The Nexus Series: Books 1-3 (21 page)

“What’s the
difference?” Amber asked impatiently.

“It looks like
it’s for a guy.  Girls have diaries; guys have journals.”

“Not
necessarily.”

“
Anyway
,”
interjected Jill, “the point is, this doesn’t make any sense.”

They couldn’t
argue.

“Let’s just get
back to HQ,” said Corey.  “We’ll see what Director Holiday thinks.”

4

HOLIDAY
looked at his watch for the twentieth time in twenty minutes.  “Well,” he
said abruptly, “if that’s all...”

The woman at the
head of the table nodded her assent.  “I think we’ve covered everything.”

“And then some,”
the director said under his breath.  He stood to leave.

“Just one more
brief thing, Director Holiday,” the humorless redheaded woman said.  “Now,
we don’t want to give you the impression that we’re unhappy with your
leadership—”

“Then you’re
not?  What a relief.”

“—but I’m afraid
we as a board are going to have to watch your department’s activities a bit
more closely.”

“Hire a
babysitter, you mean.”

“No, that seems
to be your job,” another board member interjected.

Two or three
other members made a sound similar to laughter.

Holiday let the
remark pass.  “We send regular reports.  Very detailed.  I
assume you read them thoroughly.  If you’d like us to use smaller words
and shorter sentences...”

“As I said,
Director, we don’t want to give you the impression that we’re unhappy with your
work.  We just believe you could use more accountability.”

“Isn’t that what
this board is for?”

The man with the
goatee huffed.  “It is, Mr. Holiday.  And therefore we have decided
to send someone down to keep an eye on things.”

“I see.”

“If your
department is doing as good a job as you say,” the man continued, “you can
hardly be worried about what he will find.”

“Did I say I was
worried?”  Holiday moved toward the exit again.  “Well, it’s been
stimulating, as usual.  Until next time, then.”

MINUTES
later
Holiday’s silver car was weaving through the warehouse district near the power
plant east of the lake.  He angled down a side street lined with bulky
cement-walled buildings that hadn’t been used in a generation.  Circling
behind one of the buildings he reached a sheltered garage door.  Above it
the words PETE’S FISH CANNERY weren’t quite totally faded away.

 The door
opened, and the car eased into the warehouse.  Motion sensors brought the
lights to life.  The car pulled to a stop beyond a stack of old pallets at
the back of the building.

The section of
floor beneath the car began to descend, lowering it into a tunnel.

A mile or so
later the tunnel emptied into a wide parking area ten stories beneath Lake
Anterra.  The silver car pulled to a stop between two similar black
models, and Director Holiday stepped out.  He wasn’t smiling.  Board meetings
never left him in the best of moods.

He crossed the
garage and went through a large metal door.  He stood on a concrete
balcony circling a vast room.  Much of the floor below was divided into
dozens of cubicles and workstations.  The room glowed with the light of
countless consoles and screens, and echoed with the sounds of another eventful
night at HQ.

Directly across
the vast room was Holiday’s office.  On his way there, he descended a
stairway to the busy floor and crossed to a certain cubicle.  “Hello,
Desiree.”

Dizzie Mason
hated when the director called her by her actual name, but she’d long since
given up trying to get him to stop.  She turned from her computer and
smiled in greeting.  Her hair was short and stuck out here and there like
it had a mind of its own.  Piercings from her ears, lips, and eyebrows
glittered in the glow of the computer screens surrounding her.  “Welcome
back.  Good meeting?”

“Riveting. 
And the mission?”

“They got the
goods.  Although it wasn’t what we were expecting.”

“Oh?”

“You’ll see for
yourself when they get back.  Should be here in a few minutes. 
Bradley tailed
Grandan
home.”

“I don’t suppose
Grandan
attempted to reach his client?”

Dizzie shook her
head.  “Neither did the shuttle crew.  Bradley’s standing by for our
go-ahead.”

“We’ll see about
this cargo first.”

“One other
thing,” she said timidly, grimacing.  “Chief Home Planet Liaison Riley is
waiting for you in your office.”

Holiday
frowned.  “Well, it’s been such a wonderful night.  Why shouldn’t it
get better?”

“GOOD
evening, Director,” said
a big, bald, broad-shouldered man in a black suit.  He stood in the middle
of Holiday’s office like he owned the place.

Good evening indeed. 
First the board, now Riley.  “Hope I haven’t kept you waiting,” the
director said evenly, remaining in the doorway between the back of his office
and the HQ balcony.

“As a matter of fact, you
have.  I expected you much sooner.  I know how you like to leave
those meetings as early as possible.”  Riley’s tight facial features
usually looked ageless.  But he looked haggard at the moment, as if he’d
endured a lot of sleepless nights lately.

