The Ninth (3 page)

“I’ve been noticing changes in the boy.  Starting about six years ago he started slowly developing a personality, and recently basic emotions are starting to surface.  That is why time is of the essence.  We must get him into an academy
before
he develops fully.”

The far right council member readjusted his position uncomfortably when Jack mentioned Brent was developing.

“I am still unconvinced, Weaver.”  The main council member was digging in his heels.  “I see no reason why the child need be moved.”

Jack knew he would get nowhere debating the council.  Their leader was dead set against everything Jack said even before he said it.  It was time for a parlor trick.  Jack hated stooping to such lows, but time was of the essence.

“Please explain the why to everyone else; you already know the answer.”  Jack turned to face the far right council member directly, ignoring the rest.

“What are you talking about?”  The councilman choked out the words.  The rest of the council pulled away.

“Are you seriously going to play dumb to a
Master
Weaver?”

“But it doesn’t mean anything.”  The councilman was starting to sweat.

“And now you choose to lie to me!  Explain it to them,
now
.”  Jack was laying it on a bit thick.

The council member slouched in his chair, beaten.  Taking a deep sigh, the council member started.

“My nephew has always been a black sheep to the family, a habitual liar who’s failed at everything he’s ever done.  About ten years ago he had the worse setback of his life; a plot of his fell through and there was a criminal investigation.  Maybe I took pity on him, I don’t know, but I got him admitted to a mental institute to avoid punishment.  I didn’t know at the time, but it was the same one that Brent was staying at.  Two years after being admitted, my nephew was released a new man.  I don’t mean metaphorically, he was a
different
person – a better person.  He is now a governor with a family on a rim world.  I couldn’t believe the transformation, so I looked into the matter.  It was about that time I joined this council and learned of the child.”

“And you expect us to believe it was the doings of the child?”  The head council member sounded firm, but Jack knew he was shaken.  “Impossible!”

“I have records of hundreds of cases from the institute to support the councilman, all of them after the child arrived at the institute.”  Jack pressed the head council member’s concern; maybe he could be broken yet.

“I’m afraid that’s not the least of it.”  The far right councilman addressed his superior.

“There’s more?” the head council member asked.

“During my investigation into my nephew’s change, I came across a Protectorate report.  It requested the redeployment of dozens of women and men, all of them
away
from the institute.”

“Why?”  The head council member was honestly intrigued now.

“They had nothing to do.  The local area around the institute crime rate dropped to zero.”

“Impossible . . .”

“That report was over fourteen years old.  Since then I’ve been gathering any Protectorate report dealing with crime rates and redeployments.  There is a zone around the institute, a zone with a radius of nearly three hundred miles, of absolutely no crime.  It started soon after the boy was brought to the institute, and it expanded continually until six years ago.  About the time Weaver Davis started to notice changes in the boy, the zone stopped growing.”

“Has it receded?” Jack asked, silently pleading that his assumption was wrong.  “Has the crime rate increased since then?”

“The zone hasn’t increased or decreased.  There is some minor crime, but the Protectorates attribute it all to newcomers, people who moved into the area sometime
after
six years ago.”

Jack had been right, his theory about the boy confirmed.  It was now even more important to get the child into an academy before it was too late.  The entire council was shaken; all they needed was a nudge and they would allow the transfer.

“Councilmen, before this assignment I was deployed at an academy.  My sole purpose was to train young Weavers to refine and control their abilities.  Brent needs that
now
.  If he is not taught to control his power, one day very soon it could overwhelm him.  That zone of control he emitted six years ago could return, perhaps even larger, and instead of fixing people, he could
break
them.”  Jack had nudged.

The office was larger than Nathan was comfortable with.  Back with Lazarus he had gotten used to the cramped but comfortable architecture of the old fortresses.  Every room was just big enough for what was needed, where close relationships were forged out of necessity.  There is nothing like sharing a room with four people, one barely big enough for three people, to build strong bonds.  This office, on the other hand, felt cold to him; loneliness and pointless busywork were the only things waiting for him here.  However, Nathan was never one to complain, and this position at an out of the way academy wasn’t all bad.  After the catastrophe, Nathan was content that his next assignment wasn’t in front of a firing squad, though it was hard for Nathan not to return to those days in his mind after a few hundred meaningless forms.  For him, those days were more real than the many that had passed since.

“Administer Bloom, I trust you haven’t forgotten your schedule,
again
.”  The shrill voice of Nathan’s secretary intruded in his reverie.

Shaken, Nathan dropped his pad.  Sometimes Nathan wondered if that firing squad from his nightmares would be preferable to another day with his secretary.  Muttering to himself, he leaned over to retrieve his pad.  Nathan couldn’t help but smile whenever he had to collect his pad.  When he was a young lad, he had seen a comedy set in ancient times.  As he got older, he realized it was satirical, a thinly veiled insult against some politician or another, but those details faded with time.  What struck him at the time and continued to amuse him to this day was one scene after the politician’s election, where his advisors were giving him one suggestion after another – in song no less.

What made it funny was, instead of sending the idea via pad, they handed each of their ideas to him on a single rectangular slice.  As the suggestions built up so did the stack, until the dictator couldn’t hold it anymore and dropped the entire pile, sending thousands of thin sheets flying through the room.  Every time Nathan collected his pad, he envisioned himself behind a stack of sheets, sending them flying at any occasion.  Of course, the pad had replaced those countless sheets long ago, and the gag wouldn’t make sense to the recruits at his academy.  He sighed as he wondered if even the older staff would get the joke and how ancient that prospect made him feel.

