by Mark Alpert
And then, after a few more minutes, he got a call on his cell phone. He looked at the caller ID and saw it was his informant. He answered the phone before the second ring. “What the fuck’s going on, Van? What’s with all the women?”
“Calm down, man. You’re gonna give yourself a fucking stroke.”
“You said we’d see evidence of a drug operation, but I don’t know what the hell I’m looking at. It’s like a fucking ballroom-dancing party down there.”
“If you just shut the fuck up for a second, I’ll show you the evidence. Point the cameras at the far left side of the barnyard.”
“Left side? What the fuck do you mean? From what perspective?”
“From the back of the barn. Just look near the yard’s southern wall.”
Larson repeated the instructions to Lieutenant Sims, who fiddled with the joystick on his computer. The drone shifted the camera lens until the screen of Larson’s laptop showed the area near the wall. About a dozen people were there, most of them on their feet and rushing back to the barn. But one figure in particular caught his attention, a man in Amish clothes lying facedown on the ground. Larson pointed at the screen. “Zoom in on that guy,” he told Sims.
The lieutenant increased the magnification. On the screen, two men approached the prone figure and bent over to pick him up. One of them was Amish, but the other man wore normal clothes. He was big too, and his skin was dark. Larson felt a jolt of adrenaline. “No, this guy!” he shouted, pointing at the fucker. “Zoom in on him!”
At just that moment the man raised his head, as if he’d somehow overheard Larson’s order. He looked straight at the drone’s camera from eight miles below.
It was John fucking Rogers.
TWENTY-THREE
For the next hour John sat in a corner of the barn beside Ariel, Gower, and Claudia. Along with hundreds of other nervous, cranky people, they had to cool their heels on the barn’s straw-littered floor, surrounded by hay bales and milking machines and dairy cows that lowed in their stalls.
Conroy and several of his guardsmen took Archibald away, presumably to interrogate him. Elizabeth, meanwhile, rushed to an emergency meeting of the Elders in one of the farmhouses. Ariel was anxious to leave the barn too; she wanted to go down to her lab with John so she could figure out what the Fountain protein was doing to him. But there was still too much hydrogen sulfide in the cavern. Although the flow of steam from the geothermal plant had been shut down and Haven’s ventilation fans were flushing out the toxic air as quickly as possible, it would be another hour before anyone could safely go underground.
They sat there without talking. Gower and Claudia didn’t even look at John. The mother and son huddled close together, overwhelmed with horror and grief. The revelation that Archibald had sabotaged the geothermal plant and caused Octavia’s death was shocking enough, but then they had to watch John pulverize the bastard. Gower and his mother were gentle people, and the savagery of it had upset them. Ariel didn’t talk to him either, but after a few minutes she reached out and slipped her hand into his. Without words she was trying to tell him that it wasn’t his fault. The problem was in his biochemistry, not his soul. And John tried his best to believe it.
Then Conroy returned to the barn and approached them. His face was grim. “The Council of Elders requests your presence,” he said, pointing at John and Ariel. “Come with me.”
John assumed the worst. His stomach twisted as he and Ariel stood up. “Is it Archibald? Is he dead?”
“Nay. The traitor is alive and answering our questions. The Elders wish to speak to you about a different matter.” He gestured at them impatiently. “Come, make haste.”
They followed Conroy to a door that led to a short walkway, which was covered by a canvas awning that blocked any surveillance from above. At the end of the walkway they slipped through the side door of a farmhouse and went downstairs to its basement.
They entered a room that looked like it was used for prayer meetings. Half a dozen benches were lined up on the concrete floor, all facing a wooden table and a lectern. The room had no windows, and the walls were bare except for a couple of framed, hand-stitched samplers, each showing a sentence written in German. John saw the word “Gott” stitched in black thread on the white fabric, so he assumed they were Amish prayers. The farmhouse, he realized, had been carefully decorated to resemble a typical Amish home, just in case it was ever inspected by the authorities. But John suspected that the house, like the barn, had a hidden trapdoor leading to the cavern.