“I escaped as soon as I
could,” said the director.

“No doubt.   I
suppose they told you why they sent me here.”  Even Riley’s voice seemed
more tired than usual.

Holiday nodded. 
“Although I didn’t expect you here this soon.  I see they didn’t waste any
time
—something the board usually excels at.”

Riley held up his
big hands defensively.  “Listen, Director, I’m not here to get in your
way.”

“Glad to hear
it.  You know where the door is.”

“I don’t blame
you for not wanting me around.  It wasn’t my decision.”

Holiday
sighed.  “I know.”

“Let’s just make
this as painless as possible, shall we?”

“Agreed.”

“You have a field
team on mission tonight, correct?”

“Correct. 
They’re on their way back now.”

“I just need to
be brought up to speed on the situation.”

“Of
course.”  Holiday hung up his coat and hat and led the way through his
office’s back door.

Riley followed
him out.  They walked along the balcony overlooking HQ.

“As you’ve
probably heard,” said the director, “about three months ago we discovered the
communications network of a dangerous crime lord called Sketch.  They were
using old telephones and switchboards from Earth.”

“I read the
report—a communications network that would be off the grid,” said Riley. 
He glanced across the wide room to a certain hallway.  Down that hallway
was the prize technological possession of the department—perhaps of all MS9.

Sherlock. 
That’s what they called him—the computer who spotted criminal activity as it
was happening.  He watched the city through every security camera,
listened to every phone call, kept track of every computer’s hard drive. 
No media—audio, video, or print—escaped his notice.  No electronic devices
of any kind were allowed in Anterra without being tied into Sherlock’s system
for constant analysis.

Unless those
devices were smuggled in illegally, of course; devices like the outdated phones
and switchboards Holiday had mentioned.

“Maybe my
memory’s starting to go bad,” said Riley, “but I could have sworn you caught
this Sketch fellow.”

Holiday
hesitated.  “His ring is alive and well.  Their work won’t stop just
because their boss is behind bars.”

They had circled
to the other end of the HQ balcony.  Holiday led the way toward the doors
to the garage.

“The report said
that network is no longer in use,” said Riley.  “They must have found out
you were listening in on them.”

“Most likely,”
Holiday admitted as they entered the garage.  “But not before we learned
plenty of valuable information.  We learned, for instance, that beyond a
simple phone network they were working on their own elaborate computer
network.  They planned on sneaking in materials from the Home
Planet—computer hardware that Sherlock wouldn’t know about or be able to hack
into.  We even learned one of the major Earthside contacts for the
project, a company called
Insite
Electronics.”

“You’ve been
monitoring the contact?” Riley asked as they stepped off to the side of the
garage floor.

Holiday
nodded.  “One of our United Space Programs associates on Earth set things
up for us.  We’ve been tracking every communication from
Anterra
to
Insite’s
headquarters
in Sydney, Australia.  Last week someone on MS9 called them and set up a
shipment.”

“It must have
been Sketch’s people.”

“There’s every
reason to believe so.  The phone call came from an
errander
named Doug
Grandan
. 
Grandan
has also been in touch with a certain Earthside shuttle line.”

“The ones who
will be making the transfer.”

“So it
seems. 
Grandan
scheduled to meet one of their
representatives here on Anterra earlier this evening.  We saw our chance.”

“And how did it
go?”

Lights appeared
in the tunnel across the garage.

“We’re about to
find out,” said the director.

  A black
department car entered and parked near where Holiday and Riley stood.

“Corey Stone,”
the director introduced the driver as he exited the car.

“Pleasure,” Riley
said with a handshake.

A second
department car emerged from the tunnel and parked next to Corey’s vehicle.

“Amber Phoenix.”

“Another recent
recruit, as I recall,” Riley said, extending his hand to the striking young
blonde woman.

“I signed on
three months ago,” Amber confirmed as she shook the Home Planet Liaison’s
hand.  “I joined up when Jill Branch did.”

“Speaking of the
devil,” said Holiday.

A skybike roared
out of the tunnel and pulled in next to Amber’s car.  Jill dismounted and
removed her black riding helmet.

Riley extended
his hand again.  “Very glad to meet you, Miss Branch.  I’m Chief Home
Planet Liaison Riley.”

Holiday raised an
eyebrow at Riley’s apparent eagerness to meet Jill.

“Hi,” Jill said,
and gave the big bald man a brief handshake.  Then she turned her
attention to Holiday.  “Something’s fishy, Director.”

“So Desiree tells
me.  Let’s see.”

