Markov finished up his business with Harris and Penning and made his way down to the Orange Room. The Air Route took him where he wanted to go. He understood that now. It was reading his thoughts somehow. He wondered what else the Air Route could do.
He made his way along the now familiar marble corridor and headed for the carved white archway in front of him. He wanted to return to the Orange Room for two reasons. One was to take a second look through the north-facing glass wall during daylight hours, and the other was to talk to Commander Mark Lance.
When he arrived at the Orange Room he found it to be empty but the view was every bit as spectacular as he had expected. He spent several minutes staring north towards the Great Lakes on the horizon, wondering whether he would ever have a chance to visit them again. With an effort, he managed to prise himself away from the impressive vista and return to the large crystal table in the middle of the room. Dropping into one of the large padded chairs, he pulled a small console from one of the side pockets of his combat trousers and entered his access code. He wanted to run through some reports from the surrounding Black Towers.
For a time, he was able to concentrate, but increasingly he found himself staring at the shifting patterns of sunlight as they played across the surface of the crystal table. The room was quiet now that it was empty. The only sound came from the cool air flowing down from vents in the ceiling. For the first time since stepping into the White Spear, he felt that peace was possible within the Orange Zone.
Footsteps approached from the doorway. Markov turned and saw Commander Mark Lance striding across the red-brown marble floor towards him. He crossed the room and circled around to the back of the table before taking a seat. His dull blue eyes gazed up at the ceiling. He was an implant. Markov knew he would be more than aware of his surroundings, just like Parker.
Lance sat quietly, acting as though he didn't know that Markov was there. On an impulse, Markov dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out the rice bag that he had taken from the Satellite Control Room. In a short swift movement, he flicked it straight towards Lance's face. Lance caught it easily, his gaze never moving from the ceiling. He squeezed the bag in his hand, feeling its shape and texture before placing it gently on the table in front of him.
'How do you do that?' Markov said. 'I've seen it before, but I always wondered how implants could do such a thing.'
'How can I see without my eyes?' Lance said. 'Is that what you mean?'
'Yes.'
'Eyes are just one sensory organ,' he said with a smile. 'We can all see, taste, touch, hear and smell.'
'Of course,' Markov said, 'but you can't smell a flying rice bag.'
Lance raised an eyebrow. 'Indeed you cannot, but think of it like this. We are all born with five senses to explore and understand our environment. You might say that gives us a five dimensional model of our surroundings. For most people, that is all they will ever know. For some, five senses are not enough. They want to experience more. They want to know and understand things in a different way. Those who make the sacrifice can choose to undergo the procedure. Once neural implants have been installed, they can open themselves up to hundreds of senses.'
'Are you monitoring this room's visual logs in real-time?' Markov said.
'The Heart monitors everything,' Lance said. 'I am not the Heart, but I am connected to it in some small way. I experience only what the Heart chooses to share with me. I wish that it would share more. Just as you are limited by your five senses, I am limited by mine, even though I have more.'
'Hmmm,' Markov said. He still found it odd that he didn't have direct access to the Heart himself. The only way he could communicate with the White Spear's central intelligence systems was to make a request through one of the implants. It was a limitation that he would take up with Lord Hades when he got the opportunity.
Lance sat with his hands in his lap. He hadn't tried to sweet talk Markov like he had at their first meeting. After failing so badly the first time, he had very much reverted to what Markov assumed to be his normal detached behaviour. Markov suspected there was a lot going on inside Lance's head. He made no effort to make his thoughts plain to anyone else. To be an implant was to be an island. Often such abilities led to arrogance and feelings of superiority. Markov had seen it happen before. He recalled the case of Ezabar Holland, an implant who had mistaken himself to be superior to his commanding officers. After several months of insubordination, Lord Hades had ordered his neural implants to be forcibly removed. Holland had left the security forces shortly afterwards and had lived a miserable existence in the rougher parts of Cinnamon City, refusing to work or find himself a proper home. A year later he had taken his own life. Neural implants offered great power to those with the maturity to handle them well, but they also caused problems of their own.
Markov reached across the table and retrieved the rice bag, slipping it back into his pocket. He wasn't sure why, but he had grown quite attached to it.
