‘And the glory, no doubt,’ Pav said, still behind her.
‘Dr Markov and I scrubbed up. Dr Wei and some others were waiting for us. Subject Zaye was already prepped, and we began. The initial incision yielded more blood loss than anticipated and she quickly fell into a full cranium haemorrhage. We tried to reduce the ICP, but her blood pressure was over 140/90 mm Hg. There was so much, and from multiple sources – it came so quickly, and we couldn’t control it.
‘She died on the operating table at 17.12pm. We closed at 18.02pm.’
And so that was how she died; a quick, painless and unnecessary death. Killed without intent, collateral damage to one man’s ego and another’s weakness.
‘It’s a very severe reaction. That amount of haemorrhaging, and so instantaneous, I would expect some underlying issue or degradation,’ Jun said.
‘Unique,’ said Delun.
There was that word again. A blameless word for the guilty.
‘After we closed, Dr Markov asked for me to go to his room and wait for instruction. As I made my way to the office, I re-evaluated the surgical process. Based on the information available, I concluded it was likely there would be consequences to what happened with Subject Zaye.
‘She died in a surgical operation that was outside of protocol and, from the results and information we had available, it shouldn’t have taken place. I also concluded that it was highly probable Dr Wei and Dr Markov would power me down, like Jiazheng. I hid in the contemplation room near security to avoid the same outcome.’
In any other circumstances, Delun making a conscious choice to save themselves would be monumental; on another day, she would have taken it to Dr Wei making a case for further study, and lobbied for research funding; but her thirst for pushing the envelope had been diminished. The stakes had evolved.
Pav cleared his throat and lumbered from behind Jun; a weary gun dog pulled from its dormancy. ‘Before the Police dismissed us, I ran a check on who had been in and out of the lab that afternoon. Dr Wei registered going out, but never coming in, originally. There’s a secret passage, which allows access to the building and the lab, did you know that, Dr Xie?’
Jun shook her head. A secret passageway? Why would the lab need one, other than for unregulated activity?
‘Down near the archive rooms, underground. Dr Wei must have entered through there. I’ll show you – there are no CCs, no scanners. Just an old-fashioned door code. The words United Adaptive converted into the corresponding numbers.’
What had Wei and Markov been shuttling in and out? She shuddered to think.
‘I did a sweep of the rooms,’ Pav carried on, ‘and found Delun. The only real witness to what happened, I knew they’d be a target. I covered Delun in Biowrap and hid them in a storage container in the car park until the police discharged us. Delun disabled their GPS, and I brought them here; the UA would never think to look for Delun in the forest, why would they? So, Delun’s safe, for now.’
The sun shone through the waving branches of the trees, distorting her vision. The ground seemed to slip from beneath her. Nothing would ever be the same again.
Pav teased his bottom lip with his teeth. ‘Well, Dr Xie, what do you think?’
‘I think, Pav, we should get back to your Intuimoto, the heat is making me nauseous. I need you both to make motion memories. I’ll need diagnostic ones too.’
‘But where do we go from here – should we speak to the Police?’
Jun thought about Polzin’s overly-collaborative behaviour of yesterday.
‘I think it’s best if Delun comes with me,’ she said gravely, as though her stern tone would steer them out of the mess they’d found themselves in. The Police had made it clear they were on Wei’s side. Pav had to know that too. Whatever game the lab and the Police were playing, it had been sanctioned from the top. Likely from the Neuro Counsel, and the UA. A web big and sticky enough to spare the UA’s blushes and contracts.
Pav’s stony grit returned. ‘Will you both be safe? At least take my address and details in case.’
‘As safe as I can think of for now – both you and I are targets, and besides, this is my department’s fuck up Pav – I’d rather limit your involvement. Dr Wei is aware that I know something, though to what degree… and besides, you’re-’
‘More expendable?’
Her face fell. Thinking about Desai and the stories he’d told her, no one was an exception. They were all expendable.
‘I need to go back to the lab,’ she said.
