Jacob stopped on the landing, waiting next to the door. Each second felt like a long drawn out minute. He considered taking the smaller gun out of his pocket. If he opened the door with a gun in his hand, anyone who might be on the other side would immediately know he didn’t belong there. Without the gun in his hand, he could always say he got lost. Maybe not the best story, but without the gun, he wouldn’t appear to be a threat.
“I think I’m on your level,” Kat said. “Yes, I am. I just don’t know which door you are on the other side of.”
“Is there any security?”
“Just one. He’s walking the floor. I’ve got no way of knowing where he is in relation to you. You’re just going to have to go in and hope for the best.”
“Damn.” He took the gun out of his pocket and slowly opened the door with his other hand, peering into the part of the hall he could see without stepping through the threshold. It was clear, but he could hear footsteps coming from the other direction. Slowly, he stepped into the hallway, holding the gun to his side so whoever was coming wouldn’t see it.
“Jacob, the guard...,”
“Excuse me,” a familiar voice said, “do you have the authorization to be here?”
Jacob turned to face Slade.
“Sonofabitch,” Slade said, pulling his weapon.
Chapter 52
The testing room was long and narrow, lit by a bright, sterile, white light, and contained two rows of twenty-five beds separated by an aisle ten feet wide. The wall running behind each row of beds was a floor to ceiling two-way mirror. The effect of a seemingly infinite number of beds receding to an unseen horizon had been disorienting the first time Xia helped conduct a trial. It took the better part of a morning for her to get used to the image. She wasn’t the only one. Some people couldn’t get used to it at all and had to be removed from the testing team. Test subjects were also known to ask to be removed from trials because of the mirrors. Xia once asked a supervisor why the room was designed in such a way. “It makes you concentrate. And if you can’t concentrate in that room, you shouldn’t be on a trial team,” was the answer. It made sense.
Xia found Two-Step sitting in his assigned bed.
“How’s the new chip feeling?” she asked.
He rubbed his neck at the base of his skull. “Feels pretty normal so far. It’s sore though.”
She scanned the tattoo on his forearm, getting a diagnostic reading of his chip. “Everything seems okay.”
“The nurse who replaced the chip said my old one wasn’t the easiest to get out. Something to do with how long I had it in and tissue growth or something. I guess most people upgrade every few years.”
“They do. Some more than that,” she said. She got closer to him and said more quietly, “I’ll be honest with you, I’m surprised you could mod your old one to allow you to link to the net.”
“Well, I’m pretty good at modding old tech,” he said.
“Everything else okay?”
“Not this bed. The one I got to sleep in was like a spiritual experience.”
Xia laughed. “Those are nice. I had to get one after I saw what it could do.”
“That would be great. Maybe be you could let me…” He stopped himself, his cheeks turning a hot shade of red. “Never mind.”
Xia laughed. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Easy for you to say.”
She looked around the room, infinite beds and subjects and monitors surrounding her, then sat next to him and held her pad in her lap, pretending to take notes. “Are you ready for this?” she asked.
“I am. Nervous, but ready. These mirrors don’t help much,” he said, gesturing to either side of the room.
“You get used to it. We’re going to start sending the code to the chips soon. I’ll get to you last. Remember, the overload won’t last for too long, just long enough to get you to the infirmary. When you come out of it, it’s up to you to get out of the building.”
“I guess the others should be getting here soon.” He turned his head side to side as if he were looking for them. “Or they are here already.”
“They should be.”
He rubbed his hands on his knees. “So, is it going to hurt?”
“No. Well, maybe a little at first, but you’ll be fine.”
He continued to rub his knees. “My second time doing code is going to be an overload. Nice.”
She patted him on the hand. “You’ll be fine. Just get out of the building with that chip.”
“And if I get caught?”
“Use the overload as an excuse. Act disoriented and say you don’t know where you are. My data will support that story.”
◆◆◆
The important thing about the overload was the timing. It couldn’t be too soon. If Two-Step really did have a reaction to the new chip, she wanted to know. It was unlikely but possible. Most chips implanted by professionals worked fine the first time, it was chips implanted in the streets that tended to fry on the first use. Xia also had her other test subjects to think about. She didn’t want one of them to have an adverse reaction while everyone’s attention was on Two-Step. Most problems with code happened in the first ten to fifteen minutes, so she programmed Two-Steps overload to start twenty-three minutes after she sent the code to his chip. That should be the perfect amount of time.
She stood behind the two-way mirror checking the readings on her subjects when Granger stepped next to her.
“How’s number 47 doing?”
“He’s doing well.”
“He took to the new installation?”
“You know you’re supposed to…”
“Call it implanting. I know, I know. Old habits.”
“Well, it looks like he’s fine with the new chip. I guess I...”
“Looks like you didn’t need to take him after all,” he said and walked off.
Xia checked the time. Seventeen minutes
