Wednesday, December 25, 2019

Essay on Unit 5001 Personal Development as a Manager and...

CMI Unit 5001 Personal Development as a Manager and Leader CONTENTS †¢ Personal development as a Manager and Leader o Background and Context o Planning for personal and professional development o Planning resources required for Personal Development o Implementation and Evaluation of the Personal Development Plan o Promote healthy and safe working practices †¢ Appendices o 1 - Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs o 2 - PDP o 3 – VAK Questionnaire o 4 – Honey and Mumford Questionnaire †¢ Bibliography Personal Development as a Manager and Leader Background Context At BIC Innovation, we†¦show more content†¦Source: BIC Innovation 2010 By reviewing and analysing the chart we can as employees identify where our areas of self development are needed. There are many tools and techniques available to assess and develop our skills such as observations, evaluations, one-to-ones, peer feedback for example. Detailed below are two of the tools which I have utilised to assess current skills and abilities and highlight my development needs which are: 1. SWOT Analysis The SWOT analysis is a useful way of thinking about your current working position and can help you plan towards your further development. It is also important to consider the MACRO environment whilst planning for future areas for development as these factors can have an impact on possible training. PESTLE is a useful tool to enable us to do this. PESTLE assesses the market, including competitors, from the standpoint of a particular proposition or a business. PESTLE becomes more useful and relevant the larger and more complex the business or proposition, but even for a very small local business a PESTLE analysis can still throw up one or two very significant issues that might otherwise be missed. The SIX elements in PESTLE vary in significance depending on the type of business, eg., social factors are more obviously relevant to consumer businesses or a B2B business close to the consumer-end of theShow MoreRelatedUnit 5001 Unit 5001- Personal Development as a Manager and Leader3171 Words   |  13 PagesJoanna Speed Unit 5001- Personal Development as a manager and leader A.C. 1.1 Continual Self-Development is the approach where an individual takes prime responsibility and ownership for their own learning and development. This approach requires motivation and commitment in order to exploit learning opportunities and minimise the impact of weakness. A continuing self-development should be undertaken in partnership with the organisation and self-development should enhance the role held withinRead MoreUnit 5001 Personal Development as a Manager and Leader Essay10584 Words   |  43 PagesPersonal Development as a Manager Leader Author: Liz Oram Kent County Council 16th December 2011 Contents Executive Summary †¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Page 3 Introduction †¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦..Page 3 Section 1†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Page 3 Section 2†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Page 5 Section 3†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Page 7 Section 4†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Page 10 Conclusion†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.Page 12 Recommendation†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Read MoreEssay on Cmi 50011128 Words   |  5 PagesManagement amp; Leadership Unit 5001: Personal Development as a Manager and Leader Student Name: | | Delivery Partner: | | Country of Study: | | Date Assignment Submitted: | | Declaration Statement: By submitting this assignment for assessment, I am also confirming that the following report is the result of my own study and efforts. I understand that if this not the case, I will be putting at risk the successful completion of this qualification. Instructions: You are requiredRead MoreCmi Level 5 Essay3473 Words   |  14 PagesQualification structures Unit 5001 Unit 5002 Unit 5003 Unit 5004 Unit 5005 Unit 5006 Unit 5007 Unit 5008 Unit 5009 Unit 5010 Unit 5011 Unit 5012 Unit 5013 Personal development as a manager and leader Information based decision making Performance management Resource management Meeting stakeholder and quality needs Conducting a management project Financial control Marketing planning Project development and control Human resource development Managing recruitment and selection Being a leader Leadership practiceRead MoreCmi Leadership and Management Level 5 Mod 11394 Words   |  6 Pagesand Leadership Cleeve Langdon 5001 Personal development as a manager and leader | 1. Be able to assess and plan for personal professional development | 1.1 Explain the importance of continual self-development in achieving organisational objectives1.2 Assess current skills and competencies against defined role requirements and organisational objectives1.3 Identify development opportunities to meet current and future defined needs1.4 Construct a personal development plan with achievable but challengingRead MoreCmi Level 5 Management File9810 Words   |  40 PagesLEVEL 5 - MANAGEMENT and LEADERSHIP (AWARD – CERTIFICATE – DIPLOMA) ‘Management Qualification Standards Review’ The information that follows identifies the Units that form the Chartered Management Institute Level 5 qualifications in Management and Leadership. The Units are set out in a format designed to assist in identifying the presence of your current knowledge, understanding and capability at this level. To achieve best value in competing the document you should refer to yourRead MoreEntrepreneurship and Innovation Management9362 Words   |  38 Pagesentrepreneurial spirit to understand the need of urge to meet the expectations. This gives them the same satisfaction an entrepreneur would feel on the success and acceptance of his innovative idea. Therefore being innovative is not the sole domain of the leaders, corporate or individual. The potential of the workers and employees remains unexploited in this direction. This study will try to find out the importance of the mental force of the employee on the survival of the company in this competitive worldRead MoreEstee Lauder Companies : Ethical Strategy Analysis9260 Words   |  38 Pagesthe Company surpassed $1 billion dollars in sales. The Estee Lauder Companies (ELC) now sell products in over 140 countries and territories under its well-known brands. Apart from its operations, the Estee Lauder Companies conducts research and development to identify shifts in consumer preferences, develop new products, and improve, redesign or reformulate existing products. Being a globally recognized manufacturer of luxury makeup, skincare, fragrances, and hair care products coincides with EsteeRead MoreTata Nano: the Peoples Car12280 Words   |  50 Pagesth Nano. The overwhelming positive m he e market response to Nano suggested th the hat company’s interna estimates o the market demand for Nano-like v al of t r vehicles in India was close to a e on y in of cess, global automakers su as uch millio units per year. He was aware that, i the wake o Nano’s succ Renau ult-Nissan an Chrysler h announce plans to ta nd had ed arget the ultra a-low-cost seg gment. More eover, Indian automaker Maruti Suzu was expected to laun n r uki nch the Maru Cervo in MayRead MoreB and Q Marketing Strategies in China23218 Words   |  93 Pagesregions in the world (â€Å"Success Story BQ†, n.d., para. 1). The first BQ store was founded by Mr Richard Block and Mr David Quayle in 1969 so that the brand name â€Å"BQ† was comprised by the fist English letter of their surname. After a successful development in local market for nearly 30 years, BQ acquired Marketing Dissertation 2006 BQ’s Marketing Strategies 2 outstanding achievements with the possession of 330 DIY stores in UK (â€Å"BQ in the world†, para. 4). Gilman (2004, p.2) claimed that for

Tuesday, December 17, 2019

Character Analysis of Winston Smith in 1984 Essay - 923 Words

â€Å"We are taught that the hero’s journey is the journey from weakness to strength. But...[this is] wrong. The real hero’s journey is the journey from strength to weakness.† The real hero shows the ability to rise above challenges, even in a state of weakness, and wind up victorious. The real hero is flawed, but his courage, selflessness, and sacrifices for the greater good will rise above all. Winston Smith of 1984 is described as a â€Å"small frail figure† with a â€Å"varicose ulcer above his right ankle.† This is evidently not the image conjured when one imagines a hero, but due to the deceiving nature of appearances, we must consider his actions. What does Winston do? He writes â€Å"DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER† repetitively in his diary, he engages in a†¦show more content†¦He believed in â€Å"down with Big Brother† but was too terrified for indulging in that forbidden thought to dare to do anything at all. â€Å"I love you† would be said to Winston by a girl he did not know at all. His impression of her had been one of uneasiness and animosity; he questioned why she seemed to follow him around and believed her to be a member of the Thought Police or an â€Å"amateur spy.† Though he lacked any actual knowledge about the girl, Julia, he immediately accepted her initiation of a relationship. This relationship looked to be one of physical intimacy rather than any sort of emotional dependency; Winston’s fornication with Julia seemed to be his personal way of rebelling against the anti-sex policies. He would feel as though he were revolting against the Party and Big Brother and this appeared to be the only rebelling Winston would do. This type of sudden acceptance of an anti-Party offer, regardless of any evidence from the character, would not be Winston’s first. He had made eye contact with a member of the Inner Party, O’Brien, and decided â€Å"he knew.. .that O’Brien was thinking the same thing as himself. An unmistakable message had passed. It was as though their two minds had opened and the thoughts were flowing from one into the other through their eyes. ‘I am with you,’ O’Brien seemed to be saying to [Winston]. ‘I know precisely what [Winston is] feeling. I know all aboutShow MoreRelatedCharacter Analysis Of 1984 By Winston Smith925 Words   |  4 Pagescitizens of the dystopian nation of Oceania in the book 1984 by George Orwell. One of these citizens is Winston Smith, who works in the Ministry Of Truth, altering historical records to coincide with what The Party says. Unlike most people, Winston is aware of the wrongs of the nation they’re living in wants to do something about it. In the book 1984, Winston Smith’s thoughtfulness, rebellious nature, and determination contribute to his character development throughout the novel by helping lead up toRead More1984 Argument1249 Words   |  5 PagesGeorge Orwell’s book 1984 is a very interesting novel. The novel is set up in Airstrip One. In George Orwell’s book 1984 it has many situations. One of the many situations are that some people refer society as â€Å"Orwellian.† What does Orwellian mean? Orwellian means, of or related to the works of George Orwell ( especially his picture of his future totalitarian state.) People believe that Orwell is realistic and say his work part of our society now. George Orwell was a writer in the twentieth centuryRead MoreAnalysis Of 1984 By George Orwell954 Words   |  4 PagesSophie Moore Mrs. N. Finley E209R3 – 1984 literary analysis 27 January 2015 Symbolism throughout 1984 The novel 1984 is a futuristic totalitarian society where everyone is kept under close surveillance and is forced to follow all rules and laws of the state. The novel 1984 was written by George Orwell and published in 1950. The main characters were Big Brother, Winston Smith, Julia, O’Brien, Syme and Emmanuel Goldstein. Winston Smith is a low man on the totem pole when it came to the ruling PartyRead More1984 Doublethink Analysis1237 Words   |  5 PagesThe Role of Doublethink in The Government of 1984 â€Å" War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength,†. The following quote originates from the infamous novel, 1984 by George Orwell. The significance of this popular quote was to display an example of the action of doublethink. Doublethink is the act of having two contradictory thoughts at the same time and believing both are true. Doublethink plays an influential role in the novel, 1984. The novel takes place in a super-state by the nameRead MoreSetting The Standards Of A Genre873 Words   |  4 PagesSetting the Standards of a Genre: An Analysis of 1984 George Orwell’s 1984 depicts a society in which all the people involved are gradually losing all sense of individuality. The novel follows Winston Smith, a member of the outer party in this dystopian society. As an individual, he has been forced to believe the rules of the society he lives in. In Oceania, the country in which he resides, people believe what they are told to believe. Everyone follows the strict beliefs of the party and Big BrotherRead MoreGeorge Orwell s Caged Birds Accept Each Other But Flight Is What They Long For ``1717 Words   |  7 Pagesfor.† In George Orwell’s book 1984 the main character Winston Smith felt like a caged bird and wanted to be free of the totalitarian regime that was Big Brother. In the book, Orwell portrays a society in which life as we know it is none existent. People are stripped of their individualism, programmed like zombies and made to suppress each other. In the book, kids are used to and it would seem with really g ood effect to spy on and monitor the parents and neighbors. Winston defies the regime by thinkingRead MoreA Literary Analysis Of 1984 By George Orwell721 Words   |  3 Pages The essay your about to read is a literary analysis of the book â€Å"1984 by George Orwell† it was written in 1948 as a thriller. Winston Smith is the main character of this story followed by two characters â€Å"Julia and O’Brien.† The book starts off with main character Winston being very frustrated with what is called the â€Å"Party† lead by a man named â€Å"Big Brother† hints the saying â€Å"big brother is watching you† from â€Å"George Orwells worst fear† stated by express.co.uk. the book takes you for a rideRead More1984 Discussion1069 Words   |  5 Pages1984 Discussion Questions 1. The world within which Winston lives is replete with contradictions. For example a, major tenet of the Partys philosophy is that War is Peace. Similarly, the Ministry of Love serves as, what we would consider, a department of war. What role do these contradictions serve on a grand scale? Discuss other contradictions inherent in the Partys philosophy. What role does contradiction serve within the framework of Doublethink? How does Doublethink satisfy the needs of TheRead MoreWinston Smith Character Analysis Essay examples1762 Words   |  8 PagesLiterature 30 August Character Analysis of Winston Smith from 1984 Winston Smith, George Orwell’s main character from 1984, contributes greatly to the novel in many ways. While he is presented to be a simple man, Winston adds many complex ideas to the classic piece of literature. Orwell uses internal and external characteristics, symbols, and significant quotes to develop Winston’s role in 1984. Internal Characteristics are a big part of the development of a main character and ideas relating toRead MoreThe Psychoanalysis of 19841019 Words   |  5 Pagesof 1984 The social structure of George Orwell’s 1984 is based on Freud’s map of the mind and the struggles between the id, the ego and the super ego. The minds of these individuals living in this society are trained to think a certain way. Freud’s theory of psychoanalysis can be applied to Orwell’s 1984. Using Freud’s psychoanalytic approach, 1984’s main character Winston Smith is portrayed as the one who goes against the ideas of the Party. In a Freudian point of view, Winston’s character represents

