I thought that when Older Sister had drawn circles all over that unlucky Fallen Apostle, she might already have caused some rather serious consequences. Whether it was the initial black half-hour of captivity or the constant bizarre incidents in prison afterward, they had all left Carter utterly exhausted. The psychological trauma he had been left with was even worse than that caused by the deranged Prison Mainframe. Now he was extremely sensitive to anything circular, including reruns of the London Olympics. It was hard to imagine—he would jump at the sight of the Olympic Rings flashing across the screen, so how excited would he get if he saw a huge crowd at the opening ceremony clanging together to form a giant circle hundreds of meters across? Anyway, I thought that if Older Sister drew a circle that huge, Hollywood would have nothing to do with the apocalypse.
Siweisi had already received word and prepared an identification ID and schedule for Carter at headquarters, with Imperial Soldiers assigned to meet him. There was no welcome ceremony, no work handover procedures or rituals. A few minutes later, Carter had entered his new post and begun handling the various information he needed to familiarize himself with as quickly as possible. Everything was carried out with the Empire's trademark efficiency. I could even guarantee that within twenty-four hours, that guy would be able to properly complete his duties at headquarters just like a veteran Imperial officer.
Sandora and I both felt that this military expert group should be reorganized into an independent unit and separated from headquarters' regular strategic teams. Before today, although we had a group of think tanks dedicated to analyzing Fallen Apostle military intelligence, they lacked sufficiently detailed and intuitive information, as well as any real experts. They could only exist