“He’s been all over—here and at Head Office. That’s all I can tell you.”
“One moment.”
Lilly flashed Corrigan a questioning look. He explained, murmuring, “Twenty-four hours to us is only seven minutes out there. It’s not practicable to give advance notice when you’re coming in, which is why they’re always showing up unexpectedly. But once you are in, there isn’t any great haste about having to get out. So he could still be around somewhere.”
But no. “I’m sorry, Mr. Corrigan, but it looks as if Mr. Sylvine left yesterday,” the receptionist announced.
“Damn! . . .” Corrigan drummed his fingertips on the desktop. “Is Jason Pinder’s secretary still here? She should have his Washington number.” With the imminence of the project, practically everyone was working late.
“I don’t understand,” Lilly murmured. “He’s not going to be there, is he? . . . Is there even a Washington here?”
“It’ll activate a code to have him called on the outside,” Corrigan said. “I used it with Zehl.”
“She’s not at her desk right now, Mr. Corrigan.”
“Here, let me.” Corrigan swiveled the unit and entered his own ID, which gave him access to Pinder’s files up to “Restricted” level. He keyed through several layers of indexes, found the database for personal contacts, and located the record for Graham Sylvine. It gave a Washington number. Corrigan selected it and initiated the call.
Lilly looked away and watched the receptionist with a fascination that she tried not to show. Even now she was unable to detect any hint that it was an animation. Surely this wasn’t possible.
A legend appeared on the screen to say that all personnel had left for the day, which was confirmed by a voice-over. Callers were invited to leave a message. Corrigan snorted softly, but he had expected something like this. “Joe Corrigan from Xylog, Pittsburgh, for Graham Sylvine,” he said. “Tell him . . .” He paused. “Tell him that it won’t wash this time either. He’ll understand. The memories from last time have not been erased. Repeat: have not been erased. We need to talk. Get in touch ASAP.” Corrigan hung up and stood staring at the screen. He was clearly dissatisfied, but just for the moment no immediate continuation suggested itself.
“That’s it?” Lilly said, echoing what he felt. “That’s all we can do?”
“The time differential,” Corrigan muttered. “If it takes him five minutes to respond and connect back in, that’ll still be tomorrow morning for us.”
“There aren’t any others?” Lilly said.
“Maybe Pinder,” Corrigan said, half to himself. He found it difficult to believe that somebody of Pinder’s seniority would have been misled into becoming a memory-suppressed surrogate. Therefore, Pinder would be participating in a fully aware state, probably having decided out of sheer curiosity as much as anything to see the launching of the rerun for himself, from the inside.
Corrigan’s eyes, shifting around restlessly, came back to the terminal. He reached toward the keypad, then hesitated and shook his head. “No, let’s do it from my office upstairs.” He glanced at the receptionist. “Thanks, Chris.”
“You’re welcome.” Lilly still had her visitor’s badge from earlier. The animation nodded a smile as they went on through toward the elevators.
Upstairs, Judy was still at her desk and had a sheaf of messages. “Joe, where on earth did you go? The whole world’s been calling. There are a couple of urgent—”
“Later. Can you get Jason for me right away? Whatever he’s doing, it’s more urgent.”
“Tom called in at last, but he wouldn’t leave a number. He said he’d call back.”
Corrigan stopped. It was the first time he’d thought about Hatcher since he and Lilly figured out the situation. And suddenly he knew why Hatcher hadn’t shown up for two days. Hatcher had been scheduled to enter the simulation as an observer periodically, just as Corrigan had. And the same thing had happened to him. Tom had been there, somewhere in the simworld, all those “years.” And yesterday he had found himself back at the start of it, just like Corrigan and Lilly.
“How is he?” Corrigan asked.
“Acting weird. He didn’t say why.”
“If he calls, put him straight through.”