She was a neuroscientist, a disciple of data and controlled situations. How had everything she’d known and believed in, come to this?
CHAPTER 14
22nd September 2037
‘Fan?’ Jun’s voice was absorbed by the kitchen. A pronounced silence. The counters were uncharacteristically, immaculate. Usually, there would plates and pans everywhere, collateral damage from the morning, and there was no lingering aroma of salty steamed-buns – Fan’s breakfast staple. The late-morning sun pierced through the blinds and into Jun’s eyes; she drew them even though it was only eleven am.
She’d expected to be pounced upon. Urgent questions thrown by an even more urgent-looking face. Fan hated disruption to the status quo. Waking up to the vague message she’d written of ‘going for a drive’ on the Telestream would have provoked a reaction. He’d written a responding message of ‘okay.’ Equally as vague, but at least he was alright.
The side effects from the lack of sleep and systematic shots of adrenaline, finally caught up with her. She imagined herself to be sleepwalking. Eyes reluctant to open and when they did, they looked but did not want to see. And then she remembered – the trunk of the Intuimoto.
It was remarkable how quickly a rational person adopted irrational behaviour. Had it been a good idea to bring Delun back home with her, hidden in the trunk of her car? He, like a corpse, and she, the assassin.
If the UA were to storm round – no, they wouldn’t storm. They’d be methodical. As Blum and Golov had yesterday – was it only yesterday? If they found him, the implications, well, it would be the final thing they needed. She knew only too well from Desai’s accounts how they operated. It could only be a short-term solution. She just needed to think, reason what was best, but like an Interface without its power system, her brain wouldn’t work.
Fan wouldn’t like it sprung on him, her subterfuge against the UA, the evidence in the trunk of her car. He barely tolerated her anti-PSA involvement, but this? She didn’t want to think how he’d react.
She went into their bedroom and pulled out a bag as an Ai-ssistant might, swiftly and rationally, and moved about the room collecting her things. Clothes, everyday essentials, charging stations and her Interface, anything she might need. She carefully folded each item in the bag, the simplicity of the task gave her respite; if only everything could be as undemanding as packing a bag.
Jun had tried to devise a plan after they’d left the woodland and journeyed back. She’d made a couple of copies of Pav and Delun’s memories, planning to keep one with her and stash another at the lab, for insurance. Pav talked through different scenarios and approaches, but she kept coming back to the same conclusion. The lab and UA had taken so much trouble to conceal the truth, there was no way they would be challenged.
They returned to where the Intuimoto was parked from before, hidden from view by the access road. It wouldn’t take long to get back to the lab. She needed to download as much of Odgerel’s health chip data as she could, and check if Dr Wei had tampered with it, which, she duly expected, he would have.
‘If you’re planning on going back in there, I’m coming with you,’ Pav said, unlocking his safebelt.
Though the less involved he was the better, she had wanted Pav to go with her. ‘I hoped you’d show me the secret passage,’ she said. If Wei and Markov had been using it for access, perhaps she might find something relevant.
Pav had said they would need to approach it via the woodland area, and o
n foot. There were fewer CCs; he knew where the cameras were, and the paths to avoid them. They came to a space between two trees, more like oversized twigs, with a jubilant Plum Delight bush, and some smaller shrubs in between them. Pav knelt in front of it and began to crawl in. First his head, shoulders, and then his torso disappeared, underneath sprigs of cheerful pinks and purples.
‘Careful here, Dr Xie,’ he said. ‘There are some steps right after the initial climb.’
Jun followed him, and just as he said, there were no CC’s, no security, just a simple door code. The light down here, however, was as dim as dusk.
‘Me and the boys sporadically patrol around here, but no one knows about it except the Heads of Department,’ Pav said.
And Markov, she thought, and probably Yeung too. Looking at the building face-on, the tunnel was on the left-hand side. Her lab was on the right. It meant they would have to walk the best part of the building to get to her department.
‘This entrance takes us straight into the archive rooms,’ Pav said, and punched in the code.
