Legroeder started to speak, but something caught in his mind. He felt as if a fog were settling back around his brain, as if some part of him were resolutely determined not to share with anyone.
“I believe,” Cantha said, “that the only way to wholly clarify the information is to bring Impris and her crew to the Narseil Rigging Institute for study. There, I am certain, we will find the answers we need.”
A circlet of light slid up YZ/I’s body like a ring on a pole. “The Narseil Institute.” YZ/I looked as if he were involved in a long inner dialogue, against the swirling colors of the Flux. He was silent a long time. Finally he said, “No, I don’t believe that will do. I believe what we will do is study the ship here, quite thoroughly. And see if we can’t learn the answers ourselves. Eh?”
The Narseil riggers stiffened. Legroeder tried not to betray the tension in his own throat as he said carefully, “You did promise to release the ship to return home.”
YZ/I looked faintly amused. “And so I shall… in due course. But we have extremely capable people here, and here is where the study will be done. After all—would you expect me to believe that the Narseil Institute, if it had custody of Impris, would gladly hand over all of its findings to the Free Kyber Republic?”
The Narseil were silent.
YZ/I leveled a gaze at Legroeder. “And what about the knowledge in your head?”
Legroeder studied the palms of his hands for a moment. “I’ve… already told you what I saw and felt.” Threads of light, a web work of flaws… the beginnings of the map that would come…
“But the rest of it… the hard data…”
Legroeder swallowed.
YZ/I was flickering like a ghost come alive.
Legroeder felt behind his ears. That buzzing vagueness… a feeling of cotton stuffed between himself and the implants. “I don’t… know. These are Narseil implants. I’m… having a little trouble getting access to some of the information myself.” His voice sounded stupid even to himself, as he said it. What are these damn implants doing to me?
YZ/I pulsed as if he were about to explode. “You’re having difficulty gaining access? Well, then—” he glanced at the Narseil “—maybe we can help you get access. We have people here who are quite expert in that sort of work.” Legroeder recoiled in alarm, as YZ/I closed his eyes for a moment and appeared to subvocalize. His eyes opened. “Some of my people will be coming to take you to our labs. We’ll see what we can do, eh?” He took a puff from his cigar, blew the smoke out into the Flux. “Just helping, you understand. All right?”
Legroeder stared at him, appalled. Helping, he thought, images of DeNoble flashing in his mind. Indoctrination… reinforcement… punishment… I know how the Kyber like to help. “Oh, no you don’t,” he whispered, barely aware of his own voice speaking.
YZ/I smiled chillingly. “Oh, yes I do.” He raised his chin slightly and spoke past him. “Yes, Lieutenant—in here with your men.”
Chapter 37
Final Analysis
The room didn’t look that terrible, really; it was a plain white laboratory, with a couple of high-backed, padded seats that might have been in a dentist’s office. But when the tech pointed toward one of the seats, Legroeder found himself thinking of the outpost’s maintainers working in their little artificial world in a vault, and the guards and med-techs who kept them there.
Legroeder kept his gaze implacable and stood unmoving in the center of the room. He wished to hell now he’d fought this business in YZ/I’s office, but it hadn’t seemed a smart idea at the time. And now his Narseil friends had been whisked away elsewhere, supposedly to report to their own commander. I may have no choice about this, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to just step into it for them.
“Please sit, Rigger,” said the tech, in a tinny voice that came from a speaker embedded in the front of his throat.
“Go fuck yourself.”
The tech squinted at him, as if unsure how to proceed in the face of opposition. After a moment, the tech twitched an eyebrow; one of the guards grasped Legroeder’s arm to move him toward the seat, and Legroeder yanked it away. “Get your hands off me.” The guard grabbed both arms, this time with augmented strength, and lifted him straight into the seat. Before Legroeder could get his breath back, two other guards were strapping him in with restraints that seemed to come out of nowhere. “You bastards,” he hissed, gasping for wind. “Are you trying to screw up the data?”
“Certainly not,” said the tech, in an admonishing voice. “The boss said that you needed some help in opening access to your augment stores. It may be that your resistance here is being mediated by the augments themselves, so we’ll just move things along and do our best not to cause any pain or discomfort. You’ll probably find it easier to cooperate once the procedure’s underway.”
“Like hell I will,” he grunted. He found himself suddenly thinking of Bobby Mahoney—who, if he was still alive at all, was probably living a life full of this kind of crap. Legroeder hadn’t gotten a chance yet to ask again about the boy. Where the hell’s Tracy-Ace when I need her?
The tech smiled faintly. “Bear with me for one moment.”
There was a soft whine, and Legroeder just glimpsed out of the corner of his eye a set of padded flaps rotating up from the headrest. Before he could react, his head was clamped in a vice. He felt a tingle in his temples, and an instant paralysis, leaving him with heartbeat, breath, and eye movement—and little else. He saw Lieutenant Zond off to one side, looking studiously indifferent.
“Put your implants into handshake mode,” the tech said.
Legroeder tried to snarl, but what came out was a mumble.
“All right, let’s see if this works.” The tech drew an opaque visor down over Legroeder’s eyes.
Legroeder felt a sheet of white noise slide across his consciousness like an ocean wave. Drowning—! His thoughts blurred and lost coherence; he watched his own conscious thought vanish into a haze, like milk swirling into coffee.
He was gasping; his neurons were gasping.
He was twisting on a synaptic connection; something was trying to illuminate the way into the implants attached to his brain. It was finding no entry, but the effort filled him with a sense of violation, and danger. He could not speak…
An external voice rasped and screeed, and another voice answered from within…
// No connection is possible at this time… //
The screeing voice changed pitch, dropped to a growl.
// No connection is possible… //
A metallic resonance.
// No connection is possible… //
There was a brief, sharp interaction that set his teeth chattering. Then, with an abrupt thunk, the pressure against his thought let up.
Legroeder tried to refocus; he felt a rush of claustrophobia, his heart racing. There was a rasping sound in his ears, rhythmic and urgent, frightening. His breath.
He tried to cry out. What—are you—doing—to me?
The tinny voice of the tech: “This isn’t working. Let’s try something else here…”
There was a twang, and then the world went away…