He put the notes down.
• • •
Two weeks before the station.
The assignment in its final weeks: the work was clear, the plan was assembled, the pieces were in position.
What remained was timing.
Tav was running timing in his head when Alistair came to stand beside him at the window.
"You've been running the same sequence for an hour," Alistair said.
"Yes."
"The approach from the south versus the north approach," Alistair said. "The timing question for the upload. The window that Cain's surveillance rotation creates."
"Yes." Tav watched the city. "There's a fourteen-second gap in the coverage if we approach from the south. The north approach requires twelve. The difference is significant."
"Twelve versus fourteen."
"In the wrong context, yes." He fixed on the window. "Two seconds is the difference between an approach that's clean and one that registers."
"South," Alistair said.
"South," Tav agreed.
They were quiet.
Outside the city did its work. The afternoon light had the cool glow of the last weeks of autumn — committed to gold, aware of the grey that was coming.
"The testimony," Alistair said.
"Yes."
"After."
"Yes."
"You've thought about it."
"Yes." Tav watched the window. "The inquiry will be thorough. They'll want the full account — the placement, the Protocol, Cain's operational decisions. All of it."
"They'll also want the personal account. What it was like."
"What will you say?"
Tav was quiet.
"The accurate version," he said.
Alistair found his face.
"Which is?" Alistair said.
"That it was the best three months of my adult life," Tav said.
Alistair was very still.
