S2 Episode 3: Halifax AI transcript and summary - episode of podcast Limetown

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Episode: S2 Episode 3: Halifax

Author: Two-Up
Duration: 00:49:03

Episode Shownotes

+32 days 1 hr since Lia Haddock’s abduction. Episode 3 of 5. Next full episode coming December 10th. Order the Limetown novel now at http://apple.co/limetownbook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Summary

In 'Halifax', Lia Haddock continues her investigation into the disappearance of residents from Limetown, focusing on a key figure, Maggie Kempner. After arriving in Halifax, Lia uncovers unsettling details about Maggie's financial past, which could link her to the Limetown survivors. Tension escalates when Lia confronts Maggie, who fears for her safety and believes two pivotal characters are dead. The episode grapples with complex themes such as ethical dilemmas in experimental technology, the emotional struggles of children impacted by communication barriers, and the haunting consequences of a tragic fire related to the Limetown mystery.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (S2 Episode 3: Halifax) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:00 Speaker_04
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I hope you like gingerbread cookies. Made them myself.

00:01:20 Speaker_11
Did you really?

00:01:21 Speaker_02
No.

00:01:23 Speaker_11
Can you get me my ball?

00:01:26 Speaker_02
If I held your ball hostage, would you tell me where Leah is?

00:01:30 Speaker_11
Wouldn't that be something?

00:01:39 Speaker_02
Alright. Let's talk about Maggie. After your meeting with Sylvia, what happened?

00:01:49 Speaker_11
I went to Halifax.

00:01:51 Speaker_02
But if your only lead was to go to Halifax, how did you know what to look for?

00:01:56 Speaker_11
There's a reason I charge so much for my time. Enlighten me. In my line of work, you have to be able to access and perform record searches in your sleep. It was a seven-hour flight from Bordeaux to Halifax.

00:02:07 Speaker_11
I ran the usual searches, work permits, visas, tax filings, looked for anything remotely unusual. Narrowed it down to a few hundred people who haven't reported income in years, which itself isn't unusual, but one woman, her timing was perfect.

00:02:21 Speaker_02
Maggie.

00:02:22 Speaker_11
Correct. She was still filing tax returns, but her returns said she wasn't making any money at all. She didn't report any new income in 10 years, so she must have been living off of whatever lump sum she got back in 2006.

00:02:34 Speaker_11
Who else lives off of lump sums?

00:02:37 Speaker_02
Limetown survivors.

00:02:38 Speaker_11
Bingo. It fit the timeline. Limetown went to shit in 2004, something happened at the bridge two years later, and this woman started living off what was probably a big payout.

00:02:48 Speaker_02
How could you be sure she was someone at the bridge?

00:02:51 Speaker_11
I wasn't sure. I had a lead. I followed it. She only had a P.O. box listed, so I went to that.

00:02:57 Speaker_02
How many hours did you have left at this point?

00:03:00 Speaker_11
From the moment I landed in Halifax, I was down to 17. How did you know you would find your answers in time? I didn't.

00:03:08 Speaker_11
Look, if you want to stress yourself out, invite chaos into your life, make yourself less effective, all you have to do is focus on the things that are outside your control. I knew a Navy SEAL who used to diffuse bombs underwater.

00:03:24 Speaker_11
Do you know how he kept his cool? He focused on what was in his control. He only focused on the next step. As long as there was oxygen in his tank and the bomb hadn't gone off, he could still diffuse it.

00:03:39 Speaker_11
As long as I had a lead and I hadn't run out of time, the mission was still on.

00:03:47 Speaker_02
So you went to her P.O. box?

00:03:49 Speaker_11
Yes.

00:03:51 Speaker_02
I heard you went on quite an adventure.

00:03:55 Speaker_11
Okay, there are 50 P.O. boxes outside this post office. All locked. Maggie Kempner is number seven. No one is here checking them. No observers. Yeah. Hi. I would like to inquire about getting a P.O. Box. We got none. It looks like you've got 50.

00:04:25 Speaker_11
They're all taken. Okay. I was hoping you could help me get in touch with someone. The person who owns P.O. Box 7? What's funny? They're all the same.

