531

A Problem He Couldn't Hack

"No."

Chan Yi stepped through a layer of plastic and ignored Dr. Obuo's protest. Her clinic was busy mid-afternoon and the patient she was working on twitched at her vehemence. Good thing she was working on diagnostics and not surgery.

"I have something new." She didn't need to know that it wasn't the real reason he was there. The blade he'd taken from Darcy's store would be a nice addition to his hardware, but that could have waited.

"I had enough of you yesterday. What more do you want?"

"Someplace private?"

Obuo looked away from the piece of leg tech that she was working on and stared at him. Her lips grew into a thin white line and her eyes tightened.

For the first time in seven years, Yi worried that she meant to throw him out. If Mariner Tech ever found out he was visiting her, it was likely a death sentence. He couldn't blame her for wanting to keep their distance when he felt the same way.

"Go wait in the back." She jabbed her finger towards the plastic walls. "The last room is open. I'll be there when I can."

Yi left her to the disgruntled patient he'd interrupted her with. He walked past an empty room on his right, but on the left a man was lying on a bed, healing from a visual augmentation surgery. In the next room, a young woman waited with a broken elbow joint.

Yi entered the last room, surprised to find Dr. Obuo's office. All the times he'd come to her with emergency repairs over the years, he'd never been invited back. Of course, the clinic was usually empty when he showed up. He preferred to come late enough to avoid unwanted eyes. He could maneuver around cameras, but people were a surveillance problem he couldn't hack.

The office was sparse. Although the room had three working walls, heavy plastic hung in front of each. It gave the illusion of cleanliness, though he could see the muck that bled through most walls in the Piles. Her desk was sturdy metal and the chair behind it little better than a fold-up. The computer and tech sitting on the desk and on shelves around the room were impressive though. He knew he paid her well, but she had to have found a patron to afford the equipment he saw.

He'd thought it before, but with the question from last night's visit, he began to doubt. It wasn't just the money and the quality of the tech she used. How was she alive? Mariner didn't leave loose ends, so how had she left the company and managed to survive in the Piles? When he first found her, he'd had no choice but to trust her. Over time, he stopped asking himself and just accepted that maybe she'd been smart enough to get away, living under their noses in some grand rebellious gesture to Mariner.

He ran his fingers over the cool, smooth surface of the desk and looked around the room, checking the dimensions against the outer walls. Public records were useless for placed in the Piles, but Chan Yi had taken the measurements the first time he'd been to the clinic. A precaution he did without thought. There was no hidden room though, no storage space waiting to be found.

There were also no cameras in Obuo's office. Yi had hacked her system years ago and loaded a program to hide from her cameras, but it was strange to find her private space without any security features. Was she protected by something else? Someone else?

It fit with the questions he couldn't answer. And if it were true, it might be that she could find answers to things he hadn't known to question until now.

He dropped his bag on her desk, then sat on the edge facing the doorway. He closed his eyes and took the time to run diagnostics over his system. If there was anything glitchy he was in the right place to get it fixed.

Even if he began to doubt the truths, he thought he understood her; she was his doctor and had seen him through some tough times. He trusted that if nothing else.