Monday, December 9, 2019

Internship Progress Report- Free Samples

Question: Discuss about theInternship Progress Report. Answer: Introduction The internship is defined as the job training in a specific field to gain knowledge and experience. This also helps in the, changing someones approaches towards the specific industry. This internship progress report provides a brief discussion about the changes in my approaches towards the creative industry. In the internships I have the opportunity to gain experience and apply the theories that were learnt in the class rooms. In my internship, I have worked at the fashion warehouse of Taina Olsen design. It is online site that designs bridal dresses and evening wears for its clients. Even though Tania had started the business by selling bridal wears but after some day, but now her brand is one of the leading brands for bridal, bridesmaid, and evening wear dresses (taniaolsen.com.au 2016). As an expansion of her business, this brand has almost 100 retailers throughout Australia. The following sections describe the way this internship has changed my approach. Quality Control In case of the dresses the quality control is done after each and every step of the production which is just opposite of the quality control in other industries. In other industries, the quality of the product is checked only after the product is completed. Setting quality standards: In my internship I witnessed that, the quality is checked for, sewing defects (open seams, use of different threads for stitching or inappropriate thread tension in the completed garments), Color defects and sizing defects (like use of L size sleeves for the XL size body of the garment). Preparation of audit reports related of the fabric and trim quality: In my internship, I witnessed that the quality of the fabric is checked at the very initial stage of the production of the products (as it is the most important part of the whole process). This will reduce the overall production time for the products. The company uses the penalty point process to determine the quality of the threads (Islam, Khan and Khan 2013). The same is done with the trims which are the accessories required for the manufacturing of the products as per the specification of the buyer. Inspect the garments: The inspection of the garments is done to check and control the quality of the finished product or the garments. The quality is controlled by the number of variations and faults exist in the finished product (Maia, Alves and Leo 2013). As per my experience this helped the company to deliver better products and retain them by providing value for the money. Admin Work Moving, receiving, storing and checking incoming goods: In the creative industry, like the manufacturing of the bridal dresses as per the client requirements also includes the administrative work (O'Connell 2014). Some of them are transportation of the finished goods to the retailers, receiving, checking and storing of the incoming raw materials for the production of the bridal wears. Whenever the client asks for any specific design of the bridal wear, then those specific materials are ordered from the supplier (Syduzzaman et al. 2016). After this, when the materials are delivered, I have to maintain the warehouse record for the each and every item by checking them individually. In case of other industry, the raw materials are not checked individually thus it may happen that, due to the faulty raw material the overall production time gets increased. In addition, the proper management of the finished goods is also important for the proper delivery of the goods to the retailers and in order to timely delivery of the product to the clients. Managing websites: being intern at the company, I observed that, the company mainly operates its business through the site www.taniaolsen.com.au, thus it is important for the organization to maintain the website, to make it operational and available to the users or the desired clients (Syduzzaman et al. 2016). Maintain the website is about upgrading the servers and the databases so that, it can handle more number of visitors at one time. In course of my internship, I also witnessed that, the company appointed an IT company that will integrate new security features to the website so that, the client personal data and financial can be transmitted in a encrypted format to make it confidential. Creating spreadsheets: It is one of the important business processes that are used for accounting or to visualize graphically the sales or the position of the company in the market. Moreover, the spreadsheets are also used to form business decisions. Learning Sewing Techniques Working with different fabrics: while working as an intern, I observed that as Tania Olsen manufactures several types of dresses for different prices and different client segments, thus it uses different types of fabrics to have more customers with their designer dresses (Maia, Alves and Leo 2013). While working with the different types of fabrics I acquired the skill of identification of the fabrics and the way they should be stitched to have a better longevity of the developed products. Moreover, use of the automated marker and cutting technology can enhance the whole process of cutting and resizing the raw fabrics. Discussion about the different sewing techniques with supervisor: It is important to use appropriate sewing techniques for the different types of fabric materials to achieve a better quality of the finished cloths (Islam, Khan and Khan 2013). For using different types of sewing techniques, I have to consult with the supervisor, as they have experience about the different kind fabrics and the stitching tension they can tolerate. Working with different sewing tools: In my internship, I observed that, use of the different automated industrial tools can maximize the throughput of the different processes. Like use of the automated marker tools, cutting and stitching tools will increase the efficiency of the manufacturing process which in turn helps in the increasing the revenue of the company (Mahmud 2014). As an example it can be said that, the use of the water jet fabric cutting machine will reduce the wastage of the raw fabric in the shaping and resizing of the fabrics. References Islam, M.M., Khan, A.M. and Khan, M.M.R., 2013. Minimization of reworks in quality and productivity improvement in the Apparel Industry.International Journal of Engineering,1(4), pp.2305-8269. MacCarthy, B.L. and Jayarathne, P.G.S.A., 2013. Supply network structures in the international clothing industry: differences across retailer types.International Journal of Operations Production Management,33(7), pp.858-886. Mahmud, A., 2014.Ready-made garments factory: in a sub-urban settings(Doctoral dissertation, BRAC University). Maia, L.C., Alves, A.C. and Leo, C.P., 2013. Sustainable work environment with lean production in textile and clothing industry.International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management,4(3), pp.183-190. O'Connell, J., 2014. Optimal Quality Assurance for Mass Production Apparel Industry. Syduzzaman, M., Islam, M.M., Habib, M.A. and Yeasmin, D., 2016. Effects of Implementing TQM Principles in the Apparel Manufacturing Industry: Case Study on a Bangladeshi Clothing Factory.Science and Technology,6(3), pp.68-75. Tania Olsen Designs. (2016).Home - Tania Olsen Designs. [online] Available at: https://www.taniaolsen.com.au/ [Accessed 7 Nov. 2016].

Sunday, December 1, 2019

Opening Remarks free essay sample

OPENING REMARKS by Mrs. Mary Grace Sumugat 16th General Assembly, PATTS Multipurpose Hall, 06 AUGUST 2011 Ladies and Gentlemen, Distinguished Guests and Students, Good afternoon. I am honored to address this gathering of PATTS Tourism Society as we convene the 16th Tourism General Assembly entitled â€Å"Education for Touristic Tourism† here at our Chairman’s Penthouse. PATTS Tourism Society is committed to actively raise the quality of activities and experience for every tourism student. writing service in java We want all of you to achieve their full potential to become a competitive professionals in this career. Moreover, PATTS Tourism Society will foster activities and programs that will stimulate and enhance your skills in this field . In our eagerness to serve the interest of the tourism students, we have always displayed a thorough activities and have made every effort to develop new ideas and activities which, in one way or another, have contributed promoting and enhancing tourism here at PATTS have its edge among other institutions. We will write a custom essay sample on Opening Remarks or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Our task is to make it possible. Our mission is to provide practical, step by step reinforcement through the activities provided by our organization. This year our theme is Tourmaline. Tourmalines are gems with an incomparable variety of colors. Just like Tourism, it is one of the gems of our country, which is full of colors. And as Tourism advocates we must learn how to efficiently use our resources. We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open. So I commend that we should all live by the saying, â€Å"A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step†. So now, prepare yourself to be challenged, excited and inspired. I want to say once more on behalf of the PATTS Tourism Society organizing committee, welcome to the home of the most beautiful and handsome students of PATTS College of Aeronautics. Its a pleasure to see so many of you here. Thank you and Good day!

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Prince Edward Island essays

Prince Edward Island essays Prince Edward Island lies in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and is separated from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia by the Strait of Northumberland. It once was connected to the mainland. I chose to do this province because I love lobster and the land is really beautiful. About 11,000 years ago the early people known as the Paleo-Indians lived on what is now Prince Edward Island. They gathered berries in the islands forests and hunted seals and walrus with spears along the coast. They also tracked caribou and arctic foxes. They left the area when The Maritime Archaic Indians moved there about 6,000 years ago. They also hunted and fished. They made tools and animal figures, carved out of stone and bones. I read that a 6,500-year-old ulu, a kind of knife used to butcher walrus and whales was found a few years ago in the Gulf The Micmac Indians who were related to the Maritime Archaic Indians settled almost 2,500 years ago. By this time the water had separated the island from the mainland. They called the island Abegweit, meaning home cradled on the waves. They built grass houses called wigwams. The Indians covered their shelters with furs for the cold winters. Several thousand Micmac were living on the Island when the first The Europeans discovered the island when Jacques Cartier landed there in 1534. He described it as the most beautiful stretch of land There are stories of ghosts and buried pirate gold date back to the days when sailing ships linked the island with Nova Scotia and schooners picked up cargo for the West Indies. In the early 1600s, France wanted to gain control of fishing waters. France soon made a colony. This was the first colony in what was known as Acadia. The British also claimed fishing and fur trading rights in the region. The two countries battled for this valuable land throughout the After Britain won the war ag...

