Текст книги "Regenesis"

Автор книги: C. J. Cherryh

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“Because we stopped terraforming in its tracks,” she said, shaken out of any sort of complacency. “But the military kept the research going. And the crazier Centrists still want it applied here.”

“We’re giving them Eversnow. But a lot of old business exists out there at Planys. Part of the black projects in the military wing we can’t get at, and we don’t like, are nanistics of a nature I don’t like. Officially the nanistics program slowed to a stop when he retired, no other personnel was brought in out there, and what remediation uses is very carefully regulated, but lately, with the Eversnow matter–it’s back, this time in Novgorod. There’s an inherent problem with research labs, you know. They contain knowledge you’d like to have just in case your enemies have it, but that you’d just as soon not have on the public market. And when people who know military things retire, they still know things and they have opinions–unless you want to mindwipe a Special, which wouldn’t attract too many people into the program.”

“So you think he’s been talking to people? Including Jordan? It’s not Jordan’s field.”

“Politics is. Jordan’s always been a political animal. And we know there’s been a leak to Corain.”

“One we found,” she said. “You think there’s more?”

“Oh, I think we brought a major item of it here, with Jordan.”

“My fault, you’re saying.”

“Having him sucked up by the military wouldn’t have helped at all.”

It wouldn’t. She’d prevented that. That was true.

“Thieu arrived at Planys during the War,” Yanni said, “quietest retreat he could have. We’d moved a major part of the lab there, in point of fact, because we didn’t want to risk a raid on Beta, and that research falling into Alliance hands. The staff moved back to Beta when the War ended–but he’d already gotten on the wrong side of your predecessor in an absolute fury over the cancellation of his programs. So there he was, just quietly aging, still within the Planys labs, not the man he had been, but still–still within the structure, still doing some work on biologicals for Defense, supposedly doing some side work on the rejuv sensitivity issue–he either wasn’t allowed to work on the remediation as of two years ago, or he refused to work on it any further: it’s not totally clear how that happened, and we’re quietly asking at this moment. The man has a temper that doesn’t always serve him.”

“But he still has his security clearances.”

“He still has some clearance–though he carried on correspondence with a few people in the University in Novgorod, not all of whom we were quite comfortable with: people who’d gotten burned in the program cancellation; people who leaned just a little to the Centrist fringes–ReseuneSec found it useful to let it continue, to see where the lines of communication led, granted nothing classified got out. Meanwhile he met Jordan Warrick…when Jordanmoved out there, not, of course, voluntarily. They weren’t close for the first ten years, didn’t even speak; but in the last few, as Thieu tended toward retirement, they started up a friendship. We can’t prove a damned thing, except our quiet in‑house inquiry about resurrecting a nanistics project–the Eversnow project, which we didn’t say at the time, nor mentioned Patil’s name–got Thieu very exercised. Hebreached security, at least within that close community of academics, and contacted a student of his currently teaching in Novgorod, qualified in the field, security clearance, to be sure, but not a contact he was authorized to make.”

“Patil.”

“Patil. He’d corresponded with her for years, but all those letters were innocuous, two scientists talking about programs, and definitely subject to censors who actually can read in that field. Recall there’s a strong Centrist bent in Novgorod University, through the social studies department and into some very shady nooks of the rebel chic. Patil’s work has a cult following. She doesn’t encourage the radicals. But they get excited when she publishes. When she lectures, they show up at her lecture series. If we revive the old studies for use at Eversnow, I want to be sure it doesn’tget used here on Cyteen by some lunatic with a lab vial. Let me tell you, with Thieu retired and Patil’s whole operation off at Eversnow we’re actually safer–barring something coming back by ship. All of which I mention to you just in the case I shouldfall down the stairs and break my neck–”

“Please don’t!”

