Time Salvager (42 page)
“I’ve tested the entire batch of the miasma pills, Auditor,” Buchanan said. “The handler switched several cycles’ worth with placebos. Chronmen affected by those batches would only receive two-thirds of their regimen.”
“How many pills stolen total?”
“Seven cycles, Auditor.”
Eighty-four damn pills. Over a year’s worth. What did that mean? Did James plan to continue his romps in time? For what purpose? If he was smart, he would have used his remaining small supply to wean off the lag sickness and fade into obscurity. Instead, he risked increased exposure by leaving jump trails for Levin to track. According to the most recent surveillance, his activity was actually picking up. What was he up to?
Kuo might not think it timely, but Levin and his team were closing in on James’s locations. Between triangulating his movements in the present with all his jump points to the past, the team had ruled out all of Asia and Africa, and had pretty much confirmed Europe. Just a few hits more and a little luck, and the fugitive would soon find Levin either at his doorsteps or waiting for him at one of his return jumps.
James’s actions were perplexing, though. He still seemed to be trying, somewhat, to follow the Time Laws, except of course for the most egregious ones he’d already broken. All his jumps were short, and to relatively lower-tech salvages, and most of his actions still fit the spirit of the Time Laws. With the recent revelation of Smitt’s theft, it was all but confirmed that James had no intention of just lying low. The man was no fool; he must be playing some sort of long game.
The immediate concern at this moment was Handler Smitt. Miasma theft was common. The pills could be addictive if not strictly monitored. Usually, theft was carried out by addicted chronmen or those who sold to them. It usually resulted in nothing more than a slap on the wrist and a requirement that chronman detox in therapy. The problem with Smitt here seemed suspiciously more like treason, which, on the other hand, carried only one sentence. No one in this room believed he was stealing miasma pills for any other reason than to give them to his fugitive friend.
“Our course of action is clear,” Levin said, grimacing. “Auditor Geneese, call a squad to escort Handler Smitt to the brig.”
“A moment, Levin,” said Kuo, holding up a hand. “This situation has value. If this traitor is communicating with the fugitive, arresting him is a waste of this information.” She looked over at Levin. “Place a neural bug in his mind.”
“Definitely not,” Levin said, standing up.
Young scratched his beard and leaned back. “Spying into anyone’s mind is frowned upon. It’s not our way and can lead to distrust among the ranks.”
“It would be stupid not to seize this advantage,” Kuo retorted. “We use this on all our high-value employees.”
Levin saw Young’s brows rise at her choice of words; the director was not used to being spoken to in such a manner.
“I don’t disagree,” Young said in a slow, measured tone. “But there is collateral damage to the rank and file’s morale as it is. If word leaks of—”
“Let me make this clear, Director Young,” Kuo said. “Valta feels that this course of action best suits both the corporation’s and ChronoCom’s interests.”
The room stayed very still for several seconds before Young finally nodded. “Very well. Hameel, put a sniff bug on Handler Smitt’s person and blanket his sleeping quarters. Make sure he takes it with his morning nutrient regimen.”
“This is outrageous, Director,” said Levin. This was mind rape. Levin had been a specialist in the Publicae Age during his time as a chronman. He had seen firsthand where this road led.
Right then and there, Levin realized that Young was no longer in control. Valta, Kuo specifically, was in charge. ChronoCom was now just the time-traveling arm of the megacorporation. Levin kept his face neutral, but his heart seized with indignation. Young must have noticed something, because when their eyes met, the director gave him a slight shake of the head.
“What about his past network activity?” Kuo continued.
“The neural bug will be able to track all his communications through his AI and comm bands,” Hameel said. “I’ve grabbed a snapshot of his network activity within the past week. Note this is only limited to his data traffic. An implanted neural bug will allow us to record his active thoughts.” He paused. “Filtering out extraneous data. Here we go. Handler Smitt made dozens of queries, including five regarding the Uranus substation disaster of 2411, eleven into the Moon virus of 2077, six on the moon Puck, and forty-three into the Nutris Platform. Yesterday, he had seven queries searching for the location of some salvaged items from a previous job—code name Sunken City—and over nine on Cassini Regio. Today, he had…,” he paused, “three queries to the blue sections of the city for prostitutes.”