Saturday, November 23, 2019

Full Analysis of SAT Grammar Rules Which Are Most Important

Full Analysis of SAT Grammar Rules Which Are Most Important SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips When you are planning your study approach for SAT Writing, it’s important to know where your time is best spent. Which grammar rules are really the most important to learn? What can help you make the greatest improvement to your score? Read on to find out exactly how much each grammar rule matters and how you can use this information on the test. What kinds of questions are on SAT Writing? SAT Writing follows an extremely predictable format. There are two Writing sections on the test. (Note: There are always two graded Writing sections, but some tests may have a third one that is experimental and ungraded.) The first Writing section will be between Section 2 and Section 7, and the second will ALWAYS be Section 10. In the first Writing section, you will have three question types. #1: Improving Sentences The first, which accounts for questions 1 – , isImproving Sentences. You will be given a sentence with an underlined portion and 5 answer choices. The first answer choice, A, is always the same as what is given in the original sentence (or Correct As Is). The other answers will re-write the underlined portion of the sentence in various ways. We have written aguide to the best way to approach Improving Sentences Questions. #2: Identifying Sentence Errors The second question type isIdentifying Errors (questions 12 – 29).In this type of question, you will be given a sentence that has four underlined words or phrases labeledA – D. After the sentence you also have the option of E, which is â€Å"No Error†. You have to choose the underlined part of the sentence that has a grammar mistake, or decide that the sentence has no errors and is correct as it is written. #3: Improving Paragraphs The third question type isImproving Paragraphs,which is questions 30 – 35. This section is a little different. You may be asked a grammar question, which oftentimes will look a lot like the Improving Sentences questions. However, you also may be asked questions about style and logic, such as where sentences best fit in the paragraph or what transition to use, and you can also be asked about the author’s rhetorical strategy. This ishow you should attack the Improving Paragraphssection. Section 10 consists of 14 questions which are alwaysImproving Sentences. So to summarize, this is what the breakdown of different question types looks like: But what concepts are tested? And why should you care? Almost as predictable as the question types are the grammar rules that SAT Writing will test you on. SAT Writing heavily favors a few main grammar rules,and lightly touches on a multitude of others. Why should this matter to you? This means that especially if you are aiming for a score in the 500 – 700 range, you shouldfocus your studying on the main grammar rules that are covered. In fact, many of the rules the SAT covers are so infrequently seen that there is a good chance that your testmay not cover them at all. I analyzed almost 700 SAT Writing questions from 14 official SAT tests, and wrote down the grammar concepts tested in each. For most SAT questions, the answer is fairly obvious if you know one main grammar rule. Occasionally, however, more than one rule is tested in the same question. In these circumstances, I counted the question for both grammar rules. And the winners are†¦ The overwhelming winner of the frequency test isverb tense and form.Using the correct form of the verb can mean quite a few different things, including whether or notverbs are used consistently throughout the sentence, knowing when to use gerunds and avoiding them when they are unnecessary, when to use the infinitive, when to use certain tenses, and when past participles are appropriate. These concepts make up over a whopping20% of the questionsin the Improving Sentences and Identifying Errors sections of the test. Not far behind in second place are questions dealing withcorrect use of pronouns.These questions make up12.5% of the questionsin Improving Sentences and Identifying Errors. These concepts include missing and ambiguous antecedents, pronoun case, and making sure that pronouns match their antecedents in number. We have a three-way tie for third place.Subject-Verb Agreement, Run-ons and Fragments,andParallel Structureeach weigh in at around9.5% of the questions asked. If you master these five concepts, you will have all the information you need toover 60% of the questions on SAT Writing. The full breakdown Here is the analysis of the most commonly-tested grammar concepts on SAT Writing, along with brief explanations of what each grammar rule means. #1: Correct Verb Tense and Form: 20.5% Verbs tenses are used consistently and correctly throughout the sentence Gerunds are only used when necessary Infinitives are used correctly Tenses of verbs are formed correctly Past participles are not confused with past tense Wordiness with gerunds To master this section, see our guide onhow verbs are used on SAT Writing. #2: Correct Pronouns and Antecedents: 12.5% Missing and ambiguous antecedents Correct use of singular and plural pronouns Pronoun case Pronoun-antecedent agreement â€Å"He or she† vs. â€Å"they† See our guides onpronoun caseandpronoun agreementto master these concepts. #3: Subject-Verb Agreement: 9.5% Matching singular subjects with singular verbs and plural subjects with plural verbs Sentences with verbs before subjects Sentences with non-essential clauses or prepositional phrases between subject and verb See thisguide to subject-verb agreement. #3: Parallel Structure: 9.5% Items in a list are phrased the same way Phrases connected by a conjunctionhave the same structure See ourguide to parallel structure on SAT Writingfor more on this topic. #3: Fragments and Run-ons: 9.5% Joining independent clauses incorrectly Missing subject and/or verb Recognizing non-essential or dependent clause vs. independent clause Correct use of semicolons and commas This guide breaks downhow to recognize and fix run-ons and fragments on SAT Writing. #6: Misplaced and Dangling Modifiers: 7% Descriptive phrases must be next to the word they describe See theguide to modifiers here. #7: Idioms, Preposition use, and Diction: 6% Knowing which preposition is idiomatically correct in a phrase Recognizing commonly-confused words This guide will teach youall about idioms on the SAT Writing, and here is a guide to diction and word choice. #8: Faulty Comparisons: 4% Comparing two unlike things See theguide to faulty comparisonshere. #10: Logical conjunction use: 3% Using conjunctions correctly according to their meaning: e.g., â€Å"but† for contrast, â€Å"and† for similarity, etc. See more about conjunctions in ourcomplete parts of speech guide. #10: Word pairs: 3% Properly completed word pairs, e.g.either†¦or, neither†¦nor, not only†¦but also, between†¦and, just as†¦so #10: Adjective vs. Adverb: 3% Using adjectives to describe nouns, and adverbs to describe adjectives, verbs, and adverbs See theguide to adjectives and adverbs on SAT Writing here. The above concepts make up 87.5% of the questions on SAT Writing. What about that other 12.5%? In addition to the above, master the following topics if youare aiming for an 800 on SAT Writing.The following concepts each make upless than 2.5% of the questionson SAT Writing, and many of them will not appear on any given test. #: Active or Passive voice: 2.2% Using the active voice when possible to avoid wordiness Passive voice used to correct dangling modifier or in certain constructions #12: Correct relative pronouns: 2% See the guide to relative pronouns formore information #13: Noun agreement: 1.5% Match singular subjects with singular predicate nominatives, and plural subjects with plural predicate nominatives For example: John is a scientist. John and Maria are scientists. #14: Comparative vs. Superlative: 1% Comparative used for comparing two things, superlative used for three or more Correct formation of comparative and superlative #15: Redundancy: 0.8% Repeating the same information twice See theguide to redundancy here #16: Other: 5% These concepts are tested so infrequently that it would be pointless to give them their own category These questions are very unpredictable. They can include: â€Å"noun is because† structure, â€Å"the reason is that†, comma used between subject and verb, general awkwardness, and many more miscellaneous topics How can you use this information? You should use the information above to target your studying. The first step here is to understand what kind of SAT score you are aiming for in order to get into the colleges you are applying to. If you haven’t figured this out yet, take some time to do that first. For Low Scorers If you are currently getting a low score on the SAT Writing, you should use the list above as a checklist to master one grammar concept at a time. Start with Verb Tense and Form, and work your way down. Keep in mind that if you manage to completely master just the first 6 grammar concepts listed above (Verb Tense through Misplaced Modifiers), you will be able to answer close to 70% of the grammar questions on the test correctly. After you have reviewed these concepts, take a practice test. When you correct it, make sure you note what kind of questions you have missed. (Note: If you have The Official SAT Study Guide, you can use their online resource to find answers to the questions, or you can use the appendices in Erica Meltzer’s The Ultimate Guide to SAT Grammar to check which question types you are missing.) If you are missing questions based on the top 6 topics, go back and focus all of your study time on just those question types before moving on. If you want a mid-range score†¦ If you are aiming for a mid-level score (500 – 650), you should focus your attention on learning the grammar concepts that make up the top 87.5% of the questions and ignore the concepts that make up the trickier 12.5% of the test. If you get 87% of the questions correct on SAT Writing, and get a 7 or above on the essay, most curves will put you score in the 500 – 650 range. Take practice tests to check that you have mastered concepts #1 – 10. If you are able to answers those questions comfortably, move on to the more obscure topics. If you are aiming for a high score†¦ You will need to study all of the concepts listed above. The grammar concepts that appear infrequently, such as noun agreement and relative pronoun use, individually don’t count for much. However, enough mistakes in these areas could quickly add up to give you a lower score than you are aiming for. Once you have a good grasp on all of the concepts, you may want to add a bit of strategy to your game to make the test easier to conquer. You can do this by breaking down the test even further and understanding where you will see each type of question so that you know what to expect. Fortunately, I’ve done that work for you. Not All Question Types are Equal The above percentages correspond to the grammar concepts tested across all three question types on SAT Writing, taken as a whole. However, what if we were to break the test down by question type? Though most of the grammar concepts listed above will appear in all of the question types, there are a few grammar concepts that will only appear in certain question types. Others will heavily appear in a certain type of question. Let’s look at the Improving Sentences questions first. As you can see, there are a few concepts that make up a majority of the questions in Improving Sentences: Correct Verb Tense and Form (including gerund use) Sentence Fragments and Run-ons Parallel Structure Misplaced and Dangling Modifiers Correct Pronoun and Antecedent Use There are also some question types that will almost never appear on the Improving Sentences sections. They include: Adjectives vs. Adverbs Relative Pronoun Errors Noun Agreement Comparative vs. Superlative Now let’s look at Identifying Errors. Again, a few question types make up the majority here: Correct Verb Tense and Form Subject-Verb Agreement Correct Pronoun and Antecedent Use And the question types you will almost never see include: Sentence Fragments and Run-ons Active vs. Passive Redundancy Misplaced and Dangling Modifiers How can you use this information? You can use this knowledge of the test to help anticipate what grammar concepts you will see in each type of question. When you approach an Identifying Errors or Improving Sentences question, always look for the most common grammar mistakes first. For example, when you know that over 70% of the Improving Sentences questions will have one of the top five errors listed above, you will have a much better idea what kind of answers to look for, and it will also help you make more educated guesses. What about the Improving Paragraphs section? This sectiontests the same grammar rules as Improving Sentences. However, this section also tests several rules that don’t really fall into the grammar category. Instead, they are based on style and logic, and being able to understand how words and sentences work together in the context of a paragraph. This section will also occasionally test rhetorical strategy.This means that you may be asked what the purpose of a paragraph or sentence is. Here are the types of questions you will see on this section of the test: Sentence Revision (exactly like Improving Sentences): 33% Sentence insertion or deletion: 22% Using transitions: 15% Rhetorical strategy: % Information or word insertion: 7% Combining sentences: 7% Sentence order: 2% Paragraph division: 2% What does this mean for you? Keep in mind that Improving Paragraphs only make up 6 questions on every test. That means that even if you can’t figure out any of the style, logic, and rhetorical strategy questions, but ace the grammar, you will only be missing about 4 questions on the whole SAT Writing. Students aiming for a high score obviously will not want to write off four whole questions. However, if you are aiming for a lower score, you should use your study time wisely by focusing on the grammar concepts listed above instead of worrying about the extra question types that only appear in the Improving Paragraphs section. What about â€Å"No Error† and correct as is? On the Improving Sentences section, answer A is always the same as what’s given to you in the original sentence – meaning if you choose this, you are saying the sentence is correct as is. In Identifying Errors, answer E means there is no error. How often will you see these? Taken as a whole, you will see these answers about 15% of the time. You are slightly more likely to get a no error answer in Identifying Errors (19%) than in Improving Sentences (12.5%). So if you are completing one of these sections and you don’t have any of these answers, know you’ve gone wrong somewhere! Though somequestions don't containan error, they still test you on the above grammar concepts - byseeing if you can tell when they arebeing used correctly. We havea full article on the No Error answer here. What would the statistically perfect test look like? Now that we know everything about how the test breaks down by each question type and grammar concept, let’s see what a theoretically perfect test would look like. Of course, no real SAT would follow these figures exactly, but it’ll give you a decent idea of what to expect. Use this "Perfect Test" list to help guide your studying. After you take a practice test, take note of what kind of questions you have missed. Compare your notes to this list, and start off tackling your problem areas that appear highest up. Improving Sentences: 25 Questions Total 6 questions on Correct Verb Tense and Form 4 questions on Fragments and Run-ons 3 questions on Parallel Structure 3 questions on Misplaced and Dangling Modifiers 3 questions on Correct Pronouns and Antecedents 1 question on Subject-Verb Agreement 1 question on Logical Conjunctions 1 question on Faulty Comparisons 1 question on Correct Use of Active and Passive 1 question on Word Pairs 1 question on Miscellaneous Topics Identifying Errors: 18 Questions Total 4 questions on Correct Verb Tense and Form 3 questions on Correct Pronouns and Antecedents 3 questions on Subject-Verb Agreement 1 question on Idiom, Preposition Use, and Diction 1 question on Parallel Structure 1 question on Faulty Comparisons 1 question on Word Pairs 1 question on Adjectives vs. Adverbs 1 question on Noun Agreement 1 question on Comparative vs. Superlative 1 question on Miscellaneous Topics Improving Paragraphs: 6 Questions Total 2 questions on Sentence Revision (Improving Sentences) 1 question on Sentence Insertion or Deletion 1 question on Using Transitions 1 question on Rhetorical Strategy 1 question on either Combining Sentences OR Word or Information Insertion You would have about seven questions with the answer â€Å"No Error† or Correct As Is. What’s next? Now you knowexactly what is on SAT Writing.Use the above links to master each topic. All too much for you to handle? Never fear, there aresome schools out there who don’t care about SAT Writing at all! If you are aiming to improve a low grade, see our article onhow to score a 600 on SAT Writing. If you are aiming for an 800, you will need to master all of the above concepts, even the infrequently used ones. See our article on top tips forscoring an 800 on SAT Writing. Want to improve your SAT score by 160 points? Check out our best-in-class online SAT prep program. We guarantee your money back if you don't improve your SAT score by 160 points or more. Our program is entirely online, and it customizes what you study to your strengths and weaknesses. If you liked this Writing and grammar lesson, you'll love our program.Along with more detailed lessons, you'll get thousands ofpractice problems organized by individual skills so you learn most effectively. We'll also give you a step-by-step program to follow so you'll never be confused about what to study next. Check out our 5-day free trial:

Thursday, November 21, 2019

A Film Review-Synecdoche, New York 2008 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

A Film Review-Synecdoche, New York 2008 - Essay Example Cotard is a theatre director and he does not possess the typical admirable qualities of a movie hero or protagonist. Rather, his character is dark and difficult to admire. Kaufman has deliberately made his film riddled with intricate ideas and thoughts related to love, death, loss, and recreation. Strong messages are conveyed through different scenes. For example, in the final scene Cotard and Hazel lie in bed in the same house which is set on fire. Actually, the fire is used to describe Hazel’s fate. The burning house is a bold sign of what is eventually going to happen to Hazel. It is not only related to Hazel, but it is an ominous sign of every character’s death. Earlier on when Hazel is contemplating the decision to buy the house, it is still burning. But, she still chooses to buy it which is the kind of action which translates into a person accepting fate. She puts aside her suspicions and buys a house that is not right for her. Hazel’s burning house is used to portray sudden death, while the water leak in Caden’s house is used to describe slow damage. Caden is obsessed with death and vigorously attempts to resist damage, while Hazel accepts her fate and moves into a damaged house. Such themes used by Kaufman can also be interpreted in another way also assuming Hazel to be fire and Caden to be water. For example, there is a scene where Hazel smokes a cigarette and offers one to Caden too. However, Caden refuses to smoke with her because he secretly sees Hazel as fire which may set him on fire too. So, he desperately attempts to stop this damage. In another scene after sex with Hazel, Cotard does not feel fulfilled and cries. This shows that Hazel is a warm part of Cotard’s life, but that warm part is actually a burning house inside which he is trapped and cannot escape. This is why after his sexual encounter with Hazel, he cries because he is ultimately afraid of death yet has no one to call for help. After sex with Hazel, he is

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

LAN and WAN Hardware Technology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

LAN and WAN Hardware Technology - Essay Example These two classifications are based on the distance that a network is designed to support for it various services. LANs are typically designed to share information and computer resources among equipments placed in closed vicinity, in a building or a particular premises whereas WAN is considered a network of multiple LANs that may be situated at long distances. These LANs and WANs employ different hardware technologies to ensure an efficient, robust and secure networking environment. This report will introduce hardware technologies used in each network environment. However, for the most part it will talk about Ethernet and Wireless hardware technologies. 2. LAN Hardware Technologies Local Area Networks typically connects devices placed in a building using Ethernet technologies. Ethernet network can have broadcast point-to-point or a mix of these transmission technologies. In point-to-point technology, devices commonly use Unshielded Twisted Pair (UTP) cables to connect to a nearest sw itch or hub. a) UTP cables UTP cables consist of four pairs of twisted cables insulated with a thin plastic sheet. UTP cables are categorized as CAT5, CAT5e, CAT6 and CAT6a (IEEE 802.3 2006) etc. standards of cables. CAT6a cables can support up to 10-gigabit data transfer rate in a LAN environment. UTP cables can transmit data up to a distance of 100 meters. A repeater, hub or switch can be used to enhance this maximum distance of UTP cables. A RJ-45 data connector at each end of a UTP cable connects it to various devices with a RJ-45 jack. All new building structures usually have special layouts of UTP cables running from each room to a central point known as Main Distribution Facility (MDF). (David, 507). b) Repeaters and Hubs There are three basic devices used to interconnect devices in an Ethernet network. Repeaters strengthen the transmission signal in order to carry it to a distance more than 100 meters. A hub connects devices in a network. It broadcast received signals to all devices connected to it. A hub also serves as a repeater. Repeaters and hubs are physical layer devices; physical layer is the first layer in OSI Reference model. (Null & Julia, 675). c) Switches Switch is an intelligent device used for point-to-point data transmissions. Switches operate at Data Link (layer-II) of OSI Reference Model. It can recognize distinctly various connect devices and can sends messages to only specific devices. There are switches that can operate at Network (Layer-III) of OSI Reference model. Layer-III switches can perform routing functions, which is not possible in a layer two switch. (Null & Julia, 675). d) Routers Routers are the most important hardware technology deployed in modern day networks. Router routes network traffic among various segments of a LAN or it may also be deployed in a WAN environment to route traffic among various LANs. A router is a layer-III device that can connect two different networks, which is not possible in case of a layer-II s witch. (Beasley, 194). e) Firewalls The growing and wide spread use of network technologies have instigated the need of more secure networks. Security of information means a security from internal and external threats of communication. Today, organizations have shared networks resources inside and outside of their own network and for obvious reasons want to

Sunday, November 17, 2019

Machiavellis Cycle of Governance Essay Example for Free

Machiavellis Cycle of Governance Essay Ancient Rome such a stable and economically fruitful empire. Concerning the structures of governance as it was in 16th century florence, Machiavelli expressed the opinion that only six forms of government exist that maintain a perpetual cycle of short lived power before sucuming to, what he viewed as a natural end. This is brought about either due to a successful insurection and instalment of a form of government which evolved out of oppression or a form of government that eventually grew to become greedy and corrupt through generational changes. The model Machiavelli presents begins with a society in a state of nature or Anarchy that exists until the people begin to realise strength in numbers and seek leadership from the foremost individual who assumes rulership, thus evolving into a Monarchy. The good Monarch is however, succeeded by corrupt rulers who use their power for their own gain and control through Tyranny. The Tyrant is eventually overthrown by a rebellion and the rebels retain control amongst themselves collectively producing an Aristocracy. The Aristocrats are then succeeded by a generation that again, begins to use its powers to oppress the people and becomes an Oligarchy. Like the Tyrant, they are overthrown by the oppressed who then form a Democracy. As time progresses, order and control dissolve completely until we find ourselves in a state of nature or Anarchy once again. As Machiavelli saw it, because of mans propensity to greed and corruption against the collective force of the oppressed victims, the cycle of instability could only ever provide temporal security and was not an effective enough solution. Machiavelli lived in a period of insessent political conflict and social disharmony which provided him with a deep rooted motivation to ensure order and stability could be demonstrated within the system he sought. Machiavelli drew the conclusion that a balance of power shared between a monarchical figure, an aristocratic institution and a democratic institution, as the Ancient Romans had implemented, was the most benificial arrangement in the interest of the state. In order to sustain order, it is necessary to employ the method of checks and balances, meaning each faction must regulate the other to prevent the accumulation of too power in the hands of an individual or particular group. Today we use the term separation of powers to identify this form of self monitoring government. Although critics of this form of power regulation state that it slows up progress, promotes excesses of executive power and unaccountability, those who would champion the method maintain it is an effective means to ensure liberty and democracy while avoiding the possibility of tyranny.

Thursday, November 14, 2019

Citizen Kane By Orson Wells Essay examples -- essays research papers

Citizen Kane By many, Citizen Kane is one of the greatest films ever made. Orson Wells, at age 25, directed, produced, and starred in this film. Citizen Kane is a memorable film for countless reasons. The film brought about controversy because it fictionalized the life of William Randolph Hearst, a powerful newspaper publisher. The film draws remarkable parallels with his life and his relationship with his mistress. There is also speculation that the film is loosely based on Wells’ life as well. This movie tells the fascinating story of the life and death of Charles Foster Kane, a narcissistic newspaper runner, politician, and a wealthy millionaire. What makes this movie spectacular is not only the acting of the actors, but the symbolism and cinematic effects. The techniques used by the cinematographer brought this film to life. This is what sets Citizen Kane apart from other films.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Symbolism has an enormous role in this film. â€Å"Rosebud† is the last word uttered by Cane. He then dies and takes his secret to the death. The film follows one reporter on his search to the truth. Throughout the film, the tragical existence of powerful newspaper tycoon Charles Foster Kane, becomes apparent. He spends most of his life in solitude. Although he was married twice, he always stayed alone. This was because of his incapacity of felling love, which was caused by his insecure childhood. Kane was unwillingly taken away from his mother as a young child; this s...

