“Oh!” The man reels back in surprise and slaps his palm to his forehead. “I never introduced myself. Secretary Gort Buntem, at your service.”

“Secretary?” John repeats, unconvinced. “You don’t look like a secretary.”

Gort exaggerates a shrug, flinging his arms outward and almost smacking an Official’s face in the process. “Oh, heck. I should be called an Overseer or something, truthfully. I mostly witness document signings and take care of all the domestic reports.”

He scratches his beard again, eyeing us up, then shoves the holotab back into his pocket. Then he holds up one of his fingers.

“Fact number one: this here’s the best Embassy in the galaxy”—he raises a second finger—“and fact number two: you ain’t even scratched the surface.”

Chapter Five

The tour through Threshold Tower lasts two hours. Gort can only show us rooms open to common Officials, such as the Treatise Storage Complex, a few conference rooms, and a media screening room. Then we walk into the Records Hall on Floor 18.

Big mistake.

We learn you should never put Glacia near anything that resembles a Hologis sphere, and the data orbs hanging on the walls are the perfect size. She discovers the orbs can bounce off solid surfaces and starts ricocheting them around the room to impress us. Gort gets excited because it turns out he’s a Hologis player, too. The rest of us are forced to watch them throw orbs at each other with complete disregard of the fact that this is supposed to be a tour, not playtime.

Gort finally stops messing around and shows us how to activate the data orbs. He hands out pairs of tendril gloves and tells us to pinch the sides of the orbs and pull outward. The packs of information spill open and float in midair. There are miniature planets and blocks of data about the history of the Embassy Program. To transfer information from orb to orb, you just grab the object and stick it into a different sphere.

After a bit of practice, we return the tendril gloves to slots in the walls. Gort walks us to the elevators and we drop to the Pavilion, where Victoria is waiting for us, eyes raised expectantly.

“How was it?” she asks.

“Miss Haverns may’ve turned the Records Hall into a Hologis arena,” Gort says, throwing Glacia a wink.

“Oh did she?” Victoria narrows her eyes at him. “And where would she have gotten the inclination to do so?”

“Hey, I didn’t say nothing,” Gort raises his hands in defense. “Honest.”

“I couldn’t resist,” Glacia says from behind him.

The corner of Victoria’s mouth curls. “Of course.”

Gort jerks his thumb at another group of Recruits and backs away, but his voice gets lost in the noise of the Pavilion. Victoria waves and walks us to the main elevators that will take us out of the tower.