“–in case, I say, I’m telling you verbally. There is that one very untidy and roundabout link to Jordan Warrick that we don’t like, the elderly and sometimes erratic Dr. Thieu, who connects with Patil, who’s the person we want to use at Eversnow, partly for very political reasons. But while we’re going ahead with the Patil nomination, we’re also going through the establishment on Planys with a microscope right now on the excuse of investigating Jordan, and it’s why we shouldn’t roundtrip Jordan right back to Planys at first excuse. If fire and fuel canmeet, we just want to be very sure the bottles are secure. Once we ship Patil out to Fargone, we’ll feel a lot safer.”

“But you’re saying it’s possibly all innocent.”

“Patil’s a natural candidate for the Eversnow post. But hauling her from the Centrist party to the Expansionist side of the slate is going to mightily annoy some people. It’s possible certain factions will be more interested in the politics of it than in the actual science, which is years off. Short‑term, it’s very likely to be political.”

“ ‘Rethinking the Theory of Long‑Period Nanistic Self‑direction.’ ”

“God, where did you run across that?”

“It was going to run in Scientialast year. It was pretty thick going, but I read it.”

“I should think it was. You and the censors. How did you get it?”

“The Centrists had made a fuss about it, pre‑publication, said it proved they could do what they wanted to do on Cyteen without killing the rejuv ecology. Uncle Denys was mad about it. He was threatening to have the editor fired if it ran, so they pulled it. I figured I should give it a look. So she was writing up what she shouldn’t have written about?”

“It was an agitation on her part. But a quiet one, the presentation of a theory, not a how‑to. The War’s over. We could enlist any nanistics expert we want out of Beta, and will–but for various reasons–including the fact she’s the darling of the Paxers, the Centrists, and the military, and could get us the votes–she’s our pick for the lab going out to Eversnow. It’s a dream assignment for her. She may be the Centrist intellectuals’ darling, not that they understand half of what she’s about, but she does want to see her theories put into the field, and she’show we got the two Councillors to shift their vote to support mine, notable Defense and Citizens. And just to draw a line under the fact of who’s in bed with whom, our Jordan’s spent the last eight years having lunch with the professor who taught Patil.”

“He doesn’t havea Base in System any more. So how did he know about it? How did he get the card? Maybe he wanted us to have it. Maybe he’s trying to ask a question…in his unique way.”

“That would be an interesting position,” Yanni said. “Or maybe he just wanted Justin to take exception to the ensuing investigation.”

“To drag Justin into it on his side,” Ari said, “but I don’t think he did what Jordan would want him to do.”

“Oh, it probably was within his guesswork,” Yanni said. “I assume Jordan expected the card to be confiscated, and Justin to be involved, and upset, and maybe more amenable to Jordan’s arguments. He’s psych, not nanistics, educational psych, at that. I don’tlike the notion he could have gotten this card from Thieu, and gotten it through our screening. Security’s got to take a look at that. But it’s not much more comfortable a thought that someone here gave it to him…probably with information.”

“It has a reader‑strip, ser,” Florian said. “We didn’t put it into a System‑connected reader.”

“Probably a very good notion,” Yanni said. “Damn it! Damn Jordan to bloody hell.”

“I’d rather not if I can avoid it,” Ari said. “But Justin is staying in Wing One.”

“Granted,” Yanni said. “No question. Good call.”

“ Youdidn’t bring Patil’s name up with Jordan, did you?”

“Hell, no.”

“Just asking,” she said easily. It remained a possibility, all the same. But less likely, perhaps.

So Justin was safe. But Jordan definitely wasn’t.

BOOK ONE Section 2 Chapter iii

APRIL 26, 2424

0855H

Late to bed, late to rise, and not that early to the office.

The morning was definitely off routine, when you had to rack your memory to recall what your own office address was, and it was entirely surreal to walk in and find the set‑up pretty much what you remembered–and you hadn’t put it there.

Justin had expected boxes. The office was–just moved. Things were on shelves in exactly the same order…apparently so, at least. Florian hadn’t exaggerated.