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

The Host Chapter 38: Touched

â€Å"What do I think about what?† â€Å"About our†¦ discussion out there,† Ian clarified. What did I think about it? I didn't know. Somehow, Ian was able to look at things from my perspective, my alien perspective. He thought I had earned a right to my life. But he was†¦ jealous? Of Jared? He knew what I was. He knew I was just a tiny creature fused into the back of Melanie's brain. A worm, as Kyle had said. Yet even Kyle thought Ian had a â€Å"crush† on me. On me? That wasn't possible. Or did he want to know what I thought about Jared? My feelings on the experiment? More details about my responses to physical contact? I shuddered. Or my thoughts on Melanie? Melanie's thoughts on their conversation? Whether I agreed with Jared about her rights? I didn't know what I thought. About any of it. â€Å"I really don't know,† I said. He nodded. â€Å"That's understandable.† â€Å"Only because you are very understanding.† He smiled at me. It was odd how his eyes could both scorch and warm. Especially with a color that was closer to ice than fire. They were quite warm at the moment. â€Å"I like you very much, Wanda.† â€Å"I'm only just beginning to see that. I guess I'm a little slow.† â€Å"It's a surprise to me, too.† We both thought that over. He pursed his lips. â€Å"And†¦ I suppose†¦ that is one of the things you don't know how you feel about?† â€Å"No. I mean yes, I†¦ don't know. I†¦ I -â€Å" â€Å"That's okay. You haven't had long to think about it. And it must seem†¦ strange.† I nodded. â€Å"Yes. More than strange. Impossible.† â€Å"Tell me something,† Ian said after a moment. â€Å"If I know the answer.† â€Å"It's not a hard question.† He didn't ask it right away. Instead, he reached across the narrow space and picked up my hand. He held it in both of his for a moment, and then he trailed the fingers of his left hand slowly up my arm, from my wrist to my shoulder. Just as slowly, he pulled them back again. He looked at the skin of my arm rather than my face, watching the goose bumps that formed along the path of his fingers. â€Å"Does that feel good or bad to you?† he asked. Bad, Melanie insisted. But it doesn't hurt, I protested. That's not what he's asking. When he says good†¦ Oh, it's like talking to a child! I'm not even a year old, you know. Or am I now? I was sidetracked, trying to figure out the date. Melanie was not distracted. Good, to him, means the way it feels when Jared touches us. The memory she provided was not one from the caves. It was in the magic canyon, at sunset. Jared stood behind her and let his hands follow the shape of her arms, from her shoulders to her wrists. I shivered at the pleasure of the simple touch. Like that. Oh. â€Å"Wanda?† â€Å"Melanie says bad,† I whispered. â€Å"What do you say?† â€Å"I say†¦ I don't know.† When I could meet his eyes, they were warmer than I expected. â€Å"I can't even imagine how confusing this all must be to you.† It was comforting that he understood. â€Å"Yes. I'm confused.† His hand traced up and down my arm again. â€Å"Would you like me to stop?† I hesitated. â€Å"Yes,† I decided. â€Å"That†¦ what you're doing†¦ makes it hard for me to think. And Melanie is†¦ angry at me. That also makes it hard to think.† I'm not angry at you. Tell him to leave. Ian is my friend. I don't want him to leave. He leaned away, folding his arms across his chest. â€Å"I don't suppose she'd give us a minute alone?† I laughed. â€Å"I doubt it.† Ian tilted his head to one side, his expression speculative. â€Å"Melanie Stryder?† he asked, addressing her. We both started at the name. Ian went on. â€Å"I'd like the chance to speak with Wanda privately, if you don't mind. Is there any way that could be arranged?† Of all the nerve! You tell him I said no chance in hell! I do not like this man. My nose wrinkled up. â€Å"What did she say?† â€Å"She said no.† I tried to say the words as gently as they could be said. â€Å"And that she doesn't†¦ like you.† Ian laughed. â€Å"I can respect that. I can respect her. Well, it was worth a try.† He sighed. â€Å"Kind of puts a damper on things, having an audience.† What things? Mel growled. I grimaced. I didn't like feeling her anger. It was so much more vicious than mine. Get used to it. Ian put his hand on my face. â€Å"I'll let you think about things, okay? So you can decide how you feel.† I tried to be objective about that hand. It was soft against my face. It felt†¦ nice. Not like when Jared touched me. But also different from the way it felt when Jamie hugged me. Other. â€Å"It might take a while. None of this makes any sense, you know,† I told him. He grinned. â€Å"I know.† I realized, when he smiled then, that I wanted him to like me. The rest-the hand on my face, the fingers on my arm-I still wasn't sure at all about those. But I wanted him to like me, and to think kind things about me. Which is why it was hard to tell him the truth. â€Å"You don't really feel that way about me, you know,† I whispered. â€Å"It's this body†¦ She's pretty, isn't she?† He nodded. â€Å"She is. Melanie is a very pretty girl. Even beautiful.† His hand moved to touch my bad cheek, to stroke the rough, scarring skin with gentle fingers. â€Å"In spite of what I've done to her face.† Normally, I would have denied that automatically. Reminded him that the wounds on my face weren't his fault. But I was so confused that my head was spinning and I couldn't form a coherent sentence. Why should it bother me that he thought Melanie was beautiful? You've got me there. My feelings were no clearer to her than they were to me. He brushed my hair back from my forehead. â€Å"But, pretty as she is, she's a stranger to me. She's not the one I†¦ care about.† That made me feel better. Which was even more confusing. â€Å"Ian, you don't†¦ Nobody here separates us the way they should. Not you, not Jamie, not Jeb.† The truth came out in a rush, more heated than I'd meant it to be. â€Å"You couldn't care about me. If you could hold me in your hand, me, you would be disgusted. You would throw me to the ground and grind me under your foot.† His pale forehead creased as his black brows pulled together. â€Å"I†¦ not if I knew it was you.† I laughed without humor. â€Å"How would you know? You couldn't tell us apart.† His mouth turned down. â€Å"It's just the body,† I repeated. â€Å"That's not true at all,† he disagreed. â€Å"It's not the face, but the expressions on it. It's not the voice, but what you say. It's not how you look in that body, but the things you do with it. You are beautiful.† He moved forward as he spoke, kneeling beside the bed where I lay and taking my hand again in both of his. â€Å"I've never known anyone like you.† I sighed. â€Å"Ian, what if I'd come here in Magnolia's body?† He grimaced and then laughed. â€Å"Okay. That's a good question. I don't know.† â€Å"Or Wes's?† â€Å"But you're female-you yourself are.† â€Å"And I always request whatever a planet's equivalent is. It seems more†¦ right. But I could be put into a man and I would function just fine.† â€Å"But you're not in a man's body.† â€Å"See? That's my point. Body and soul. Two different things, in my case.† â€Å"I wouldn't want it without you.† â€Å"You wouldn't want me without it.† He touched my cheek again and left his hand there, his thumb under my jaw. â€Å"But this body is part of you, too. It's part of who you are. And, unless you change your mind and turn us all in, it's who you will always be.† Ah, the finality of it. Yes, I would die in this body. The final death. And I will never live in it again, Melanie whispered. It's not how either of us planned our future, is it? No. Neither of us planned to have no future. â€Å"Another internal conversation?† Ian guessed. â€Å"We're thinking of our mortality.† â€Å"You could live forever if you left us.† â€Å"Yes, I could.† I sighed. â€Å"You know, humans have the shortest life span of any species I've ever been, except the Spiders. You have so little time.† â€Å"Don't you think, then†¦Ã¢â‚¬  Ian paused and leaned closer to me so that I couldn't seem to see anything around his face, just snow and sapphire and ink. â€Å"That maybe you should make the most of what time you have? That you should live while you're alive?† I didn't see it coming the way I had with Jared. Ian was not as familiar to me. Melanie realized what he was going to do before I did, just a second before his lips touched mine. No! It wasn't like kissing Jared. With Jared, there was no thought, only desire. No control. A spark to gasoline-inevitable. With Ian, I didn't even know what I felt. Everything was muddled and confused. His lips were soft and warm. He pressed them only lightly to mine, and then brushed them back and forth across my mouth. â€Å"Good or bad?† he whispered against my lips. Bad! Bad, bad! â€Å"I-I can't think.† When I moved my mouth to speak, he moved his with it. â€Å"That sounds†¦ good.† His mouth pressed down with more force now. He caught my lower lip between his and pulled on it gently. Melanie wanted to hit him-so much more than she'd wanted to punch Jared. She wanted to shove him away and then kick his face. The image was horrible. It conflicted jarringly with the sensation of Ian's kiss. â€Å"Please,† I whispered. â€Å"Yes?† â€Å"Please stop. I can't think. Please.† He sat back at once, clasping his hands in front of him. â€Å"Okay,† he said, his tone cautious. I pressed my hands against my face, wishing I could push out Melanie's anger. â€Å"Well, at least nobody punched me.† Ian grinned. â€Å"She wanted to do more than that. Ugh. I don't like it when she's mad. It hurts my head. Anger is so†¦ ugly.† â€Å"Why didn't she?† â€Å"Because I didn't lose control. She only breaks free when I'm†¦ overwhelmed.† He watched as I kneaded my forehead. Calm down, I begged her. He's not touching me. Has he forgotten that I'm here? Doesn't he care? This is me, it's me! I tried to explain that. What about you? Have you forgotten Jared? She threw the memories at me the way she'd done in the beginning, only this time they were like blows. A thousand punches of his smile, his eyes, his lips on mine, his hands on my skin†¦ Of course not. Have you forgotten that you don't want me to love him? â€Å"She's talking to you.† â€Å"Yelling at me,† I corrected. â€Å"I can tell now. I can see you concentrate on the conversation. I never noticed before today.† â€Å"She's not always this vocal.† â€Å"I am sorry, Melanie,† he said. â€Å"I know this must be impossible for you.† Again, she visualized smashing her foot into his sculpted nose, leaving it crooked like Kyle's. Tell him I don't want his apologies. I winced. Ian half smiled, half grimaced. â€Å"She doesn't accept.† I shook my head. â€Å"So she can break free? If you're overwhelmed?† I shrugged. â€Å"Sometimes, if she takes me by surprise and I'm too†¦ emotional. Emotion makes it hard to concentrate. But it's been more difficult for her lately. It's like the door between us is locked. I don't know why. I tried to let her out when Kyle -† I stopped talking abruptly, grinding my teeth together. â€Å"When Kyle tried to kill you,† he finished matter-of-factly. â€Å"You wanted her free? Why?† I just stared at him. â€Å"To fight him?† he guessed. I didn't answer. He sighed. â€Å"Okay. Don't tell me. Why do you think the†¦ door is locked?† I frowned. â€Å"I don't know. Maybe the time passing†¦ It worries us.† â€Å"But she broke through before, to punch Jared.† â€Å"Yes.† I shuddered at the memory of my fist striking his jaw. â€Å"Because you were overwhelmed and emotional?† â€Å"Yes.† â€Å"What did he do? Just kiss you?† I nodded. Ian flinched. His eyes tightened. â€Å"What?† I asked. â€Å"What's wrong?† â€Å"When Jared kisses you, you are†¦ overwhelmed by emotion.† I stared at him, worried by the expression on his face. Melanie enjoyed it. That's right! He sighed. â€Å"And when I kiss you†¦ you aren't sure if you like it. You are not†¦ overwhelmed.† â€Å"Oh.† Ian was jealous. How very strange this world was. â€Å"I'm sorry.† â€Å"Don't be. I told you I'd give you time, and I don't mind waiting for you to think things through. I don't mind that at all.† â€Å"What do you mind?† Because he minded something very much. He took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. â€Å"I saw how you loved Jamie. That was always really obvious. I guess I should have seen that you loved Jared, too. Maybe I didn't want to. It makes sense. You came here for the two of them. You love them both, the same way Melanie did. Jamie like a brother. And Jared†¦Ã¢â‚¬  He was looking away, staring at the wall over me. I had to look away, too. I stared at the sunlight where it touched the red door. â€Å"How much of that is Melanie?† he wanted to know. â€Å"I don't know. Does it matter?† I could barely hear his answer. â€Å"Yes. It does to me.† Without looking at me or seeming to notice what he was doing, Ian took my hand again. It was very quiet for a minute. Even Melanie was still. That was nice. Then, as though a switch had been flipped, Ian was his normal self again. He laughed. â€Å"Time is on my side,† he said, grinning. â€Å"We've got the rest of our lives in here. One day you'll wonder what you ever saw in Jared.† In your dreams. I laughed with him, happy he was joking again. â€Å"Wanda? Wanda, can I come in?† Jamie's voice started from down the hall and, accompanied by the sound of his jogging steps, ended right outside the door. â€Å"Of course, Jamie.† I already had my hand held out to him before he shrugged the door aside. I hadn't seen him nearly enough lately. Unconscious or crippled, I hadn't been free to seek him out. â€Å"Hey, Wanda! Hey, Ian!† Jamie was all grins, his messy hair bouncing when he moved. He headed for my reaching hand, but Ian was in his way. So he settled for sitting on the edge of my mattress and resting his hand on my foot. â€Å"How are you feeling?† â€Å"Better.† â€Å"Hungry yet? There's beef jerky and corn on the cob! I could get you some.† â€Å"I'm okay for now. How are you? I haven't seen you much lately.† Jamie made a face. â€Å"Sharon gave me detention.† I smiled. â€Å"What did you do?† â€Å"Nothing. I was totally framed.† His innocent expression was a bit overdone, and he quickly changed the subject. â€Å"Guess what? Jared was saying at lunch that he didn't think it was fair for you to have to move out of the room you were used to. He said we weren't being good hosts. He said you should move back in with me! Isn't that great? I asked him if I could tell you right away, and he said that was a good idea. He said you would be in here.† â€Å"I'll bet he did,† Ian murmured. â€Å"So what do you think, Wanda? We get to be roomies again!† â€Å"But Jamie, where will Jared stay?† â€Å"Wait-let me guess,† Ian interrupted. â€Å"I bet he said the room was big enough for three. Am I right?† â€Å"Yeah. How did you know?† â€Å"Lucky guess.† â€Å"So that's good, isn't it, Wanda? It will be just like before we came here!† It felt sort of like a razor sliding between my ribs when he said that-too clean and precise a pain to be compared to a blow or a break. Jamie analyzed my tortured expression with alarm. â€Å"Oh. No, I mean but with you, too. It will be nice. The four of us, right?† I tried to laugh through the pain; it didn't hurt any worse than not laughing. Ian squeezed my hand. â€Å"The four of us,† I mumbled. â€Å"Nice.† Jamie crawled up the mattress, worming his way around Ian, to put his arms around my neck. â€Å"Sorry. Don't be sad.† â€Å"Don't worry about it.† â€Å"You know I love you, too.† So sharp, so piercing, the emotions of this planet. Jamie had never said those words to me before. My whole body suddenly felt a few degrees warmer. So sharp, Melanie agreed, wincing at her own pain. â€Å"Will you come back?† Jamie begged against my shoulder. I couldn't answer right away. â€Å"What does Mel want?† he asked. â€Å"She wants to live with you,† I whispered. I didn't have to check to know that. â€Å"And what do you want?† â€Å"Do you want me to live with you?† â€Å"You know I do, Wanda. Please.† I hesitated. â€Å"Please?† â€Å"If that's what you want, Jamie. Okay.† â€Å"Woo hoo!† Jamie crowed in my ear. â€Å"Cool! I'm gonna go tell Jared! I'll get you some food, too, okay?† He was already on his feet, bouncing the mattress so that I felt it in my ribs. â€Å"Okay.† â€Å"You want something, Ian?† â€Å"Sure, kid. I want you to tell Jared he's shameless.† â€Å"Huh?† â€Å"Never mind. Go get Wanda some lunch.† â€Å"Sure. And I'll ask Wes for his extra bed. Kyle can come back in here, and everything will be like it should be!† â€Å"Perfect,† Ian said, and though I didn't look at his face, I knew he was rolling his eyes. â€Å"Perfect,† I whispered, and felt the razor's edge again.

