Rollback

Load Answers Don. Load and unlock Answers Sarah Revised — passphrase ‘Aeolus 14 umbra.’ Execute."

"What are you doing?" Don said, sitting up. "What’s ‘Flaxseed’?"

"It’s a program an ethics prof designed years ago, when we were studying the million-plus sets of survey responses that were uploaded to our website. It measures the degree of agreement between respondents. See, comparing survey responses is a bit tricky. Many of the eighty-four questions have four or five possible answers, or use graduated scales, so you can’t just look for exact matches — two answers that are different might only be subtly different. A person who chooses ‘A’ might be thinking along the same lines as someone who chose ‘B,’ while someone who picked ‘C’ clearly has a different mind-set."

"Ah," said Don. He gestured at the datacom Sarah was holding. "And?"

She glanced down at the display, then looked back up at him, a smile on her face. "I knew there was a reason I married you."

Chapter 39

"Cody McGavin arrives tomorrow," Sarah said, "and there’s something we should discuss before he gets here."

They were sitting at the dining-room table, drinking coffee. "Yes?" Don said.

"It’s just that I won’t be able to do what the aliens want," she said.

He made his voice soft. "I know."

Light was streaming in through the window. Don could see Gunter outside, raking leaves.

"So," she continued, "I’ve got to find somebody else to do it, if we’re going to do it at all."

He considered this. "You could use that Flaxseed program to see who else of the original respondents had replies close to yours."

She nodded. "I did that. Of the thousand sets of responses we sent, there were only two that were really close to mine. But God knows who they belonged to."

"Didn’t you keep records?"

"It was an anonymous survey. Professional pollsters told us we’d get much more honest answers that way. Besides, even if we had asked for names, we wouldn’t have been able to keep them. The website was at U of T, remember, and you know what Canadian privacy laws are like."

"Ah." He took a sip of coffee.

"Of course, each participant got to chose a login name and a password, which we told them to keep secure. But even if we had the names, it might not have done any good."

"Why not?"

"As I said before, McGavin was probably right, back at his office, when he said that most advanced races would likely be very long-lived. Indeed, since the Dracons apparently have ring-shaped chromosomes, they might in fact have always lived a very long time, since they’d have avoided one of our principal causes of aging.

Anyway, although it probably never even occurred to them that anyone they were replying to might be dead a mere thirty-eight years later, probably half of those who originally filled out the survey have passed on by now."

"I suppose that’s true," he said.

"But," said Sarah, looking sideways at him, "you and I had very similar answers."

"So you said."

"So, maybe, I mean, if you wanted to…"

"What?"

"You could do it. You could look after the Dracon children."

Don felt his eyebrows going up. "Me?"

"Well, you and Gunter, I suppose." She smiled. "I mean, he’s a Mozo; he’s designed to look after the elderly, but taking care of alien children can’t be much more difficult than looking after a crazy old bat like me."

Don’s head was swimming. "I — I don’t know what to say."

"Well, think about it," she said. "Because you’re definitely my first choice."

Months ago, when Sarah and Don were contemplating rolling back, Carl had said they’d have to do more babysitting — but that seemed to have fallen by the wayside when Sarah’s rejuvenation had failed. But tonight Carl and Angela had dropped Percy and Cassie off at the house on Betty Ann. The ostensible reason was that the adults were going to see a hockey game, but Don suspected there was also a feeling that the children wouldn’t have their grandmother much longer, and so they should spend time with her while they could.

Percy was thirteen, all loose limbs and long hair. Cassie, at four, was a whirlwind with pigtails. Because of the age difference, it was hard to entertain them both together, so Cassie and Sarah had gone upstairs with Gunter to look at whatever treasures Sarah’s closets held, and Don and Percy were on the couch in the living room, half-watching the same hockey game Percy’s parents had gone to on the TV above the fireplace, and making their own game of trying to spot Carl and Angela in the crowd.

"So," Don said, muting the sound during a commercial break, "how’s grade eight treating you?"

Percy shifted on the couch a bit. "It’s okay."

"When I was a kid, we went all the way to grade thirteen."

"Really?"

"Yup. Ontario was the only place in North America that had that."

"I’m glad we only have to go to grade twelve," said Percy.

"Yeah? Well, in grade thirteen we were old enough to write our own notes for missing class."

"That’d be cool."