“Well,” Grant said, at his shoulder, “they were neat.”

“Certainly better than some invasions we’ve had,” Justin muttered, and let go a long, long breath. He hadn’t known he was that wound up about the move, but he had been. He didn’t see a safe. Opening several desk drawers didn’t turn up Ari’s material. It had gone somewhere, and that bothered him.

“Her stuff isn’t here,” he said.

“Security will have it,” Grant said. “Five against ten, Florian will have gotten it, personally.”

“Well, it’s not a bad office,” Justin said, looking around. It wasn’t bad. It was even good, given there was room for the two of them–ample room, but nothing for staff. God knew what Em thought, this morning, arriving to find he had no office and no job.

There was a window. The view from the purported window was fake, but it was a very expensive fake: a screen showed the Novaya Volga from, one supposed, the top of the cliffs, more likely the top of one of the precip towers–he’d never been up there: nobody went there, except the repair and maintenance crews working on the weather system, and most of those were robots.

It was a dizzying image, if one thought about it. It gave an illusion the whole building was forty stories tall, when the brain knew for a fact they were on the ground floor.

“Nice view,” Grant said.

“You’re such an optimist.” Justin ran his hand over the spines of the physical books on the shelf, finding no flaw in the order of them–printout of this and that psychset. He likedprintout, when it came to review. He marked‑up with abandon, and liked things in order, hisorder. The stacks on the desk looked like his stacks. He thumbed through them. They were in a reasonable order. Likely the stacks on Grant’s desk were the same.

But he wanted to find something they’d messed up. He checked the drawers. Exact order, exact contents. “I hate it when I don’t know what they’ve done wrong. I’m sure there’s something.”

“The movers were ReseuneSec, weren’t they?” Grant asked. “They’re used to not having things look disturbed.”

That was worth half a laugh at least.

There was an in‑office coffee dispenser sitting on a sideboard. That was new, and good. The machine was loaded and it turned on and functioned at the touch of a button. That was even better.

And the movers had improved on one other thing: the move had organized the supply cabinet contents in a logical, eye‑pleasing way, with little colored bins for the various styli and clips and pointer‑tags. He surveyed it top to bottom, looking for flaws.

“Color‑coded.” Justin remarked, giving up his search. “I suppose our mess was too much for them to get here intact. We have all shiny new paper clips.”

“Have a cup of coffee.” Grant handed him one, an implicit calm‑down.

“You know Jordan’s going to be beside himself this morning.”

“Likely he is,” Grant said. “Just about now.”

He took a sip. It was better coffee than what they’d had available down the hall in the old office. Much better. It was probably real. “Pricey.”

“Free,” Grant said.

“Meaning we’re entirely on her tab.” That didn’t improve the taste.

“Do we ever actually run through our wages?” Grant asked.

“We never get a chance to find out, do we? And what about our regular work?” He turned full circle, looked at the walls, the river view, and something beyond vertigo bothered him, something indefinably bothered him and made his shoulders twitch. He walked across the office and back before it dawned on him. “It’s backward. It’s damned backward! The back wall is south. The old office wall faced north.”

“Is that going to bother you?”

“It’s already bothering me.” He was still frustrated. The office had always had its carefully designed clutter–even his every‑other‑layer stacking was preserved, in the pile on the corner of his desk. The room was white‑walled, had a view that cost a month’s pay. The desks were new black lacquer, not brown lake wood, scarred from years of use. Their use. It was like that damned black and white bedroom they lived in, that was what. “I want some flowers in here. Some pictures that don’tmove.”

“I can order the flowers,” Grant said, and added wickedly. “Red?”

“No. Blue. Green. Purple. Anything but red.” There was one red pillow, one red flower, in their professionally decorated black, gray, and white quarters.

“Maybe you’d like to pick out the pictures yourself.”

