centre. She took them to her own rooms on the side of the building and made some tea -- artificial, of course, nothing Earth-like grew on Horizon. Alex sat down by Thi Loan's side, swallowing the stretched-out taste of dehydrated drinks.
"I'll show you to your rooms later," Meghan said. Her blue tirka ruff kept opening and closing -- like gills -- as she spoke. Alex couldn't help but stare. Damn it, why? He'd seen many xenos over the years, so many variations on nano-modifications -- heard so many voices, some even weirder than Meghan's warbling, staccato tones. It was the same transformation that was going on inside him.
But he knew he was lying to himself.
How do I live, if I know you won't be here by year's end? he'd asked Mother a lifetime ago. He had been devastated by her decision to refuse further medical treatment. She'd turned her face away from him, hiding a grimace of pain. "You can't change what's already happened. You can't heal me. And you certainly shouldn't try to follow me," she'd said, as if sensing the horrible thought that that was already coalescing in Alex's mind. "All you can do is live hour by hour, and day by day."
That had been impossible for Alex to hear. If he had to let go, he at least needed to know more. To understand her decision.
Meghan drank her tea and waited for Thi Loan to do the same. Thi Loan wasn't really drinking -- her gaze was distant, even though her own ruff was barely visible.
"All right," Meghan said. "This is the point where I usually give xenos enough pointers to make sense of the planet." She set her cup down on a woven-fibre mat. "Unfortunately, in the case of Horizon, I believe you already know all you need to."
"We've read the files," Alex said. "On the out journey."
"Yep," Meghan said. "And the files are all you get. As they said: we can talk to the tirkas. Or rather, we have a fragmentary understanding of their language, and some of their customs. And that's it. They're not interested in us: they might understand what we're saying -- but they rarely talk to us."
"Surely observation --" Alex started.
"It's been tried. We've learned a few things, as I said. But only scraps. I have thousands of hours of video," she smiled bitterly, "but no framework in which to interpret them. I see them gather around a bit of driftwood, but how do I know whether it's a religious ceremony, or just curiosity?"
"I'll see those videos," Thi Loan said, speaking up for the first time.
Meghan shrugged. "If you like." She shook her head. "We've been on Horizon for a century, and we still live separately."
"Tell us about Kishore," Thi Loan said. She'd brought the palms of both hands together, in what Alex called her Buddha pose, and her face was creased in thought.
Meghan shrugged. "He'd been here five years. He was one of the older crop of xenos, with the second generation of nanos. But they were good enough for him to try to establish contact. You'll have to read some of his findings."
"About the triad matings?" Alex said, carefully skirting Kishore's real accomplishment: the discovery that tirkas and hatirkas were the same species, a transformation from larva into sterile adults. The same discovery which had allowed the scientists of the Federation to reprogram Thi Loan's nanos, to allow her to change from tirka to hatirka -- from the slightly alien to the completely incomprehensible.
Meghan nodded. Her smile was ironic. Likely she knew what Alex wasn't telling her about Kishore and nano research. "You already know all there is to know about him, don't you?"
Thi Loan shrugged. "You might have seen something that wasn't in the reports."
"I wish," Meghan said. "I just found his body in the boat. That's all."
Thi Loan was staring in the distance again; after a moment of silence, she spoke up. "The hatirkas . . . Their song has changed."
Meghan looked at her for a while. "Maybe," she said. "How long have they given you?"
Alex knew the true meaning of the question -- how long until the nanos finished their work within Thi Loan -- but he chose to be vague. "We have to find a solution as soon as we can."
"Yes," Meghan said. "The entire quadrant depends on the spaceship-fuel Horizon produces. I imagine they'd want those boats to start again, and fast." She looked again at Thi Loan. "I'm just not sure what they think you can do."
Alex bristled at the implied criticism, though it wasn't unexpected. "Thi Loan's the best xeno the Federation has."
Meghan waved a hand. "I know. Spare me the praise. I've read her file. If you want to work a miracle . . ."
The miracle Alex wanted had nothing to do with the ships or with the tirkas, but he didn't say it. It was a foolish idea: what xeno could go against the programming of their nanos, against their masters of the Federation?
He wished Thi Loan could.
There was a bubble in their room: a smooth, huge vat of nano-grown fibreglass which took up half the space available. It rocked back and forth, driven by the mechanism on its pedestal -- and the liquid inside sloshed to a rhythm almost identical to that of the waves outside.
Alex and Thi Loan took one look at it, and then at each other. Thi Loan raised a hand to her blue-veined lips. Alex suspected that she was imagining the same thing he was: a being with the stubby arms and sinuous, serpentine shape of hatirkas -- and the eyes of a human -- crawling into the safety of the bubble to complete its metamorphosis away from prying gazes.
"Yes," Alex said, and together they moved the bed to the other side of the room -- just under the window, as far away from the bubble as possible.
But the bubble was still there during dinner, wedged into his thoughts. Thi Loan was even quieter than usual: the only noise that punctuated the meal was the silvery sound of her chopsticks against the metal bowl. Alex's throat itched, and no amount of honeyed tea could wash down the bitter taste. Of course, it wasn't in his oesophagus that the problem was, but in his wind-pipe, which was rearranging itself on a molecular level.
"You want to see the videos tomorrow?" Alex said.
"Might as well start with something. I'll go out afterwards." Thi Loan's face was set.
Alex said, "You don't have to."
Thi Loan smiled without joy. "You think I can't handle this planet?"
She was bristling easily tonight -- the long journey, perhaps, had made her more sensitive than usual.
Alex had no wish for a quarrel, but he could not bring himself to lie. "You saw what the beach did to you. How it affected you."
"Yes." Thi Loan was silent for a moment. "Yes. There is that." She sighed, and then raised her bowl of tea to her lips. Her eyes were as bright as the stars in the void. "But I'll still do this. I have to."
When the sea had finally engulfed her village after its long, protracted agony, Thi Loan hadn't been there: the Federation had kept her away, as it had done during her whole studies -- afraid she'd abandon everything and go home.
She'd been incommunicado on Lixacan, on a diplomatic mission to establish a joint city with the Yoalli. She'd said nothing when Alex had brought her the news; nothing when the first mails had come from her family, showing her the deserted streets where the water lapped at the houses. But the holos of her childhood, which she'd always kept on her personal reader, had vanished overnight -- replaced by pictures of Alex and her mountaining in the Andes, in the Himalayas, climbing the summits of the Alps with a broad smile on their faces, and no sea to be seen for hundreds of kilometres.
"The sea --" Alex said.
Thi Loan shook her head. " -- is my own affair, Alex. Please. You worry about me too much."
Alex could have brought up any number of points. But he was wise enough to say nothing.
"You're right," he said. "Let's take things as they come."
Hour by hour and day by day, Mother whispered in his mind, You don't have to understand why. If you love me, just accept it. But he'd learnt to ignore her by now, to relegate her to the back of his thoughts with his other fears -- and he took Thi Loan's hand and brought her into the bed, and they made love slowly, fiercely, as in the first days of their marriage, a bulwark against the storm.
The bubble, all the while, never stopped rocking.
Afterwards, Thi Loan slept curled on the bed, her throat a slightly darker blue where her ruff was developing.
There had been a legend, once, about blue throats and a god who had swallowed poison to save the world. Alex couldn't help but wonder what the god had felt, sacrificing himself for the sake of mankind.
Of course, no one had asked Alex or Thi Loan how they'd felt either. It was how the game was played: ten years of xeno courses at uni, full medical benefits and a salary big enough to own acres of land on Old Earth -- but there was a catch. There was always a catch. Where their masters bid them go, they had to go -- and they had to go with a smile on their lips.
Alex thought of drunken parties in Mumbai, of sunsets by the shivering sea; of all that would be gone when the nanos irrevocably changed Thi Loan; and he found that his hands were shaking.
To calm himself, he walked to the computer terminal, turned it on, and began typing the usual messages: "Dear Aunt Linda, Dear Father, we have safely arrived on Horizon . . ."
His com chimed, "Alex! Didn't expect to see you around!" Pablo. Of course. Who else would be online so late -- and who else would pepper his speech with exclamation marks and 3D-emos?
Alex forced a smile he didn't feel; he turned on his internal head speakers and diverted the audio to them. Then, with a flick of his hand, he activated holo-visuals. Pablo's tanned face appeared on-screen, with the prominent fangs and fan-like ears of his hanjiu flock.
"Hombre," Pablo said, crushing Alex in a hug. Even in virtual space, it was as disturbing as in real life to see two ghostly arms folding around him. They hadn't nicknamed Pablo "the Bear" at uni for nothing. "It's good to see you."
"Good to see you too," Alex said. "How are you doing?"
Pablo grinned. "Trying to explain Christian religion to the hanjiu. So far, so good."
Alex couldn't help it. "You do know --"
"That's it's on the list of untranslatable topics? Yeah," Pablo said. "They asked, Alex. What was I supposed to do?"
Alex shrugged. "I don't know. I guess I'd have done the same." He'd never been one for rules, and neither had Pablo.
"Anyway . . ." Pablo shook his head, as if trying to dislodge a persistent insect. "How's Horizon?"
Alex had expected the first thing that would come to mind to be Thi Loan, but instead he found himself saying, "Big. Ocean as far as you can see."
"Scary," Pablo said. Pablo, like Alex, was from a race of mountain-dwellers, without Thi Loan's hate-love relationship with the sea: to him, the ocean wasn't a source of subsistence or of pride, but simply the invisible killer, the encroacher irretrievably drowning the lowlands of Earth. "And the tirkas?"
"Scary," Alex said, finally, thinking of the lone figures on the shore. "In a different way."
"That's aliens," Pablo said. "Once you get to know them --"
"That's not going to happen," Alex said. And he wasn't talking about the tirkas' total indifference to humans, but about the fact that they were taking Thi Loan away from him. He was being unfair and he knew it; but he couldn't help himself.
"Yeah, I don't think we have that. We're looking into Kishore's murder, and --"
"Alex." Pablo's voice was concerned -- yet as unyielding as steel. "I'm not the Federation, remember? I don't care about your excuses."
That was too much, even coming from Pablo. "I don't need excuses," Alex said, his hands clenching into fists. "They're changing her, and there's no coming back. And I'm supposed to watch, damn it! I'm supposed to watch all the while, and do nothing!"
On the other end of the com, Pablo's face had grown unreadable, the hanjiu ears turned towards the ground, the mouth as purplish as burst blood vessels. "That's the way it works. Can't change the nanos, Alex. Can't give them new orders." But his eyes wouldn't quite meet Alex's, and that had always been Pablo's way of lying.
"There is a way," Alex said, trying to contain the hope rising in him -- strong enough to crush his chest. "You know there is --"
Pablo didn't say anything for a while. At length he turned away from the screen -- not letting anything of his gaze betray him. "There might be," he said. "Government hacks. Illegal, of course. And dangerous. You know that as well as I do."
They'd both known a girl when they'd been in uni: Elspeth, a tall, uneasy blonde who had never looked quite right for the xeno program. She'd gotten hold of hacks, God only knew how -- and the janitor had found her in the morning, all twisted out of shape, every organ trying to evolve into something else, something different. Like a puzzle of flesh all askew, and the pictures had gone around -- and everyone had wondered what she'd been trying to do. But of course, they'd never know.
"I know," Alex said. "Believe me. But --" But if he had to go down into Hell to prevent this, he would. He'd had enough of one family member wasting away on his watch. There would not be a second one. "If there's a chance, any chance at all . . ."
"That's how they sell those, you know. Misplaced hopes." Pablo sighed, a sound that Alex's new ears struggled to interpret. "I'll look into it. But I make no promises. No guarantees. You two are on your own."
Alex turned slightly to look at Thi Loan -- and felt the ache in his own throat, the tightening, as if he was going to suffocate at any moment. Nanos, he knew -- nanos, not grief or the sense of loss -- just a new configuration for his vocal tract.
He thought of the last planet they'd been on, of the herd-like garakas and their placid, Zen-like mentality; of Thi Loan, smiling as she recounted a Vietnamese legend to them: something about a girl finding a golden ball among the husked rice kernels and ascending into the stars to speak to the Jade Emperor.
"We've always been on our own," he said.
Meghan showed them the videos, hour upon hour of them, an endless accumulation of frames that didn't make any sense.
Thi Loan sat watching them, her brown eyes wide -- taking in everything, dissecting it, trying to build a coherent system from what she was seeing. Alex had no doubt she'd succeed: Thi Loan had the uncanny ability to make sense of widely different cultures, the same gift that had allowed her to sail through her classes at uni -- the same gift that had gotten her noticed by the Federation, chosen for this job.
Alex, to whom the videos didn't speak, drifted into Meghan's quarters.
"I take it the prodigy is working?" Meghan asked, somewhat sarcastically.
Alex didn't rise to the bait. Theoretically, he should have been out there, gathering the information Thi Loan needed to fit into the tirka frame of mind. He couldn't bring himself to do it though; it felt like aiding and abetting the Change. He just couldn't do that.
"Where did you find Kishore?" he asked.
"Drifting in his boat." Meghan shook her head. "Never found a cause of death, either."
"What was he doing out there?" Alex asked.
"What we all do," Meghan said. "Gathering information on the hatirkas."
"He'd done it often, I take it."
Meghan's gaze was shrewd. "It wasn't unusual, if that's what you mean."
"Apart from the fact that he died."
Meghan shook her head. "Yes," she said, finally. She stared at the Spartan furnishing of her room. "I'll show you what was on the boat, if you want."
It wasn't terribly interesting, sadly: there was a change of clothes, a neon lantern, and a handful of first-aid nanos. A pile of memory chips, too, which made Alex frown. Meghan slid one of them into a reader, and handed it to him. "He took notes everywhere," she said.
The chips weren't very interesting: mostly fragments of Kishore's magnum opus, a thorough study of tirka and hatirka life that would, theoretically, have propelled him to the firmament of xenobiology. But everything was incomplete, and nothing coherent could be put together. "That's useless," Alex said, finally, and Meghan nodded.
"Nobody said it would be useful," she said. "Or that his death can be solved at all."
"And you can live with that?" Alex asked.
Meghan shrugged. "Do I have a choice?" And, when he remained silent: "Not everything makes sense, Alex. That's the first lesson you learn here on Horizon."
After that, the days seemed to shiver and merge into one another, like a hazy road in the midday sun. Alex got up in the morning and washed, staring at his image in the mirror -- at the alien ruff on his throat. The water cascading over him felt warmer and more reassuring than it should have.
Most mornings he went walking. He tried not to remember the first thing he'd see when opening his eyes -- not to chronicle, day after day, the effect the nanos were having on Thi Loan: how her eyes had turned larger and broke the light into facets, how her arms kept shrinking, tightening around their bones like those of a malnourished child.
Pablo sent regular, terse messages about his progress -- or lack thereof. But Alex didn't say anything. What Pablo had offered, and what he'd accepted, was illegal, and, if they were caught, there would be Hell to pay.
One morning Alex woke up to find that Thi Loan wasn't by his side. His first, panicked thought was that the nanos were faster than he'd thought, and that she'd already shut herself into the bubble for the final transformation. But the bubble was empty, quietly rocking on its pedestal. Then where --?
With his heart tightening, he ran out of the research centre and onto the grey, glistening sands, looking towards the horizon, a wordless, anguished prayer resonating in his thoughts.
There was a group of tirkas talking to each other in staccato gestures, utterly unaware of his presence. The wind carried to his ruff the smell of their conversation -- something about changes and the will of the sea.
And then, as if the world had shifted on its axis, he saw that one of them wasn't a tirka at all, but Thi Loan. He knew from the way she held her head; the calm, measured way her forked hands rose and fell.
He stood for a while, his expanded throat contracting with the rhythm of his breath, tingling with each chemical he received. He thought of the nanos continuing their slow, insidious work inside her. She wasn't looking at him; she hadn't looked at him in a long time, and now she'd changed so much he barely recognized her.
In a heartbeat he was running toward the other side of the small island where they'd found Kishore's boat.
He ran, his feet sliding on the sand, breathing in the acrid smell of Horizon's brine. The sea by his side wasn't grey or blue or wine-dark -- but the iridescent colour of growing algae; and in the distance were the hatirkas, sinuous shapes limned in refracted light.
Better not think of the hatirkas.
Kishore's boat was still there, half on land, half in the water. Alex slowed down when he got near it: an air of neglect and stillness hung about it, as commanding as the silence of the grave. Oily water lapped at its keel, making a low, gurgling noise that sounded almost happy.
On a whim, Alex hoisted himself inside, wincing as his muscles protested. He wasn't as fit as he had been before the transformation began -- and the nanos would be messing with his metabolism for another few days.
The boat was simple enough: a hull with a hybrid motor, starting on battery and burning the algae for fuel once it got into deep waters. A pair of steel oars hung within the hull -- just in case. They didn't look as though they'd been used at all. A patina of salt and oil covered them, the same patina that covered everything left outdoors on Horizon; but they didn't seem to have algae. Just to be sure, Alex lit his UV lamp and passed it over the whole keel. And, sure enough, nothing shone back.
There was a fluorescent handprint near the back; and when Alex ran his own hand on the steel, something inside the boat clicked -- and a secret panel slid open.
Inside, nothing; just more fluorescent fingerprints. Alex photographed them, not really believing that was a great discovery: the prints probably belonged to Kishore or Meghan, nothing out of the ordinary.
When he pulled himself out of the boat, he found himself staring at a tirka -- and although it was looking at him with what first appeared to be the same bored disinterest that tirkas show toward all humans, there was something else in this one's stance. It was emitting a chemical: the tirka equivalent of a hand wave.
Alex took a deep breath and fumbled with his own, newly-grown glands, trying to imitate it as best as he could.
The tirka cocked its head right, then left, radiating disapproval. Damn the manuals, Alex thought. They always told you that using this stuff was instinctive once you'd studied the language. It only worked if you were Thi Loan -- but then, Thi Loan was quadrilingual in Earth languages, and fluent in God knew how many other alien tongues.
"Apologise/humility," Alex said, hoping he'd put the stresses where they belonged and he hadn't mangled the diphthong past retrieval.
The tirka said nothing for a while, and just when Alex had convinced himself that it was going to leave, it moved its ruff with an audible sigh. "Youth/ignorance. Deep waters/ends."
It barely made any sense -- God, how he wished Thi Loan were here.
The Hachand. The Changing One. The Dying One. In their language it seemed to be the same. It was talking about Thi Loan. "Yes/emphasis," Alex said.
The tirka gestured towards the boat. "Owner/curious."
It was an odd accent to put on the last word -- in fact, the association of the chemicals and of the high-pitched accent almost made the secondary meaning of curiosity more important than the primary. Why the emphasis?
Alex pointed at the boat again, and at the sea. "Owner/dead?"
The tirka turned its multi-faceted eyes towards the boat. "Deep waters/secrets," it said, with an expansive mandible movement, their equivalent of a shrug. "Sea/depths keeps all/takes all."
"Compartment/secrets," Alex said, gesturing at the boat. His head spun, and he only kept the vocabulary possibilities separate through sheer strength of will. Juggling between the spoken and the modulated meanings was taking a heavy toll. "Stolen/destroyed?"
The tirka shrugged again, and turned away. Clearly, it had said all it had wanted to.
Alex watched it walk to the shore, dipping its forked hands into the sea -- crooning to itself in words he couldn't understand.
Meghan, he knew, would have been overjoyed -- a tirka had taken an interest in a xeno, had spoken without being prompted to. But Alex knew why it had chosen him, and it wasn't because of his own nanos or anything he had done; it was only because of his connection to Thi Loan.
They did, after all, notice more than they let on. Why had they thought Kishore curious -- and not Meghan, for instance?
Alex pulled himself into the boat again, and knelt by the secret compartment. He shone the lamp into it and watched the fluorescent handprints. They were in a sequence, except for one, which dragged across the whole of the compartment: a slow 90-degree rotation while gradually splaying the fingers.
He was on Horizon, and there were double meanings within everything.
Carefully, Alex laid his own hand on the steel -- every instinct in him screaming that he was destroying evidence -- and rotated it to match the handprints, slowly extending his fingers.
He hadn't expected it to be that easy; but if life had taught him anything, it was stubbornness. He placed his hand into position again, and tried yet again.
Nothing on the second or the third try. But on the fourth . . . Just as he was about to give up, believing the tirka to have meant nothing more than what it had said, another click resounded through the steel; and the back of the compartment split apart.
