Chapter 197 - 0197 Ask Me
The glass case waited under V-07.
Six green rings turned inside it, separate and close enough to hurt.
Rina knelt before the case.
Iharu knelt beside her.
Sam stayed standing because the Record needed both hands and because his knees had made no legal promises.
Caleb stopped three steps from the bed.
The screen above V-07 changed.
VESSEL PROXIMITY REQUIRED.
The silver in Caleb leaned forward like a starving thing smelling an unlocked kitchen.
Sam said his name.
That helped.
Tali added, "Recommendation. One step at a time. Vessel states intention before moving."
"Accepted," Caleb said.
The woman in the chair watched with her hands folded.
Kikaru stood between her and the bed.
"If you speak in sorrow," Kikaru said, "I will make a noise near your face."
The woman looked at her.
Kikaru smiled.
"Educational noise."
Soma crouched beside the case with his tablet angled away from the glass. "No scan. Still blanking optical capture."
"Then use your eyes," Sam said.
"I resent how often that is the answer."
Rina put her hand on the glass.
She kept her palm still and asked.
"Sefa, what do you want?"
The rings slowed.
The room held its breath badly.
Sefa’s voice came through the case, rougher than before.
"Closer."
Caleb’s body wanted to obey the word.
His right foot shifted half an inch.
"Mine," he said.
The foot stopped.
Rina turned her head. "Caleb?"
"I heard him."
"He asked."
"I know."
Caleb looked at the case. "I am moving one step. My choice."
The screen wrote:
VESSEL APPROACH ACKNOWLEDGED.
He stepped forward.
The rings brightened.
Pain moved through his palms without cutting skin.
The silver inside him answered the light like it knew the old wound by name.
"No intake," Caleb said.
The case clicked.
VESSEL LOAD ASSUMPTION DENIED.
Sefa gave a sound that might have been a laugh if laughter had survived being split into six jobs.
"Good."
Rina pressed her mouth shut.
Sam opened the Record to Sefa’s unfinished page.
"Ask the next question," he said.
Rina nodded.
"How do we help?"
The first ring lifted.
VOICE.
It circled once inside the glass.
Sefa said, "Give that one back last."
Rina frowned. "Your voice?"
"Voice lies when scared."
Sam’s pen hovered over the page. "Noted with personal offense."
The second ring rose.
WITNESS.
"That one first," Sefa said.
Iharu leaned closer.
"Do you want me?"
The ring turned toward him.
"Yes."
Iharu’s face changed by a millimeter.
That was enough for Rina.
She put her shoulder against his.
Iharu spoke to the glass.
"Sefa Amadi witnessed harm and survived division. I witnessed him answer. I witnessed him refuse sorting. I witnessed tower stands."
The ring shook.
The center screen printed:
WITNESS FUNCTION REQUESTS RETURN.
CONFIRM SUBJECT CONSENT.
Rina looked at the glass.
"Sefa?"
"Yes."
The ring sank through the case floor.
The case held quiet for one breath.
Then the room speaker gave a human cough.
Rina flinched.
Sefa muttered, "Still loud."
Iharu covered his face with one hand.
Sam wrote so hard the pen scratched.
"Witness returned," he said.
The third ring lifted.
ANCHOR.
It pointed toward Iharu, then toward Rina, then toward Caleb.
"No," Sefa said.
The ring stopped.
The woman shifted in her chair.
Kikaru made a small warning sound with her teeth.
Sefa spoke again.
"Anchor stays outside."
Iharu lowered his hand.
"With us?"
"With you. If I keep it all inside, she can pull the tower down with me."
The screen hesitated.
EXTERNAL ANCHOR MODEL UNREGISTERED.
Sam looked almost happy.
"Register it."
EXTERNAL ANCHOR MODEL UNREGISTERED.
Page Zero warmed under his palm.
Sam smiled at the screen.
"Oral witnesses registered. Living claim active. Directional use denied. External anchor witnessed."
The Record wrote before the wall did.
EXTERNAL ANCHOR ACCEPTED BY CLAIM.
The wall followed:
ANCHOR FUNCTION HELD IN LIVING CLAIM.
