Anniversary Day (15 page)

Although it was pretty obvious. Tyr zoomed back out. A second or less after the needle went in, Soseki froze in place. Then the gray color started spreading over him.

“That’s enough,” Romey said. “I don’t need to see that again. I need some good images of this blond man, holo images as well as 2-D.”

“Already got it,” Tyr said and sent it to her via her links. She let the flat images whiz past her left eye, and did not even look at the holoimages because she knew what they would show. They’d show the blond guy in motion, so that the officers would see his gait, his height, his gestures. The officers would know exactly how this guy moved and got around. They might even be able to track him just from the image.

She forwarded all of the images to the entire Armstrong PD with a notice that this was the guy they wanted—“for questioning,” of course. She did want him for questioning. She wanted to know what the hell was going on.

Romey also sent it to DeRicci. And then, because Romey promised, she also sent it to the investigators in Moscow Dome.

Immediately, she got a scrambled text response from Moscow Dome:

You’re kidding, right?

She moved away from her team, and answered on the same encrypted link.
No. You recognize this guy?

Hell, yeah
.
We’re looking for the same guy
.

Romey frowned.
I thought the attacks happened at the same time.

They did
. The liaison from Moscow Dome sent her a series of images. It looked like the same guy, only he was getting close to Moscow Dome’s mayor.

Romey cursed.
Clones
? she asked.
They’re using clones?

What else would it be
? The liaison sent back.

It made no sense. Clones were obvious. They got noticed. They were easy to track, particularly if—like most clones on the Moon—they were registered.

Anyone claimed responsibility for yours yet?
she sent.

DeRicci was the one who responded. Clearly she’d been monitoring the communication.
No one’s claiming responsibility for any of it,
she sent.
But, clearly from these images, it’s only a matter of time
.

Twenty-five

Deep Craters Hospital smelled like puke. At least, this wing did. In some room, not too far from the waiting area, someone kept retching over and over again. The sound alone was enough to make Nelia Byler’s stomach churn, and the smell didn’t help. Apparently the air filters here, along with the hospital’s state-of-the-art cleaning bots, weren’t enough to get rid of the odor instantly.

Or maybe the fact that the smell lingered had more to do with her own acid reflux, which was staying ahead of her medical programming, which was the same programming the governor-general had. When the governor-general wanted to upgrade her medical protocols to the latest model, she asked if Byler would be her guinea pig.

Try it first, Nelia, and see if it works
, the governor-general had said. Then she had added, with a bit of a sheepish smile,
If you don’t mind, that is.

Fortunately, Nelia hadn’t thought of herself as squeamish. She thought of herself as a courageous person who always took one for the team. Whatever Celia Alfreda asked for, Celia Alfreda would get—at least as long as Nelia Byler worked for her. Nelia thought it a privilege to work in the governor-general’s office, at the governor-general’s side, doing the governor-general’s bidding.

Now all of that might be over.

She wouldn’t let herself think about that.

She wrapped her arms around her torso and paced. The waiting area was nice, homey, with comfortable couches that reminded her of those in the house she grew up in. Every table top had a screen with entertainment programming so powerful it could block out everything else, and make the viewer lose track of time. One specially set up screen would order from every single restaurant in the city.

She could live here if she wanted to. Apparently, people did.

But not today. On this day, she had the waiting room to herself. Except for the champion vomiter down the hall, this wing was empty. They would bring Celia here if she survived the surgery—or whatever the hell they were doing to her.

Byler’s eyes filled with tears, and she blinked hard to keep them back. No one knew what exactly was wrong with the governor-general. They only knew that she was dying by centimeters, that every part of her body was solidifying.

Celia’s state-of-the-art medical protocols had slowed everything down, but they couldn’t overwhelm whatever it was—at least that was what Byler heard in the last update. Not that the person who had updated her—and it had been a person, not an automatic message through her links, not an avatar, not some kind of bot—had known exactly what was going on.

The people who specialized in Celia’s condition—as much as people could specialize in her condition, given that no one knew exactly what was wrong with her—were working desperately on Celia, trying to save her life.

But Byler had gotten the distinct impression that saving her was next to impossible.

Byler had her arms wrapped so tightly around herself that she could barely breathe. She really needed to loosen her fingers; they dug deep into her ribcage, sending an ache through her entire body.

But she was reluctant to let go. The pain made her feel alive. Or maybe it was a tiny punishment for her inability to stop this attack.

No one even knew how it happened. The governor-general’s security detail had secured the scene. Last Byler heard, they were waiting for someone from Armstrong’s Police Department to officially handle the investigation.

The rest of the team had gone back to the governor-general’s office. Because this was Anniversary Day, only a skeleton staff remained there. Most everyone who was anyone was either making a speech, cutting a ceremonial ribbon, doing some kind of publicity,
something
to make the day seem less ominous than it actually was.

Byler hated celebrating—if that was the word—a disaster. Marking a disaster, then. She had hated it before Celia fell ill. Now Byler wondered if they hadn’t brought this entire crisis on themselves simply by marking the anniversary in such a public manner.