Inside were Kishore's true secrets: a thin sheet of paper that was covered with incomprehensible equations; and a memory chip already eaten at by the oil and the salt.
The chip was standard-issue: Alex's personal reader could read it. He had to fight to slide it in because of the layers of foreign materials on the circuits; but the reader powered up, all the same.
Whatever had been on it was badly damaged, plastered over by Horizon's brine, but Alex could get the beginning of it, and enough words scattered throughout to guess at what it was.
It was a report, and it wasn't going to the Federation, but to a researcher at Betelgeuse Point, which hosted the biggest oil refineries in this quadrant. It said something about new processes, and about the low yield of Horizon's algae fields -- it seemed there was barely enough fuel produced to cope with the explosion of spaceship traffic.
It was an old, old dream: being able to put Horizon's algae within tubes, to control their growth from start to finish -- and to increase fuel production by a thousand fold. It was this century's Eldorado -- and like its sixteenth-century equivalent, no one had ever found it. Horizon's algae weren't reproducible with nanos; they withered when taken away from the planet, and the labs had yet to come up with a reason to explain this.
Everything in that report -- whatever it had been before the sea had eaten at it -- that had been Kishore's real reason for coming to Horizon: not helping Meghan, or writing a book, but simply following his dreams of fame and fortune.
It wasn't surprising. Disappointing, perhaps, but Alex had had enough experience to know the depths of human greed -- the same humans who'd send Thi Loan to Horizon to make sure production continued without a hitch, without caring about her past or her future.
Was that the reason for Kishore's death: something so brutally simple? Something he could give to Thi Loan, enough that she could get the boats running again, before it was too late to reverse the nanos' work in her body?
Slowly, Alex walked back to the research centre, trying to crush the nascent hope that made his heart beat faster.
He found Meghan in her lab, watching a video of tirkas entering the sea. She was vocalising notes to her e-assistant -- something about the tirka cycle and the rhythm of algae growth.
"Alex?" she said when he closed the door.
He laid the chip in front of her. "You said you'd checked the boat."
Meghan frowned. She turned off her e-assistant with a flick of her head, and took the chip. "I did," she said, curtly. "You found this in the compartment, I presume."
Things were starting to make less sense -- and he wasn't even facing a tirka, or Thi Loan. "You knew about the secret compartment? Then why --?"
Meghan took the chip and slid it into the reader of her e-assistant. Her lips mouthed the words of the report for a while. At length, she raised her eyes. "Kishore was paranoid about backups. He'd had most of his master's work destroyed when his student hall burnt down, and he swore it wouldn't happen again. He kept copies everywhere. I found piles of chips beneath his bed, and another pile on the boat. I gave you every one of those, incidentally. That compartment was full of them." She shrugged. "I must have missed this one when I gathered them."
"That I gave you everything I found on that boat. Why not? It was the truth." Her voice was defiant, and Alex knew why she'd done this -- the petty need to remain in control of Horizon, to challenge Thi Loan on a ground where she couldn't lose. He'd have liked to shout at her, but he couldn't -- he still needed her goodwill.
"It's a report to Betelgeuse Point," he said, slowly. "About algae yield. You didn't think that might be significant?"
Meghan just stared at him, obviously struck speechless.
Alex went on, relentless, "He mentions tubes and artificial growth."
Gradually, he became aware that Meghan's expression was no longer hostile -- but that she was shaking her head in a slow, sad way. "Oh, Alex. I know what you're thinking, but I've seen the original report. I can show it to you. It's not the reason he died."
"It's not?" His voice was as challenging as hers had been a moment ago.
Meghan went towards the back of the lab and placed the palm of her hand on a cupboard -- which slid open. The shelves were full of chips; and on the right was a small keypad. She typed in some numbers, and the shelves shifted and presented a single chip.
"There," she said, coming back to the table. "You'll see."
Alex slid the chip into his reader -- it went in smoothly, easily, as if eager to disgorge its contents -- and fired up the screen.
It was a report to Betelgeuse Point; and it was focused on algae yield. But, with the missing words filled in, the context became quite different. Kishore hadn't been experimenting with new ways to grow or harvest algae; the whole point of the report was simply to confirm that there was no other way to produce fuel for spaceships, that tubes and artificial lights and nutrient wouldn't make a difference. Alex recognized the profusion of technical points and mathematical formulas: the scientist's supreme weapon to try and confuse the layman. Kishore hadn't even gathered enough data to justify all of this; but he'd written the report anyway.
"They pressed Kishore the last time he went to buy supplies," Meghan said. "I wrote some of that piece, actually." She grimaced. "The last thing we wanted, both of us, were more machines on Horizon."
Alex stared at the report, willing it to change, to become something else. He'd believed, so much, that he'd found the solution; that Thi Loan could solve the problem before her metamorphosis had become too advanced to be reversed; but now he saw it was as foolish to have believed in that as to believe that the sea level on Old Earth would decrease.
As for the possibility that Betelgeuse Point had come here and killed Kishore in retribution . . . It was just too ridiculous to even consider. The place was too small, and any extra person would have stuck out like a mountain-dweller on the beach.
"Perhaps the hatirkas misunderstood what he was doing," he said.
Meghan shrugged. "Who knows that the hatirkas think?"
Only one person, Alex thought. Like Meghan, he knew the answer to that question; but he couldn't bring himself to utter it out loud.
Thi Loan was still on the beach when he came home -- absorbed in her discussion with the tirkas. He waved to her, but she didn't answer. He couldn't say he was surprised; he simply went inside to brew himself some tea.
With the ruff around his throat, he was much more sensitive to the foul taste in the mug: he gulped the liquid down in one convulsive swallow. But it wasn't quite enough -- not salty enough, not mingling with the taste of Horizon's air. Soon, he thought wryly, he'd have to eat like the tirkas: fish and young algae buds, culled from the waters. He didn't think his digestive tract would be up to it, though. Modification of the intestinal flora wasn't on the list of nano-work: too much trouble, and it was easier to import food along with the other supplies the bases needed.
He felt drained of everything -- having his hopes raised and crushed again seemed to have emptied him from the inside out. So he lay on his couch and slid down into darkness -- into nightmares of Thi Loan crawling into the bubble, of hatirkas dancing before him, tormenting him with the weight of their knowledge -- laying their cold, damp fingers on his hands, dragging him underwater where he choked on algae oil . . .
He woke up to something cold touching his shoulders: Thi Loan's forked hands, shaking him out of his sleep.
"You were -- screaming," she said. Her chemicals trembled in the air, on the edge of blossoming into accents.
Her eyes were wide and faceted, and he had to make a conscious effort to remember what had happened. "Bad dreams," he said. "Did you have a good day?"
Thi Loan shook her head -- and for a moment she seemed lost for words. "Good," she said finally. "Learnt many things. About the Change."
It didn't surprise him. "Giving yourself to the sea, that sort of thing?"
She paused after he spoke, confirming the fear growing in his belly. "More complicated." Her eyes were distant again -- she focused on him with a visible effort.
"Thi Loan," he said, frightened that the time had come, that he was going to lose her.
"I'm all right." Her gaze was still remote. "Come on. Let's eat."
At dinner, he couldn't help but notice that she was eating fish and algae, even if they were still human-made things.
"About Kishore --" he said, hoping to draw her from inside her shell. He told her about what he'd found on the boat.
Thi Loan shook her head, her gills opening and closing on the rhythm of her breath. Her face was already tighter and longer than that of a tirka. "He was a good man," she said. "In love with Horizon."
"The tirkas are telling you that?"
She shook her head again. "His reports. Don't be silly, Alex. The tirkas don't care about us."
Alex snapped, "I'm not sure how they ever rose to the top of the food chain with such a blithe attitude toward other life forms."
Thi Loan smiled, revealing a row of neat, sharp teeth, as fine as those of a shark. "There was some . . . thought, a long . . . time ago. They decided we're . . . harmless. Harmless," she repeated, a little uncertainly, as if she were no longer sure that the word was the right one. "Are they wrong?"
"No, but --" He wanted to tell her about how frightened she made him -- about the chemicals that she emitted, hanging in the air like so many unsaid words: care/devotion, duty/dreams, sea/secrets . . .
After dinner, he discovered that they couldn't make love anymore; she'd changed too much for that. She lay on her side of the bed, exhaling chemicals with every breath. He stared at the ceiling, trying to accept the realization that the end was near. He saw how she struggled with human language; how long would it be before he had to speak to her in the tirka monosyllables?
Mother, in her final months, had been the same: so gaunt as to be unrecognisable, shot with so much morphine she had barely been coherent. And when she'd finally slipped away, he had been holding her hand in the hospital, willing her to at least wake up and say goodbye. But she never had.
The console was beeping, quietly: a message. In silence, he rose and walked to the keyboard, and rerouted the volume to his integrated head-speakers.
It was from Pablo, and the only thing it said was: Call me back. It's urgent.
He didn't like the sound of that: sending the hacks to him via the network shouldn't have posed any problems. Had they been found out? That didn't sound like a good explanation, either: the Federation would have impounded their ship, implants, and nanos in a heartbeat if that had been the case.
He typed in Pablo's number and waited for the image to come into focus. Pablo was wearing military fatigues, and his hands were covered in mud.
Pablo shook his head. "Building a mud house," he said with a smile -- an expression that didn't even touch his eyes. "But that's not what I wanted to tell you."
"The hacks," Alex said, a hundred alarm bells ringing in his mind.
Pablo smiled, tiredly. "I'll send them to you via the network. If you still want them."
"Your hacks cost me a fair bit of hobnobbing with high-ranked Federation officials," Pablo said. He was looking Alex straight in the eye -- and Alex knew the expression: it was the same one Meghan had had when he brought her Kishore's report.
Pablo hesitated, then started speaking very fast, without stopping, his words tumbling on top of each other, merging with each other. "They told me things -- things known only at the highest levels. That the Federation would never send anyone on this kind of mission with barely-tested nanos."
Alex stared at him. "They made her do it."
Pablo's voice was soft, as soft and as cutting as the surgeon's knife when it parted flesh. "They didn't, Alex. Thi Loan volunteered for this."
That was -- He heard the words, and no matter which way he turned them, they didn't make sense. "That's not possible," he said, hoping Pablo would say something, anything, different from what he'd heard.
But Pablo stood his ground, his muddy hands falling at his side -- wan and small and defeated, but unwavering. "I know what I heard, Alex. If that's what it'll take to convince you, hombre, I can ask for her holo-recording -- the one where she suggested the whole scheme to the Federation . . ."
She volunteered. Thi Loan volunteered. The words beat against the confines of his mind like the wings of a maddened bird. "Stop," he whispered, and realised that Pablo hadn't spoken for a while.
Thi Loan volunteered . . .
"I'm sorry," Pablo said. "Alex . . ."
There were no words in the abyss he was falling into. He'd have asked why, but Pablo wouldn't know the answer -- and he couldn't bear the weight of someone else's speculation.
"Thank you," he said finally, politeness coming to his rescue when nothing else would.
Pablo shook his head. "I'll keep the hacks."
On impulse, Alex said, "No."
"No?" Pablo's voice was incredulous. "You don't need the hacks."
Anger flared for the first time. "Don't judge what I need and what I don't."
Pablo said nothing for a while. At length: "All right. I'll send them on to you. But --"
"I know," Alex said. "We're on our own."
Pablo shook his head, half-annoyed, half-angry. "You're not. That's why you shouldn't do any insensata thing right now, hombre. Anger's a bad judge."
Alex said thanks again, cutting the communication as gracefully as he could.
But he didn't move: he stared at his white, salt-wrinkled hands, their nails encrusted with gritty sand. He thought of Thi Loan, striding ahead of him in the mountains of the Himalayas, turning back to him with a wide, mocking smile, daring him to run to her -- of the way she'd stood on the beach with her hands clenched at her side, longing for something she couldn't have.
He'd thought he was supporting her, that he was making it easier for her to complete a Change she didn't want.
He never could keep a secret from her: that had always been his challenge. Even counting how distant Thi Loan had become, how alien to his ways of thinking, she'd still know something was wrong as soon as she took a good look at him.
So he decided to take the offensive.
He got up before she did -- and waited for her in the kitchen, cradling a mug of acrid tea between his hands.
She stopped when she entered. "Alex?"
"I spoke to Pablo last night."
"Pablo Jimenez y Cruz," he said. "Remember him?"
"Of course." Thi Loan stood with one hand on the wall, intrigued. "I don't see . . ."
Sometimes, there was no solution but bluntness. "I wanted hacks. To turn you back before it was too late." He paused for a second -- not long enough for her to interject -- and went on. "But of course you don't want hacks, do you? Seeing as you were the one who volunteered for this mission -- this Change -- in the first place."
There was a silence, filled only by the distant roar of the waves. Thi Loan had turned as still as a statue, except for her ruff, which was dilating and contracting faster than a human heartbeat. "I see," she said. "I see."
"That's all you can say?" Alex snapped. He inhaled the smell of the tea, its wrongness, its artificiality -- knowing it was all that anchored him to sanity. Seven years of marriage, and that was all that she had to say?
"What do you want from me?" Her words were slow, halting -- a further sign that her metamorphosis had entered its final stages. He forced himself to let her speak, to let her explain herself.
"Something. Anything. Why you suggested this madness to the Federation."
"Not madness." Her voice was quiet now. "I knew you wouldn't understand."
"No," Alex said. "You lost your home to the sea. I don't understand why you'd wish to lose yourself in it too." Even as he said it, he wondered if it wasn't her death-wish -- if it wasn't the same as those old Buddhist monks who would set themselves on fire to be free of the chains of the world. But Thi Loan wasn't Buddhist -- she wasn't even religious. "I don't understand why you'd endanger our marriage."
Thi Loan smiled and shook her head. "There is no marriage anymore, Alex."
"Because you chose to have your nanos activated!" He was up on his feet and shouting, and she still didn't move -- still looked at him with those bright, faceted eyes that he couldn't read. Her chemicals saturated the air, shaping words on the cusp of perception, words he couldn't understand. "Do you think that you'll get your home back if you give something to the sea?"
Thi Loan shook her head. "Who knows? But it's not the point. It's my choice, Alex. I need to do this."
Her voice, when she spoke again, was that of a tirka, and the words hovered on the edge between English and an incomprehensible language. "Because I need this."
"You're not making sense," Alex said, slowly.
"I'm your husband, damn it!"
Thi Loan's eyes glazed again, taking on the distant look that was neither human nor tirka. "Change/everything clear/revealed."
"You're mad," Alex said. She was saying everything, and saying nothing. Did she really hope the sea of Horizon would explain why the sea on Earth had drowned the Mekong Delta? That had been caused by mankind and global warming, and nothing she found on Horizon would ever change that.
Thi Loan just stood there -- not rising to the bait, not getting angry. Just staring at him, a rock against which every one of his assaults broke into a thousand disjointed pieces.
"You're mad," he said again, and strode out into Horizon's muddy sunlight, leaving her behind.
When he came back, she wasn't there anymore -- but there was a darker shape inside the bubble, and he couldn't open it no matter how hard he struck it with his fists. He screamed himself raw, trying to reach her; but the slow, steady rocking of the bubble diminished his voice to nothing. Her chemicals hung in the air, a tantalising smell, perpetually out of reach.
It was Meghan who found him, later, sitting on the beach with his reader on his knees.
Wordlessly, she slid down by his side. They watched the hazy shapes of the hatirkas, sliding in and out of the fog like beasts from children's tales.
"You know," Alex said, after a while, "They still creep me out."
"You get used to them."
"No," Alex said. "I can't. And I can't believe she'll ever get used to them either -- no matter what shape she's in."
Meghan shook her head. Her face was unreadable. "No one said it would be easy, Alex."
"Did you know?" Alex asked. "Did you know she'd volunteered for that?"
Meghan had a movement of recoil, barely perceptible unless one watched out for it. But Alex had done nothing but watching things since sunrise.
"No," she said. "She hid it well."
"Yeah. Even from me." He tried to keep the bitterness from his voice, but it was hard when he remembered Thi Loan's final proclamation. There is no marriage, Alex. "What a world."
Meghan took sand and let it drip from her hand, glistening in the sunlight. "You believe yourself responsible?"
"I don't know." And that was the worst: the thought that he could have said something, or done something, that had tipped her over the edge, that had ultimately made her volunteer for this. "I don't understand why she did this."
Meghan inclined her head, slowly. "We're not telepaths, Alex. You can't --"
"She was my wife, damn it!" No. No longer. The Hachand. The Changing One. The Dying One. One and the same.
"Her village -- it was disappearing, the whole time she was in college, studying xeno. But they wouldn't let her come back, not until she'd finished her indenture. They were afraid -- afraid we'd all run away if we saw our families. And afterwards, they posted her on one planet after another, until the only thing she ever saw were the holos of the drowned streets."
"In her culture, the sea is everything, and it takes everything," Meghan said. "For her, it had taken her childhood, her community -- everything except her life. It makes sense."
He recognised the doubtful tone, the same one the teachers had taken when warning them in their first xeno classes: just because something made sense didn't mean it was real. "You think that's the reason?"
Meghan shifted in a crunch of sand. "It's one possible reason," she said. "If it makes sense to you . . ."
People needed reasons, didn't they? Stories. Anything to make the going easier. He could have made up something, too. "It's not going to be enough," Alex said.
He saw her shake her head, sadly. "I'm afraid that's all you get. I'm sorry." She rose, letting the last of the sand drip back into the beach. "Goodbye, Alex."
That wasn't enough, Alex thought again as he listened to the sound of her footsteps receding in the distance.
He flipped open his reader, stared at Kishore's report -- at the words so neatly aligned, revealing nothing more than their vast ignorance of what was really happening on Horizon. If they couldn't understand what pushed people to sacrifice themselves -- if they couldn't understand why a wife would leave everything she'd ever known behind -- how could they hope to make sense of the hatirkas, or of what had happened to Kishore?
There was something else in his reader: Pablo's hacks. They couldn't be used on Thi Loan anymore, but there was a way, surely, to hack into himself, to set in motion the same metamorphosis Thi Loan was going through.
There was only the sound of the waves, and the distant song of the hatirkas. The beach was clean, the air heavy but free of any chemicals. He thought of the way Thi Loan had run away from him on the mountain path -- and of that first day on the beach, when they had already been apart from each other, and he knew the only answer he could give.
Whatever her reasons, she had made her choice, and he wouldn't demean it. But just as he wouldn't join Mother in death, neither would he join Thi Loan in her Change.
As the sun sank towards the horizon, he heard a vast, indescribable noise in the research centre. But he didn't turn around. He didn't need to. He just listened to the scratching of stubby paws, dragging themselves on the cold sands -- to the slow unfolding of a long, serpentine body -- and felt the chemicals saturate his ruff.
Thi Loan was on the beach now -- a silent shadow in the growing darkness, smelling of brine and oil. Dragging herself towards the waterline, and whispering of longing/sorrow/duty/pain until Alex's own throat ached with the need to respond.
Far, far away, on the vast, unknowable sea, the swarm of hatirkas had opened, leaving an empty space as neat as the path of a spaceship. And Thi Loan was swimming towards them, glorious and magnificent. The whispers on the wind changed to need/sorrow/share/atonement, and then into something else, something that made no sense at all but filled him with a great, quivering joy.
There followed another noise then, over the endless roar of the waves: the ponderous noise of motors striking the water. The first of the automated boats were leaving their platforms, harvesting algae from the waves -- the machine that fed the quadrant was grinding to life once more. There would be spaceships and space travel, and humans navigating once more between the stars in the sky.
Thi Loan had done her job, gotten the boats running again. The algae harvest was back underway. Alex had no idea how, and probably never would.
In the end, the algae was all the Federation really cared about. All they had ever really cared about. They would probably send Alex home without figuring out how Kishore had died. But he didn't care anymore. He merely sat there on the cold sands, with his useless hacks on his knees and his stories incomplete, listening to the song of the hatirkas and knowing he would never understand any of it, just as he'd never really understood Thi Loan.
And, like Mother's death, it didn't make sense. It wouldn't ever make sense no matter which way he turned it.


