that test was?”
“BDNF. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor. Luke said that was the marker.”
“Yes, he’s a smart boy, all right. Very smart. Everyone involved now wishes they’d left him alone. His BDNF wasn’t even that high.”
“I imagine Luke also wishes you’d left him alone. And his parents. Now why don’t you go ahead and say your piece.”
“All right. There were conferences both before and after the Second World War ended. If you remember any of your twentieth-century history, you’ll know about some of them.”
“I know about Yalta,” Tim said. “Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin got together to basically carve up the world.”
“Yes, that’s the famous one, but the most important meeting took place in Rio de Janeiro, and no government was involved . . . unless you want to call the group that met—and their successors down through the years—a kind of shadow government. They—we—knew about the German children, and set about finding more. By 1950 we understood the usefulness of BDNF. Institutes were set up, one by one, in isolated locations. Techniques were refined. They have been in place for over seventy years, and by our count, they have saved the world from nuclear holocaust over five hundred times.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Tim said harshly. “A joke.”
“It’s not. Let me give you one example. At the time that the children revolted at the Institute in Maine—a revolt that spread like a virus to all the other Institutes—they had begun working to cause the suicide of an evangelist named Paul Westin. Thanks to Luke Ellis, that man still lives. Ten years from now, he will become a close associate of a Christian gentleman who will become America’s Secretary of Defense. Westin will convince the Secretary that war is imminent, the Secretary will convince the President, and that will eventually result in a preemptive nuclear strike. Only a single missile, but it could start all the dominoes falling. That part is outside our range of prediction.”
“You couldn’t possibly know a thing like that.”
“How do you think we picked our targets, Mr. Jamieson? Out of a hat?”
“Telepathy, I suppose.”
Mr. Smith looked like a patient teacher with a slow pupil. “TKs move objects and TPs read thoughts, but neither of them are able to read the future.” He drew out his cigarettes again. “Sure you won’t have one?”
Tim shook his head.
Smith lit up. “Children such as Luke Ellis and Kalisha Benson are rare, but there are other people who are rarer still. More precious than the most precious metal. And the best thing about them? Their talents don’t fade with age or destroy the minds of the users.”
Tim caught movement in the corner of his eye, and turned. Luke had come down the driveway. Further up the hill, Annie Ledoux was standing with a shotgun broken open over her arm. Flanking her were Kalisha and Nicky. Smith didn’t see any of them yet; he was gazing out over the hazy distance to the small town of DuPray and the glittering railroad tracks that ran through it.
Annie now spent much of her time at Catawba Hill. She was fascinated by the children, and they seemed to enjoy her. Tim pointed at her, then patted the air with his hand: hold your position. She nodded and stood where she was, watching. Smith was still admiring the view, which really was very fine.
“Let’s say there’s another Institute—a very small one, a very special one, where everything is first class and state of the art. No outdated computers or crumbling infrastructure there. It’s located in a completely safe place. Other Institutes exist in what we thought of as hostile territory, but not this one. There are no Tasers, no injections, no punishments. There is no need of subjecting the residents of this special Institute to near-death experiences such as the immersion tank to help open them to their deeper abilities.
“Let’s say it’s in Switzerland. It might not be, but it will do. It is on neutral ground, because many nations have an interest in its upkeep and continued smooth operation. A great many. There are currently six very special guests in this place. They are not children anymore; unlike the TPs and TKs in the various Institutes, their talents do not thin and disappear in their late teens and early twenties. Two of these people are actually quite old. Their BDNF levels do not correlate with their very special talents; they are unique in that way, and thus very hard to find. We were searching constantly for replacements, but now that search