"Answering circuits are functioning."
"Can you tell me anything about Antarctica? Anything at all?"
Silence for a moment. "Do you mean Antarctica before or after removal of the ice?" the voice asked.
"Afterward—I guess."
"We have no information on Antarctica after 2062," the machine said. "Ice removal was completed in 2021, and settlement proceeded along with rapid technological development. In 2062 Antarctica ceased all contact with the rest of the world."
2062 was the year of the Great Blast, Kesley thought. And Antarctica had drawn the curtain.
He shrugged and walked away, taking a seat on a curved metal stanchion projecting from the floor. Somewhere, locked in the obstinate memory banks of this computer-city, might be the information he needed to orient himself in the world, the missing data that everyone maddeningly withheld from him. But where to find it? How to get it?
Suddenly the City's voice said: "Dale Kesley!"
"I'm here. What do you want?"
"You will have to leave at once. We will tolerate a delay of no more than five minutes, plus or minus one."