“To the brain,” Helix said, looking over her shoulder at Hector’s hologram.

“That would be correct,” he said, his voice thick with reluctance.

She looked back at Chango. “We have to go back up.”

Chango’s eyes bulged wide. “What?”

oOo

Slatermeyer ventured back out onto the balcony. Below him was the vat currently occupied by Lilith. Even from here he could see the pulpy blue polymer lining the walls and floor of the vat. It was a rich crop. His mind strayed to the research he’d been doing on the poly before his abduction. Its conductivity ratios and propensity for self-propagation pointed to something, some highly specific application that had continued to elude his grasp.

He looked up at the mounting where the transceiver had been, and then down again into the growth medium, where he could just barely make out a darker lump on the bottom of the vat. He walked around the balcony to the dive platform and stopped, expecting to see the tetras converging to herd him back into the office, but they didn’t seem to care anymore. Lilith and several of her brood swam around on their backs in the vat below, apparently unconcerned about his approach. Colin sat down on the dive platform, checked the seals on his suit, and carefully lowered himself into the vat. He dove down, skimming along the bottom towards the lump. It was the transceiver, alright, still attached to its armature, but it was beyond any hope of repair, coated as it was with blue polymer. Just the same, he took it with him.

In the lab Hector was still on the holo, and he and Helix and Chango were arguing.

“I almost got killed in the ventilation system, and now you want me to climb all the way back up again?”

said Chango, her hands in the air.

“If Graham catches on, he won’t hesitate to kill the other tetras,” noted Hector. Helix shook her head. “He can’t get in, he welded the door shut.”

Colin ignored them and took the transceiver over to a small area of counter space. He set it down and began methodically peeling the blue poly from its surface.

The camera itself was remarkably well preserved, but it wasn’t until he got the casing off that he discovered the real impact of the blue poly on the instrument. It had apparently leached into the transceiver’s inner works through the peripheral port. The poly coated the chips and wires. Slatermeyer took the camera to a magnifying stand and tried to peel off the poly with a tweezers, but he only succeeded in pulling a wire loose. He upped the magnification, and examined the severed wire. It was solid blue poly, all the way through its tiny diameter. He’d been wrong, the poly wasn’t coating the circuitry at all, not any more. It was the circuitry. Like a sea change, or a petrification, the blue poly had replaced the camera’s electrical components, while maintaining their structure. He pressed the ends of the severed wire back together and watched the seam disappear as the poly knitted itself together again. With trembling hands he replaced the transceiver’s casing and switched it on. The current episode of We Are the World leapt into the air before him in perfect holographic detail. Natasha was taking the witness stand, to testify in her own defense. Chango and Helix turned and stared. “I can’t believe you’re watching soaps at a time like this,” said Chango.

“She’s testifying?” said Helix, “No! I never would have let her do that. Damn.”

“What’s going on?” Hector asked.

“What’s going on,” said Slatermeyer, “is that we’ve been sitting on the biggest technological innovation since the brains, and we never even knew it. The poly-” Slatermeyer bundled the scraps from the casing into his gloved hands and rolled them into a ball. He approached the transceiver carrying Hector’s image, and held it up. “The blue poly, it-Do you realize what it would mean, if we could completely integrate the circuitry in every system, and eliminate the need for an interface between the brains and the electrical network? Processing speeds would hit the roof.”

“Well, a biological network has been discussed, Slatermeyer.” Hector shrugged. “But we rejected it because of the cost of uprooting the infrastructure.”

“That’s just it.” Slatermeyer bounced the ball of blue poly on the ground for emphasis. “We don’t have to uproot anything. We don’t have to do anything at all.”

“What are you talking about?” said Helix.

Slatermeyer faced her. “Your friend can get us out of here, can’t she?”

“Well yeah. She’s going to take me up to the top of the tower, where the main control system for the brain network is located.”

Chango sighed. “I never could talk you out of a damn thing.”

Slatermeyer squeezed the blue poly between his hands. “Fine. I’m going with you. Part way, anyway.”

He turned to face Hector again. “We’ll talk about this in person.”

oOo

“How did it go?” Graham asked Benny as soon as he stepped into the office. Benny dumped Ada’s tanks next to the desk and helped himself to a hearty portion of Graham’s liquor.

“Oh, I got Helix in there alright,” he said, sinking into a chair. “Soldered the door shut like you said, no problem.”

“Good. No one’s getting in or out of there now.”

“Well, I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”

“What now? Graham leaned across the desk towards him. He looked haggard, thought Benny. He probably wasn’t used to such late nights.

“I ran into an old chum on the way back. Chango Chichelski. She had these with her.” He hefted the tanks up to show Graham. “They’re Ada’s. She must have been to my apartment.”

“You left them there?”

“Sure. I wasn’t planning on sticking around town. That was your idea, remember?”

“What happened?”

“I was bringing her back here, but she got away.”

“She got away.”

“Yeah. There was a scuffle in this office she ran into. There were people in there, still working, at this hour. I shot somebody, but it wasn’t her. By the time I got out of there, she’d slipped away, but I have an idea where she went.”

Graham gritted his teeth. “Can you share it with the rest of the class?”

“A grating was missing from the door to the maintenance stairway. It was too small for me but I kicked the door open. Two floors up an access panel had been removed from a ventilation duct.”

“She crawled inside?”

“Yeah. You don’t know Chango. She can get in and out of places no one else would even dream of going. She could be anywhere, now.”

“Does she know what happened to Helix?”

“No, but my guess is she was on her way to see Hector Martin when I found her. If she succeeds in finding him, he can tell her.”

“Christ. And you shot someone. Who?”

“I don’t know, some suit.”

“Lovely. Would she really try to get into the vat room through the ventilation system? More importantly, could she?”

“If anyone could, it would be her.”

Graham stood up and got himself a drink. “What would my mother say?” he muttered softly.

“Don’t you think, what with me shooting someone, with witnesses and everything, that it’s time I should be leaving?”

“We have to stop her.”

“Why? She has no evidence anymore.” He gestured to the tanks. “And so what if she does get into the vat room. They’ll be dead by then right?”

“The two queens, yes. There are others, but I don’t think they can do much without their — uh —

mother.”

“Then what are you worrying about? Just notify security and they can catch her when she comes out.”

“It isn’t good. Too many loose ends. She may already be in contact with Martin. Together the two of them, tanks or no tanks, can make considerable trouble for us.”

“For you. I’ll be long gone.”

“Not without money for a plane ticket.”

“Oh come on. You’ve got to let me go. I’m not going crawling around in any ventilation ducts, I’ll tell you that right now. If you’re so hot on the idea, you do it.”