Death Dream by Ben Bova Page B

reporters on their own. Somebody calls you, somebody starts pumping you at the local bar, somebody bumps into you at the supermarket—you tell 'em to talk to me. And you tell me or Vickie right away. We can't have leaks to the media! I don't want to wake up some morning and see a scare story about us on Good Morning, America ."
    "I carried a Top Secret clearance most of the time I worked for the Air Force," Dan said, barely keeping the anger out of his voice. "I know how to keep my mouth shut."
    "Good," said Muncrief.

    As he walked down the corridor toward the simulations lab, where Jace waited, Dan did not wonder why Muncrief was so afraid of the media. His mind kept echoing Muncrief's words, I hired you to keep Jace happy. He hired me because I'm cheaper than a supercomputer. I'm cheaper than buying new hardware.
    "No more hardware," Dan answered Jace, who was still slanted rigidly across the wooden chair. "I thought he'd have a stroke right there in his office, he got so worked up."
    "Maybe he'd leave us enough in his will to buy the extra machine."
    Dan grinned, despite himself. "Intel's working on a teraflop machine," he mused.
    "Yeah, the Paragon XP/T," Jace muttered. "Probably cost a mint and have more bugs in it than Guatemala."
    "It's not ready yet, anyway," said Dan.
    Jace opened both eyes and lifted his chin a little.
    "Muncrief must be really strapped for cash. He's always bought me whatever I asked for."
    "Like me," Dan said, repeating silently that he was not worth as much as a new machine.
    Jace ignored the thrust. "You're just gonna have to come up with something brilliant, Danno."
    "Hey, you're the genius. I'm just a glorified technician."
    It was a standing joke between them, sometimes a bitter joke. Jace took all the credit for their work and Dan stayed in the background, telling himself that Jace could not get along without him. But he knew that it was a lie; Jace did not need him. He might have found his life a little easier with Dan around, but if Dan disappeared off the face of the earth Jace would barely notice he was gone. Dan had been surprised and hurt when Jace had left him behind in Dayton; his comfortable view of their partnership and his own worth had crumbled. His work deteriorated; he was hell to live with and he knew it. Dr Appleton tried to straighten him out; Susan tried to be understanding and supportive. But then Jace had phoned and asked Dan to come to Florida with him and Dan's world bloomed into spring.
    Until he realized that he would be leaving Dr Appleton, the man who had given him his chance, his career. The man who had been better than a father to him.
    "I'll be able to develop VR systems for teaching," Dan had said to Appleton. "Medical systems for surgery, systems for operating spacecraft remotely—all the things we've dreamed about."
    Appleton had nodded understandingly. "You might as well go with Jace, Dan. You haven't been much good to us or yourself since he went away."
    Dan straddled the plastic chair backwards and leaned his chin on his forearms. "Why don't we just let the background details fuzz out? We can make the individual batter stand out when you're in the field, and the infielders and the pitcher when you're at bat. The details of the stadium and the crowd don't matter that much, do they?"
    "The hell they don't!" Jace sat up in his chair, both eyes snapped fully open.
    "But—"
    "This is supposed to be an experience, buster. A full friggin' three-dimensional experience with sight and sound and feeling. The background is important. Vital. I don't want the user to think he's in some friggin' video arcade! I want him to be there! Yankee Stadium or Wrigley Field or whatever, he's got to be there with full detailed sights and sounds. Even smells."
    "The smells are easy!" Dan said. "We can just pipe some vapor into the VR chamber."
    "That's cheating."
    "But it would work."
    "Yeah. Maybe. It's the friggin' visual details we've gotta sharpen up. We can't go brute force