The walls hem me in, my throat tight and thick and words come slow. “The one redoing the circuits on the rooftop.”
“I’m not diverting funds for the lunch break haven of an employee who isn’t even employed.” Mr. Remmings tries to loom, except he’s not tall enough. “Don’t assume I don’t know how much time you spent up there. We’re barely eking by as is. Another year like last one, and we may have to close our doors.”
A Shadow. My cousin dosed an Enactor Shadow. The Brinkers were right.
Mr. Remmings glares and autopilot kicks in.
“No, sir,” I say. “Of course not. My mistake.”
Mr. Remmings leans back and straightens his jacket. “If you want to remain under our banner, you must remember that good employees are dedicated to preserving the museum above all else.”
I keep my head up, shoulders back, and refuse to feel the hit. “Yes, sir.”
He opens the door. “Then get to it, Franks.”
I step through.
The grand lobby arcs in a perfect circle, vast and open. Staircases curve the walls between story-high windows and thin partitions complete with chairs and embedded wall-screens. Each a digistorage access point for a different historical record. Tiled stripes of green, blue, and purple spiral across the floor, radiating from the tower’s central golden sun.
A small crowd stands around the sun, almost full tour capacity. An odd mix of everyday adults in work clothes. Usually our tours run on students or the historically passionate. The ancient interested in expanding their education, or simply in a way to spend an afternoon. Sometimes we’ll have visitors from different planets and sectors within our House—and once I even had a couple from the House of Westlet—but not often. This city is the central core of Galton. While Scholar Gilken is among our most famous historical figures, there are other things to see.
Not today, apparently.
Behind me, the employee door clicks closed. Mr. Remmings is gone. It’s just me and the fifty-plus people packing the lobby floor. Tired people with grim eyes and drawn faces.
Someone calls, “It’s her,” and my toes ice over.
No one’s here for Gilken. They’re here for a show.
And Mr. Remmings provided.
I want to turn around and walk out.
Can’t.
So I walk straight into the sun. Stand not to the side or behind like I normally do, but smack in the center of the vivid tile.
“Welcome to the Gilken Museum, where the official record of our House was born.”
The whole room shifts, darkens. They want to eviscerate me. They can get in line.
“Gilken first began his quest in the basement of an old digiwatch repair—”
“Really?” calls someone male, though I can’t pick him out in the crowd. “That’s all you’ve got to say?”
The shape of the group splits between those who shuffle and those who don’t. But this isn’t my first tour or even my worst one, at least not yet.
I don’t change tone or take the bait. “Would you rather start with the fifth-level balcony, instead? And the initial research on—”
“I’d rather start with you,” calls the faceless man.
Of course he would.
I make my smile stick. “As you like. I’ve been with the museum two years, but my fascination with Gilken began much earlier—”
“Why?” Female this time and less harsh. The crowd shifts to my right, front row rearranging to showcase a heavyset woman. Her hair is gray at the roots, round face soft, arms limp under loose sleeves. She looks ancient, a match for Mrs. Divs with her ringed eyes and weary mouth, but I don’t think she’s that kind of old. Closer to Dad’s age then Yonni’s.
I retrace the conversation, careful to answer the exact thread. “Because Gilken always has the perfect answer. Whatever the problem, he’s thought it through.”
“And my daughter’s passing?” asks the woman. “When they pulled her charred body out of the wreckage? What would Gilken say about that?”
Family. They’re not gawkers, they’re family.
He’d say I’m a stupid, careless idiot who doesn’t have a heart. No wonder they want to skin me. They’ve earned the right.
I grab my forearm behind my back and dig my nails in. Fight the sudden need to giggle, the buckle in my knees.
Stand, I will stand.
“Why did she do it?” the woman asks, and the words drip even if her face doesn’t. “Why did she have to involve my baby?”
Because Mom probably didn’t know her daughter, and if she did, she didn’t care. Nothing mattered more than the Accounting.
I certainly didn’t.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry.”
Useless. No amount of “sorry” helped me when Yonni died.
The woman closes her eyes, and I can feel the tears that don’t fall. If I was Missa, I’d step forward and offer something—a hug? A shoulder?—but I’m Millie Oen’s daughter and haven’t that right.