Page 147 of Tracked and Taken

“SENTRY.”

“Yes, Head of Security.”

“You like him.”

The pause is four seconds long. In SENTRY terms, that is a geological era.

“He is a liability, Head of Security.”

“That is not what I asked.”

Another pause.

“The assessment is filed.”

“Under what folder.”

The longest pause yet.

“Domestic.”

I smile into my tea.

“Sealed?”

“Sealed, Head of Security. He does not need the encouragement.”

“No, he does not.”

“Thank you, Head of Security.”

“Run my morning.”

“Director Morrison, 0830, your office. Ms. Knight has moved tea to 1830, both of you, and instructs me to tell you that she has already heard about the corridor.”

Of course she has.

I get into my uniform. I don’t braid my hair, loose today rather than the regulation tight, a margin I don’t interrogate. I look in the mirror. The collar fastens at the second button.

The mark sits above it. Two small, dark scars. Still faintly warm. If I button to the top, Morrison will still know. If I leave it open, the station will know.

I leave it open.

Not for the SNAG. Not even, entirely, for him. For the woman who woke up with her mouth on a throat and did not want to pretend, at 0826, that last night was an operational footnote.

I go to work. The cotton under the uniform reminds me, at every step, of the wall.

Madge Morrison is in my office when I arrive at 0826.

She is in the visitor’s chair, not mine, which is the first unusual thing. Morrison always chooses the desk chair. The chipped WORLD’S OKAYEST DISPATCHER mug is in her hand, which means she has brought her own coffee, which means she has done her own logistics on the way over and would not be reduced to drinking what I keep in this office.

Steel-gray hair. Practical bun. The blue eyes that catalogue every person and surface as a default operating mode.

“Torres.”

“Director.”

“Sit.”