7. Chapter Seven
Chapter Seven
MIRO
Day two, and I’m still beating my head against the redacted data.
Percy’s analysis confirms my handoff-window theory overnight.
Substrate activity spikes during the monitoring gaps between processing cycles, clustered around three eastern junction nodes.
Exactly where I thought they’d be. I should be pleased to have the confirmation.
Instead, I keep coming back to the blank spaces where the operative names used to be.
“I can see how they did it, Perce.” Rotating the projection, I follow the timing data with my finger.
“The mole slips in through a tiny access window, moves between compartmentalized cells, then gets out before monitoring catches the trace. It’s smart.
Careful. Whoever did this knew exactly how far they could push without getting seen.
” Sitting back, I rub at my eyes. “And I still have no idea who it is.”
Percy emits a soft confirmation tone.
“Working on it.”
I pull the redacted logs into a second window and start picking them apart again. The names are gone, but whoever handled the redactions was focused on removing identities, not hiding the structure underneath.
“The metadata’s still dirty,” I mutter. “Timestamp patterns. Access sequences. Packet sizes.”
The more I look, the faster my thoughts start moving.
“Different file types leave different footprints. Intelligence reports don’t move through the system the same way financial records do. Communication intercepts generate different traffic than personnel files. If I separate those signatures and compare them against the junction activity...”
Percy’s interface shifts from amber to green. The correlation matrix unfolds across the screen before I’ve fully finished the thought. Not because Percy understands what I’m saying. Because he’s already running the same analysis.
“Good.”
The data spreads across the workstation in branching chains of connections. Names are still gone. Those aren’t coming back. But people leave habits behind. They leave routines. Preferences. Patterns.
Redactions hide identities, but they can’t hide behavior.
I watch the model build itself from the gaps. Not names, but fingerprints. The way specific operatives move through the network. The kinds of files they access. The times they tend to work. Little pieces of themselves scattered through the system without realizing it.
The shape of the intrusion sharpens and suddenly I can see it. Not the person. Not yet. But the outline of them. A grin pulls at my mouth despite myself.
This is good. Really good.
It’s probably the cleanest piece of pattern reconstruction I’ve done in years, and I’m still staring at it when something changes.
The door never makes a sound. Maybe he’s learned to move quietly. Maybe he’s always moved quietly and I’m only noticing now. Either way, I know he’s there before I look up.
Heat rolls across the space between the door and my workstation and settles against my bare forearms and the back of my neck. My focus shifts toward him automatically, the same way Percy’s sensors register a signal entering range. Immediate. Unconscious.
“You’re early again.” I keep my attention on the screen.
“You’re smiling at a datapad.” His voice comes from beside me now. “Should I be concerned?”
“Percy is a better conversationalist than most sentient beings I’ve met. Present company included.”
A quiet breath brushes the top of my hair. I freeze for half a second before forcing myself back to the analysis. He’s standing closer than he was yesterday. Or maybe he isn’t, and I’m just paying more attention.
“New data for you. Supplementary access logs for the western junctions,” he says as he settles into the chair beside mine. “They might fill in some of the gaps.”
His scent winds around me and I breathe it in before I can stop myself. I immediately resent noticing it.
The Warrens are full of artificial pheromone blends and recycled air. There shouldn’t be anything distinctive about one person’s scent, and yet my brain picks his out with irritating ease.
Warm. Spiced. Masculine.
Irritated with myself, I rotate Percy’s projection toward him, amber pathways overlaying the blue network architecture.
“I found a way around the redactions. The names are gone, but the activity isn’t.
Whoever scrubbed the files removed the identities, not the patterns.
I can see when specific operatives access the system, which files they tend to work with, how they move through the network.
I can’t put names to them yet, but I can distinguish one behavioral profile from another. ”
His focus sharpens on the analysis. Appreciation comes first. Genuine appreciation. His posture shifts almost imperceptibly as he studies the data, his attention narrowing with the unmistakable look of someone encountering work that impresses him.
Then it fades.
The change is subtle enough that most people probably wouldn’t notice it, but I do.
A stillness settles over him. The easy interest drains away, replaced by something more guarded.
The muscles around his eyes tighten as he looks back at the screen, seeing not just what I’ve found, but what finding it means.
You’re very good at your job, Miro. That’s what concerns me.
Amir Okoro standing behind his desk at Helix Corp. A commendation letter in one hand. A security review authorization in the other.
I’d understood what was happening before he finished speaking. The commendation wasn’t a reward. It was a muzzle.
Being exceptional had never led to promotion. It led to supervision. Restrictions. Closed doors. The moment someone decided you knew enough to become a problem.
I force the memory down.
“If you can reconstruct operative movements from the metadata I gave you,” Zavin says, his voice calm and unreadable, “what stops the mole from doing the same thing?”
The question has nothing to do with the quality of my analysis.
He’s assessing exposure. Risk. The possibility that I’ll use this information against him.
That I could be the person he’s seeking.
I’ve gotten too comfortable with his friendly persona.
I forgot he’s not my friend. He’s a predator.
An unpleasant flush spreads across my skin.
“Your mole already had unredacted access. They don’t need to reconstruct anything from metadata. I’m the one working at a disadvantage here, not them.”
He absorbs that without the guarded look easing. The distance between genuine respect and concern hangs in the air between us.
“Show me the full reconstruction.” He leans forward as he says it, closing the space between us.
I expand the behavioral map and walk him through the analysis, highlighting the narrowed candidate pool, the timing correlations, and the access windows at each junction node. He follows it quickly, catching connections almost as soon as I point them out.
Zavin only seems to want confirmation that he’s reached the same conclusion. When he reaches past me to expand a cluster of data points, the scaled texture of his forearm brushes my bare skin.
The contact lasts less than a second, but I feel it anyway. His arm is already pulling back when my gaze drops to the movement, and his does the same. Not for long. Just long enough.
I notice other things too. The way his jaw tightens when I lean across the projection. The occasional flick of his eyes before he drags them back to the analysis. Small slips. Easy to miss if you aren’t looking for them.
Unfortunately, I am. Which means I know exactly what I’m seeing.
The attraction is mutual.
Given that he’s withholding evidence, investigating a murder, and technically my employer, that’s less helpful than it sounds.
“Whoever did this is in a much smaller group now.” The analysis gives me something solid to hold onto, a way back to familiar ground. “The problem is that the names I need are still sitting behind those redactions.”
“Your work is impressive.”
He says it quietly. The professional distance is gone from his voice.
For a moment he sounds more like the man I heard in my room in the Splits when he laughed.
Genuine. Not the version of himself he shows everyone else.
The shift catches me off guard — I don’t know what to do with the knowledge that he’s letting me see it.
“The work is the easy part.” I meet his eyes and hold them. Looking away feels too much like backing down. “Trusting me with enough information to finish it seems to be the harder part.”
Something shifts in his expression. The scales along his throat darken slightly, a reaction that looks involuntary. My words landed. That doesn’t mean he’ll give me what I want.
In the end, he leaves without answering. The heat of his presence fades from the workspace a little at a time until it’s just me, Percy, and the amber glow of the hologram. The partial movement map still hangs across the projection, full of gaps I could close if I had access to the right data.
I’m already working through alternatives.
Not because I’m trying to be difficult. I’ve lived through what happens when information starts getting withheld. First it’s one restriction. Then another. Then another. By the time you realize the doors are closing, you’re already trapped inside them.