Severance (15 page)

As he’d guessed, the door unlocked for him without incident.
He watched it slide open, revealing the simple two room apartment within. He
stepped inside and allowed the door to close behind him. It was quiet. Harold
felt like an intruder — he had never been there without Kevin.

After he was hatched, Kevin had been placed in the care of
the ship’s social services department, legally an orphan. Which wasn’t a huge
problem for Harold’s work, as he had essentially unlimited access to Kevin
throughout his childhood so that he could continue his work.

And that work ended up going very well. Kevin was a
remarkable boy, smart as hell, good in school, sociable, and well adjusted as
could be. He had even made it into the navy. The antithesis of every stereotype
of canned babies, Kevin was the perfect poster child for Harold’s work, even if
he hadn’t wanted to be.

There was more to it than work of course. Harold’s
involvement with the boy may have fallen short of what an ordinary father would
provide, but it was more than just a professional obligation. Whether as a
mentor, or just an older, gray–haired brother, Harold was always there, ready
to listen, or help steer the boy through the trials of adolescence. It wasn’t a
textbook kind of relationship, nor a textbook kind of love. But it was still
love.

And now he was gone.

Harold blinked away some of the moisture building up in his
eyes and pushed himself into his clinical, data–gathering frame of mind. He started
picking through the apartment, finding it full of the standard artifacts and
detritus that tended to wash up in young men’s apartments. Sporting equipment
in the closet. A picture of an unpopular musician on the wall, placed there for
ironic purposes. Beside the desk, a framed image of Harold and Kevin on skates,
taken when Kevin was about eight. Harold’s throat grew thick.

But there were no pools of blood, or stained knives, or
threats carved in ancient runes on the wall. Whatever Hatchens and his men were
looking for, it probably wasn’t forensic evidence. But they had been in there
for hours at least and could have searched it top to bottom several times over.
It wasn’t torn apart — as promised, Hatchens’ men had reassembled everything
in the same state as they had found it. Harold couldn’t figure out what any of
this meant. Short of forensic evidence, what else could they be searching for?
Some other sort of clue to the identity of Kevin’s killer, perhaps. Which would
mean that it wasn’t a stranger — someone Kevin had known had done this.

Harold mentally tried to assemble a list of Kevin’s
acquaintances. He had given Kevin more space during recent years — young men
didn’t need bearded geneticists cluttering up their social lives. It was Kevin
who initiated most of the contact between the two, in fact; Harold never let on
just how much he appreciated this. But their conversations had mostly been
about work, trading grievances about that particular day’s labors. Nothing
about the interactions with Kevin’s friends and — presumably — lovers. Harold
simply didn’t know much about Kevin’s personal life. And he certainly didn’t
know why someone would want to murder the boy.

Weary, Harold sat down on the bed. There was nothing here
for him. He’d assumed that when he got here he would spot some trinket or
belonging of Kevin’s that he would immediately recognize as a perfect memento or
keepsake. But there was nothing like that. He wasn’t even the sentimental type,
he realized. The memories were good enough for him.

Harold tensed, remembering the message that Kevin sent and
recalled before he could read it. That must have been just before Kevin’s death.
His mind raced, spitting out wild theories. Was it a plea for help? A warning?
This time Harold refused to chide himself for his paranoia. An erased message
just before Kevin’s death was too much to be a coincidence. There must have
been something in that message. Something important.

And Hatchens knew it, too.

That explained Hatchens’ oddly casual behavior around
Harold. Hatchens would know all about Kevin’s communications on the day of his
death; it was probably standard procedure for such an investigation. So, it was
reasonable to assume he knew of the message Kevin had sent and then recalled. Maybe
he had read it himself. Would he know that Harold hadn’t read it, or simply
assumed he had? Harold didn’t know enough about the messaging system to be
sure.

He wondered if the message explained the lengthy search
Hatchens had been doing of Kevin’s apartment. Maybe the message referred to
something he had hidden in the apartment? But, what? That, Harold couldn’t say.
He looked over the room again.

