Another summer morning dawned bright and clear in Ilnestrom. At least I assume that was the way it was. I wasn't awake to see it so I can only go on the evidence of its later progress. Due to the lateness of the previous night's proceedings I completely forgot to set the alarm and, being someone who needs his full complement of sleep hours, there was no way that I could awaken in time to see the dawn. Or, more importantly, to set out at a business-like hour for my second day at work. My first clue that another day was well underway was the incessant burbling of the discom.

My first reaction was of course denial. The only thing registering in my sleep numbed brain was that I wasn't finished with the job at hand and how could anyone dare interrupt such a vital function. My second reaction was panic as I realized that I was supposed to be back out at The Site, with George and yesterday's cast-offs. I was immediately awake and running for the discom when I saw the time. It was nearing nine in the morning. In my panicked state I neglected to hit the "video off" before I poked at the reply button.

The screen resolved to the daunting image of M. Beeson. If any cells in my brain had been lagging behind the rest, the sight of those piercing dark eyes in the taut skinned face brought them up to speed. The blonde hairs pulled back from her high forehead appeared to be so tight they'd have done a harp justice.

"Ah," I stuttered, frantically trying to think of something to say. "Just on my way out the door. Been a bit delayed." As the last words left my mouth I realized the video was on. I fervently hoped she'd either not notice I was still in my pajamas or assume that was my normal work attire. "Be out at The Site in nothing flat."

"I wouldn't bother, Mister Malvern," the reply came with an acidic overtone that should have immediately alerted me to the fact that something was wrong, that this was not just a normal wake-up call.

"Oh, no bother," I said, completely misinterpreting her message. "I'd be there already but as I said I encountered a minor delay. Did I say that already? Minor delay? I'll be at work..."

"There's no work going on at The Site today, Mister Malvern," she said with a double dose of acid dripping from each word, "as I'm sure you're aware."

She may have been sure I was aware, but I hadn't the faintest idea what she was talking about.

"Has something happened?" I squeaked out, with a sickening premonition that I was about to get involved in something very unpleasant.

"Oh?" she asked, with more sarcasm than you'd think such a short word could carry. "You don't know what's happened?" The emphasis she placed on "don't" was extremely disturbing.

"No. Everything was fine when I left. What's happened?"

"You don't know about selector arms battering each other with rubbish?"

"No."

"You don't know anything about selector arms ripping other selector arms apart?"

"No."

"You don't know anything about selector arms pelting the control room with garbage?"

"No," I said. The "no's" were getting progressively weaker as I answered each question.

"The Site has been ruined and the programming to control a very expensive machine has been hopelessly corrupted, and you know nothing about it?"

"No."

"I don't believe you, Malvern. Who paid you to do this to us? Was it Reclamation Consultants? Was this their plan or your plan? Or was it your uncle's, perhaps? Why did he inflict you on us? What's his game here? Is Grumpitz in league with our competition? Or is he setting us up for a takeover? Go ahead. Deny it. But you won't get away with it, Malvern. We'll trace this plot back to it's founders, and the lot of you will all be going away for a very, very long time. You'll regret the day you ever heard of Resource Optimization, you filthy saboteur!"

And with that she clicked off. Her last sentence seemed to echo off the walls as the screen went blank. But she was certainly right with that last prediction. I already regretted ever hearing the name of Resource Optimization. I went back to my bed and sat there, stunned.

This whole situation was utterly incredible. The only logical explanation was that my playful programming of the day before had somehow been activated, had taken on a life of its own, had gone berserk if that term can be applied to machinery. But how could it happen? I am, I must admit, not the most computer adept person on the planet, but I couldn't believe that I caused something like that to happen. I'd terminated my programs, erased them. Nothing I'd done could have altered the production programs. Yet from her description, what had happened at the site sounded disturbingly like the simple routines I'd programmed run amok.

I sat there pondering, my mind leaping from one horrible realization to another. And then I took the only course of action I could think of that made any sense at the moment. I lay down and pulled the covers over my head and tried to go back to sleep. With any luck this was all just a nightmare and when I woke up again everything would be normal.

But it was not to be. Barely half an hour later the discom interrupted my slumbers again. Warily I approached it and tentatively poked the reply button. It was Uncle Grump's visage that appeared on the screen and if anything could have been more frightening in the current situation than the sight of M. Beeson spouting fire and brimstone it was the image of Uncle Grump in full roar. I involuntarily backed away from the discom from an irrational, gut oriented fear that he would reach out from the screen and throttle me. His face was contorted and so red I had to suppress an urge to fiddle with the color controls. He was firing off words so fast and so loudly that only a fraction of them came through intelligibly. But the message came through too clearly. He was angry, more angry than I'd ever seen him and I had seen him throwing fits that would make a Friulian swamp-bear back off. Ultimately he wore himself down to a level at which I could understand him.

