Australia."
"Australia? Why?"
"To tell you the truth, Hawk, I don't know what's going on. This is coming from the very top. Just do what you're ordered to. Out."
The radio went dead. Hawkins ripped the headset off and slammed it against the floor, ignoring the looks of his team members. He pressed his fists against his temples, trying to block out all the faces, and one face in particular-a woman still alive, at least physically, lying on another bed, covered with a white sheet up to her neck, her large eyes staring aimlessly straight ahead.
BATSON Socorro, New Mexico
19 DECEMBER 1995, 0015 LOCAL
19 DECEMBER 1995, 0715 ZULU
The five men at the table to the left of the band's stage had begun verbally grading the women going to the bathroom over thirty minutes before. Their scale ranged from negative ten to a seven for a mini-skirted young girl. Don Batson had ignored their raucous laughter. In the drunken glow of seven beers he was much more interested in the woman seated next to him. Linda was one of his graduate assistants and their relationship had recently become much more than professional.
Don looked much younger than he actually was, an almost indistinguishable sprinkling of gray in his black hair, a hint to his thirty-eight years. Black steel-rimmed glasses framed a remarkably unlined face and covered dark eyes that blearily took in his surroundings. Only in the light of day could the redness in his nose and sprinkling of burst blood vessels in his cheeks be spotted. He kept his body in good shape at the university gym and sweated out" the alcohol every day. Don Batson took everything life had to offer him with eager arms. At the present moment one of those arms was occupied with Nancy's thigh, squeezing the smooth flesh in anticipation of a night's pleasure.
Peter, one of Don's third-year undergraduate students at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, had just finished describing his experiences the previous summer during an internship with a mining consortium in Colorado. As the humorous story drew to a close, Don finished his mug of beer and then leaned forward.
"I've got a small problem that I want you to solve." The younger students groaned with mock horror while Nancy smiled, used to Don's favorite game-setting up problems that required innovative solutions. He looked at her. "I don't want you answering either-you've heard it before."
Sure he had their attention, he continued above the muted clatter of the bar. "You have a half-inch diameter, two-foot-long steel tube welded onto a steel deck, the tube standing perpendicular. The top is open. You also have a hanger, a pair of pliers, a four-foot piece of string, and a piece of eight-and-a-half-by-eleven typing paper.
"A Ping-Pong ball is placed in the top of the tube and slowly settles to the bottom. The diameter of the tube is barely one eighth of an inch larger than the circumference of the Ping-Pong ball. Your job"-he grinned-"should you choose to accept it, is to get the Ping-Pong ball out of the steel tube given what's available to you. And the Ping-Pong ball must be intact--no using the hanger to puncture it and pull it out."
Don sat back and listened to several of the usual solutions, pointing out how each one wouldn't work. Finally, he took pity on his students. "All right. Listen up. There's a teaching point here, as always. You all have focused on the material I gave you and not on the problem. You have tunnel vision. Someone give characteristics of the object you wish to remove from the pipe."
"It's round," one student drunkenly declared.
"True," Don acknowledged. "What else?"
"It's white," another announced to laughter.
"What else?" Out of the comer of his eye Batson noted that the men near the bathroom had now written numbers on napkins and were holding them up as women walked past.
"It bounces."
"Good. You're on the right track. More physical characteristics. How would you describe a Ping-Pong ball to someone
"Australia? Why?"
"To tell you the truth, Hawk, I don't know what's going on. This is coming from the very top. Just do what you're ordered to. Out."
The radio went dead. Hawkins ripped the headset off and slammed it against the floor, ignoring the looks of his team members. He pressed his fists against his temples, trying to block out all the faces, and one face in particular-a woman still alive, at least physically, lying on another bed, covered with a white sheet up to her neck, her large eyes staring aimlessly straight ahead.
BATSON Socorro, New Mexico
19 DECEMBER 1995, 0015 LOCAL
19 DECEMBER 1995, 0715 ZULU
The five men at the table to the left of the band's stage had begun verbally grading the women going to the bathroom over thirty minutes before. Their scale ranged from negative ten to a seven for a mini-skirted young girl. Don Batson had ignored their raucous laughter. In the drunken glow of seven beers he was much more interested in the woman seated next to him. Linda was one of his graduate assistants and their relationship had recently become much more than professional.
Don looked much younger than he actually was, an almost indistinguishable sprinkling of gray in his black hair, a hint to his thirty-eight years. Black steel-rimmed glasses framed a remarkably unlined face and covered dark eyes that blearily took in his surroundings. Only in the light of day could the redness in his nose and sprinkling of burst blood vessels in his cheeks be spotted. He kept his body in good shape at the university gym and sweated out" the alcohol every day. Don Batson took everything life had to offer him with eager arms. At the present moment one of those arms was occupied with Nancy's thigh, squeezing the smooth flesh in anticipation of a night's pleasure.
Peter, one of Don's third-year undergraduate students at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, had just finished describing his experiences the previous summer during an internship with a mining consortium in Colorado. As the humorous story drew to a close, Don finished his mug of beer and then leaned forward.
"I've got a small problem that I want you to solve." The younger students groaned with mock horror while Nancy smiled, used to Don's favorite game-setting up problems that required innovative solutions. He looked at her. "I don't want you answering either-you've heard it before."
Sure he had their attention, he continued above the muted clatter of the bar. "You have a half-inch diameter, two-foot-long steel tube welded onto a steel deck, the tube standing perpendicular. The top is open. You also have a hanger, a pair of pliers, a four-foot piece of string, and a piece of eight-and-a-half-by-eleven typing paper.
"A Ping-Pong ball is placed in the top of the tube and slowly settles to the bottom. The diameter of the tube is barely one eighth of an inch larger than the circumference of the Ping-Pong ball. Your job"-he grinned-"should you choose to accept it, is to get the Ping-Pong ball out of the steel tube given what's available to you. And the Ping-Pong ball must be intact--no using the hanger to puncture it and pull it out."
Don sat back and listened to several of the usual solutions, pointing out how each one wouldn't work. Finally, he took pity on his students. "All right. Listen up. There's a teaching point here, as always. You all have focused on the material I gave you and not on the problem. You have tunnel vision. Someone give characteristics of the object you wish to remove from the pipe."
"It's round," one student drunkenly declared.
"True," Don acknowledged. "What else?"
"It's white," another announced to laughter.
"What else?" Out of the comer of his eye Batson noted that the men near the bathroom had now written numbers on napkins and were holding them up as women walked past.
"It bounces."
"Good. You're on the right track. More physical characteristics. How would you describe a Ping-Pong ball to someone
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