Broken Mirror (35 page)

“Welcome,” she said, smiling broadly. The glare from her bright white teeth obscured her face. Victor’s brain was acting up, but he’d left his fumewort in the car.

The docent paused as if the tourists needed time to digest the full import of that single word, and then she continued. “Welcome to the Institute for Applied Biological Sciences. We are the largest research facility in the Organized Western States that is focused solely on the medical sciences. Today I’ll take you through an exhibit showcasing the discoveries and developments pioneered over our fifty-year history. You’ll see our genomics lab, where approximately 40 percent of the Human Genome Initiative’s first-pass sequencing was carried out. And I’ll take you to our world-famous cafeteria, which is exclusively provisioned by our genetically modified crops and livestock. Supplementary information will be available throughout the tour to those of you with Mesh devices. Follow me, please.”

Elena whispered in Victor’s ear, “Fake food! The Puros would freak out if it was sold in the R.O.T.”

The tour group moved past a set of glass partitions and a pillar with a blue light on top. When Elena neared the pillar, it turned red. The receptionist sitting nearby spoke into a microphone. Within seconds, a security guard emerged from a doorway and approached Elena. Victor watched with a mixture of fear and surprise.

“You’ll need to check your weapon with us during the tour,” the guard said.

“Oh, okay. I forgot I was carrying.” Elena smiled as she gave up her stunstick and received a numbered token in exchange, but Victor knew she resented letting it out of her grasp.

“Weapons don’t seem to be a big deal here,” Victor remarked. In SeCa carrying a stunstick would get you a gene screening and some jail time.

Elena shrugged. “Here and in the R.O.T., as long as you don’t disrupt commerce, personal freedom reigns.”

The docent began to explain the founding of the institute, which came about during the Repartition. She described how tax rebates from the federal government poured into the urban centers of the O.W.S.
—
its capital, Salt Lake City; industrial Portland; mineral-exporting Boise; and East-Asian-trade-oriented Seattle. Research-focused Las Vegas exploded into a major biotech and materials science hub, one of the most important academic centers of the A.U. outside the Eastern Seaboard and the last city along the Cold Nile Miracle route to the Democratic Republic of Mexico. Las Vegas was governed by a techno-libertarian criminal with a fetish for city planning, according to Elena’s hushed whispers.

“The King of Las Vegas or the chief of the Corps?” Victor asked.

Elena answered, “They’re one and the same.”

They followed the docent and the tour group up a long hallway that curved in a gradual spiral incline around the building’s central column of stairs and elevator banks. The atmosphere was one of calm reflection and deep focus, about as far from the Springboard Café as possible. Victor wanted to live in a house that looked like this. Why hadn’t anyone ever told him how amazing Las Vegas was?

As they followed the ramp upward, years were marked on the floor in glowing numbers. When the docent reached 1934, the wall lit up with a vidfeed showing the DNA molecule and a picture of the four coauthors of the paper announcing its discovery, one of whom was a tall, wild-haired twenty-something named Jefferson Eastmore.

At 1975 the wall activated again. Multicolored lines radiated from a central point. White numbers and letters surrounded the wheel of color.

“The human genome,” Victor whispered to Elena. “Every base pair in every chromosome sequenced and mapped. It’s the baseline for all individual genetic comparisons.”

The docent overheard and gave Victor a satisfied nod. Then she launched into a more long-winded explanation for those on the tour with less scientific literacy. Victor wrapped his arm around Elena, tipping his mouth toward her ear. “In the next room. Get ready.”

“Anything you say, sweetie pie,” she said. “By the way, I know what the human genome map looks like. I’m not stupid.” She poked him in the ribs, hard.

Victor suppressed a yelp and held his hands up in apology.

Elena smiled, and years dropped off her face, almost as if they were two teenagers again, goofing off in one of SeCa’s stodgy museums. Her smile soon faded, and a sad, heavy look took root. “You’re trying,” she said. “That’s what’s important.”

The docent led the group into a room that made them look like they’d been miniaturized and dumped onto a circuit board. Boxy machines the size of construction vehicles dotted the vast room. Racks of smaller metal boxes were arranged in long rows, separated by aisles. The treacherous terrain was strewn with cables like the webs of giant, sloppy spiders.

