Rollback

Chapter 18

Don returned to the lobby. It said something nice about Canada that anyone could walk around the vast Barbara Frum Atrium, looking up at the six floors of indoor balconies, and watch while all sorts of CBC personalities — the Corporation frowned on the use of the word "stars" — came and went, unaccompanied by security guards or handlers. The little restaurant Ooh La La!, which had been there forever, had tables spilling out into the atrium, and there was one of Newsworld’s anchors enjoying a Greek salad; at the next table, the lead performer in a children’s show Don had watched with his granddaughter was sipping coffee; crossing over to the elevators was the woman who currently hosted Ideas. All very open, all very welcoming — of everyone, except him.

The broadcasting museum was tiny, and tucked off to one side, clearly an afterthought in designing the building. Some of the stuff predated Don. The kiddie program Uncle Chichimus was before his time, and This Hour Has Seven Days and Front Page Challenge were shows his parents had watched. He was old enough to remember Wayne and Shuster, but not old enough to have ever thought they were fu

Don had forgotten that Mister Rogers had gotten his start here, but there it was, the original miniature trolley from that show, back when it had been called Mister Rogers’ Neighbourhood, the last word notably sporting a U.

No one else was in the museum just now. The emptiness of the handful of rooms was a testament to the fact that people didn’t care about the past.

Monitors were showing clips from old CBC shows, some of which he remembered, much of which was cringe-worthy. In the vaults here there must be tapes of dreadful stuff like King of Kensington and Rocket Robin Hood. Perhaps some things should be allowed to pass out of living memory; perhaps some things should be ephemeral.

There was some old radio and television hardware on display, including machines he himself had used early in his career. He shook his head. He shouldn’t be curator of a museum like this. He should be on display, a relic of a bygone age.

Of course, he didn’t look like a relic — and the Canadian National Exhibition no longer had a freak show; he could just barely remember visiting the Ex as a child and hearing the barkers call out descriptions of fish-tailed men and bearded ladies.

He left the museum, and left the building, going out the Front Street entrance. There were other broadcasters in town, but he doubted he’d have better luck with them.

And, besides, he liked working on radio drama and audio documentaries of the kind nobody but the CBC made anymore; as far as other broadcasters would be concerned, his CV might as well have said he painted cave walls at Lascaux.

Don arrived at the entrance to Union Station, which was at the bottom of the U comprising the oldest part of the subway system.

He headed downstairs and passed through the turnstile, paying the normal adult — rather than senior citizen’s — fare, and then took the escalator down to the platform. He stood beneath one of those digital clocks that hung from the ceiling. A train came rushing in, and he felt his hair whipping because of its passage, and—

—and he was transfixed, unable to move. The doors opened, making their mechanical drumroll sound, and people jostled in and out. Then the three descending tones sounded, indicating that the doors were closing, and the train started moving again. He found himself stepping right up to the edge of the platform, looking at its departing back.

A little boy, no more than five or six, was staring out the rear window at him. Don remembered when he used to like sitting in the front car as a kid, watching the tu

Soon enough, another train was coming down the curving track; its headlights cast mad shadows in the tu

The train stopped. He looked into the window facing him. Most riders got out at Union, although a few people always rode the train around the bend.

Around the bend.

This was the time-honored method to do this, wasn’t it? Here, in Toronto, it was the way the despondent had handled things since before he’d been born. The subway trains roared into the station at high speed. If you waited at the right end of the platform, you could jump in front of an incoming one, and—

And that would be it.

Of course, it wouldn’t be fair to the train’s operator. Don remembered reading years ago, in the Star, about how devastating it was for subway drivers when people killed themselves this way. The drivers often had to go on extended leave, and some were so afraid that the same thing would happen again they were never able to return to their jobs. Stations in the downtown core were forty-five seconds apart; there wasn’t even time for the drivers to relax between them.

But that had been back when the trains had had human drivers. These days, they were operated by sleek mechanicals, courtesy of McGavin Robotics.

The irony was tempting, and—

And he was trembling from head to toe. Suddenly, his body sprang into action, moving as fast as it could, and—

—and he just barely squeezed through the doors before they rumbled shut. Don clung tightly onto a metal pole for the whole trip home, like a drowning man grasping a log.

Chapter 19

Back in 2009, Sarah had spent at least as much time discussing the Dracon questio

"The Dracons are probably at least as clever as we are, no?" had said Don. "So wouldn’t they see through any attempt at deception?"

"That’s what I said!" Sarah replied, sounding pleased to be vindicated. "The instructions for the questio