The Second Sphere

The hallway filled quickly with investigators and technicians collecting samples. The room in which the throwaway and Newberry lay dead looked like a science experiment. Men and women milled around with disgusted faces, annoyed at being pulled from the Source in the middle of the night. A hurricane had struck Victor Newberry’s apartment, and I knew no one had a grasp on where it came from or where it would go.

We didn’t have too many crime scenes like this in the intelligence business. Usually, if we had a contract to kidnap or take out a particular GR operative, we would make a given scene appear like an accident. But this scene couldn’t be construed as an accident, and there was no way to cover it up. There were so many witnesses that the JSF had to be called in to help interview them.

Standing by the elevator, I felt like my insides had been drained. I watched the scene play. I tried to make myself think about what happened. I could use words to describe the blood and gore, but the images didn’t come to me, like the horror had been stricken from my record.

A security officer guided me into a recently evacuated apartment, where I went to the bedroom and flopped on the bed. I lay on the rumpled sheets, unconcerned about who was there before. I felt drained. The chip was supposed to give me strength. But the organism in my neck had dried up.

The room was frozen in time, just seconds before someone knocked on the door to get the residents out: An open suitcase, half filled with clothes; a pink bottle of perfume spilled on the bedside table; a Love drive partially hidden underneath the pillow. For a moment, I thought about dosing. But even that simple act seemed hard. And that scared the hell out of me.

Bryant and Nelson marched in with their hands jammed into their pants pockets. It was as though they’d matched their disheveled clothing before they came, made sure that their faces presented the same dire unhappiness. I wanted nothing more than to pretend as though everything were okay. But my hands shook badly. Bryant sat on the bed next to me and put his hand on my leg. I felt cold.

“What in the hell were you doing here?” Bryant asked. I tried to answer a question that sounded so simple.

“I…” My voice cracked, so I stopped and swallowed hard. “The feed stopped and Newberry’s connection with the Source trace broke.”

“Just start from the beginning. Tell us what led you here. It’s okay,” Nelson said. “Take a deep breath.”

So I told them about my meeting with Newberry, how I agreed to meet with him the next day at the Dahlgren Institute. And then I precisely laid out Newberry’s movements immediately after that.

“So,” Bryant said, “Newberry got a throwaway?”

I nodded.

“Did Malinda check other access? Maybe security here at the Marquis?” Nelson asked.

“She did,” I whispered.

A Laslow technician came into the room. He held a small plastic case, which he handed to Bryant. “Sir, this was found in the debris,” he said. “I thought it might be important.” The translucent amber box contained a chip about the width of a thumbnail, thin as a whisker.

I didn’t know what was on that chip. But I guessed it contained the very information that Newberry had been talking about, and told Bryant and Nelson as much.

“We’ll get some analysts to review this tonight,” Bryant said.

“No,” I said. “This is not something that we can let analysts work on. Not yet. We’ve got to see what’s on it first. I promised Newberry.”

“Orion, I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Newberry told me that he had sensitive information.”

Bryant sighed. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll hold on to it until tomorrow. You can review it when you get in.”

The officer left the room.

“So tell me again what happened once you got to the hotel.” Nelson’s jaw clenched.

“We were standing right outside the door when we heard cries for help.” A man in uniform came into the room just as I started, carrying a glass of water. He handed it to me. I took a few sips, then proceeded.

“At first, I thought they were just having sex. But then Newberry started crying for help.”

The whole time I spoke, telling them every last gruesome detail of what happened in the room, Nelson’s eyes were on my face. When I finished telling them the rest of the story, Bryant sighed. He waited for Nelson’s response. But when Nelson didn’t say anything, Bryant’s eyes fell on me.

“What was it?” he asked.

“I have no idea. Never seen anything like this.”

“And you said that the throwaway bit Newberry?” Bryant asked. His eyebrows were knit together. “You think that had something to do with him attacking you?”

“I couldn’t say for sure,” I said. “You get the chips out?”

Bryant told me that the throwaway’s chip was crispy, but that Newberry’s was still scan-friendly.

“You need to get some rejuvenation when you’re done talking with the JSF officer,” Bryant continued. “We’re going to have a transport get you home. Okay?”

I nodded.

“We’ll get this worked out,” Nelson said. He put his hand on my shoulder as though this was supposed to console me. Perhaps my face wasn’t displaying my emotions. I was quite certain that Nelson had absolutely no sense of how I felt, nor had he any idea about how this would end up.

Bryant waited for Nelson to leave the room. “I’m sure everything will be okay,” he said with the same ridiculous confidence.

“Thanks,” I said. “But I’m not sure.”

Bryant smiled hesitantly. He left the room just as a JSF officer came in. The man took my statement and asked a few questions. I told him the same story I’d just told Nelson and Bryant. Telling the tale, I felt distance from it, as though it were just a film, something that couldn’t possibly be real.

When the officer was done asking questions, he stood and left the room. I was alone. I knew that I needed to get up, that I couldn’t stay at the hotel any longer. Memories started to press up against me, and I needed to be at home if I was going to confront them.

Finally, I stood. My legs felt weak, and it took a moment to steady myself. Out in the hallway was the same mess I’d left. If anything, it was worse. Swarms of people moved around each other, doing their assigned tasks. Before I left, I wanted to see Malinda, make sure that she would be okay.

It took a while to find her. A JSF soldier standing by the elevator told me where she was; a floor up, sitting in a room with a shrink, getting her head worked over.

I hesitated when I got up there; I didn’t know how she was dealing. Through the cracked door, I heard a man chattering away. I knocked before I opened it. The two of them jumped when I came into the room.

“She needs a few minutes,” the man said to me as he put up a hand. He came over to block my entrance. All I wanted to see was her face.

“Malinda,” I said, not knowing whether there were any words to convey how I felt, much less words of comfort. She flashed her eyes at me. She appeared unfazed by what had happened downstairs, as though she’d set up a wall between her and the memories. I wished for the same kind of discipline.

The man shoved me toward the door and shut it behind me. Apparently I wasn’t welcome. I went back downstairs to get information about my ride and a Laslow man standing by the elevator led me downstairs.

We left the building through a service entrance. The ground was sticky, covered in recycling grime. Walking down the narrow dirty alley on one side of the building, I looked over my shoulder. A crowd had formed outside the front entrance: journalists; a few interested spectators. Bot cops kept them back.

There was no chance of keeping this quiet.

There was a transport at the end of the alley, a small three-seater. I slipped into the back seat, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to speak, acknowledging that I didn’t want anymore questions asked of me.

“You know where you’re going?” I asked the transport system. My eyes felt leaden.

“Yes, sir,” it said. “You just relax; I’ll let you know when we get there.” When we pulled away, my aching head fell back against the seat. The weight of the evening was too much for me. I closed my eyes, hoping that the entire mess would be gone when I opened them again.