Where it all Begins - Part 5

"Stay here and watch me, Lieutenant," she said and passed me the datapad. "I'm going to have a closer look." I started to say something, but Dr. Halsey walked away, then half jogged across the painted lines of hopscotch squares on the playground. A breeze caught her sun-dress and she had to clutch the hem with one hand, grabbing the brim of her straw hat with the other. She slowed to a trot and halted four meters from the base of the hill. The children stopped and turned.

"You're in trouble," one boy said and pushed Number 117. He shoved the boy back and then looked Dr. Halsey squarely in the eyes. The other children looked away; some wore embarrassed smirks, and a few slowly backed off.

But 117, however, stood there defiantly. He was either confident that Halsey wasn't going to punish him - or he simply wasn't afraid. When I started to walk closer to the two of them, I saw that the boy had a bruise on his cheek, the knees of his pants were torn and that his lips were cracked. Halsey took another three steps forward, causing several of the other children to take three steps back.

I faintly heard the doctor ask, "Can I speak with you, please?" while she continued to stare at the boy. He finally broke eye contact and shrugged, before lumbering down the hill. The other children giggled and made some noises; one even tossed a pebble at him. Number 117 ignored them all.

Halsey lead the boy to the edge of the nearby sandpit and stopped. "What's your name?" she asked.

"I'm John," he said. The boy held out his hand.

Doctor Halsey took the hand and she seemed surprised by his grip. "It's very nice to meet you," she said before kneeling to get till she was level with the boy. "I wanted to ask you what you were doing?"

"Winning" the boy replied.

Dr. Halsey smiled at that. It seemed that the subject was unafraid of her. "You like games," she said. "So do I."

He sighed. "Yeah, but they made me play chess last week. That got boring. It's too easy to win." He took a quick breath. "Or - can we play gravball? They don't let me play gravball anymore, but maybe if you tell them it's okay?"

"I have a different game I want you to try," she told him. "Look." She reached into her purse and brought out a metal disk. She turned it over and it gleamed in the sum. "People used coins like this for currency a long time ago, when Earth was the only planet we lived on."

The boy fixed his eyes on the object. He reached for it.

Dr. Halsey moved it away, continuing to flip it between her thumb and index finger. "Each side is different. Do you see? One has the face of a man with long hair. The other side has a bird, called an eagle, and it's holding - "

"Arrows," John said.

"Yes. Good." The boy's eyesight must be exceptional to see such detail so far away. "We'll use this coin in our game. If you win you can keep it."

John tore his gaze from the coin and looked at her again, squinted then said, "Okay. I always win, though. That's why they won't let me play gravball anymore."

"I'm sure you do."

"What's the game?"

"It's very simple. I toss the coin like this." She flicked her wrist, snapped her thumb, and the coin arced, spinning into the air, and landed in the sand. "Next time, though, before it lands, I want you to tell me if it will fall with the face of the man showing or with the eagle holding the arrows."

"I got it." John tensed, bent his knees, and then his eyes seemed to lose their focus on her and the coin.

Dr. Halsey picked up the quarter. "Ready?" John gave a slight nod. She tossed it, making sure there was plenty of spin.

John's eyes watched it with that strange distant gaze. He tracked it as it went up, and then down toward the ground - his hand snapped out and snatched the quarter out of the air.

He held up his closed hand. "Eagle!" he shouted.

She tentatively reached for his hand and peeled open the tiny fist. The quarter lay in his play; the eagle shining in the orange sun.

I stared in surprise, almost dropping the datapad. 'Did he see which side it was before grabbing it? Did he just get lucky? Or did he ... No there was no way he reached out his hand to grab the side he wanted.' I thought in doubt at how he accomplished that.

John retracted his hand. "I get to keep it right? That's what you said." He asked Halsey.

"Yes, you can keep it, John." She smiled at him - then stopped. I saw something flash through her eyes. I wondered if I saw her face correctly. For a second it almost looked like, she was regretting something.

"Can we play again?" asked John.

Dr. Halsey stood and took a step back. "That was the only one I had, I'm afraid. I have to leave now," she told him. "Go back and play with your friends."

"Thanks," He ran back, shouting to the other boys, "Look!"

Dr. Halsey strode back towards me. The sun was reflecting off the asphalt, causing the temperature to rise. She stepped under the canvas swing and asked me, "Tell me you recorded that."

I handed her the datapad with a puzzled look. "Yes. What was it all about?"

Dr. Halsey checked the recording and then sent a copy ahead to Toran on the Han for safekeeping. "We screen theses subjects for certain genetic markers," she said. "Strength, agility, even predispositions for aggression and intellect. But we couldn't remote test for everything. We don't test for luck.

"Luck?" I asked. "You believe in luck, Doctor?"

"Of course not," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. "But we have one hundred and fifty test subjects to consider, and facilities and funding for only half that number. It's a simple mathematical elimination, Lieutenant. That child was one of the lucky ones - either that or he is extraordinarily fast. Either way, he's in."

"I don't understand," I say as I started to fiddle with the pipe I carried in my pocket.

"I hope that continues, Lieutenant," Dr. Halsey replied quietly. "For your sake, I hope you never understand what we're doing."

She looked one last time at Number 117 - at John. I followed her eyes. He was having so much fun, running, and laughing. When I looked at Dr. Halsey's expression, I became extremely confused. She looked like a commander sending off men on a mission . . . more specifically a suicide mission.

A voice interrupted my musing. It was a young girl. The same one that I heard the laughter from. I whipped my head around.

"Are you sure that it has to be done?" a young-looking girl said. "Doctor Halsey?"