A Chronetic Memory (The Chronography Records Book 1) (17 page)

Then he smiled. It was an adventure. What he might discover today! He let out a whoop, grateful that the road to the nearest tube station was mostly deserted. A hundred years ago, there’d have been ground cars along this road and he’d have garnered some questioning looks.

Vashon Island was one of the few places left in the Seattle area where a person could still find towering fir trees, flourishing madronas, and gentle streams. While the urgent need for housing in the more urban areas had stacked apartments high and squeezed homes together, the quirky community on Vashon had continued to hold out.

It wasn’t just the Seebak house and lab combo that nestled among the trees. Most homes, except those along the shore or close to the main highway along the length of the island, still had a green belt buffer to separate them.

Lexil remembered the West Seattle neighborhood he had come from, over ten years earlier. Houses were spaced no more than seven meters apart. Side windows were always tinted, to give a measure of privacy, both upstairs and downstairs. Some of the older homes had been divided into quaint, multi-level apartment units. His parents, both professionals, had been wealthy enough to afford a house without an upstairs apartment.

What a different life that had been! His mother was the consummate hostess, gracious and caring. His dad was a little more reserved, but appreciated his mother’s social ease. He had come to know all his neighbors at a very young age because they were frequent dinner guests and often joined his family for afternoon barbecues on the weekends in fair weather.

In contrast, on Vashon, he interacted with none of the neighbors. He knew other people on the island, of course, because he had enrolled in Vashon High School for his last two years. Most of his studies there had been through the telestudy program, because it was more convenient to his work with Doc in the lab, but there were the mandatory group sessions and lots of online interaction. He probably knew a hundred or so other kids—now young adults—his age. There had even been a girlfriend for a while. Their relationship had ended on a friendly note, but he had completely lost touch with her in the intervening years. He had heard she was married and had a little girl and another on the way.

Funny that she came to mind just now. Well, she was his only serious relationship. He didn’t count the casual flings he had enjoyed during his college years. By that time, his work had become so interesting he hadn’t invested the kind of time or attention that a strong relationship had needed. To be honest, he had probably been an irritation to those girls, and he didn’t blame them at all for breaking it off after just a few weeks. He wasn’t a very good relationship risk. He missed it, though, he had to admit. What he really needed was a partner, someone he could share his work with.

Lexil laughed at himself. That was a dream unlikely to happen any time soon.

He spotted the tube station, and sprinted the remaining distance. Green line to Alki Point, blue line to First Hill. Then the adventure would begin.

After an uneventful ride in a tube car with two people staring off into space—evidently absorbed in something on their eyescreens—and a man taking a quick nap on the way home, Lexil transferred to the blue line at the Alki Point substation. The tube cars to First Hill were crowded, even at this time of night. Eventually, he arrived. He was grateful he didn’t have to commute every day to work.

He put through a call to the lab. “Doc? Any movement?”

“Yes, I’m afraid you’ll have to travel a bit more. Head over to Lower Queen Anne. It looks like the disturbance is heading back to the Wallace home, or something nearby. It—she? he?—is moving that direction.”

Lexil checked the schedule. He’d have to wait about ten minutes for the shoreline tube to arrive from the south. He found a bench and tapped into his calculations for the insertion experiment.

About three months earlier, he’d started toying with the idea of a program that could cancel the effects of time decay, which was a continuing annoyance in their research, and, he imagined, any research at the institute as well. First, he had had to investigate what caused the time decay in the first place. He had come to a tentative conclusion, but he wouldn’t be able to be sure until he was able to test out his hypothesis. Perhaps this would be the opportunity he was waiting for.

20

DANI’S APARTMENT, First Hill, Seattle, WA. 1740, Thursday, June 8, 2215.

Dani disconnected. Maybe a connexion call hadn’t been the best way to talk to Kat about bringing Anders over to meet them. She had to admit, Kat had been right about all the things they had to address between the three of them before bringing Anders into the equation. He didn’t even know about Jored yet. At least Kat and Marak knew that, from her perspective, they were part of an alternate reality.

Although, Dani reminded herself, they might not have realized that she fervently wanted to reduce them from the “real” to the merely “possible” in the process of getting her own Kat and Marak back, the Kat and Marak who were the parents of a very appealing little boy named Jored.

So she had agreed, reluctantly at first, then in complete accord, that the meeting with Anders should be postponed. It might be possible later in the evening, but Kat had suggested waiting until the next day. Friday was the day before the weekend, and they would all feel more relaxed. That was one of Kat’s strengths, being able to step back and see a bigger perspective. In that, at least—and really, in almost every other way she could think of—Kat was her Kat. She just wasn’t Jored’s mom.

She glanced at the time and was startled to realize that she’d have to hurry to catch the next shoreline tube train to the Wallace house. They still hadn’t increased the frequency on that line, and she didn’t want the fifteen-minute wait between trains. She grabbed her bag and rushed out the door, almost hitting her shin on the edge of the chair on the way. Who had moved that? She could have sworn it wasn’t there just a few minutes ago. She wasn’t old enough to be getting this forgetful.

No time to worry about it. She owed Anders a call to explain the delay, but she could make that once she got settled in the tube car.

WALLACE HOME, Lower Queen Anne, Seattle, WA. 1755, Thursday, June 8, 2215.

This time, it was Kat who opened the door after the irisscan announced her arrival. She greeted her with a warm hug and a question. “How was your day?”

“Good, I think. I came up with an idea that I think you’ll like.”

“Meeting Anders, you mean?”

“No, that was just an impulsive thought in the tube car home. This is better.”

“So then, what?”

“I want you and Marak to meet Jored.”

