Prolog

A new program at Wycherley College was founded in the auspicious year 2000 ACE by a group of anonymous billionaires “for the furtherance of paranormal and other non-standard intelligence, regardless of lineage, means, age and beliefs, so the world can be made a better place by those most capable of creating the means to do so.”

The enlightened and moneyed founders had the wisdom to understand that administration and faculty had to be as gifted as the students. They also knew the fledgling program would foster enmity with the traditional faculty at the college and with citizens in the nearby town.

The global search for the college’s first attendees was complemented by a similar search for an appropriate administrator and a small number of faculty.

While the college continued to search for an administrator, the incumbent Dean Astrid continued in place, assuming control of the nascent Paranormal Studies Program.

Two genius faculty members were selected among thirty-five-hundred candidates: middle-aged Dr. Asplundh and twenty-something Dr. Sund, colleagues and former employees of a highly classified artificial intelligence and robotics program of the US government.

Of the ten students stipulated as the desired number, only five arrived—all geniuses—Brian Foster, Nancy Newberry, Vanessa Holdup, Robin Fairchild, and Todd Umlaut. To separate their living quarters from the college dormitories, a habitat called ‘the treehouse’ was built especially for them and their spectral creations. The college failing to find ten students created an existential issue. Nursing was the rival program. Its champion was doing everything in her power to undermine the program for the gifted.