'I've been going through the reports about Gail Thompson,' he said. 'I see that we have you to thank for identifying that the Rix Mulholly visual logs were fake.'
Lance smiled, leaning back in his chair. He was an implant and he shared that detached look that they all had, but there was a smugness about him too. Markov did his best to ignore it.
'Yes, that was me,' he said. 'I always help where I can.'
'Your analysis was pivotal in putting together the evidence against her. It made a real difference. Thompson depended on those visual logs to back up her story that the Beacon Attack Force comms units had been hacked. Once that lie was uncovered, her story quickly fell apart.'
Lance nodded, a thin white scar standing prominent on his upper lip. When he folded his arms, his eyes slid shut, but his pupils still moved beneath his eyelids. Markov tried not to let it bother him. He looked over Lance's head, through the tall glass wall behind him. There were more guards on top of Tower Two today, just as he had ordered. Already things were starting to change.
'I read the report,' Markov said, 'but I didn't follow your analysis. Tell me how you knew that the visual logs were fake.'
Lance opened his eyes and licked the corner of his mouth. 'It was simple,' he said. 'At Beacon Station they only have a single imprinting system to encode time signatures onto all the visual logs. The system is old and poorly maintained. I identified a number of problems with the time codes that it generated. The system's timer had become slow over the years. It hadn't been synched with the master clocks here at Central Command. There was a mechanism to do so, but the network link had failed six months earlier and nobody had bothered to repair it, presumably because it wasn't used by any combat critical systems.'
'So the time codes on the visual logs were wrong?' Markov said.
'Yes, but not by much. The ones I analysed had a delay of around one-hundredth of a second. It wasn't obvious unless you knew what to look for.'
Markov rubbed his hand across his wide chin. 'So how did that prove that Rix Mulholly didn't exist?'
'The sections of visual log that included Rix Mulholly all had perfect time codes. All the other visual logs did not. It was obvious that those sections had been inserted by a different system than the one used at Beacon Station.
'It was good work,' Markov said. 'I'm just pleased that it was you that had to work it out and not me.'
Lance offered a condescending smile. 'It was trivial,' he said, with a look not far from pity or disdain.
Markov sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his barrel chest. Implants always thought themselves superior to everyone else. He should have remembered not to compliment Lance. It would only reinforce his self-inflated ego and make him harder to deal with in the future.
'Lance, I need you to look into something else for me.'
Lance inclined his head. 'What do you need, General?'
Markov tried to keep his face expressionless. 'You've seen some of the reports. You have direct access to the Heart, or at least part of it. You must know more about what happened at Havers Compound than I do. There were too many security breakdowns. Even the satellite platforms were compromised. The Kamari took control of one of the platforms and launched several satellite strikes against the Beacon Attack Force.'
Lance shook his head. 'That is a disgrace, General.'
'It's worse than that. They used our own weapons against us and we still don't know how they did it. We had to shut down the platform to prevent the Kamari from using it against us again. We need to know how they did it, and we need to make sure that they can't do it again. I want you to investigate this for me. Come up with a list of actions and recommendations. Find out what we need to do to ensure that this can never happen again. Can you do that?'
Lance offered a thin smile. 'Of course.'
'Let me know if you need something to get this done. This is high priority. I expect everyone to cooperate with your investigation. I will make that clear.'
'Okay, General. I will report when I have some news.'
Markov nodded. He sat watching Lance for a long time. Lance sat motionless, staring up at the ceiling. His shirt cuffs were loose. Why wasn't he wearing any cufflinks? His shirt collar wasn't straight either. Markov couldn't abide untidiness. Lance made no attempt to leave. His body was still present but it was clear that his mind was already somewhere else. It reminded Markov of how different they were. Lance could be actively carrying out his duties without the need to take his body wherever he was going. Markov was still imprisoned within his own body, but he wouldn't have it any other way.
'You can go,' Markov said, his voice a little harsher than he had intended.
Lance got up and walked out of the room. He showed no sign of knowing or caring whether Markov was still there.
Markov grunted under his breath. He wasn't sure if he would ever get used to implants.