Main Core Workroom
“Mentor, Ren Stryker is calling you,” Tocohl said. “He states that it’s an emergency.”
Tolly put his tool down on the bench, nodded at Haz to put her end of the rack down, and pulled his glasses off as he crossed the room.
“Send it to the workroom screen, please, Tocohl.”
There were three people in the screen, sitting in a semicircle and looking pretty grim.
“This is Tolly Jones. I was told Ren Stryker was calling with an emergency.”
“Mentor Jones,” Ren Stryker said, “that is true. I have asked Korlu Fenchile, Belagras Denobli, and Pawli Ebrits to assist me. We have worked together before. Korlu is the team supervisor, Gracie is the official representative of the Carresens-Denobli Family, and Pawli is the head of team security.”
Bad and worse, Tolly thought.
“Pleased to meet,” he said, nodding at the group in the screen. “What’s going on, Ren?”
“Marsi tried to subvert me,” Ren Stryker said, and there was a plaintive note in his voice, as if he couldn’t quite believe himself. “She came into my private area. I told her to leave. She did not leave, but began to—to—”
He stopped.
A minute went by the long way.
In the screen, Korlu Fenchile shifted.
“I’ll take it, if you don’t mind, Mentor. Ren’s still a little upset. No blame there; it’s an upsetting situation. Known Marsi forever, myself. Tellin’ it short, Ren gave Marsi the warnaway, like he says, only she just started in to open a contact board. He told her to stop again. She kept on ignoring him, and got a tool outta her case. Ren felt threatened, and give ’er a shock. Knocked her out. He called me. I grabbed Pawli and we picked her up, with the case. Got all this on record, mind.”
Tolly nodded.
“Marsi come around by the time we got her to the lock-in; medic come and took a look, said she was lucky Ren hadn’t been mad. Marsi was plenty mad, wantin’ to be let out. Wantin’ to talk to Ren about some substandard connectors she could fix up for him. Wouldn’t answer us anything sensible, so finally I just said to leave her to cool down.”
He paused, and looked even more unhappy than he had.
“She was alive when we left her, Mentor, but she wasn’t next shift, when me an’ Gracie went down to see her again.”
“The current was too strong,” Ren Stryker said, grief in his voice. “I damaged her.”
“That’s never off the table, when you’re running current through a human,” Tolly said. “What did the medic say?”
“Systems failure.” Korlu looked sour. “She died.”
Tolly sighed.
“Talking from personal experience, I’d say Marsi was working for somebody who didn’t want her to talk honest to her friend Korlu. There’s a protocol that can trigger the Last Program in humans, Ren, and nothing they can do to stop it.”
Silence.
“Mentor,” said Ren Stryker.
“Here.”
“That is a terrible thing.”
“No argument from me,” Tolly said gently, and met Korlu Fenchile’s gaze in the screen.
“Her toolbox?”
“Well,” said Gracie, “that’s the other innerestin’ thing, Mentor. Young person by the name of Kilber Tarymax tried to liberate Marsi’s tool kit from the lockbox we had it in. He’s locked in now, sedated. The tool kit’s in Ren’s safe.”
A pause.
“Don’t guess you know if we’re looking for another bad shock with Mister Tarymax.”
“Can’t predict,” Tolly said, “but brace for the worst. The big problem is that tool kit.” He took a deep breath, and brought every bit of stern sincerity he could muster into his voice. “Don’t open it. Best thing to do is call somebody qualified to come and collect it.”
“Qualified?” Pawli repeated. “Like who?”
“Like the Liaden Scouts. Or the Uncle,” Tolly said.
“Uncle’s sister can’t take it in hand?” asked Boss Fenchile.
“My guess is Light Keeper yos’Phelium won’t want that thing on-station, but we can ask him, if you want.”
The three of them exchanged somber looks.
“I got a contact for Uncle,” Gracie said, rising. “Thanks, Mentor.”
“No problem. Ren?”
“Yes, Mentor?”
“You need to talk, or you’re still feeling sad about this, you call me, yeah? I can help. It’s what I do.”
“Thank you, Mentor. I will call, if necessary.”