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Microsoft's Xbox Elite 2 controller announced: Here are the key details
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HomeOther TechGamingMicrosoft's Xbox Elite 2 controller announced: Here are the key details
Microsoft's Xbox Elite 2 controller announced: Here are the key details
Were you waiting for the new controller from Xbox? The company has finally announced it.
We have some news for gamers who have been waiting for the new Xbox and accessories. Software giant Microsoft announced some details about its upcoming Xbox gaming console at the E3 yesterday. The new gaming console has codenamed as Project Scarlett and will only be launched next year. However, that wasn't the only big announcement from the company. Microsoft also announced its Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 at the event.
According to the company, the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 has been re-engineered completely and it comes with new adjustable tension thumbsticks. Users will be able to adjust these thumbsticks using a tool that can improve precision. We should also mention that the trigger grips in the new controller have also been updated. Besides this, the bumpers have been redesigned and the hair locks are now shorter, which will enable the user to fire faster. Another thing worth mentioning is that paddles and thumbsticks of the new Xbox controller have also been revamped for more customization.
The company has also added support for USB Type C and Bluetooth. There is also a rechargeable battery on the controller that can last up to 40 hours with one charge. It is worth noticing that the controller design has been upgraded to come with a wrap-around rubberized grip. The new controller's design is a big update to the look and feel of the existing one as it comes with a lot of more options for customization. It also comes with the connectivity support that gamers have been waiting and requesting for since so long.
It is worth adding that Microsoft updated its Elite controller last time in August last year when it unveiled a new robot white coloured option. Although the controller had a new colour variant, it did not offer any new features. The second-generation Elite controller has been rumoured for more than a year now. The company has said that the pre-orders for the Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 will begin now and it will be available in 24 countries starting November 4. The new Xbox controller is priced at $179.99.
Speaking about the Project Scarlett Xbox gaming console, it has a custom-designed processor that is based on AMD's Zen 2 and Radeon RDNA architecture and it is promised to be four times more powerful than the Xbox One X. Project Scarlett gaming console will have support for 8K gaming, up to 120fps framerates, variable refresh rate and ray tracing.
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order 15-minute long gameplay trailer released
Halo Infinite will be coming to Microsoft's 'Project Scarlett' console, PC and Xbox One in 2020

