Part 27 (1/2)

Scott-Olson shook her head. ”I'm pretty sure we know what's causing this. But I've been wrong before. I try to keep an open mind.”

And then she went back to her office, mostly to cut off the debate. One of the windows on her desk screen blinked. She touched it. The system had found a memoir by Allard da Ponte. Da Ponte had died just recently, and this memoir was published by his family after his death. He had lived in the Outlying Colonies.

Scott-Olson sank into her chair, reading as she did so. Da Ponte had survived the ma.s.sacre. He had been four at the time.

And the account he left was as chilling as anything Scott-Olson had seen all day.

40.

Ki Bowles had gotten the earliest news reports before she left Tycho Crater, but she hadn't understood the urgency of the situation until she returned to InterDome Media's offices in Armstrong. InterDome had one of the largest buildings in the city, and the complex spread for two full blocks.

Because Bowles was one of InterDome's best-known reporters and she had a lot of seniority, she could go anywhere in the complex. So when she got off the bullet train from Tycho Crater, she headed immediately to InterDome's live-feed monitoring chamber.

The monitoring chamber had no windows. The walls were screens, but the screens were unlike those found in the average building. These screens had high-resolution imagery, and everything shown on them was life-sized. Multiple images did not run in the chamber. Instead, one large image covered the entire room, so that the person who monitored this particular story could feel as if the story lived and breathed and surrounded him.

Bowles usually stayed out of the chambers, preferring to experience the story herself through live reporting. But this time, she couldn't. So she went through a series of image rooms, each worse than the last-starting with the images coming out of Sahara Dome, and ending with the s.p.a.ce around Mars.

The bodies disturbed her, as did the panic in the various Domes, but the scope of the crisis became clear to her as she stood in the center of the last room, the blackness of s.p.a.ce around her, Mars a red presence in the foreground, and s.h.i.+ps coming off it like fur off a cat.

So many of these s.h.i.+ps collided, exploded, or simply lost control and flipped end on end that it seemed as if no one were piloting them at all.

Maybe no one was.

Bowles had seen things like this before in her history cla.s.ses. She had studied ma.s.s exodus when she was dealing with Etae last year. But she had never personally witnessed this kind of panic.

She burst out of the room and headed past the imaging chambers to the main offices. Her boss, a shy, sensitive man named Thaddeus Ling, had the largest office on the floor. He was also s.h.i.+elded by a bevy of security codes, links, and real-life a.s.sistants, all of whom were supposed to keep people out.

Bowles pushed through the doors without sending a message in advance, as was the desired custom, startling three a.s.sistants who were lounging at their desks.

”I'm seeing Thaddeus,” she said as she continued toward the large plastic doors he had painted a bright yellow, just because he could. Her own links were screaming; the security worked in the form of high-pitched blasts to the inner ear.

The a.s.sistants were scrambling after her, demanding that she stop. At least that's what she thought they said, because she couldn't hear a thing. The instant headache she got for her troubles made her vision blur. But that yellow door was hard to miss.

She hit it with both palms and it bent open, as if it were expecting her.

Maybe it was.

She stepped inside Ling's office, and immediately all sound ceased. She wished the headache had as well.

”This is really unorthodox, Ms. Bowles.” Ling was standing beside a jade sculpture of one of his ancestors, a slender woman who had a pleasant face. Ling's face wasn't pleasant. It was too thin and had frown lines that enhancements couldn't tame. They made his golden skin look chapped, and over time, his eyes had stretched until they seemed too large for the sockets. Apparently, no one had ever suggested repairing that.

”Have you been to the imaging chambers?” she asked.

He was rearranging some tinier jade sculptures on a shelf built into the wall. Plants she didn't recognize rose around the shelves, the green leaves looking alien against the brown backdrop. The only thing that looked natural, oddly enough, were the jade sculptures on every surface. There was even a life-sized dog next to his desk.

”I've been thinking of getting rid of those chambers,” he said, moving a sculpture the size of his thumb up two shelves. ”They're a waste of s.p.a.ce.”

”They help put things in perspective,” Bowles said. ”Come with me.”

He peered around yet another sculpture. This one was a simple obelisk as tall as Ling was, with writing in a language Bowles didn't recognize running up the side. ”You barged in here so that I would accompany you to the imaging chamber?”

”You want a larger office?” she asked. ”Maybe a little more power with InterDome? Haven't I heard you mention that you'd like to be in charge of the expansion to Earth?”

”We're not going to expand to Earth in my lifetime,” he said bitterly.

”Stop it, Mr. Ling,” she said. ”We've got a story here.”

”Is it that security chief story you were nagging me about?”

”It might be,” Bowles said. ”Come with me.”

Then, without waiting for his reply, she grabbed his arm and pulled him away from the sculptures. He b.u.mped into the obelisk and for a moment, it looked like the entire thing was going to tumble. Bowles caught it with one hand and pushed it back into place, surprised at how heavy it was.

”Violence doesn't solve a thing, girl,” he said.

She narrowed her eyes and kept pulling him forward.

When they reached the doors, she said, ”Shut off the d.a.m.n security. My head can't take more of those tones.”

He smiled. ”You're the only one who has ever gotten through them.”

She took that as a promise and pulled him out of the room. The a.s.sistants watched gape-mouthed but did nothing to stop her. When she hit the corridor, she kept her grip on Ling, but noticed that she was no longer pulling. He was keeping pace with her.

”I have to inspect these rooms anyway,” he said. ”I've been promising the unit manager that I would give him a report on the chambers within the week. Everyone believes they're not worth the funding-”

”Everyone except the writing staff, the reporters, and the researchers,” Bowles said. ”Of course, you never bother to check with us.”

”Sarcasm won't put me in a mood to help you, Ms. Bowles.”

”I'm not bringing you here to help me,” she said. At least, not exactly. ”We have the story of the century here, and we have to figure out how to cover it.”

”You could have explained it in my office,” he said.

”Not like this.”

She pressed a hand on the lock that opened the first imaging chamber, and walked inside. The images coming from Sahara Dome were still devastating.

Ling gasped.

She took him from room to room, showing the ever-expanding crisis on Mars, until they reached that last room. The images were as amazing as ever: the blackness, the pinp.r.i.c.ks of burning light against a red planet, the sheer volume of free-floating s.h.i.+ps.

”My G.o.d,” he breathed. ”Have they all gone mad?”

”They're afraid of something and they're running,” Bowles said. ”Everyone thinks they're crazy, but I downloaded some Disty histories. I found a lot of evacuations. Do you know how they discovered our solar system in the first place?”

”No,” he said, without looking at her. He was watching the tiny s.h.i.+ps whirling away from the surface.