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Backscatter

By: Backscatter



"Yes of course. Apologies."

Megan gave his waist a brief squeeze. "Alvaro, I was just kidding!" She held him for a while and then commented, "I looked up Madeira in a political atlas yesterday. It mentioned the country was created only twenty years ago."

"Yes. We became independent on the fiftieth anniversary of our autonomy from Portugal. The first step happened on July 1, 1976."

Megan nodded. "Was in a good decision?"

Alvaro thought for a moment. "I think so. We managed to avoid the religious wars on the Iberian peninsula. Such horror! To destroy all beliefs that are not your own, to spread such death and misery, and then claim you are the only solution to the misery you yourself created!"

"Yes, I know. It's amazing such insanity is so effective... So, what kind of government did Madeira pick?"

Alvaro gave Megan a small squeeze on her waist and a smile of gratitude. He realized she was nudging him to get off the topic of terrorism and be more cheerful. "Our government is a modified version of the U.S. system. There's a single integrated House of Congress, a hundred-member legislature elected by thirteen districts. The executive branch is elected at-large, as are all the judges."

Megan took a moment to consider. She hadn't expected such a wealth of detailed information. "You have at-large elections for all your judges? That's interesting."

Alvaro nodded. "The idea was to have a uniform judiciary across the districts." He sighed and took a deep breath, giving Megan another friendly hug on her waist.

Megan thought for while and then asked, "I'm curious. You said an integrated Congress? What does that mean?"

"Well, there are thirteen districts, ranging in size of thirty-nine Representatives for Funchal to one for Porto Santo. When Congress votes on a bill or a budget, the votes are counted two ways, by individual Congressperson and by the number of districts in favor of the proposal. If there is majority approval from both views, the proposal passes and the decision is final. If there is affirmation from just one view, the president decides the issue."

"Oh, I get it. Neat! It's a modified version of a U.S. Presidential veto."

"Well, somewhat. Your President's veto can only be overridden by a two-thirds vote in both your Houses. Our President's veto is much more limited. It's not really a veto at all. He or she has political cover. Either a majority of districts or a majority of Congressional votes will be in support of the President, no matter what the decision."

Megan nodded. "I like it! And how do you deal with ties?""

"It's very simple. Any ties again allow the President to decide the issue." Alvaro looked up at night sky and took a deep breath. "The thought was to combine the benefit of a Two House Congress with the efficiency of One House. Your Senate and House of Representatives have to negotiate different versions of the same bill. With our system, the integration of the district perspective and the per-capita perspective is automatic. It's the same group of people."

"Thanks for telling me all this. My political atlas had none of this kind of detail. And do you have a Supreme Court?"

"Not in the U.S. sense. We do have a Superior Appellate Court for judicial review."

Megan shook her head. "That's not what I mean. How do you resolve Constitutional issues?"

"We don't have a Constitution."

"Oh wow, really? So your liberties aren't protected?"

Alvaro was quiet for a number of steps, and then finally spoke. "We look at the matter a little differently. We believe it is the responsibility of the people who write the law to interpret the law. The judiciary's job is to administer the law, definitely not to come up with novel ways of interpreting it."

"But your liberties aren't protected."

"Well, not in the U.S. sense. If two laws are found to be in possible conflict, the matter is referred to the legislature for resolution. It's their job to make the law consistent. And there's supposed to be a slight bias against precedent with the judiciary. In cases of conflict, the more recent law is considered to have more standing."

"What? Really?"

"Well... I guess judges are allowed some discretion before Congress acts. Megan?"

"Uh huh?"

"You're quite right. Privacy in Madeira isn't as protected as it used to be in the U.S. But you've had martial law in the U.S. for what, three years now?"

She nodded. "Yeah, just about." She gave a deep sigh. "I see your point. We had our rights to privacy protected by a Constitution that was almost impossible to change, and the extremists used the rights as a cloak and we couldn't adapt." She leaned her body closer to him. "Tell me more about what your home is like. And all I could see on the map were two dots on an ocean. How large are the islands? What are they like?"

Alvaro smiled at her interest. "Well, Madeira is the main island with 741 sq km. It has a mountainous interior with radial ravines running to the coast. Porto Santo is the other inhabited island, much smaller, 42 sq km, about 40 km to the northeast of the main island at the closest tip to tip. Slightly closer to the southeast are some small rocky islands, Die Ilhas Desertas, in a line about a dozen km long and very thin. Total land area of the archipelago is 797 sq km."

"And where do you live?"

He paused, and with the flat of her hand Megan felt a slight tension in the muscles near the small of his back. She began to wonder why her simple question would cause such a reaction, and then he said, "I grew up on Porto Santo. Now I have a home in Funchal, the capital."

"Oh yes, you mentioned that name before. Funchal?"

"From the Roman times, for fennel. It grows there profusely. The Romans called the archipelago the Purple Islands in honor of a very pretty flower, Geranium Maderense."

Megan nodded. "It must be difficult, living on such small islands, so isolated."

He shook his head. "It's been a blessing Megan, these last thirty years. The isolation has saved us."

"Ah. Are you self sufficient?"

Alvaro shrugged. "Not quite. Almost. We're working very hard now to become so. The current population for both islands is about 120,000. Tourism used to be a prime industry. Now there's much more farming."

"Yes, of course. And what do you grow?"

"Commercially? Sicilian beets, wheat and corn, grapes for wine, bananas, spices. We produce an amber-colored dessert wine." He smiled proudly and boasted, "It's very famous, and deserves to be." He paused for a moment. "We trade extensively with the West African Union. And almost every family has a personal vegetable garden, like here. Most of our protein comes from fishing. We raise chickens too, and goats and sheep for milk and cheese. Much of the milk is reserved for the children."

Megan felt a brief shiver as she remembered eating the rich ice-cream for dessert. "Yes, it's the same here. The milk is for the children. Thank God for calcium tablets."

They walked quietly for a while. Megan thought silently, "Very little milk left, a perfect match for the lack of children. When was the last time I saw an infant? My gosh, not since California..." But that thought seemed too bitter to voice. She said out loud, "And where do you get your metals?"

He blinked and then grinned. "We do a lot of trading, but mostly from recycling. You wouldn't believe the amount of rubbish that was left over from the twentieth century, landfills packed with broken cars! The islands are more pristine now than they have been in centuries!" He paused and added quietly but proudly, "And we have a first-class health system. There were seventeen hundred healthy children born last year."

Megan gasped. "Are you at breakeven?"

He shrugged. "The population has grown over 10% since the plague, but that's because of our very young age profile. If the current birth rates hold steady, we'll expand a bit more and then drop back to about where we are now. But as for what the real future will be, who knows?"

"Yes, of course. But you're still doing so much better than here. If you looked around, you'd see there are almost no young children in Bell County at all." Megan paused for a moment, trying to think of a more pleasant topic. "And where are your horses?"

"On both islands. Most of the stables on the main island to the east and north of Funchal, in the farm areas."

"My gosh, this sounds so idyllic. What would ever induce you to leave, especially for a place like Ft. Hood, Texas?"

"Well..." He paused for a moment and chuckled. "It was never our intention to come here. These meetings were scheduled for Houston..." Another pause, and then very quietly, "There was a threat. I can't be more specific. Your government suggested we move the negotiations here."

"And what are you negotiating?"

Megan felt Alvaro struggling for how to respond. "Commerce..." he said vaguely.

"I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have asked."

"Oh, I don't mind. I'd be curious too."

"You're such a puzzle to me Alvaro! How can someone so young hold such an important government office?" She hugged him. "Can you tell me anything about what your position is, without getting into specifics?"

"Ah, on this trip, I guess I'm sort of a science advisor, to help with the bargaining."

"Oh. So you work for your government's Commerce Department?"

"The Energy Department, actually."

In the white light from the guard towers, Megan saw Alvaro frown, as though he thought he had said too much. She couldn't understand why. His comment seemed innocent enough. She tried to change subjects. "And you use the horses for farming?"

"Well, they're there as a backup certainly. But except for Porto Santo, they're mostly used for recreation. Riding in the mountains or along the coast, it's so beautiful..."

Megan leaned her head on his shoulder and sighed. "My heart longs to see your home."

"Want to come back with me?"

A giggle. "Right! Alvaro, my government owns me." Megan nestled her head against him.

"Hmmm?" Alvaro accepted her offer and leaned his head against hers, breathing in her fragrance and sighing at the clean smell of her hair, enjoying its softness against his cheek. He leaned in closer and the hair tickled his ear. It felt delightful.

Megan took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The close contact with her date almost made her lose her train of thought, but then she remembered. "My education costs were huge, over $80,000 in student loans. And we've had rampant deflation for the last several years. Everything is falling apart, and it would take me 200 years to earn my debt now."

"Two hundred years?" Alvaro whispered. "Truly?"

"Uh huh. My debt carried over one-for-one into the new script. I'm paid $8 a week plus basic housing, and I have to eat! My dinner tonight was a week's salary. I wasn't joking."

Alvaro pulled his head away and stared at her. "My gosh Megan. Are you a slave?"

"Oh, where would I go? I have security here, subsidized food and friends and a safe place to live and a job that I love. I really can't complain."

Alvaro was silent in words but was speaking with his body. He leaned close and lightly kissed her near the top of her head. His arm remained around her waist holding her, his hand gently caressing her hip.

They returned to their living quarters. Surprisingly the hall lights had power. Alvaro walked Megan to her door. She turned and smiled at him. She had thought this last moment might be awkward, thought with current conventions he might expect to sleep with her as payment for the meal. But his eyes were without lust, filled only with admiration and tender affection. Megan gulped as she realized no one had offered her such emotions in many years.

She whispered, "Thank you for a truly enchanting evening Alvaro."

He tried to speak. The words wouldn't come, and then words became unnecessary. Before either of them realized it, they were in each other's arms, sharing a kiss that seemed to bridge the great gulf between their two lives. And then nothing in Megan's universe existed except the arms enfolding her, the hand caressing her hair and the back of her neck and the lips touching hers. Her heart cried out in sorrow as the kiss ended.

"Good night sweet Megan," he whispered. "God be by your side."

Her lips quivered. "Will I ever see you again?"

"I hope so." He sighed and looked as if he wanted to say more but then stopped himself. They shared one last brief hug and smile, and then Megan retired to her home.

Chapter 2. Bon Voyage

Three days later.

Time: Tuesday, May 14, 2047 8:44 AM twelve km north of Ft. Hood, Texas

Megan stood quietly watching Little Thunder from an adjacent stall. The mare was the finest Morgan horse Megan had ever seen and was about to produce her first foal. The birthing so far had gone without a hitch, and Megan was very pleased with the performance of her assistant Private Collins. Megan had dropped into a role of quiet observer almost an hour ago.

Her mind drifted back to the weekend. While she was at work on Sunday, Alvaro's party had apparently left the base and there was no indication they were ever coming back. Megan had spent the last two days working to convince herself that Saturday night was exactly what she had called it, one enchanting evening, nothing less and nothing more. "But this was different," a small voice inside her head insisted. Megan shook her head and took a deep breath. The voice was quieter now than yesterday, and soon it would be silent.

"Did I do something wrong Ma'am?"

"Huh?" Megan looked at the Private. "No, not at all. You're doing a fantastic job Derrick, flawless. I'm very proud of you." She paused for a moment. "I was just day dreaming about something else."

Derrick nodded and got back to the mare. "Won't be long now, a half-hour maybe."

Megan studied the mare and nodded. "I think you're right." She took another deep breath and looked around the barn. They had ample light. The large barn doors faced due east, and the morning sun was streaming directly in now. Megan would have wished it to be a few degrees cooler for the mare, given how humid the air was, but conditions weren't bad. She wondered if she should trust Derrick with the birthing and get back to her rounds.

"But it was different, and you know it was!" the soft internal voice persisted. "Love is so rare..."

"Shut up!" Megan's mind snapped at the voice. "Just shut up! You want to know something? He's probably married!"

"No!"

"Then why didn't he want to bed me?! He probably had some lingering guilt about his wife!"

"Search your memories woman! You know that's not true!"

"I probably should have asked him if he had children!"

"Megan, that's not what the evening was like! You are deceiving yourself!"

"Shut up! If it were love, he would have at least left a message! He would have found a way!"

The inner voice was silent.

"Aha! Got'cha! Now shut up!"

A military trooper came out of the communications room at the other end of the barn and ran up to her stall. "Dr. O'Connor Ma'am, the commander wants to see you immediately!"

