10:58 a.m.
Trace’s expression reminded Jenna of how Zack had regarded her in the Everglades, just before—
I stabbed him in the eye.
—he tried to kill her. There was no grin of triumph, no exultation of sadistic bloodlust. Just a grim mask of resolve to perform an unpleasant task for the greater good, like cleaning up a toxic waste spill or putting out a brushfire.
You are dangerous.
He brought his gun up with a determined brusqueness. She could almost read his thoughts: Make it quick. Don’t let her distract you. She’ll kill you if she gets the chance.
Jenna doubted very much that she was physically capable of killing him. Just trying to speak left her on the verge of collapse. “How…did you find me?”
No real mystery there. The drainage system was probably a matter of public record. One phone call, and Cort would have known where she would end up. After that, it would have been a simple matter to intercept her on the river. She did not need an explanation. She just needed to make him realize that if he pulled the trigger, he would be killing a real human being. Trace showed no indication that he had even heard her.
You have to live.
How?
Flight? Impossible. She wasn’t sure she could muster the strength to stand, much less make a dash for the tree line, and even if she could manage that, Trace was so close, she wouldn’t get two steps.
Fight?
With what?
She closed her right hand over a smooth river stone the size of her fist. She could throw it. Even if she didn’t put him out of commission, it might buy her a second or two to run.
And then what?
Her inner voice had no advice to give, but to her surprise, Noah’s advice came to her. Your gut reaction to a threat will be to either run away, as fast as you can, or to blow through it head on… But a lot of times, those are the worst choices you could make. You might make a bad situation even worse, or you might miss out on an opportunity.
Opportunity?
She had just seconds to live, and she had already tried and failed to engage Trace. No doubt he had been skilled in the same arts of manipulation that Noah had taught her. What did that leave?
“I saw the signal!” she blurted. “The alien transmission. I know what it says.”
Trace’s expression did not change, but he did not fire.
“You guys are wrong if you think it’s from Earth. It’s not. I know who sent it and why. And I’m the only person who can tell you what it says. Kill me, and you’ll never be able to stop what’s coming.”
Trace remained statue still for several more seconds.
This isn’t working. Jenna curled her fist tighter on the rock. She would only get one chance, and even if she managed to connect, he would still get a shot off. I need to turn sideways, make myself less of a target, keep my vital areas protected…
Trace raised the radio unit once more. “This is Trace. I think you should hear what the girl has to say.”
54
11:05 a.m.
“Get up,” Trace snarled, giving himself plenty of room in case she tried anything. Not that she had any intention of doing so. After Trace had reported her words to Cort, he had been advised to bring her back to the observatory, and that meant Cort was willing to hear what she had to say.
Opportunity.
She got to hands and knees, but when she tried to stand up, a wave of vertigo forced her back down. “I don’t think I can,” she said.
“You’d better. The only way you’re getting out of here alive is on your feet.”
She didn’t think he was exaggerating. Grinding her teeth, she managed to stand. Once again, the world started spinning, so she staggered toward the woods. Ignoring Trace’s shouts, she threw her arms around the nearest tree and hugged it until the sensation passed.
She made her way from tree to tree, following a path that led up to a rural road, where another agent waited at a parked car. Trace directed Jenna to sit in the back then slid in beside her.
Ignoring the gun barrel pressed up under her ribs, Jenna closed her eyes and allowed herself to drift. Life slowly seeped back into her chilled muscles, but she knew that her continued survival would now depend more on her mental abilities than a swift physical recovery. She would have to convince Cort that she was worth more to him alive than dead.
During their first encounter, the advantage had been his, but now she was in possession of a secret that could change the world. The trick would be convincing Cort that she was telling the truth.
Does he need to know the truth?
The question hit her like an epiphany. Cort was not some potential ally she needed to win over. He was her enemy. He wanted to kill her.
“They will fear you,” the teacher had said, “not because of what you are, but because your very existence will force them to admit what they really are. Humanity has been judged and found wanting, and you are the proof. They will fear you. They will try to kill you.”
Cort had said almost exactly the same thing. They’ll find you! They will kill you!
Almost as an afterthought, the teacher had added. “They cannot be trusted.”
Jenna remembered the teacher’s words vividly, even though she knew now that this was an implanted memory. Not a false memory. It was as real as anything she had experienced. Stranger still, she could feel the rightness of the words. They were a part of her, the only possible explanation for who she was, and why she had always been different than everyone else. She could no more question the validity of these feelings than she could doubt her love of chocolate or her dislike for country music. It was simply who she was. More importantly, it defined what she had to do.
Soter had been more right than he knew when he had spoken of her destiny.
You have work to do.
You have to live.
The car’s abrupt halt roused her from the state of half-sleep, and she opened her eyes to see the familiar road leading up to the observatory. A police car partially blocked the lane, but the officer waved them on and Jenna saw no more evidence of law enforcement. There was no trace of the tourists or civilian personnel. In the brief time since her failed escape, Cort had taken over the observatory and shut it down.