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Fluke, or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings Chapter 35~36

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE Yeah, but You Can't Dance to It The Colonel was standing in the middle of the mother-of-pearl amphitheater when the whaley boys led Nate in. â€Å"You two go on now,† the Colonel said to the whaley boys. â€Å"Nate can find his way back.† â€Å"You came out of your lair,† Nate said. The Colonel looked older, more drawn than when Nate had seen him before. â€Å"I don't want to be in contact with the Goo for what I'm going to tell you.† â€Å"I thought it didn't get information that way,† Nate said. The Colonel ignored him. â€Å"I was hoping you would have had a brainstorm to solve my problem, Nate, but you haven't, have you?† â€Å"I'm working on it. It's more complex –  » â€Å"You've been distracted. I'm disappointed, but I understand. She's a piece of work, isn't she? And I mean that in the best sense of the word. Never forget that I chose to send her to you.† Nate wondered how much the Colonel knew about them and how he knew it. Reports from the whaley boys? From the Goo itself, through osmosis or some extended nervous system? â€Å"Distraction has nothing to do with it. I've thought a lot about your problem, and I'm not sure I agree with you. What makes you think the Goo is going to destroy humanity?† â€Å"It's a matter of time. That's all. I need you to carry a message for me, Nate. You'll be responsible for saving the human race. That should go some measure toward consoling you.† â€Å"Colonel, is there any chance you can be more direct, less cryptic, and tell me for once what the hell you're talking about?† â€Å"I want you to go to the U.S. Navy. They need to know about the threat of the Goo. One well-placed nuclear torpedo should do it. It's deep enough that they shouldn't have any problem justifying it to other countries. There won't be any fallout. They're just going to need someone credible to convince them of the threat. You.† â€Å"What about the people down here? I thought you wanted to save them.† â€Å"I'm afraid they're going to be a necessary sacrifice, Nate. What are five thousand or so people, most of whom have lived longer than they would have on the surface, compared with the whole human race, six billion?† â€Å"You crazy bastard! I'm not going to try to convince the navy to nuke five thousand people and all the whaley boys as well. And you're more deluded than I thought if you think they'd do it on my word.† â€Å"Oh, I don't expect that. I expect they'll send down their own research team to confirm what you tell them, but when they get here, I'll see to it that they get the message that the Goo is a threat. In any case you'll survive.† â€Å"I think you're wrong about the Goo finding us dangerous. And even if you were right, what if it just decides to wait us out? On the Goo's time scale, it can just take a nap until we're extinct. I'm not doing it.† â€Å"I'm sorry you feel that way, Nate. I guess I'll have to find another way.† Nate suddenly realized that he'd blown it – his chance to escape. Once he was outside Gooville, there would have been nothing to force him to do what the Colonel wanted. Or maybe there would be. Right then he wanted very badly to see Amy. â€Å"Look, Colonel, maybe I can do something. Couldn't you just evacuate Gooville? Drop all the people on an island. Let the whaley boys find somewhere else to live. I mean, if I reveal the Goo to the world, it's all sort of going to be out of the bag anyway. I mean –  » â€Å"I'm sorry, Nate, I don't believe you. I'll take care of it. Evacuation wouldn't make any difference to the people here anyway. And the whaley boys shouldn't exist in the first place. They're an abomination.† â€Å"An abomination? That's not the scientist I knew talking.† â€Å"Oh, I admit that they are fabulous creatures, but they would have never evolved naturally. They are a product of this war, and their purpose has been served. As has mine, as has yours. I'm sorry we didn't see eye to eye on this. Go now.† Just like that, this crazy bastard was going to plan B, and Nate had no idea how to stop him. Maybe that was what he was really brought here for. Maybe the Colonel was like someone who makes a suicide attempt as a cry for help, rather than an earnest attempt to end his life. And Nate had missed it. He started to back away from the Colonel, desperately trying to think of something he could say to change the situation, but nothing was coming to him. When he reached the passageway, the Colonel called out to him from the steps by the giant iris. â€Å"Nate. I promised you, and you deserve to know.† Nate turned and came a few steps back into the room. The Colonel smiled, a sad smile, resolved. â€Å"It's a prayer, Nate. The humpback song is a prayer to the source, to their god. The song is in praise of and in thanks to the Goo.† Nate considered it. A life's work contemplating a question, and this was the answer? No way. â€Å"Why only male singers, then?† â€Å"Well, they're males. They're praying for sex, too, aren't they? The females choose the mates – they don't need to ask.† â€Å"There's no way to prove that,† Nate said. â€Å"And no one to prove it to, Nate, not down here, but it's the truth. Whale song was the first culture, the first art on this planet, and, like most of human art, it celebrates that which is greater than the artist. And the Goo likes it, Nate, it likes it.† â€Å"I don't believe it. There's no evolutionary pressure for it to be prayer.† â€Å"It's a meme, Nate, not a gene. The song is learned behavior, not passed by birth. It has its own agenda: to be replicated, imitated. And it was reinforced. Have you ever seen a starved humpback, Nate?† Nate thought about it. He'd seen sick animals, and injured animals, but he'd never seen a starved humpback. Nor had he ever heard of one. The Colonel must have seen something in Nate's reaction. â€Å"There's your reinforcement. The Goo looks after them, Nate. It likes the song. I wouldn't be surprised if all of whale evolution – size, for instance – was accelerated by the Goo. We should have never started killing them. We wouldn't be at this juncture if we hadn't killed them.† â€Å"But we've stopped,† was all that Nate could think to say. â€Å"Too late,† the Colonel said with a sigh. â€Å"Our mistake was getting the Goo's attention. Now it has to end. The gene has had its three and a half billion years as the driving force of life. I suppose now the meme will have its turn. You and I will never know. Good-bye, Nate.† The iris opened, and the Colonel walked into the Goo. Nate ran all the way home, not sure how he had navigated through the labyrinth of tunnels, but found his way without having to backtrack. Amy wasn't at his apartment. His pulse was throbbing in his temples as he approached the buzzy, bug-winged speaky thing to try to call her, but he decided instead to go directly to her on foot. He checked at her place, and then at her mother's, then at every place they'd ever been together. Not only was Amy gone, but no one had seen her mother either. Nate slept fitfully, tortured by the notion of what the Colonel might have done to Amy because of his own stubbornness. In the morning he went searching for her again, asking everyone he encountered, including the whaley boys by the bakery, but no one had seen her. On the second day he went back through the corridors to the Colonel's mother-of-pearl amphitheater and pounded on the giant black iris until his fists were bruised. There was no response but a dull thud that echoed in the huge empty chamber. â€Å"I'll do what you want, Ryder!† Nate screamed. â€Å"Don't hurt her, you crazy fuck! I'll do what you want. I'll bring the navy down on this place and sterilize it, if that's what you want – just give her back.† When at last he gave up, he turned and slid down the iris facing the amphitheater. There were six killer-whale-colored whaley boys standing in the passageway opposite him, watching. They weren't grinning or snickering for once – just watching him. The largest of them, a female, let loose a quick whistle, and they crossed the amphitheater, walking in a crescent-shaped hunting formation toward him. Short of being a professional surfer or a bong test pilot for the Rastafarian air force, Kona thought he had found the perfect job. He sat in a comfortable chair watching sound spectrograms scroll across one computer monitor, while on another a program picked out the digital sequence in the subsonic signal and broke it into text. All Kona had to do was watch for something meaningful to come across the screen. Strange thing was, he really had started to learn about spectrographs and waveforms and all manner of whale behavior, and he was meeting the day feeling as if he was really doing something. He ran his hand over his scalp and shuddered as he read the nonsense text that was scrolling across the window. Auntie Clair had bought him four forties of Old English 800 malt liquor, then waited until he'd drunk them, before persuading him to let her cut his dreads down so they matched on both sides (because his true natural state should be one of balance, she said. She was tricky, Auntie Clair). The problem was, in jail his dreads had been almost completely torn off on one side, so by the time she finished evening things out, he was pretty much bald. Out of deference to his religious beliefs (to allow him a reservoir for his abundant strength in Jah, mon), Clair had left him a single dread anchored low on the back of his head, which made it look as if a fat worm was exiting his skull after a hearty meal of brain cells in ganja sauce. And speaking of the sacred herb, Kona was just on the verge of sparking up a bubbling smoky scuba snack of the dankest and skunkingish nugs when the text scrolling across the screen ceased being nonsense and started being important. He took a quick sip of bong water to steady his nerves, placed the sacred vessel on the floor at his feet, then hit the key that sent the streaming text to the printer. He stood and waited, bouncing on the balls of his feet for the printer to expectorate three sheets of text, then snatched the pages and dashed out the door to Clay's cabin. â€Å"I must be out of my mind,† Clay said. His suitcase was on the bed, and he was taking clothes out of the drawers and putting them into the case, while Clair was taking clothes out of the case, grouping them by a precise system he would never understand, and replacing them in the suitcase so that he would never find anything until he returned home and she helped him unpack. They had done this a lot. â€Å"I must be nuts,† Clay said. â€Å"I can't just go wandering around the oceans randomly looking for a lost friend. I'll look like that little bird in the book, the one that walks around asking everyone, ‘Are you my mother? ; â€Å"Sartre's Being and Nothingness?† Clair offered. â€Å"Right. That's the one. It's ridiculous to even leave port until we have something to go on – steaming around, burning up fifty gallons of fuel an hour. The Old Broad may have money stashed, but she doesn't have that kind of money.† â€Å"Well, maybe something will turn up in the whale calls.