The sheriff wanted to go to the police station first. That was the only building in Centrus that he really knew, and if there had been any premonition of disaster at the official level, we might find evidence there. We had no objection.
I wanted most to go to the communications center, where there was a line to Earth, but that could wait.
The station is half the Law Building, a four-story mirror monolith. The east half comprises the courts; the west, the cops. We went around to the west door and walked in.
Inside, it was pretty dark, and we paused for a minute to let our eyes become accustomed to it. The window wall was at minimum polarization, but it still let in only a thin grey fraction of the morning light.
The security gate stayed open in spite of the sheriff’s pistol and our potentially lethal screwdrivers. We walked up to the front desk and I turned the log around and flashed it with my penlight.
“Twelve twenty-five, it says. Parking violation.” Civilian clothes and shoes in front of the desk, a sergeant’s uniform behind. He was probably arguing about the ticket at 12:28. The sergeant wanting him to disappear so he could go to lunch. Well, he got half his wish.
The sheriff led us across to the other side of the large room, past dozens of office cubicles, some plain grey or green boxes, others decorated with pictures and holos. In one, an exuberant spray of artificial flowers caught the beginning of the day’s light.
We went to the briefing room, where all the officers would gather in the morning, to review the day’s plans. If the board said “12:28–DUMP CLOTHES AND GET ON BUS,” at least part of the mystery would be cleared up.
The briefing room was about sixty folding chairs that had started out in orderly lines, facing a wipe-board on which the writing was still clear. It was mostly code, which the sheriff identified as case numbers and squads. The message “Birthdays today: Lockney and Newsome” probably had no hidden significance.
We went off in search of cartridges for the pistol, but in most of the little carrels there were either no weapons or more modern ones, worthless without power. Finally we found a supply room with a half-open divided door–I asked whether they still called them Dutch doors; and the sheriff said no, range doors, for whatever reason. (I’ve always had trouble with the language because there are so many words identical to English ones, but unrelated except for sound.)
They had more ammunition there than you could cart away with a wheelbarrow. Charlie and I each took a heavy box, though I wondered what in the world he planned to shoot with it.
He took four boxes, and as we carried them back to the ambulance, provided an oblique answer. “You know,” he said, “this looks like the result of some ideal weapon. Kills all the people and leaves all the things untouched.”
“They had one like that back in the twentieth,” I said. “The neutron bomb.”
“It made their bodies disappear?”
“No, you had to take care of that part yourself. Actually, I guess it would preserve bodies for a while, by irradiating them. It was never used.”
“Really? You’d think every police department would have one.”
Charlie laughed. “It would simplify things. They were designed to kill whole cities.”
“Whole cities of humans?” He shook his head. “And you think we’re strange.”
We were back outside in time for Marygay’s pass. She said they were going to de-orbit and come in on the next pass, so we wanted some real mass between us and the spaceport.
They’d decided not to wait for the others. Too much weird was going on. Antimatter evaporating was no more or less odd than what we’d been seeing, and we did know it could happen, and strand them up there.
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Chapter twenty-two
I was sure the landing would have an unearthly beauty; I’ve seen matter/antimatter drives from a safe distance, or somewhat safe. Brighter than the sun, an eerie brilliant purple.
We weren’t sure how little shielding would be safe, so at the appointed time we cautiously made our way down into the Law Building’s second basement.