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Microsoft Office 2003 For Dummies
Wallace Wang
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If you have Microsoft Office 2003 For Dummies and just use it to create documents and for e-mail, that's like having the ultimate gourmet kitchen and only cooking frozen dinners or having a 42" plasma high-definition, sound surround TV and only watching old reruns. This book will help you take control of Office 2003 and use it to take control of your life—at work or at home. It covers Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Access. (Note that not all versions of Office 2003 have Access.) You'll learn how to create all kinds of documents, set up and use databases, create spreadsheets and do all kinds of numerical calculations and computations, and present your creations in style. With detailed explanations and screen shots, this guide covers:
Creating, saving, opening, and printing any Office 2003 file
Getting comfortable with common Office 2003 commands, including using the menus and toolbars, working with the task pane, using multiple windows, and copying and pasting with Office Clipboard
The basics for working in Word, plus info on formatting your text or document, aligning text, adding headers, footers, or page numbers, adding and editing pictures, and more
Playing the numbers with Excel, with info on the basics of spreadsheets (numbers, labels, and formatting) and creating and editing formulas
Creating and manipulating charts—line, area, column, bar, and pie varieties
Creating PowerPoint presentations using AutoContent Wizard, a template, or from an existing presentation
Adding color, pictures, and transitions to jazz up your PowerPoint presentation
Getting organized with Outlook, including handling e-mail, organizing contact information, managing tasks with a to-do list, and scheduling appointments
Storing stuff in Access, with the basics on using a database, searching, sorting, and making queries, and creating reports
Microsoft Office 2003 For Dummies was written by Wallace Wang, the popular, bestselling author of more than 20 For Dummies computer books. It gives you a great overview and step-by-step how-to for the most common and most helpful functions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Access. It's a great guide to exploring the incredible powers at your fingertips with Microsoft Office 2003 and enhancing your productivity. It's also a great reference to keep handy so you can get a quick review of tasks you don't often do or figure out more ways to use Office 2003 to make quick work of your work.
Related content on Dummies.com
Customizing the Menu Bar in Office 2003
Watching Out for Macro Viruses in Office 2003
Taking Shortcuts with Macros in Office 2003
Customizing the Office 2003 User Interface
Sharing Data within Office 2003 with Smart Tags
Working with the Task Pane in Office 2003
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Dummies has always stood for taking on complex concepts and making them easy to understand. Dummies helps everyone be more knowledgeable and confident in applying what they know. Whether it's to pass that big test, qualify for that big promotion or even master that cooking technique; people who rely on dummies, rely on it to learn the critical skills and relevant information necessary for success.
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Leeds United January transfer target Brenden Aaronson and midfielders that fit the bill
Watch: Leeds United fan knocked down by Met police officer at West Ham's London Stadium
Castleford Tigers Women break new ground on the continent
Castleford Tigers Women have confirmed a "ground-breaking" loan move with French side Déesses Catalanes.
By Seb Sternik
Wednesday, 5th February 2020, 1:41 pm
Jasmine Cudjoe.
Castleford's Jasmine Cudjoe, Lucy Eastwood, Esme Reynolds and Hollie Dodd will spend three weeks in Perpignan but they are scheduled to return ahead of the start of the Women's Super League.
The four players will train with the French league leaders and will be available to feature in their upcoming games.
Head coach Lindsay Anfield has hailed this as a first for women's rugby league, saying: "This is a historic move not only for Castleford but for the women's game as a whole.
Esme Reynolds.
"This will be a fantastic experience for our girls and I hope they will learn a lot from it."
The Castleford boss also praised the French side for their help with the move. She said: "We have a strong relationship with them [Catalans], having already played them twice – once over in France and the rematch here in England. I'd like to thank them for helping to organise this ground-breaking move and for maintaining our special relationship."
Déesses Catalanes are one of the rising forces in French women's rugby league. Similarly to Castleford, they come under the umbrella of their main club, the Catalans Dragons.
Led by 2017 Wheelchair Rugby League World Cup winning captain, Cyril Torres, the 'Goddesses' play their home games at the home of local side St Esteve XIII Catalan.
Hollie Dodd.
When asked about the move, Castleford's Jasmine Cudjoe said: "Basically, we've been asked to go over there and play some games. We're going out there on the February 8 and we're going for three weeks.
"With the language barrier, it's going to be difficult. I know they have limited English so we'll see how we can communicate with them. But, I've seen them play, they're a really good team and they've got some really good players."
Lucy Eastwood.