Megan shook her head and wiped her wet eyes as she forced her mind to switch gears. "At his office?"

"Yes Ma'am, and he told me to stress the word immediately!"

Megan was a civilian, and her official employers were the Mounted State Rangers, not the military. Still, to refuse the order was unthinkable. She turned to her assistant. "You'll be okay Derrick?"

He nodded. "I'll be fine Ma'am, thank you."

"I think so too. You run into any trouble, page Dr. Campbell."

"Yes Ma'am, I will."

Megan stared at the man for a moment. He was not just her assistant. He was also a good friend. Megan snapped her body to attention and gave him a crisp salute. Derrick blinked and then stood and did the same. Megan then ran out of the barn. She unhitched her horse and galloped back to base.

It was usually a long wait for anyone to see the commander, but Megan was escorted into his office seconds after she arrived. His expression to her was very unexpected and it took Megan a few seconds to decipher it. She finally decided it looked like incredulous laughter.

"Don't bother to sit!" he ordered as his aide closed the door.

Megan stood obediently, still panting a bit from her gallop and her race into the building.

"Miss O'Connor..." He paused for a moment. "Megan, you've got a big decision to make and no time to make it. There's a jet at Houston taking off for Madeira at 11 AM today. Do you want to be on it?"

"Sir?!"

"I'm fueling the Cessna to take you there. But I need an answer now!"

Megan sputtered. "I did some reading sir, early on Sunday. I thought only Madeira nationals were allowed on the islands."

He nodded and then surprised Megan by laughing. "Girl, just a few minutes ago our State Department requested that I get you down to Houston to catch that plane, and they put the word request in quotes. You catch my meaning? I can't order you to leave, and I realize you deserve time to think about this, but..." He looked at her silently for second, and then the long ethnic friendship between them finally touched and softened his eyes. "Lass," he whispered in a Scottish accent, "yee'd be daft not to go."

A resounding cheer of affirmation echoed from Megan's inner voice. She cried out loud, "Agreed! Do I have time to collect my things?"

"No! Sorry. You'll have to say your goodbyes with e-mails from Madeira. I've taken the liberty of packing the bags from your quarters. You might want to use the time on the Cessna to prioritize your possessions. I have no idea what your weight allowance might be." He glanced at the clock. "Megan, to make that flight, you should be already in the air. You know where the runway is. Dismissed!"

Megan nodded and took a deep breath. She blinked away the tears in her eyes. "Goodbye Brian!" she half shouted as she turned and ran from the office to her horse. She galloped directly to the plane, her mount bucking a bit at the end from the startup sound of the loud engine. A maintenance man nearby was securing the hose from the fuel truck. Her flight was a single-engine propeller plane, and it wasn't until two minutes later as her plane was lifting off that she realized she had forgotten to leave behind her leather riding chaps.

Megan didn't recognize the man next to her, but he treated her with courtesy and seemed a very professional pilot. "This is a Cessna Skyhawk Ma'am, forty-some years old but very well maintained. We'll be cruising at 2500 meters at a speed of 225 kph, about as fast as this plane wants to go. Estimated time for touchdown in Houston is... 10:50 AM."

"10:50 AM?!"

He held up a finger to ask her to wait and then spoke into his microphone. "Roger Houston Control, I copy." He then turned to her. "Yes Ma'am. In another hour, we could have had something faster, but..." He finished with a shrug.

Megan nodded and bit her lip. They were not an Air Force base and the cost of aviation fuel was so astronomical, she still couldn't quite believe she had her own private flight to Houston. And whether she made the connecting flight to Madeira or not was totally out of her control. She decided she was not going to worry about it.

"Ma'am?"

"Yes lieutenant?"

"The commander asked me to tell you something. He figured he might not get the chance himself."

Megan nodded expectantly.

"The commander hosted some talks between these foreign diplomats and our State and Defense Departments."

Megan nodded again.

"The commander didn't attend the talks himself, but he said he noticed one curious thing. I take it you had dinner with a guy named Alvaro Lopes?"

"Yes, that's right."

"The commander said he held the most junior diplomatic rank of the group, some sort of science advisor. But he also thought it might be this Alvaro guy who was running the show from their end, just by watching how they interacted with each other. You know what I mean?"


Backscatter



Megan was silent for a moment and then replied, "Yes, I do."

The pilot nodded and got back to his flying.

Megan settled back into her co-pilot chair and tried to relax, her mind in deep thought. The engine was loud but once they reached their cruising altitude, the sound became more bearable as the pilot reduced throttle to 80%. The plane leveled off and began to fly at its top cruising speed. Megan read their heading on the dashboard as a few degrees east of southeast. They were flying directly to the Gulf coast. For a while it seemed they were also flying directly into the sun, but then some dark clouds blotted out the glare. A few minutes after 10 AM, Megan stretched and unsnapped her harness and turned to the empty seats behind her. Across the seats lay two traveling bags that had been taken from under her cot at her quarters.

It was everything in the world that she owned. Almost all the items were clothes. There was one shoebox for everything else, pictures of a family she hadn't seen in years, a thousand dollars of useless bills in various denominations she was keeping as souvenirs, a small purse with $73.48 in the new script that represented her life savings, her birth certificate and citizen papers and diplomas. Under the papers her eyes caught the letter her older brother had written her as he lay dying during the Portland water poisoning attack of 2043. It occurred to her she had not read his letter since coming to Texas. How had she allowed that to happen?

The pilot was talking quietly to Houston Control, in a voice that seemed infinitely calm. After he signed off he turned to Megan. "Ma'am, you see those dark clouds ahead? Houston tells us we have a bit of turbulence coming up. You might want to put your harness back on."

"Yes, thank you lieutenant." Megan closed her bags and settled down. "Turbulence indeed," she thought to herself as she clicked herself back in and gazed at the swiftly approaching blackness. "But nothing like what's in my stomach." She stared through the windshield at the churning thunderstorm and tried not to shiver.

The George Bush Intercontinental Airport at Houston was a ghost of its former glory. Megan guessed it had no more than few civilian flights a week. Commercial air travel was in its death throes due to the price of oil, and there was continuous debate in Congress whether to phase out the massive subsidies and let the civilian aviation industry collapse completely. It was no surprise then when Houston Control gave the Cessna immediate clearance to land.

They were buffeted by rain squalls and fierce cross winds all the way down, and then the pilot made a landing so gentle that Megan didn't even realize they were on the ground. They taxied for a few moments after braking, and then the pilot let out a loud whoop. Megan thought at first he was celebrating his perfect landing, but then he said hoarsely, "Oh Lordy, look! Now there is one piece of sweetness!" Up ahead through the rain a large and very sleek looking jet was appearing.

"What is it?" asked Megan. She stared in wonder at the sharply tipped wings.

"A Bombardier Global Merchant! Looks like their last model too, from the 2030s. This side of Mach-One Ma'am, this is as good as good gets. Forgive me if I drool for a while." He gazed at the jet. "Look at the size of those engines!" he whispered in awe. "Combined thrust of seventy-six kilo-Newtons. That sweetness can lift!"

Megan gave him a quick smile. "Permission to drool granted lieutenant. So that's my plane, huh?"

The pilot nodded slowly as he followed a ground crew's signals that were guiding his Cessna. He finally taxied into position about forty meters from the port wingtip of the jet and then the person outside in the yellow slicker raised his two red-glowing wands into an overhead X. The pilot cut his power and the Cessna's engine became silent. "A pleasure flying with you Ma'am."

A group of people were running up to their plane. Megan turned to thank the pilot but then her door opened and she was hustled out into the drenching rain. She barely remembered to grab her two bags. They made a mad dash across the tarmac and then her escort left her as she completed her final run up a slippery stair ramp to a portal just behind the pilot cabin. The jet door closed and sealed behind her seconds after she entered. Megan felt a gentle shift in both the cabin pressure and the plane as they began to move. She shivered for a moment in the cool dry air, a marked contrast to the swampy air outside.

"Welcome to Madeira, Dr. O'Connor. My name in Cintia." a young Spanish-looking woman in a crisp uniform said to her in greeting. She appeared to be about Megan's age.

Megan stared at her without comprehension. She decided to try humor. "Oh? Did we land already?"

Cintia smiled. "This jet has diplomatic rights. You entered Madeira sovereign territory when you walked through the door."

"Oh. Sorry."

Cintia gave her a brief shrug and then a kind smile as she looked at Megan's soaked clothes and riding chaps. "You'll be able to shower shortly after take-off. But for now you'll have to strap in. We should be getting our final clearance as soon as we taxi into takeoff position."

Megan stared at her. "Shower on the plane?"

"Uh huh. This way please." Cintia led her to the ultra plush nine-passenger cabin area. Megan was in awe of the spaciousness. There was over two meters of head room where she stood, and the seats were arranged 3 x 3 with a single center aisle. There were two men and two women sitting in the front that Megan did not recognize. They gave her brief nods to acknowledge her presence. Then Megan's eyes lit on Alvaro. She flashed him a timid smile.

He gave her a quick smile back, and then made a complex hand gesture with the phone he was using. Megan nodded her understanding.

"Aisle seat be okay for now, Dr. O'Connor?" Cintia had magically procured a large white towel, and Megan realized she wanted to protect the plush leather seats from Megan's wet and dirty horse-smelling clothes.

"Yes, that'll be fine." Megan looked around the cabin as Cintia laid out the towel. She finally noticed that her guide was wearing some sort of uniform. She asked politely, "Are you the stewardess?"

Cintia smiled and nodded. "A little of everything. Mostly I'm the navigator and backup copilot, but I'll come back and assist you with anything you need." Cintia waited until Megan belted in, and then gave her a quick briefing on how to leave the plane in an emergency. A double-chime sounded, and with a last nod Cintia turned and went quickly forward into the pilot cabin.

The lift-off was swift and very powerful, and the jet rose from the ground at a very steep angle, Megan guessed far more quickly than would ever be possible for the Cessna. As the plane neared its cruising altitude, Cintia returned from the pilot cabin and escorted Megan to the cargo area in the rear of the plane. There were numerous large crates securely strapped to the floor and walls. There was also a door leading to a plush bathroom. Cintia entered with Megan and described the operation of a small but ultra high-tech looking shower stall. "Once you lock the stall from the inside, nozzles will spray you in three directions with six liters a minute. It might not sound like much but it does a fantastic job. Normal cycle is for two minutes, but if you need more, the override is right here..."

After finishing a short lesson on how to use the flushless toilet, Cintia gave her a kind smile and left. Megan looked around and gaped at the small bathroom. It was well lit, and everything seemed to be in sparkling mint condition. The richness seemed to glow with an aura of wealth and power. The only thing out of place seemed to be the reflection of the person Megan saw in the mirror. She nodded at herself with a shrug, and then disrobed and stepped into the shower.

She paused for a moment before locking the stall and starting the cycle. "Am I really on a jet? It's so incredibly quiet in here, almost no noise, almost no vibration. It feels as if I'm in a building! How is this possible?" She faced the door, her eyes away from the nozzles as Cintia had instructed her, and locked the door.

Megan was used to taking quick showers and she found this one super luxuriant. The super fast needle mists were remarkable in their quick cleaning and rinsing power. She soaped and washed everything including her hair in the first hundred seconds. Then she just relaxed for the last twenty, feeling her skin tingle from the hot sprays. There was an automatic hot-air drying cycle, and afterwards she got out and changed into some clean clothes from her bag, simple pants and a shirt. Feeling completely clean and refreshed, she headed back to the passenger cabin.

She paused to look at the crates on her way through the well lit cargo area. Most of them bore NASA labels, and from the stenciling she guessed some sort of positioning control equipment. Then a transparent cargo box caught her attention. It was very securely strapped to the floor. The thin case was almost empty but a few small rectangles were visible and they had a very pretty golden shine. Megan knelt to examine them just to satisfy her curiously and then blinked when she realized they were gold ingots. Stamped on each one was the inscription, "Bank of Madeira, 500 grams gold, 99.9999% pure" and then a serial number. Megan shook her head in wonder.

She finally returned to the passenger cabin and was happy to see Alvaro was off his phone. She raised her eyebrows and smiled at him, fighting an urge to laugh. They were sitting together a moment later.

"Megan, the way this was handled must seem so ridiculous to you, but there was no other way."

"I've got a million questions!"

Alvaro's mind flashed back to their Saturday dinner. "Start with the most important."

"Alvaro, what will I be when we land in Madeira?"

