It was a lovely day on Cygnus Alpha; seventy-two degrees, a light breeze, and sunny. Shame to have to go to work, thought Jack.

"Hey, Billy, could you cut the grass today?" he asked. "It's getting kind of long."

"Do I have to, Dad? It's so hard, and Rover doesn't like the noise." Billy moved towards his pet beagle, as if to get his support against this chore.

"Just leave him inside while you do it. It won't take too long, and we can go out for ice cream when I get back. There's a new shipment of real milk just in from Earth."

Jack flagged down the monorail and headed for his office. He made a note on his calendar to leave a little early today. Being the Colony Administrator was often pretty busy, but he tried to make time for Billy.

Jack's office was in the middle of district one -- downtown and government. He had the top floor of a twenty-story building. On a clear day, he could just about see his house, though it was hard to pick it out from the others in district five. They were all pretty similar, with solar panels on the roof and large green lawns.

It was a comparatively light day; checks on colony Key Performance Indicators and meetings with Education, Medical, and Agriculture. The news from Agriculture was especially promising -- new grains and livestock were expected from Earth any day now. In just a few months they should be able to make their own milk and cheese, and beer and wine would follow in a couple of years.

Jack's last meeting of the day was with a Dr. Vikram Gupta from Ecology. Jack had never understood why they didn't merge Agriculture with Ecology, but even a Colony Administrator had to pick his battles.

Gupta came in -- he was a short man, dressed in an ill-fitting suit. Unpacked for this occasion? Jack wondered. Gupta smiled nervously as he shook Jack's hand.

"Dr. Gupta," said Jack. "Please, have a seat."

"Thank you, Administrator."

"Now, what can I do for you?"

"Well sir, it's about some research I've been doing on the local flora. You see, I think it's alive."

Jack frowned. "Alive? Why, of course it is."

"Sorry sir -- wrong word. No, I mean the plant life, I think it's a single living organism, all connected, encircling the planet. And there may be some intelligence to it -- my research indicates cells similar to neurons."

"I see. And how sure are you of this?"

"Well, not completely sure yet, sir. But with some more research, I think we could come to a conclusive statement and--"

Jack held up a hand. "So you've come to ask me for more funding? Why not go through the proper channels? What did Academician Fafunwa say?" This last was a half-question. He knew very well what Fafunwa had said, since he had told her to say it.

"She said she wouldn't support it sir, but--"

"So you want me to devote some research funds to a theory that the whole planet is alive and intelligent, against the advice of scientific leadership? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, you know."

"Yes, sir, but if--"

"Where are you from, Gupta?"

"District twenty-seven, sir."

"No, I mean, where are you really from? On Earth."

"San Francisco."

"San Francisco. They used to call it everyone's favorite city. And how are things in San Francisco now?"

"Not good, sir."

"Not good. Let's say I approve your request, and it's not a waste of money and we find out that the whole planet is one big Gaia-like connected organism. Then what? We become another failed colony, like Canis Delta. And you get shipped back to San Francisco, or Toronto, or wherever we can find that's not too much on fire. Is that what you want?"

Gupta was silent. He bit at his fingernail. Scientists, thought Jack. You could punch them in the nose and they'd take three years to analyze the data, formulate a hypothesis and write a grant request for a follow-on study.

"Gupta," he said. "You know about Schrödinger's cat, right? It's alive or dead, but you don't know which until you open the box. You know what the point of the story is?"

"Well sir, it's about quantum superposition and--"

"No, Dr. Gupta. The moral is, don't open the box. Not unless you really want to see a dead cat. Do you understand me?"

* * *

It was a beautiful day outside while Billy mowed the lawn; seventy-two degrees, a light breeze, and sunny. Rover lay inside, hiding under the bed, hoping to block out the high-pitched screams that came with each push of the mower -- "Help! Please, help!"