Mario Gurfein was born in Buenos aires in1945. In 1953 he began to study violin with Ljerko Spiller and painting at the Mutualidad de Estudiantes y Egresados de Bellas Artes. Three years later, he abandoned the violin for a chance to begin working with Juan Batlle Planas whom he assisted in the creation of various murals. Between 1963 and 1964 he worked on a cargo ship and went to southern Europe for the first time. Since 1965, sporadically, he has acted as decorator and costume designer for various theater shows. He lived in Paris and Milan between 1967 and 1969 before settling in Paris in 1980.
1965: Lirolay Gallery, Buenos Aires.
1967: Guernica Gallery, Buenos Aires.
1976: Art Gallery International, Buenos Aires.
1984: Alberto Elia Gallery, Buenos Aires.
1985: Jean Briance Gallery, Paris.
1985: Le Salon d'Art, Bruxelles.
1991: Lina Davidov Gallery, Paris.
1997: "Itinerario", Recoleta's Cultural Center, Buenos Aires.
2000: Pascal Gabert Gallery, Paris.
2002: Praxis International Art, Miami.
2003: Maison de L'Amérique Latine, Paris.
2004: National Museum of Fine Arts, Buenos Aires.
2006: UNESCO, dans le cadre du Salon du Livre Latinoaméricain, Paris.
2006: MAMAN Fine Art Gallery, Buenos Aires.
1963: Painting First Prize, Argentine Hebrew Association, Buenos Aires.
1967: Braque Painting Prize, Buenos Aires.
1968: Braque Drawing Prize, Buenos Aires.
1994: Fortabat Prize, Maison de L'Amerique-Latine, Paris, Francia.