Jill opened the
compartment of her skybike and removed the camera and notebook.

Holiday took them
and looked them over, expressionless.  “What else?”

“Nothing.”

The director
stroked his chin.  “Curious.”

Riley wrinkled
his brow.  “This won’t help Sketch’s people build their network.”

“I don’t think
Sketch’s people are involved,” said Corey.

“We’re on the
wrong track,” Jill said in frustration.

“In any case,”
Riley said, examining the notebook, “this is non-digital paper.  Whoever
brought these items here has done so illegally.  You’re on the track of a
smuggler, even if it’s not a member of Sketch’s gang.”

That wasn’t much
consolation.

“What do we tell
Bradley?” asked Amber.  “Do we continue with the mission?”

“We do,” Holiday
affirmed.  “Riley is right.  And there’s still a chance Sketch’s ring
is behind this.” 
A very slim chance,
he didn’t say aloud.

DOUG
Grandan’s
apartment was along the river north of the
lake.  It was the sort of suspicious place where you’d expect an errander
to live.

Across the street
from the three story brick building sat a black car, and in the car sat the guy
who’d fired a few rounds in
Grandan’s
direction about
an hour ago.  The young Korean man waited as patiently as he could manage;
patience was not one of Bradley Park’s strong suits.

His console
speaker finally came to life.  “It’s time, Bradley,” said the director’s
voice.

Finally. 
“Okay, I’m going in.  I’ll let you know how it goes.”

The original plan
was for Bradley to pretend he was Jill’s—Cordova’s—replacement to continue the
job, but Bradley was a pretty big fan of improvising.  This
Grandan
kid seemed like the type who would be easily
intimidated.

He got the duffel
bag containing his uniform out of the trunk and headed into the apartment
lobby.

5

DOUG
Grandan
awoke to the sound of his front door being
rammed open.  Then Bradley burst into his bedroom.  One hand leveled
a gun.  The other blinded him with a flashlight.  When he spoke, his
voice was twisted and mechanical sounding from behind his uniform’s
visor.  “Who are you working for?”

Grandan
tried to answer, but the words just couldn’t seem
to slip out between his quivering lips.

Bradley lunged to
the bedside and grabbed
Grandan
by the collar of his
pajamas.  “
Who?
”

“I—I—I d-don’t
know,”
Grandan
squeaked, “I swear!”

“How did he reach
you?”

Grandan
gulped.  “In person.”

That was
weird.  “He came here?”

Grandan
nodded.  “We m-met at the back of the parking
lot.”

Where there were
no cameras.  That figured.  “Can you describe him?”

“No, he—he—he
wore a mask!”

Not a
surprise.  If they had thought
Grandan
would
know his client’s identity, they would have questioned him long ago. 
“Where were you supposed to make the drop?”

“I didn’t get the
goods.  Someone was onto us.”  He wrung his hands.  “They killed
my contact.”

Bradley shook his
head.  “That wasn’t Cordova.  That was us.”

Grandan’s
wide eyes widened a little more.  “You set
us up?”

“We got your
client’s shipment.  All we don’t have is your client.  Now
how
were you going to make the drop?”

“I d-don’t know.”

Bradley stared
him down from behind his visor.  “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“He was
gonna
let me know where to make the drop.”

“How?”

“I don’t
know!  Once I got the goods, I was just
s’posed
to come home and wait.”

“THEN
you’ll wait with him,” Holiday told Bradley when he’d reported.  “Let us
know the second you hear anything.  And Bradley?”

“Yeah?”

“Try to set Mr.
Grandan
at ease, will you?”

“Um, I’ll try, but
he’s pretty shaken up.”

The director
sighed.  “As I recall, we had a much more subtle strategy prepared. 
You were supposed to play the role of Cordova’s associate and continue the
plan.”

“I’m not too
great at subtlety,” Bradley said defensively.  “I figured it would be easy
to scare the answers out of him.  It worked.”

“For the time
being.  Just calm him down as well as you can.  We may need his
cooperation before this is over.”

The director
signed off.  The rest of the team were assembled in his office, along with
Riley.

“Why didn’t you
just let
Grandan
make the pickup and follow him to
the drop point?” the Chief Home Planet Liaison asked tightly.

The question
annoyed Holiday.  They didn’t try to do Riley’s job for him; it would be
nice if he would return the favor.

“We couldn’t risk
him making the transfer successfully,” Amber answered before the director could
make a snide remark.

“Not that it
would have mattered, as it turns out,” Corey lamented. 
A journal and a
camera.  Pathetic.

“Well,” the big
bald man said, “you’re all doing an excellent job, here.  I’ll be heading
home for the evening.”

