Chapter Twenty-Seven #3
“Nothing, really,” Candace says. “It’s mentioned in a long list of Highwall’s prototypes.
The other items in the list don’t inspire confidence in the author.
A machine to receive messages from your future self.
A machine to change past probabilities. Are these even possible?
We’re tempting reality-destroying paradoxes, with some of them.
But the Cruciform—it sounds like an alternative to leaguing.
Like the machine Highwall wanted to discuss with LDS. ”
“She mentions it.” Sick, shaky excitement builds in me.
“In the notebooks—she mentions it. She and her core research team managed a five-person league. They cured her bite with it. But they couldn’t sustain it.
Their league broke down. Afterward, they started discussing a ‘technological alternative,’ a machine powered by navigators’ future possibilities the way a beast-bite feeds on futures.
Highwall and Lucasson thought the machine would only temporarily increase risk of death, but—right after Highwall talks about testing it out, she writes that Miura died.
I think he was first into the machine. I think it killed him. ”
Vik blanches. “Jake. Jake died. And he was a candidate. What if that’s what the files are for—choosing students as batteries for this machine?”
“Jake died?” Candace echoes. “What about the other candidates?”
Vik, eyes horrified and disbelieving, passes a hand down his face.
“Ninety-six candidates going back eight years. Most are just fine. They graduated from the Academy, went on to college or specialized training. The older ones have the usual jobs. Nav research at prestigious universities, emergency response, high-profile bodyguarding. But every year, between one and three of the candidates dropped out suddenly. Over eight years, about a dozen total. Most of the dropouts were ultimately fine too. They transferred to other schools with nav programs, graduated, whatever. But four of the dropouts died shortly after they left the Academy. Even if the Cruciform only increases risk of death for a little while, some of the people used as batteries might die during that window—”
“Wait,” I say. “In the notebooks, it says that after Miura died, Highwall met with MO, whoever she is, and they agreed to dismantle the Cruciform. The machine shouldn’t still exist.”
“MO’s a she?” Candace asks.
“Oh,” Vik says. “Hmm.”
Candace and I stare at him while he pulls his phone from his pocket.
“‘Oh hmm’ what?” I burst out.
“I’m searching Google Scholar for Highwall’s published articles.
She’s first author on pretty much all of them, but some have four, six, even twelve authors.
If any of the other authors has the initials MO…
” He trails off for a minute, scrolling and tapping on his phone.
“I’m going to keep looking. But, Candace, can you search for Molly O’Reilly?
She was working at Stanford when she collaborated with Highwall.
And Norah, Marissa Olson, UNC-Chapel Hill. ”
I type “Marissa Olson UNC-Chapel Hill” into my phone browser’s search bar. The first hit is LinkedIn offering me forty-plus “Marissa Olson” profiles. I keep scrolling. Past a clinical psychologist’s personal website, a D1 soccer player’s Instagram…
The last hit on the first page makes me blink. Blink again.
I click the link and read with mounting disbelief.
“Molly O’Reilly’s at Columbia now,” Candace says. “Professor emerita. She’s published a bunch of articles on unregulated nav destabilizing financial markets. Nothing about machines.”
“Guys,” I say. “Marissa Olson was an engineering PhD at UNC-Chapel Hill in the eighties, around the same time Highwall was running a lab at Duke. The campuses are less than ten miles apart. And I found Olson’s wedding announcement. She married one of her professors.”
“Sketch,” Candace says.
“Yeah, but—the professor’s name was Dr. John Langmore.”
For a moment we stand in silence.
Then Candace’s eyebrows scrunch together.
“Every navigator alive shouts it from the rooftops if they attended one reception where Highwall showed up for five minutes to eat half a canapé and down two cocktails. If Dr. Langmore is Marissa Olson—if she worked closely enough with Highwall that Highwall mentioned her in personal papers—wouldn’t we have heard about it? ”
“Unless Dr. Langmore wanted to keep what she did with Highwall a secret.” Associations fly at me thick and fast. “MO—Dr. Langmore—she agreed to dismantle the Cruciform. Maybe she was ashamed of what the Cruciform did or was scared the wrong people would get their hands on it. But when Mr. Davis itemized Highwall’s papers after she died eight years ago, maybe he found the Cruciform schematics.
Maybe he rebuilt the machine. Then, also eight years ago, the candidate files start, looking for students who are powerful but vulnerable—“
Candace stands. The paperback falls to the floor. “Wait. Wait. There was a file on Bree. There was a file on Bree. Where is she right now?”
“We need to—” I gulp air. “We need to get behind that second door.”