Page 63 of Girl, Empty
And amongst the ice and electronics was a human shape.He was huddled against the wall, as far from the air conditioning unit as he could get.Ella crossed the treacherous floor in a graceless slide, then found purchase on patches of textured metal between ice sheets.Noah – or who she assumed was Noah - had tried to make himself small.He'd wedged himself into a corner, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around his legs.His clothes were frozen rigid, his hair was a crown of ice.His glasses had frosted and cracked.
She pressed fingers to his carotid, knowing what she'd find but needing to try anyway.
Nothing.No pulse.Skin like marble.
The human body had limits, and Noah had passed them all.
They were too late.
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
The narrow street outside Blackglass Creations was now a crime scene circus.Ella perched herself on the SUV's tailgate with soaking wet clothes, dripping hair, and a towel wrapped around her shoulders.Her brief tour of Noah Redmond's icy tomb had rendered her cold enough to warrant paramedic attention, but they'd checked her vitals, pronounced her lucky, and moved on to more pressing emergencies.
Not that any amount of paramedic attention would bring the victim back to life.The EMTs had gone through the motions anyway and wrapped Noah in thermal blankets for the ride to the morgue.It had taken twenty minutes and a crowbar to fully open the server room; now, the poor forensic technicians needed to somehow navigate that sub-zero environment, including the electric blizzard pumping out of that air conditioning unit.
Amanda Pierce had stopped crying a few minutes ago minutes ago.She’d accepted a foam cup from one of the uniforms, but hadn’t touched it.Just used it as a heating system for her hands.Ripley emerged from the building looking like she’d just been wrestling with machinery, which Ella guessed was accurate.
‘Power's off,’ she announced, stripping off her gloves.‘Whole building.Had to find the mains.Of course, nobody thought to put up any signs.’
‘Thanks, Mia.That’ll make things easier on CSI.Miss Pierce, are you ready to answer some questions?’
‘Yes.Anything.’
Ella had one burning question above all others, in hopes that an explanation might douse this fire of annoyance in her gut.‘My first question, and don’t think of this as insensitive, but why didn’t you kill the power to this place?’
‘I don’t know how to.’
The words were so simple.A spike of contempt impaled Ella’s mind, and she had to stop herself saying, You can build pointless apps nobody needs, but you don't know how to flip a mains switch?You people spend all day building apps that add nothing to anyone's life, but when it comes to things that actually matter, like knowing how to switch power off to save someone's life, you're useless.
‘You… didn’t know how?’
Amanda flinched.Tears threatened to come again.‘I didn’t think!I was terrified!’
Another mental narration came; That's the problem.You've outsourced your ability to think to a machine.You just assume technology will save you, until the moment it decides to kill you instead.Tonight, it froze a man to death while you stood outside swiping a keycard like that was going to suddenly start working
‘I see.’The cold had gotten into her bones, and Noah's frozen corpse had gotten into her head, and she was tired of watching people die because convenience had replaced competence.
‘Believe me, I wish I’d been the one trapped in there instead of Noah.He was… a wonderful human.’
‘Your boyfriend?’Ripley asked.
‘Maybe in another life.’
Ella stepped back from the conversation.The way Amanda had saidwonderful humanfor some reason felt like a knife to her heart.A moment of introspection later, Ella realized it wasn’t the hypothermia that had turned her into a, it was Austin Creed’s.She saw herself in Amanda, and Ben in Noah.Ben, who'd died because Ella hadn't been fast enough, smart enough, good enough to save him.
‘I’m sorry.That was out of order.’
‘No.You were right.I should have known.’
‘There’s no blame here,’ Ripley said.‘Can you talk us through what happened?’
Amanda took a moment, composed herself, then said, ‘It was about 8:30.I was in Noah’s office, then I got a notification on my phone saying there was a problem with the server in the basement.Me and Noah went down there.The air con was down at like 20-something, when it should be at 64.I didn’t even know it was possible to go that low.’
‘Apparently it is,’ Ripley said.‘Is the air con part of a network?Could someone access it remotely?’
‘Yes, it needs to be.It syncs with our servers.’
‘How did Noah get in there on his own?’