He understood the deep meaning of her question and fear. "Not a concubine! God knows there too much of that in the world already. What will you become? Beautiful and free, like the islands. We truly need an experienced horse doctor. I've arranged a position for you. Everything else is up to you."

Megan trembled and let out a huge sigh of relief. "I thought only Madeira citizens are allowed such jobs, or even to be on the islands."

"You're perfectly correct. I have a set of papers for you to sign, and it would be a great boost to my diplomatic career if you would sign them before we land. The papers will grant you dual citizenship."

Megan stared at him for a moment and then leaned back into her plush chair and whispered, "Alvaro, tell me what you've done."

"Oh, pulled in a few favors with members of Congress. Accepting citizens from other countries is done on a case by case basis. Megan! You were too modest! You should have boasted to me that you were first in your veterinary class at U.C. Davis."

"How do you know that?"

"Congress wanted documentation on what they were voting on. I tried to swing it with just my own praise, but we wound up pulling your transcripts."

"You didn't need my permission?"

Alvaro blinked. "Your State Department got them for us. In Madeira, all adult education records are public. The issue of privacy never occurred to me. Did I..."

"No, of course not! Why should I be offended? I'm just a little surprised, that's all."

He paused for a moment. "Our cultures are a little different. Give yourself time for the adjustments."

"Yes..." There was a brief flash of sunshine at Alvaro's window, and the view caught Megan's attention.

Alvaro smiled. "Ever been on a plane before?"

She grinned. "Once. Earlier today..."

"Want to change places?"

Megan gave a cheerful smile and nodded vigorously. After switching, she stared out the window for a long time. "My gosh, we're so high," she whispered. "My country..." She turned back to him and asked, "Alvaro, do you still think of this as your country too, with your dual citizenship?"

"I try to. I took my oath seriously."

Megan thought of papers she was about to sign. "But what if you or I were in a situation where the interests of the U.S. and Madeira started to diverge?"

Alvaro gave a deep sigh. "Yes, I know. We're only human Megan. Sometimes life hands us difficult choices. As for me, Madeira is my home." He tried to shift to a more cheerful topic. "Here, let me link to the aircraft's computers and show you something." He typed on his laptop for a moment and presented her a large map. "Here's our flight path in yellow, Texas to Mississippi to Alabama to Georgia and then finally over the Carolinas. We'll be flying directly over the northern end of Roanoke Island at the coast a little before 1:30 PM Houston time."

Megan stared in fascination. "And that little red dot on the yellow line is where we're right now?"

"Yep."

Megan looked back and forth between her window and laptop for a moment. In the time it had taken her to shower, they had flown above and beyond the thunderstorm. The clouds below were breaking up and she was getting a good view of patchy sunshine on the terrain below. She clapped her hands in childlike delight and exclaimed, "My gosh! This is so neat!"

"Yeah, I know. I played for hours the first time I had this too. Here, take my laptop. This is how you zoom in. You can see how the display matches the terrain out the window."

Megan played with the system for a while. "Wow. We'll be flying directly over Atlanta, Georgia... I've never been east of Texas..." She paused. "How high are we?"

Alvaro leaned over and asked her to click an icon. It showed their height and air speed as 13,200 meters and 905 kph. A footnote also showed this represented 84% of the jet's maximum altitude of 15,710 meters and at 97% of its maximum cruising speed of 935 kph.

"And we can fly all the way to Madeira without refueling?"

It seemed to Megan that Alvaro suffered a very brief moment of regret, and then he said, "Easily. A Global Merchant with a light load is rated at 9,100 kilometers, and even as loaded as we are, Houston to Madeira is only 7,300 km."

"As loaded as we are?"

Alvaro nodded and gave her a brief history of the jet. "Madeira bought this plane in 2042 from the Arab Emirate of Dubai. Very few planes of this model were ever built. It's a combination of a small cargo transport and an executive business jet. The basic design is an oversized version of a Bombardier Global 5000 from the early 2000's, expanded 7% in all three dimensions. The plane's fuselage is based on a carbon nano-tube fiber mesh, incredibly strong and flexible. The weight savings are tremendous, allowing us to lift with a 4000 kg payload and 20,000 kg of fuel."

Megan's eyes went wide. The thought of using twenty metric tons of incredibly precious aviation fuel for a single trip seemed beyond belief. She forced herself to gaze out the window to keep from laughing at the absurdity. The jet ride felt impossibly smooth. Megan thought if she closed her eyes, she could easily imagine herself sitting in a plush chair in a solid building.

She spoke up. "Everything is so incredibly quiet! This is nothing like my ride in the Cessna. Is it because the engines are towards the rear of the plane?" She paused. "But even in my shower, everything was so quiet!"

Alvaro gave her a slight shrug, as if trying to decide what to say. He finally commented, "It's a fantastic piece of technology."

"It seems so hard to believe, 9100 km in a single trip..."

Alvaro agreed with her and then added, "It's great for our needs. Madeira has a perfect location for trading. This jet can reach anywhere in North America except the southwest coast of Alaska, all of South America except for Southern Chile and Argentina, all of Africa, and as far east as western India and western China."

Megan nodded and then advanced the display to the end of the flight, zooming down until the small details of the runway at the east end of Madeira were clearly visible. "I can't wait to see your country for real. It's so beautiful, even on the display." 

"Well, we'll be landing a little before 1 AM local time. You won't see much." He leaned over again and pointed out another icon to Megan. "Click on that. It'll display sunrise and sunset in the local time zone wherever you move the cursor. The default is today's date. You can set it for tomorrow... here."

Megan interacted with the display for a moment. "So Madeira's sunrise tomorrow will be at 5:09 AM and sunset at 6:59 PM. My first experience with jetlag Alvaro, should be interesting."

Alvaro laughed. "It's not particularly pleasant!"

Cintia opened up a lunch buffet during their time over the Carolinas. Megan got a chance to chat with all the members of the passengers and crew. She was pleased to see that in addition to Cintia, the senior pilot was also a woman. Megan also became quick friends with the first copilot, a very gregarious guy by the name of Xanti, which he told her was Portuguese for James. At the end of lunch, Megan asked him if she could get a quick tour of the pilot cabin.

His eyes flashed an expression of sorrow and for a brief moment, he looked at a loss for words. He finally said, "There are strict rules against that while we're in flight. I'll ask the captain if she'll allow a quick look from the doorway after we land." Megan politely nodded her gratitude.

Besides Megan, the plane had four men and four women, and after sitting back down with Alvaro, she quietly told him how balanced the mix seemed. Alvaro gave her a short explanation. "We had no choice. After the plague of 2036, our society almost fell apart. We couldn't afford the waste of a gender bias."

"Well, if this plane is any judge, you've done fabulously well since the plague. How did you do it, keeping hold of the technology I mean?"

"Well... Truthfully? The answer is partly a State secret. But the other parts are just being good traders. And we have a very strategic position."

"Ah, your air fields. I thought so!"

"Yes. Very valuable to other countries for emergencies, commercial and military. I'm telling you this assuming you're becoming a citizen."

Megan nodded and glanced out her window. They were now past the three-hour mark of their nine-hour flight, and her view of the Atlantic expanse was beautiful and clean. She turned back to Alvaro and grinned. "So, where do I sign?"

Chapter 3. Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay

Nine months later.

Time: Saturday, February 29, 2048 10:00 AM, the docks of Porto Santo

Megan O'Connor sat dangling her legs off a wharf, relaxing and enjoying the cries of the sea birds. She was by a large artificial harbor near the southeastern end of Porto Santo, waiting for the monthly transport ship from the main island to dock, and she was expecting to see the ship in a few minutes. A short distance away her horse Feathers was tied up peacefully, alongside an additional mount for Alvaro when he arrived.

She sat quietly and admired the beauty of the ocean and wildlife around her. Megan's arms and legs were bare and tan. She had put on a few kilos since coming to the islands, but it was all due to the excellent quality and availability of both food and exercise. The extra weight was all sleek muscle, and she knew she was in the best physical shape of her life.

The sun was shining brightly now from due southeast, a pleasant change from the drenching rains of yesterday. This was the wet season and the rains were plentiful. The overnight low had been 16C, and currently the temperature was halfway to its expected high of 20C. It was an arch typical winter day, and Megan knew from experience that if you bumped up the numbers by 6C, it would be the typical range for a summer day in August. The numbers represented a mere 1C increase from what they were fifty years ago. The coldness of the surrounding deep ocean had so far spared Madeira of much of the world's global warming. Megan had a private joke with herself that if paradise had a climate, it would be that of Madeira.




Backscatter



Porto Santo with its 42 sq km of land was 5.7% of the size of main island of Madeira, and with 1200 residents held 1% of the country's population. Once a plush vacation getaway for Europe's elite, the tiny island was now a fabulously successful year-round agricultural community, for reasons Megan still did not fully understand.

She had first arrived at these docks by hitching a ride on a fishing boat on a sunny afternoon in mid May of 2047, one brief day after being dazzled by the richness and power of Funchal. The trip on the fishing boat had fascinated her almost as much as her jet flight two days previously. The boat was powered both by sails and a powerful hydrogen engine, and the nets were operated with battery-driven winches. Megan was amazed at first at the rich and varied harvest the crew delivered to the people of Porto Santo at the end of the day. But then an elder crewmember told her they had caught in five hours of work what his grandparent would have caught in one. The deep sea around Madeira was not nearly as fished out as the Caribbean, but it was still in sad shape.

As she waited now for Alvaro's ferry, her mind drifted back to her first days on the island. Everything was so novel then! But now the small island was her home. She felt as if she knew almost every square meter, and each one was a treasure. Playing on the beaches, hiking on the short mountains or on the rough rocky coastlines, riding absolutely everywhere, it was one picture-postcard day after another. As in Texas, she had a challenging job that she loved. But unlike Texas, she also had lots of free time for recreation and reflection. And her soul had responded to the gentle beauty and the kindness around her, growing in ways she never realized were possible.

Love! Twelve hundred people, and they as dear to her now as one large family. Her first day at Madeira, Megan remembered feeling shocked when Alvaro told her the position reserved for her was that of Lead Veterinarian of Porto Santo. Alvaro would continue to live and work on the main island. Megan was asked to commit to the job on Porto Santo for one year. She did, and for the first few weeks felt somewhat abandoned.

But as the spring of 2047 turned to summer, she began to see Alvaro's point and the thoughtfulness behind her placement. Portuguese and English were both in common use on Madeira. Here on Porto Santo, almost everybody knew a little English but by tradition it wasn't used. It was full immersion for Megan into the new language, and she picked it up far more easily than if she had been at the capital. By the fall, she felt comfortable speaking in the language, before winter she realized she had switched to thinking in Portuguese, and on Alvaro's last visit at the end of January, he had paid her the ultimate compliment of saying she was speaking without an accent. Megan wasn't sure, but she suspected her dreams now were in Portuguese too.

Beautiful and free. That's what Alvaro said he wanted her to be. And it had come to pass. She had a true and permanent place in the society around her, and it was totally independent of her relationship with Alvaro. In their dating now, when they would meet as the transport made its round trips on the last weekend of each month, they met as equals.

Porto Santo! Her home! She knew it so intimately well, and yet her island still presented her some deep mysteries. Such dichotomy! Sometimes reality is just as it appears, and sometimes appearances can be deceiving. The dilemma that Megan faced when she first arrived was how to tell the difference.

A smile crossed her face as she spotted the ship heading for the harbor. She had never known the modified naval frigate to be late, though on one month its service between Madeira and Porto Santo had been cancelled due to an extended 14,000 km round-trip trading expedition to Scandinavia and Russia.

Megan knew the ship was used extensively for trading besides its month-end ferry service between the two home islands. A dock hand once told her the ship usually paid a monthly visit to Dar-el-Beida of the Islamic West African Union, the city once called Casablanca. The I.W.A.U. was Madeira's number one trading partner, and its port was only 800 km due east of Porto Santo. Over Christmas the ship made a more extensive excursion, traveling 2500 km to the north and east to trade with Ireland and the UK.

The ship was named Discovery and with a length of 134 meters was rather small for its mission of deep-sea merchant. It had an unloaded displacement weight of 4800 tons and was a former Halifax-class military frigate. The ship was converted to a corvette transport in 2040, retaining almost all of its original firepower with the exception of the helicopter landing deck in the stern area which was converted to additional cargo and passenger space.

