The meeting started as casually as it was supposed to look. Hayes ordered a martini and Vallenti a Scotch on the rocks. There was some small talk about how Rostov in Marketing seemed to be teetering on the brink of making a damn fool of himself over his secretary and how Madison Renfield had made a damn fool of himself on "The Bones Bolt Show." When Vallenti brought up the subject of Renfield, Hayes sadly shook his head.

"Sooner or later somebody's got to stop him. I mean, what makes that pompous jackass believe that he can be an adequate spokesperson for the corporation on something as wild and woolly as 'Bones Bolt'?"

Vallenti swirled the ice in his drink. "That's the trouble with PR. They can cover most of their screwups by claiming that they were working according to some devious, deep-psych program. According to them, they can never be wrong. It's just that the rest of us don't appreciate the subtlety of what they're doing. We can't see the big picture."

"It doesn't hurt any that Renfield knows where a hell of a lot of bodies are buried. He's hushed up a lot of people's indiscretions in his time, and he's not going to go quietly when the crunch comes. He'll call in all of his markers, and in public if need be, before he allows himself to be deposed."

"I hear that he practically brainwashes his new arrivals these days. Weekly indocrinations in the viewing pods downstairs with the chemical softeners going full blast."

Hayes looked at Vallenti in real amazement. "Sure he does. I thought everyone did. It's hardly the time for loose cannons rolling around or for underlings to be plotting revolution. You mean you don't do that over in Development? ''

Vallenti covered his loss of face by signaling for a waiter. They had arrived at the point in the conversation when the two of them should cut out the third-party gossip and get down to business, and he was furious at himself for having reached it at a distinct disadvantage. Why in hell didn't his department brainwash the newly hired? Anything that kept the help loyal and docile had to be in everyone's best interests. When the waiter brought him another Scotch, he turned the subject around to the reason that he had asked Hayes there in the first place.

"So how are you getting along with Project Superstar?"

It was Hayes's turn to look surprised. "You heard about Superstar."

"Just a whisper."

"I think I'm going to have to make some inquiries as to who's been whispering in the ranks. This thing's supposed to be fully under wraps."

Vallenti smiled. They were back on even pegging. Apparently Hayes's brainwashing was not yielding the results for which he had been hoping. Interdepartmental spying was conducted on all levels, but Special Projects took great pride in being among the least pregnable. Vallenti was delighted to have punctured their smug assurance. He gave Hayes a few moments to recover his composure before continuing.

"Those of us in Development who know about this are, to put it mildly, a little worried."

Hayes raised an eyebrow. He still looked a little worried himself. "How many of you know about Superstar?"

Vallenti held up a reassuring hand. "Don't worry, Hayes, it's really just a handful of us. We've totally respected your need for privacy. It's just that we wonder if what you're doing may be, to put it very bluntly, a trifle misdirected."

Hayes's eyes hardened. "I'd like to hear exactly what you think Superstar actually is."

"The way we heard it, you're planning to wire up a major teen hearthrob during a special live show, and that it will be marketed to the fans as a chance actually to be their idol in a special two-hour package deal. It's going to be the spearhead of a number of short-term forays into the youth market."

"You seem to have heard a great deal."

Vallenti grinned. "We don't know who you intend to use as the first subject."

"That's a relief."

"Why don't you lift the corner of the dustsheet and let me in on the secret?"

Hayes shook his head. "I can't do that. The deal isn't finalized yet and we really can't afford anyone else knowing. Why don't you just tell me what's bothering you all over at Development? What is it about this project that you think is so misdirected?"

Vallenti sipped his Scotch. "To be frank, we have never done particularly well with live recordings of any kind. God knows we tried for long enough. The clients just won't accept reality. It's too damned flat. The computer composites are quite literally a hundred times better."

"I think you're rather missing the point."

"You're telling me that I'm not seeing the big picture?"

"If you like."

Vallenti scowled. "Now you're sounding like Renfield."

"We're not going to market just the live recording. We'll make a tape of this entertainer, but then it will be subjected to all the same processing as any simulated fantasy. Even in those, you do have to use recorded experiences as base material." Hayes grinned. "I mean, where else would you get your orgasms except from a tape of the real thing?''

"So the live experience angle is really just a marketing ploy. You're really paying a fortune to have this guy's name on the advertising. Basically it's very much the same as the Elvis Presley or Michael Jackson experiences that we already have on catalog."

"Except that this guy is alive and current and topping the Billboard chart."

Vallenti laughed. "So the subject is male?"

Hayes grimaced at his slip. "I guess that narrows the field for you by half.''

Vallenti suddenly leaned forward. He wasn't laughing anymore. It was time to drop the bomb on Hayes-the bomb that was the real point of the meeting. "You want to know what else is bothering us about Project Superstar?"

Hayes looked at Vallenti suspiciously. "I somehow thought that your major concern wasn't that our efforts might fail."

"Are you sure that this whole thing isn't a cover for clandestine work on a death-experience program?"

Hayes's eyes widened. "A death-experience program? Are you joking?"

Either Hayes was genuinely shocked, or he was a consummate actor. Vallenti shook his head.

"I'm not joking. The information is that death-experience research has been resumed. You have to admit that your project would be an ideal cover.''

"But work on the death experience is strictly forbidden after what Jonas did. You know that as well as I do. His attempts to tape through a human death nearly ruined us."

"Someone's messing around with it again."

"It's no one in Special Projects. I can assure you of that."

"Can you be certain?"

"It's my department, damn it. And how can you be so sure anyway?"

"We have evidence."

"What evidence?"

"Supply requisitions."

"How can they prove anything on their own? We've booked out truckloads of live recording gear for the research on Superstar."

"That's what made us think it might be you guys."

"I already told you. It wasn't us."

"There is one other piece of evidence."

"I think I need another martini."

"Three weeks ago there was a execution down in Mississippi. A character by the name of Jamal Vance. He killed five people when a supermarket heist turned sour.''

"What about him?"

"We have a tape and polygraph record of a prison guard who claims to have, along with three others, substituted a gimmicked execution gurney that was capable of recording Vance's feelings from the moment that he was strapped down to it, through the lethal injection, and for twenty minutes afterward."

"Someone made a death tape."

"More to the point, someone has a death tape. Can you imagine what they would fetch on the black market?"

Hayes looked thoughtful, and Vallenti was convinced that if it was someone in Special Projects who had made the tape, the man sitting across the table from him didn't know anything about it.