The three Elders—Elizabeth, Margaret, and Cordelia—sat behind the table at the front of the room. Standing beside the table was the elderly, white-bearded bailiff whom the Elders called Old Sam. In his broad-brimmed straw hat and round, wire-rim glasses, he looked just like a geezer from Pennsylvania Dutch country. The Elders were also disguised as Amish now—all three wore plain black dresses and white bonnets. There was even a German Bible on the table to complete the masquerade. The only out-of-place item was a MacBook laptop on the lectern, which had been angled so that its screen faced the Elders sitting at the table.
Conroy escorted John and Ariel across the room. As they approached the table and lectern, John heard a familiar voice coming out of the laptop. All three Elders were staring at the computer with looks of revulsion. When John got close enough he saw Sullivan’s face on the screen. He was speaking with the Elders via a wireless video call, standing in front of his own laptop somewhere and facing the machine’s camera.
John glanced at Ariel, who stiffened when she saw her half brother on the screen. Judging from the background, he seemed to be deep in the pine woods. A dozen of his Riflemen stood behind him, including Marlowe, the one who’d broken John’s nose and ribs. Sullivan’s face still bore the scratch marks that Ariel had given him, but he beamed with pleasure when she stepped into view of the laptop’s camera. “Ah, sweet sister! I’m delighted that you can join our conversation. And thank you so much for bringing your paramour. Dear me, it looks like his arms have been parboiled. Did you have some trouble getting out of the cavern?”
Before either John or Ariel could respond, Elizabeth leaned across the table and pointed her finger at the screen. “As you can see, we’ve fulfilled your request. Now proceed with your statement.”
Sullivan raised an eyebrow. He looked amused. “Aye, my statement. Well, first let me say how pleased I am that you didn’t execute the paramour immediately. I suspect that Lily had something to do with this decision. She’s taken quite a shine to the Negro.”
“You’re trying my patience.” Elizabeth furrowed her brow and narrowed her lone eye. “What does this have to do with our present impasse?”
Sullivan kept smiling. “I assure you, Mother, it’s quite relevant. Didn’t you wonder how I knew the paramour was still alive? It’s because he appeared just an hour ago on the surveillance footage that was captured by the drone hovering over the farm. As we speak, the FBI and other federal agencies are examining this footage and preparing a response. I’ve been told that a team of several dozen armed agents will pay a visit to Haven shortly after eleven o’clock tonight.”
Elizabeth didn’t say anything at first. She just stared at the laptop’s screen, without moving a muscle. Margaret, in contrast, swiveled her head back and forth, her eyes darting between her sister and the laptop. Even Cordelia shifted in her chair, disturbed enough to cast an anxious glance at the Chief Elder. But Elizabeth remained frozen. Her face was like a pale block of stone, and her scar was a reddish crack running down its side.
Finally, she shook her head. “You’ve broken your oath. You’ve betrayed your sisters and brothers.”
“Nay, just the sisters. My brothers stand with me.” Still grinning, he pointed at the Riflemen behind him. “We only want equality, Mother. We used to think it was magic that kept you young, but now we know better, don’t we? It’s just a protein, an organic molecule. And you have the power to give it to us.”
“Do you truly belie
ve this is the way to help your brothers? By exposing us to the American government? By revealing our secrets to bureaucrats and intelligence agents who are still barbaric enough to torture their enemies?” Elizabeth was trembling now, shaking with anger. “Once the federal agents ransack our laboratories, we won’t be able to give you anything!”
Sullivan shrugged. “Aye, the consequences will be dire, but you have only yourself to blame. For years we urged you to pursue this research. For decades, Mother. And when the researchers finally succeeded, when they finally identified the Fountain protein, what did you tell us?” He stopped smiling. His face darkened and his green eyes turned murderous. “You said Fountain was too difficult and dangerous to manufacture. You refused us because you were afraid of handling a few aborted fetuses. The slight threat to your safety outweighed all our hopes.”