The extensive missile, torpedo, and gun armament of Discovery had saved it more than once from pirates. Its high firepower to cargo ratio made it very unappealing for pirates to attack. It was the flagship of Madeira's tiny navy, which consisted of Discovery and twelve high-speed armed patrol boats that were hydrogen powered and used for local coastal defense. Discovery with its boats and land-based attack helicopters was a formidable weapon. The flagship had state-of-the-art battle control systems, and could coordinate the mini sea and air fleet into one integrated multi-point firing system.

Megan pushed out her bare arms into the warm sunlight and stretched. What was her previous thought? Oh yes, dichotomy! She thought of the obvious facts of her first days here, and what an obvious fit her placement was.

The tiny island of Porto Santo had a compact community hospital at the airport terminal complex near the center of the island. It had first-class facilities and staff. Adjacent to the human hospital was the animal clinic, equally well equipped but staffed by local farmers. They had a huge amount of practical experience but none the advanced training that Megan could offer. She immersed herself in farm-animal care and treatment, horses and goats, dogs and cats, ducks and chickens. There were even a few pigs and sheep and incredibly, a dozen milk-producing cows and three bulls. She would often partner with the human surgeons in the treatment of injured animals.

And then there was the not so obvious, in fact, the incredible. Power! Electricity existed here in abundance, both at Madeira and even at tiny Porto Santo. In her nine months here, Megan had never known it to fail. Impossible! Like a dream from her childhood bedtime stories in Portland. Her Irish father would tell young Megan fables of a fast world bright with its power, in the times before the cruelty took the brightness away.

Security about the abundance of power was a concern for everybody. There were strict standards against exposing electric lights to the outdoors, especially at night. The island was isolated, but such displays might arouse the puzzlement of ships passing on the horizon or people analyzing satellite photos. Occasional accidents would of course happen, but the island tried to emit no more light than what would be typical for 1,200 people using lamp-oil.

On the main island of Madeira, the standards were considerably more relaxed. It was public knowledge that the high mountains provided hydroelectric power, and there was an extensive farm of twelve 2.0 MW wind turbines on Die Ilhas Desertas, the thin narrow island chain 35 km southeast of Madeira. It was power that had saved the society in 2036. But at Porto Santo, where was the power coming from?

Although Megan's island home of Porto Santo had no hydroelectric power, there were three 2.0 MW wind turbines on Ilhen na Cahleta, a tiny island at the southeastern tip of Porto Santo. Megan would often ride her horse along the southern beach and gaze westward across the narrow 500 meter channel. The three huge wind towers were clearly visible, ninety meter diameter rotors with their hubs a hundred meters above the ground. Almost everyone on the island thought that these three towers were the sole source of Porto Santo's power.

But were they? Were they enough to run the very capable hydrogen disassociation plant and desalination plant and water storage systems that were also on Ilhen na Cahleta? Were they enough to run the sewerage treatment plant on the opposite eastern end of Porto Santo? Were the three towers enough to run all of Megan's household appliances and first-class plumbing and give her all the concealed lighting and hot water she would ever want? In her idle time, she played with the numbers, and they just didn't add up. So where did all the power come from?

And the fresh water! The desalination plant produced a tremendous amount of fresh water, enough to do extensive irrigation during the hot dry summer last year. The common attitude among the local population was just to shrug and avoid prying too deeply into how the government was performing its magic. Her husband-to-be Alvaro Lopes was universally held in almost reverent regard. In the year after becoming Madeira's managing director of Energy in late 2041, power outages became a thing of the past, and fresh water was now abundant. No one wanted to ask the probing question of why.

In addition to the remote island wind farms, the Madeira Energy Department ran two very well secured power facilities, one in the high mountains of Madeira where Alvaro worked and one in the high hills of Porto Santo. Megan had often ridden or hiked up the hill to the boundary of the local power plant, both to enjoy the view of the island and to exchange friendly waves with the guards. But the power plant's interior was the one complex on the island she had never visited. Where did all the power come from?

The problem came to the forefront of her attention in the late summer of 2047, when for several weeks the west trade winds died and it was still business as usual for the island's power consumption. In quiet talks with the locals, Megan discovered that before 2042, the still air of the doldrums would have resulted in major hardships of spoiled food in non-working refrigerators and running the farms purely on human and horse power. But no longer. Where did all the extra power come from?

After pressing her friends to discuss this, Megan found that there were several ideas existing in the local population. The first was that additional power was being delivered from Madeira through an undersea power cable to Ilhen na Cahleta. Megan was sure that wasn't right. Porto Santo had 20% of the country's wind turbines and 1% of its population, and the main island was much more prodigious in its use of power. The thought of Madeira shipping power to Porto Santo was absurd.

What was in the powerhouse? The island's second conjecture was that the government had somehow procured and installed compact SNAP (Space Nuclear Auxiliary Power) generators for the days and weeks when the wind died. Megan did some research. SNAP power units were basically cans of plutonium-238 dioxide surrounded by radiator fins with thermocouples in between. Megan had done very well in basic college physics back at U.C. Davis. It wasn't her calling but she understood the concepts.

Megan's problem was that she saw people charging electric farm equipment on the island's power grid during the weeks when the wind had died. Could SNAP generators meet that kind of demand? Her back-of-the-envelope calculations suggested a minimum of a hundred tons of plutonium dioxide to support the usage she had seen. Where in the world could anyone ever get a hundred tons of plutonium dioxide? At a very basic level, the idea seemed ridiculous.

And to make matters absolutely maddening, she was sure Alvaro knew the true answer to the apparent magic. In some quiet times with her, when they were alone together in the evenings, he did everything but openly admit there was a hidden explanation, and Megan in her mercy would stop her questioning only because she could see how much she was distressing him.

She thought perhaps if she researched his background, she might discover the key to the mystery. Without telling Alvaro, she downloaded from Madeira's online library all the papers he published in the late 2030's and his doctoral thesis from Princeton. Megan was stunned by the quality of Madeira's main library. It was located at the University at Funchal, and its archives were vast, world-class. Megan guessed it probably surpassed the current U.S. Library of Congress. 

Megan O'Connor was born in Portland, Oregon on July 10, 2024. She started grade school a year early and then skipped a grade, starting junior high in 2033 as a young nine-year old and then spending three years each in junior high, high school, premed undergrad at the University of Washington, and then finally veterinary grad student at U.C. Davis. Megan was very proud of her achievement of going from junior-high to her Doctorate in just nine years.

Alvaro had done it in eight, and starting from a much younger age. He was a true wunderkind, spending only three years in grade school and two years in junior high and entering high school as a young nine-year old, the same year Megan entered junior high. Megan was flabbergasted when he told her his birthday was August 03, 2024. She was actually older than he was by a few weeks. When Alvaro had come to Princeton as a grad student in the fall of 2039, he was barely fifteen years old, but he already had an extensive list of publications in refereed journals. He received his Ph.D. in June of 2041, two months before his seventeenth birthday. He was among the first of the foreign students to swear mandatory allegiance to the United States.

And his Princeton thesis! What a disappointment for Megan, at least in terms of solving the energy mystery. It was on cosmology, the creation and lifecycle of the universe. His ideas on cosmological evolution were so revolutionary that he had resurrected an extinct field of physics, pulled several world-renowned Princeton professors out of retirement just to work with him. It was a revolutionary advance, with a whole new branch of fundamental physics that Alvaro in his thesis called singularity mechanics.

His approach seemed to solve three distinct long-standing problems with astrophysics and deep-sky observations from the 2010's. The first had to do with the inflationary phase of the early universe, just after its conception in the Big Bang. The second was the Mario Livio anomaly, concerning the gravitational lensing of the cosmos. The third was the apparent super quiescence of black holes. Alvaro's work was considered seminal for solving all three major problems.

Megan's problem was that she had no idea how to understand his work. The mathematics was simply too difficult for her to follow. But it certainly didn't seem the type of thesis that would explain how to get the equivalent of a hundred tons of plutonium dioxide on a hilltop. Her love was a brilliant astrophysicist and probably among the world's top mathematicians, and his current work remained a complete mystery to her.

Alvaro, her love! The transport ship Discovery was docking now, and in a few minutes they would be in each other's arms again. Two wonderful days of hiking and riding were before them. Picnic lunches in the hills, leisurely strolls on the beach, riding their beautiful horses, two electric-light dinners with superb farm-fresh food, two wonderful nights of being with her future husband.

They had not announced anything yet, and some of their friends were beginning to roll their eyes and ask what they were waiting for. But unknown to all their friends, they had not yet begun to sleep with each other. Megan was quite willing. It was Alvaro who wanted to hold back until they were married, or perhaps at least until they announced their engagement. The reasons were the morals Alvaro's parents had taught him as a child. The question of whether Megan was a virgin had nothing to do with the decision. They had discussed the issue briefly. Alvaro was a virgin and Megan was not.

Megan knew the wait was almost over. They met only one weekend a month, but they had been talking and e-mailing with each other daily through the undersea cable since her first day on the island. They both knew each other's character intimately. They both owned each other's love, and soon they would announce to their country that they owned each other's bodies. Megan smiled. Perhaps as early as this weekend, and if not this month, probably the next. The long wait was almost over.

And he was here! Her true love was walking down the plank to the docks. She got up and raced to meet him.

Chapter 4. St. Bridget's Complaint

Time: Saturday, February 29, 2048 9 PM, lower level of Megan's quarters

Alvaro and Megan came back to Megan's house at 9 PM after a long evening stroll and headed straight to the lower level. It had been a wonderful day of recreation for them both. Most of it was spent riding their horses in a great circumnavigation of the beaches and coastal roads of Porto Santo. They had dinner at Megan's home at 5 PM and then left again just at the sun was setting at six. A full moon rose in the east a half hour later and provided ample light for their long walk. They started off by holding hands and soon switched to holding hips. The numerous houses along the roads appeared dark and vacant, but they both knew how deceiving appearances could be. The world was quiet and peaceful, filled only with the sounds of the night wildlife and the farm animals.

"Such a beautiful night," commented Alvaro in Portuguese as they walked.

"I like it even better with a new moon," replied Megan with fluent Portuguese and a cheerful laugh. "The stars are stunning then... Hah!"

"What?"

"I was just thinking about something my parents told me long ago. It seemed so romantic this evening when we had dinner by electric lights. We save the candles for emergencies. But my mom once told me that when she was a teenager, candlelight was considered romantic, much more so than electric lights. Imagine!"

Alvaro smiled. "Do you think of home often?"

Megan paused. "The people sometime. Our web connections are down so often now, not to Madeira but to the rest of the world. I sometimes wonder if my old friends are okay, and I haven't been able to reach my parents since Christmas."

Alvaro nodded and sighed. "It's not us. The worldwide web is failing."

"Yes, I know. Everything is under the knife and the explosive. But not here!" She gestured at the nearby farm houses with her free arm. "Here is an oasis of peace! I bet you every one of those doors is not even locked."

Alvaro laughed. "Ha! I grew up here, remember? No bet!"

"Is it the same on Madeira?"

"Almost. Not quite but almost. There's actually a jailhouse in Funchal."

"No! Really?"

"Uh huh. A 120,000 people Megan. They can't all be sociable."

"No, I suppose not."

There's one here at Porto Santo too."

"A jail?! Oh nuts, really? Are you serious? Where?"

"By the docks. Well, it's not really a jail, but you can lock people up there, a holding pen. Criminals would be transferred to the main island."

Megan paused for a moment and then laughed. "How I've changed! A year ago I would have thought it impossible to live in a society without locks and fences and jails. Now I'm having a hard time with the reverse."

Alvaro smiled and squeezed her hip and switched from Portuguese to French. "Viva la difference!"

"Oh, indeed!" she laughed as she returned his squeeze and leaned to give him a quick kiss. "It almost feels as if I must think this way while I think and speak in Portuguese, and to think of locks and jails, I'd have to go back to thinking in English."

"The solution is obvious. Continue thinking and speaking in Portuguese."




Backscatter



She laughed again. "Sounds like a plan." The two lovers continued their long stroll.

They returned to Megan's house after a delightful three-hour walk. They retired to the lower level, and by the light of a five-Watt nightlight, Alvaro inspected the shutters on the small high windows that were just above ground level. Satisfied everything was secure, he gave Megan the okay to turn on an array of recessed high-efficiency light-emitting diodes. The array lit the room to a level that would be a little dim for reading but otherwise was perfectly adequate.