It was an invitation to all the nutcases in the universe to do something spectacular and have it mean even more than it should.

Those tears threatened again. She stopped pacing and looked out the window at the city, going about its business. A few cars flew past, their passengers looking away from the shaded hospital windows. She could see out, but she knew from experience that no one could see in.

People, looking like nanocreatures themselves, walked on the sidewalks below. People or aliens or something two-legged and mobile. Of course, she wasn’t even sure of the two-legged part.

Her fingernails found a way through the fabric of her shirt. The last thing anyone needed was the attacker to be something other than human. Then the entire Earth Alliance would get involved, and it would become an Alliance-wide incident, not just a Moon incident, which was bad enough.

She really should have gone back to the office. She should have coordinated all of the publicity, she should have prepared the press releases, she should have been doing interviews.

But she wanted someone here in case Celia woke up, someone Celia trusted, someone Celia knew actually cared for her.

At least, Byler hoped Celia knew. She probably didn’t. She probably thought Byler was as opportunistic as everyone else. And maybe Byler was, on some level. But she couldn’t imagine working for another politician. No one would be like Celia, an innovator as well as an organizer, someone who knew how to get others to do her bidding, even when what she wanted was desperately unpopular.

Byler let out a shaky breath. What if this attack was related to Celia’s policies—to
Byler’s
policies. Because Byler had written half the damn agenda. Byler decided which things should get the most attention. Celia had just signed off on them.

Byler abruptly sat on the couch. They didn’t prepare you for this kind of emergency, not even when you majored in foreign relations and diplomacy, government and Earth Alliance politics. No matter how many internships you did, how many campaigns you apprenticed on, nothing prepared you for this moment, when the person you worked for, the person you
believed
in, was a hair’s breath away from death, a moment away from a true assassination, not just an assassination attempt.

Something blared across her links. She put her hands to her ears, even though the sound was internal not external. A red light flashed across her eyes, and tears did fall for a moment, tears of pain.

She wiped at them, frowned, and then remembered that everything except her emergency links got shut off from the moment she stepped into the hospital.

She stood, took a deep breath, and answered.

What?

She had no idea who she sent that to, and she was surprised to see Noelle DeRicci’s face pop up in front of her.

In all of this, Byler had forgotten about Soseki. Her stomach clenched, and she thought sympathetically (for the first time) of the vomiter in the nearby room.

This was part of a pattern. She had forgotten.

You had your links off,
DeRicci sent.

I’m in Deep Craters waiting room
, Byler sent back.
I didn’t shut them off on purpose
.

DeRicci nodded, then asked for an update. Byler told her all that she knew, which wasn’t much.

You didn’t contact me for that, though, did you?
Byler asked. DeRicci could have gotten the update from anyone on the governor-general’s staff. Even though Byler was a bit fuzzy-headed, she had been thinking clearly enough to keep her own people apprised of the governor-general’s condition.

You’re right,
DeRicci sent.
I didn’t contact you for that. I wanted to know if you’ve seen this man
.

She sent an image and then a vid of a man crossing a room. Byler’s breath caught. The man looked completely familiar. She had been watching him when Rudra Popova contacted her about Soseki’s death.

Yeah
, Byler sent.
He was at the governor-general’s speech
.

Did he touch her?
DeRicci asked.

Byler shrugged, then realized DeRicci couldn’t see her.
I don’t know
.

But?
DeRicci asked.

But something was on the edge of Byler’s brain, something she couldn’t quite recall. He had vanished—or she had looked away—and then when she looked back…

He talked to her
, Byler said.
I think he was talking to her when she fell ill
.

Her heart pounded. Was that true? She wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

You’d have to check with security, though
, Byler continued, covering her ass because as a politician’s assistant, it was a damn reflex.
I was in the back of the room, and he had moved to the front. I remember looking at him just before I got the medical protocol message
.

The what?
DeRicci asked.

I’m hooked into the governor-general’s private medical program
, Byler said.
Me and a few others, including security. The program kicked in right at that moment, and we all jumped into action
.

Or, rather, security had. She had been too far away.

She added,
I think that’s the only thing that saved the governor-general’s life
.

If, indeed, she was going to live.

Do you have any idea who that man was?
DeRicci asked.

No,
Byler sent.
But he had to be cleared. We have strict security procedures since the Mars crisis. No one comes close to the governor-general without about six layers of specialized clearance
.

DeRicci cursed.
I suppose I have to go to her security team for that as well
.

Yes, sir
, Byler sent.
I’m sorry I’m not much use to you at the moment. I felt someone should monitor her condition
.

Well, she’s not dead yet
, DeRicci sent, with characteristic bluntness.
That’s a good thing. Soseki died within seconds
.

You think this is the same thing?
Byler asked.

You described her symptoms
, DeRicci sent.
They sound like an extremely mild version of what killed Arek.

Byler swallowed hard.
Do you think she’ll survive this?

I don’t know
, DeRicci sent.
I sure as hell hope so. But until we know what they did, we may not be able to do much more than hold off the inevitable
.