Steve Luck has been a core faculty member of the Center for Mind and Brain (CMB) and a professor in the Department of Psychology since 2006. He has served as director of the CMB since 2010. Professor Luck is also on the faculty of the UC Davis MIND Institute and is an affiliate of the Center for Neuroscience. He is a member of numerous professional organizations and an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Society of Experimental Psychologists, and the American Psychological Association (Divisions 3 and 6).
Professor Luck's lab studies basic mechanisms of attention and working memory in healthy individuals. He also examines dysfunction of cognition in people with psychiatric and neurological disorders (including schizophrenia and ADHD). This research uses a combination of behavioral/psychophysical methods, eye tracking, and event-related potential (ERP) recordings. Professor Luck also spends considerable time promoting the use of rigorous ERP methods. Toward that end, he has published multiple books (An Introduction to the Event-Related Potential Technique, The Oxford Handbook of ERP Components). He has provided training to more than 1,500 researchers in workshops around the world (ERP Boot Camps), and has developed of an open source software package for ERP data analysis (ERPLAB Toolbox).
Professor Luck teaches in the areas of Perception, Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience in the Department of Psychology. He was one of the founders of the Cognitive Science major and serves on the Program Committee for the major. He is also a leader in new approaches to undergraduate education, especially "hybrid" courses that combine online lectures with live small-group discussions. Detailed information about one of these courses, as well as practical tips for creating a hybrid course, can be found at http://psc100y.faculty.ucdavis.edu.
Professor Luck has won a number of prestigious awards throughout his career. He received the Troland Award in Experimental Psychology from the National Academy of Sciences in 2001 and the APA Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology in the area of Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience in 1998. In 2004, he was awarded the American Psychological Foundation F. J. McGuigan Young Investigator Prize, and he received the James McKeen Cattell Sabbatical Award in 2004. He is an elected fellow of the Society of Experimental Psychologists and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.


