“He loved the stories about the Code Talkers,” May said. “The ones from World War Two. There is that old movie about them that he used to watch when he was a boy.”

“Windtalkers?” Redhouse asked.

“I think so,” May said. “I didn’t like watching it. Too much blood. One year for his birthday I got him a Code Talkers dictionary. He would read that a lot.”

I pulled up a Navajo Code Talkers dictionary online. It had several hundred words in it, a number of categories, including names of airplanes, ships, military units, and months.

“Tah Tsosie,” I said.

Everyone in the room looked at me strangely. “What did you just say?” Redhouse asked me.

“Tah Tsosie,” I repeated. “I just looked up the Code Talkers dictionary. The month of May is Tah Tsosie. I am aware I’m pronouncing it terribly.”

“You really are,” Redhouse said, smiling.

“Johnny called me that for a little while after I gave him the book,” May said.

“It’s worth a shot,” I said, to Redhouse. He typed it in.

The file opened.

“May, Janice,” President Becenti said. “Do you want to see it alone first?”

“No,” May said. She reached over to her granddaughter, who took her hand. “Stay.”

Redhouse hit the keyboard again to play the file.

And there was Johnny Sani, alive to me for the first time.

“Hello, Grandma. Hello, Janis,” he said, staring into the lens, which he held close to his head so that it obscured most of the background. “I think maybe they can hear what I do on my phone so I went and bought a camera. I’m going to hide this for now, so if something happens to me you’ll find it.

“I think there’s something wrong with me. I think maybe something they did to me is making me sick.

“You remember I went in to look at a job for a janitor. After I did that I got a call from someone who said he was a recruiter for another job. Said that it would pay really well. He said to go back to the computing facility and that there would be a driverless car waiting for me. All I would have to do is tell it my name and it would take me to my job interview. So I did and the car was there and I told it my name.

“The car drove me to Gallup, to a building where a threep was waiting for me. He said his name was Bob Gray and that the job would be acting as a personal assistant for an important man. I asked them what that meant, and he said it mostly meant running errands and taking him to places he wanted to go. He said I would get to travel and see the world and it would pay well, and all that sounded good to me.

“I asked Bob, why me? And he said it’s because I was special in ways I didn’t even know about. Then he gave me two thousand dollars in cash and said that was the first week’s salary right up front and I could keep it even if I said no. He said the job paid cash so I wouldn’t even have to pay taxes on it or nothing.

“Well, I took the job right then. Bob said that the CEO liked his privacy so I shouldn’t tell people anything but that I got a job. So I did.

“And then after I said good-bye to you, the car drove me to California. Bob met me and showed me my apartment and said it was mine now. Then he gave me some more money.

“The next day Bob took me to meet my boss, who was named Ted Brown and who was also a threep. He said that as his assistant I would become an Integrator, which is someone who took people places in his head. They would need to put a computer into my brain for that to happen. I was scared at first but they told me it wouldn’t hurt and that Ted would only need me to do it every once in a while and the rest of the time I could do what I wanted. But because my job was secret they would have me use a code name, named Oliver Green.

“They took me to a doctor’s office and I went to sleep and when I woke up they had cut all my hair off my head and said that they had put a computer into my brain. I had headaches for the next few days. They said it was the computer getting used to my brain. They said it would take a couple of weeks for it to get used to me.

“When that was done Ted and Bob came over and said it was time to try integrating. Ted said that he would come over into my brain and move my body around. I said okay, and then I felt a little sick, and then my arm moved by itself. That scared me but Bob told me to relax and not to worry. Then Ted walked my body around my apartment for a while.

“After that Ted would use my body a little bit every day. We would go to the store or the library and once he even mailed a money order for you at the post office. And I thought, this isn’t so bad, I just had to remember to relax.

“We did this for three months. I asked him when we would travel and he said soon.

“And then it started to happen.

“One day I was watching a show and I blinked and the show was over and another show was on. And I thought I must have fallen asleep and not even known. Then the next day I put a burrito in the microwave and pressed a button to start it and I blinked again and it was dark outside and the burrito was cold. I could tell I cooked it because stuff leaked out of it. But it was done cooking for so long that it got cold again.

“It started to get worse. I would be doing something and then I would be somewhere else, doing something else. I would put on one shirt and then another shirt would be on me. I once went to put on a show that is on TV on Monday and it was Tuesday, and it was morning, not night.

“I didn’t tell Ted about it because I was worried I would get fired if he knew I was sick. But I finally got so scared that I had to tell him. He sent me to the doctor and the doctor said I was fine and that sometimes people who were Integrators had what he said were ‘dropouts.’ He said they would stop and that when they did I would get my memory back. I tried not to worry but it kept happening.

“Then one day I looked up and I was in a group of men I didn’t know and one of them was talking to me and I had no idea what he was saying. Then he said something about killing someone. I don’t remember the name. He asked me a question and I didn’t know what he was talking about so I stayed quiet and didn’t do anything. And then one of them said, ‘He lost the connection,’ and another one said, ‘shit,’ and then another one asked if that meant the other guy was in the room. I was pretty sure he meant me. I just stayed quiet and did nothing and then it was the next day. Bob came by to ask me how I was doing. I lied to him and I said I was fine.

“I think I figured it out. I thought I was having dropouts because they put the computer in my head. But I think it’s really that Bob and Ted are using the computer in my head to give me dropouts.

“The thing is, the dropouts are getting longer now. The last one I lost three whole days. I don’t know if I can do anything about it. I thought about trying to run away but I have a computer in my head now. I know they will find me. And they can make me drop out any time they want. And I think when they drop me out they use me to do bad things. Or they are going to make me do bad things.

“I don’t know what to do now. I’m making this so that if you find out that I’ve done something bad, you’ll know it wasn’t really me. You know I wouldn’t do that. I don’t know if I can stop them from using me to do something bad. But I promise you if I can I will.

“All I wanted was a job. I wanted to give you someplace nice to live, Grandma. And you too, Janis. I’m sorry. I love you.”

The picture wheeled from Johnny Sani’s face, showing the interior of his bedroom in Duarte. Then it went blank.

*   *   *

“Who in goddamned hell does something like that?” Becenti said. It was fair to say he was fuming.

By this time May and Janis Sani had left the conference room, distraught. Captain Laughing had escorted them out, motioning to Redhouse that the conversation should continue in his absence. President Becenti did not need any prompting.