"Okay, I'll let you get back to it. Yes, I'll be polite." Jane hung up the phone on her boss-his name was Steve-with a grimace; his voice was so loud, so grating, it almost made her miss the days when the sole reminder of his presence was the occasional post-it note on her desk. Jane's boss had become an all-too-present reminder of the way things had changed over the two days since the news of the source of the virus had reached the media. Her phone rang constantly now: if it wasn't her boss telling her about some new crisis to navigate, it was a member of the press asking for an interview, or, worse, an enraged, self-righteous citizen seeking justice. Jane felt completely unqualified to deal with any of it.
Thinking about her most recent vengeance-hungry phone call, she gritted her teeth in frustration. The woman on the other end of the line had begun by asking Jane, loudly and hysterically, what she planned to do about "those goddamn robots." Jane was completely at a loss for what to tell her. She couldn't tell the woman what she honestly thought, which was that her anger, and her terror, was misplaced, although she understood where it came from. That was what she wanted to say to the woman: "I understand where you're coming from, I've felt like that, the idea that we have these creatures in our midst with completely different brains and morals and needs is terrifying to me, but we can't do anything about it right now, we are so woefully underprepared to understand this situation there is no way we can even start to think how to deal with it." All they wanted was justice. All Jane wanted was justice. But she didn't know what justice would look like. And she knew that answer wouldn't satisfy anyone. So she usually issued a polite statement: "Ma'am, please try to stay calm. We are doing all we can to bring the ringleaders to justice."
She didn't know what to say at the press conferences, beyond the same bland assurances she used on the phone, statements so meaningless her callers usually hung up in disgust. She couldn't vilify the robots; she couldn't even talk about them without remembering the recent reports of great upswings in violence against them. (She'd seen the aftermath of one particularly violent attack; the robot's processors had been burned out, and then someone had simply beaten his frame until it had looked an awful lot like the corpses of the first plague victims, molten and twisted in an almost organic way.) Jane understood, on one level, that pain held no terrors for robots. She understood that the murder of a robot was probably entirely different from the murder of a human. At the same time, she had to wonder about the person who felt so much rage that they were able to inflict such harm on what looked so much like a person. What was, she was beginning to feel, a person.
She had her first video conference with the president of Canada in ten minutes, a conference that had been put off for far too long (by the robots, of course). With every passing minute, Jane became more certain that the robots' government was being evasive because they had commissioned the attacks on Boston. That would mean the start of a war, surely. Jane was completely unqualified to deal with this discussion, let alone the bloody aftermath. Why wasn't anyone here with her to take this call? She wasn't even qualified to do anything about the crisis, her sole function was to act as a mouthpiece for the government and a go-between for its dealings with the robots. But the police had their hands full, and her boss was away at the moment, giving yet a press conference. He was the head of publicity for the City of Boston, a position that seemed absurdly insufficient in the face of the chaos that was threatening to envelop them. And the mayor was...where was the mayor again? For an instant, Jane's panicking brain delivered her an image of the mayor under sedation in a hospital bed, a victim of the plague. And that image made her think of the plague ward, and then, with a thrill of embarrassment, of the woman who'd taken up residence there for four days.
She had done a terrible job of dealing with Maura Isles. Every thought of the impeccably stylish, incomprehensibly complex robot sent her into paroxysms of shame. That wasn't quite right: every thought of her own behavior around the robot sent her into paroxysms of shame. It was useless wondering why she'd gotten attached to the robot: Jane had let herself get too isolated in the past few months. Maura Isles was simply a skilled manipulator of human emotions. Jane had let herself get tricked into a dead-end infatuation, and the only possible result was shame.
One question remained, however, and in the depths of her self-chastisement she came back to it again and again. What possible motivation could Maura Isles have had to make Jane fall in love with her? Jane was assuming, of course, that that was Maura's intended goal, because the alternative-that Jane had fabricated the entire thing-was too crushing. And so she stopped thinking about Maura, or she tried to. It wasn't that hard, actually; she was so busy. Maura Isles hung at the corner of her day, weighing on her bones like a lingering cold and occasionally intruding into her thoughts with a pang like a pulled muscle.
A message flashed across the screen in front of her; the robots were calling. Enough of these unhelpful thoughts. Jane rearranged the papers on the desk: a file containing all the police reports on human-robot violence, a copy of Maura's report on the "origin and dissemination of an artificially engineered viral haemorrhagic fever," a copy of City Hall's most recent official statement on the status of the investigation and prosecution. She answered the call.
"Good afternoon, Ms. Rizzoli." The president's voice was stern, measured.