00:04:36 Speaker_06
I'm not sure. They all have the same owner. The person who has box 7 is the same person who has box 8, 9, 10, all of them. What?

00:04:49 Speaker_02
What a fun little mystery.

00:04:54 Speaker_03
Well, I've been here since 1965. Shaving, trimming, grooming, you name it, I did it.

00:05:02 Speaker_11
Yeah, but the P.O. boxes, have you seen anyone?

00:05:05 Speaker_03
Oh, one time a lady comes in asking for a trim down in her, well, you know what, her nun's naughty, if you know what I mean. And I had to say, ma'am, not today.

00:05:19 Speaker_11
Okay, but the P.O. boxes.

00:05:22 Speaker_03
What P.O. boxes?

00:05:30 Speaker_07
Hello? Coming. Oh, sorry, dear. I was just watering some hydrangeas in the back. How can I help you? Hi. I have a weird question for you.

00:05:43 Speaker_11
I'm looking for the person who checks those P.O. boxes. Maggie... Oh, Maggie Kettner. You know her?

00:05:49 Speaker_07
Well, not so much personally, but she's my biggest customer.

00:05:53 Speaker_11
I've been looking for her. We're friends. We go way back, and I know she's in the area, but the post office lost her address.

00:05:59 Speaker_07
Well, she's in here every week, picking up fresh flowers. Huge bundles. You know, come to think of it, I haven't seen her this week. We're the last. I normally do extra orders for her, and they've just been sitting in the back wilting.

00:06:14 Speaker_07
I wonder if... Well, I'd love to check in on her.

00:06:18 Speaker_11
I just don't have her address. Maybe I can pick up what she normally gets and drop them off?

00:06:22 Speaker_07
Oh, she's never liked having her flowers delivered. I did it once and she was just a bit weird about it.

00:06:28 Speaker_11
Well, we're friends. It wouldn't be weird. I could even pay for them now.

00:06:34 Speaker_07
It'd be a shame for those hydrangeas to go to waste. Okay, let me get to me. Well, I don't have her address written down, but her house isn't too hard to find, if you have a rough idea. So it's out in the middle of nowhere.

00:06:49 Speaker_11
Tick tock. How you feeling? You just focus on what's in your control. I still had time, which meant... I still had time. You have arrived. Alrighty. I'm on a very long driveway. No house in sight yet. Haven't seen a house in miles.

00:07:14 Speaker_11
Huge pond to my right that has its own island. Small cottage up ahead. There's a light on inside, but it's pretty dim. Hello? I have a flower delivery.

00:08:01 Speaker_09
Miss Kempner? Hello?

00:08:06 Speaker_11
The porch opens straight into kitchen. There's a bowl of soup, half-eaten, still warm. The scene looks disturbed. Door. Hello? Hello, Maggie?

00:08:30 Speaker_08
I couldn't do it. I couldn't. I couldn't do it.

00:08:34 Speaker_11
Maggie. Maggie Kempner.

00:08:37 Speaker_08
Oh God, please don't hurt me.

00:08:38 Speaker_11
I didn't mean to. I didn't. I couldn't. Maggie. Maggie. I am not here to hurt you. I'm just here to talk to you. Maggie. Stop. Look. There's a hole in the ceiling. Look at it, Maggie. Focus. Do you see it? Good. You did that. You were aiming for your chin.

00:09:08 Speaker_11
But you didn't go through with it. Why were you aiming a gun at your chin? Maggie, Maggie. Maggie, I am not here to hurt you. I promise. I want to ask you questions. That is all. Get up. We're going to your kitchen. You can walk.

00:09:32 Speaker_11
One foot in front of the other. We're just gonna talk. Maggie? What was that back there? You heard my car. You thought I was coming to kill you. Why would you think I want to kill you? I thought... just... I'm not here to kill you.

00:10:10 Speaker_11
I'm here to find someone else. And I need your help. No one else lives here. I understand that. I still need your help. What are you talking about? Why are you... A man named Daniel is trying to kill Emile Haddock.

00:10:29 Speaker_11
And I have less than 24 hours to stop him. They're meeting at a place called The Bridge. I need you to tell me everything you know. What is this?

00:10:39 Speaker_10
This isn't funny, okay? This isn't funny and it isn't fair and... I just need information about The Bridge so I can save Emile from... Emile and Daniel are dead. They died years ago in the fire. They're all dead.

