The Myasthenic Spelunker Society
- Back in California, the UCSD library has several different virtual sections: Hacek, Geisel (Dr. Seuss), Scooch-a-mouti, Lovecraft. And there's some possible fighting between the Hacek fans and the Scooch-a-mouti fans.
- Meanwhile, the Elder Cabal is still scheming to temporarily interfere with the scanning by breaking in to the biotech labs.
- Part of that plan involves going through the old steam tunnels, which gives this chapter its title: the oldsters in the group used to go spelunking (which is "cave exploring," so maybe doesn't really apply to steam tunnels?); and "myasthenic" has to do with muscle fatigue.
- Tommie Parker is very excited by this project and has discovered a time when he could create a diversion and break into the biotech lab. In fact, he's arranging all these different people to work together to do parts of this project, like create the glue they need. And he's feeling young and powerful again.
- Winston Blount suggests they bring virtual Sharif along as a way to document the project.
- Robert figures out that the Mysterious Stranger has suggested that to Blount. So it's like everyone is dealing with the Mysterious Stranger.