Sifting through the documents and forms on his pad, Nathan searched for his schedule.  As the Administer for the entire academy, he was always behind with endless strings of things to sign, to watch, and to approve, and yet, on top of all that, his secretary delighted herself in constructing an exhausting to-do list.  Meet with this instructor, lecture at that assembly, inspect this, look at that, or some other meaningless task designed to waste his time and give his ever-growing stack of documents time to grow.  Finally, Nathan found his schedule, and, as he expected, it was packed.  Getting up from his desk, he sighed as he prepared for another long day.  Putting on his formal wear, he noticed something off on his pad.  There was an hour break without anything planned.  Rushing out of his office, half dressed, Nathan jumped in front of his secretary’s desk.

“Jessica, what’s the meaning of this break at 3 o’clock?”  Nathan demanded.

Ignoring him, his secretary continued reading her pad, the reflection of a cosmetic article taunting him in her glasses.  Sighing, Nathan returned to his office, sat in his chair, rested his pad in its alcove on the desk, and activated the intercom.

“Miss Fields, there is a break in my schedule from 3 o’clock until 4 o’clock.”  Nathan forced calmness into his voice.

“Yes there is, Administer Bloom,” the shrill voice replied.

“
Why
is there a gap in my schedule, Miss Fields?”

“You have a meeting that hour; they asked me not to make a record of it.”

“
Who
made the appointment then?”

“I don’t remember the name, Administer.  I believe it might have been someone called Mavis.”

“Mavis?  I don’t know anyone by that name.  Have they arrived?”

“I’m your secretary, Administer Bloom, not the dock master.”

“Fine, Miss Fields, I’ll go check it out myself.”

“But your schedule, Administer Bloom . . .”

“I have one more question, Miss Fields.”

“Yes, Administer?”

“You weren’t going to tell me about the meeting, were you?”

“No, Administer.”

Nathan finished getting into his formal wear and left his office, wondering if there was any chance he could throw his secretary out a docking port and make it look like an accident.  Rushing down the identical hallways, Nathan made his way to the dock master.  Many instructors had complained to him about getting lost in the corridors of the station, as if as the Administer had any say in matters of construction.  Each time he gave out the same answer: “You’ll get used to it in time.”  It was easy for him to say.  Nathan had gotten lost thanks to the
precise
directions his secretary gave him on his first day as Administer and had learned the layout of the station the hard way.  It took him five hours to find his office.  Maybe making it look like an accident wasn’t so important.

“Hey, you!” a rough voiced called out to Nathan.  “You can’t come through here!  Dock workers only.”

“I didn’t know I needed permission to wander my station.”

“Administer! Man, I’m sorry.  I didn’t recognize you.  It has been a nightmare down here.  They took over my entire docking bay.  Didn’t your secretary tell you?  I told her it was important for you to know right away.”

“Of course, but never mind that.  Who’s taken over?”

“Special ops or something like that,
way
over my pay grade.  What am I supposed to do?  I’ve got seven transports waiting to dock, and I can’t even tell them why.  I’m not about to blab what I’m not supposed to and have military intelligence or some shadow man make me disappear for a bunch of recruits.”

“I can’t help you with that, but I tell you what.  My secretary was hinting that she had a thing for you.  Since you can’t do anything down here, why not stop by and take her to lunch down in the mess hall.”

“Really? That’s odd.  She told me to get lost last time I asked her out.  Something about she’d rather kiss a latrine than go out with me.  Whatever that is.”

“My boy, she was playing hard to get!  You can’t give up so easily!  I’ll tell you what, if she gives you any trouble you tell her it’s a direct
order
from me.”

The dock master smiled wide and ran off toward Nathan’s office.  Not a docking port, but it would do.  With one annoyance taken care of, Nathan inspected the docks.  As the dock master had said, men in uniform were everywhere, checking every docking port and inspecting every device and machine.  Nathan had endured his fair share of annual inspections, but these men moved with a purpose beyond receiving a paycheck.  Nathan immediately locked onto two men standing on either side of a docking port, the only one with a pod still in it.

“Excuse me, I’m the Administer here and I was told I had a meeting with your superior.”  Nathan tried to put what little dignity he had left into his voice.

Glancing at each other, the two military sentries saluted Nathan and opened the access hatch to the drop pod.  Entering, Nathan was surprised at its size.  Drop pods were more or less standardized, oval ships designed to get travelers from one ship to another or to planetary surfaces and back, as the case may be.  Function ruled over form on the countless pods dedicated to the stations, as they were mass-produced by the thousand.  Crossing the room, Nathan could make out secondary compartments.  This pod was unique, more of a ship than a pod.  As the hatch sealed behind Nathan, shutters on the opposing wall slid open revealing a panoramic view of the world below.  It was not a picturesque world, mostly dunes of sand with some rock formations and open bodies of water here and there, but Nathan had grown used to it and had even vacationed on it once – only once.

“You’re early!  I hadn’t expected you for hours.”  It had been a while but Nathan recognized the voice.

“
Jack
?” Nathan asked the figure emerging from a side compartment.

“You’re surprised?  I cleared our little get together months ago.  Your secretary was abundantly clear on your busy schedule.”

“Don’t mention my secretary.  I’ve had enough of her for today.  She, along with the rest of the support staff here, are government appointees.  You’d sooner cut through your own arm with a pad than get one replaced.  I barely have enough
actual
military personnel to teach half the recruits.”