† â€Å"I hope. Libby and Margaret have a lot of sonic data streaming in from Newport, but it's still like looking for a needle in a haystack. Clair, she saw guys climbing into a whale –  » â€Å"So, baby, what's the worst that happens? You go to sea and do your best to find Nate and you fail? How many people ever did their best at anything? You can always sell the ship later. Where is it now anyway?† Just then the screen door fired back on its hinges and smacked against the outside wall with the report of a rifle shot. Kona came tumbling through the door waving pages of copy paper as if they were white flags and he was surrendering to everyone in the general Maui area. â€Å"Bwana Clay!† Kona threw the pages down on Clay's suitcase. â€Å"It's the Snowy Biscuit!† Clay picked up the pages, looked at them quickly, and handed one to Clair. Over and over the message was repeated: 41.93625S__76.17328W__-623__CLAY U R NOT NUTS__AMY Clay looked at Kona. â€Å"This was imbedded in the whale song.† â€Å"Yah, mon. Blue whale, I think. Just came in.† â€Å"Go back and see if there's more. And find the big world map. It's in the storeroom somewhere.† â€Å"Aye, aye,† said Kona, who had begun to speak much more nautically since Clay had purchased the ship, making his bid to go along on the voyage to search for Nate. He ran back to the office. â€Å"You think it's from Amy?† Clair said. â€Å"I think it's either from Amy or from someone who knows everything about what we're doing, which means it would have to be someone Amy talked to.† â€Å"What are the numbers?† â€Å"A longitude and a latitude. I'll have to look at the map, but it's somewhere in the South Pacific.† â€Å"I know it's a longitude and a latitude, Clay, but what's the minus six hundred and some?† â€Å"It's where pilots usually express altitude.† â€Å"But it's a minus.† â€Å"Yep.† Clay snatched the phone off of his night table and dialed the Old Broad as Clair looked quizzically at him. â€Å"Equipment change,† he whispered to Clair, covering the receiver with his hand. â€Å"Hello, Elizabeth, yes, things are going really well. Yes, they've picked up considerably. Yes. Look, I hate to ask this – I know you've done so much – but I may need one other little thing before we go to look for Nate and your James.† Clair shook her head at Clay's blatant playing of the missing-husband-shoved-up-a-whale's-bum card. â€Å"Yes, well, it may be a little expensive,† Clay continued. â€Å"But I'm going to need a submarine. No, a small submarine will be fine. If you want it to be yellow, Elizabeth, we'll paint it yellow.† After fifteen minutes of cajoling and consoling the Old Broad, making calls to Libby Quinn and the ship broker in Singapore (who offered him a quantity discount if he bought more than three ships in one month), Clay stood over a world map that was roughly the size of a Ping-Pong table, which Kona had spread out over the office floor, pinning the corners down with coffee cups. â€Å"It's right there, off the coast of Chile,† Clair said. She taught fourth-graders, and therefore basic world geography, so she could read a map like nobody's business. Kona placed a bottle cap on the spot where Clair was pointing. â€Å"We'll need nautical charts and the ship's GPS to be exact, but, basically, yep, that's where it is.† He looked at Kona. â€Å"Nothing else since that message?† â€Å"Same thing for five minutes, then just normal whale gibberish. You think the Snowy Biscuit is with Nate?† â€Å"I think she knew me well enough to know that I'd be thinking I was crazy to be looking. I also think that even if I believe the Old Broad's story about her husband, that doesn't explain how Amy was able to stay down for an hour on fifteen minutes' worth of air, so there was something going on with her that could be connected to this weirdness. She obviously knows more than we know, but – most important – we have nowhere else to look.† Kona looked at Clair, as if maybe she would answer his question. She nodded, and he resumed drinking his beer. Clay got down on his hands and knees on the map. â€Å"The ship broker says there's a deepwater three-man sub here, in Chuuk, Micronesia, that's about to finish up with some filming they're doing of deep shipwrecks.† Kona put a bottle cap on the atoll of Chuuk, Micronesia. â€Å"The owners will let me lease it for up to two months, but then a research team has it reserved for a deepwater survey in the Indian Ocean. The Clair is here, just north of Samoa.† Clay pointed. Kona put a third bottle cap just north of Samoa and did his best to drink off that beer while balancing the other two that he'd opened to get the caps. â€Å"So the Clair can probably be in Chuuk in three days. I'll fly in and meet them, pick up the sub, and then we can probably steam to these co-ordinates in four or five days if we cruise at top speed,† Clay said. â€Å"Now we're here –  » â€Å"We can't be, we can't be there,† said Kona. â€Å"Why not?† â€Å"Out of beers.† â€Å"So you get to that spot. Then what?† Clair asked. â€Å"Then I get in a submarine and see what there is to see six hundred and twenty-three feet down.† â€Å"So we're sure it's feet, not meters?† â€Å"No. I'm not sure.† â€Å"Well, I just want you to know that I am not comfortable with you doing this sort of thing, Clay.† â€Å"But I've always done this sort of thing. I sort of do this sort of thing for a living.† â€Å"So what's your point?† Clair asked. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX Black and White and Red All Over Once, off the coast of California, Nate had followed a pod of killer whales as they attacked a mother gray whale and her calf. They first approached in formation to separate the calf from the mother, and then, as one group broke from the pod to keep the mother busy, the others took turns leaping upon the calf's back to drown it – even as the mother thrashed her great tail and circled back, trying to protect her calf. The whole hunt had taken more than six hours, and when it ended, finally, the killer whales took turns hitting the exhausted calf, keeping in a perfect formation even as they ripped great chunks of flesh from its still-living body. Now, in the amphitheater, as the killer whaley boys approached – their teeth flashing, the breath from their blowholes puffing like steam engines – the biologist thought that he was probably experiencing exactly what that gray-whale calf had during that gruesome hunt. Except, of course, that Nate was wearing sneakers , and gray whales almost never did. It was a big room. He had space to move. He just had to get around them. His sneakers squeaked on the floor as he came down the steps, faked right, then went left at a full sprint. The whaley boys, while amazingly agile in the water, were somewhat clumsy on land. Half of them fell for the fake so badly that they'd need a postcard to tell them how it all came out. They stooged into a whaley pile near the steps. The remaining three pursuers tried to fan out into a new formation, the alpha female coming the closest to getting between Nate and the exit. Nate was running in a wide arc around the amphitheater now, and by virtue of sheer speed he could tell he'd beat at least two of the remaining killers, but the alpha female was going to intersect with him before he got clear. She probably weighed three times what he did, so there was no going though her with a vicious body check. Maybe if he'd been on skates, he'd have tried it: pit his pure, innate Canadian skating force against her paltry cetacean hunting instinct and drive that bitch to the mother of pearl. But there were no skates, no ice, so at the very last second, as the female was about to slam him in a bone-breaking crunch against one of the benches that lined the walls, Nate pulled a spin fake, a move that was much more Boitano than Gretzky but nevertheless sent the big female tumbling over a bench in a tangle of black-and-white and i vory – like a flaccid piano botching the vaulting horse. Nate high-stepped the last twenty yards to the door, thinking, Yeah, three million years of walking upright not for nothing. Rookie. Meat. About the third step into his jubilation, Nate heard the sound of a great expulsion of air from his right, then a wet splat. Suddenly he saw his sneakers waving before his face. He felt the freedom of weightlessness, the exhilaration of flight, and then it was all gone as he slammed to the floor, knocking the wind out of himself. He slid to a stop in the huge loogie of whale spit that one of the trailing males had expectorated at his feet. Had he been able to breathe, he might have called a foul, but instead he struggled to get to his feet as the two males closed on him, showing dagger-toothed grins as they approached. Oh, my God, they're going to eat me! he thought, but then he saw that they both had unsheathed their long pink penises and were leading with a sort of a pelvic thrust. Oh, my God, they're going to fuck me! he thought. But when they got to him, one picked him up by the arms and bent him over forward, and he felt the great teeth scraping his scalp as his head slipped int o the whaley boy's mouth. No, they're definitely going to eat me, Nate thought. And in that suspension of time, right before the final crunch, amid the slow motion of an infinite last moment, clarity came to him, even as he screamed, and he thought, This is probably not going to go as well as the last time I was eaten. There's probably not going to be a girl at the end of this one. And then the female whistled shrilly, and the male stopped biting down just as his teeth were starting to cut into Nate's cheeks. The biting male pulled back and apologetically wiped saliva and blood from Nate's face, then propped him up and fluffed him a little, as if to show that he was good as new. Nate was still being held fast by the other male, but the biter was grinning sheepishly at the alpha female and making a squeaking noise that Nate, even with his limited understanding of whaleyspeak, understood as meaning â€Å"oops.