John heard a furious grunt from Ariel. She stepped forward and jabbed her finger at the screen. “Don’t change the facts, cur! The threat would be far more than slight. We’d need to process thousands of fetuses every year to make enough Fountain for all our men. It would be impossible to keep the operation secret.”
Sullivan turned, aiming his murderous eyes at his sister. “The fetal tissue is not that difficult to obtain. All you need is cash, which our family has in abundance. With the relatively small number of gold bars we took from Haven’s vaults, we established the necessary connections with the medical-waste companies that dispose of aborted fetuses. If you had only given us the catalyst to transform the fetal tissue into Fountain, we could’ve produced as much protein as we needed.”
“Fool! I could’ve developed a better way to synthesize Fountain. I just needed some time to—”
“Aye, you have all the time in the world, but unfortunately we do not. We’ve waited long enough, sister. We can’t—”
“Silence!” Elizabeth stood up so forcefully, her chair tipped backward and crashed to the floor behind her. She gave Ariel a baleful look, then turned back to the laptop’s screen. “Do you realize that your vindictive acts have doomed all of us? Once the federal agents discover Haven, they won’t rest until they know everything. They’ll learn about the Riflemen too and all your unsavory connections. Your men will be interrogated and imprisoned, just like us.”
Sullivan shook his head. “My actions aren’t vindictive. They serve a purpose. After the failure of my last attempt to obtain the catalyst, I decided to pursue a different strategy. But my goal is the same.”
“You’re speaking in riddles. What’s your goal?”
“Haven is doomed, that’s true. But our family can escape this catastrophe.” Sullivan stepped closer to the camera in his own laptop, somewhere in the woods. His face filled the screen. “You’ve planned for this day, Mother. I know you have. For centuries you’ve been obsessed with security. I’m sure at some point you developed a contingency plan that would be put into effect if Haven was discovered.”
Elizabeth fell silent again. She folded her arms across her chest as she stood behind the table.
Sullivan nodded, taking her silence as confirmation. “You’ve placed buried caches all over the country, each filled with currency and weapons and other emergency supplies. Your Rangers operate a transportation network that could disperse our family if it has to flee from Haven. And in all likelihood you’ve already selected an alternative refuge, a hidden place where the Furies can rebuild their community. I don’t know where it is, but for safety’s sake it would have to be far away. Beyond the reach of the American authorities, for certain.”
Again, Elizabeth said nothing. She had an excellent poker face. Her expression never changed—it was pure, unrelenting ferocity. But John sensed that Sullivan was right. Elizabeth undoubtedly had a backup plan.
“You face only one obstacle,” Sullivan continued. “But it’s a sizable one. The federal agents have surrounded the farm, and their drone is watching you from above. If you try to escape from Haven, the authorities will arrest you. If some of you manage to slip past them, the drone will reveal where you are. And you have less than ten hours before the agents force the issue by breaking through the fence and searching the premises.” He took a step backward, and his face shrunk on the screen. “Your situation is perilous indeed. But fortunately, I’m willing to help you.”
Elizabeth let out a mirthless laugh, finally breaking her silence. “And how would you help us, pray tell?”
“As you know, I’ve assembled a small army, nearly two hundred men trained for combat.” He pointed again at the Riflemen standing behind him. “And because of my connections with the authorities, I know the details of their operation—where their agents are stationed, how many are at each post, and so on. My men can launch a surprise attack on their positions. We can neutralize the agents, shut down their communications and disable their drone. That should give you enough time to shepherd the Furies out of Haven and send them on their way to the new refuge you’ve prepared.”
The Chief Elder tilted her head. Now her expression was skeptical. “You think your ragtag soldiers can defeat the American government?”