Iharu swallowed.
Rina squeezed his arm.
The anchor ring faded, leaving a green mark across the tower witness card in Iharu’s hand.
"Heavy?" Rina asked.
Iharu looked at the card.
"Honest."
The fourth ring rose.
CLAIM.
It moved toward Rina and stopped.
Rina went still.
Sefa said, "Only if you want it."
Rina closed her eyes.
Caleb heard the room waiting for need to become pressure.
He said, "Choice words."
Rina opened her eyes again.
"I want claim. I do not want ownership."
CLAIM MODEL AMBIGUOUS.
Sam snapped, "That is because you keep using ugly nouns."
Rina ignored the screen.
"Sefa Amadi is claimed by people who know his name. I am one of them. I do not own him. I answer when he calls."
The claim ring touched the glass.
Sefa’s voice came softer.
"Yes."
The ring dissolved into the cracked tracker in Rina’s hand.
The dead screen lit green.
Rina breathed out and almost dropped it.
Iharu caught her wrist, not the tracker.
"I have it," she said.
"You have you," he answered.
The fifth ring lifted.
LIGHT.
Caleb felt it before the word appeared.
His silver opened toward it with hunger and recognition.
The light had been inside VOSS-07. It had been carried through the Child. It had burned behind ribs that were never a body, and Caleb had taken the seven-marked fragment from that broken thing without crushing it.
The ring turned toward his hand.
Sam moved closer.
"Careful."
"I know."
"Say more useful words."
Caleb looked at the ring.
"I can stand near it. I cannot carry it."
The screen wrote:
VESSEL REFUSES LIGHT LOAD.
Sefa’s voice came through the case.
"I do not want you to carry it."
The silver hated that.
Caleb loved him for it.
Rina looked at him.
Caleb kept his eyes on the ring.
"Where?"
"Hand," Sefa said. "Not inside."
Caleb extended his left hand over the glass.
His hand hovered above the slot.
The case opened a slot as narrow as a coin.
The light ring rose through it and settled around his wrist without weight.
It burned cold.
Caleb’s silver surged toward it.
"Mine," Caleb said.
The surge stopped at his skin.
The ring stayed outside.
The screen printed:
LIGHT HELD EXTERNALLY.
VESSEL INTAKE DENIED.
Sam exhaled through his nose.
"I hate that we are inventing law faster than the murder basement."
Soma pointed at him. "That sentence has scholarship potential."
The sixth ring stayed at the bottom.
INDEX stayed at the bottom of the case, turning slowly.
The room changed around it.
Names appeared on the floor again, black marker under every folded bed, more than before. Lines crossed lines. Some names had no family mark. Some had only a number. Some had the same status Sefa had worn like a wound.
HELD.
Rina looked down.
"Sefa?"
"That one is crowded."
Caleb felt the light ring bite his wrist.
The silver inside him offered the old answer.
Take it.
Hold it.
End the crowd.
He closed his hand.
"No intake."
The case stayed open.
The woman in the chair spoke at last.
"Index cannot return to him without the names."
Sam turned slowly.
"You do not get to explain now."
"Call it constraint."
Tali’s voice went flat. "Recommendation. Treat all helpful statements from source of harm as suspect and still test them."
Soma nodded. "Annoyingly, yes."
Sam looked at Page Zero.
The Record had written one new line under Sefa’s entry.
INDEX FUNCTION CONTAINS UNRELEASED CLAIMS.
Rina stared at it.
"If he takes it, he takes them."
Sefa answered from the case.
"If I leave it, they stay."
The index ring kept turning.
The old trap came back with cleaner math.
Caleb looked at Sam.
Sam looked at the Record, then at the names on the floor.
"We ask them too," Sam said.
The woman in the chair went very still.
Every name on the floor lit green at once.
The screen above V-07 printed:
MULTIPLE CLAIM REVIEW REQUESTED.
VESSEL PROXIMITY REQUIRED.
Caleb lifted his wrist with Sefa’s light burning outside his skin.
The silver waited behind his hand.
"Then we ask everyone."