On Broken Wings (49 page)

Morrison stared at her. Svenson was afraid to speak.

"So Superman couldn't do it, but Supergirl's going to swoop in and save the day." Arkham was shaking his head as if he hadn't expected even a Simulation engineer to make so foolish a statement.

"Got a better idea, Terry?" Christine snarled. The three men sat up straight.

"I've got a real good idea that you're grandstanding, toots, 'cause no one in his right mind could expect you to pull it off." Arkham's sneer carried decades of contempt. "No matter what comes out of this, even if I and my project go down in fucking
flames
, you'll be remembered for your heroic gesture in a lost cause."

Christine's face lit with fury. Morrison headed off her riposte.

"Can it, Terry, you're out of line. Chris, I hate to say it, but he's right. You don't have a chance, not if you were to put in a twenty-four hour shift from now till the demo."

Christine stood, eyes blazing.

"Enough of this. Rolf and I are going back to my cubicle right now, and we're going to get started. By the end of the day -- I mean, by midnight -- you'll have a list of the functionality we think we can restore by demo time. Then it will be your job to start cutting back the demo to miss the missing parts. If anyone comes up with a better plan, you know where we'll be." She turned to Svenson. "Come on, Rolf. We've got work."

Svenson rose and followed Christine out of Morrison's office. Morrison appeared paralyzed. Terry Arkham's face was contorted in frustration and anger, as if the effort Christine had just promised were the result he'd wanted to avoid.

When Morrison's door had closed behind him, Christine said, "Get all the system block diagrams and any data-flow diagrams we saved from the initial pitch to the customer. I'm going to start sketching out the approach."

Svenson nodded. "Okay, Chris."

She clasped his upper arm and squeezed. The strength of her grip surprised him. "We're going to do it, Rolf. I promise you we will."

"I believe you." The strange thing was that he did, but he was more afraid than ever.

***

"Are you going to take that from her?" Arkham demanded.

Morrison turned toward the team leader.

"Take what, Terry? An all-stops-out effort when we need it most?"

Arkham sputtered.

"Can it, Terry. She might not be able to do it. Myself, I don't think she can. But she's going to try. And you've got a
problem
with that? When it's your project and your future on the line? What am I missing here?"

The team leader collected himself and fell silent. Morrison looked at his watch. Resolve built inside him. "It's three-fifteen. You've got work to do, too. Go review your demo plan, find ways to drop pieces if you can, reduce the functionality you'll need from the simulator, but without making it an arm-waving exercise. Bring me a draft by seven." Morrison pulled out his wallet and riffled through his credit cards. "We'll have dinner in here."

"You're ordering dinner in for us?"

Morrison nodded. "From the best restaurant I can find that will deliver. They're putting it all on the line for us, Terry. Don't you think a little appreciation is in order?" He picked up the phone and started to dial. "I wonder what Boomer likes to eat?"

***

Morrison summoned them back to his office at seven PM precisely. The engineers arrived to find his conference table covered by a white tablecloth, with four place settings upon it. Fresh green salads and generous portions of coq au vin with side dishes of rice pilaf and roasted zucchini awaited them. A large loaf of fresh French bread and a salver of butter stood at the center. Cans of soda stood incongruously next to the four gourmet meals.

Morrison shrugged and grinned. "Federal contractor. No alcohol allowed, remember?"

For the first time that day, Rolf Svenson laughed. "You did okay, Boss. Take it from me. Where'd you get all this?"

"Grucci's Gardens."

"Oh, boy," breathed Christine.

They finished their meals before anyone spoke.

"How does it look?" Morrison asked.

Svenson looked toward Christine, and she nodded at him. "It's possible, Roger. It'll be thirteen days of hell, but we can do it, given that there are no further acts of God to cope with." He sipped at his cola. "I had private copies of all the early data-flow diagrams, they're still applicable, and Chris has convinced me that we can code from them. Can you shield us while we do it?"

The project director looked uneasy. "What do you mean?"

"We can't afford any distractions. This is going to require perfect concentration for every second of the next thirteen days."

"Oh." Morrison relaxed. "That's a given. You really think you can do it? I shouldn't start backing and filling with the customer, just in case?"

"We can do it," said Christine. She wiped her mouth and pushed away her plate. "That was delicious, Roger. Thank you."

"De nada, cutie." The endearment plainly startled Christine. She and Morrison grinned at one another. Svenson's hopes rose inside him.

If we survive this, it could wind up being the best thing that's ever happened to this department.

"What about your end, Terry?"

"Well, I can't cut a lot out of the demo." The Tactical team leader gestured his helplessness. "The customer asked for most of it, and I have two hours to fill. Realistically, there are only about three minor features I can afford to pass over. If I try that with any of the major stuff, the customer will simply ask to see it, and we'll be worse off than before."

Svenson's neck hair prickled at Arkham's unconcern. Apparently, Morrison was similarly affected.

"Are you fully on board with us, Terry? This is for your benefit, you know."

Arkham recognized the warning shot. "Of course, Roger, but you can't expect me to eviscerate -- "

"I
do
expect you to do whatever you can short of perjury to make this work out. And I expect you to go over your demo plan a second time, tonight, and squeeze more out of it than two or three minor features. There are a lot of ways to fill two hours. If you need help, say so."

Morrison's tone was soft, but the words and his countenance were not. The Tactical software team leader turned pale.

Terry didn't expect that. Roger's been in his corner for so long, he's forgotten what it's like not to get automatic approval for all his whims.

"Shit, Roger, you know I'll give it my best." It was little short of a whine.

