The Fourth Sage (The Circularity Saga) (6 page)

She crumples the napkin into a tiny ball inside her palm and slips it into one of her coverall pockets. The water bottle goes into the other, while the bread stays in her hand. She gets up and places the tray onto the belt on the opposite wall of the room. When she turns around she almost runs into Seth. Or better, he almost runs into her.

"I'm sorry," he says quietly, while maneuvering around her.

"No problem," she answers.

He looks pale, tired. His eyes are red and the spikes in his hair are gone. That concerns her more than his pale look. Their eyes meet. Then he looks away.

"Are you okay?" Aries asks.

"Yes," he replies. "I'm sorry for what I did. The other day. It won't happen again. It won't happen again, I promise..."

His voice trails off and he walks away. He seems smaller. Aries wants to follow him and tell him that it's okay and that it wasn't a big deal and that she's sorry for what she said about cockroaches and that she didn't really mean what she said. Seeing him like this is worse than when he’d bullied her the other day. But he's gone before she can move, and she doesn't want to draw any attention to him or herself.

She leaves the cafeteria and climbs the ladders toward Electrical. The brief encounter with Seth has left her strangely affected. What happened to him? Were there any additional measures the Corporation had taken after the incident yesterday morning? This brings her thoughts to C.J., who she still hasn't heard a word from. Aries is aware of the sting of guilt in the back of her mind, telling her that she should have asked about her sooner.
I'll do it today,"
she promises herself. Finding the hawk last night and subsequently stumbling into Kiire's room so unexpectedly has completely blotted out her concern for C.J.

She puts on her gear at the locker and enters the command center. Ty stands there, hunched over some blueprints and completely focused on them.

"You're early," he says, without looking up.

"I am," she answers. She can't remember him ever telling her anything other than that she was either early or late. She knows he doesn't mean anything by it other than that, by now, it's just banter between friends.

"What you got?" Aries asks, ready for work.

When she looks over Ty's shoulder she sees a blueprint that she hasn't seen before. It shows the core of the building, from above, as a round center. From there, and like spokes in a wheel, eight arms reach outward, crossing through Tier One all the way to the third tier. Horizontal maintenance shafts. Tiers Four and Five have their own maintenance crew. So does Tier Six. The three groups don't usually communicate with each other. Tiers One through Three are on the same self-contained system of heat, cooling, and power. Four and Five have their own utility structure as well. Six is completely separate from the rest, as it houses the superrich and
SELKom's
headquarters. The shafts on the large blueprint end in the third tier.

"We are getting a bunch of current fluctuations in some of the exchange units," Ty tells her, while pointing at the blueprint. I want you to check them out. Each one. There are four in each arm, eight arms, so we're talking about thirty-two units. It'll take you a couple of hours for each one, so you'll be busy for a few days. Sound good?"

"Yes, sir," Aries answers.

"One thing, though." Ty looks up from his blueprint and straight at her.

"What is it?"

"You'll be taking the lift. The units are on the 282nd floor."

"No problem," Aries replies.

"You're such a bad liar," Ty says. "One day you're gonna get caught."

"I know. But I'm gonna have you to bail me out."

Ty grins as he takes out the DIAG, a small rectangular box that has several wires attached to it. Its greasy exterior belies its wondrous capabilities. Among many other things, it measures the smallest fluctuations in electrical current. Aries hangs it over her shoulder.

"I can get Bailey to go with you," Ty says, while checking the batteries on a walkie-talkie and handing it to her.

"I'm okay," Aries replies.

"You sure? I can spare him."

"I'm good."

"Okay."

Her smile hides her relief that Ty is not insistent. Bailey has made a couple of strange remarks toward her when they worked together in the past. At the moment they happened, they went straight over her head but when she thought about them afterward, she began to feel creeped out by them, and subsequently by him. He lives in the second tier and must be in his fifties. She doesn't think he's married and doesn't know anything about him other than that she never feels a hundred percent comfortable in his presence, even though (aside from those two remarks) their interaction is usually distant but professional.

"Ready?" Ty brings her out of her train of thought.

"Yes," Aries answers. She checks the walkie-talkie and clips it onto her belt.

They climb a couple of metal stairs two levels up and arrive at two small cabins, mounted next to each other and to a steel column at the outermost edge of the large, round opening at the center. Each cabin fits two people plus some material, or one person and a larger item. They are part of a system of lifts connecting large sections of the vertical structure at the innermost core of the building. From the lift, one can see far down until blackness swallows all light coming in from the floors over two hundred stories below.

Aries feels her heart pounding within her chest when she approaches the lift. She stifles the impulse to check each of the steel bolts connecting it to the column, together with the cogwheels that transfer power to pull the lift upward and to break its descent when it comes down.
There is so much that can go wrong with a machine like this
, she thinks.

"Let me know your progress once you're up there," Ty says, as he opens the metal louver and lets Aries step into the lift. The distance between the individual steel rods in the grid are such that one can see straight through it. Without spending another thought on this and thereby exponentially increasing her unease, she pushes the numbered buttons on the keypad: 282. After hitting the completely greased over Enter button, the lift begins its ascent. Not quietly, though. There is a slight delay between her pushing the button and the lift actually rising. Then there is a snapping sound when the brakes disengage and the motor begins to turn the cogwheels. The sounds are utterly disconcerting. One glance past the steel grid into the abyss below is enough to make Aries dizzy, so she looks straight ahead, breathing through her nose. Deep breaths. She is fully aware of the small camera mounted in one of the corners of the lift interior. Her face, she knows, is an emotionless mask.