00:10:56 Speaker_11
They're not. Both of them are alive. What are you talking about?

00:11:05 Speaker_10
They all died 10 years ago. Everyone there. And why would Daniel want to kill Emil? That's, that's just, this is messed up.

00:11:19 Speaker_11
Whatever game you're playing. They did not die 10 years ago. And I don't know why Daniel would want to kill Emil, but I do know that if I don't intervene very soon, he will probably succeed. Oh my God.

00:11:33 Speaker_11
I know you probably weren't expecting me, but I promise that once you tell me what I need to know, I will leave. So can we talk? Do I have a choice?

00:11:46 Speaker_10
Of course. OK. Can we do this outside so I can smoke? I don't like smoking inside. Sure. You can sit. It's safe. I had the whole thing reinforced with steel bolts. Your hands are shaking. I've been thinking about killing myself for a while now. It's okay.

00:12:33 Speaker_11
You didn't. That should tell you something. That I'm a coward? If you were a coward, you would have pointed it at me.

00:12:41 Speaker_10
I had a dream last night. This monster or something was trying to break in, and I grabbed the gun to shoot, only the barrel flopped down like a garden hose, like in the cartoons.

00:12:54 Speaker_11
Do I look like a monster, Maggie?

00:12:58 Speaker_10
No. But I learned a long time ago that real monsters rarely look like monsters.

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00:13:46 Speaker_00
Hi there, I'm Tracy Lien, and I wrote some of the episodes of Limetown that you're listening to. I also recently wrote the novel All That's Left Unsaid, published by HarperCollins.

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All That's Left Unsaid is a murder mystery set in a Vietnamese community in Australia.

00:14:03 Speaker_00
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Liane Moriarty, who wrote the number one bestseller Big Little Eyes, calls All That's Left Unsaid an unforgettable debut, utterly compelling from start to finish.

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You can buy it now in the US from all booksellers, including Barnes & Noble and Amazon, in the UK from Waterstones, and in Australia from Booktopia, QBD and Dimex. That's all that's left unsaid. Thank you for listening.

00:14:52 Speaker_12
Okay.

00:14:54 Speaker_02
I am so curious how you do that.

00:14:57 Speaker_11
What?

00:14:59 Speaker_02
All these people have no reason to talk to you. But they talk to you.

00:15:06 Speaker_11
We've talked about this. I adapt to whoever I'm talking to and I say the things they want to hear.

00:15:12 Speaker_02
But why do you listen then? What do you mean? The clock is ticking. You need specific information, but you're asking her to tell you about her whole life, and you listen to her.

00:15:26 Speaker_11
So much of what I do is patience. Patiently observing a target, learning patterns, learning hopes, dreams.

00:15:32 Speaker_02
Weaknesses.

00:15:34 Speaker_11
Letting people talk gives you the information you need, and then the information you didn't know you needed. You just have to know how to filter it. It's why I'm a fixer and not an assassin.

00:15:45 Speaker_02
But you do kill people.

00:15:46 Speaker_11
I fix things.

00:15:52 Speaker_10
I was an overqualified childcare worker, okay? I got a call from my ex, Paul. He was a chemical engineer and he just started working for some, um... How did he put it? Patent farmer. He said it was like a micro Silicon Valley on steroids.

00:16:17 Speaker_10
Super secretive in Canada and they needed someone to work childcare. I told him he could get screwed. Things had ended badly between us. I was gonna hang up before he gave me the number. They were offering me $250,000 a year to do childcare.

00:16:37 Speaker_10
Just a few hours a day. Hard to stay noble in the face of that kind of money. I told myself it was the same job, and if there was more money to be made, all the better. Also, my dad was sick at that point. Alzheimer's. I couldn't be around it.

00:17:01 Speaker_10
So it was an easy way to pay off someone else to take care of him. I didn't know what the project was until they made me sign all the NDAs. Something like they'd eat my firstborn if I ever said a word to anyone about anything.

00:17:19 Speaker_10
When I got there, I learned that the bridge was a barge just off the coast of Halifax.