"Good afternoon, Mr. President."
"I'll get right to the point, since I understand you're under a lot of pressure right now." Jane had a feeling that that was where the President wanted her. He seemed smugly satisfied that Jane was, despite her best efforts, looking a bit discomposed. Or maybe Jane was reading too much into his blank expression? She seemed to be very good at that these days. "We have been fully informed of the situation in your country." (By whom? Jane wondered. Did she have to start worrying about robot spies now?) "Rest assured we are prepared to offer you any aid that seems useful in this trying time. It seems to me, however, that given current theories circulating regarding the origin of the virus infecting your populace, any contact between our government and yours might be imprudent. My only suggestion at this time, Ms. Rizzoli, is that all robots registered in your country should be instructed to return to their homeland, and soon."
"But that will just be seen as an admission that robots-that your government-were responsible for the plague! Are you trying to start a war, Mr. President?"
"Of course not. But I am concerned about potential backlash against my fellow robots."
"Your fellow robots are now citizens of the United States. It's our decision whether or not to let them stay here. And frankly, I don't see any reason to force them to relocate."
The president lifted an eyebrow. "You realize that such relocation would not actually cause them any discomfiture? We are robots, Ms. Rizzoli, not humans: infinitely adaptable, infinitely rational." He paused; Jane turned the phrase over in her mind. Surely there was something wrong with it, but she couldn't figure out what. "But if you wish for the registered robots to remain in your country, there is nothing I can do about it. It goes without saying that I have no opinion on the matter." (Bullshit, thought Jane. You were trying to start a war.) "That is my only suggestion, Ms. Rizzoli. I trust Dr. Isles was helpful to you?" The name went through Jane like an electric shock.
"Y-yes-of course. She was invaluable."
"Good. And now that you have a handle on the virus, all that remains is to...manage the public." The president smiled a thin, humorless smile.
"Yeah. Got any tips?"
"I'm sorry, Ms. Rizzoli; dissent is something we almost never have to deal with."
"That must be very boring for you." Jane couldn't prevent a touch of bitterness sneaking into her tone. Internally, she wondered: "almost" never? "Well, Mr. President, thank you for your time."
The robot inclined his head slightly; his image disappeared from the screen.
Jane leaned back in her chair and sighed in frustration. Robots were so complicated. There were so many layers of subtext she hadn't picked up on in that conversation. She still didn't have any idea of how to keep the terrified, battered population of Boston from rioting against resident robots. And her fears that this attack had somehow originated with the robot government hadn't been calmed; after this video call, she was pretty sure that it had been a prelude to open war between their countries. But why? Was there really so much resentment between the robots and the humans? Her mind flashed back to the image of the murdered robot down at BPD. Human resentment toward robots she could understand, especially now: the fear of the almost-human, the fear of the invincible other in our midst. The fear of the retaliation by the used against their oppressors.
But had humans really acted as the oppressors in the human-robot relationship? She could understand the human perspective, more or less, but what possible motivation did robots have for wanting to get rid of humans? Her imagination sprinted through several different situations, including the probable outcome of a robot-human war. It wasn't pretty.
There was somebody who could help her, who might be able to provide some insight into the years of tension between robots and humans. Jane swallowed the queasy feeling that rose in her stomach at the thought of seeing Maura Isles again, after having made such a fool of herself hardly two days ago.
She couldn't explain to herself, let alone Maura, why she'd been unable to go back. It was pride, that was all, hurt pride at having betrayed her own emotional weakness and instability. Her emotions had gotten away from her, she'd made a stupid mistake, and now she was too proud to face the consequences. It was especially embarrassing because the person who had witnessed her mistake wasn't capable of making them herself and couldn't possibly have any sympathy for her. Once again, she worried, with a jolt, what Maura must think of her and her baffling behavior.
She also felt unprepared for another encounter with Maura; she wasn't sure she'd be able to control herself around the robot. The stress of holding herself together in the face of both her own out-of-control emotions and the public's confused, angry outcry was too much, even in private. If she was on the brink of tears here, alone in her office, what could possibly ensue when she found herself in the company of the only person who had shown her any affection in months?
There was nowhere else to go, though, so Jane pulled herself together, gathered her things, and went out to her car. She drove the half mile to the hospital feeling jittery, and checked in at the front desk. She took the elevator up to Maura's lab, adrenaline coursing through her veins.
But when she reached the glass doors of Maura's lab, her stomach sank. The room was dark, there was no hint of movement among the shrouded lab equipment, and the door wouldn't open when she pressed the button. Maura was gone.