Outside In Part 12

Riley visited, but he seemed distracted and never stayed long. I endured another fifty hours as a patient. Finally Lamont released me at hour sixty-two with so many instructions on how to care for my newly healed skin, I almost jumped back into bed. Almost.

"Are you staying with Riley?" Lamont asked as she packed a few meds and a salve into a bag for me.

"No." I carefully pulled on the shirt and pants she had brought me. The curtains had been closed; otherwise I would have flashed the ISF officers. Logan's vision had improved, but he still had another week in here at least.

"The barracks?" Surprise laced her voice.

"Don't worry about it."

She stopped and pierced me with her doctor stare. "You need to sleep in a clean environment for another week. No pipes or air shafts ora""

"I know."

Lamont touched my arm. No longer in doctor mode, she said, "Stay in my extra room. No strings attached."

"What if you find an intern?"

"At this point, it's highly unlikely, but if I do, then we'll wheel an extra bed into the sitting room. Once we move to the medical center on one of the new levels, we'll have plenty of s.p.a.ce."

I considered. "Does no strings mean if I have a gaping wound, you won't try to st.i.tch it up for me?"

"No. I'm still your doctor. It means I won't try toamother you."

"Okay, I'll stay."

She nodded as if I just agreed to take my pills on time and pushed the curtains back.

"Doctor?"

Lamont tightened her grip on the fabric and wouldn't meet my gaze. "Yes?"

"Thanks."

I contacted Riley through my microphone. His terse reply indicated he was in the middle of something and would catch up with me later. Heading up to the main Control Room in Quad G4, I planned to fetch those mics from Logan's room.

The double metal doors failed to hiss open when I approached. Odd. A mechanical voice asked for identification. I said my name and they parted just wide enough for a large ISF officer to poke his head out.

"What do you need?" he asked.

"For you to get out of my way," I said.

He didn't move. "Only authorized personnel are allowed in unless you have a reason for being here. I'm sure you understand the need to protect the critical equipment and personnel inside the Control Room."

Was that a slam? In an icy voice, I asked, "And you're the protection?"

"Yes. No one gets by me."

"Uh-huh. Tell Takia I'm here."

"She's at a Committee meeting."

Figures. "Fine. I'll come back."

As the door clanged shut, fury simmered in my blood. I understood the need for security, but to prevent me from entering was borderline paranoid. No, not borderline, but outright paranoid. I was the last person the Committee had to worry about.

Or was I? I alone knew about level seventeen, and there weren't many places I couldn't get to. Actually there was no place I couldn't get to. Scanning the hallway as I walked away from the Control Room, I found a perfect heating vent. And the beauty of the heating system was the vents were all close to the floora"easy to access.

I had left my tool belt in our storeroom so long ago it felt like a centiweek instead of a week and a half. In a pinch, the thin flat disks of Jacy's microphones worked as well. Most of the vents popped on and off, but the ones on the fourth level had screws as well. I wiggled into the shaft and pulled the vent back in place.

Warm air flowed around me as I swam toward the control rooma"pulling with my arms and pushing with my feet. It was harder to do with regular clothes and a pocket full of mics. Plus my skin burned with the added friction.

The familiar smell and hum reminded me of when I had slept in the heating ducts. Combine that with muscles that had been doing nothing but lie in a bed for the last hundred and thirty hours, and the trip turned into an endurance test.

Finally, I reached the control room. Through the slats of the vents, I saw legs of seated workers and rows of computers. Bypa.s.sing them, I found Logan's rooms. In no time, I popped open the vent and tumbled into his small living area. The Captain had occupied this s.p.a.ce when he was on duty but not needed. I imagined problems had been few and far between until Domotor recruited me.

Glad to have room to stretch, I glanced around. No surprise the place was a mess of computer parts, wires and gadgets. It took me longer than I hoped to find his stash of mics. Pocketing them so I was balanced, I debated about returning through the heating system. The bigger air ducts would be easier to navigate, but I would have to climb to the ceiling. My newly healed skin hadn't liked my recent activities and I doubted I had the strength to scale the wall.

Instead, I walked from Logan's rooms and through the control center. Most of the workers just nodded a greeting unperturbed. A few seemed surprised. The oversized ISF officer's glare could have burned a hole in sheet metal. But he didn't try to stop me.

I waved to him as the doors opened for me to leave. "Guess I should change my name to No One, since no one gets by you." It was not a mature thing to do, but I never claimed to be an adult. And I never could resist a challenge.

Tracking down Riley proved to be a challenge as well. I found him at his old work station, banging on the keyboard in irritation. He monitored electrical usage and since the power plant produced all the electricity in Inside, his station was located in the office next to the plant's control room.

"Not now, Trella. I'ma""

"Busy. I know. I'm starting to understand how you felt when I attended back-to-back Committee meetings."

My comment earned me a glance and a brief smile.

"This is critical. The computera" He slammed a fist on the keys. "d.a.m.n it. There goes another one."

"Has the network been compromised?" I peered over his shoulder.

"Sort of. Files are just disappearing as if they never existed."