00:17:25 Speaker_10
It was permanently docked, but I guess being on the water meant it fell out of the jurisdiction of local police and government, and maritime police couldn't care less. You mean like a shipping container barge? Yes and no.

00:17:38 Speaker_10
Think of how a fancy cruise ship can be. This barge wasn't too far from that. It was like a campus on a boat. There were three floors. If you picture it, the hallways were on the outer rim.

00:17:52 Speaker_10
To get from one room to another, you had to walk around the outer perimeter of the barge. What were they doing there? They were making a contact lens that let you read other people's thoughts. A direct brain connection. No more talking. Mind reading.

00:18:13 Speaker_10
An evolution of the Limetown tech? It seems so. Yes. A bridge, if you will. You spend enough time with tech people, and you quickly learn that their lofty plans to change the world have no legs. But it was never my job to be convinced.

00:18:32 Speaker_10
I was there for the kids, and they were paying me more money in a year than I had made in my entire life by a lot. Weren't you skeptical? Well, yes. Every researcher on that barge had problems.

00:18:46 Speaker_10
Paul was fired from his last job for a bunch of ethical violations. Going ahead with clinical trials on humans before getting approval, that sort of thing. These are all brilliant people who just couldn't follow the rules and were basically unhirable.

00:19:03 Speaker_10
Hi, baby. Now's not a good time. He's my alarm clock. I have to feed the hens before he goes nuts. Do you mind if we finish first? He's going to just keep barking. I can't focus like this.

00:19:17 Speaker_10
I can tell you more, I will, but I need to do the normal things right now. Okay. Oh, good boy, Humphrey. Always taking care of your chicken friends, right?

00:19:33 Speaker_02
Maggie. How'd she look?

00:19:37 Speaker_11
Well, I walked in on her trying to kill herself, so... I'd say pretty bad.

00:19:48 Speaker_02
It shouldn't have gone that way for her.

00:19:51 Speaker_11
Seems like anyone who came remotely close to Limetown spent the rest of their lives shitting themselves in fear. It really was a great idea, don't you think?

00:20:01 Speaker_02
I just don't know how you can look someone in the eye who is hurting like that and not feel anything.

00:20:08 Speaker_11
You don't know what I feel. That's my design.

00:20:15 Speaker_02
Let's continue.

00:20:21 Speaker_10
Okay, the bridge. I taught myself Farsi while I was there. Beautiful language.

00:20:27 Speaker_11
Okay. I need you to focus.

00:20:30 Speaker_10
Yes, okay, I get it. The bridge. We were there on the barge for 18 months before there were any major breakthroughs. One day they called a barge-wide meeting and showed us a contact lens. It looked like a regular contact, but it had a blue rim.

00:20:49 Speaker_10
They told us we'd all start testing it. That no one would be left out. That was the rule. No exceptions. The lead researcher gave this whole spiel about inclusion and diversity, but it was in relation to making everyone wear the damn thing.

00:21:06 Speaker_10
There was a set for everyone on board. The 15 researchers, the cook, the cleaner, the tutor, security, me, even the children. The children? I was against it. The youngest kid, Sonny, was barely two. You can't go sticking a contact lens into a baby's eye.

00:21:25 Speaker_10
But I had no say. So where was the... They were pushing out updates every week. They added a kind of control panel that showed up in front of your eyes and you could change the settings with your thoughts. You could filter by geography.

00:21:39 Speaker_10
You could mute the groups or individuals. It took them a few months to figure out how you could put up a wall so no one could read your thoughts, so that made for an uncomfortable time. I bet.

00:21:52 Speaker_10
There wasn't an HR, so the lead researcher, Lyle, had to call an impromptu meeting telling everyone to try their hardest to keep their thoughts PG-13. He should have taken his own advice.

00:22:07 Speaker_10
We teach the kids mental exercises like visualizing the building of a wall, brick by brick, and as long as they kept thinking of the wall, then anyone trying to read their thoughts would only see a wall. The kids should never have gotten the contact.

00:22:25 Speaker_10
Did it affect them differently? Of course. Speech is like anything else. You need to learn to do it, and then you need to practice doing it. You go from crying and throwing tantrums to speaking, and life gets so much easier.