† A half hour later they threw him into his apartment, and the alpha female grinned at him as she tore the stainless-steel doorknob out of the wall. The wall bled for a while after she left, then clotted over and rapidly began to heal. Nate stumbled into his bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror. There were bloody gashes down his forehead and cheeks. In another place and time, he realized, he would have gone to the emergency room to get stitched up. His hair was matted with blood, and he could feel at least four deep dents in his scalp where the whaley boy's teeth had broken the skin. There was a large knot at the back of his head where he'd hit the floor when he fell, and evidently he'd hit an elbow, too, because every time he bent his right arm, a sharp, biting pain shot all the way down to his fingertips. He pulled off his bloodstained clothes and climbed into the shower. Then, ignoring the strange fixtures that usually gave him pause, he leaned against the shower walls and let the water run over him until the bloody crust was gone from his hair and his fingers had shriveled with the moisture. He dried himself, then collapsed into his bed, wishing for a last time before he fell asleep that Amy was there, safe, next to him. He slept deeply and dreamed of a time when all the oceans were filled with a single living organism, wrapped like a cocoon around a single huge land mass. And in his dream he could feel the texture of every shore as if it were pressed against his skin. Nate awoke in the early hours before light came up in the grotto. He went into his living room and sat in the dark by the big oval picture window that looked out over the street and, ultimately, the Gooville harbor. There were shapes out there moving in the dark. Every now and then he'd catch the reflection of some dim light on a whaley boy's skin, but mostly he could tell they were out there by the sonar clicks that echoed around the grotto and by the low, trilling whistles of whaley-boy conversation. After an hour sitting there in the dark, he padded to the door and tried to open it. There was nothing but a smooth scar where the doorknob had been. The seal around the door was so tight it might have been part of the walls that framed it. In trying to work his fingers into the doorjamb, he realized that his elbow wasn't grating as it had been when he went to bed. He reached up to touch the gashes across his forehead and felt the scab flake away as easily and painlessly as dry skin. He immediately went to the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror under the bright yellow bioluminescence. The gashes were healed. Completely healed. He brushed away the dried blood that had seeped after his shower to find new, healthy skin. It was the same with the dents in his scalp and the great goose egg at the base of his skull. He didn't even have a sore spot. He returned to the living room, fell into the chair by the window, and watched the light come up in the grotto. Outside, there was a lot of movement in the street and the harbor, and, watching it, Nate started to feel sick to his stomach, despite his miraculous healing. All the movement outside was that of whaley boys. There wasn't a single human out there anywhere. For two days he didn't see any other humans in Gooville, and even when he had screwed up his courage to use the buzzy, bug-winged speaky thing on the wall, he realized that he had no idea how to make it connect. By noon on the third day, he decided that he had to get out of the apartment. Not only couldn't he find Amy or do anything else while in here, but he was rapidly running out of food. He reasoned that the best time to make a break for it was in the middle of the day, when it seemed that the number of whaley boys out on the street was sparsest, because so many of them went down to the water at that time to swim. He dressed in long pants and sleeves for protection, then made the first attempt at the window. He tore one of the bone chairs from the floor in the kitchen, wiggling it first, as if loosening a baby tooth. He cast the chair at the center of the window with all his strength, preparing as he did to make the ten-foot leap to the street when it went though. But it didn't. It bounced back into the room. Next he looked for something sharp to try to puncture the window, but the only thing he could come up with were shards of the mirror in the bathroom, and although the mirror spider-webbed when he struck it, his fist wrapped in a towel, the shards stayed adhered to the bathroom wall, so all he'd really done was create a shiny mosaic. Finally, frustrated after three hours of ineffective attacks on the big window, he decided to hit it with the heaviest thing in the apartment: his body. He backed into the bedroom, sped through the living room, leaped into the air about halfway across, curled into a ball, and braced for impact. The window bulged out about three feet, until it appeared to the whaley boys outside that someone inside was trying to blow a giant bubble, and then it sprang back, trampolining Nate across the room into the far wall. At the bottom of the wall someone had installed a couch for just such an emergency, and Nate slid neatly into it with his newly flattened side down. â€Å"Well, that was just stupid,† he said aloud. â€Å"Boy, that was stupid,† Cielle Nuà ±ez said. She came into the living room and sat in a chair across from where Nate was piled onto the couch. â€Å"You want to tell me what in the hell you started?† â€Å"How did you get in? The knob is gone.† â€Å"Not on the outside. Come on, Nate, what did you do? Every human in Gooville has been locked down for the last three days. If I weren't the captain of a whale ship, I wouldn't have been able to come here either.† â€Å"I didn't do anything, Cielle, honestly. Where's Amy?† â€Å"No one knows. Believe me, that was the first place they went.† â€Å"Who?† â€Å"Who do you think? The whaley boys. They've taken over everything. Humans aren't even allowed near the ships. Ever since some of them heard you yelling about bringing the navy down here.† â€Å"I was. He has Amy, Cielle. I was just trying to get her back.† â€Å"Him? The Colonel? Why would he take Amy? She's one of the few who've ever even seen him. She's a favorite.† â€Å"Yeah, well no one is his favorite now.† Right then Nate made a decision. He wasn't going to get out of this place on his own, and the only person he could even consider an ally was sitting right there in front of him. â€Å"Cielle, the reason the Colonel called your ships back, the reason no one is allowed to leave the harbor, is that he wants you all here when the place comes down. He's got some plan to get the U.S. Navy, or somebody's navy, to attack Gooville with a nuclear torpedo. He thinks that the Goo is going to destroy the human race if he doesn't destroy it first. He wanted me to go to the navy. He thought I could convince them of the threat because of my scientific credibility, but I said no. That's when he took Amy.† â€Å"So all that yelling I heard you doing in the amphitheater – that wasn't you talking about bringing the navy here, that was just you trying to get Amy back?† â€Å"Yes. He's a loon, Cielle. I don't have any interest in bringing this place down. He thinks that there's some grand war going on between memes and genes, and that humans and the Goo are on opposite sides of it.† The whale-ship captain stood and nodded as if confirming something to herself. â€Å"Okay, then. That's what I needed to know. That's why he sent me here. I'll try to get them to send you some food.† â€Å"What? Help me get out of here.† Nate suddenly had a very bad feeling about this whole exchange. â€Å"I'm sorry, Nate. They have Cal. The whaley boys have him. You know how that feels. They told me I had to find out if you were plotting against the Colonel. Thank you for telling me. I think they'll let him go now.† She walked to the door, and Nate followed her. â€Å"Get me out of here, Cielle, at least –  » â€Å"Nate, there's nowhere to go. The only way out of here is a whale ship, and whaley-boy pilots are the only ones who can run them. They've been on notice not to let you on since we got here. Right now I couldn't leave if I wanted to.† She pounded on the door. â€Å"Open!† The door clicked open, and two all-black whaley boys stood outside waiting. They caught Nate by the shoulders and threw him back into the apartment as he tried to rush by them. â€Å"My own crew, Nate,† Cielle said. â€Å"See what you've done.† â€Å"He's going to kill you all, Cielle. Don't you see that? He's crazy.† â€Å"I don't believe you, Nate. I think you're the crazy one.† The door slammed shut. Back at Papa Lani, Clay was doing a final check on the equipment he was taking with him to meet his new ship. Diving and camera equipment lay spread out across the office floor. Kona was going through the checklist on the clipboard with a felt-tip pen. â€Å"So you tink the Snowy Biscuit going to be there?† â€Å"I'm going. I just wish that we could answer her. Tell her I'm on my way.† â€Å"You mean, like, put the digital in the whale sound and send it?† â€Å"Yeah, I know, we can't do it. Did you find a canister of soda lime for the rebreather's CO2 scrubbers?† â€Å"I can do that.† Kona held up the canister Clay was looking for and checked it off the list. â€Å"You can?† â€Å"I been looking at it long time. She not that hard to put that message back in the call. But how you going to send it? You need some gi-grandious big speakers under the water, mon. We don't have nothing like dat.† Clay stopped his inventory and pulled Kona's clipboard down so he could see his eyes. â€Å"You can put a message into the waveform so it would come out the same way we've been taking it out?† Kona nodded. â€Å"Show me,† Clay said. He went to the computer. Kona took the chair and pulled up a low-frequency waveform that looked like a jagged comb, and then he hit a button that took a small section and expanded it, which smoothed out the jags. â€Å"See, this part here. We know this a letter B, right? We just cut it and paste with other letters, make a goofy whale call. I got the all the letters but a Q and a Z figured.† â€Å"Don't explain, just do it. Here.† Clay scribbled a short message in the margin of Kona's checklist. â€Å"Then play it for me.† â€Å"I can play, but you won't hear it. It's subsonic, brah. Like I say, you going need some thumpin' speakers to send it. You know where we can steal some?† â€Å"We might not have to steal them.† While Kona pieced together the message, Clay grabbed the phone off his desk and dialed Cliff Hyland. The biologist answered on the second ring. â€Å"Cliff, Clay Demodocus. I need a favor from you. That big sonar rig of yours, will it broadcast subsonic frequencies?†¦ Good, I need you to take us out on your boat tonight, with your rig.† Kona looked at Clay. Clay grinned and raised his eyebrows. â€Å"No, it has to be tonight. I'm flying out for Chuuk in the morning. If I need to send out a signal, what can I plug in to it? Tape, disk recorder, what? Anything with a pre-amp?† Clay covered the receiver with his hand. â€Å"Can you put it on an audio disk?† â€Å"No problems,† Kona said. â€Å"No problem,† Clay said into the phone. â€Å"We'll meet you at the harbor at ten, okay?† Clay waited. He was listening, pacing in a little circle behind the surfer. â€Å"Yeah, well, we were just talking about that, Cliff, and we figured that if you said no, we'd just have to steal your boat and your rig. I could probably figure out how the rig works, right?† There was another pause and Clay held the phone away from his ear. Kona could hear an irritated voice coming out of the earpiece. â€Å"Because we're friends, Cliff, that's why I'd tell you in advance that I was going to steal your boat. Jeez, you think I'd just steal it like some stranger? All right, then, we'll see you at ten o'clock.† He hung up the phone. â€Å"Okay, kid, get this right. We have to have it ready and to the harbor by ten.† â€Å"But what you gonna do the bad guys get it?† â€Å"Even if they do, only Amy will know what it means,† Clay said. â€Å"Cool runnings, brah.† Kona was concentrating on putting the message together, his tongue curled out the corner of his mouth as an antenna for focus. Clay leaned over his shoulder and watched the waveform come together on the screen. â€Å"How did you figure this out, kid? I mean, it doesn't seem like you.† â€Å"How's a man supposed to work his science dub wid you yammerin' like a rummed-up monkey?† â€Å"Sorry,† Clay said, making a mental note to give the kid a raise if any of this actually worked.