The docent explained, “Watch your step. We’re in the midst of a project to replace the original optical cables with faster flexible crystal nanotubes.” She gestured to a tangle of cables on the floor. “Data protection takes creative wiring.”

A few of the tour group members laughed politely while the rest gawked at the machines and took pictures.

The docent patted the nearest machine. “Each RTX-sequencer was dedicated to a single chromosome. This institute was responsible for half of the raw sequencing data; the other half came from a consortium of universities throughout the New England Commonwealth, the Greater Ohio Constitutional League, and the Southeastern Confederacy. We also performed data verification for the HGI as a whole. Some of you might recall the day of the announcement, when President
—
”

“Are these still running?” Victor asked.

A slight frown tugged at the docent’s mouth and then vanished. She said, “Not all of them. Miniaturization has come a long way in the past fifteen years. The sequencing and storage capability to recreate the work done in this room could fit within a small car today. We do utilize some of the machines from time to time for niche projects.”

“And the libraries? The complete set—they’re here too?”

“Yes, at the Institute we provide the HGI libraries, current and historical, to other research institutions to assist them in their genomic analyses.” She cocked her head, as if eager to hear another question, but he could tell she wanted to move on. Now that he knew that the libraries were, in fact, here, he was eager for her to do so too.

“Thank you,” Victor mumbled.

“Let’s take a look inside one of the sequencers,” the docent said, and led the group further into the room.

Victor remained behind while Elena went ahead. She glanced back at him, and he waved her on.

He slipped behind one of the machines, listening for a hum, any sign that it was turned on and connected to the Institute’s network. It was silent. The case hanging around his neck thumped against his chest, and he fought to remain calm as he fumbled with it and removed the data leech that Ozie had given him.

The next row over, Victor found a gently whirring machine. Through a grate on its side, he saw reflections of flashing diodes. Peering around the machine, Victor found a data cable, crouched, and affixed the data leech. It would ping the data traffic flowing through the cable, testing to see if it could access the genome libraries and find a path to the Mesh. In addition, a computer virus in the leech would seek out surveillance vid feeds at the Institute and disrupt them. Seconds ticked by. Victor heard the docent continuing her explanations of the HGI and the accelerated development of research and medicines that the project made possible.

The light on the data leech turned red. He removed the device and tried another. Fifteen seconds later, another red light. He moved to another machine. Red light, no connection.

Footsteps clicked behind him. Victor whirled.

Elena beckoned him. “I’ve run out of smart questions for her, and we’re moving on,” she said.

“I haven’t found it yet.” Victor removed the data leech and darted to the next machine. Its cables snaked under a floor panel, which he wedged open and tossed aside. He put the clamp around a thick purple cable. “We can’t leave without connecting this.”

Elena looked up at the ceiling. “What if they have vidfeeds?”

“Ozie’s got that taken care of. The data leech is a cyber sabotage smart bomb. They won’t find it unless they physically stumble over the device.”

A voice rang out from behind a rack of machines. “Excuse me!”

A security guard rounded the corner and eyed them suspiciously. He had obsidian-black skin, broad shoulders, and no hint of softness in his voice. “What are you doing in here?” he asked.

Victor froze where he was crouching next to the data leech. They’d been caught. He could look forward to years in jail and, after that, the rest of his life in a facility.

Elena hauled Victor to his feet. “Oh, perfect!” she squealed. “We were trying to get a picture together. Do you mind?” She took the imager from Victor neck and handed it to the guard. He looked dubiously at the device.

Victor shifted so that his foot hid the data leech.

“Just press that contact,” Elena instructed. “Give us a three count, please.” She squeezed Victor’s middle and kissed his cheek. His chest flushed; it felt like drinking warm cider.

The guard was watching them closely. Victor blinked, petrified that the guard wasn’t buying it.

“Thank you, sir,” Elena said.

The guard grunted. “Not my idea of a romantic date, but I don’t claim to understand kids these days.” He held up the imager. “One, two, three.” The guard pressed the contact. “I don’t think anything happened.”

