Zendyne | Page 3

gone from his screen, too, replaced by the familiar representation of a standard artificial mind. Lilith had left everything neat and tidy, just like she found it. Lee stared at the new display, almost embarrassed at the childishness of his design compared to the enormity of what had been there before.
There was an insistent knocking at the bedroom door. "Everything okay in there, Mr. Lee? Anything we need to know?"
"Yeah, just give me a minute."
The door handle started to turn. Lee yanked the connector free of the doll and thumbed the power button to OFF. He managed to fumble the ��deck back into its pouch just as the senior containment operative poked her head into the room, her gaze scanning from victim to doll to Lee. "Glad to see you have the situation under control."
He stared at the team leader blankly. He��d worked with the woman before but now her name had vanished from his head. Was that suspicion in her eyes as she glanced at the open flap of his nerd pouch? He tore his gaze away, looked at the dead customer instead. "As okay as it can be, I guess, under the circumstances. I��ve, um, been checking the unit."
"Naturally. Anything we need to know?"
He tried to think of something to tell her, settling for, "Nothing out of the ordinary, as far as I can see."
She looked at him keenly, then nodded towards the doll��s unfortunate owner. "If this isn��t out of the ordinary, I��d say Droid Division is neck deep in the brown stuff."
"Well, I can��t be sure��"
"Until we tidy up here and get the evidence back to the lab for analysis. I know the drill." The woman��s expression was weary. She shook her head and pursed her lips, looking at the bloodstains on the carpet. "Don��t worry, Mr. Lee, we��re on it."
He pulled himself together and left them to their work: sanitizing the room, packing the inert doll, and zipping the corpse into a body bag. Kelly, the victim��s security man, was still waiting at the top of the stairs. He looked surprisingly relaxed, considering what had just happened to his boss.
"You okay?" Kelly asked. "Your first time?"
Lee wasn��t really okay, but at least he��d put some distance between himself and all the blood. He nodded weakly. "Yeah. I wasn��t ready for something like that, I guess."
"You never are, no matter how many times you see it." Kelly��s ghoulish grin belied his words. "So, what happened?"
Lee took a deep breath. "Some kind of weird accident, as far as I can tell. Kinky stuff, you know? Makes you wonder, the things these rich guys do for kicks."
"Yeah, well, I just did his security. You got to be discreet if you want to get anywhere in this job. Not that there��s far to go, know what I mean?"
"Of course. You made a smart move, calling us first."
Kelly beamed. "That��s what I figured."
Lee stifled a sigh. His work was supposed to be about the purity of engineering design, not the sleaze of corporate cover-ups. He did his best to smile. "Our recruitment people should be here soon. They��ll look after you. Don��t talk to anyone else, okay?"
The rentacop glanced at the bedroom door. "Your colleagues in there already briefed me. This won��t go anywhere. Not from me."
Two containment operatives emerged, manhandling a zipped-up body bag towards the stairs. Lee stepped aside, nodding at their burden. "I hope he��s conscientious about archiving his memories."
The rentacop gave a short laugh. "More like paranoid, if you ask me. Gets himself backed up every week, rain or shine. I drove him over to the clinic myself, day before yesterday."
"Well, that��s a piece of luck. Sometimes people lose months."
Kelly grinned. "Lucky day all round, I��d say."
"Yeah." The doorbell rang again. "That��ll be our recruitment people. I��ll clear out, let you get on with the paperwork." He stuck out his hand. "Nice meeting you."
Kelly��s grip was firm. "Thanks for everything."
"Welcome to Zendyne," said Lee.
***
The atmosphere back in the lab was tense. News of the rogue 9400 unit had traveled fast; it wasn��t long before everyone seemed to know there was a serious problem with one of Lee��s designs.
Colleagues who��d routinely called at his cubicle with a joke and a technical question suddenly found that they had important work to get on with, or refused to meet his gaze when he passed them in the corridor. It made Lee feel as if he were unclean.
Which he was, of course. No one who planned to get ahead in Zendyne could afford to be associated with a loser. People were more than happy to talk about one, though, as Lee discovered when he went to the head of the stairwell to grab a coffee, and the whispered discussion around the machine trailed into embarrassed silence at his approach.
He did