"Dunstan! Dunstan!" he roared "You fool! You idiot, dolt, walking disaster, one man curse upon civilization! How, tell me how you could do such a thing!"

"Uncle, I can explain..." I stammered out, not sure that I really could. And he wasn't about to let me try.

"I'm sure you can, you incredible ass. You can explain everything, can't you? Well you'll have a hard time explaining this one. And it won't just be me you'll be explaining it to. I'll..."

"It was an accident! I was..."

"An accident! An accident, he says. The worst accident that ever happened to this planet was when you were conceived, you misbegotten half-wit. I can't believe anyone would purposefully inflict a walking malignancy like you upon an unsuspecting world. When I'm done..."

"But I was only following instructions..."

"Following instructions? What kind of instructions? Who would give instructions to destroy a multi-million furt machine? Were you bought off by someone? I can't believe even you could do something like this from stupidity alone!"

"He told me to practice running the system by..."

"Who told you to wreck Resource Optimization? Was it Dizergas and Marwin? Was it that venomous old thief, Kalanterian? I can't believe it! Betrayed by my own nephew! Led into ambush by someone I tried to help! Sold out to my enemies for a pile of silver!"

"Uncle, it's nothing like that. I've never heard..."

"Do you realize that Resource Optimization is filing both criminal and civil complaints against both of us? Industrial sabotage! They're going to demand millions in compensation and punitive damages!"

"But Uncle, it's nothing like that. I..."

"Go on and deny it, you ungrateful traitor. But I'm not taking the fall with you. I'm washing my hands of you, Dunstan. But before I do, I'm going to do you, and myself, one last favor. I'm instructing my legal staff to file a charge of non-self support against you. Once you've been pulled in by Social Welfare and it's documented what an incompetent, idiotic moron you are maybe they'll believe you did destroy their machine through sheer stupidity and not as part of some convoluted plot. Goodbye, Dunstan, and have a nice life wherever So-Wel sends you."

The screen went blank, but I'd swear the image of Uncle Grump remained for some minutes after, like a satanic apparition glaring out at me.

This morning was certainly going from bad to worse. First M. Beeson, then Uncle Grump. Instinct told me that it was not advisable to stay around and see who would call next. I dressed hurriedly and dashed out the door. But where to go? Out on the street I started first left, then right, then left again. Then I stopped and it struck me. When faced with disaster, one turns to the expert. I set off for Jeremy Giffen's headquarters at maximum speed. I needed advise from the best.

Not surprisingly, after the previous night's activities, it took repeated rings to get his attention. When he finally appeared at the door it was barefoot, bare-chested and wearing a pair of trousers only partly done up. When last I saw him the night before, or more correctly in the early hours of the present morning, he and Morgan Dunfey were about to take Thorley Verrill to the terminal via what they referred to as the "scenic route." One could only speculate how many drinking establishments composed their itinerary.

"Oh, Dunce, it's you," he mumbled, shaking his head sporadically as if trying to clear it. "Come in, come in. Get brea'fast," he mumbled.

I followed him up the stairs, trying to give him an abstract of the situation. I doubted that he was absorbing any of it but in my agitation I kept spouting. We passed the front room. Through the open door I could see a recumbent figure on the sofa, largely hidden under a blanket. Bare feet hung over one end. The color of the hair sticking out beyond the other edge of the blanket, black with a speckling of premature gray, indicated it was most likely Morgan Dunfey. Jeremy led me into the kitchen. The leftovers of the night before, crumbs and scraps of this and that, were still scattered around the table. He brushed them off onto the floor and seated himself, then motioned me to sit opposite. I did so, starting my sad tale over again.

I went through it, from the fateful dinner party, through the day at The Site, with a detailed recounting of the communications from M. Beeson and Uncle Grump. When I was finished he sat looking at me for a few moments. Then he got up and went to the sink. Removing a few odd utensils he turned on the tap and began to fill it. While it was filling he went to the freezer and removed a tray of ice cubes which he dumped into the rising waters. When the sink was nearly full he turned off the tap. Then, taking a deep breath, he plunged his head into the icy depths.

I watched first with surprise and then with growing concern as he failed to surface. Just as I was getting up to see if he'd drowned himself he straightened up and exhaled loudly. Twin streams of water shot out from his nostrils. He took several deep breaths and returned to the table.