"Is that possible? I thoughta""

"Lousy son of a Trava!"

White light filled the monitor. Without thought, I covered Riley's eyes with my hands and dipped my head, blocking mine with my upper arm.

After a few seconds, Riley pulled my hands down. "It's okay. I think." A strange hitch cracked his voice.

I peeked. White still dominated the screen, but big black letters shone from the center. Squinting at them, I read: All access denied by order of the Controllers.

9.

I BLINKED A FEW TIMES, BUT THE WORDS REMAINED ON the screen. All access denied by the Controllers. "Please tell me it's a joke," I said to Riley. "Or Logan's idea of a sick prank."

"Wish I could. But this is the third system that has disappeared."

A dizzy weakness swept over me. "Critical systems?"

"Not yet."

"Yet?"

"I can't stop it. Takia and a few others tried as well."

"Does the Committee know?"

"Yep. They've been getting kicked out, too. Mostly informational systems and not mechanical or life systems."

Good thing. "Can Logan bypa.s.s the Controllers?"

"I would think so. Why else would they have targeted him?" Riley swiveled around to face me. "We need to find who has hacked into the network."

"How?"

"I don't know. I need to talk to Logan and maybe Anne-Jade. She might have a few ideas." He rested his elbows on his legs and put his forehead into his hands. "It wasn't supposed to be like this."

"What?"

"We reclaimed our freedom and we have all this room to spread out and grow. Yet some group is hijacking the net work and blowing holes in our world. Why? Why are they destroying when they could be building levels and using their computer knowledge to help Logan?"

I knelt down, pulled his arms away and met his gaze. "Because of fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of change. Fear of the Committee's decisions."

"Fear can be a big motivator." Riley tucked a loose strand of my hair behind my ear. "Did you think our new life would be like this when we were fighting the Pop Cops?"

"No. I thought we'd be lying on that big green carpet under that huge blue ceiling in Outside relaxing."

He laughed, but sobered. "We won't ever see the real Out side. We have to make the most of what we have Inside. We can't let fear ruin it."

"You've convinced me. Now you only need to convert nineteen thousand others," I joked.

But he wasn't amused. "No, Trella. You're not convinced. If you were, we wouldn't have half these problems."

An icy chill zipped through me. "So I'm to blame for half of these new problems?" I kept my voice even despite my desire to scream at him.

"No." He slid off the chair and knelt in front of me so we were eye to eye. "I didn't mean it that way. It's just you gave up too soon."

"Gave up what?"

"Power. You handed it over to the Committee without thinking about how the Insiders would react."

"The Committee members are Insiders. And they have more experience."

"This is all new to everyone."

I balled my hands into fists, tapping them against my thighs. "Yes, but they're older and more knowledgeable. All I know is the internal structure of Inside. Good for moving around unseen and planting mics, but little else." My knuckles knocked against my pants' pockets. The discs inside jingled.

"Planting mics for whom?" Riley asked in concern.

Glad for the change of topic, I told him about Jacy's request. I pulled a handful from my pocket. "Can you get the frequencies from them? Logan wants us to listen in too."

"Where are you sticking them?"

I listed the areas Jacy requested. "But I'm not bugging the Control Room or Anne-Jade's office. And I have extras to plant for us."

Riley sat back on his heels as if bracing for bad news. "Why?"

Explaining Jacy's theory of two groups, I speculated that one of the groups had to be connected to the Travas. "The Pop Cops had moles in the lower levels, spying on the scrubs. They could still be loyal. Perhaps by listening in, we can discover who sabotaged the power plant."

He considered. "I doubt the network hackers worked in the lower levels. With the degree of complexity it needed, I believe there could only be a few suspects with that ability. And the people I'm thinking of are all uppers."

His obvious sincerity didn't stop my instant ire over his statement. "Logan broke into the network and reached the highest levels without a port. He's not an upper so why are you a.s.suming only they could sabotage the files?"

"That's a valid point. Why are you getting so defensive?"

"I'ma" I had been about to protest, but realized I had overreacted. "It was an automatic gut reaction. The Pop Cops had brainwashed us to believe the uppers were superior in every way."

"You know that's not true."

"Knowing and believing are sometimes hard to combine."

While Riley discussed the network problems with Logan in the infirmary, I showered then slept. When I woke, Riley had left a wipe board listing the frequencies of all the mics next to Sheepy.

I reported to the air plant at hour seventy to a.s.sist with the clean up and repairs. No surprise to see Hank there, barking orders and organizing workers. Pleased to see so many helpers, I waited until he finished instructing a team before claiming his attention.

"You're in high demand," I said to him with a smile. "Do you even have time to sleep?"

"Sleep? What's that? A new type of ca.s.serole?"

I would have laughed, but the craters under his eyes proved he and sleep were strangers.

"You have a big crew now. Can't you take some time off?" I asked.

My comment had the opposite effect. Hank's mood soured. "Yeah, lots of scrubs being forced to help."

"What do you mean?"

Hank shook his head in a slow way as if he couldn't believe I had to ask. "Where have you been, Trella?"