"Think really big," said George Lovins, describing the promotion campaign he wanted.

"Penetrating," said Harry Groucho.

"All-encompassing," said Tom Willard.

Chris Chandler, the fourth nut, said nothing.

"As big as your invention?" Henry shot back, smoking fiercely.

"Nothing is as big as that," Lovins told him. "We're serious. We know you think we're fools, that we're crazy." He started playing to the camera that was getting all of this. "We know that the media back home has been making fun of us personally and so has, well, just about everybody in the world who's seen the show. Geniuses are always misunderstood in their time. We know that. We also now realize that this whole show has not been dedicated to developing a world-changing invention, but to showcase our eccentricities, if you will, in an effort at packaging us as entertainment. We've been on camera for almost three months, teased to the brink of insanity by beautiful women who secretly ridicule us along with everybody else, but you know what we've done for you? We've made an invention that will solve the world's biggest problem." He turned to Henry. "Think ten thousand times bigger than 'IT.'"

Henry knew good television when he saw it unfold, so he decided in an instant to use this footage. He played the skeptical producer who is won over by a good argument.

"All right, you guys win," he told them after four additional minutes of debate, spreading his hands in a gesture of surrender.

"We've got one condition," said Groucho.

"What's that?" Henry said warily.

"We want big screen TVs set up here at the unveiling, and we want cameras set up in ten major cities of our choice showing large public areas, like Times Square in New York. The cameras will capture these images in real time and beam them to our TVs by satellite."

"Why on earth do you want that?"

Lovins grinned. "We want to see the news of our invention spread around the world. We want to see the world's reaction, see them finally appreciate our genius."

"It'd cost a lot," Henry said, rubbing his chin. "We'd have to do the show live, during the day."

"We don't mind, Henry."

Henry was trapped. He decided to gamble. He would play.

"All right," he said.

The next episode aired with the negotiation footage, accompanied by a major promotional blitz, and the media went crazy, giving the show unbelievable coverage that topped even Survivor. All of America and the many people around the world with an appetite for the fast food that was American television were crazy with anticipation. It was bigger than, "What is 'IT'?" It was bigger than, "Who shot JR?" It was bigger than anything in an age when even snow storms were covered to death by the press, which made everything bigger than it was, always fearful that they would miss out on the next bandwagon.

Dillon, seeing all the great publicity, threw in a direct satellite hook-up to massive TV screens in the public areas being shot for viewing by the four inventors, so the public could watch at the same time they were being watched. Giant sound systems would ensure that everybody could hear what the inventors had to say. BOP ran ads that said Life of the Mind was no longer a show, but the world's largest tele-conference.

Henry buried his face in his hands and moaned.

What if they had nothing? he wondered. It'd be the perfect revenge for them. They could unveil a mousetrap or a Post-It pad or a peanut and say they'd invented it, and make BOP crash and burn. Dillon didn't see it that way. He believed that the nuts had something big. But Henry was terrified.

On the screen, the raw footage was still rolling and the fourth nut was taking his turn with the camera, speaking in a stilted manner, as if clumsily reciting a speech.

"Hello, people of Earth, my name is Chris Chandler and I'm an expert on lost civilizations -- incredibly advanced civilizations that preceded recorded history, in the Hyperborean Age, in the time before mighty Atlantis yielded to the waves . . . "

Lunatics, Henry thought. Lunatics have my career in the hairy palms of their sweaty hands.

Showtime. Henry walked out of the studio building into the afternoon heat, down the path and found the talent and crew assembled on the beach with an exclusive group of reporters from around the world. The small army of big-chested girls laughed, surrounding the four nuts who were grinning like kids let loose in the candy store. Surrounded by scores cameras, the big TV screens and tons of equipment, they looked like they were making some last stand against the monster robots in a campy, low-budget sci fi flick.

Henry took a deep breath and walked straight up to them, dragging his stomach along like a twenty-five-pound weight.

I should have picked four serial killers, he thought. That would have been safer than this. The working title: Who Do You Trust?

"Henry! Come on over here!" George Lovins shouted, then gladhanded him as he approached. "Here it is, right here."

"No peeking," said Willard.

"It is greatness personified," Groucho said, doing a bizarre jig, making the girls laugh.

A table had been set up and on it perched a strange object with multiple limbs, covered by a dark blue sheet.

"That's going to change the world," Henry said, slapping the breast-pockets of his faux safari jacket for cigarettes.

"You bet," winked Chandler.

"So when do we start shooting?" said Henry.

"We already started, boss," one of the cameramen said.

He glared at his assistant, Laura, who shrugged and mouthed I don't know.

"We just wanted to make it more real," Lovins said. "So we made a deal with Dillon."

"You went around me to my boss, you cocksucker?"

"You're on television, Henry," Willard said. "The whole world's watching."

"What?"

"See there?" Chandler pointed at the ten big-screen TVs, where hundreds of thousands of people on each screen were looking up in a silent state of shock and sympathetic embarrassment. He took an awkward step backward, reeling with vertigo.

Henry grinned sheepishly at the camera, trying to recover, his mind spinning with stress, heat and sunlight. "Hey, world," he said, "what do you want, I'm a television producer."

On the TV screens, the world laughed soundlessly at his joke, startling him.

Garbage in, garbage out, he thought.

"Wave, Henry!" shouted Lovins.

All of them waved at the cameras, and the world saved back.

"Give us a thumbs up if you can hear us!" shouted Willard.

The world gave them the thumbs-up, laughing at the fools on the island.