MICHAEL CRICHTON

THEY HAD NO FOOD, NO WATER, AND VERY LITTLE ammunition. Theydragged themselves through the jungle, clothes burned and torn, faces haggard,exhausted. They did not speak to one another, but silently pressed on. Elliot saidlater they were “living through a nightmare.”The world through which they passed was grim and colorless. Sparkling whitewaterfalls and streams now ran black with soot, splashing into scummy pools ofgray foam. The sky was dark gray, with occasional red flashes from the volcano.The very air became filmy gray; they coughed and stumbled through a world ofblack soot and ash.They were all covered with ash—their packs gritty on their backs, their facesgrimy when they wiped them, their hair many shades darker. Their noses andeyes burned. There was nothing to do about it; they could only keep going.As Ross trudged through the dark air, she was aware of an ironic ending to herpersonal quest. Ross had long since acquired the expertise to tap into any ERTSdata bank she wanted, including the one that held her own evaluation. She knewher assigned qualities by heart:YOUTHFUL-ARROGANT (probably) / TENUOUS HUMAN RAPPORT (sheparticularly resented that one) / DOMINEERING (maybe) INTELLECTUALLYARROGANT (only natural) / INSENSITIVE (whatever that meant) / DRIVEN TOSUCCEED AT ANY COST(was that so bad?)And she knew her Late-stage conclusions. All that flop-over matrix garbageabout parental figures and so on. And the last line of her report: SUBJECT MUSTBE MONITORED IN LATE STAGE GOAL ORIENTED PROCEDURES.But none of that was relevant. She had gone after the diamonds only to bebeaten by the worst volcanic eruption in Africa in a decade. Who could blame herfor what had happened? It wasn’t her fault. She would prove that on her nextexpedition....Munro felt the frustration of a gambler who has placed every bet correctly butstill loses. He had been correct to avoid the Euro-Japanese consortium; he hadbeen correct to go with ERTS; and yet he was coming out empty-handed. Well,he reminded himself, feeling the diamonds in his pockets, not quite emptyhanded.Elliot was returning without photographs, videotapes, sound recordings, or theskeleton of a gray gorilla. Even his measurements had been lost. Without such251