But how will
we get along without you looking over our shoulders?
Holiday wanted to
ask.  “We’ll keep you posted,” he said.

JILL
sat back on a leather sofa, alone with her thoughts.  Through the glass
wall in front of her she looked down on GoCom’s central lobby several stories
below.  The lobby was lit and fairly busy.  But the lounge Jill sat
in was empty and dark, as it always was this time of night.

She’d found this
place a couple weeks after joining the department.  She usually came here
after a mission, just to sit by herself and contemplate while idly watching the
people in the lobby below.  It was relaxing.

At least, usually
it was relaxing.  Tonight, not so much.

In one way, the
evening’s mission had been a complete success.  Her role in the operation
had gone like clockwork.  She’d gotten
Grandan
out of the way, met with Cordova, and intercepted the goods from the shuttle,
all without a scratch or a hitch.

But she still
couldn’t shake the feeling it had all been for nothing.

She sighed,
trying to forget about it. 
Just think about something else. 
Something happy.  Something relaxing.

“Hey, Jill.”

She sat up and
jerked her head around—and let out a sigh.  “Diz!  Wow, you scared
me.”

“Sorry.” 
Dizzie crossed the dark room.  “I just thought you could use some
company.”

Then why do
you think I came up here?
  But it was impossible to be annoyed with
Dizzie.  “Sure.  Have a seat.”

“A drink?” 
Dizzie stepped over to the vending machine near the sofa.  A minute later
she was back with a bottle of water for Jill and a grape soda for herself.

“Thanks.  By
the way, how did you find me?”

Dizzie looked
embarrassed.  “Um, I asked Sherlock to tell me where you were.”

Jill shook her
head.  “Stalker!”

“I know, I know!”
Dizzie said apologetically, taking a seat on the sofa next to Jill.  “Just
been a little worried about you lately.”

“I’m fine,” Jill
said dismissively.  “I mean, thanks for the concern, though.”

“You sure there’s
nothing bothering you?”

“Well, I’m not
too happy with how the mission went, to be honest.”

“I know.  I
heard.  You think you’re chasing a wild goose.”

Jill suppressed a
laugh.  “On a wild goose chase, you mean?”

“Whatever,”
Dizzie said with a wave of her hand.  “Anyway, you seemed kind of uneasy
even before the mission.”

“Really?” 

“It’s just that
you’ve been a little...quiet lately.”

“I’m always
quiet.”

“Well, yeah, I
know.”

“We can’t all be
like you, Diz.  We don’t all just say whatever we’re thinking all the
time.”

Dizzie
grimaced.  “I guess I could stand to shut up a little more often.”

“Hard to
imagine,” Jill chuckled.

“Isn’t it?” 
Dizzie swigged some grape soda.  “Sometimes I use my mouth before my
brain.  I should try the opposite.”

“I don’t
know.  I’d say it’s actually one of your best qualities.  It’s kind
of nice to be around people who feel free to speak their minds.”

“Really?  It
doesn’t bother you?”  Dizzie looked skeptical.  “What about that time
I told you I’d rather have a root canal than listen to classical music, and
then you said classical music was your favorite?”

Jill
shrugged.  “You were just being honest.”

Dizzie took
another swig.  “What about the time I described how I threw up after
eating too much pizza, and I could still see all the individual toppings—?”

“
That
was
a little overboard,” Jill agreed.  “I think it got to Bradley more than
me, though.”

Dizzie struggled
not to laugh grape soda onto the leather sofa. “He ran out of the room like it
was on fire!” she burst when she’d finally swallowed.

“Maybe you
shouldn’t have told that story when the
caf
was
actually serving pizza.”

“That’s what made
me think of it, though.”

Jill shook her
head.  “Okay, so sometimes you could stand to say a little less.  But
it’s nice that you don’t hide how you’re thinking or how you’re feeling. 
I envy that about you, actually.”

“Well, you don’t
have to hide either, you know.  You could stand to open up a little!”

“I know,” Jill
said quietly.  “It just doesn’t come as naturally to some of us.  But
I promise I’ll try, if
you’ll
promise to be patient with me.”

Dizzie pursed her
lips.  “Patience—now there’s something that doesn’t come naturally to
me.  But I’ll do my darnedest.”  She drained her soda, and tossed the
can across the lounge.  She flung her hands in the air as it bounced off
the wall into a recycle bin.

“You’re good,”
said Jill.

“So I hear.”
Dizzie stood up.  “Well, I guess you probably came up here to get some
alone time.  I’ll let you get back to it.  Don’t stay up too late.”

“Yes, mother.”

Dizzie scowled
and started heading back to the lounge exit.

