The conspiracists come in almost as many flavors as the mystics. Many maintain that the Kurians and Lifeweavers, being of the same species, are simply playing an elaborate game of good cop/bad cop with humanity, to better control them for their own nefarious ends. Others see the Lifeweavers as basically good, but using humans as cannon fodder to fight an ancient war that spilled over onto Earth, to mankind's misfortune.
In Valentine's opinion, the Lifeweaver lurking in the depths of the rabbit warren offered strong evidence that excluded two of the above schools of thought.
* * *
Valentine hadn't slept since he set off on his courier flight. Thirty-six, no, forty hours now, he corrected himself.
Someone knocked on his door. "Yeah?"
Thunderbird's voice through the steel: "You wanted your interview, you got it".
Valentine wondered if he should shave. No, the sooner the better. Shaving wouldn't make a difference one way or the other. He opened the door.
Thunderbird stood there with two of his bigger Bears.
The enmity that had sprung up between himself and Thunderbird had turned into a wary truce back in the warren. As there was nothing Valentine could do on a battlefield - or a multiblock killing floor, in his mind - without getting arrested at the very least, he'd followed orders and flown back to Grizzly Ridge. He took the precaution of landing at the fuel depot to refuel, found Gide, and had her guide him up into the hills above the motor pool to a vacant house with an even more vacant garage. She sensed that there was something wrong and asked him about it, but Valentine didn't want to explain, couldn't without following the cowardly urge to flee the Cascades entirely.
But flight wouldn't save any lives but their own.
He trotted back to Grizzly Ridge, explained that his engine was misfiring and being maintained back at the motor service yard. He had written up both a request to see the Lifeweaver and a letter of resignation from Delta Group by the time the column returned. He waited outside Thunderbird's office and told him that unless the request was immediately granted, the resignation would follow.
In all probability he'd resign anyway, but Valentine didn't add that. He needed the interview.
That rated six clucks of Thunderbird's tongue, then an order to return to his quarters and get cleaned up.
Thunderbird walked him to one of the big, gurney-sized two-door elevators that served the medical center. Shielding the control panel with his body, the colonel pressed buttons using both hands.
"I think we got off on the wrong foot", Thunderbird said as the elevator dropped. "I figured you knew about your old man's solution".
Valentine didn't want to ask the question on his mind, and luckily the elevator stopped, and he had a brief reprieve as they met two more Bears at a duty desk in a rough-hewn, unpainted tunnel. Under bare bulbs projecting from boxes linked by a conduit, Thunderbird handed over an order sheet and he and Valentine turned in their IDs. Thunderbird checked his sidearm and they submitted to a pat down and being wanded by a metal detector as one of the Bears spoke into a phone.
A woman in a medical uniform appeared. "He'll see them", she told the Bear at the duty desk.
"Pass nine-nine", the Bear shouted down the hallway.
"Pass nine-nine", a voice shouted back.
The big Bears sat down opposite the duty desk to wait. Thunderbird and Valentine walked down the darkening corridor, following the woman in white, the bulbs becoming less frequent and finally giving out. Valentine spotted an old hunk of armored vehicle crammed into a turn in the tunnel, a turreted gun that looked like a 30mm cannon covering the tunnel back toward the duty desk. Two layers of thick metal cage kept the Bears inside - Valentine guessed there were two,
but it was hard to tell... at their station. Valentine saw a portable toilet between the layers of cage.
They turned the corner past the dug-in vehicle and came upon a set of bars worthy of a rhino cage, a small door in a heavy frame offering access to the other side. Valentine heard dripping. The medical officer fought down a yawn, took a key looped around her neck, and put it in a lock at the half door.
They crouched to pass through.
There was another turn ahead, and Valentine felt the space and light around the corner through the transmitted drippings.
"I want to see him alone", Valentine said.
"Don't try anything funny. If the medical staff calls, I'll come in and put an end to you".
"Maybe", Valentine said.
The medical officer looked to Thunderbird, who nodded. "Take him in", he said.
She looked Valentine up and down. "You look tired. Are you okay ?"
"Fine".