The car continued up the now desolate road and parked in front of the transmitter building. Jenna remained still, staring out the window, until Trace told her to get out. Jenna complied, moving robotically, careful not to do anything to provoke him. The short car ride had restored some of her vital energy, but she was in no shape to fight or run.
As Trace ushered her into the transmitter building, Jenna saw the physical evidence of the battle that had been waged to take the building—gouges in the walls, broken windows, bloodstains—but the bodies had been removed. A miasma of smoke hung in the air but the fire in the electrical room had been put out. The building seemed to be deserted. Jenna saw no one—alive or dead—until she reached the control room.
She took in the scene in gulps of recognition. Mercy was there, alive and apparently unhurt, sitting on the floor with her back to the wall. Soter was there too, looking a little rattled, but otherwise intact. A single gunman stood guard over them.
Next, Jenna saw Cort, still wearing the same tropical shirt, but his trousers had been replaced by baggy sweatpants. He stood with the aid of crutches. His scowl deepened when he saw her. “Well, look what the cat dragged in.”
Until that moment, Jenna had not considered what she must look like. Bruised and battered, still soaking wet, and barely able to stand—if she looked half as wrecked as she felt, then Cort’s remark was probably justified. Still, his words raised a spark of defiance. “Sorry about your leg, Cort. I should have aimed a little higher.”
Her taunt did not evoke the rage she expected. Cort, like all the other killers that had been sent after her, seemed to have mastered the trick of depersonalizing the grim business of sanctioned murder. Instead of retorting with a threat, Cort simply regarded her
for a moment then turned to the other person in the room.
Noah Flood came forward, almost at a run, and swept Jenna into his arms.
Jenna felt her sense of reality crumble. She stood there, unable to move, feeling his familiar strength, breathing in his scent, and she felt as if she were once more in the underground river, being carried along by a current too powerful to resist, toward an unknowable fate. She wanted nothing more than to believe that this was real, that Noah was here to rescue her and take her away to safety, but she couldn’t endure the roller coaster of emotions anymore.
“Normally, I’d get all teary-eyed at this little Hallmark moment,” Cort remarked, “But then I remember how many good men you’ve killed today, and I just want to put a bullet through your brain.”
Noah jumped to her defense. “You know that wasn’t her fault.”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass whose fault it is. She’s dangerous, and you know it.”
Jenna raised her hands, placed her palms flat against Noah’s chest, and pushed him away. A pained look creased his face, and he let out a soft grunt. It wasn’t the hurt of rejection but real, physical pain. Cray’s bullet had not killed him, but it hadn’t simply bounced off either. She forced down the upwelling of concern and addressed Cort. “You’re right. I’m dangerous, and so are all the others. You have no idea what you’re facing.”
“That’s why you’re still alive, kid. You’re gonna explain it to me.”
“And what do I get in return?”
Cort flashed a mirthless and insincere smile. “Anything you want. I’ll write you a blank check.”
“What you will do,” Noah interjected, “is guarantee her safety. And if I have even a moment of doubt about whether you’ll keep that promise—”
“Stay out of this,” Cort leveled his venomous gaze at Noah. “You’ve caused enough trouble for one lifetime. But you know, you’re right. She was just defending herself. You’re the one who’s really to blame for all of this. We let you get away with it fifteen years ago, because we thought you could handle it. I guess we know better now, don’t we?”
“You’re wrong about her.”
“She’s dangerous,” Cort insisted. “She’ll turn on you the first chance she gets, and then we’ll all be screwed.”
He turned to Jenna. “Here’s what’s going to happen, little girl. You are going to start talking. If I like what I hear, you get to keep breathing. You’ll be taken to a secure facility—I won’t tell you where—and that’s where you’ll spend the rest of your life. How long that might be will depend on how good your information is. That’s as close to a guarantee as you’re going to get.”
“Everything is going to be all right.” Jenna realized that Noah was speaking to her. “I know you’ve been through a lot. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you, but now I am. We’ll get through it together, okay?”
Cort let out a low growl of displeasure.
“Okay?” Noah asked. “You trust me?”
Jenna didn’t know how to answer. Was this another trick? Were Cort and Noah working together, playing some kind of good-cop/bad-cop game? She couldn’t tell. She would never be able to tell. These two men were as skillful at deception as they were at violence.
Listen to your gut, but make up your own damn mind.
Her gut told her that she had no choice but to trust him.
You have to live.
Yes. I think I do.
She held his gaze. “Aren’t you worried about what I might do?”
“Should I be?”
“You tell me. You’re the one who said I was a ticking time-bomb.”
“That’s not what I said...” He inclined his head, ceding the point. “But I do know a thing or two about defusing time-bombs.” He managed a wan smile. “I said that to get you away from Soter, but I don’t believe it. Nobody is born evil. The universe doesn’t work that way. Those others—the clones—might have your DNA, but they aren’t you. Soter raised them to be what they are. I raised you.”
“Nurture wins over nature?”
“Exactly. I’d like to think I raised you pretty well.”