That nettled him, too. “Ordering flowers is not your job to do. You’re not my–”

“I’m not as afflicted by the decor as you are,” Grant said. “It’s a born‑man problem. You’re fluxed. I’m sure I could order flowers in a sane, logical way. Possibly I’d be calm enough to pick out complementary pictures. Clearly–”

“The hell.” He found his mood improving, unwanted improvement, even toward laughter. “Oh, hell, blue. Blue would be good. Blues and purples, that sort of thing.” The single screen pretending to be a window drew the eye and suggested blue‑greens and grays. “Cancel the purple. Blues and quiet greens. That might do it. I’d like that. If you wouldn’t mind doing it. I’m not that logical, at the moment.”

“I’m sure there’s something that’ll work,” Grant said nicely. “I’ll look.”

By computer. You could do anything by computer. It would be there in an hour, if they opted for messenger service, and flowers and paintings could get through security, oh, by tomorrow, if security was in a good mood.

It certainly wasn’t the way he’d done things in the days when he’d been free, on his own salary and Grant’s.

Before the first Ari had gotten her hands on him. Before Jordan had gotten himself in trouble and gotten shipped to the far side of the world.

So Jordan came back, and Ari protected him from his own father…meaning she’d finally gotten her way and gotten him all the way into her wing–to do nothingin his career, but teach her.

Standing, he flipped on the computer. The screen blinked up.

Threemessages from Ari, in the upper righthand corner.

Calamity?

He dropped into the chair, keyed the messages up.

And had to laugh, however ruefully.

“What is it?”

“Ari’s postscripts. The first Ari didn’t do postscripts. Wouldn’t have done a postscript when she was six. Our girl’s done two in the same letter. She’s worried I’ll hit the ceiling. I think she’s really worried.”

“What does she say?”

“That they’re giving the other office to Jordan. That were better off here. That the old office was bugged, anyway.”

That got a laugh from Grant.

Justin keyed off and got up. “Let’s go out for lunch.”

“Out for lunch? We haven’t gotten any work done yet. I’m just into the flowers.”

“Lunch. Relaxation. Out of the Wing. Prove we can. But somewhere lesslikely to run into Jordan.”

“Jordan is going to be heading for Yanni’s office about now. If we stay off that track, we’ll miss him.”

This time helaughed. It made fair sense. Jordan was going to take about five minutes to realize he’d been given the office solo, and bet on it, Jordan wasn’t going to be working today, either.

Straight line course for Yanni’s office, no question.

Not that Yanni would do anything to make Jordan happier. Yanni didn’t do it, Ari’s final note had said. And she claimed she hadn’t done it.

So who had? What other authority was there, ruling his life?

Justin walked over to the desk, picked out the printout he’d been working over. Laid the project‑book, open, on his desk, where he would work on it when he got back. “There. We’re officially moved in and my desk is officially cluttered, so it’s home. God knows what the fallout was from that card Jordan handed me. Opening barrage, in what’s going to be some kind of war, I’m afraid. A war for possession of us, for starters. For possession of Reseune, I’m very much afraid. Jordan’s not going to win anything and I don’t think he’ll stop until someone stops him. And I don’t want that, Grant, damn, I really don’t want it.” His mood crashed. He leaned on his chair back. “He’s headed for a fall.”

“You think she’ll send him back to Planys?”

Deep down, he actually wished she would, this morning once and for all. And that was so startlingly dark and traitorous a thought that he felt deeply ashamed of himself. Jordan had spent twenty years in comparative privation, shut out of the modern world for a crime his accuser had likely committed; and his own son at least owed him some sympathy for the resultant bitterness, didn’t he?

But not when Grant was in danger from that sympathy: Ari had created Grant, Jordan had written some of his first tapes, knew at least his initial keywords and triggers, and if Jordan decided there might be flaws in Grant’s loyalty, and wanted to revise things, he could do major damage.

And hellif he’d let that happen, not if it meant Jordan going straight back into exile. He shoved back from the chair and picked up his coat.

