Analog SFF, November 2005 by Dell Magazine Authors

Author:Dell Magazine Authors
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science Fiction
Publisher: Dell Magazines
Published: 2010-12-15T07:07:18.584000+00:00

* * *

Novelette: The Case of the Contumacious Qubit by Thomas R. Dulski

You never know where a purely routine task may lead—especially if you get mixed up with someone like Baker!

I can't say that I was overjoyed at forced retirement at 59 1/2 years of age. I had given nearly three decades of reasonably dedicated service to the research laboratory of Monash Chemical, a small-cap niche-market manufacturer of bulk specialty chemicals. Over that span I'd obtained a few patents and published some technical articles; I had even seen some of my work make a sizeable, albeit short-lived, profit for the company. True, I had had to endure an onerous burden of lab politics, corporate policy fads, and humiliating performance appraisals by fatuous, and often captious, young MBAs. But the work had been interesting for the most part, and I had fully expected to continue there until mandatory retirement at age 70.

But it was not to be. The world economy had once again yielded to unseen forces and cloaked interests and the general call was for another up-tick to even higher levels of productivity—read: work force reductions.

And so there I was in suburban Philadelphia with rather more time on my hands than I was accustomed to, and with a bit more marital togetherness than either my wife or I were fully comfortable with. Marcia had been a good deal more shocked by this development than I. And now that the initial reaction had subsided she had taken to leaving the newspaper open to the job listings. While I explained to her that I didn't feel particularly challenged by an opportunity to collect shopping carts in a strip mall parking lot, the objection did not seem to impress her. My pension was not lordly, but we were hardly in desperate straits. Yet Marcia rarely missed an occasion to point out some octogenarian delivering newspapers.

I was paging through a copy of Consulting for Dimwits and musing over my plight one morning when the phone rang. It was a fellow named Carstairs that I knew from professional society meetings. It seemed that he was an organizer for a local student science fair in New Jersey. The event was to be held at a small college in a few days time and they were short of judges. Word had gotten to him that I had recently been shown the door at Monash and would I consider coming up for a day or two to judge the senior chemistry exhibits? It was a bit of a drive, but I was feeling the need for lebensraum at this point so I rather hastily accepted.

The following Monday morning, throwing together a one-suiter of assorted clothes, I announced to Marcia that I'd made some professional contacts about a consulting assignment and would be out of town for a few days. I'd take the Sentra and leave her the van.

I used my AARP card to obtain a reasonable rate at a clean but modest motel near Ptolard University. The soda

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.