added, "Here's some good news. We
think we may have all the copies of the pictures sold to WNN. The risk at the
moment is that someone who had a set may have posted them on the internet.
Nobody's admitted to that, but the only way to know for sure is to wait and
see."
Thumbing over her shoulder at room 835, Mandi asked, "What about the tape of
what happened in there?"
In a firm tone, John said, "It goes into an NIA vault. One copy goes to
Washington. That's it."
"Does Washington get copies of all your incident tapes?"
"Well, no, but this one's not exactly routine and I've been ordered to
supply a copy."
Altogether unenthused, Mandi muttered, "Uh, huh. Is there anything else,
John? I have to go do some things."
He shook his head and said, "No, nothing else that I can think of. Thanks
again, Mandi."
Nodding, she said, "You're welcome. See you later, John."
Heading back past 835, Mandi refocused her vision and began looking inside
the trunks, bags, and boxes that were lined up for removal along the wall.
She saw the outlines of all sorts of objects, electronic components, and
weapons, but no tapes. Glancing around slowly, she let her vision sweep the
interiors of nearby rooms from 835 to 831, but saw no videocassettes of any
type.
Then she realized that the large trunk was missing from the equipment
lineup. Lifting slightly from the floor, Mandi flew toward the elevator alcove,
arriving just as the doors opened for the two guys who'd taken the trunk on the
dolly.
Landing and smiling as she approached, Mandi said, "Hi, guys. Need another
hand with it?"
One grinned at her as they stood the dolly upright in the elevator and said,
"No, ma'am. I think we've got it this time."
Mandi boarded the elevator and pretended to examine the damage she'd done to
the handle as she scanned the trunk and chatted with the guys.
She saw three cassettes in the trunk and used her heat vision to melt the
fragile tape within each cassette. They -- whoever 'they' happened to be --
would realize the damage hadn't happened by accident, of course. The damaged
tapes were Mandi's message to them: "No pictures."
Would it really do any good? Or would her action simply piss somebody off
enough to leak the other pictures? Mandi sighed, knowing that her exposure was
inevitable, anyway, but she vowed to stave it off as long as possible. Privacy
was just too damned hard to