Kuo bolted up from her seat and hovered over Hameel in an instant. “What did you say?”
Hameel was so thrown off by her sudden intensity that he nearly fell off his chair. Geneese and Shizzu had risen and powered on their exos. Levin kept his hands firmly pressed down on the table. Kuo seemed undeterred as she slammed her hand down on the table in front of Hameel.
“I’m sorry, Securitate,” he stammered. “What are you asking about?”
“What did you say again about Cassini Regio?” she pressed, leaning in close. “Tell me!”
Hameel looked as if he were about to soil himself. “The handler made queries into energy shipments to the colony on Iapetus a few days ago. Then he began to look into the dark side of the moon. It wouldn’t have meant much except I don’t think the Cassini Regio side has a colony.”
“He’s mining Valta classified affairs,” Kuo said, sprinting toward the door. “I’m going to gouge his eyes out until he tells me what he knows about it.”
Before she could leave the room, Levin was there, blocking her path. “You won’t touch the handler.”
The two stared each other down. Kuo was the only one who had powered on her exo, though. Levin hoped that Young’s presence would deter violence from the securitate. Or if it didn’t, the director would realize how unstable she was and pull her off Levin’s command.
To be honest, he wasn’t sure if Young had the spine to defend his auditor. After all, it had been a long time since Young was one of them. Once, Levin would not have questioned where Young stood, but now, as an administrator, the director saw things in a different light. Would standing with his own men be advantageous for Young and his view on what was best for the agency? In the end, as in other situations where Valta was involved, Young sat on the sidelines and said nothing.
“You’re the one who wanted to use the handler for information,” Levin said. “If you burst into Handler Ops right now, what do you think will happen with James and the girl? My guess is we’ll never hear from them again. Wait until we’ve captured James. You’ll get your answers then.”
Levin half-expected a kinetic coil to tear a hole through his chest as Kuo pondered her options. Finally, she nodded. “If any sensitive information from Cassini Regio leaks, I’m holding you responsible. There will be consequences.” She looked over at the rest of the room. “Excuse me while I report this. I need to increase our security diligence on that moon.”
Levin watched her backside as she left the room and walked down the hall. He turned back to Young. “How much longer are we going to have to tolerate this?”
“Finish your fucking job and you won’t have to tolerate this much longer, Levin.” Young sighed. “Valta’s commitment to Nutris is significant. They’ve been on the losing end of a four-way power grab over Saturn and Jupiter for the past ten years. They’re desperate.”
“What could they have retrieved from Nutris that could change their fortunes?” Shizzu frowned. “I was there. There was no military technology on it. It was a just a biological research facility.”
Young grunted. “Isn’t it obvious? How else do you weaponize cures?”
The rest of the room was quiet as those words sunk in. There had not been a significant use of biological weapons since the AI Wars, when the machines had tried to use a nano-variant of the Ebola plague. The results were terrible.
“It’s not our business,” Young said. “ChronoCom only polices the chronostream, not the behavior of the corps that pays our bills. As auditors, I expect all of you to work toward the agency’s interests, and I’m telling you right now that Valta’s interests parallel ours. Hameel, how soon can you get the neural bug functioning?”
Hameel looked uncomfortable. “It will take time to replicate. Neural bugs are rarely used, for obvious reasons. Once it’s in the handler’s system, it will take time for it to latch on to his synaptic nerves and transmit his thoughts. Director, I have to officially protest—”
“I expect word as soon as Smitt’s morning regimen has been dosed,” Young said, struggling to stand. “I want that detector removed as soon as we receive word about the fugitive’s location. Not a word outside this room. Now get out of here.”
There was a bright yellow flash followed by James hunched over puking up his lunch. He exhaled as a second surge of vomit crawled up his throat and dribbled out of his mouth. He counted down from ten and exhaled, and then added another ten-count. When his mind and stomach cleared, he stood up and took a deep breath.
Everything looked much different than it had just a few seconds ago. In the present, the city had long been abandoned, a giant metal relic half-sunk into the brown ocean. He was standing in a park, except in his time, all the soil, grass, and trees had long since washed away. In their place, several meters of dried ocean mud caked the ground, angled at a thirty-degree slant.