The picture was wrong.

Harold tilted his head to look at the framed picture beside
the desk of him and Kevin at the skating arena. Harold hadn’t been in Kevin’s
apartment in over six months, but he knew that picture had changed since the
last time he had been there. The flimsy digital frame normally displayed an
image of Kevin’s graduation from the naval academy — Kevin in his uniform and
an embarrassed grin, Harold beside him, eyes obviously watering. The only time
Kevin had ever seen Harold uncomposed. That was why he had liked the picture so
much; it had been in that frame for years.

Harold swallowed, working through the permutations of what
that meant. For him, the picture on the wall was a huge glaring clue; he knew
exactly what it was pointing at. For anyone else — like a searching security
officer — it would be meaningless. If Kevin had left a message only he could
read, he had done it for a reason.

Harold felt various muscles tighten, suddenly sure he was
being watched, remembering his confrontation with Hatchens just outside. The
security chief had calculated a little too obviously when he agreed to clear
out of the apartment. He had wanted to see what Harold would find in this place,
what the security officers missed. Harold looked around the room, trying to
figure out where they would hide a sensor if they wanted to watch him. He then
realized he had no idea what a sensor looked like or even how large one was. He
turned his terminal over in his hands. That had a massively powerful sensor in
it
somewhere
. A security sensor would probably be even smaller. He had
read that during the war, the Hungry had rigged up special programs on their terminals
to spot the things, which is how they’d been able to destroy them. But Harold, mild–mannered
genetic engineer, certainly didn’t have anything like that with him now. He
flexed his fingers, and took several deep breaths.
Slow down, Harold.
He
reminded himself that the ratio of Actual Massive Shadowy Conspiracies to
Predicted Massive Shadowy Conspiracies was vanishingly small.

That said,
some precautions probably couldn’t hurt.

In a stack of boxes beside the desk, he found a paper book
he had given to Kevin as a birthday present. It was from Earth and was
decidedly worthless — everyone on board the ship had been hoarding natty Earth
objects, convinced they would fetch them vast sums one day. He walked out the
door, clutching the book tightly in his hand. As good a token as any to remind
him of Kevin. And if his paranoid musings were correct, it would serve as one
hell of a red herring for his watchers.

The first hour of every morning was Kinsella’s time, which
he spent alone in his office, often doing nothing more productive than
breathing. Sometimes he stared out the window, an enjoyable compliment to, but
no substitute for, the breathing. Mostly, he daydreamed. Winning fistfights.
Laying multiple women at once. Replaying recent conversations in his head, with
wittier lines for himself. Winning fistfights with multiple women at once.

He wouldn’t have much more time to spend like this. Probably
wouldn’t have much free time at all for the next several months. He tried to
enjoy the moment while it lasted. By himself, away from all those troublesome
people.

At 9:01 a.m., his assistant Bletmann opened the door to the
office and stood quietly at the threshold. “Chief Thorias is on his way, sir.
Should be another ten minutes.” Kinsella dismissed him with a wave, then
watched the door close, before exhaling slowly.
It was really happening.

He spun around again in his chair to face the window, then
allowed himself another couple of rotations, just for fun. He would make sure
to have this chair brought up to his new office. Or, get a second one made.
Couldn’t hurt to have two. He couldn’t recall what Helot normally sat on.
Something dull and utilitarian he imagined, just like the ass it supported.
Kinsella extended his feet to the carpeted floor, allowing them to drag himself
to stop. He looked out the window at the garden well in front of him.

He was doing it for them, not that they would appreciate it.
Not that they would even understand it. Not that they really
needed
to
understand it. He didn’t need to understand them to do his job. Kinsella had
watched from his window the previous day, as the horse–orgy wound through the
streets below, progressing to its inevitably distressing conclusion. “Morons,”
he said, shaking his head. And yet, it was ultimately the morons’ ship. They
had a right to be heard, to have a voice. And he was the morons’ choice to be
the morons’ voice.

