So what was Finnion talking about? Getting out of here, clearing the limits? . . . A party obviously canceled at short notice. It sounded as if they were intending to leave the country suddenly. All because somebody had been found trying to snoop into Garsten’s office? Surely not. It made no sense. The situation was getting crazier by the minute.
Then something else in the corner of her eye caught her attention—just for an instant. She turned her head to look at the large briefcase of Garsten’s that one of the guards had carried on board and put on the floor just below one end of the table. Michelle was sure it had moved. She watched it while she nibbled on a roll, trying not to stare too conspicuously. It did it again. The whole briefcase didn’t move; but a bulge appeared for a moment part way along one side. Something was moving inside it.
After her experiences this week, the first thing that came to mind was mecs—they seemed to be involved in everything, whichever way she turned. She frowned. What could be going on this time?
The briefcase had come out of Garsten’s car. When Garsten left the parking lot where Michelle had been seized, before he reappeared later at Microbotics, he’d said he was going to check his office. At Microbotics, Michelle had overheard Finnion saying something over the phone about the office being “clean.” That had to mean Garsten’s office. “Clean” probably meant that the signs of interference had been cleaned up—although why they would want it that way, Michelle couldn’t imagine; she’d have thought Garsten would rather have left it as was, for evidence. But nothing today was making any sense. So if Finnion had meant that the mecs were no longer in Garsten’s office, where were they? That had to be it. Michelle was looking at them. They were in the briefcase that Garsten had brought with him.
Excitement gripped her suddenly for the first time in hours as she realized the implication: It meant that the van was out there somewhere in the city, and Corfe or Kevin—or conceivably both of them—were still operational. Which in turn meant there was still a possibility of letting the outside world know where she was.
Before her eyes, a lump appeared in the side of the briefcase again, stretched to become a peak, and then a gray metal blade thrust itself through and began sawing its way down toward the floor. Michelle almost choked; then she sat forward hurriedly, putting her hand to her mouth as one of the guards glanced at her. She was not immediately sure what she meant to do, but obviously, to let anything come walking out onto the open floor would be guaranteeing disaster.
Yet even as she watched, a metal hand grasped one side of the rent and pulled it aside. Sure enough, one of the beer-can-size mecs that had been in Garsten’s office began squeezing its way out. Michelle was on her feet reflexively. The guard who had eyed her before looked up questioningly. For a moment she stood, confused; then she wiped her brow with a flick of her hand and took off her coat. “It’s hot. I need to get out of this.” The guard looked away and resumed eating, smacking his lips noisily. The mec was outside the bag, and from the angle of its head Michelle could tell that whoever was operating it had seen her. She wasn’t sure if that model registered sound or not. Surreptitiously, behind the cover of her coat, she made a quick “hold-it” gesture, showing her open palm and rocking it sideways several times.
She looked to one end of the room, then the other. “Is there a bathroom anywhere I can use?”
The guards looked at each other, as if to ask why nobody had thought to brief them on something like that. The one farthest away shrugged and nodded. The other moved past Michelle and opened the door in the left side of the end wall—the one opposite that through which they had entered. Beyond it, stairs led down to a corridor leading aft. He checked the doors opening off from it. “There’s one right here.”