MICHAEL CRICHTON

The computer ran through possible expedition routines quickly, testing a newone every ten seconds. After each data fit, outcomes were printed—cost,logistical difficulties, supply problems, total elapsed times from Houston, fromPresent Point (Nairobi), where they were now.Looking for a solution.It wasn’t like the old days, Munro thought. Even five years ago, expeditionswere still run on guesswork and luck. But now every expedition employed realtimecomputer planning; Munro had long since been forced to learn BASIC andTW/GESHUND and other major interactive languages. Nobody did it by the seatof the pants anymore. The business had changed.Munro had decided to join the ERTS expedition precisely because of thosechanges. Certainly he hadn’t joined because of Karen Ross, who was stubbornand inexperienced. But ERTS had the most elaborate working database, and themost sophisticated planning programs. In the long run, he expected thoseprograms to make the crucial difference. And he liked a smaller team; once theconsortium was in the field, their working party of thirty was going to proveunwieldy.But he had to find a faster timeline to get them in. Munro pressed the buttons,watching the data flash up. He set trajectories, intersections, junctions. Then,with a practiced eye, he began to eliminate alternatives. He closed out pathways,shut down airfields, eliminated truck routes, avoided river crossings.The computer kept coming back with reduced times, but from Present Point(Nairobi) the total elapsed times were always too long. The best projection beatthe consortium by thirty-seven minutes—which was nothing to rely on. Hefrowned, and smoked a cigar. Perhaps if he crossed the Liko River at Mugana.He punched the buttons.It didn’t help. Crossing the Liko was slower. He tried trekking through theGoroba Valley, even though it was probably too hazardous to execute.PROPOSED ROUTING EXCESSIVELY HAZARDOUS“Great minds think alike,” Munro said, smoking his cigar. But it started himwondering: were there other, unorthodox approaches they had overlooked? Andthen he had an idea.103