Megan took her hot shower first. After she dried herself, she let the towel fall and looked at herself in the mirror, eyeing her B-cup breasts with a critical eye. "Not bad," she thought. "A typical Celtic lass. More than a hint of red in my hair, green eyes... and my body? It's certainly pleasing to Alvaro. He loves the curve of my hips." She raised her arms straight out and studied her image. She never had much vanity, felt herself blessed with a fine body and as attractive as a typical woman, but nothing out of the ordinary.

She knew that was not how Alvaro thought of her. She could see it his eyes and deportment, how he admired other attractive women compared to how he admired her. His expressions revealed the core of his desires and hopes, and the fact that he considered Megan to be the most stunningly beautiful creature that could ever possibly exist. He had often said so too, and with complete sincerity.

Megan smiled and lowered her arms. She was pleased with how she looked now too. The intense amount of exercise and excellent diet had done wonders. She allowed herself an idly fancy of one day magically going back to Ft. Hood, Texas again. She thought she might now be considered a bonnie lass at the base. But no matter. Her true love was here. All thoughts of other men were folly, and she pushed them from her mind.

After slipping on her sleep clothes, she left the bathroom and found Alvaro working with her computer, checking his e-mail though the undersea cable. Seeing the bathroom free, he switched places and showered while Megan prepared their beds.

Ten minutes later Alvaro came out of the bathroom dressed in pajamas and drying his hair. He smiled at Megan's setup. It was the same as last month. The large bed in her bedroom was turned down and all prepared for sleep, and her bedroom door was open. The fresh linen for the foldout sofa was still in the closet, and Alvaro would have to make up the sofa bed himself. The offer was obvious. Megan was hinting there was no need for Alvaro to sleep in the living room.

Alvaro gave Megan a shy smile and sat down beside her on the sofa. They were cuddling a moment later, the soft fabric of their pajamas the only thing separating them.

"Have a busy day yesterday?" Megan asked. By tradition, they did not discuss work outside her house during their weekend holidays. Their rides and walks were purely for recreation and intimacy.

"A bit. I might have to be away the end of next month."

"Yikes! Really?"

Alvaro nodded. "Another trade mission to the U.S."

"Back to Texas?" Megan's eyes sparkled with interest.

"No, the East Coast, Virginia. And Discovery will be gone too. It will be docking at Brazil and Mexico. But we could move our next holiday up or back a week. I could catch a ride here on a fishing boat."

"I guess that'll be okay." She gave him what she hoped sounded like a sexy growl and whispered, "If you have a choice, make it a week sooner!"

He laughed. "Okay!" They kissed for a while. "How about you? Interesting Friday?"

She shrugged. "My morning was completely dull. Some dogs for wellness checkups and vaccines. There was a young gentle pooch with the ridiculous name of Bone Cruncher. Oh yes, the highlight of the morning, one duck with an injured wing." She paused for a kiss. "The afternoon was much more interesting! I brought in a goat to the kindergarten class and talked about how to keep the animal healthy. What a joy to work with children Alvaro! Nine girls and eight boys, they're so beautiful!"

"You can leave your clinic unattended?"

"Sure. I had nothing scheduled. And if there were an emergency, the clinic is only a few hundred meters away from the school. My two teenage assistants would call me. They usually spend their afternoons studying upstairs in the clinic library." Megan paused and then laughed. "At least that's what they say they're doing. Carlito and Luzia have started dating each other."

"Uh oh!" laughed Alvaro. "Do you think you should leave them alone like that?"

"Oh, they're responsible. They won't go too far. They both asked me to trust them, and I do."

"Hmmm," Alvaro muttered as he started nibbling her neck. "Trust is a beautiful thing. Your neck looks very trusting..."

Megan's mind was still on her work. "How Madeira still manages to get dog vaccines these days is completely beyond me." She paused again and gave a soft gasp at a particularly intimate caress. Alvaro's hand was stroking the underside of her breast, almost cupping her, and his mouth had moved to lick the soft center of her throat. It was trust, and she tilted her head back to expose herself fully. His tongue caressed her vulnerable throat while his hand slid to caress her other breast. Soft strokes at first, and then a firm squeeze. Megan could feel her nipples getting hard. "Hmm, that feels nice.... Thinking frisky thoughts?" She wiggled her body playfully, and let the back of her hand slide along his hip and then teasingly across his groin. Through the soft cotton of his pajamas, Megan felt a very stiff erection.

He grinned. "A lot of flashing images, you, me... I guess I was also thinking about two teenagers alone together in a library!" He licked Megan's neck to her ear, his open hand cupping her now from underneath, supporting and fondling the weight of her breast. "I know Luzia's parents, and Luzia too. I went to preschool with her older brother, back in the 2020's. You're right, she is responsible, and worthy of trust. But physically she's the kind of girl boys dream about..."

Megan wiggled and then sighed as Alvaro's fingers at last found her nipple. "I know. But Alvaro, they're both eighteen. They have the right to be together without chaperons." Megan turned to kiss her lover, and for a long while no words were spoken. Their caresses were intimate and loving but not demanding. Eventually they got into a position where Megan was giving Alvaro a backrub. Megan was kneeling on the floor and Alvaro was lying prone on the sofa, looking so relaxed Megan thought he might fall asleep.

She definitely didn't want that. She pulled down the bottom of Alvaro's pajamas a bit with one hand and lowered her head and started licking his tailbone. Her other hand was still massaging the small of his back. Alvaro had done the same thing to her their last night together five weeks ago, and she had found the experience both heavenly and sexually arousing in the extreme.

Her mind flashed back to the experience. She had been panting. Alvaro's breath had felt hot and ragged between his licks, and in the dim light she had seen his male eagerness for her making a big tent in the front of his pajama bottoms. Megan had lain still and submissive, hoping her lover would remove her pajama bottoms completely and mount her, either in her bedroom or right here on the sofa, she wouldn't have cared which. But her exposed tailbone was as far as Alvaro ventured that night.

What had stopped him? Megan didn't think it was sexual morality, not any more. In their hearts, they had both accepted each other as life mates, husband and wife. Megan was sure of it. So what was stopping Alvaro from mounting her? What was stopping Alvaro from asking her to marry him? Megan suddenly realized it must be something fundamental, perhaps some deep issue of honor or loyalty. Could it be his job?

"It's time," Megan thought. "It's time to get some answers. But how to do it?" The solution came to her almost immediately. Their bonds of trust and love for each other were infinitely strong. There was no risk. She should simply complain and ask.

But first, having him lying and submissive like this was just too good an opportunity to pass up. Holding him down with one hand on the small of his back and with her tongue still on his exposed coccyx, her other hand began to caress his thighs. She gradually made her caress more intimate, and was soon lightly stroking the back of his sac through his pajamas with her fingertips. Alvaro was breathing deeply and sighing, his body turning to butter beneath her hands and lips.

She turned her hand and pushed down with her fingers, diving underneath the testes and then lifting up, cupping his sac through his pajamas as he had cupped her breasts through her nightshirt. Megan pushed up with her third and fourth fingers, separating the testes and letting them fall to either side of her two middle fingers. Then she used her thumb to massage and probe the exposed orbs, rolling first one, then the other. Alvaro whimpered in his pleasure.

A flashback came to Megan. Early in the week, she had been on a farm and had witnessed two pigs mating. Megan was amazed with the depth and complexity of the courtship. The sow at first was more interested in sex than the boar. She walked around nudging him, and even playfully mounted his back and then his head. The boar finally took the hint and became amorous. The sow grunted happily when she was mounted, and their love making was quite tender.

Not the copulation itself. The boar's penis was very eager and energetic as it drilled the sow, and the boar would thrust frantically to recouple whenever his penis slipped out of the sow's vagina. He drilled her hard and deep. But otherwise the mounting was very tender. The boar nestled his head into the coarse hairs on the back of the sow's neck, and his expressions of affection for the sow beneath him were unmistakable. After their long intercourse, they both curled up with each other for a nap.

Megan sighed as the memory faded. She still had Alvaro's sac in her hand and he was perfectly still. Caressing his testes was by far the most explicit she had ever gotten with him in expressing her desire for coitus. And yet he was still holding back. It was time to talk.

She gave one last kiss to his coccyx and changed positions, releasing his sac and pulling his pajama bottoms back up. Megan then knelt on the floor close to his head. She began massaging his upper back and shoulders while kissing the back of his neck. 

Alvaro grunted in deep appreciation. With his eyes still closed, he murmured, "I love you."

"And I love you, now and forever." Megan decided she needed to wake him up a bit before saying anything heavy, so she said in a very conversational tone, "New York was available on the web yesterday. I downloaded something interesting from the U.N."

Alvaro sighed and opened his eyes and gave her a peaceful smile. "Oh?"

"Uh huh. The U.N. Population Commission released its yearend report for 2047."

"Ah. I didn't see that. How do things look?"

"Well, the population is about what we expected, maybe a little worse. Total world population at the end of 2047 was estimated to be 2.4 billion, just about was it was a hundred years ago."

Alvaro sighed. "A few years after the end of World War II."

"Yes. But the real news was the birthrates. They've collapsed! The current rate is estimated to be 0.19 children born per woman's lifetime."

Alvaro's eyes went wide. "My gosh. I can remember hearing the 2040 numbers when it first dipped below the 2.05 breakeven. I was still at Princeton. It's dropped an order of magnitude in just seven years."

"Yes. I wasn't too surprised with the new figures though. Back at Ft. Hood, none of the women I knew wanted to have children anymore. The world was just too depressing, and the terrorists were intentionally targeting the children. The grief was unbearable."

Alvaro sighed. "Any good news in the report?"

"Well, maybe one bright spot. With all the attacks on the world's power grids, global CO2 remained constant last year, 460 ppm." Megan sighed. "Still way too high, but at least not going up."

Alvaro grunted. "The extremists actually did some good. They must be very disappointed."

"Yeah. Anyway, human production of carbon dioxide is now estimated to be where it was in the early 1920's, mostly from coal burning."

"But Megan, the downward spiral of the population, did the U.N. have any thoughts on when it might stabilize and recover?"

"It's very unpredictable. We're currently locked into a really nasty feedback loop. It's a completely new social phenomenon. There's no historical precedent. The worst reports are coming out of Asia and the Indian subcontinent. It's an absolute horror. People... Women in particular don't want to produce children in such a cruel and insecure world. And people don't want to make the effort to build anymore when their efforts are constantly being blown up."

Megan sighed and continued. "The effect hammers the population from both directions, existing people are getting killed and there are very few replacements. Death by violence far exceeds all other causes combined. I sometimes wonder..." There was a long moment of silence.

"Yes?" Alvaro gave her a kind smile. "Wonder what?"

"I wonder if this is the effect that kills intelligent life in the universe. The technology advances to the point where small groups within a species have access to tremendous destructive capability. You mix in a religious extremism that justifies the death and misery, and the stage is set for the species to self-destruct."

"My God Megan. Let's hope God designed the universe a little better than that."

"And how did God design the universe Alvaro? You're probably the best person on the planet I can ask."

His eyes popped open. "Huh?!"

"I've read your research papers from the late 2030's, and your thesis."

"Ah. I wondered when you'd want to talk about that."

Megan gasped. "You know?!"

"Of course. My works are public, but I also have the right to see who is downloading things I've published." He paused. "I'm sorry Megan. I had forgotten the morality of this is different in the U.S."

Megan dismissed his apology as unnecessary with a shake of her head. "You're not angry that I didn't tell you?" She got a look of pure puzzlement at her question. "Oh, never mind. I love you."

"And I love you. And I love your gentleness. You never pressure me to talk about things I've sworn not to talk about. I know how this frustrates you. It frustrates me too." He reached up and stroked her soft hair. "You are so beautiful Megan... considerate and gentle and so lovely."

She smiled and held his hand and kissed it. "I know you think so. I can see it in your eyes. Alvaro?" Her voice squeaked as she spoke his name. She thought to herself, "It's time! He loves me! Have courage! Trust him!"

"Hmm?"

"My love, I trust you completely, so much that I feel safe laying a complaint before you, a St. Bridget complaint."

Alvaro sighed and looked at her. "I don't know what that means."

Megan gave a nervous laugh. "My mother was Welsh. My father was Irish but grew up in Glasgow, Scotland. I never paid much attention to my ethnic backgrounds growing up. But there was one folk story my father told me that stuck in my mind. In the fifth century, St. Bridget complained to St. Patrick about what a woman could do with a man who took too long to propose. St. Patrick replied with a gift, granting one day every four years when a woman could propose marriage."

"February 29th," whispered Alvaro.

