“This way,” mutters the policewoman as she guides Jeremy, Conor and Sarra past a row of unoccupied offices. “Here,” she says as she leads them into what appears to be an interrogation room. There is a table in the centre of the room with a lamp on top of it and two uncomfortable looking chairs on either side. She closes the door behind her.
“What’s going on?” says Helena over their earpieces.
“We met someone…” says Conor.
“How nice for you,” says Helena.
“What’s her name?” Chatravati asks.
“Who are you?” Sarra asks the woman.
She looks up with wide eyes, as though she’s surprised that they’re even talking to her. “Me? Oh, I’m Claire. Claire Ducati.”
“Did she say Ducati?” Chatravati asks.
“Uh-huh,” says Conor.
“I think that I knew her grandfather…” Chatravati says.
“Of course you did,” says Sarra and rolls her eyes.
Then they realise that Claire is staring at the three of them again, with her arms crossed over her chest and wearing a facial expression that’s difficult to decipher. “I can’t believe it,” she says at last. “Westcrest are here… right in front of me!”
“You… know who we are?” Sarra asks.
“Yes, yes,” says Claire and nods emphatically. “Everyone on the force knows about the Westcrest file. Not everyone believes it of course… but to a lot of people around here you guys are bonafide heroes. There’s no way we would’ve been able to handle the zombie situation without your help.”
“Wait a minute,” says Conor. He has listened in on hundreds of police communications in the past few months and not once has he heard anyone within the Sanctum refer to them as zombies. “You called them zombies…” he says to her.
“Well that’s obviously what they are,” says Claire and rolls her eyes. “My job here is to interview prisoners on intake. For the first few nights after that… situation at the nightclub, they kept bringing them in for me to interview.”
Sarra frowns. She doesn’t think about it if she can help it, but she still feels responsible for the events that took place a few months ago at Saul DuPont’s nightclub. Jeremy grabs her hand and Conor pretends not to notice.
“I’m guessing you didn’t have much luck,” says Conor.
“How do we know we can trust you?” asks Sarra and lets go of Jeremy’s hand.
Claire’s face becomes very serious, although all three members of the members of Westcrest can still see excitement sparkling in her eyes. “I think I can guess why you’re here,” she says. “You want to shut down the Enforcer program.”
Their faces don’t give anything away but silence is the only affirmation Claire needs. “A lot of the existing officers want to get rid of the Enforcers as well. They feel like we’ve been replaced by… robots.”
“Worse,” says Conor.
“Then let me help you,” says Claire. “But first, we need to get as many people out of the building as we can. There are a lot of good people here that have nothing to do with the Chief’s latest initiative.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” says Sarra grumpily.
Claire bites down on her bottom lip. Then she spots a waste paper basket in the corner of the room. “We could start a fire,” she says. “And set off the alarms. Except… I don’t have a light.”
“I can take care of that,” says Sarra.