“We don’t have to win this battle. All we need to do is hold them off until you’ve escaped. Then my men will retreat and melt away in the darkness, dispersing into the countryside like all the other Furies. And we can take steps to discourage the authorities from pursuing us. The most important step is killing Rogers and leaving his body behind at the farm. He’s the only one the federal agents are truly interested in finding. They’ve already identified him as the primary suspect in their criminal investigations, and once they have his body they’ll be largely satisfied.”
John felt the eyes of everyone in the room fall on him. Margaret Fury stared at him the hardest. If it were up to her, they’d probably murder him on the spot. Elizabeth stared at him too, but not for very long. She kept her focus on Sullivan. “So you’re proposing to extricate us from a perilous trap that your own actions have pushed us into. This makes no sense, from a logical standpoint, unless you’re going to demand something in return for your help.”
Sullivan smiled again. “You’re correct, Mother. Luckily for you, our demand is quite reasonable. We want the catalyst. Tell Lily to send the formula to me in an e-mail. And please don’t attempt to trick me. As you know, several of my men learned biochemistry from working in Lily’s laboratory, and they’ll know if she tries to send us an inauthentic formula. As soon as we determine that you’ve given us the proper catalyst, I’ll order my Riflemen to attack the federal agents.”
“And how do I know you’ll live up to your end of the bargain? After we give you the catalyst, what’s your incentive for helping us?”
“Once we receive what we need, the rebellion will be over. We can be allies instead of enemies. After the escape from Haven, we can assist in the relocation of our family. Our great hope is to reconcile with our mothers and sisters and join the new community you establish, wherever it may be.”
He tried his best to look sincere, opening his eyes wide and holding out his hands. But Elizabeth frowned at the screen. “That’s a wonderful sentiment, but not very convincing.”
“Then think about this. If we allow you to be captured, you might feel inclined to tell the authorities everything you know about me and my men. That could make things very difficult for us. Helping you escape serves our own interests.”
Elizabeth nodded, still frowning. She stared at the screen for a few more seconds, deep in thought. Then she turned to her sisters, first glancing at Margaret and then at Cordelia. “I believe we’ll need some time to discuss the matter.”
Sullivan frowned, too. His face reverted to its natural condition, a dark, hateful glare. He seemed relieved that he didn’t have to smile anymore. “I’ll give you two hours. Either send me the formula by four o’clock this afternoon, or face the Burning Times once more.” Then he disconnected the wireless video link and the screen went black.
The silence that followed was so complete that John could hear himse
lf breathing. Ariel bit her lip and muttered, “Bastard.” Conroy went to the lectern and closed the laptop, and Old Sam stepped behind the Elders and righted Elizabeth’s fallen chair. Then the bailiff shuffled back to his post beside their table.
Elizabeth sat down with a tired sigh. “You were right, Delia,” she said, glancing at her sister. “It happened exactly as you said it would.”
“Nay, not exactly.” Cordelia shook her head. “Your son’s crimes have surpassed even my direst predictions.”
Margaret leaned across the table. She seemed confused. “How now, what’s this? What predictions are you speaking of?”
“Sixty years ago Delia warned me that our men would rise against us. She said it would lead to the destruction of Haven.”
“Nay, nay.” Cordelia waved her wooden hand in a dismissive gesture. “I merely predicted that the coming advances in genetics and biochemistry would reveal the secret of our everlasting youth. And I surmised that our men would be the first to covet it.”
Margaret turned to Elizabeth and gave her an aggrieved look. “You never told me this. Why wasn’t this matter brought before the full council?”
“My apologies, sister.” The Chief Elder looked down at the table and raised her hands to her forehead. She began massaging her temples. “I saw only one way to forestall Delia’s prophecy, and that was to order our women to slay their baby boys. We couldn’t do that, of course, so I let the matter drop.” Without looking up, she pointed at the closed laptop that had displayed Sullivan’s face a minute ago. “And just seven years later I gave birth to that monster.”