"Best thing for a hangover," he said, still snorting and dripping. "Let it know who plays harder ball. Now, what was this problem you were talking about?"

One more time I repeated the story. This time Jeremy appeared to be paying attention, asking questions and nodding his head. When I'd finished he got up and went back to the pantry, this time returning with coffee and rolls. We spent the next ten minutes munching and sipping, though the coffee had obviously been ageing for some hours and the rolls were likewise experienced in the world, while Jeremy considered the situation, occasionally asking for clarifications of certain points. Finally, he drained the last of his coffee and cleared his throat.

"Well, I don't think this is too serious. A bit nastier than the usual industrial misunderstanding perhaps but nothing to get too worried about."

"Easy for you to say. You weren't there to get the full force of the Beeson blast and the Grump avalanche."

"Let's consider them in order of arrival. Now, this Beeson woman, I take it from your description that she essentially reigns by terrorizing those around her. Correct? So this diatribe of hers, placed in that context, is really nothing unusual, just her usual response. There's been a mistake, an accident, and she has to be seen to take action. The action is not what's important at this point. It's the appearance of taking action. To do anything other than fly around like an avenging angel would cause her subordinates to doubt her grip on the situation. You didn't do anything intentional, did you?"

"No. Actually, I don't even understand how it could have happened."

"There you have it. You were the person on the scene. You know what you did or didn't do. The worst you could be culpable of is foolishly tweaking a few buttons, which, since they were seriously lax in teaching you what buttons to tweak, rebounds against them."

"But she's claiming sabotage, criminal conspiracy, threatening me and my immediate relations with a long vacation on the Island of the Damned."

"But you already said you didn't do anything intentional to damage their system. It's your word against theirs and they have the burden of proving they're right and you're not. And if you didn't do anything how can they prove you did? They've got a losing case here and if M. Beeson doesn't understand it in her current agitated state I'm sure the corporate legal staff will explain it all to her when she cools down. And don't forget the embarrassment factor."

"Embarrassment factor?"

"Well, this Beeson answers to someone, I assume. The bigger fuss she makes, the more likely the obvious question is going to occur to her higher-ups. Who hired this fool? And do you think she's going to want to say 'I did?' And to top it off, how is she going to explain leaving a multi-million furt machine in the hands of a new, untrained employee on his first day on the job. Believe me, when she calms down, takes a deep breath and thinks about it all, she's going to want to keep this whole affair as quiet as possible. You'll probably never hear from her again."

That was reassuring. I could have happily gone through life without ever encountering M. Beeson again. But there was still the other, major threat to my current lifestyle. I pointed it out to Jeremy.

"There's still the Grump. If he goes through with his threat to turn me in to Social Welfare I'm sunk. I have no job. My finances are dwindling fast. A deaf, dumb and brain dead prosecutor could make the charge stick."

"You're much too worried, Dunstan. You have to realize how little interest the government has in dealing with these non-self-support charges. No aspiring bureaucrat makes his way up the ladder by making people wards of the state. It costs public money and nobody likes the government to spend public money unless they themselves happen to be the recipients. It's a nuisance to the bureaucrats to have to deal with things like this, so they deal with it the way all bureaucrats deal with things they don't like. They give it the lowest possible priority and hope it disappears before they actually have to do something about it. Say Uncle Grump has his pet attorney run right down and file the charge this morning. It will still be months before anyone gets around to looking into it. I wouldn't be surprised if a year from now you're still waiting to hear from So-Wel."

"But what if the Grump prods them along. You haven't seen him in full roar. If he'd been Mohammed, the mountain would've come to him without waiting to be asked a second time."

"It's still a non-problem, Dunce, even if he sticks a laser prod up their collective rear. The counter to the non-self-support charge is simply to have gainful employment. Get a job, run on down to So-Wel, and file the appropriate papers showing gainful employment and the charge is dismissed as baseless. I've had creditors pull the non-self-support charge on me two or three times. They like to use it as a stick to get your attention. Every time I've picked up some bit of work, stuck a few furts in the ready cash account and that was all I needed to get the charge dropped."

"You make it sound so easy."

"But it is. You'd be amazed. I'm even amazed at times. Stick your nose out in the world and things just seem to fall into place."

I'd finished my coffee. Jeremy escorted me back down the stairs. As I went out the door, he offered one last bit of advice.

"Take your fate in your own hands, Dunstan. Go out there and take your fate into your own hands."

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