The project director let that monitory gaze rest on Arkham a moment longer, then pushed his chair back from the table, stood and rubbed his midsection.

"Your meals are on me until this is over, gang. Lunch at one, dinner at seven. Be here on time, because it's all going to be hot and tasty." He began to clear the table.

"I have to go out and get something for Boomer," Christine said.

Morrison grinned. "No, you don't." He reached under the table and picked up a foil bag that had lain there unseen.

"What's in there?"

Morrison mooed.

Svenson erupted in laughter.

***

"So how do we do this, Chris? You're the one with all the confidence."

She shrugged. "We just do it, that's all. You've got the requirements and the high-level design right there. There's enough of the detailed design in the data-flow diagrams that I can interpolate the rest as I go." She glanced down at Boomer. The Newfoundland was licking his chops, the very portrait of canine contentment. "I'd better bring in a bag of his regular dog food. I don't want him to get used to Grucci's finest."

Svenson grinned. "Sounds right to me. Okay, where and when do we start? Do you want to take the rest of the night off?"

"Hell, no. We go till we drop. Pull the executive synopsis out of that pile and give it here."

He did. She studied the diagram and the few paragraphs of accompanying prose for a few seconds, then turned toward her monitor and laid the document next to her keyboard.

"Rolf, forgive me for saying this, but I think we'll have our best chance if I do all the coding and you just help me stay organized. Is that okay?"

Svenson swallowed hard. "Sure, Chris. I was about to suggest it myself."

She continued to face the monitor, but he saw the edge of her grin.

"Bullshit, Bubba. But I love you for it."

She started to type.

***

Terry Arkham returned to his cubicle in a complete internal panic. He stared at the cover page of the demo plan lying on his desk, started to reach for it, then dropped his hand to his lap. Waves of fear shot through his body like currents of icewater.

They thought they could do it.

Morrison was solidly behind them.

He'd put his own nuts in a vise.

He had to come up with something quickly, or else.

====

Chapter
45

Christine's days became a blurred continuum of coding and testing and fixing problems and testing and coding some more. At eight each morning, she and Rolf sat down to confront a fresh insurmountable hurdle. By midnight each night they had surmounted it. Sometimes they even finished early.

Four days had seen about a third of the work come and go. Rolf, who had been so dubious and tentative on Monday, had caught the fever from her. They were going to do it. He would gather the necessary materials and outline the day's challenge. She would write the code, mind and fingers pumping so furiously that the air around her seemed to hum. He would test it, ensuring that she missed nothing.

Rolf did more than that. He brought coffee. He walked Boomer. He talked to her when she needed to be distracted. He confronted would-be visitors at the cubicle door and threatened them with death if they should puncture her trance. He probably prayed.

They only saw Arkham and Morrison at meals, which also served as their status sessions. Morrison simply tried to stay abreast, and did whatever he had to do to keep the remainder of the world off their backs. He did not ask them a second time about whether to prepare a fallback position. His understated support and unspoken faith in them was a source of sustenance they could not have imagined.

It wasn't clear what Arkham was doing. He had less to say at each encounter. If Morrison was working with him in background to shore up the demo plan, neither gave any sign.

Dick Orloff, the only person outside their working group who knew of the disaster, joined them for Friday's dinner meeting. Over a magnificent platter of shrimp Creole, Morrison asked for the odds for the first time since their Monday afternoon conference. Christine looked to Svenson, Svenson said, "Three to one in favor, maybe better," and Morrison smiled. It wasn't his usual toothy mask. It was a shy smile, and curiously boyish. He leaned back in his chair, rubbed at his chin, and said offhandedly that he hadn't felt this good in twenty years. Soon everyone was giggling and grinning from ear to ear, except for Terry Arkham.

***

Svenson was about to follow Christine back to her cubicle for their evening labors when a tug on his arm halted him.

"Whoa, Sven. Got a minute to come talk to me?"

Arkham was looking up at him with concern. Christine had stopped and stood watching them with eyebrows raised.

"Go ahead, Chris, I'll be there in a second." She continued on. He turned to Arkham. "What is it, Terry?"

The Tactical team leader put a finger to his lips, then motioned to Svenson to accompany him. They went to Arkham's cubicle and took seats.

Arkham picked up the demo plan and started to leaf through it. "This isn't going too well, Rolf."

"You don't think we can do it?"

"No, I don't think I can do it." He waved the demo plan. "I can't cut this thing back. Roger has tried to help, but he hasn't found anything I didn't already think of. We're going to need every feature you planned to implement in the first place."

Svenson relaxed. "Oh, okay."

Arkham's gaze became sharp. "I thought you were dropping about fifteen percent of the working parts."

"Chris doesn't think we have to."

" 'Chris doesn't think we have to?' And what does the team leader for Simulation Software think, or do I have to submit a special requisition form for that?"

He's angry. Angry that we're going to pull it off!

"I think Chris is the greatest thing since bottled beer, and she has yet to be wrong." Svenson permitted himself a smile, relishing the insolence of it in the face of their calamity. "So I'm going along with her. Don't misunderstand me, Terry. There still won't be a real-time display or any automatic controls. You don't need those, do you?"

"No...no." Arkham turned away, his mouth working.

"Terry, I need to know what your problem is. You've been the voice of doom on this effort since you heard about the disk fault. If I didn't know better, I'd say you wanted us to fail. That can't be, right? So there's got to be something else. If you're pissed at me about something and you've been storing it up, here's your chance to hit me with it. I promise to listen calmly. If I can make it right, I will."