00:22:44 Speaker_10
Sunny and Val, they were two and three. They stopped talking. Sunny had just started when he arrived at the bridge. He was stringing together basic sentences by the time he got the contact.

00:22:58 Speaker_10
But with the contact, he could communicate what he wanted without having to struggle with new words or getting his mouth and tongue to pronounce things correctly. The researchers thought it was fantastic.

00:23:11 Speaker_10
But as I kept telling them, what happens if they don't have the contact? They didn't listen to you? No. Of course not. I was being paid a lot, but I was still just the childcare worker. They thought I was being a negative Nancy about it.

00:23:27 Speaker_10
That I wasn't seeing the future. It sounds like you were the only sensible one. They were just so enamored by what was possible that they didn't stop to think about what people are actually like or how relationships even work.

00:23:44 Speaker_10
People need to learn to communicate with words, with actions. As part of growing up, we shouldn't have to be mind readers. Within three months of the contact being introduced, the barge had basically gone silent. It was surreal.

00:24:05 Speaker_10
You'd wake up and forget to put in your contact, walk into the dining room for breakfast, and here were nearly 30 people all sitting together eating in complete silence. It was like someone had hit the mute button on the world.

00:24:20 Speaker_10
And then you'd hear a kid laugh, because people still laughed with their voices, even while wearing the contact lens, and it was Creepy. It's like a bad dream. The kids took to it really, really fast. They became so attached to it.

00:24:38 Speaker_10
The younger kids would throw tantrums if you tried to take it from them. They called in a psych at one point. Unlicensed, of course. He lost his license to practice a while ago, but they called him in because they could buy his discretion.

00:24:52 Speaker_10
He just shrugged, said they'd grow out of it. I would sometimes take out my contact during childcare hours to force the kids to talk to me. I remember once, Madhya, who was five, coming up to me and just staring at me with a furrowed brow.

00:25:11 Speaker_10
I asked her, using speech, what is it? And she just furrowed her brows even harder, put her hands on her hips and huffed. It was cute for a moment, and then she let out this shriek. This ear-piercing shriek that wouldn't stop.

00:25:36 Speaker_10
I tried to calm her, but she just started thrashing. She grabbed my hair and pulled out a fistful. One of the older kids had to hold her down while I ran upstairs to get my contact. When I could finally connect with her, her feelings washed over me.

00:25:54 Speaker_10
There was so much happening, frustration, anger. She was five, but her rage was so sophisticated, beyond her years in a matter of speaking. The contact exacerbated all those feelings because it made communication so easy for them.

00:26:20 Speaker_10
But it also meant that when they reached a roadblock, They didn't know what to do with it. Without the contact, they lost the ability to comprehend. So they howl. That sounds horrifying. When you're in it, you only focus on what you can control.

00:26:37 Speaker_11
I admire people like that.

00:26:40 Speaker_10
You're a strong woman. I should have focused on what was best for the kids. Older kids didn't have that same problem. They had time to cement their spoken language skills, but there were other problems.

00:27:00 Speaker_10
Children have always lied and deflected through speech, and they did the same through thought. Madhya once came to me crying, showing that Richie had pulled her hair. You could see in her mind the scene playing out.

00:27:14 Speaker_10
She's playing with Play-Doh and suddenly feels a sharp yanking sensation in her scalp. She turns around and there's Richie, a bigger boy, laughing. I called Richie out on it and he projected a different scene. His vision showed Tyler doing it.

00:27:30 Speaker_10
Tyler's vision showed Richie doing it. So you can see how this isn't helpful. So who did it? Oh, Richie, of course. Tyler was a bastion of justice. He was only seven, but he would stand up for anyone who he felt was being picked on.

00:27:47 Speaker_10
Richie's dad, Lyle, used to always cut in front of the women in the dinner queue. And I never said anything because I just didn't see the point.

00:27:57 Speaker_10
But one time he cut in front of me and Tyler tapped him on the elbow and said, excuse me, Miss Maggie was ahead of you. Lyle was so embarrassed. I guess he'd never been called out like that before. Tyler. Tyler is Daniel's son. Correct.

00:28:14 Speaker_10
He also had a daughter, Macy. They were there for a meal. Daniel was his bodyguard.

00:28:21 Speaker_11
And you knew them?