Megan nodded and took a deep breath. "I can't wait another four years. I can't bear to. Alvaro Lopes, will you be my husband? Will you have me as your wife?"

Alvaro gasped. He was silent for a moment, and then tears started forming in his eyes.

"Alvaro, dearest, what's stopping you?! I can feel your desire and your love for me. It's as fierce as my own!"

He nodded and sat up. Megan joined him, sitting at his side. Alvaro reached over and simply held her for a moment and then said, "I've been working on this for months, for permission for you to join the Energy Department."

"Huh?" Her nose scrunched, and in both confusion and frustration she hissed, "What?!"

"Megan, as my wife, my primary loyalty will transfer to you. I would never hide anything from you. And I've currently sworn to do just that."

An epiphany of understanding struck Megan. "And this is the only thing that's stopping you?!"

Alvaro rested his head against hers and nodded. "Congress is horrified with the idea of a multi-national knowing our source of energy."

"But you're a multi-national!"

Alvaro totally ignored her comment. "I've been negotiating for months, reluctant to issue an ultimatum."

He grimaced, and then Megan saw his frustration transform into an emotion she had never seen him express. "Oh Alvaro, please don't be angry."

He stared at her. "Such a gift you have sweet Megan. You read and understand emotions so easily! In all sincerity, I am in awe of your ability." He took a deep breath and stood up and began to pace.

Megan followed him and stood up. "Well..."

"It's true. I even see it when you interact with animals! You have such an empathic rapport with your horse! Feathers knows what you want from her with no visible guidance. You and she would be world-class at dressage."

Megan smiled. "Thank you." She tried to interject a bit of humor. "If the world ever starts up the competitions again, maybe we'll try out." She leaned up and kissed his cheek. Alvaro kissed her back. Megan took a deep breath and sighed. "Perhaps you're right. I've always found it easy to empathize with animals... and with people. Alvaro?"

"Yes?"

"Have you ever lied to me?"

His eyes pleaded for mercy. "In the deep sense, yes. Sins of misdirection. I don't think I've ever told you a direct lie, but I know I've misdirected you when you've asked me things. I've said things that were objectively true but only appeared to answer your questions. Megan, forgive me?"

"My love, of course." Her heart felt as if it were breaking. "And I give you my word. I will never again ask you to violate your oaths to Madeira."

His jaw clenched. "No! This farce and lack of trust must end! No more! I won't stand for it!"

It took a few seconds for the implications of Alvaro's anger to sink in. She gasped and cried out, "You mean you'll marry me?!"

He hugged her. "Beautiful, precious Megan," he whispered as he held her. He started to cry. "I feel so honored... Yes, my answer is yes. Thank you so much for asking me!"

They hugged and kissed fiercely. Megan's mind was a whirlwind of emotions. She tilted back and swooned in Alvaro's arms. She was dimly aware of him bending her slightly, and then his free arm cut off her balance at the back of her knees. An instant later she was being carried to her bedroom by her lover. They were both weeping with joy.

Chapter 5. First Union

Alvaro laid Megan on the bed and then lay beside her. They wept and caressed each other, their minds overwhelmed with caring love. And then the miracle of sexual desire occurred. The transformation took them both, the caring love evolving and transforming to an erotic love within a few electric seconds. They were both eager and almost desperate to express their new commitments with their bodies.

They quickly shed their pajamas. Naked flesh pressed against naked flesh, the need to couple became a physical necessity. Megan wondered dimly in her haste how Alvaro might want to mount her. They wound up in a missionary position. Megan smiled and curled her legs, wrapping them around Alvaro's sides. Then she started to buck upward with her hips and pubis pushing against his groin, rubbing his full erection against her soft inner thighs and vulva. She whimpered in her impatience.




Backscatter



Alvaro was gasping and thrusting, his penis butting against Megan's closed labia. In a moment of understanding, she remembered this was Alvaro's first time and he had no experience with how to penetrate her. Megan spat on her hand and wetted herself. Then she spat again and grabbed the velvety head of her lover's erection. She smeared her spit across his penis head, squeezing him. Alvaro gave a tremendous shudder from the pleasure. Megan opened her outer lips with one hand and guided the throbbing erection to her vaginal entrance.

Alvaro felt his penis head cup into something warm and moist and infinitely silky. He thrust once hard and was resisted. Megan gave a quick grunt from the impact of his cock on her aroused open labia just below her clit. Alvaro lowered his hips for a better angle and thrust again, catching and sliding up her vaginal tract. He cried out at the sensation. A hot, wet muscle was gripping him fiercely. He pulled back and thrust again deeper. Feeling tight resistance, he pulled back and thrust again as deeply as he could. And then he started to orgasm, one spurt after another of overwhelming pleasure and release, pressing hard against Megan's womb as he inseminated her.

Megan's legs were locked around his sides. She continued to buck and thrust her pelvis against him as he came, the heels of her feet pressing against the backs of his thighs and butt and pushing him to remain sheathed inside her. Alvaro gave one last spasm and collapsed, rolling on his side and gasping for air, not so much from the physical exertion as from the emotional whirlwind in his thoughts. As he lay panting, his penis softened and slid from Megan's vagina.

Megan turned and faced him, showering his cheek with featherlike kisses.

"Megan, I'm sorry," Alvaro muttered in apology.

Megan blinked and whispered back, "Alvaro, dearest, what do you mean?"

He gasped, "I know women desire a longer coitus."

His embarrassment seemed so incomprehensible that Megan lay for a moment totally bewildered. And then she finally realized what he had said. "No Alvaro, no. Believe me, no. In all my life, I've only had sex with two other men. They were both older and much more experienced. I never knew what it was like to make love to a virgin man. But I did dream about it. It was wonderful for me Alvaro. I mean it. Your inexperience is precious to me. To feel your desire for me, your virgin eagerness, to feel you couple to your first woman, I'll remember this night forever."

He looked at her closely. He could hear the sincerity in her voice. He nodded and lay by her side. His hand came to her stomach and he started to pet her, stroking down to press on her womb, and then returning to her stomach to begin the stroke again. Megan grunted in satisfaction as his hand finally rested pressing on her uterus. It felt a little bit as if he were still inside her.

"Megan," he whispered. "I came inside you. Do you think we might have started something?"

"No. I know my body. It's very regular. I should be starting my period Monday or Tuesday."

"Ah. That's good." His hand came up from her womb and cupped her breast.

Megan grinned. "Well, maybe not too good. We'll both be turning twenty-four this summer. These are my prime years for birthing healthy children."

Alvaro shivered and nodded. "Yes... But perhaps a year or two for just the two of us?"

Megan nodded back. "Oh yes, I'd like that." She sat up and nestled her head into his groin, slipping his limp penis into her mouth and lapping it with her cheeks and a wet tongue.

Alvaro gasped and shuddered. "What are you doing?"

The penis popped from her mouth which then formed a playful smile. "Cleaning you. Don't you like it?"

Alvaro stared at her and then nodded vigorously. Megan grinned and returned to her suckle. The time passed quietly, the penis became semi-stiff in her mouth. And then she heard Alvaro whisper, "Two other lovers, huh?"

She ran her lips up the shaft one last time and turned to face him. There was no disappointment or jealousy in his eyes, only...

"Ah, curious are you?"

Alvaro gave her a sheepish grin. "A bit. Well, maybe more than a bit."

She bent down and gave another soft kiss to his penis head, and then looked back to him. "What would you like to know?"

"Well..." Her lover squirmed for a moment. "Megan, even as your future husband, it's not right for me to invade such private matters."

"Oh, I don't mind. Ask what you want, and if you get too personal, I'll let you know." Megan gave him an encouraging smile and turned to lie beside him, resting her arm draped across him and petting his chest with her hand.

"Okay!" He smiled happily and petted her in silence for a moment. "Your first lover, how old were you? What was he like? How did he persuade you to have sex with him?"

Megan leaned over and bit his nipple hard. Alvaro jumped for an instant but otherwise remained unmoving, keeping his body vulnerable to Megan's teeth. As a reward for his trust, she licked and suckled him. She finally broke her suction lock and stared as his nipple in the dim light. Her teeth marks were still visible but as she intended, she had not broken the skin. "Wow Alvaro, you sure do ask personal questions!" 

"Sorry! Uh, too intimate?"

"Very! But I'll still tell you. It was the fall of 2042. I had just started my first-year of grad school at U.C. Davis. I had just turned eighteen. I was working too and feeling overwhelmed with the amount of studying I had to do. I was also in a very insecure position financially, on track for going deeply into debt with my student loans. I felt very exposed. My life was so different in Portland and the University of Washington. I was protected there. But at U.C. Davis I was on my own. And then my supervisor in the store where I worked asked me if I'd like to go out for dinner. He mentioned a really nice restaurant."

"Oh hell..."

"Yeah, I know. I was so naïve back then Alvaro. Back at Washington U. the morals on this were completely different. I thought it was a date! I had no idea I was semi-pledging to have sex with the man in return."

She paused for a moment and then said in a much softer voice, "It was a very nice meal, and then he took me back to his apartment. And then... Well, it wasn't exactly rape. I guess I sort of allowed what happened next." Megan and silent for a long moment and then sobbed once, and then again. The long-buried memories had unexpected power.

"Megan, please forgive me. I shouldn't have pried."

"No Alvaro, I'm actually glad you asked me. I want to confess a flaw within my character. After having sex with me, he saw the blood on my thighs and the way I was clutching myself. He realized he had broken a virgin, and... and he offered me extra money, in addition to the dinner. I... I was so deeply in need of money... And I took it. See? Not rape. I was a whore that night."

Alvaro gave her an angry frown. "Don't ever think that! You were violated and traumatized. Afterwards, in the following days, did you feel ashamed, or did you think that the sex was a good exchange for the money?"

Megan shuddered and bit her lip. "I remember. My shame was intense, nightmares... Okay, I get your point. I'm not a whore." She petted him for a while. "My second man..."

"Megan?" Alvaro whispered, his eyes openly pleading with her.

"No, it's okay Alvaro. I want to tell you. This one you should know about. Mansur was a fellow grad student from Saudi Arabia majoring in business administration. He was older than I was, about ten years my senior. We dated casually for almost a year. And then things got serious. I started wearing headscarves, started to learn his culture. We made love with each other. Mansur was disappointed the night he found out I wasn't a virgin, but afterwards he didn't seem to mind. We started having sex together often. And then..."

Alvaro petted her breast and kissed her. "And then?""

Megan sighed. "I couldn't adapt. I didn't mind wearing headscarves in public. I used colorful scarves at first, and then Mansur asked me to wear more traditional ones, black or gray. About a month after that I started wearing abayas, you know, the loose robes that hide everything? And then he asked me to wear the niqab. I had just a slit for my eyes, and I didn't like breathing through a veil. And then it was time for Mansur to return to his country. It was December of 2044. He asked me to marry him. Well, not exactly. He asked me if I wanted him to ask me to marry him. It was a rather strange conversation..."

A long moment of silence followed. Alvaro caressed Megan once and waited patiently for her to continue.

"We talked for days about Saudi Arabia, what my life would be like. It's gotten a lot more fundamentalist in the last few decades. I wouldn't be allowed to be alone with another man. I would need to wear a full burqa when I was in public. A woman could have acid thrown at her if her eyes are visible in public. I was horrified at the thought of forgetting and losing my vision. And I wouldn't be able to practice my profession. I'd be a housekeeper wife. And I'd have to convert to Islam, become a Muslim. And I... Oh, I just couldn't do it..."

"Hell Megan," whispered Alvaro. "No one likes to be controlled or manipulated into becoming someone they don't want to be."

"Oh, it wasn't that simple. Mansur wasn't a monster. He was a good man, had a sharp mind and a funny sense of humor. And he did a lot of thoughtful things for me..."

"Megan, he tried to manipulate you."

Megan frowned. "Somewhat. But it wasn't that black and white. It was a true dating relationship that lasted almost two years. I willingly tried to become what he wanted me to be, and he helped me financially. But our cultures just didn't blend well. And he didn't manipulate me for sex. I think I enjoyed it as much as he did, maybe even more so near the end. And I knew it. Mansur used to call me his nymphomaniac. So who was manipulating whom Alvaro?"

"Well..."

"My turn! I know that I'm the first girl you've ever fucked..."

"Megan please, such language!" He blushed and gave a shy laugh.

"...but perhaps I'm not the first girl you've kissed! Tell me Alvaro?"

He stared at her in amusement. "About my distinguished career in dating? Well, okay! There really isn't anything here." He collected his thoughts for a moment before starting his story.