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Majority of voters do not think PM's deal delivers the type of Brexit people voted for, YouGov poll reveals
More than half of the British public does not think the Prime Minister's Brexit deal delivers on the referendum result, according to a new poll.
The YouGov survey found only 12 per cent of adults think Theresa May's deal honours the leave vote compared to 58 per cent who claim it does not and 31 per cent who don't know.
Labour voters are even more unhappy with Mrs May's deal than Tories, with 66 per cent opposed to the withdrawal agreement compared to 58 per cent of Conservatives.
Posted on Mar 12, 2019 at 12:10
neha1985
Trump Considering Ending Refugee Resettlement to U.S.
Sheriff's volunteer dismissed after he falsely claimed Hardee's refused to serve him because he was wearing a 'Blue Lives Matter' bracelet
by: pooja
'You are both liars'! Definitely not anti-Semitic AOC amplifies Ben Rhodes' anti-Israel smear job
by: neha1985
Hollywood Prepares To Ruin Film Franchises For Our Moral Betterment [Satire]


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Home Forums > Off Topic > Political Views >
Climate Change reality
Discussion in 'Political Views' started by ehanes7612, Jun 29, 2017.
Dec 30, 2017 #501
EU Country Germany
Stone said: ↑
Record cold everywhere. It must be global warming-cooling?
No, due to political correctness You call it alternate global warming
Berthold, Dec 30, 2017
no hatred!!
The drought is going to suck the moisture out of our bodies to death if left uncovered outside, lol.. no more public nudity!!!!!
troy, Dec 31, 2017
Jan 1, 2018 #503
Tom-DE
By now you still don't know what is happening, you must be an idgit!
Tom-DE, Jan 1, 2018
I don't care... just making light of an objective topic, it's all theory, there are too many variables for one perspective too be 100 percent correct, so, tom-de entertain yourself by lashing out an insult...hahaha
troy, Jan 1, 2018
troy said: ↑
Hey, are you talking to me? I certainly wasn't talking to you, a piece of ****! Now that is an insult!
emydura
Record cold everywhere. It must be global warming-cooling? :rollhappy:
What a moronic comment. That's something I would only expect from someone like Donald Trump. Hey wait a minute, I recall Donald said the same thing. Obviously, this is where you are getting a lot of your 'alternative facts'.
How do you have an intelligent debate with a person who cannot even understand the difference between weather and climate.
emydura, Jan 1, 2018
Tom-DE said: ↑
Sorry, You don't know ether. Are You an idgit also?
Berthold, Jan 1, 2018
emydura said: ↑
Yesterday with 16.5° C we had the warmest Silvester in Germany. It was warmer only in 1961 with 17° and in a lot of years in the century before.
I am confused, is it weather or is it climate? Is it climate of Germany or of the world?
Berthold said: ↑
Compared to a piece of **** like you, maybe I am! but at least I don't make up **** and post them here.
Don't pretend you are educated or intelligent! Regardless what you stand for in this matter, for someone who doesn't know the differences between climate and weather, you are not much better than a moron!
Victoria Australia
Well happy new year to you to David. If that's your nasty tone then so be it. I'm actually surprised by this reply from you. (maybe you're still pissed from NYE?) Seems to be the only strategy your side can come up with. Well if it's unprovoked attack to me you can expect it back ten times over.
You obviously have no idea what you are talking about. It's pretty obvious to any non-moron that I was making a simple joke to illustrate just how stupid this debate has become. So I guess that makes you the moron?
**** Trump! This is me saying this. It seems whatever kind of weather we have it is blamed on global warming by the climate scientologists. Funny, when the weather is very hot it is climate change or global warming and when it's very cold it's JUSTweather but probably caused by climate change. Total crazy, closed minded, ignorant bullshit by science denialists like you.
The definition of climate has been deemed by scientists to be the average of weather over a thirty year period. Of course even this is plain stupid made-up nonsense but if that is the framework to work with then let's do that.
There was gradual cooling from about 1973 to about the early eighties. So much so that the ''consensus'' among climate scientists at the time was that we were entering a mini ice age. (look it up if you don't believe me) You may remember it. Did it happen? Did the cold continue? Well no. It started to warm again up to the present. During this time were was a period where temperature stabilized for about 20 years. co2 rate rise remained the same or increased.
It was and is called ''the pause'' It has been denied and even hidden or erased by the warmists but it is there and will remain there. Forget what you may have heard. That is on record and that is what happened. You can see it in post #494 in this thread.If we take the science definition of ''climate'' we have had no climate change at all. Only weather change. No ''global warming'' Only a very slight warming trend in the weather during part of the eighties and part of the recent period.
The cooling in the 70's also cannot be called climate change, only a temporary change in the weather just as this warming period is. Temporary, just like all the weather changes before. Extreme hot days in the US are on the decline. Yes there are fewer today than in the past.
There has been no more that between zero and 1.6mm rate of sea level rise globally. That is the closest estimate from the worlds leading expert. As an example, Fort Denison tide gage shows a rock steady 0.6mm per year rise for the past one hundred years. Venice and most of the Indian Ocean shows precisely 0.0mm sea level rise.
There is growing evidence we are entering a period of solar minimum starting in the next couple of decades. It's not unreasonable to expect a lot more cold weather, a decline in global temperatures and hopefully this trash global warming pseudo-science junk fad will be finally put to bed. All this as the co2 continues to rise unabated. Oh and by the way, in the mean time the Earth has greened 15%. Equivalent to adding a photosynthetic area the size of Africa to the globe. I can't remember over what period exactly. You can look that up for yourself. And while you are at it maybe check some more facts before you go calling people morons lest you look like one yourself as you trash opposing views while trying to reduce your ''carbon footprint''.
Give it up. The co2 driven global warming myth is dead. The hypothesis did not work out. No amount of data tampering or computer modelling will change it. Don't be a climate scientologist zombie.
Stone, Jan 2, 2018
Don't pretend you are educated or intelligent!
But so it seems compared to You.
Is Your probationer informed about Your posts in this forum?
Probationer(that is what you call it in German?)?
As I would expect it, you are making up more **** again as you go? FYI, I am always on Santa's best list, you goddamn moron/idgit!
1989 from NOAA
ehanes7612
:rollhappy: :rollhappy: :rollhappy: :rollhappy: :rollhappy: :rollhappy: oke:
ehanes7612, Jan 4, 2018
ehanes7612 said: ↑
What's so funny I find it rather tragic.
Dr. Kirby Hanson, the meteorologist who led the study, said in a telephone interview that the findings concerning the United States do not necessarily ''cast doubt'' on previous findings of a worldwide trend toward warmer temperatures, nor do they have a bearing one way or another on the theory that a buildup of pollutants is acting like a greenhouse and causing global warming. He said that the United States occupies only a small percentage of Earth's surface and that the new findings may be the result of regional variations.
Now this is hilarious! :rollhappy:
Several computer models have projected that the greenhouse effect would cause average global temperatures to rise between 3 and 8 degrees Fahrenheit in the next century. But scientists concede that reactions set off by the warming trend itself could upset these predictions and produce unanticipated changes in climate patterns. Legislative Action Sought
Hmmm. So we are now almost 1/5 into the ''next'' century so we should be seeing a temp rise of between 0.6 and 1.6 degrees by now...Ha ha ha.. This is stuff is just gold! Oh maybe the warming has ''upset these predictions and produced unanticipated changes'' ???
You tax dollars at work.....
1989? You must be struggling for evidence.
Here is something from this century. If climate change wasn't real, it should be pretty easy to disprove. There has been no shortage of people trying. The fossil fuel industry has poured big money into research in an attempt to prove that the planet is not warming. Here is one such example -
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/jul/29/climate-change-sceptics-change-mind
You still don't get it David. The word ''Climate'' as it is used in ''climate change'' is made up. It is meaningless.
It's just weather. Using a few years (30 or so) to determine if the climate is changing is just plain stupid. Sydney had 47 degrees the other day. It still did not break the 1939 record. Just weather.
As for the Guardian....Please!
You can't cherry pick where you start your line from. It goes up and down and up again and DOWN AGAIN! Bid deal if it has warmed 1.5 degrees in fifty years. The climate is NOT changing like you think it is. There is NOevidence of continual un-ending global warming. There just isn't. Forget about the warming predictions you see in the popular press. They are wrong.
Jan 11, 2018 #519
Earen
Try looking back a bit further.
https://xkcd.com/1732/
Earen, Jan 11, 2018
g[/img][/url]
Mike - the Guardian did not undertake that research. The data analysis was undertaken by Richard Muller, who at the time was a well-known climate skeptic like yourself. The research was funded by the fossil fuel industry. These people were from your side. The point of this study was to prove that human-induced climate change did not exist. Richard Muller was critical of the way climate scientists had analysed the data previously so he applied his own methodology. But in the end his conclusions were the same - the earth is warming and it is caused by humans. Here he writes a piece in the NY Times -
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/opinion/the-conversion-of-a-climate-change-skeptic.html
As for that graph you keep using. More rubbish from the climate skeptic blogs you keep reading. This one from Steve Goddard. That guy won't even write under his own name so how can you take him seriously. Go and read real science.
emydura, Jan 11, 2018


