What a dreadful scavenger hunt that would be. But if it’s remotely possible that the missing GOD chip might be mingled with Vera’s remains, then for sure the same possibility has crossed Neva Rong’s wicked thoughts.
“I’m really sorry, Joan. I’m getting there as fast as I can. You know how Norfolk traffic is even on a good day . . . ,” I’m saying as a satellite map appears in my smart lenses.
Without asking, I’m zoomed in on an angry red line, miles of backed-up traffic, and the smoldering scene of a fiery accident less than a mile from Joan’s office. Nothing is moving in the westbound lanes of Brambleton Avenue. Every road leading to the Tidewater District public health complex is at a standstill. A hit and run, ART texts in my lenses.
Further information indicates witnesses reported an SUV speeding away from the scene after being rammed by another vehicle that exploded into flames. I can’t stop thinking of Carme on her way to the OCME, and it would have been around the same time the crash occurred.
Where is she? Why is she late? I tell myself that nothing can hurt her without someone knowing. Our SINs would download the data in real time, alerting Dick and others should the worst happen to either of us.
“Totally stuck because of the accident barely a mile from you, gosh what a mess,” I redirect my misleading comments, making Joan think I’m a stone’s throw away, trickery coming more easily. “There’s no getting through from Brambleton or any surrounding streets, and I don’t see how you’ll get your investigators in for that matter,” I add another dash of deception.
“Forget it, no point,” she says, having no clue I’m on the second floor of Dodd Hall, 48 kilometers (30 miles) away. “As hot as the fire was, may as well be a crematorium. I’m having the wreckage hauled next door to the evidence bay, we’ll recover what we can in there instead of in the middle of a busy highway.”
In the meantime, she adds, it won’t be easy getting police to show up and help out with Neva Rong and the circus she creates. But at least the traffic jam is keeping some of the media at bay for the moment, since they can’t get through either, she adds.
“Again, I apologize,” I reply from the other side of the Chesapeake Bay. “I’m completely stuck,” as I lean against the thick oak banister, not going anywhere. “How did Neva manage to get to your office if no one else can get through?”
“You won’t believe it. But then again you probably will,” Joan begins to simmer down. “She was dropped off by helicopter,” and another security recording begins playing in my lenses.
A time stamp of 3:00 p.m., I’m seeing the modern three-story brownish brick-and-stucco building that includes forensic labs and autopsy suites. Spartanly landscaped with tidy islands of snow-frosted grass, winter-bare trees, it’s surrounded by other medical centers, hospitals and facilities.
The parking lot is mostly empty, just the usual OCME vehicles and those of personnel working the weekend shifts. In the background the traffic is at a standstill on Brambleton and Colley Avenues.
“. . . Apparently, she got permission from the effing governor to land here,” only Joan doesn’t say effing as I listen to her in one earpiece while hearing the thudding of helicopter blades in the other . . .
A Bell 407 thunders in, white with blue stripes, going lower and slower . . .
Settling into a hover over the concrete helipad with its big painted H and thrashing orange windsock . . .
ART runs the tail number, and I read in my smart lenses that the helicopter is registered to the charter management company HeloAir based in nearby Richmond.
11
“. . . BOTTOM LINE, Neva claims she has rights because she’s next of kin, which she legally isn’t. Vera Young’s daughter is,” Joan goes on.
I’m listening to her in my earpiece while watching snow flying everywhere in the video recording I’m seeing in my PEEPS and SPIES, the chopper setting down softly on its skids.
“She has zero legal rights to the body,” Joan is saying, “and thank God it’s being picked up at the end of the day, and maybe life can go back to normal around here.”
As a back door of the chopper opens . . .
And Neva emerges, glamorous in designer glasses, shouldering an oversize black crocodile bag, a black full-length sheared mink coat buttoned up to her chin . . .
Surprisingly agile as she climbs down from the skid . . .
Shutting the door, walking away from the whirling blades, her hair and clothing blowing everywhere . . .
“What do you think she’s really after. Maybe other sensors?” I ask Joan as I worry about the missing GOD chip. “Because she knows darn well we would have detected the micromechanical devices implanted in Vera’s fingers, that we’d extract and examine them,” and I remember how startled I was at her crime scene when I picked up the transmissions with my spectrum analyzer.
“She knows about the chips we recovered and is demanding them as well, claiming they’re property of Pandora Space Systems,” Joan says. “Of course, we don’t have them anymore. You guys at NASA do, and whoever else is involved.”
“Chances are good there may be other implants she’s interested in that didn’t show up and therefore weren’t found,” I reply as I think of my own.
“Look,” Joan’s impatient voice in my earpiece, “she’s here to cause trouble plain and simple.”
“That’s for sure,” I agree.
“And I can’t order her off the premises any more than I can keep the media out when they show up . . . ,” she adds while I watch Neva on video pushing her way inside the OCME lobby, almost knocking over Wally, the unarmed OCME security guard in his khaki uniform . . .
“Hold on!” Wally’s startled old face, his balding pate on the video feed . . .
“Good afternoon,” she announces brightly as if she knows it’s to an audience. “I’m Dr. Rong. Neva Rong. Here to see my deceased sister after being repeatedly stonewalled and denied the most basic human decency . . .”
I’m seeing all of it in my lenses even as Joan complains in my Bluetooth earpiece while I hear Neva in my implanted one, and dichotic listening is bound to get tiring. I’m reminded of holding a conversation on the sofa with Mom while trying to follow what characters are saying on a television show, and I resume creeping down the stairs, the old flooring creaking much too loudly beneath my boots.