Chapter 32


Footsteps echoed from floor to ceiling and back, as Demillia followed Ravi's secretary to the Memory Room. Despite her life's sudden acceleration, they didn't walk any faster than usual. The secretary was complaining about her boss, pausing often to look back. Demillia assumed she was under observation, and nodded sympathetically.
  They entered a restricted area with glass partitions, checkpoints, and airlocks. The walls looked unbalanced, as if they held up different ceilings. Millipol had recreated a series of illegal labs here, as isolated as prison asteroids. The most skilled criminals served their sentences inside. A new shipment was due from Zondyne this week.
  "So far, Ravi has spent over a hundred thousand hours hunting double agents," the secretary sighed. "It's all he does. He doesn't even trust me, and I'm his lover."
  "We have that many traitors?" Demillia asked naively.
  "One is too many."
  Entering the Europa Laboratory, they felt an unfathomable chill. Coolant pumps hummed, and the walkways were padded with insulation. Demillia glanced through a window at gothic boilers and Erlenmeyers, connected by micron scaffolding like dripping wax.
  Inside these flasks were the self-catalyzing reactions found on Jupiter's moon Europa, the biggest discovery of 2033. A nuclear probe had spent a year melting through ten kilometers of ice, until it had fallen into the crystal clarity of a sub-zero lake. The ice was beyond ancient, but it had sparkled freshly in the floodlights.
  The abyssal caves were filled with a misty suspension made of a few competing molecule types. Every million years or so, new chemicals would link up in unstable polymer chains, and massive drapes would billow from the ceiling. They might look solid, but were as fragile as smoke, often erupting in colors that would have been spectacular if not for the eternal darkness.
  Actually, the caves were profoundly empty, but all these things could have happened, with only minor chemical changes. The few graffiti-stain Europan molecules were a dead-end, a local maximum that prevented real life from forming. The universe was full of false starts, but no two worlds failed in the same way. Millipol wanted to know if the polymers could affect the stability of Earth life. No one else was allowed to know the answer. A UN Monitor dangled from the ceiling.
  They walked past a rotating spiral that glowed at the edges. Nearby, the air seemed to turn to liquid. Heat was merely fast-moving particles colliding. When one atom hit another, they traded velocities, the second absorbing all the speed of the first. If it fled the scene, it would take the heat with it, which it could then transfer to other particles, or radiate away. Instead of a constantly evaporating fluid, the spiral used superconducting currents to unheat the lab.
  Another door slid open, toward an odorless hospital wing with slip-proof floors and handrail corridors. A window into a clean room showed a forest of surgical equipment around an operating table. The secretary stopped beside a door with a red light. It unlocked and opened.
  "You know what happens next," she smiled, turning away. "You lie, you die." At that moment, Demillia was glad she'd come.