Jill found she
didn’t really want to be by herself any more.  “You know, I’ll head back
down with you.”

THEY
took several narrow passages back into the recesses of GoCom.  Now they
were in a small room with deep red carpet and old-fashioned wooden-paneled
walls.  There was an elevator at one end of the room—an elevator almost no
one ever used.  It wasn’t convenient to anyplace any GoCom employee or
visitor would be going.

They called the
elevator and stepped inside.  The console had buttons for floors one
through twelve.  Jill ignored the console and opened a panel in the
wall.  She punched a twenty-digit code into the revealed keypad.

TEN
stories beneath the ground floor of GoCom, the elevator doors opened.

Jill and Dizzie
stepped out into the department lobby.  The middle of the midnight-blue
carpet was emblazoned with a shield emblem with THE NEXUS in bold
letters.  To one side of the lobby were Holiday’s office and the door to
HQ.  They took a long hallway heading the opposite direction toward the
dorms.

They found a few
of their coworkers in the dorm lounge.  Three girls sat at a table playing
cards.  A couple boys were shooting pool, and a couple others watching
TV.  Another girl was sipping tea and reading in the kitchen/dining loft
above the back of the lounge.

By now Jill knew
most of the residents here by name.  All of them were in their late teens
or early twenties—young men and women whose troubled pasts and, in most cases,
criminal records had not stopped Director Holiday from recruiting them and
making them integral members of the department.

People like Jill.

Dizzie led the
way up a stairway to one side of the lounge.  They came to a hallway lined
with doors to the girls’ dorm rooms.  They stopped at Dizzie’s door. 
“See you in the morning,” she said, giving Jill a quick hug.  Dizzie was
always one for hugs.

“See you
then.  What are you up to the rest of the night?”

“Probably
practicing.  We’ve got a show coming up.  You?”

“I was going to
say sleep, but if you’re playing your guitar....”

“I’ll keep the
volume low,” Dizzie promised.

“I was only
kidding.  I’m exhausted so don’t worry, you won’t keep me awake.  And
thanks.  Thanks for stalking me and coming to see me.  You’re
awesome, Dizzie.”

“No,
you’re
awesome! 
G’night
.”

“Night.”

Dizzie
disappeared into her room, and Jill entered her own room next door.

It was still hard
to believe she lived here.  In a way she’d grown used to it over the past
three months.  But in another way she was still shocked every time she
walked into her room and realized all over again that she lived here,
belonged
here.

She never got
tired of that feeling.

Jill had made
quite a few personal touches to the room.  She had some framed prints of a
few of her favorite impressionist pieces, some potted plants, a nice collection
of books on a shelf next to the bed.

And one
photograph.  It faced her from the desktop each time she came through the
door.  There was her own smiling eleven-year-old face with a beautiful
Korean woman next to her.

For the
thousandth time Jill imagined it was a full family photo, that along with her
and her mother there was the smiling face of a middle-aged man—a man Jill had
never met.  She pictured him sort of like Director Holiday.  There
was no reason, really, except that Giles Holiday had been the most fatherly
figure Jill ever had.  She knew her dad had emigrated to Anterra from
somewhere in Europe.  She didn’t know from where—knew almost nothing else
about her dad, actually.  She supposed she must look something like
him.  She hadn’t inherited much from her mom other than the black hair and
dark eyes.

And a life of
crime.  But that was a thing of the past, now.

Jill got into her
pajamas, grabbed her toothbrush from the closet bathroom in one corner, and
stepped out the sliding glass door at the back of her room.  From her
small railed balcony she looked down on the lounge while she brushed her
teeth.  The girls at the card table were ignoring their game and talking.

Just talking.

It seemed to come
so naturally to them.  Maybe, unlike Jill, they’d grown up with
siblings.  Or maybe, even if they hadn’t, they’d had parents who listened
to them; who talked to them the way they were talking to each other now.

Jill looked at
the balcony next to hers.  Behind that sliding door came the muffled roar
of Dizzie’s electric guitar.

You don’t have
to hide
.

But if you’re
used to hiding, it’s hard to stop.  You couldn’t just jump out and yell,
‘Hey, here I am!’  Could you?  Maybe she didn’t have to do it that
way.  Maybe over time, slowly but surely, she could come out from behind
the walls she’d always tried to keep between her and everyone else.

Maybe.

SHE
was dreaming again.

The same dream.

A face was
looking at her—the beautiful Korean face from her photograph.

“We can do this,
Jillian.”

Fifteen-year-old
Jillian didn’t answer.

“Come on, it’s
not so bad, is it?  Are you ashamed to be working with your mother?”