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but it doesn’t cover as much as it could have, at least not by population," Sam observed. Something about the pattern bothered him.
    “You’re right. For whatever reason, the anomalies seem intent on having a presence on every populated continent," Rui responded.
    “Not quite, Rui. There’s no impact site on either of the poles. Of course the human presence on those landmasses is negligible. Perhaps they had a floor…” Camilla drifted off in thought.
    “Do you have the population data on that laptop?” Sam asked Rui.
    “Yes. We didn’t have much time, but we did put a basic table showing population by country, continent and as a percentage of the world total. If no one minds, I’ll bring that up on big screen.” Hearing no objections, Rui did so.
    “Could you add another column showing the distribution of the anomalies by continent?” Sam waited a moment for Rui to populate the column and then observed that the distribution did not map as would be expected if the intent was to achieve minimal coverage on all populated landmasses and then distribute them evenly by each continent’s percentage of the world’s population. “Africa and the Americas are about right; within a half a unit or so, but the real outliers, if we accept the minimum of one per populated continent and exclude Australia from consideration, are Europe and Asia. In Europe, four countries are targeted when it only warrants two by population and Asia should have at least ten, but has only eight.”
    “I noticed that too, though I think part of it might be our somewhat arbitrary inclusion of Turkey in Europe rather than Asia. It really could be counted in either," Dan commented.
    “The disparity could be due to the populations of other animals in those areas. For all we know, it could include insects or even plants. We have no reason to believe they are targeting based solely on human life," Camilla added.
    “You’re right, of course, but I’m inclined toward another explanation based on two factors," Sam started, cautiously. This was not his area of expertise, but he had an idea and he had difficulty keeping his ideas to himself. “I think we can conclude that they are in fact targeting based on human population density and not the density of life.”
    Camilla had been staring intently at Sam as he spoke, clearly thinking about the problem and his point. As he finished his first point she said, “You're right. I should have seen it immediately.”
    “What?” Jack asked.
    Sam gestured to Camilla, offering her the floor. She declined, “You saw it first, Sam.”
    “If they were targeting life in general, wouldn’t there be some impact sites in the oceans? If I recall they make up over 90 percent of the Earth’s living space.”
    “Nearly 99 percent, actually," Camilla corrected, somewhat chagrined.
    “What’s your second point, Sam?” Dan asked.
    “Well, this would be less tenuous a point if there was an impact site on Greenland, but I still think it works. Pull up the map again, please?” Sam waited a moment for Rui to do so then continued, “The Americas are clearly distinct continents, as is Australia. Africa not so much, but far more so than Europe. It is our political considerations that lead us to make a distinction between Europe and Asia, which is why we had some ambiguity about Turkey. Just looking at a map without those considerations, an outsider wouldn’t see a difference between the two, not from a geographic perspective. Going with that logic, we don’t have an imbalance. There are 12 impact sites in Eurasia, just as we would expect based on the numbers.”
    “This is interesting folks, and I don’t mean to stifle creativity but the clock is ticking. I think the most salient question is whether the targeting is intended to reach the most people or destroy as much of humanity as possible in their first strike. Does anyone have any thoughts on that?” Web asked, slightly frustrated at the academic tone of the