"By the time I reached puberty and the hormones kicked in, I was a fish out of water with my peers. I started as an undergraduate at Madeira in the fall of 2036. I had barely turned twelve years old and my parents had just died the previous March. Trying to date the young women around me was the last thing on my mind. They were six years or more my senior and the few that I did know well treated me like a younger kid brother. Those were crazy times Megan! Over half our professors were dead from the Satan Bug and there was great uncertainty whether the college would continue."

"Yes, of course. The age difference must have been incredible." She petted him with great tenderness and affection. "It must have been very hard for you to socialize, especially at Princeton."

"Yes. I wound up being a bit of a loner. The States were sort of okay. Some of the professors there treated me as their child, or maybe I should say their grandchild." He stared at his fiancé for a long while. "Wife to be?"

"Yes?"

"Even then, back at the end of the 2030's, my ideas for meeting Madeira's energy needs were there. But I couldn't complete the work myself. I needed colleagues on my level. The government of Madeira spent a lot of resources to put me through grad school."

"Oh, I think they got their money's worth. Alvaro, it's okay. You don't have to tell me about your work now."

He nodded. "Okay. Anyway, I got back to Madeira just before I turned seventeen. I've been working with the Energy Department ever since."

"And occasionally kissing a pretty girl?"

"Well..." Alvaro blushed deeply. "There was one. The summer of 2044. There was a summer intern at my lab. I was turning twenty. She was about a year older. It was a bit awkward. As the director of the lab, I was three levels above her, but in terms of emotional maturity, she was by far my superior."

He was silent for a while and Megan petted him, her fingertips caressing his thighs teasingly close to his penis and sac. She nudged him by running the soft pad of a single fingertip lightly and slowly up the front ridgeline of his shaft. "Don't stop now!"

Alvaro shuddered with the pleasure of the slow sexual caress and then continued. "She was interested in me Megan. Her name was Elvira. She is an extremely gracious and beautiful person. I'd like to introduce you to her someday."

"Alvaro, the girl! Tell me what happened!"

"Oh, she rested her head on my shoulder in an elevator one day. We were alone, and for a few moments very secluded. I was so shocked. I was actually in physical contact with a girl! I pulled away and said something ridiculous."

"Something inappropriate? You weren't rude, were you?"

"Oh no, nothing like that. Something completely ridiculous, inappropriate only in the sense of being out-of-place for the gesture she had made. I think I complimented her on her test results or something. I was so nervous!"

"Oh, I get it. You really were shy, weren't you?"

"Extremely."

"But eventually you kissed her?"

"No. In hindsight, she dropped a few more hints that summer that she was still interested in me, but I was so naïve I didn't see them." Alvaro sighed. "She married two years later. She's expecting now, her first child, I think in another three months. I'm very happy for her. She really is an incredibly beautiful person." He sighed. "And that's it."

"That's it?" Megan blinked. "What do you mean, that's it?"

"What do you mean, what do I mean? Elvira was the only one. What else can I say?" 

"What?! Alvaro! I'm the first girl you've ever kissed?!"

Alvaro gulped and looked at her sheepishly and nodded. "Saturday night, May 11, 2047, by the door of your quad. I remember... how wonderful your body felt, how soft your lips were. I'll remember the moment forever."

"My gosh Alvaro..." Megan looked at him with wide eyes. "I never would have guessed. You weren't shy around me at all! In fact, you were charming! I remember feeling swept off my feet, and I had a very sexy dream about you that night. You were delightful, both in real life and in my dream!"

He grinned. "Well, I've been working very hard these last few years, pushing myself to be more sociable. But I think it was mostly you Megan. Your heart was so open and accepting, and you treated me as an equal. You were so beautiful in your dress. My desire for you overwhelmed my shyness."

Megan stared at her future husband for a long moment, and then she hugged him and started to cry. They held each other in tender affection for a while, and then the transformation took them again. Alvaro began to explore Megan's body with his eyes, nose, and mouth, and Megan lay obediently still, offering herself for inspection.

Alvaro began with her face, tracing the outline of her cheeks and mouth and nose and chin with his fingers. They gazed at each other while he petted her. "Such beautiful eyes you have Megan, pools of liquid green infinitely deep. It's so easy for me to get lost in them..."

He slowly covered her entire body with his mouth. Neck, shoulders, long lingering suckles at her breasts and his nose sniffing her nipples. Megan actually felt her fat and aroused nipple get sniffed up into a nostril. She took a sharp breath from the erotic sensation of her sensitive tip being embraced by his nose.

Ribs, arms, armpits... He licked deep into her armpits until she giggled uncontrollably and told him it was too ticklish to bear. He nodded and moved down to her feet, kissing and licking her toes, long strokes of his tongue, tasting the bottom of her feet, soft kisses on her ankles and calves. He lifted her legs and kissed the backs of her knees. He laid her legs back down and turned, slowly kissing her up her thighs to her hips. Megan was drifting in an ocean of sensual pleasure, pure and soft. And then Alvaro returned to her knees and began to kiss her up the insides of her thighs.

With her lover's head between her legs, Megan began to pant in sexual heat. Alvaro's nose and lips and tongue slowly drifted up to her vulva. She arched her hips and spread her legs wide to give him better access. His tongue began lapping her offered upturned pubis. He would start by running the length of her pink labia with his tongue, diving down into the vagina, then back up and pushing the tip of his tongue underneath her clitoral hood.

Megan was gasping and squirming. It felt as if someone were stimulating her labia and thighs with electric current. "Alvaro!" she cried out as her uterus went into a prolonged spasm, "What are you doing?" The exquisite lips and tongue left her labia and she whimpered at the loss.

"Cleaning you! Don't you like it?" he asked playfully.

Megan cried out in her sexual frustration, "Oh please, don't stop... please..."

"Dearest..." Alvaro whispered. He had no idea how closely he had driven his fiancé to orgasm. His lips returned to her sex, seeking her, finding her. Megan felt the tongue slide deep into her vagina, then lapping up and diving under the protective folds above. Alvaro's fingers gripped her pubic fur and he lifted up with a strong pull. Megan felt his hot breath on her clitoris and knew she was completely exposed. And then his lips and then his tongue and then his teeth found her.

Megan screamed as her orgasm took her, crying out incoherently as her body vibrated. She twisted her head from side to side, groaning and shuddering, the pleasure seemed beyond her human ability to accept, a white-hot spark of pure pleasure burning in the pit of her legs. And it seemed to last forever...

Megan finally drifted away from her cyclone of sexual release. She looked at Alvaro sleepily and muttered, "So you think you're inexperienced, huh?"

He smiled and cradled her in his arms. "But a fast learner with the right teacher."

"Uh huh..." She grinned and blinked her eyes, trying to stay awake. "I love you."

"I know. I love you too." 

"I know." Megan looked sleepily and the clock and then she collapsed, closing her eyes and letting her body become completely limp. The room was cool, but her body was hot and sweaty, flush in its after-sex. "Hmm," she muttered. "I probably need another shower."

"You smell great..." Alvaro kissed her check and sniffed her. He pulled a clean sheet and a blanket over her. "Here, take these covers. You'll want them later."

"Oh, I feel okay. I'm probably smelly too... sweaty... Hmm..."

"You smell great," he insisted. He bent his head and kissed her breasts and nipples, and then licked her armpit, lapping up a bit of her sweat. "Tasty too, a bit salty." There was absolutely no response, and he realized then she was falling asleep in his arms. He kissed her cheek tenderly. "Megan," he whispered, "my sweet wife, thank you so much for asking me."

She nodded and swooned in her sleepiness. "Just a few seconds till midnight. Marry me Alvaro?"

"I will."

She sighed deeply, rapidly losing all her thoughts. "Marry me Alvaro?"

"I will, I promise. My dear sweet wife," he whispered in reply. He petted her until her breathing turned deep and slow. He switched to English and whispered again, not expecting her to hear him in her sleep. "Aye Megan O'Connor, you're a bonnie lass!" 

The faintest mutter. "Love me Alvaro?" In her sleep, she had followed him into English.

"I will!"

Chapter 6. Revelations

Three months later.

Time: Sunday May 31, 2048 8:42 AM

It was late springtime in Funchal, and the sun was bright and halfway between the horizon and vertical in a cloudless eastern sky. Megan Lopes had been up since sunrise at 5 AM and had just returned to her apartment after attending a church service with her husband. She locked the door and decided to indulge herself with another shower, in spite of just taking one yesterday evening after returning from her honeymoon.




Backscatter



She washed quickly in the delightful hot and clean water. After a full year at her new island home, her mind would still sometimes compare the current luxury with what it was like to take a shower in Texas. But not today. She would start her new job at Madeira tomorrow, and her mind was much more agreeably engaged.

After she showered and changed into some loose clothing, she prepared a 10 AM brunch for two and then enjoyed reading a book and sunning herself on the corner balcony.

She had fallen in love with Alvaro's three-bedroom condo when she first saw it a year ago, and now she was co-owner. It was spacious and luxurious, very well appointed and perfectly located, adjacent both to Madeira University to the east and the prime downtown commercial district of Funchal to the west. The condominium complex was on oceanfront property, and the views of the Atlantic below, the garden campus to the east, and the mountains to the north were superb.

Megan wondered if her fiancé would want to go for a stroll on the oceanfront walkways after brunch. The rest of today was the last big block of free time on their schedules until next weekend. She looked at the clock as she sipped her ice tea. The time was already after 10 AM and it was unusual for Alvaro to be late, even by a few minutes.

Megan closed her eyes and thought that her future life now appeared so idyllic, she should start to worry. Real life just doesn't get and stay this good. She had completed her one-year commitment to Porto Santo and had married her true love on May 23rd. Their honeymoon had been be one glorious week of frolic in a secluded mountain cabin.

Megan was somewhat surprised on March 1st, the day after Alvaro accepted her proposal, when he suggested they return to being celibate until after the wedding. But now she was so glad he did. The wait seemed very long, and there were times during the engagement Megan felt physically frustrated and impatient for sex with her future husband. But the pent up impatience caused the honeymoon to be intensely erotic, their sex together explosive. She was very glad they had waited.

And now they were back at the capital. Megan thought she had a perfect career before her. She would work even-months at Madeira in the farm areas at the foothills of the mountains, and odd-months at her old job at Porto Santo. As much as possible, Alvaro would work in a second office at the Porto Santo energy complex and live with her even during the odd-months.

There was a distinctive knock on the door which Megan recognized as Alvaro politely announcing his presence, and then he let himself in. "Hello dearest," he called out. "Having a nice day?" He saw the dining table by the bay windows laid out with a fine assortment of food. "Ah, looks good!"

They kissed and sat down and chatted about their friends while they ate. Alvaro had a small envelope in his pocket that he had brought with him, and he laid it on the table by his side as they finished their meal. Megan eyed it with a raised eyebrow. "Is that what I think it is?"

Alvaro nodded. "Once I hand it to you, you're legally responsible for its safekeeping. I'm required to review the rules with you."

"Okay. I can take it off and place it beside me when I shower or sleep or get sexy with you, but it never leaves my immediate presence. Never. I go swimming, it swims with me. I get married again, it goes under my wedding dress."

"Oh, you're in a playful mood this morning! Pray continue."

"And if I can't find it, there is a thirty-second rule for searching for it. Then I contact Energy Security immediately, no exceptions. Only afterwards do I continue my search."

Her husband nodded. "In all seriousness Megan, don't be ashamed about calling in and finding it three minutes later. I've had it happen to me a few times. Just follow the rules, even if it's your tenth call of the day." He sighed. "It's not that much of a burden in practice. You get used to it after a while." He slid the envelope over to her.

"Oh, I don't mind. The policy at Ft. Hood wasn't much different." Megan opened the envelope and took out the security badge and stared at her new photo ID. A large shimmering holographic E had been added, and the entire badge was a medium shade of green. "Well, as Kermit the Frog once said: It's great to be green!"

Alvaro looked puzzled. "Kermit the Frog?"

"A puppet character from long ago. I saw him as a young child, when there was still public television in the U.S."

"Oh."

Megan unclipped her current citizen ID with a white background and replaced it with the new badge. "Should I just destroy the old one?"

"No. Hand it in to building security downstairs. They're authorized to document receiving and destroying a standard citizen badge."

"Okay. And this new one will get me into the green-badge areas?"

"Yep. The guards will run your ID through the system the first time through, but once they get to know you, just a personal inspection of your badge and face will do."

