Chapter 23: Doss Asks One Question

The shift rotation fell on the last day of the week, which meant a ninety-minute overlap between the Bureau's analytical staff and the garrison personnel whose patrol routes brought them through the administrative wing's lower corridors during the 1600 hour transition.

Kael had known this. He had noted it during his second week, when the overlap had produced a minor congestion at the Level Nine access checkpoint and he had been obliged to wait four minutes for clearance. He had adjusted his departure timing since then by six minutes — leaving at 1754 rather than 1800 — which placed him in the corridor before the garrison personnel arrived and after the Bureau's junior analysts had cleared the lift bank.

He was at the lift bank when he saw Doss.