Jun timed their walk to her department; less than ten minutes, but the narrow passageways and Fluro-lighting made it seem longer. It was like the walls were closing in on them, and the claustrophobia spread like a rash on her skin.
They had done a quick sweep of the lab, no Wei or Markov in sight. The lab, for the first time in weeks, was empty and quiet. Its eeriness prompted Jun to work quicker. She downloaded what she could of Odgerel’s health chip data from the system, but as suspected, the annotation of Mepivacaine had been removed, and the time of death altered. Jun made a motion memory of what she had seen last night when Dr Wei confronted her. That would have to do. After uploading Delun, Pav’s and her memories on to the datacarrys, she had kept a copy for herself and had put the other in a hermetic capsule and posted it through Delphine’s locker:
Dr Chui,
Please hold these duplicate files of Subject Zaye’s data. It’s doubtful that I should need them, but please keep them in case. There’s no need to disclose them to myself or the wider team unless I specifically ask for them. Please do not release.
Dr Xie
She wasn’t sure if it had been shrewd sharing the evidence, or careless implicating someone else, but it had been done now.
Jun looked at the bag, bulging with all her things, but where was she going? Like clouds passing the sun, her mind cleared, and Mikhail’s name shone through. The experienced to her novice, Mikhail would be able to help. He would still have connections to the Autonarmy, and they had a network. She could probably lay low in one of the Ghettoes. But how to reach him? They’d be monitoring her, and it was easy to track her Intuimoto. It would only be a matter of time before the UA appeared. How could she and Delun leave for the Ghetto, or anywhere, undetected? She couldn’t destroy her GPS without destroying the Interface.
She thought about Adalbert, Mikhail, and even Jonquil. They had been prepared. They had exit strategies; they knew people, who with one whisper of a codeword would know what to do should things go wrong. Who was she? Someone ill-equipped playing at espionage. If only she and Pav had stuck together – his car would have been perfect.
She threw the bag over her shoulder and walked through to the kitchen. She could leave in her car, of course, go to Pav’s. She thought about Mikhail again, his parents and their car. A unique incident. And did she want to implicate Pav any further?
‘Good afternoon Mr Li. Ms Xie is in the kitchen presently. You have no scheduled plans…’
The hair on Jun’s arms and neck stalked. Her bag fell from her shoulder, like a hand pulling out of the cookie jar.
Fan paced into the kitchen and on seeing her, stopped dead. They were both caught off guard. There was an awkwardness, two rhythms disturbed, struggling to find their harmony. Fan’s eyes drew to her bag beside her feet.
He looked weary. His puffy cheeks had sunken like pockets. ‘Where have you been? I was worried,’ he said and wrapped his arms around her. ‘Are you okay?’
Her mouth felt dry. She had an overwhelming desire to blurt out everything. From Pav, to Delun in the trunk, but in parallel, she was reluctant to say anything at all. The eerie, unfamiliar feeling she’d had when she walked through the door, played back to her. ‘Where have you been?’ She barely recognised her voice.
He pulled away. His doleful eyes looked at the bag. ‘I’ve been out of my mind.’
For better or worse, she needed to relay the story. ‘I couldn’t sleep last night, thinking about Odgerel…Subject Zaye,’ she said, her voice cracked. ‘A woman, healthy in every mental and physical capacity apparently dies by suicide… no predeterminate health chip data, no other indications…’ she said and paused, taking a deep inhalation of breath, before mouthing ‘I don’t believe it.’
Jun motioned for him to sit on one of the stools they’d bought only three weeks ago, a day or two before Odgerel first came to the lab. That felt like a lifetime ago now.
She was about to talk Mandarin but thought better of it. She looked through her bag and took out her Interface and typed out a message.
There were no signs that suggested she had suicidal predispositions. She was a remarkable woman and no doubt she found it a frustrating situation to be in… but when I saw her last, I left her in good spirits. Whatever happened in between then and when she was discovered, was outside her control.
