Setting a steaming cup of hot chocolate in front of Sage, Pali rested a hand on his shoulder. "Anything else I can get you?"
He was sitting so still, staring at the floor, that she began to wonder if she should call a medic. Suddenly he shrugged, jarring her hand away. "Maybe some crispies," he muttered.
"I'm sorry?"
"I think he means Risky Crispies," Kyd said. "He must be coming around. He always eats those while he works."
Ramo, sitting apart from the others, snorted into his coffee.
"Or some potato chips," Sage said, looking up.
Pali peered at him, then at Kyd. "Am I out of it?" she asked. "What are potato chips?"
This time Kyd looked puzzled. "I'm not sure. Can you get them in the commissary, Sage?"
The designer shook his head. "Nickie's, uptown, has them."
"Great!" Ramo said. "That's just a wonderfully useful thing to know." He slapped his thighs and stood up. "Look, I think I'll be going. If you guys aren't interested in discussing reality . . . my head's a little dizzy and it's late, and I know where there's a cold beer with my name on it." He bowed. "I'll see you ladies"—he glanced at Sage and shook his head—"later."
"Ramo—" Pali said in a halfhearted effort to stop him.
Ramo strolled out without answering. Pali sighed and turned back in resignation. She wasn't much closer to understanding what had gone wrong in the rapture session. Sage seemed unwilling or unable to explain. But if they didn't find out, one thing certain was that she could forget about her sculpture—and she wasn't ready to do that. Never mind her own personal disappointment: where was she going to come up with thirty million dollars' worth of arts projects on short notice?
She walked around in front of Sage. His eyes rose to meet hers. "Are you going to be all right?" she asked. He nodded. "Can we get you . . . Risky Crispies . . . here at the commissary?" He nodded again. Pali glanced at Kyd, who took the hint and scurried out.
Sage lifted his cup of cocoa, blew on it delicately, and sipped. "Do you think you can try to tell us what happened?" Pali asked.
Sage frowned, nodding, staring across the room. "I'll try," he whispered. He was still staring thoughtfully a few minutes later when Kyd came back with a box of Crispies. He tore the box open without blinking. "It's nothing like we imagined," he said suddenly, scowling up at the two of them. He popped a cracker into his mouth and crunched. "There are things"—he struggled for the words—"things going on that . . . I didn't know about . . . things I don't think we're supposed to know." He rubbed his arms, shivering.
Pali exchanged glances with Kyd. "I don't follow. Did you go outside of your authorization? Did you actually see something wrong?"
"I didn't mean to," he whispered.
"Didn't mean to do what, Sage?"
"I didn't mean to go so far in. I wasn't trying to, but it . . . it invited me in, it . . . it made me look at these things." There was pain in his voice, and fear in his eyes.
"What things?" Pali asked softly.
Sage shook his head. "The inner part . . . of the system. I don't remember it all. When I lost the enhancements . . ." He shook his head and ate another cracker. "There was a window," he said suddenly. "An image, a realtime image of another star system. That's what we were trying to tell you about when—"
"Yes, but how could there be—?"
"I don't know!" he cried.
Pali gazed at him for a long moment, as confused by the intensity of his reaction as she was by what he'd seen—or thought he'd seen. "Well, I mean . . . are you sure that's what you saw? Is such a thing possible?"
Sage bristled with anger. "Of course I'm sure. I saw it, we both saw it, when we gave the system the problem; and then it came back and said it had already solved something like it and here was the answer and"—he stretched out his arms—"boom, there it was. A star system, and two spaceships fighting."
"But"—Pali shook her head—"Ramo thinks it was a simulator."
"No."
"But another star system?"
"That's what I'm trying to tell you! There's something that the system knows how to do that nobody else knows! It shouldn't be possible!"
Pali struggled to absorb the implications. Either Sage was crazy, or . . . "Sage, someone must know about it. If it's secret, why were you allowed to see it?"
Sage met her gaze, and in his eyes was deep bewilderment. He looked frightened, but not crazy. "I . . . don't know. I don't know," he whispered.
She blinked, believing him. "Well . . . what about our project? Is it worth another try?"
Sage took a moment to answer. "Maybe. But . . . if it had wanted to solve the problem for us, instead of doing this . . ." He hesitated, swallowing. "It wanted me to see those things."
Pali stared at him for a long time. "Why, Sage?" she asked. "Why?"
He gazed back at her silently, helplessly.
* * *
After Sage had gone home, they talked in Pali's office. Pali was reconsidering her determination to continue. It was one thing to do some unobtrusive experimental work, but quite another to be stumbling into secret aspects of the Company's intelligence system without knowing what they were doing. Maybe Sage had gone a little crazy; or maybe Kyd's choice of a designer had been too shrewd. Maybe he was a better designer than they'd realized; or maybe he'd slipped right past the security checks without even being aware of it.
Kyd didn't buy it. "If he'd done it himself, he would have been aware of it," she said.
"You think he's lying, or nuts?"
"No. I think it took him completely by storm. It scared him, Pali—it flat-out terrified him. I've seen him scared before—of people—but never of the gnostic system. He must have touched something."
"Kyd, look, maybe we should ask around and try to find out what it was."
Kyd was staring thoughtfully into space, as though preoccupied. She shifted her gaze to Pali. "And blow the lid off your project?"
Pali gestured helplessly. "We can't just pretend it didn't happen."
"That may be true," Kyd said. "But whatever it was, it was shown to him. Something in that system wanted him to see what he saw. Don't you even want to know why?"
Pali laughed bitterly and shook her head—though in fact, she was aching to know. But damn it . . .