The dome above him now was clear with the sun just appearing in the northeast. In the present, the glass was shattered, with only a few jagged edges still remaining. The sun in the present was too weak to penetrate the heavy soot clouds that perpetually covered this entire area.
“Are you all right?” There was a note of concern in Grace’s voice. “You’re reacting worse to it every time you jump.”
“Don’t worry about me,” he said through gritted teeth. “Remember, keep the chatter low. The neural bugs here can’t detect you, but my brain waves might react in a way they can detect.”
“I do pay attention to the briefings, James.”
James was standing on the grass in a large park with a row of perfectly trimmed hedges on one side and a grouping of evenly spaced trees on the other. A marble path to his left cut through the center of a sea of green grass and made a right turn at the far end. He jumped into the hedge and nestled deep into the vegetation. Being caught on the grass was a level-two offense. He had fifteen minutes to prepare for the next few hours.
James checked the time: 5:43
A.M
. Seventeen minutes until the night curfew lifted. He’d have to stay in hiding until then. Jumping in thirty minutes before the curfew lifted was optimal for a chronman in this time period. Jump any earlier and he would be moving through curfew, where the security eye patrols were highest. Coming in any later, during operating hours, carried a high risk of being seen. The city was crowded with people who would report him in an instant.
James cleared his mind and steadied his breathing, putting his body through the mental exercises he had learned at the Academy when acclimating to the specifics of this time period. There was a mental calmness that a chronman had to maintain when moving through the Publicae Age. James stayed very still in the bushes and breathed in and out in an almost meditative state. When he felt prepared, he opened his eyes and stared at everything in his field of vision, making sure each identified item filled up his entire active thought.
The blade of grass was green. Green and symmetrical. Symmetrical and trimmed. Trimmed to the edge of the walkway. The walkway was clean. Clean like the air. Purified air was life. Life was the morning. Morning was the sun. His thoughts continued on, occupying his mind so that stray thoughts that could betray him would not be detected by the neural bugs.
“It’s six
A.M.,
James,” Grace said, her voice evenly measured and monotone.
James stood up and jumped onto the grass. Standing on grass was being wrong. Being wrong was undesirable. Undesirable was committing offense. Offense to society was violating the social contract. Social contract was Adonia.
James walked down the path. He saw the first neural bug perched on one of the light poles off to his right farther down the walkway. By this time, he had calmed his heart rate and cleared his mind. The AI band would pass along the proper forged identity to the system, but there was no way to mask an active brain scan, and in Adonia, there was no escaping those.
He felt a slight buzz, as if an invisible hand had just brushed his hair as he walked nonchalantly under the neural bug, its flickering blue light following him like a watchful eye. James kept his thoughts empty and his emotions suppressed as he turned the corner. In the distance, roughly forty meters away, was the next neural bug.
The path led to a statue up on a small grassy hill overlooking the entire park. To any of the security eyes, he was a devout Adonian making his morning pilgrimage, which, while not necessary, was a common and approved-of behavior.
Behavioral approval is important. Importance is proper. Proper is good citizenship. Good citizenship is devotion. Devotion is pilgrimage.
The statue was of two robed men, mirror images in every way, studying each other for discrepancies. The plaque below them read:
HAPPINESS IS UNIFORMITY OF MIND AND ACTION
2253
“Whoever said the Technology Isolationists were the precursor of these carbon-copy idiots were morons,” Grace grumbled. “Twisted and stupid.”
“Both of your factions believed in isolationist superiority.”
“Yes, but that’s the extent of it. We understood that intelligence and creative differences went hand in hand.”
“Hush, please, High Scion, or you’ll give me away.”
“Don’t hush me, boy.”
The streets began to fill as the morning crowds, filtering through the narrow corridors of the city, came out single file along the moving walkways, standing uniform and straight as if duplicately dressed doll figures moving down a conveyor belt. The only way to tell them apart was by their height and faces. All else that could be controlled—dress, hair, accessories, clothing—was exactly the same. It occurred to James that it was fortunate the Adonians never perfected cloning, or he imagined he’d be looking at hundreds of the exact same people moving down an assembly line. Here and there, one of the Adonians would move out of line and proceed by foot along his or her way, while others still would join in and take his or her place. It was very orderly. The moving walkway never stopped.