I like it. I also like the fact that he isn't looking at the camera. Something is beyond the window, obvious to some I'm sure but that's my take.
I really want to know what you're trying to tell the viewer here.
I've tried to figure it out. But... I guess I'm totally not... "artsy".
Please tell me what I should have seen. I want to know.
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Meaning and definitions of neigh, translation in Tamil language for neigh with similar and opposite words. Also find spoken pronunciation of neigh in Tamil and in English language.
What neigh means in Tamil, neigh meaning in Tamil, neigh definition, examples and pronunciation of neigh in Tamil language.


Regency Wealth Management reaches over $256 Million in Regulatory Assets Under Management!
Regency Wealth Management hits the $220 Million mark!
Time to Give Up Do-It-Yourself Investing?
Do You Know Your Beneficiaries?


There are a few really bad photos in here, but since they work together I decided to put them anyway.
Also this is not exactly how I want this page to be, but for now it is ok.
You can click on the images to open a gallery and seetem in full size.
I like it very much. Very good drawings.
I'm always amazed at people who can do work like yours, I love them!
It is always great to have some positive feedback!
Hello!Great to come across your blog. Very beautiful work, I especially like your travelogue!
It looks beautiful and effortless, but so carefully executed.
Very cool. Thanks for stopping by my blog.
I really like that you think about what works together, and don't worry too much about whether every image is the highest quality. Sometimes "bad" works really well.
Very fine pieces of art!
Your artwork is very nice. Thanks for visiting me and the like of my post "Which One?".
I like the picture. It has a quiet quality. Or maybe that's the subject.
Thank you for liking my blog. I love your Portfolio…..
Thanks for dropping by "Honey." I like your style.
There are some beautiful pieces here! Nice blog. Thanks for checking out my blog as well.
Thank you very much! I am reall glad you liked my work!
Your art work is amazing – so very thoughtful. Thank you for liking 'Incredible Follies'.
Amazing how you can visualize something/someone and make it come to life on canvas. Thanks for the like of my post "My First Rose of Spring".
I like your work. Thank you!
Thanks for the like. I could stand to put my portfolio up also but, just never seem to get around to it.
Thanks its a good idea. I really should I know.
I like those a lot. I wouldn't be surprised to find them in the Tate.
You're welcome! Thank you for sharing Portugal and your art with us!
your work is really beautiful, emotional.
SO beautiful and full of deep stories. i love the way you see the world.
I like they way you perceive the portrait as the category. Your drawings show your attitude(s) and in a very strong and direct way, with no unnecessary steps you clearly present your ideas… It would be nice to see more of your work… with different techniques and different topics. Bon courage!
Thank you so much for the comment! I intend to update it soon actually but i am happy you liked it!
Awesome drawings! Keep up the good work. God bless.
Wow. You are very talented!
I find your simplest versions the most compelling. They really give a unique impression of the subject. Beautiful work!


text:
package io.novaordis.gld.api.store;

import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;

import static org.junit.Assert.assertEquals;
import static org.junit.Assert.assertNotNull;
import static org.junit.Assert.assertTrue;
import static org.junit.Assert.fail;

@Deprecated
public class StorageStrategyFactoryTest
{
    // Constants -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    private static final Logger log = LoggerFactory.getLogger(StorageStrategyFactoryTest.class);

    // Static ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Attributes ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Constructors ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Public ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

//    @Test
//    public void fromArguments_NoStorageStrategyFlag() throws Exception
//    {
//        try
//        {
//            //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//            Configuration c = null;
//
//            StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, Arrays.asList("blah"), 0);
//            fail("should have failed with IllegalArgumentException");
//        }
//        catch(IllegalArgumentException e)
//        {
//            log.info(e.getMessage());
//        }
//    }
//
//    @Test
//    public void missingStrategy() throws Exception
//    {
//        List<String> args = new ArrayList<>();
//        args.add("--storage-strategy");
//
//        try
//        {
//            //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//            Configuration c = null;
//
//            StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, args, 0);
//            fail("should fail with UserErrorException, missing storage strategy");
//        }
//        catch(UserErrorException e)
//        {
//            log.info(e.getMessage());
//
//            Throwable t = e.getCause();
//
//            assertTrue(t instanceof NullPointerException);
//        }
//    }
//
//    @Test
//    public void unknownStrategy() throws Exception
//    {
//        List<String> args = new ArrayList<>();
//        args.add("--storage-strategy");
//        args.add("NoSuchStrategy");
//
//        try
//        {
//            //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//            Configuration c = null;
//
//            StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, args, 0);
//            fail("should fail with UserErrorException, no such storage strategy");
//        }
//        catch(UserErrorException e)
//        {
//            log.info(e.getMessage());
//
//            Throwable cause = e.getCause();
//            assertNotNull(cause);
//        }
//    }
//
//    @Test
//    public void strategy_stdout() throws Exception
//    {
//        List<String> args = new ArrayList<>();
//        args.add("--storage-strategy");
//        args.add("stdout");
//
//        //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//        Configuration c = null;
//
//        StdoutStorageStrategy ss =
//            (StdoutStorageStrategy)StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, args, 0);
//        assertNotNull(ss);
//    }
//
//    @Test
//    public void strategy_Stdout() throws Exception
//    {
//        List<String> args = new ArrayList<>();
//        args.add("--storage-strategy");
//        args.add("Stdout");
//
//        //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//        Configuration c = null;
//
//        StdoutStorageStrategy ss =
//            (StdoutStorageStrategy)StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, args, 0);
//        assertNotNull(ss);
//    }
//
//    @Test
//    public void makeSureAllRelevantArgumentsAreRemovedFromList() throws Exception
//    {
//        List<String> args = new ArrayList<>();
//        args.add("blah");
//        args.add("--storage-strategy");
//        args.add("Mock");
//        args.add("--mock-argument");
//        args.add("something");
//        args.add("post-argument");
//
//        //            Configuration c = new MockConfiguration();
//        Configuration c = null;
//
//
//        MockStorageStrategy mss =
//            (MockStorageStrategy)StorageStrategyFactory.fromArguments(c, args, 1);
//        assertNotNull(mss);
//
//        assertEquals("something", mss.getMockArgument());
//        assertEquals(2, args.size());
//        assertEquals("blah", args.next(0));
//        assertEquals("post-argument", args.next(1));
//    }

    // Package protected -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Protected -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Private ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    // Inner classes ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub