What would he do for a month? Halden's job was his life. For him, a month felt like forever.

He stood in his living room, staring at the couch, then at the TriVid screen.

Maybe he should go on a trip. He'd always wanted to go to Iriaki...

No, he hadn't.

He grimaced as he realized it had been his daughter's dream, not his own. When she was a child, he had always been so busy with work he'd never found the time. He had once urged his wife to take her, to just go there together, the two of them, but she had refused. In those days, she never wanted to go anywhere without him. He idly wondered if she regretted that decision today.

Of course she did. How could she not?

Then Lucy had grown. She'd found a job and moved into a house of her own. She became so busy herself she never got to make that trip. When she met her husband-to-be, she swore they'd go there for their honeymoon. But that day never came.

He wiped a tear from his eye and clenched his fists.

No. He wouldn't go to Iriaki. He never could now.

He grabbed the bag he'd brought back from work and took out his things. He wouldn't normally have brought anything back at all, but he was leaving for a whole freaking month. His office was his life. There were just too many things there he couldn't do without. Not for a month.

Like this picture of him with Marcia and Lucy. He stared at it for a moment. A remnant of happier days. He set it down gently.

There was also his measure-pin, the sky-blue pen his wife had offered him on his thirty-fifth birthday, a tempclock... He froze.

He was holding the holofile that Groggan had brought him.

Why did he have this?

This wasn't good.

Not good at all.

The contents were classified. They were never supposed to leave official buildings. He could get into a lot of trouble for this. He should take the document back immediately.

He frowned and activated the file, flipping through the data again. Reading it made him uneasy. Something was off. None of this made any sense. It just couldn't be.

This was an urgent matter, he realized. He had to take it back. Let someone know it needed to be handled right away. Surely, they would forgive him... it was not like he had taken it on purpose. He had been distracted, troubled, aching...

He closed the holofile and moved his hand back toward the bag. He stopped, his frown increasing.

What if...

No.

It wouldn't be proper.

Worse. It would be illegal.

Plus, he was supposed to rest.

He snorted.

Rest.

Like he could do that.

He'd go crazy if he didn't do anything.

But what could he do?

Well...

There was one thing he could do.

He moved away from the bag, still holding the holofile, and headed to his desk, in a small office at the back of his house.

Sitting at his chair, he rummaged through drawers until he found what he was looking for: an old cloner he hadn't used in years.

Hoping it would still work after all this time, he slid it against the holofile's cover and waited. He watched with amazement as the small dark screen lit up and numbers scrolled across the screen.

As he copied the file, he tried to convince himself that everything would be okay. Nobody would know. He'd be fine. And just to be safe, he'd delete the copy when he was done.

Once his crime was perpetrated, he went back to the bag, placed the original holofile inside, then hurried to his glider.

He would return this thing to the Institute.

Then, he would travel to the Tin'kisti Belt.

And he would find out what the hell was going on there.

One way or the other.