Kat opened her mouth to answer, and then closed it. Then opened it again. Finally, she got out a feeble, “How, exactly, do you want us to do that? Describe him to us really well?”

Dani tried not to laugh at her flustered friend. If this worked out the way she hoped, Kat would be going through a lot of other emotions as she saw herself and her son interacting. There was so much love in their family! She found herself longing for just one more taste of that. But she wanted Kat and Marak there too.

“No, I have a different idea. But I have to figure out a way around a difficulty, first. That’s part of what I want to talk to you about.” She looked around. “Where’s Marak?”

“He’s in his office. Has a story deadline. Said he’d be out in a few minutes.” Kat walked toward the kitchen. “Do you want something to drink? I assume you’re staying for dinner.”

“Yes. What do you have?”

“Iced tea, frapple, beer, Italian berry vanilla blast-of-caff lemon-lime cola supreme?” Kat made out-of-breath noises at the end of the last option, exaggerating them comically for Dani’s benefit.

Dani laughed. She couldn’t help it. “My grandfather used to call those ‘graveyards.’ He’d probably never believe we actually buy that stuff now.”

“I’m convinced we’ll buy anything, if it’s packaged attractively. So what’ll it be?”

“Iced tea is fine. It’s hot outside, for June. It’ll feel good to cool off.”

“Want to take them outside? Or would that be too hot for you?”

“No, you’ve got shade out there. It looks nice.” The back yard did look nice. She was used to seeing it scattered with baseball bats, riding toys, and a swing set. This new back yard was nicely manicured, with flowering shrubs and annuals arranged around the outer border and a raised vegetable garden near the back. A fountain just off the patio offered soothing sounds. It was very calming.

The two women sat down at the table with their drinks and sipped companionably for a few minutes. Kat waved at the glass door to remove the tint for a moment. “I was checking to see if Marak was coming,” she explained. “I wanted to ask you what you found out about the finances at the institute. Last night was so crazy, we didn’t get a chance to talk about that. But I keep thinking we should wait until Marak gets done and can listen too.”

“Until Marak gets done and can listen to what?” asked Marak, as he slid the door open and waved at it to tint it again.

“Those questions she was digging into about the institute’s finances.”

“I
would
like to hear about that.” He turned to Dani, and his friendly grin dropped for an instant, to be replaced by a look of concern. “You are keeping safe, though, aren’t you? Not taking any risks, inviting unnecessary attention?”

“I’m pretty sure nobody knows that I exist there,” she reassured him. “Except Anders.”

“Who’s Anders again?” he asked, pulling up another chair to join them at the table.

“She’s managed to cultivate a confidential informant already,” Kat explained. “Minus the compensation, of course.”

“Whoa. Moving up into big time investigations already. You learn fast!” He was teasing, but she could tell he really was somewhat impressed.

“Anders works in Financial Services. He’s an intern too, and they pay about as much attention to him as they do to me. He was eager to help, and he’s really good at covering his tracks on the system.”

“Could be useful. What has he discovered?” Marak asked.

“More than forty percent of the money that comes into the institute is from unidentified contributors and donors. He said that wasn’t including the donors that choose to remain anonymous. These are just unexplained sums of money.”

Marak whistled. “Any idea where they come from?”

“Well, yes. But this part comes from my own investigation. And it ties in to Kat’s main gripe with the institution.”

“Privacy.” Kat interrupted.

Dani nodded. “What do you guys know about time decay?”

“It happens to objects you used to be able to scan? And you can’t scan them any more?” Marak asked.

“Yes. I helped write a graduate paper at the university. It showed that time decay was caused when—and only when—the video, audio, and/or olfactory recordings of an object were played on an independent projector for the first time. Later, at the institute, I was told that some objects decay without that, but now I’m not so sure.”

“Ah. You’re talking about blackmail.” Marak had already leaped to the end.

“Wait. How do you get from what she said to what you said?” Kat asked.

“Scan and record a crime. Play recording. Demand money. Blackmail!” he said, succinctly. “And time decay, seemingly with no explanation for why it is happening.”

Dani nodded again. “I hate the idea that the institute is doing that. And I’m sure that some of the commissioned scans they have me do are helping to give them more evidence,” she added, miserably.

“You’re also researching history,” Kat said, reassuringly. “The goal is to put a stop to the bad stuff so the good stuff can go on.”

“How did you come to the blackmail conclusion, Dani?” Marak asked. Always the journalist, confirming each source.

“I went back to the padlock. It had decayed. But right after the blank part in the scan was another that showed me, pretty clearly, what had gone before.”

“And it was the kind of material that could be used to threaten someone?” he asked.

“Yes, except it’s someone at the institute, so I’m not sure if they’re getting money from that person.”

“Control then.” Marak got it again. “That puts an interesting spin on things. If you’ve got someone at the institute under that kind of control, you might find someone who could answer a lot of your questions.”

Dani sat up. “That’s what I was thinking.”

“Whoa, girl. Don’t go there. That person is also a person who is being closely watched. He might feel threatened if he knows you know something damaging to him. And he might be under some kind of pressure to report on other people there. You’d be waving your hands and asking for attention.”

Dani didn’t bother to correct the mistaken gender words. It wasn’t her intention to expose Dr. Brant and further complicate her life. She’d just let Marak go on thinking that the blackmail victim was a man, for now. Maybe forever.

But she wasn’t ready to give up her idea of trying to get the scientist alone to talk to her, either. With Marak’s warning ringing in her ears, she’d just take extra steps to be cautious.

“None of this surprises me,” said Kat. “It would be good to get some specific evidence and shut the whole thing down, of course. But Dani, don’t you dare think that we expect you to do this.”