"Of course! What's he doing here?"
"That's what he wants to talk about. Shall we go to my suite?"
"Just a second, please?" The young man was looking at her with adoration so open it was almost embarrassing, and Cortin wondered where that had come from. "I haven't seen Captain Odeon in ages …"
"I don't mind if he doesn't." Cortin watched them embrace, one hand close to her pistol, but it seemed that all Powell wanted was a kiss. At least that much of his conditioning held, she thought. When they broke, she repeated, "Shall we go to my suite?"
This time they made it. Suite Alpha's office was simple, but comfortably appointed, designed to give the subject a feeling of relaxation and trust. Cortin took her place in a grouping of furniture intended to help the subject feel more at ease that the normal desk-centered version of first stage, and gestured the other two to adjoining seats. "Now, Charles, what is it you don't think I'll believe?"
"That—" The young man gulped, tried again. "That I … had to come back. The Brothers … some of the older ones had me, the ways Captain Odeon and the others helped me find out I liked, but it … with them, it wasn't right, and I finally figured out that was because Captain Odeon and the others also helped me realize the Brotherhood itself was wrong. Especially to hate you, when you're the one who let them help me." He gestured, helplessly. "So I had to go back to the Center, and find you, and … offer to help you any way I could, in return for the help you gave me."
Her truthsense told her he was being absolutely honest. "Did you tell the Brothers how you felt?"
"No, ma'am—that didn't seem like a very good idea. I let troopers see me, but they didn't do anything—maybe because you'd had me released. Anyway, I didn't manage to get arrested until I hit one of them—and then no one'd believe I'd done it to get arrested! And that's how I ended up here."
So Mike and the Inquisitors had modified the conditioning she'd set up, had they? Powell was supposed to be terrified of her, if not of them—justifiably so, she admitted to herself—but he was grateful instead, enough so that he'd risked his life to get back. He could easily have been shot for attacking a trooper, not simply gotten arrested. As it turned out, their modification should prove more useful than her simple revenge, so she couldn't get too upset with them—but she would definitely have to find out how it had been done! "That's good, then. What help do you think you can give me?"
"To start with, I overheard them planning a raid. I don't think it's the big one—nobody down at my level is supposed know anything about that, except that it's going to happen—but maybe it'll help? Even though I didn't hear much?"