Enigma by Michael P. Kube-McDowell Page A

that your part in it brings you great satisfaction.” He smiled again, in fatherly fashion, and the picture was replaced by a fax of Thackery’s student record. In the space where it had once said ON HIATUS, the legend now read WITHDRAWN WITHOUT PREJUDICE.
    The second message was text only, and Thackery found it puzzling at first. There was no header, only a twenty-four-year-old clip from POLINET.
FOR RELEASE: 3:00 p.m. GMT May 12, A.R. 172
)CAPITOL ISLAND—World Council insiders are pointing to Associate Director John Merritt Langston as the most likely candidate for the seat of 75-year-old retiring Councilor Den-Buodi Kuoinmoni.
)A 52-year-old native of Newfoundland, Langston would be the youngest ever selected to the 17-man executive body, and the first North American so honored since the turn of the century…
    The rest of the article comprised an unusually positive biography of Langston, in which he came off as being bright without being snobbish, fast-rising without being ambitious, and one who practiced traditional values without being a shill for them. It was sharp, well written, and incisive. And it made not a whit of sense until Thackery reached the end and the creditline:
A NEWS ANALYSIS BY ANDRA THACKERY,
POLINET CORRESPONDENT.
    Even then, he only understood who had sent it, with just the barest hint of why. It took Andra’s trailing note to fill that gap—
Merritt—son—
    Within an hour of your leaving that day, I came to admit (I always realized) you did indeed deserve to know. Since then I also realized other difficult truths: Most importantly, that when I could not have him, I tried to make you into him, and that I think is a far greater offense.
    Even so, I can only make myself tell you now because you are beyond reach, and you cannot disturb him, or me, with your hunger for an alternate past. Don’t wonder at his silence, for he never knew—another choice I made for all of us.
    It is impossible to control and too late to change what you feel toward me. But please believe that I am as proud of you as I can be. I have asked a friend to drive with me into the country and help me find Cygnus, so that I can look into the night sky and think of you often.
    Andra
    Numbly, Thackery asked the netlink for a picture of John Langston. He looked a long time into the eyes of the gaunt face which appeared on the display, then asked for a younger picture. The eyes became stronger, the chin firmer, the folds and wrinkles fewer. He asked for a younger picture yet, and a chill went through him when it appeared. It was as though he were looking into an unfaithful mirror, or at the face of a brother, or—
    There was one message remaining in the queue, and for one brief moment of wish-fulfilling weakness Thackery allowed himself to hope it might be from Langston—from his father. Even now, as little as it would be, it would mean so much—
    But there were to be no tidy endings. The final message was a routine congratulatory from the current dean of Tsiolkovsky Institute, a man whose name meant nothing to Thackery and whose words were formal and meaningless.
    Thackery retreated to his bed as a wounded animal goes to his lair. There was almost deliberate cruelty in the way Andra had told him, for it was already too late for him to use the knowledge. There was no way to reach out to Langston, no way to heal the trauma. Descartes had crazed, and the wall had gone up. When it came down again, Langston would be dead.
    And so would Andra.
    He saw with renewed clarity how selfish she was, even at the last. She had given him what he had demanded, but only after waiting long enough to render it valueless. For all her apologies, her message did more to free her conscience than it did to restore what had been stolen from him.
    Damn you, Andra! Better you hadn’t told me at all than to tell me now, in this way. You’ve made leaving harder, not easier. And instead of redeeming yourself, you’ve given me another reason to hate