The hall where Senator Ryman?s keynote speech and the associated dinner party were being hosted was downtown, in one of the areas that was rebuilt after the Rising. Shaun and I did a series of articles on the ?bad? parts of Sacramento a few years ago, taking cameras past the cordons and into the areas that were never reapproved for human habitation. Burnt-out husks of buildings stare out on cracking asphalt, the biohazard tape still gleaming across their doors and windows. In the white marble and clean chrome paradise of the government assembly hall, you?d never know that side of Sacramento existed. Not unless you?d been there.
It took three blood tests to reach the foyer. The first was at the entrance to the underground parking garage, where valets in plastic gloves brought the test panels, clearly expecting us to allow the polite fiction that there weren?t guards with automatic weapons flanking the booth. Those men stood there like statues, sending goose bumps marching across my arms. It wasn?t the security; it was how blatantly it was displayed. No one would argue if they gunned us down. I had my recorders running, but without a security schematic, I couldn?t afford to transmit across what might be compromised airspace, and without Buffy, I didn?t have a security schematic I could trust. We needed her so badly. We always had.
Steve stayed behind in the garage, standing silent guard over the car; without my press pass and invitation, he?d never make it into the party without making a scene, and we didn?t want to do that. Not yet. I was pretty sure there were a lot of scenes in my future. Assuming the senator listened long enough that we could keep on having a future.
It took a second blood test to get out of the garage and into the elevator. The third blood test came as a bit of a surprise; it was required to get out of the elevator. How they expected me to have been exposed to the virus during the ten seconds I?d spent between floors was a mystery to me, but they wouldn?t have spent the money on a testing unit if it hadn?t happened at least once. The elevator doors didn?t open until the light over the door went green, and I spared a moment to wonder what happened when more than one person took the elevator at a time. Then I stepped out into the foyer and into a world that had never known the Rising.
The mystery of the extensive security was solved in an instant, because this huge, lavishly appointed room looked like it was lifted straight from the pre-infection world. No one carried visible weapons or wore protective gear. A few folks had the clear plastic strips over their eyes that signaled the presence of retinal Kellis-Amberlee, but that was it. The place even had picture windows, for God?s sake. It took careful scrutiny to see that they were holograms, looking out over an image of a city too perfect to be real. Maybe that?s how it was once, but I doubt it; corruption?s been with us a lot longer than the living dead.
Even without visible weapons, there was security. A man with a portable bar-code scanner in one hand stopped me not two steps out of the elevator. ?Name??
?Georgia Mason, After the End Times. I?m with the Ryman campaign.? I unclipped my badge, handing it over. He swiped it through his scanner and passed it back, frowning at the display. ?You should have me on your list.?
?According to this, Shaun Mason has already checked in with those credentials.?
?If you?ll check your list of associated journalists, you?ll see that we?re both registered as being attached to the Ryman campaign.? I didn?t bother trying to win him over with my scintillating wit. He had the look of a natural bureaucrat, and that sort of person almost never yields from the stated outline of their job.
?Please wait while I access the list.? He made a seemingly careless gesture with one hand. Only seemingly careless; I could see four people in the crowd who were now looking in our direction, and none of them was holding a drink or laughing. If four of the guards on duty were being that blatant, the math of professional security meant there were four more who weren?t.
The scanning unit beeped as it connected to the wireless network and queried the files available on the press corps cleared for entrance. Eventually, it stopped beeping, and the officious little man?s frown deepened.
?Your credentials are in order,? he said, sounding as if the very fact that I hadn?t lied was inconveniencing him. ?You may proceed.?
?Thank you.? The watchers had melted into the crowd now that they were sure I wasn?t gate-crashing. I clipped the badge back to my chest, putting several feet between myself and the man with the scanner before reaching up to tap my ear cuff. ?Shaun,? I muttered, quietly.
There was a pause, the transmitter beeping to signal that it was making a connection. Then Shaun?s voice, close by and startled: ?Hey, George. I figured you?d be neck-deep in site reviews by now. What gives??