00:28:23 Speaker_10
Well, I knew everyone. We all lived on the bridge. But of all the parents, I probably knew Daniel the best. He was definitely the most present parent. And because Daniel was always with Emil, I got to know him, too.

00:28:38 Speaker_10
He was the only parent on the bridge that wasn't a researcher. And that made a difference. The researchers, there was always an arrogance with them. Some treated me like I was a servant, but Daniel treated me like I was a person.

00:28:55 Speaker_10
He was always a bit guarded. His wife had died years earlier in a car accident when the kids were really young. I know he had a lot of anxiety about raising both Tyler and Macy on his own. He was very protective. His kids turned out great, though.

00:29:13 Speaker_10
God, after the fire... And when did that happen?

00:29:17 Speaker_11
There's nothing left of it. So, what would it mean if Daniel is meeting Emil at the bridge?

00:29:29 Speaker_10
I haven't talked about them since the fire. I don't know what caused it. I wasn't there. But if we're going to talk about the bridge, then I'm going to talk about those kids because no one seems to remember them, and that's wrong.

00:29:49 Speaker_10
Those kids should have lived, and I should have done more to help. But I'm bad at confrontation and saying the hard things to powerful people, and it's much easier to point the gun at my own head than the real problem. I'm sorry.

00:30:14 Speaker_11
Don't be. I'd love to hear about them.

00:30:22 Speaker_10
The two of them, Daniel and Emil, used to leave the bridge with Daniel's kids a few times a week for dinner at the Dick. And one time, Macy invited me. I was new, so I hadn't really gotten to know anyone. Daniel had been standoffish,

00:30:42 Speaker_10
So we go to the dick, and Daniel's not saying anything, and Emile is kind of awkward. And Macy... I have never seen a 12-year-old read a room so well. She was being so... kind. Totally overcompensating for her dad's coldness.

00:31:06 Speaker_10
She was handing me the menu and telling me I should order first and making recommendations for all of her favorite things. And then her little brother, Tyler, also chimes in and asks me what food I like, and then he starts making recommendations.

00:31:23 Speaker_10
After a while, when the grownups still weren't talking, these kids put their hands on the table like they were in a boardroom or something, and Macy says, Okay, Dad, what's going on? We have a guest here and you're acting like a child.

00:31:39 Speaker_10
They were really something else. They broke the ice for us. Daniel was always a really tough guy. He used to be a heavyweight boxer. Really intimidating. But he was a big softie with his kids. Told the worst jokes.

00:32:00 Speaker_10
One time the cook on the bridge made everyone wontons for dinner, and he says to Tyler and Macy, this is without a doubt the heaviest meal I've ever eaten. Get it? Wontons. Oh, God. Tyler laughed, but Macy rolled her eyes so hard she hurt herself.

00:32:19 Speaker_10
And Emil? He and Daniel, I think they both felt like outsiders. And they were, especially on a barge full of wonky scientists. Daniel and Emil had an understanding. Emil became part of the family.

00:32:36 Speaker_10
I mean, those kids knew how to make someone feel welcomed. Like they belonged. When Tyler and Macy talked to you, you felt like you were the most important person to them. If the kids approved of someone, Daniel approved of them.

00:32:55 Speaker_10
All of the researchers on the bridge had all this reverence for Emil, treated him like he was special or precious, and Tyler and Macy treated him just like anybody else. Watching them reminded me that there were normal people out there.

00:33:12 Speaker_10
They kept you sane. Yeah. Daniel's family used the contact like anyone else, but when they left the bridge, they'd use speech. Mostly for my benefit, because they knew how I felt about the need to speak.

00:33:29 Speaker_10
But they also didn't want to weird out the waitstaff at the Dick.

00:33:33 Speaker_11
You keep saying the Dick. Was the restaurant actually called that? Like D-I-C-K?

00:33:41 Speaker_10
Um, no. Don Quixote. It was this cheesy tapas place close to the bridge that was really more of Tex-Mex on tiny plates than actual Spanish tapas. Their sign out front abbreviated Don Quixote to DQ, which Macy said was pronounced phonetically as dick.

00:34:04 Speaker_10
Daniel told her to watch her language, but she said it was just phonetics. This is my memorial for the children. I guess it's for everyone who was on the bridge. It was the first thing I had built when I bought this property.