"Anyhow, Pali, we're still up against your deadline—and besides, this is your project. If you drop it now, what are the chances of your ever getting another crack?" Kyd stood with hands on her hips, looking like an impatient coach.
"But it's only a damn sculpture!" Pali cried. "This other thing—we're talking about something that might be . . . I don't know. It could be nothing, it could be . . . God, anything!"
"Including a misunderstanding," Kyd pointed out.
"Yes, but—" Her voice caught. The terrible plain truth was, she was afraid of what it might be. "Suppose," she said softly, "we dig deeper, and find that it's something we don't want to know about."
Kyd's eyebrows went up, but she didn't appear deterred.
Pali turned away and stared, without seeing, at her wall holo. And what about Sage? Would the next time be even worse? Or would they all laugh when they discovered what it really was?
"Pali," Kyd said behind her, "of course you're worried. But you haven't broken any rules, and we don't even really know that something's wrong. Are you going to just drop this idea that you've been working on for months? I know what it means to you."
Do you? Pali thought, closing her eyes. Do you know? It's not months, it's years I've been working on it. It was to be the first genuinely creative thing I've done since . . . the first thing I've made that I could be proud of, since . . .
Her throat constricted as she thought of a child, too long ago. She shivered suddenly. You can't think about that. You can't bring him back. All you can do is try your best with what you've got now. Is that so wrong?
She cleared her throat noisily and blinked a mist out of her eyes. "Okay," she said huskily. "One more try. If Sage is willing."
Kyd walked up and embraced her silently. Her eyes, bright green and alert, met Pali's. "Is there anything I can do now?"
"Well—" Pali hesitated, then shook her head. "I'll have to talk to Russell about extending the authorization to the system." She chuckled. "I had to sweet-talk him once already. I guess I can do it again."
"He'll be putty in your fingers," Kyd said teasingly.
Pali nodded without answering, and thought, Do you know about that, too? "Lock things up for me, will you? I'll see you tomorrow."
* * *
The shimmer-door dissolved and admitted Pali into Russell Thurber's outer office. "Anyone home?" she called. The lobby was empty; it was an hour past quitting time.
"In here." Russell's voice was muffled, coming from the next room.
Pali stood in his doorway and laughed in spite of herself. "Russell, what are you doing?"
A reeking cloud of smoke was rising from behind the desk. Covering the desk was a clutter of model pieces, diagrams, tools, and syringes of glue. Pali walked around the desk and found Russell, a pepper-haired man in his forties, on his hands and knees assembling a model railroad on the carpet. A cigarette protruded from one corner of his mouth. He was squinting as he aligned the cars on the track. "Hang on a second," he muttered. He bent down and sighted along the carpet and nudged something into place. Then he sat back and waved his cigarette with a grin. "Let's see if this works." He picked up a controller and touched a switch. The train levitated a fraction of an inch and glided, whispering, around the oval track.
"Russell, you look ridiculous."
"Eh?" he said, looking up. He touched the switch, and the train halted and settled back onto the track. "I've been trying to get this working for months."
"In your office? In your business suit?"
Russell chuckled and stood up, dusting off his pants. "Why not? I'm going to set it up here."
Pali raised her eyebrows and fanned away cigarette smoke. "For heaven's sake, why?"
"It's a perfect display piece," Russell said. "It uses a Company-made power pack and levitator, and Company-made logic in the control system." Russell leaned against the desk and pulled another drag on his cigarette as he surveyed his handiwork.
This is a man I tried to have a relationship with? Pali mused, shaking her head. They had been lovers, briefly, a year and a half ago. She could not imagine now why she had thought it might work. He was a neurotic workaholic and a chain-smoker, and she was . . . well, heaven knew she had her own faults. And she hated cigarette smoke.
"So, what's up?" He turned at last to give her his full attention. "You're working late."
"I need a favor."
"Name it."
She coughed as a cloud of smoke drifted her way. "Would you mind putting that thing out for a minute?"
"Sure." Russell dropped the cigarette into a lidded ashtray. The air slowly cleared. "What's the favor?"
She took a breath. "My pet project again."
"The one you don't want to tell me about?"
"I will," she said. "I just want to get it—"
"Sure, sure, I know. What about it?" Russell cocked a curious eye at her and waved her to a seat. He sank back into his desk chair and rocked.
"Well . . ." Pali gazed beyond him for a moment. Russell's picture-window view of the city, especially at night, always gave her pangs of jealousy. She looked back at him. He was studying her with an expression of quiet interest. "We've run into a bit of a snag," she said, keeping her voice casual. "Nothing fatal, I hope, but we need more time in the system to work it out."
Russell shrugged. "Don't see why that should be a problem. Anything in particular you want to tell me about it, if anyone should ask?"
She waggled her hand noncommittally. "I'd rather—"
"Keep it under your hat. I know." Russell leaned forward and pushed a hand through his thinning hair. "Well, I suppose since I've gone with you this far—"
"Thanks, Russell," she said quietly.
"But can't you tell me something about it?"
"It would just spoil the surprise."
Russell sighed. "All right. Just, please, reassure me that the Company is going to like this as much as you think I will."
She smiled. "Why, Russell, sometimes I think you're afraid of me!"
"Not of you," he said evenly, hiding the indignation that she knew was stirring beneath the surface. "Just of what you might do. I'm awed by your ability to come up with the damnedest ideas and then ride placidly over the storm while the rest of us struggle to hang on. That's all."
Pali accepted the compliment with a shrug. If only you knew, she thought with a twinge of guilt. She stepped carefully over the train track to stand close to the window. She peered out over the city, a jeweled landscape in the evening. "You won't be disappointed, Russell," she said to the window, keeping her voice expressionless through the lie. "I'm sure you won't be."