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management. Would that -- "
"Excuse me?" ZORAC interrupted.
"Yes, chief?"
"Sandy's outside the lab, asking to come in."
"Oh, sure."
ZORAC disengaged the lock of the outer door, which was kept closed for
security reasons, and Sandy entered a moment later.
"Hi," Hunt greeted, leaning back in his seat and relaxing. "I thought you were
helping Duncan count bootleg headworld shops."
"He's with Rodgar's crew, counting computer throughputs. That's not my line. I
wanted to talk to you about something else."
"As long as it's not insurance, saving the environment, or talking to
Jesus."
"No. It's about Gina."
"I thought she went to Geerbaine with King and Kong to collect her things."
"That's why I wanted to catch you now -- while she isn't around." Sandy
glanced uncertainly at Nixie. "It's, er, kind of private."
She seemed serious, Hunt could see. He looked back at Nixie. "Would you mind
taking over with Tom for a while? You seem to get through better on your own
sometimes, anyhow."
"Sure. Go ahead," Nixie said.
Hunt walked with Sandy back through the outer room, then through a darkened
area where a couple of Ganymeans were studying patterns in a glowing,
changing, holographic image eight feet high. They went on out the far door,
through the central hall of the medical facility, and emerged into one of the
main corridors of PAC. Hunt stopped and raised his eyebrows inquiringly.
"They've got to her," Sandy said without preliminaries.
"Who have?"
"I don't know. Whoever the Jevlenese are who were really controlling
Baumer. They've done something to Gina."
"How do you know?"
"That story she told about the headworld trip she went on. It didn't happen
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that way -- not the way she says. In fact I don't think it happened at all."
"What makes you say that?"
"She wouldn't have been curious. She'd already found out enough about it. We
both had -- back on the Vishnu. And I know that he couldn't have dragged her
into a place like that again."
Hunt scanned Sandy's face with a quick, interrogative motion of his eyes.
"Let's find somewhere more private to talk," he said.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
They found a small lounge that wasn't being used, opening off from a library.
There were some easy chairs, of both human and Ganymean scale, reading tables,
and several workstations with panels and displays.
"Her story simply isn't credible, Vic," Sandy said after the door had closed
itself behind them. "You don't understand what that machine can do once it
gets inside your head."
Hunt shrugged in a way that asked what more there was to know. "It creates
dream worlds to order. What's so terrible about that?"
"Have you experimented with it -- even since Gina and I went to Chris about
it?"
Hunt realized, even to his own surprise, that he hadn't. "No, as a matter of
fact. I suppose I've been busy with other things."
"You see. You're a scientist. You only see it as a piece of technology.
As a tool. I said the same thing to Chris."
"Okay, so it's a re-creation, as well -- even a reality substitute that people
can get hooked on. I don't use drugs, either. Some people tell me it's because
I'm high all the time and don't need them. But if this lets you do even better
without messing up your chemistry, maybe it could be quite fun."
Sandy shook her head. "You don't always have control over it. It can work on
things that it pulls out of your subconscious that you didn't even know were
there. Or maybe things that you preferred not to think about. Maybe you find
out you're not who you've thought you were all your life. Most of the walls
that people build inside their heads are to defend their prejudices about
themselves from assault by facts. Then, suddenly those walls aren't there
anymore..."
Hunt stared at her, realizing that his attempted flippancy had been a mistake.
His manner became more serious. "There are still millions of
Jevlenese out there who presumably didn't see it that way," he pointed out.
"If it's really such a bad trip, how come Garuth had to shut the system down
to tear them away from it?"
"You can have bad trips on molecules, too. Vic...I don't know how it affects
everybody else. But I do know how it affected me, and how it affected
Gina. And I'm certain that she wouldn't have gone near it again. At least, not
the way she said -- with Baumer. And not when she was out on an assignment for
us. And definitely not if she knew she'd be walking into JEVEX, not VISAR."
Sandy paused, giving Hunt a long, sober look, inviting him to reflect on the
implication. But the expression on his face told her that he had seen it
already. She nodded. "But Gina isn't giving us a line. She remembers it the
way she says -- and I think there's only one way that could have happened."
"Christ!" Hunt breathed.
"Which means that Baumer was setting her up from the beginning. He led her to
whoever is really behind all this. What happened to her wasn't done at any
headworld shop run by the local Mafia."
Hunt was already nodding. It all made sense. "We need to tell Cullen about
this," he said.
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