  The chaperone AI had prepared the room. A hiss played over a ticking metronome. "Please lie down," said a steady voice from above.
  The sound-absorbing walls merged into the ceiling, covered with something like grass. It looked luxurious, but the couch was purely clinical. The designers hadn't fully understood the procedure, and treated it like a sacrament.
  She sunk into the couch. The Chaperone AI was an accumulation of rules, an endless transcript. As patient as a catalog, it usually generated more questions than it answered. Sometimes it got stuck in a loop.
  "I'm not that good at this," it said in a relaxing tone. "You can tell me what to do."
  "Let's begin the IM-Feed."
  "Please put that round thing on your head." The Interface helmet lay on a wheeled table. A robot arm reached down, and Demillia handed over her static cassette.
  "Do you swear to provide the most relevant information under penalty of treason?" it asked.
  "I do." The room went dark, and the words "Session 1 / File 1" appeared.
  Demillia's Interface implant was a small disk in the back of her head, hidden behind five millimeters of hair. A billion tiny electrodes randomly linked to the busiest part of her brain, a controlled tumor. The implant created a second field of vision, allowing her to be in two places at once. She could link directly to the Net, and participate in perfect simulations.
  Occasionally, a hole would open up in her mind. She took an instant sleeping pill whenever that happened.
  The implant could generate an unbreakable code. A picture or a string of text was shown for a fraction of a second. Everything her eye saw was broken into dynamic associations in time and space, "Tetroids" percolating through her mind. The implant recorded the static, and could later replay it in the outer neurons of her occipital lobe. She then saw the original picture in her head, bright and clear, though it tended to fade fast.
  The Chaperone spent a minute calibrating the helmet, before sending the first burst at 60 Hertz. A memory of a dream, more a feeling than a perception.
  "You won't recognize simple shapes at first," the Chaperone said in a hypnotic drone, overriding her inner voices. "We're bypassing the image processing areas in your retina, thalamus, and striate cortex. To relax your association networks, imagine yourself floating through space."
  Dull people could make good witnesses, because they didn't understand what was happening. Some bystanders barely noticed a terrible accident, because these things happened every minute on the Net.
  Instead of relaxing, Demillia fed the AI her prepared data: "I see a face with a beard. Xiao stole this picture from the Church of Ultimate Truth." Actually, Tina Kinner had traded the file with Chen two days ago. "I can't see clearly. My mind has changed since yesterday."
  She tried to describe the bearded man. "I think E8, Finno-Ugric, Nordic cheekbones. The church found him while looking for Anonymous."
  "Have you seen him before?"
  "We all know him. He starts rumors, smear campaigns, false myths . . . He can be hired for a very high fee, if you belong to the right group. The Church thinks he works for us." It was the Mole's profile. "Show me our Personnel files," she suggested, "I may recognize him."
  A bearded face appeared before her, changing like plasticine. The internal video didn't hurt her dark-adapted eyes. The Chaperone named two men. "Who does he resemble most?"
  "Neither. Himself. I can't visualize when my visual cortex is being stimulated. The static reverses my hippocampus index stream, so I'll forget everything the moment you cut the power."
  "Forget" was the magic word; the reason she'd had the implant in the first place. After a pause, the Chaperone's voice became flat and toneless, as if she had damaged it. "Continue to talk. I need every impression."
  The AI played back the static as they flipped through employee albums. Occasionally, Demillia recognized a face matching a picture in her head. As her trance state deepened, the portraits flickered so fast they seemed to be talking. Soon, the Chaperone would have recorded enough patterns to decode Xiao's remaining files without her help.
  Many groups loathed Millipol. At least 10% of the staff had been bribed at some point. Spies sent garbled transmissions from secret meetings, locked offices, even while walking, powered by the friction of their clothes. She read a portion of a recent infiltration report, and the Chaperone quickly deduced the date and circumstances. It was very good at guessing names.
  There was no such thing as free will. Before she realized what she was doing or why, Demillia had removed her helmet. She slowly rose from the couch, stood up in the darkness, and took three steps to the door's emergency bar. It opened silently.
  The dimly lit halls were empty, all the doors locked. How long had she been inside? She had memorized the route to the nearest exit, and began to walk as if she actually stood a chance. Without a mandatory escort, this was an infiltration event. In the dark cafeteria she saw abandoned briefcases, a cup on the floor, an overturned chair. A group of armed guards waited around the corner, but they ignored her completely.
  The text and images in her mind continued unabated. She heard herself reading, while the Chaperone filled in the missing words. Demillia stopped, and with a supreme effort imagined herself back on the couch. It was as if she controlled reality.
  She had no idea how long the session lasted, but began to realize Rick was right. The Chaperone already knew most of Xiao's fake data, and could probably guess the rest. The information came from dozens of illegal organizations, including the Depot gangs and the Triads. Rick claimed Millipol had infiltrated them all. Eventually, the agency planned to absorb them, using double agents and intermediaries. Every group would be integrated from within, with or without their cooperation. Even the Resistance would be assimilated. Ravi had actually announced this goal, but no one thought he could outsmart the fast-evolving Fams.
  That would be the UN's job. Rick said Millipol had violated its charter. The biggest infraction had been the Multiverse attack and the subsequent data release, but he needed proof. Well, here it was.
  Finally, Demillia had seen enough. Rick had used her, as he was supposed to do, but deception could work both ways. With sudden relief, she decided she would not share anything she learned today, short of murder or treason. It was none of his business. Let him get his own proof.
  "All done," the Chaperone said. At first, the end of the session felt no different than the start, but then Demillia noticed she had a splitting headache. She opened her eyes, and saw the session had only lasted an hour. It had been as tiring as a press conference.

  She didn't hear the door unlock, but felt a slight draft. A sudden weight pinned her against the couch, and handcuffs clicked. The helmet came off, the final image shattering for what seemed like a thousand years. One shock canceled another.
  Standing behind a white light, an Internal Affairs agent grabbed her shoulder, while a senior officer frowned. She was pulled up and frisked by a female agent. Before her stood a gallery of cops, sharing the credit for her capture. Technically, this wasn't an arrest, since she had surrendered all rights upon entry.
  "You are hereby charged with breaking your oath of cooperation. Do you have a statement?"
  They forced her to her feet. "Take this traitor to the Intake Room," the officer said, before yelling: "Where is Parkland?" Demillia stared back blankly.
  Hands pushed her to the door, the restraining device delivering a series of kicks. The hall was empty, the staff locked inside their offices. The long walk began.
  A sudden tug, and the agents drew closer, aiming their weapons outward, eyes moving in unison. Demillia tried to lean against a wall, but the restraints pulled her back. Shouts rang around a corner, and something fell with an echo. Her captors tangoed back, spinning her along.
  Suddenly, there was smoke everywhere. An agent tumbled down wrapped in a net.
  "Stop!" The smoke seemed to slow, and Chief Ravi Jahan stepped forward with a raised hand. "Everyone freeze," he whispered clearly.
  Ravi pulled his hands apart, and the cops drew away from Demillia.
  "This is an Internal Affairs special operation," he said. "Agent Palteri works for me."
  Demillia approached slowly without shuffling. "Thank goodness your brilliant plan worked." She smiled: "Could you remove this thing?"
  Ravi stared back. No one could relax. "This was necessary. You don't know the facts!"
  "Apparently not enough people have died yet." Then she spit in his face. The restraints fell off, a kilo of gear hitting the floor.
  Ravi stared at one of the guards. "I'll deal with you later."
  "Can't you do it now?"
  "Later."
  Until this morning, Ravi had believed he knew Millipol's executive structure better than anyone. When Rick had shown him there had to be another, deeper layer, he held his anger in reserve. The last person who had unintentionally insulted him now worked in a country without electricity.
  Ravi had been a model of cooperation, immediately agreeing to Rick's plan. Demillia worked best under pressure, so Internal Affairs had secretly recorded the Chaperone interview while Ravi watched from his office. The Chaperone knew much more than it should, about too many people. It had been designed to integrate data, not to make brilliant guesses.
  Another division had also noticed Demillia, and arrested her on its own initiative. The incident had nearly caused casualties on both sides. They would laugh about it later.
  "No one will remember you were here," Ravi assured her. On this floor, the law was only a tool. By definition, there were no crimes, only errors.