She nodded. “I trust you.”
“Tell him what you know.”
Jenna faced Cort and took a deep breath. “For starters, you’re wrong about what’s going on here. This isn’t some Cold War Soviet disinformation campaign, and what’s happening right now has nothing to do with the Russians.”
“So, what then?” Cort asked. “Aliens?”
Jenna nodded, and with more certainty than she felt, continued. “The messages Dr. Soter received came from an extraterrestrial intelligence that wants to take over the Earth. They think that we’re a disease, and that if they don’t step in, we’ll make the planet unlivable. They want the Earth for themselves, but before they can take over, they need to get rid of us, and what better way to do it than to have us destroy ourselves. The things that have been happening—what you told me the others like me are doing—that’s just the first step.”
“You were here for what, half an hour?” Cort’s demeanor remained skeptical, but his question was sincere, and Jenna wondered if the Agency he worked for had not already secretly reached the same conclusion. “How do you know all this?”
“The second transmission received by Dr. Soter contained an entire human genome, which he used to create…us. What you call ‘clones.’” Jenna paused. She would have to choose her words carefully now to avoid raising questions she wasn’t willing to answer. “Our DNA includes instructions from the aliens, and the message itself contains the trigger to bring our memories of those instructions to the surface.”
She turned to Noah. “Remember what you said? ‘It’s like a switch gets thrown.’ Something hardwired into our DNA. You were right on both counts.
“Soter hoped that the DNA transmission contained instructions for creating a human ambassador—someone who could communicate with the aliens. He thought that we would be able to read the part of the message that he could never decipher. When it didn’t work, when the clones read the message and…changed…he thought it was some error in his gene sequencing. Back to the drawing board. But it wasn’t an error. The message activated those buried memories. It told them what they were supposed to do: start World War III.”
She paused, letting it sink in, and was surprised by how much she cared about Noah’s reaction. Not only had she just confirmed his original worst case scenario about the clones, she had also admitted to reading the message, activating the alien memories coded in her DNA. If he had any doubt about whether she was damaged goods, she had just removed it. Yet, if Noah felt that way, he gave no indication.
It doesn’t matter what he thinks, cautioned an inner voice. Her own voice, but also the voice of the teacher. They will fear you. They will try to kill you.
“So?” Cort asked. “Soter’s science projects blow a gasket and try to destroy the world. You’re not telling us anything we didn’t already know.”
“Aren’t you listening? These aren’t random actions. It’s the prelude to an invasion.”
Cort stared hard at her. “Let’s say I believe you. You’re one of them. Why should I trust you?”
“Because I’m one of them,” Jenna said, speaking slowly as if explaining a difficult concept to an impatient child. “I know what they’re doing. I know how they think. And…” She took a deep breath. “I know what’s going to happen next. If you want to stop them, you need my help.”
Noah nodded to Cort as if to say: See? Told you, but Cort just shook his head. “Sorry kid, but if that’s all you’ve got, you’re not worth the bother.”
He nodded to Trace.
“Cort!” Noah’s protest had a menacing air to it. “That wasn’t the deal.”
“There is no deal,” Cort said, shaking his head. “There never was, and you know it. This isn’t even my decision to make. There’s no other way.”
“There’s always another way.”
“Not this time.”
Cort’s pronouncement had the finality of a guillotine, but then he added. “Look, I get that you think of her as your daughter—”
“She is my daughter,” Noah replied in a quiet voice.
He moved so quickly that even Jenna was startled. In the blink of an eye, he was behind Cort, gun drawn and pressed up under Cort’s jaw. Cort dropped his crutches in surprise, letting them clatter loudly on the floor.
Trace and the other two gunmen brought their weapons up, aiming in Noah’s direction. Jenna did not doubt that they were expert marksmen, capable of hitting what little of Noah’s form was visible behind his human shield, but doing so would almost certainly result in Cort’s death. She wondered if that mattered to them. Would they be willing to sacrifice their leader to make sure Jenna was dead?
As if reading her thoughts, Trace shifted his aim to her. “I’ll kill her.”
“Don’t do it,” Noah warned, moving his gun to cover Trace.
More shouted threats sizzled between the armed men, all of them talking but no one hearing. Somebody was going to pull a trigger, and once that happened, everyone in the room would probably die.
Jenna could feel the situation reaching a boiling point. She had to do something to stop the room from exploding into a storm of violence, but what difference could she make, unarmed, exhausted and helpless?
You have to live. They will fear you.
I have to make them fear me, she thought, and she realized she wasn’t as helpless as she believed.
55
11:20 a.m.
“Stop!”
Jenna’s shout did not merely cut through the tension; time itself seemed to freeze. Then, one by one, guns lowered. The men fought against the command, with shaking muscles and disbelieving expressions. Their compliance was not voluntary. Jenna was as surprised as everyone else. Was this some newly discovered, genetically programmed ability, or an extension of the techniques Noah had taught her? Regardless of the explanation, she knew the effect would not last. She could already sense the window of opportunity sliding shut.
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