00:34:27 Speaker_10
The fountain and the flower garden. I couldn't say goodbye. They didn't have funerals, so I... I grew a garden for them. Just to remember. To apologize. For what?

00:34:51 Speaker_11
Outliving them. How did the fire happen?

00:35:01 Speaker_10
I need to sit down. The contact was close to being done. We were two years into the bridge. I think they said something like a few more months and it would be ready for market. People were now wearing the contact all day.

00:35:22 Speaker_10
Some people even went to sleep with it, even though you weren't supposed to. I had to leave the bridge for a while. My father passed away. I'm sorry. I feel shitty for saying it, but by then it was a relief more than anything.

00:35:39 Speaker_10
I was the only family he had. I had to go settle the estate. There wasn't a lot, but it still took time. I was gonna be gone for a month, and the tutor was filling in for me.

00:35:52 Speaker_10
I'd left my contact behind, because I didn't want to think about it while I was away. Macy told me I should bring it so she could send me her thoughts, so I would know she was thinking of me. The contact could transmit pretty far by then.

00:36:10 Speaker_10
I told her it was sweet of her, and of course I wanted to hear from her, but I just needed time to sort out, I don't know, becoming an orphan, I guess. She told me she understood, but I could tell from her feelings that she didn't.

00:36:30 Speaker_10
And that she thought I didn't want to hear from her. I can't believe that was the last exchange between us. It ended up taking five weeks. I'd written postcards during that time to Macy and Tyler and Daniel.

00:36:51 Speaker_10
I thought they might appreciate how old school it was. They never wrote back. When I got back to Halifax, there were people waiting for me at the airport. I didn't recognize them, but they knew who I was.

00:37:09 Speaker_10
They said they were from the agency that was in charge of the bridge. They gave me a name. It was some acronym. IDS? I don't remember. It was a combination of letters and numbers. They drove me to an office on the outskirts of town.

00:37:26 Speaker_10
I kept asking them what was going on, and they wouldn't say. And when I told them I needed to be back at work, they ignored me. They sat me down in this windowless room. There were two of them, a man who never said anything and a woman.

00:37:43 Speaker_10
The woman was clearly in charge. She was around my age, very cold. She sounded like a robot. She told me that while I was away, there had been an accident at the bridge, an electrical fire.

00:38:03 Speaker_10
It happened in the middle of the night when everyone was asleep. She said everything had been destroyed along with everyone on board. That doesn't sound suspicious at all. I didn't believe her. The bridge was a state-of-the-art facility.

00:38:19 Speaker_10
There were smoke detectors everywhere. How can an entire ship burn without even one person getting off? It was dark to land. It didn't make any sense.

00:38:30 Speaker_10
I just kept telling her that she was full of shit, and I didn't know why she was doing this to me, so... She showed me photos. Photos of what? Bodies. Charred. Unrecognizable. There were small ones. It was the children.

00:39:02 Speaker_10
I was the only person who didn't die because I wasn't there. I'm sorry. I just... I... I kept thinking. The last conversations I had with them. Those kids. Remembering the exact feeling Macy had when she thought I didn't want to hear from her.

00:39:32 Speaker_08
I was the only adult around when they played, when they let their guard down so I could feel what the other adults missed.

00:39:44 Speaker_10
Remnants from nightmares that bounced around in the playrooms.

00:39:52 Speaker_08
I should have brought the contact with me to soothe them, to let them know I was thinking about them, that I cared, and instead, She thought I didn't want to hear from her or any of them. That was her last experience with me.

00:40:18 Speaker_08
That was how I made her feel. I wish she could have known how much I adored her, how much I adored all of them. But of course I wanted to hear from her. Of course I wanted to hear her stories.

00:40:43 Speaker_11
They knew you cared, Maggie. Kids know who looks out for them. So what did the people who picked you up at the airport do then?

00:41:05 Speaker_10
Then they slap another contract on the table. On top of the photos, they don't even bother to clear the table. It's another NDA and another number.

00:41:18 Speaker_10
If I promised to never say a word about this, about my time at the bridge, about anything I heard or saw, they would guarantee me a payout, a lump sum in cash and a promise that I'd be left alone. I had so many questions.