Looking at his face, as he read what she had written, she hoped for a glimmer of responsiveness. He was blank. She carried on typing before she allowed herself to think.
Something happened to her, some of the team inadvertently…
Her finger hovered before she finished typing the rest.
Killed her.
They both looked at one another. Jun felt if she moved an inch on either side, her heart would career through her chest.
He clasped the Interface and its iridescent screen slipped between her fingers as he pulled it to him. His fingers scanned over what she had written and deleted what they both knew was dangerous. His response appeared swiftly.
Do you know what you’re saying? Don’t mention this again. TO ANYONE. EVER.
But now she had begun, she didn’t want to stop. Only now she realised how much she had wanted, needed, to tell Fan. She wrote down everything. How Wei and Markov operated without consent, and how they’d barely begun before Odgerel had haemorrhaged uncontrollably.
Fan took the Interface and re-read what she had written. He had to believe her. His message in response sprung just as quickly as before.
No good can come of thinking like this. Neither the UA nor the lab will admit wrongdoing. They won’t overturn their verdict of suicide. It’s as good as suicide if you take this any further. Jun, I love you, but you need to think about the world we live in.
Reading his words, she struggled to catch her breath, but what had she expected from him? Tears found their way through her eyelashes and escaped down her cheek. She felt more alone than before.
Whatever it is you think you know, you need to let it go. There’s only one consequence of making an enemy of the UA, and it’s not a good one.
‘I can’t not do anything Fan, not when I know…’
One question that she hadn’t let truly surface, but skated on the periphery, was what part had she played in it all?
Fan pulled her closer to him and squeezed. She felt his heart knock through their chests. She couldn’t fight him as well. She needed him to fight with her. He took the corner of his shirt and dabbed her eyes as gently as if he were wiping the wings of a butterfly. He took a deep breath in and gave a controlled release out; he encouraged her to do the same.
Don’t do this. Don’t turn your back on the UA. I can’t. I won’t, and you shouldn’t either. Imagine the worst thing that could happen. It’s that, and then some.
Jun read the words slowly. The force of it landed like a kick in the abdomen, and she turned just in time, but all that came was a dry-heave.
Fan stroked her ba
ck, and then he was in front of her, but she couldn’t look at him. Looking at him would compound it all.
‘What’s keeping you at the lab?’ he said. ‘Jun, I know we haven’t talked about this… but it might be the perfect opportunity to… I love you, and we’re not getting any younger? Why don’t we think about starting a family?’
Through the tears, she saw a hazy, lopsided smile slide across his face.
‘You can go back to neuroscience at some point when this has passed, and you’re ready. Or start something new…’ he said.
She had thought about children with Fan, of course she had, but it was too much to think about now. She wanted nothing more than to play at someone else’s life and see what it was like. It would be so much easier to forget Odgerel, forget the woman who was too exceptional, slope away, and have a baby. It might even be a relief to focus her energy on something else, but was that a good enough reason to bring someone into this world?
She picked up the Interface and swiped the screen to erase the conversation, so it was blank again like it had never happened.
‘Well? What do you think?’
She hadn’t been ready for marriage a few weeks ago, let alone children. And now?
‘It’s not that easy,’ she said, her voice barely louder than a whisper, ‘I can’t just ignore it, pretend it didn’t happen. The guilt would be… too much to bear.’
The hopeful charm on his face melted away. ‘Then I don’t know what we’re going to do,’ he said.
‘Why can’t you just be on my side?’
‘Why can’t you be on mine?’ He leant his arm against the counter. Jun was reminded of Golov, he’d leant just like that yesterday. Golov, Blum and their threats. There was no running from the UA.
Jun tapped on the Interface.
I have proof that Dr Wei and Markov drugged Odgerel against her will. Delun is one of our tech Ai-ssistants. He saw it all, and I brought him here. Dr Wei, Markov, Yeung, the Counsel and the Police are all in on it. It likely goes to the top of the UA for all I know. A husband is going to have to live without his wife, a child without its mother…
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