“Jordan’s not making it easy for anybody,” he said grimly. “Not for me, not for you, not for two hours running since he’s been back.”

“Why does he do it?” Grant asked, reaching for his own coat. “What does an intelligent CIT want out of this situation?”

“Intelligent as he is, I’m afraid intelligence is nowhere in this situation.”

“You’re angry with him.” Halfway into the coat.

Justin settled his own onto his shoulders. “You noticed that.”

“Angry enough to take action against him as you did. That seems justified, from my own view.”

“I’m angry about being uprooted into an office that’s just damned backwardto what I’ve been used to for most of my life. I’m angry at being co‑opted deeper into Ari’s wing. I’m angry because I’m going to miss Abrizio’s…”

“We can walk over there. Nothing’s stopping us.”

“We could run into him!”

“So you want to avoid him permanently?”

“ Damnit.”

“But not damn him?”

“I don’t know!”

Grant frowned. “So all across the horizon, very intelligent CITs aren’t acting rationally. Young Ari didn’t do a thing, Yanni didn’t, the elder Warrick makes a stupid move, and the younger doesn’t know what he damns, but he doesn’t want to talk to his genefather at all. What was the card you asked me to give Florian?”

It bordered on funny, it was so stupid. The idiocy of the situation afflicted his already raw sensibilities. At very least, his universe was not on the same track this morning, and he no longer knew where it was going, not an unusual condition in his life, but not one he liked.

“Jordan’s likely to be at our favorite lunch haunt on any given day if he’s using that office, and I don’t want the confrontation. So, for starters, I think we’ll walk to the north corridor of Admin for a late breakfast. That won’t be on his route.” He stared disconsolately at the cabinets, finding everything out of sorts. “They’ve color‑coded the damn supply cabinets. It looks great. But are we going to remember to put the clips back in the red box? Should we have to remember? Does anyone care?”

“At least your father won’t be into your notebooks.”

“Definitely a point in favor of this place.”

“And it wasoriginally his office.”

It was. It had been. “Let’s just get out of here before–”

The desk phone went off. He shot a look at Grant. It rang again. It was Jordan’s ID. He hesitated toward the door, then looked back.

It went on ringing. He swore, and punched in Speaker.

“Dad?”

“ Where in hell are you?” came from the other end. “ What’s going on?”

“They moved us. I think we were bugged.”

“ Youthink we were bugged! Bloody hell!” So much for that piece of deliberate naivete. And more quietly, even gently, Jordan added: “ Are you all right?”

He hadn’texpected parental concern. That ploy hadn’t even been on the radar. It set him back about a beat or two and almost hurt. Not quite. “We’re fine. Dad. We are.”

“ Where are you?”

“Wing One.” Where Jordan couldn’t come. Not a hope in hell he’d ever get through her security to have a look around this office. “They moved my office.”

And Jordan had to know that the move was for good.

“ Are you going to protest this?”

Tell the truth or temporize? Truth was simpler. Kinder, if that mattered. “No, actually.”

“ No?”

Outrage. Truth, again? Or was it a lie?

Both wrapped together, both truth andlie, likely. Jordan wanted his son to rise up and challenge Admin, and challenge Ari’s existence. But he didn’t really expect it to happen–for reasons Jordan thought he understood better than the rest of the universe. “It won’t do a damn bit of good if I do. It’s not a bad office here. More room. Certainly more room than four of us and staff jammed into the other one.”

“ Come to breakfast.”

Now a lie was necessary. Absolutely the polite thing. “Things are in a mess here. I’ve got some unpacking to do. I’ve got to find some things.”

“ Supper, then. We’ll cook.”

It wasn’t an invitation. It was a challenge to trust. Maybe to come talk about that card he no longer had. And he didn’t trust Jordan, not at all. He wasn’t bringing Grant and himself through Jordan’s doors, subject to whatever they were handed to eat and drink, which might have God‑knew‑what in it. “I can’t.”

