Free The Facilitator by Sahara Kelly Page A

Martine closed her eyes and focused on her interface, letting images of energy flowing through it enter her mind. She’d done this before, sought various strands of brilliance, but now she could feel as much as see a new ribbon beginning to twine through her neural channels. It was silvery blue, cool, fresh and in many ways familiar. It was him.
    “That’s it, honey.” His arms tightened and then…then…
    She was no longer Martine .
    Soaring high into a darkness that seemed endless, the energy that was Martine struggled to comprehend the impossible.
    Beside her was Johann, or John as she knew his incorporeal self. There were no bodies, no limbs, no smiles or bald scalps. No distinction that these were male and female energies.
    There were no words handy to describe where she was or who she was with. All these things, she just knew .
    Just as she knew John was speaking to her.
    “It’s working. Come with me. Think your way beside me .”
    She obeyed, finding that a simple command to follow. The darkness became a tunnel, lights flickered and passed, colors flashed by, the sensation of motion very strong even though she had no substance to feel a breeze or eyes to blink at the brilliance.
    Together they passed through a vortex and emerged into something that was not dissimilar to the data-storage system.
    “We’re in some kind of cortex, aren’t we? The server cortex somewhere.”
    “Yes.” It was John’s voice, intertwined through her own energies. Separate beings, one presence. Mega weird. “I need you to see something.”
    Images began to flicker, not those of a video presentation but almost like memories half-glimpsed, incomplete and insubstantial. Until one froze in front of them and the being that had been Martine lost its breath.
    It was Taber.
    “Oh God.” She absorbed the image of him.
    Tall and proud in his uniform, Taber was a shining example of the best the world could offer to its fighting forces. His eyes were steady, his uniform impossibly perfect in every detail. It was the sort of image that parents proudly imprinted on the sides of their transportation vehicles and grandmothers had transferred to their quilts.
    Then the image shifted—and once more it was Taber, this time laughing and drinking with his unit. Then another image, Taber in action, followed rapidly by Taber being debriefed and deployed elsewhere. There were quick flashes of conferences, people in dark suits, shadowed images of nighttime streets…it was as if his entire life history was being played out in this hidden cyberworld.
    Then, suddenly, Martine was seeing herself and Taber’s last moments. The blood, her hands on him, the anguish on her face… Had she been able to, she would have sobbed. She remembered the agony she’d felt, she vividly recalled her helplessness to stop it, the only thing that prevented her from screaming silently in horror was the sensation of John in and around her consciousness.
    The truth began to dawn, a realization that chilled whatever physical presence she had at that moment.
    “He wasn’t sick, was he ? ” Trembling words barely whispered.
    “No . ” Serious, sober. “No, he’d never been sick a day in his life.”
    “I killed him . ” Flat, precise.
    “Yes.”
    “I didn’t know . ”
    “No you didn’t. You couldn’t. You were used, Martine. You were just a tool . ”
    She shivered, the gathering of energy around her becoming icy even as she mentally turned to John for comfort. He was there, encompassing her, shielding her as he guided them back into the vortex of light. “Hold on . ”
    She felt a falling sensation and gasped aloud, seeing the Piazza San Marco flash past before they both shimmered back into Eternal Tranquility and the late Mrs. Alder’s room.
    Slumping, Martine released the old woman’s cooling hand, tried to stand and swayed, catching herself on the end of the bed as her neural interface connections snapped sharply apart.
    “Easy.” Johann was holding her