In his twenty years of delivering mail and ferrying passengers in and around Alaska, the Yukon, and Northwest Territories, the pilot at the airstrip in Yellowknife had never had anyone ask him to fly them to Aurora Junction. Until Hollis Burns.

The pilot thought the guy's story about being an exploration geologist, and doing research on the mining of lamproites and other diamond-bearing rocks, seemed too weird to make up. Plus, the guy had come up with $500 cash -- which was what chartering his Piper Cub would cost. And he'd seemed well-prepared in terms of gear: down-filled parka and sleeping bag, huge rucksack full of nonperishable food. So the pilot thought, why not -- although the guy did seem bent out of shape about being stopped on the Mackenzie Highway by a Mountie who just wanted to warn him about driving too fast, because if you hit a moose at that speed you're a goner.

When the plane took off into the low-lying midday sun, Hollis, sitting in the passenger seat, immediately felt the biting cold. Though it was early fall, this far north it was always borderline winter. It was difficult for Hollis to make small-talk with the chatty pilot. Poor bastard probably didn't get the chance to converse with people at all, doing this for a living, in this god-forsaken part of the world.

A camping trip? A reindeer safari? An ice-fishing expedition? A seal-hunting trip? Wrong, wrong, and wrong. What Hollis is doing at the top of the world is far more bizarre than that. Just wait.

They flew low -- about 4,000 feet -- and as he looked down Hollis could see the vegetation getting sparser, and the paved roads -- indeed, any roads at all -- petering out to dirt trails, and then to nothing. The occasional moose -- and a single, lone wolf -- caught his eye, but other than that ... just tundra. The landing at Aurora Junction was on a pathetically brief stretch of pavement that looked more like a suburban driveway than a runway. It would be covered with snow within a month. As the pilot eased the tiny, toy-like airplane down gingerly, Hollis's heart began to race. They slowed to a halt in front of a steel quonset-hut that had a single jeep and a heavily modified Volkswagen van parked outside.

"You sure you know where you're headed, Mister?" the pilot asked Hollis warily before he released the locks on their doors. He eyed Hollis with suspicion and doubt -- as who wouldn't in a situation like this?

"Absolutely," responded Hollis, a little too heartily, and sounding fake. "This is my third trip up here." Ironically, he wasn't lying. It was.

The pilot had combined his chauffeuring of Hollis with a mail-run, and he grabbed the canvas bag he'd thrown in the back seat and stepped out onto the tarmac. The bitter blast of polar wind hit him in the face, and he squinted into it. Hollis deplaned from the opposite side, and, shouldering his backpack, waved to the pilot and headed into the quonset hut.

To call it a terminal was absurd -- even the phrase "coffee shop" was being generous. But a pretty young girl -- she might have been Eskimo, actually, Hollis thought -- manned a counter with a Bunn coffeemaker. Hollis walked over and ordered coffee -- milk, no sugar -- and paid in U.S. currency.

Moments later, he was seated at a steel card-table and folding chairs that seemed to represent the only "waiting area" in the place. He had removed his knapsack, placed it on the floor, unzipped a side compartment, and unfolded what looked to the coffee-girl to be a very complex map of the area. She wondered what he could possibly be doing.

If she had looked over Hollis's shoulder at the map, she might have been alarmed at the remote tundra locations which Hollis had circled in red felt marker, and labeled "Landing Site," "Pickup Point," and "Phase hovering."

Who was this guy?

"But it doesn't look a thing like what I designed!!!"

Lucien was on the phone screaming at a multimedia producer who was running the first online ad that Lucien had designed and produced for the new Cummings Footwear "The Other Shoe Has Dropped" campaign.

It was a display banner that Lucien had spent hours on: carefully selecting typefaces, agonizing over color and point size. Now that it was online and he'd actually seen it "live," he was having kittens over it.

"Don't talk to me about browsers!" he yelled into the phone. Then, "All right, all right, I'll calm down. But if the client sees this I'm history. He'll think we're all design morons here!"

"Jill? Jill, get in here!" Lucien hollered to Jill Campbell, who happened to be passing by the door. "I'm going to put the phone on speaker."

Obediently, and somewhat puzzled, Jill walked into Lucien's office and sat down. She knew enough not to trifle with him when he was having a drama-queen moment.

Raising his eyes to the ceiling melodramatically, Lucien pressed the "Spkr" button on the phone. "Al, this is Jill Campbell, our copywriter. I want her to hear this."

"Well, Lucien," came the voice from the phone, "this is more about programming than copywriting."

"Just talk, please," Lucien said rudely. 'Jill, he's talking about why the Cummings online banner looks like a piece of --" "Okay, it's like this," Al went on helpfully, interrupting in the happy yet baffling way that only computer geeks can. "Browsers are just computer programs built by programmers to do certain things. Older browsers did nothing but show letters and numbers, with no choice of type font. Newer browsers can show graphics, and obey commands to change the relative size and type-color. The problem here is that the browser you're using -- late last year's model I'd guess -- isn't able to recognize the HTML command tags for font faces and sizes. I suggest you get a new browser, so that you really see what we've put together for you."

Fed up. When in doubt, always take out your fears, frustrations, anger, and insecurities on inanimate objects - preferably, pieces of frustrating computer technology. But there's a fine line between being a prima donna and a lunatic - and Lucien's treading it. If he doesn't lighten up, it's going to become obvious that he's cracking under the strain of Detective Berkowitz's suspicions ... and his own guilt.

"But," screamed Lucien, "if we can't see the ad properly, there must be millions of people who can't see it either!"

"True," replied Al, maddeningly disinterested. "But it's a good incentive for people to keep up with the newest browsers. Some can be downloaded via the Internet directly, at little or no cost."

"I don't care! What can we do now?" demanded the near-hysterical Lucien. Showing his immaturity and stupidity, thought the still-silent Jill Campbell. People like Lucien always think that intimidation is the way to be forceful and effective, she observed to herself.

"Well," droned Al, "I guess we could run the sections that offend you as individual pieces of art, but that would slow down download time. Unless, of course, we could get viewers to download other plug-ins ... "

Lucien leaned over a press the "Spkr" button again, disconnecting the phone call, and stared at Jill.

"I hate this job," he hissed, angrily ripping his computer mouse out of its keyboard port and, unbelievably, throwing it violently out the open window with all his might. It landed harmlessly on the terrace of the floor below, where a clerk in the purchasing department heard it land outside her window with a gentle click.

Jill Campbell stood up, smiled at Lucien, said "Thanks for sharing," and walked back to her office.