"Scott, we don't know who employed him."
    "The United States government employs me, miss."
    "Don't argue with me, I've had a very bad day. Recognize my face? You ought to."
    "I'm not from this city...."
    This had definitely gone far enough. I managed to interpose myself and sort of back her toward the conference room, vaguely hearing the interview continue behind me. "Look, it's okay," I assured her, using the same tone I use on Newton when he goes to the vet. "This is okay."
    "Have you ever traveled outside the country?" the man inquired.
    "No."
    "Have you received an inoculation against Lyme Disease?"
    "I don't have a biological system."
    "I'm going," Lucky announced with a frustrated gesture. "I'm going back to Chandler's. When you guys need me, let me know. I am absolutely no use to you right now."
    "We'll give you a call."
    She slammed out the door. I sighed, thinking that if the rest of the day went this well I might just give up.
    "Thank you very much for your assistance, I hope I haven't been any trouble," the census taker concluded. "I do recommend personally that your friend switch to decaffeinated. But I've had worse, someone pointed a gun at me once, apparently they didn't like it when I asked—" He paused. "Oh, one last question, I almost forgot. Racial designation?"
    "Artificial life form."
    "I'll put that down as 'other.' Thank you."
    After he had gone I dug around in my pockets until I found Taurus' business card. "Any suggestions on what I should say?"
    "The truth?" Scott suggested.
    "I may have to leave the city," Hans announced abruptly. We all stared at him. "I apologize, it is for the safety of my family."
    I raised my hands in a gesture of surrender. "Would you please, I know this is against your normal nature, but would you PLEASE," I was going to say explain next, but his phone rang and cut me off.
    He listened for a moment and said, "Excuse me, I must take this call in the other room."
    I banged my head gently on the wall. Maybe I could have Felix's old cell. Padded, comfy, somewhat bloodstained but so what. Better than dealing with this random assortment of lunatics while the world crumbles around us. Scott's the only sane one out of the lot of us, I swear.
    "I'd tell him the truth," the robot in question resumed his statement.
    "Well, that's a given, but I'm not sure what kind of help I'm requesting under the circumstances. Advice, material aid, a shoulder to cry on since I think I'm going to snap in about ten minutes at this rate?"
    "Well, I don't know if you happen to particularly want to cry on his shoulder..."
    "Don't tempt me, it's a very attractive shoulder. Anyway, you were saying."
    "You can start off by saying that we have a whole bunch of corporate records that we need a professional's help to analyze."
    "This would be the SysGen file?"
    "Yes. I have a lot of data on them."
    "Anything he'd be looking for in particular? I'm sure he's very busy."
    "How much can the mayor of New York have to do?"
    "I think he walks around and shakes peoples' hands a lot."
    "Tracking down the board of directors, major research scientists, who they worked for before SysGen, who they work for now. Follow up on the advice of the gentleman from the Host, find out of any of them do or did work for Taurus Industries."
    "Worth a shot," I sighed. "I am totally out of ideas. While I'm thinking of it, though, here's a copy of my notes on the situation. Me."
    "Yes, I agree," he stated after a moment, looking over some of them.
    "With what?" I looked over his "shoulder." He tapped the paper with a pseudopod, indicating my question mark next to the fact that Travis had been recorded. "I happen to think that there is a TL series as well."
    I noticed that I was pacing again, somewhat agitatedly. "There's probably lots of them. We'll probably spend the rest of our lives tracking the suckers down. I'd be happy if I could find any of mine."
    "Why?"
    "Because in 13 months a time bomb is going to go off."
    "You have them all in your head, why don't you ask them what they're doing?"
    "I can't access it normally. Remind me to call Trent." Repeated crises keep pushing me off the path toward resolving my own situation, it seems. And I'm probably not pushing back as hard as I should.
    "Do you think he could teach you to?"
    "I don't know. I'm under the impression that the barriers between the personalities are very important to my sanity. As was evidenced the other day."
    "I thought that was more like a core dump," he half-questioned.
    "Well yes, but everything else went, along with that. It was just... really, really bizarre to put it mildly. If you have any brilliant ideas in the middle of the night while I'm getting the eight hours of sleep we humans need, let me know."
    "I'll certainly call."
    Stephanie came in. "Just getting the coffee, um, the gentleman in the costume just locked himself in the bathroom while on the phone, is he okay?"
    This was not sounding good.
    "He's taking a private phone call," Scott told her.
    "Oh. Okay."
    "Well, I'm going to go head to the psych hospital, then," Scott said resignedly.
    "Do you want me to go with you?" I still had to call Mr. Taurus.
    "No, I'll go alone. You can catch up with me later, but you might have to go meet him, or something."
    "I doubt it. I'll let you know what happens."
    Hans came in. "I have to go. Call me if there's an emergency."
    He was halfway out the door before I could ask, "Are you leaving the city?"
    "Not just yet," he said over his shoulder, and was gone at top speed, leaving a burning crater in the concrete.
    Scott headed out. I rested my head on the table for a moment, then picked up the card and the phone.
    "Hello, this is Anthony Taurus."
    He'd said it was his private line but I was still startled to find that he answered himself. "Mr. Taurus."
    "Ah, Needle, how are you?"
    "Doing much better than I was when we met, thank you."
    "Glad to hear it. The newspapers from your city paint a rather depressing picture at the moment." He sounded concerned.
    "It's been an interesting twenty-four hours," I said cautiously.
    "I would say so."
    "Leave it at that. I wanted to first of all thank you for your kindness the other day."

| Top |