Elena stepped forward and grabbed the imager from his hands. “No, that worked just fine. It’s silent, so I don’t look like a tourist.” She made the faux-shutter sounds that most imagers used these days.

Victor regained the use of his voice. “Did you see which way the tour group went?”

The guard wore the barest smirk on his face. “You must have missed them while you were smooching. Out the door, and to your left.” He turned and pointed.

Victor glanced down. The light had turned green. “Let’s get some lunch,” he said to Elena with bluster and walked ahead.

They rushed to rejoin the group while the guard followed. Elena made a show of fixing her hair and checking her makeup in a glass display cube holding an ancient microscope. Victor rubbed his lips. None of the group seemed to notice their performance, though the docent narrowed her eyes for a brief moment. The guard smiled, turned, and left.

“Good work,” Victor said to Elena. “I couldn’t get a word out.”

“You got the job done. That’s what counts.” She squeezed his arm. “We make a good team.”

When the tour group arrived at the institute’s restaurant, Victor and Elena asked to be pointed toward the exit.

“Won’t you be joining us for lunch?” the docent asked.

Elena piped up first, “I don’t eat doctored meat.”

The docent’s eyes widened, and her mouth gaped like a catfish. She straightened her shoulders and said, “Our produce is safe and delicious, I assure you.”

“I’m sure it is,” Victor said. “It’s just that we’re late for
—
”

“For a lunch date, where we’ll eat all
natural
food,” Elena said, tugging at his shirt. “I need to get my stunstick back, and we’ll go.”

The docent eyed them suspiciously, but she called a security guard who returned Elena’s stunstick and escorted them to the front door.

They wandered into the sunshine.

“All set?” she asked.

Victor smiled. “I think this is actually going to work.”

“Great, let’s get a room,” Elena said. “I need a shower before we head back.”

“I like it here. It’s civilized. We can stay overnight.”

Victor summoned his car, and soon it arrived at the drop-off/pick-up turnout. They climbed inside, and he programmed the destination, a hotel in the Summer zone. The car drove for a few minutes and stopped in front of a twenty-story building that curved away from them. A huge cantilevered awning hanging above them was strung with lightstrips like paper streamers. They got out and placed their bags on an autoporter, a low hexagonal dolly, which followed them inside.

The hotel lobby had smooth, polished, cream-colored laminate flooring that was surprisingly unslippery. Large potted ferns bordered a walkway to the registration area, where a young man stood behind an oiled rosewood desk.

Victor reached into his pocket to pull out his Handy 1000, but Elena placed a hand on his arm.

“In case they’re following you,” she whispered, “let’s put this under a fake name.”

“I’m sure Ozie will handle it.”

“Let’s not press our luck.” Elena elbowed him out of the way.

The receptionist smiled and asked if they would like two separate beds. Victor looked to Elena. “Adjoining rooms,” Elena said.

The receptionist replied, “Don’t miss the history exhibit on the origins of Las Vegas just past the elevators to your left.”

On the sixteenth floor, they found their rooms, showered separately, and met in Victor’s room.

“Can you show me more of the dreambook?” Elena asked.

“Why?”

“I finally got Ozie to talk before we left. I understand the conspiracy about diagnosing MRS, but I don’t understand how your dreams fit into this. Ozie said he doesn’t remember his dreams. And recurring dreams are apparently not a common symptom. Plus, yours might be coming true.”

Bile rose in Victor’s stomach. “They don’t. It’s just coincidental.”

“You told me that these were true, prescient dreams. You had a gut feeling about your granfa, and you were right about that. That means it’s not just your dreams. Something’s up with your brain. Let me help you figure it out.”

Reluctantly, Victor withdrew the leather-bound journal from his bag and handed it to her. “They started as early as I can remember,” he said, “but I only began writing them down when I was eleven, after the family reunion in New Venice.”

“I remember that,” Elena said. “It was my first time in the Louisiana Territories. I always thought it was strange for my family to join your family’s party.”

Victor shrugged. “I think Granfa needed to show how buddy-buddy he was with a union official. He wanted the union’s support.”