“ Arrested?”

“Just detained. I don’t know for how long. It’ll ease up. It always does.”

“ Damn it, I’m going to Yanni with this.”

So they both went through the motions. The pretense of familial affection. The reality of outrage. “Don’t use up your credit with him. This was bound to happen. They’re not going to like us working together. You knew that when you pushed it.”

“ You mean she’s not going to like it.”

“Look, you’ve got to settle in, start producing again, start your work up…let them see you haven’t lost a beat. That’s what’s important. Get current with things… I understand they’re going to give you that office.”

“ Current!”

“All right, yes, I’m sure that’s an issue among the younger researchers.” It was, and a painful one, which he used with only the faintest twinge of shame. “Get a new project going. And since you’re in that office alone with Paul, there won’t be any question what’s my work and what’s yours.”

There was just a little silence on the other side. As if his son’s work was going to overshadow his, as if, if it was any good, no one would believe he did it. That was going to sting. And he did it deliberately, knowing how instinctively jealous and competitive his father was. Jealousy had been the core issue with Jordan and the first Ari, that Jordan wouldn’t be second to her…he’d tried to be her equal partner in research, and that hadn’t worked, because the first Ari hadbeen smarter than Jordan, just like the second. Heaccepted that fact of life, with his Ari. Jordan hadn’t ever been able to. He didn’t know what he felt at the moment, but it was perilously close to unreasoning anger–which didn’t damned well help in a fencing match with his father.

“ That’s the way it is, is it?” Jordan asked. “ That’s the concern she has, just so solicitous to have me look good? Pardon me if I don’t buy it.”

“I don’t either, Jordan, but there’s a certain assumption around the labs that you’re so many years behind the times, that you can’t possibly overcome–”

“ The hell! The hell I am! And the hell I can’t!”

“It’s the next generation, dad. They don’t know you. Just produce. They’ll learn who you are.”

“ Who I am? Damned right they will!”

Jordan broke the connection, right there.

Grant lifted a well‑controlled eyebrow. “Breakfast?”

BOOK ONE Section 2 Chapter iv

APRIL 26, 2424

1302H

Message from Hicks, director of Reseune Security, to sera’s security: Consultation urgently needed.

It might involve the card–if Hicks was running an operation at Yanni’s direction, they’d gotten in the middle of it last night, and Hicks was probably quietly furious at their having swept it up.

They could say no. They could hold onto the card and force Yanni to request sera to order them to release it; but a feud with Hicks wasn’t profitable. Hicks had agreed when they’d outright insisted on their monitoring the business with Justin and his father, and relaying what they found to him; and the interview seemed, overall, a reasonable request.

“I’ll likely be a while,” Florian said, while leaving the security station.

“All secure here,” Catlin said. “I’ll hold things down. It wouldn’t be good to annoy ReseuneSec if we don’t need to.”

“No,” he agreed. “It wouldn’t.”

He took the card with him, carefully protected in an envelope–its disposition dependent on what he heard from Hicks: maybe he would turn it over, maybe not, and Hicks would not lay hands on him, not if Hicks wanted his career. He headed out, downstairs, out of the wing and over to Admin, to an office that supervised his kind, but not him, not Catlin, and no one else inside sera’s apartment.

ReseuneSec was operationally directly responsible to Yanni Schwartz these days. Hicks had succeeded Giraud Nye in the post, and hadn’tbeen implicated in Denys’ attempt on sera’s life–in fact Hicks had stood down, done his best to keep things calm and safe for most of Reseune, and taken neither side, while sera’s people and Denys’ people shot at each other in the halls of Wing One. So Hicks had kept his job. Yanni said he was a good man, and since they trusted Yanni–so far–they trusted Hicks–so far.

Over to Admin, upstairs to the executive level, down the corridor from Yanni’s office. The ReseuneSec offices were a busy place, even at this early hour. The anteroom was full of people in suits, people in uniform. If he had to wait, he had things he could do in the interim.