00:41:36 Speaker_10
If 30 people had died, why wasn't it reported in the news? Was there a police investigation? Were there records? Did the families know? What about funeral services?

00:41:48 Speaker_10
The woman told me that Maritime Police had looked into it, that it had been discreet, given the nature of the work happening on the bridge. She said the families knew and settlements had been paid.

00:42:00 Speaker_10
I knew she was lying, and she knew I knew she was lying. What could I do? I was in shock, so I signed it. And you never went to the police. Would you have?

00:42:15 Speaker_10
Knowing that these people were possibly responsible for the deaths of 30 people, and had done such a good job of covering it up, that there was no record of the bridge or the accident anywhere? No.

00:42:27 Speaker_11
You did the right thing.

00:42:29 Speaker_10
That woman. If you'd spoken to her, you'd have known that she doesn't care. If I so much as thought of going to the police, she would have made me disappear. Just like she made all those people in Limetown disappear. Lenore.

00:42:50 Speaker_10
She never gave me her name, but you heard her. The whole world heard her.

00:42:57 Speaker_11
And you thought she'd sent me here today.

00:43:00 Speaker_10
I... It had never occurred to me that the contact lens came from somewhere else. I thought we made it at the bridge, but then, duh, why call it the bridge, right? When I heard those Limetown interviews and Leah Haddock, it all clicked for me.

00:43:14 Speaker_10
Of course, it was stolen tech. All this time, hundreds of people died so that we could make the contact. I thought this was all over 10 years ago, and then the Limetown broadcast.

00:43:31 Speaker_11
If the bridge is destroyed... It is. I've gone back. What's left of it?

00:43:38 Speaker_10
There was barely a dock. You could see parts of it. What was left was blackened. It was definitely a fire, but the barge itself was gone. I was hoping for some closure, hoping that seeing it I would be able to move on, but... The opposite happened.

00:44:01 Speaker_10
I could picture it. The fire, I could feel their fear, their confusion, the sheer terror of it all. I didn't have the tech anymore, but I could feel it like I did. Maybe it was psychosomatic, I don't know, but I know what I felt.

00:44:26 Speaker_10
I felt those kids die, and I could never, ever forget it. Why do you believe that Daniel and Emile are alive?

00:44:41 Speaker_11
I've heard from Daniel. Not directly. And I've spoken to people who have seen him, as recently as a few years ago. He's alive.

00:44:50 Speaker_08
God.

00:44:51 Speaker_11
If Daniel wanted to meet Emile at the bridge, but the bridge isn't there anymore, what could he mean?

00:44:58 Speaker_10
Lenore said everyone on board died, including Daniel, but if Daniel is alive, the children... Maggie, where would Daniel and Emile meet if they said they were meeting at the bridge? No, no, no, you're not listening.

00:45:13 Speaker_10
If they're alive, it means... Maggie, where was the bridge? I need an address. Maggie! Pope's Harbor. It was just off Trunk Highway 7. The bridge is gone, but the dick is still there. Did you say they'll be there? No.

00:45:42 Speaker_09
Wait. Wait. If you're going to find them, I'm coming too. I can save them this time. I won't fail them. I can. If we find them... Maggie, listen to me. I was lying to you.

00:45:56 Speaker_11
I work for Lenore, and the only reason I didn't kill you was because I feel sorry for you. But you need to disappear now. Use whatever resources you have to go anywhere else and never come back. The next person won't be as soft-hearted.

00:46:14 Speaker_09
I don't believe you! Maggie, don't do this. Please, please let me come. I want to help. Goddammit, stop! I need to help! I know you're good! I know you can make this stop! I see you for who you are!

00:46:45 Speaker_02
Why did you stop recording?

00:46:48 Speaker_11
I don't record kills if I can help it.

00:46:51 Speaker_02
Why did you kill her?

00:46:52 Speaker_11
She knew where I was going and she would have followed me and I could not allow that.

00:46:56 Speaker_02
How did you do it?

00:46:57 Speaker_11
It doesn't matter.

00:46:58 Speaker_02
What did you do?

00:46:59 Speaker_11
I finished what she started. Say it! I put a bullet through her chin and I made it seem like she did it.