"Okay." She paused for a moment. "This might actually help me in my job on Porto Santo. There are stables at the Energy Department site. Now I might be able to treat a horse there in an emergency."

"I raised that point to the committee handling your case more than six months ago. It did generate some sympathy."

"But not enough."

"No. I should have issued my ultimatum to Congress last year."

"Oh Alvaro, I don't know. Who knows how that might have played out before I had built up my reputation as a useful and loyal citizen? Let's just be thankful I have my green clearance now. Which means," she added with a meaningful smile, "that you can finally tell me about your job!"

"Yes. Not here of course. But I thought I might show you my office today."

Megan nodded and got up from the table and offered her husband her hand. "Let's go."

It was short drive in their hydrogen / electric hybid car but also a steep one. After driving about thirty minutes on winding roads, they were about nine kilometers from their condo and also 1500 meters higher. They found the research area of Madeira's energy complex deserted, though the greater site was still very well populated by security and operations personnel.

Her husband's office in the research building was spacious and secluded, overlooking a small inner courtyard. Megan blinked when she saw the private sleeping area. "I remember something from our Ft. Hood date. I asked you where you lived, and you looked a little pained before you mentioned your condo in Funchal. That was one of your misdirections, wasn't it? This was the place you considered home."

Alvaro nodded. "Yes. Thank God the times for lies are over." He walked over to a safe and opened it and pulled from the bottom something that looked like an oversized flashlight. "I've thought a lot about how to explain this to you. I decided to start with a demo." He handed the device to his wife with a playful grin on his face.

Megan hefted it. "Looks like a heavy-duty flashlight. Wow, it's very heavy. Four D-cells inside?"

Alvaro shook his head no. "This device contains our first two prototypes. Megan, allow me to officially introduce you to Coke and Golem."

"Prototype of what?" The continued playful smile from Alvaro was the only answer she got. Megan shrugged. "Okay. So you named the flashlight Coke and Golem?"

"Sure. Why not?"

"Oh, I don't know... Cute names I guess. Where did they come from?"

"From two prototype computers, way back in the last century. I'll tell you the story sometime."

"Yeah, I'd like to hear it." Megan examined the heavy device for a moment. "Can I turn it on?"

"Sure. It's a fully functioning flashlight."

She switched it on and shined a bright beam around the room. It was easily visible, even with the windows and the sunlit courtyard outside. "Wow, a huge amount of light, more than I was expecting."

"Tunable up to about 75 Watts from Golem. The reason it's so bright is that we're using high efficiency white diodes. Examine the device more closely."

"Okay." A moment passed. "I must admit, it's very heavy. I think I also feel a slight resistance when I try to turn it. Is there a gyroscope in this thing?"

"Excellent guess Megan. In reality, there are two high-precision turbines inside, running the length of the cylinder."

"Turbines?" Megan frowned. "Husband, that makes no sense. You use a turbine to convert an external source of momentum into rotational energy. But this flashlight is self-contained." She played another moment with the device. "The bottom can be unscrewed. May I?"

Her husband nodded. Megan unscrewed a cap and then stared in fascination at the very familiar pattern of round holes. Out the back end of the cylinder was a single, ordinary looking Madeira wall outlet. Megan looked up at Alvaro. "Is this what I think it is?"

Another nod. "Yes, the outlet is courtesy of Coke, European and Madeira standard, 230 volts, 50 Hertz, nice sine waves."

Megan raised her eyebrows but said nothing. She looked around and saw the room's air conditioner at a window. She paused for a moment to think.

The outside temperature was about 24C, about as warm as it ever got here in the mountains. The room felt quite comfortable. There was no need for air conditioning. Still... She walked over to the unit and considered. The air-conditioner was unplugged, its cord lying tucked invitingly against the wall.

It was a large unit and with Madeira's gentle climate easily capable of cooling the large office. Megan knelt and plugged the cord into the cylinder's socket and, hearing no objection from Alvaro, turned the unit on.

It started up immediately. Megan held her hand near the vent until she felt a large amount of very cold air blowing into the room. She turned to her husband with a very puzzled look. "I'm assuming this isn't a cheap trick, that there isn't another power source for the AC."

"No. I give you my word. Reality here is just as it appears."

Megan nodded and laid the heavy device on the floor by the AC. She then stood up. "This is very, very impressive. What's the load on the flashlight?"

"You're running the compressor on high. I would guess about five Amps."

"And what's the maximum load this wondrous flashlight can handle?"

"Thirty-four Amps usable, 7.8 kW. Coke also uses about fifteen milliamps from Golem to start itself."

"Start itself?" Megan frowned and stared at the setup for a moment. "I'm flabbergasted, I really am. I know this isn't a SNAP generator. It's cool to the touch, and generating a hundred times the power of what a SNAP this size could do. What kind of batteries can deliver this kind of performance in such a small package?" She looked at the clock in the room. "I should have timed this of course, but I'm guessing at least two minutes. Every additional second makes this more and more impressive."

She reached for the flashlight to hold it again. "May I?"

"Sure. It's safe."

She nodded and picked up the flashlight. It was more difficult now to change its alignment. "Wow. I still hear nothing, but the gyroscope must be really spinning now! And the flashlight is not getting warm at all. In fact, if feels even cooler now than it did before. Yes, definitely, I can feel it pulling the heat right out of my hand. Very strange." megan blinked. Alvaro's earlier words had finally sunk in. "7.8 kilowatts?! I could run my house on this?!"

"That's right. And not a gyroscope Megan, a turbine. It's rated at 2500 RPM, and probably spinning about 350 RPM now."

"Yes, you mentioned that. Alvaro, that makes no sense. The flashlight is not coupled to an external source of momentum. Tell me the punch line!"

"Punch line?"

"How long can these miraculous batteries run the AC?"

"There's no time limit. The AC will run for hours, weeks, years. Eventually it will break, but it won't stop from a lack of power."

Megan grimaced. She was watching her husband's eyes and saw his complete sincerity. "Oh no..." she whimpered, almost crying. She felt wobbly and placed the device back on the floor. "May I sit down?"

"Oh gosh yes! Sorry Megan!" A few seconds later they were sitting on a nearby couch.

She felt better after a moment. She shrugged and frowned. "Perpetual motion Alvaro?"

"It does give that appearance, doesn't it? But the energy and momentum of the universe are being conserved. The flashlight is running on dark energy."

Megan gave a small explosive laugh that sounded like a hiccup. "I know a bit of the concept. I've tried to understand your papers the best I could. That's the cosmological force that's pushing the universe apart."

"Pulling the universe apart. Dark energy has a positive energy density but exerts a negative pressure."

"What's a negative pressure?"

"A pressure that's less than zero, a pressure that pulls things apart and expands them, just as a positive pressure will crush things, cause something to collapse."

"Oh... Okay, makes sense I guess. But isn't dark energy too weak to be measured? In the laboratory I mean."

"Normally, yeah. My doctoral thesis implies a way to make a background measurement very accurately. The first time I did that was even earlier, back in the fall of 2037, two years before I went to Princeton. To three significant digits, the cosmic background pressure of dark energy is negative 5.84E-10 Newtons per square meter. When we try to measure more precisely, we see variations, great ripples in the dark energy of the universe."

Megan was silent for a moment. "I feel as if I'm standing in a falling elevator, and it's about to fall even faster... So, about half of a billionth of a Pascal, okay. And except for the ripples it's uniform, right? Pulling out in all directions, right?"

"Yes, ordinarily."

Megan tried to make a joke. "And what you've done is something out of the ordinary."

Alvaro tried to respond in humor. "Excellent Megan! Brilliant! I knew there was some clever reason I married you!"

She managed to give him a small smile back. "Uh huh. So tell me, what have you done?"

"There's a way to create a lens, a negative energy resonance that has an incredible focusing ability with dark energy. We can focus half a spherical surface of dark pressure down to a very small area at the center of the sphere. It creates an unbalanced pull at the center, a strong one if the sphere is large enough."

"And the flashlight is at the center of this resonance?"

He nodded in approval.

"How big is the sphere?"

"Golem's radius is 300 microseconds times the speed of light. The outside lens is created with some very unusual light within the device. The radius of the Golem's sphere is 90 km. We have a 94.4% efficiency in focusing the dark pressure of two opposite hemispheres. The result is a net force of fourteen Newtons for each hemisphere."

Alvaro gestured to the device. "Two hemispheres of net force are phased and locked to the opposite blades of a tiny turbine that's vacuum sealed and magnetically suspended inside the cylinder. The power delivered to the turbine is the pulling force of twenty-eight Newtons times the velocity of the turbine blade. That's Golem. Coke has a ten times bigger radius, and hence a hundred times the power."

"Alvaro! What you're saying is ridiculous!"

"Huh? Why do you say that?"

"Well, for the sake of argument, I'll give you the point of focusing a big pulling force. But why isn't the force pulling the shingles off the roof?"

Alvaro blinked. "Because that's not where the receptor for the resonance is. It's not like a magnifying glass with sunlight Megan. That's not how dark energy works."

Megan struggled for a moment and then took a deep breath. "Okay. I surrender. The AC is still running. I withdraw my objection and I'll try not to make another. Can you tell me, how do you focus dark energy?"

"With a packed rainbow inside the flashlight. That's my name for a large scale quantum resonance phenomenon make out of virtual packed light. I take a super-continuum white laser, pack the coherent wave front, and then let the beam chromatically split and resonate and self-organize into a packed rainbow."

Megan stared at her husband with blank eyes, showing him he had lost her.

Alvaro took a deep breath. "I know these are a lot of unfamiliar concepts, but there's no other way to explain it. In normal light, the density in the wave front goes from zero to some positive maximum in amplitude and energy density."

"Uh, okay. You've finally said something I think I understand."

"In packed light, the wave front is squeezed. Peak amplitude is increased, but total energy remains the same. The result is small regions of negative energy density in between the peak amplitudes."

"Stop! I think I can understand negative pressure, a pull instead of a push. But how can you have a negative energy density?"

"Yeah, I know. It's there in the math of the quantum mechanics and the singularity mechanics. I don't see it either, in terms of having a visual model to explain the effect. But it's real. It's there in the math and the phenomenon is real."

"But..."

"Yes?"

"Alvaro, I still don't get it! If you're focusing a force, why doesn't it pull on things besides your turbine blades?"

"Because that's not where the resonance receptor is. Megan, you have to give up some very intuitive but wrong models of what force and quanta are. Light is a prime example." Alvaro looked up at the ceiling light and held his hand under its light. Then he held his other hand above the first and caused a shadow.

"See this shadow? Right now Madeira Power & Light is pumping energy into the electron distribution in the light bulb filament above me. The shadow on my lower hand gives the appearance that the light is streaming from the bulb and moving through the air and getting blocked by my right hand so it doesn't hit my left."

Megan stared at him. "Are you saying that's not what's happening?"

"Exactly! Appearances can be very deceiving! What's really happening is that there is a photon-electron interaction, a photonic emission in the bulb, and then a very short time later another photon-electron interaction, a photonic scatter, on the surface of my top hand, and then even later, a third interaction, an absorption of the photon by an electron getting a kick of energy in the retina of my eye. And in between the three interactions, the photon is nowhere at all,"

"Uh, what?"

"With a few hours, I could go downstairs to the dark energy labs and build a Max-Zender interferometer on an optical bench. I could run a simple photonic experiment and prove this to you. Shadows might make it seem that photons move through the air, but you'll never explain how a rainbow works with a model like that. You'll never explain quantum tunneling, never explain quantum entanglement, never explain how a laser works. You'll never explain how a diffraction grating works with a model of light moving from one place to another. Megan, there are just too many real physical phenomena where that model breaks down! Light doesn't move, not in a kinetic sense, it doesn't follow equations of motion. Light follows the principle of least action. In between the interactions, the photons and the dark energy are nowhere at all. That's the way the universe operates. The quantum and singularity physics demand it!"

Megan paused for a long moment. "I guess I'm dimly following some of this. It's quantum magic, huh?"

He nodded and added, "There's another phenomenon with light called Newton's Rings. It has to do with the partial reflection of light on glass. The reflection disappears if the glass thickness is an integer number of wavelengths of the light, due to quantum destructive interference. The effect drove Sir Isaac crazy, and for good reason. Does the reflection come from the front surface of the glass? No. From the back surface? No. The reflection doesn't really come from anywhere, because the light itself is obeying the principle of least action, not equations of motion. You can never explain Newton Rings with a model of light moving through the air and glass."