The morons’ voice spun around in his chair at the sound of
the door opening, seeing Chief Thorias standing at the threshold. “You asked to
see me?” the security chief said, his voice barely audible. Kinsella knew he
did that deliberately, the big man that spoke softly; a trick he had read
somewhere to appear more intimidating. Kinsella wished he had thought of it
first. Awkward to copy it now.

“Yes, Chief. It’s time,” Kinsella said, pausing for effect. “Will
you accompany me to the command center?” A thin smile crossed Thorias’ face. He
had been relishing this nearly as long as Kinsella had. Maybe longer.

The pair left the mayor’s office and walked out to the upper–levels
of the Bridge, passing several extra security officers stationed throughout the
halls. Another one of his morons, bless his little voting heart, had run
through the place shooting people in the face yesterday. Kinsella had thought
it pretty funny, more so when he had found out that no one had gotten seriously
hurt. Still, a pretty shocking lapse in security. Thorias had taken the matter
very seriously, resulting in a city hall swimming with thick–necked security
officers. Their presence comforted the mayor. Although he doubted anything
drastic would need to be done, it was nice to know when heading into a meeting
like this that the men with guns were on his side.

§

From her stomach, Stein peered down the length of the
crawlspace to the room at the far end. It was hard to be sure without checking
her terminal, but if that was a pump room, she would definitely be able to get
water there. She listened carefully for any noises that a group of heavily
armed men might make.

She had heard someone speaking a few minutes after she’d
found her hiding spot. Not close enough to make out any words, but it was a
safe bet the voice belonged to one of the two security officers who had been
chasing her. The voice never came back, but if she heard them speaking once,
that meant they’d been bold enough to come into the crawlways after her.

So, she stayed put, worried they might be waiting nearby for
her to come out. There was also the small matter that she didn’t have anywhere
to go. Minutes passed, then hours, while she shivered and quaked and, with no
one else around to see, cried. Sleep may have come, possibly multiple times —
she wasn’t sure. There was little difference between consciousness and unconsciousness
anyways; if she dreamed, it was about hiding in awful little spaces.

During her periods of probable wakefulness, she mostly
thought about Bruce. She never should have asked him to do something so stupid.
It was a pointlessly risky plan she’d come up with, and she should have known
he was incapable of turning those down. Pointless risk was in his blood, might
very well be there
in place
of his blood, shuttling around oxygen and
bold dares to his organs as necessary.

“Check this out,” he had said, surprising her in the back
row of the classroom. She’d looked up from her terminal, annoyed at his sudden
interest in her. This was usually the first step in a chain of events which
ended with her punching someone in the groin, or more rarely, sleeping with
them and then punching them in the groin.

She squinted at him, trying to dredge up the name attached
to the big doofus. It was her second and final crack at this school thing, and
she didn’t know anyone in her class. But, eventually it clicked; Bruce was the
kid’s name. She turned away from him.
Definitely one of the situations that
ends with a punch to the groin
.

Oblivious, he gave her a big thumb’s up and turned to face
Ms. Sallans at the front of the room, who was stressing something extremely
important about the Zhang neo–dynasty. Ms. Sallans turned her back to the class
for a moment, zooming in on something on the front display. Suddenly, Bruce
sprang out of his chair, moving swiftly to the front of the room, almost
completely silent. He snatched Ms. Sallans’ terminal from her desk and
retreated to his desk just as quietly. A faint trill of laughter rose from the
room, but no sudden outbursts. The class was familiar with Bruce’s antics.

Stein watched from the corner of her eye as Bruce messed
around with the terminal. As soon as he picked it up, it would have locked out
all of Ms. Sallans’ content, so she wasn’t sure what he could do. He finished
what he was doing and flashed another grin at Stein. The teacher had turned
back to face the class but hadn’t noticed her terminal had gone wandering.
Masking his smile, Bruce raised his hand. “Ms. Sallans? Was that where the
March of the Thousand Equals happened?”