After an eternity, the lift stops, not without shaking and sputtering loudly. Aries exits, glad to have solid ground under her feet once more. As she orients herself on the floor, she sees the eight doors leading into the maintenance shafts. She heads for the first one.

"I'm here. Opening door number one," she says into the walkie-talkie.

"Sounds good," Ty answers. "Oh, by the way, C.J. is sick. I got a message from her parents this morning. They don't know when she'll be back."

"Okay."

Aries approaches the first door. This floor is basically a large circular landing with doors leading to the eight shafts. The rest is covered with rusted steel plates. Aries has no clue what's behind them. Aware of the camera right above the door, she punches in the code she got from Ty. The light switches from red to blue, and the door opens with a slight suction sound.

"Did they say what C.J. had?" Aries asks into the walkie-talkie, while she enters the long shaft.

"No."

"Okay. Talk to you when I'm done."

When she enters the narrow shaft she has to duck her head, as it is just under five feet high. She walks along the green LED lights that illuminate the floor and ceiling. When she's about ten feet into the shaft, the door behind her closes again, hermetically sealing itself into the frame. This is the third time she's been up here. Once with Ty and once with C.J. But being alone in the narrow shaft is a completely different experience from being with someone.

"Approaching the unit," she says into the walkie-talkie. There is no answer. "Ty, I'm approaching the unit. Just thought I'd let you know."

Nothing. Just before she is about to push the button again, Ty's voice comes on.

"Got it. Sorry I couldn't answer right away."

She registers the relief she feels when she hears his voice on the other end and kneels down to open the trapdoor in the floor. She flips on her headlamp and climbs down the five rungs of the narrow ladder. This brings her into a cube-like space. The six-by-six-by-six-feet cubicle holds servers and other equipment that line the four walls of the space. She pulls the strap of the DIAG over her shoulder and places it on the floor in front of one of the units.

She takes off the front cover and connects some of the wires of the DIAG with contacts in the unit. To find the right contact for one of the wires she looks at the electrical blueprint Ty had placed in the bag. She turns on the small screen on the DIAG and an oscilloscopic image appears. It shows the wavelength of the current, represented in a curved sinus line. She compares the image on the screen with the one she has on a small pocket card. They are identical. She disconnects the clips, closes the panel, and moves to the one next to her. When she opens the front panel she hears a sound, not unlike air escaping from a sealed container. She gets up and peers through the opening in the floor of the shaft. From there she can see that the door is open. Maybe an inch, probably less.
That's odd,
she thinks. As far as she knows, this can only happen when someone with the proper authorization code stands outside.

"Ty?" Her voice echoes in the long shaft.

She stands still, listening intently and looking into the semidarkness of the shaft.

"Ty, you there?"

She climbs out and before she reaches the door, Ty's voice comes through the walkie-talkie.

"You okay up there?"

Aries is completely startled. So much so that she has to catch her breath. Then she grabs the doorknob and opens it. There is nobody there.

"Aries?" Ty's voice seems louder than usual.

"Yes. I'm here. My door just opened."

"Come again?"

"The door to the shaft opened while I was down in the first unit."

There's a pause. Aries becomes aware of how quiet it is up here.

"That's strange. I don't see how this can happen without someone standing there. It closes automatically once you step away from it. Let me know if it happens again."

"Okay," Aries replies. She walks away from the door. It closes, once more sealing itself into the frame.

"It just closed," she says into the walkie-talkie.

"Okay," Ty's voice answers.

She climbs back down through the trapdoor and continues with her task. She finishes four of the eight shafts without incident. In the second unit of the fifth shaft, she finds the irregularity. She sees it right away when she turns on the oscilloscope on the DIAG. The waves on the screen are completely different from those of all the other units. Not only does the shape of the sinus curve look different from anything she has ever seen before, but the part of the sinus curve going downward into the negative actually goes slightly backwards. If Aries is not mistaken, that's completely impossible.

"Ty, you there?" she says.

"Yes. You got something?" Ty's voice echoes through the small, cube-like space.

"Looks like it. I think I found the glitch. Second unit in shaft number five. The image looks very strange. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it."

"Can you take a picture?"

"Sure. I'll take a screenshot."

"That's my girl. Why don't you come down? We can go up there together tomorrow and fix it."

"Sounds good. I'll be down in a minute."

Aries pushes a button on the DIAG to capture what's on the screen in the internal flash drive. Then she takes off the wires, puts everything back into the shoulder bag and climbs out of the trapdoor. She arrives at the door and punches in the code. Nothing happens. She punches the code in again. Nothing. She pulls the doorknob then pushes, tries to move the door. No results. She taps the camera above the doorframe with her finger a few times. Then she walks back several feet, turns and comes back toward the camera, looking up. Nothing happens.

"What's going on?" she asks the silence. "Ty, now my door won't open... Ty? You there? Ty, can you hear me?"

No sound comes from the walkie-talkie.

"Ty—"

Without warning, the lights in the shaft go out. She stands in pitch black until she remembers the headlamp and turns it on. The bright beacon illuminates the shaft about fifteen feet into it. Behind it is blackness. She turns and looks into the camera again.

"Come on! Open the door!" she says, half out of frustration. The other half is the slowly building uneasiness that begins to creep up on her. This can't be coincidence. As she looks into the camera, her neck hair stands up. She turns her head quickly to see if there is anyone behind her. But the shaft is empty. All she sees is the flickering light beam of her headlamp. She looks back toward the camera. She begins to breathe more heavily, feels fear rise up inside her. The feeling of panic is all too familiar to her but it normally only occurs when she is somewhere high up. Small dark spaces don't bother her. This one is different. She registers that she feels trapped.