He went to the desk. “Florian AF, Sera Ariane Emory’s bodyguard. The director called.”

The receptionist immediately lost the preoccupied look. “Ser. You’re expected.” He stood up and personally escorted Florian down a carpeted hall straight to the director’s office, past cameras and other devices–no matter all the waiting CITs back there.

That was gratifying, on sera’s behalf. It made a good impression–so far.

“Florian AF.”

A man with dark hair, dark good looks, and a gold bar indicating a colonel’s rank, intercepted him and the receptionist both.

Kyle AK. Alpha azi. Hicks’ aide.

“Ser.” Kyle AK outranked him. And might prevent him, but he would notdo business with a substitute. He eyed Kyle AK with a certain reserve, just stared at him, at a dead stop, and the receptionist retreated.

“The message was from the Director,” Florian said. “I’ll seethe Director.”

“To be sure,” Kyle AK said smoothly, and opened the door that said Adam Hicks, Director, Reseune Securityin gold letters.

He walked in with Kyle AK, facing a silver‑haired, square‑faced man at a desk.

Suit, not uniform. That was Hicks, CIT, and never trained in green barracks, not an expert in actual practice, only in administration. He’d gotten the services of Kyle AK, a very highly trained alpha, former Fleet service. And it was widely suspected that Kyle AK was and had been the source of no little policy and no few orders in ReseuneSec…but it was the born‑man who held the office and signed the papers.

“Ser,” Florian said. “Florian AF. You called sera’s office.”

Hicks got up from his chair and offered his hand across the desk, again, proper behavior. “Florian AF. A pleasure. Have a seat.”

“Ser,” Florian said, placing hands in the back of his belt and continuing to stand, post‑handshake, as Hicks sat down: he had reached a decision. “Jordan Warrick surreptitiously passed a calling card with a contact number to Justin Warrick. The younger Warrick volunteered the card to me when I intercepted him on the quadrangle, and made no further comment. I think you’ll know that from my report.”

“Do you have the card with you?” Hicks asked him.

“Yes. May I have your word, ser, we’ll have the benefit of your investigation? This regards a person under sera’s authority.”

“Agreed. Absolutely agreed.”

Florian reached into his jacket front and pulled out the envelope. Hicks took it and laid it on the desk in front of him.

“What do you know about the card?” Hicks asked.

“The number, ser, belongs to a Dr. Sandur Patil, University of Novgorod.”

Hicks’s face betrayed very little. He was good, in that regard. “Researcher and professor. Did the Director brief you who she is?”

“Scheduled for promotion to a directorship at Fargone. Yes, ser. Director Schwartz said so, in conversation with my principal.”

Hicks nodded slowly. “How far did he brief her?”

“Perhaps farther than he briefed you, ser, so I shouldn’t go into specifics.”

Momentary silence. A perusal by very cold, very opaque eyes. “You know about Eversnow.”

“Yes, ser. We do.”

“You got this card from the younger Warrick.”

“It was given, Ser. Volunteered by him.”

“He got it from Warrick Senior.”

“We observed that he did, ser, unless cards were switched. We didn’t search him. Justin Warrick has been honest with us.”

“Your personal recommendation on the matter. Florian AF?”

He drew a breath. “We’ve pulled Justin Warrick into sera’s wing, to prevent further contact. That was our immediate action.”

“Is he aware of what’s on the card?”

“The card was given him without explanation. He wasn’t observed reading it. He volunteered it to me, and we ran the address on it. We didn’t, however, run the data strip. It seems to us that needs to be done in lab.”

“We’ll do that,” Hicks said, “with precautions.”

“Sera will appreciate notification of the contents, whether or not it immediately concerns her security.”

Hicks’ jaw clamped. He was a man not in the habit of letting go of information without knowing parameters in advance. But slowly he nodded. “We appreciate your turning this over, Florian AF.”