Freedom

by Daniel Suarez

  She wiped her tears and started clicking on D-Space as Fossen drove at high speed down to the road.

  “If we move quickly, we’ll be fine. They’re coming in from the east and south. . . .” She paused. “But there’s also another force reported coming in from north and west.”

  “Yes, all right, but we can make it to town?”

  “Yes.”

  Fossen glanced to them both. “We’re going to be all right. We’ll get to the storm cellars at the elementary school just like we planned. We’re going to be all right.”

  As he looked down the road, he could see the lights of Greeley just a few miles ahead. There was thunder in the distance and the lights suddenly went black.

  At the sound of tornado sirens Ross sat up in the motel bed and reached for his HUD glasses on the nightstand. He tried to turn on the lights, but they didn’t work. A glance at the digital alarm clock confirmed that the power was out.

  So much for local power generation.

  He threw on his black Nomex flight suit and computer belt as the system logged him on. The sirens were winding down now, and he could see hundreds of darknet call-outs beyond the walls and hear the voice of Floyd_2, an ex-army officer that the darknet had automatically selected as civil defense commander, based on his reputation score and skill set. His voice came in over the public comm channel in mid-speech. . . .

  “—need everybody to those storm shelters. Security drones show helicopters and a light armored force converging on Greeley from all four compass directions. Everyone, please get to the middle school storm cellars. Ex-military folks and hunters, you have your assignments. We’ve only got a few minutes. I’m going to project the location of the choppers onto layer six, and I want all tagged enemy objects placed on that layer, too.”

  Four bright red call-outs appeared some ways off to the east, identified as Helo 1, 2, and 3.

  Floyd_2 paused. “Everyone move quickly but calmly to the middle school storm shelters. You can see the video surveillance overlays on layer five. It looks like these people are heavily armed. We’ve got summons in for infrastructure defense and equipment, but it looks like there are a lot of darknet towns under attack tonight. So I think we’re on our own for the time being. Let’s look out for one another now.”

  Ross could hear the voices of people outside moving through the darkness. The hushed voices of parents. The worried, high-pitched voices of children.

  Then Floyd_2’s sudden urgent shout over the channel. “Incoming!”

  An explosion tore a hole in the air nearby. Its shockwave hit the front of the motel like a solid object, blasting out one of Ross’s windows and shaking the whole building. Ross hit the floor and pulled blankets down on top of himself from the bed as glass continued to rain down. A layer of previously unseen dust had lifted off of everything and hovered in the room as a choking cloud. There was another explosion somewhat farther away that made Ross realize his ears were ringing. Dogs were howling and car alarms had gone off throughout the town.

  The second explosion was followed by the crackling of distant gunfire in an indeterminate direction. Possibly every direction. Ross peered up at the jagged edges of the front window with its imitation, snap-on window frames. He could see guttering orange light and shadows across the street. Flames. But the sky between the curtains looked tinged with its own glow. Possibly dawn—or more flames farther off.

  Ross listened in the darkness of his room to the gunfire, between which he could hear people screaming. And now the sound of helicopters. Not the deep, booming thump of Bell Rangers that he remembered from Building Twenty-Nine. No, these choppers had a high-pitched buzz to them that was soon followed by the sound of ripping fabric. Then more screams.

  He could see the call-outs of dozens of nearby operatives racing past beyond the walls. Obviously headed for the middle school. He could hear their voices over the public darknet comm channel as well, and a series of jagged lines adorned each call-out as they spoke. It was like a surreal first-person game.

  [Beavertail]: “Three Helos coming in from the east. They’re using miniguns!”

  [Yardil]: “Thanks for the fucking news flash, Darrol!”

  [Floyd_2]: “Cut useless chatter, Yardil!”

  [Knockwurst]: “ASVs coming in across the fields. East and west. Half a mile off.”

  [Needleman]: “I’m on the west side. What’s an ASV?”

  [Knockwurst]: “M1117. Armored car. Gun platform.”

  [Needleman]: “Holy shit, I’m pulling back to B-twelve.”

  [Vorpal]: “Sniper fire at the barricades on the thirty-eight. North and south. We’ve got casualties!”

  [Beavertail]: “Get stragglers into the storm shelters. We’ve got snipers on the east and south sides. They’re taking up positions in the abandoned cars on the edge of town.

  [Vorpal]: “I knew we should have moved those fucking things!”

  None of it sounded good. Before Ross was fully dressed there was a pounding on his motel room door. Through the wall he could see a call-out that read OohRah. It was Sheriff Dave Westfield, a recent member and second-level Constable. He had also been a marine in his youth.

  “Rakh! You okay?”

  Ross grabbed his things and opened the door. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  OohRah held an M16 rifle. “The feed says we’re being hit with Hellfire missiles. It’s time to get to the middle school.”

  Ross could see that the building across the road was engulfed in flames. It had been a machine shop—one of the local fab labs. A family lived on the second floor. Now there was no second floor, only a ground floor with doors and windows belching flames.

  The sound of a helicopter was approaching.

  OohRah rushed into Ross’s room. “The feed says the missiles are coming from a gray Cessna 208 Grand Caravan that left a decommissioned army airfield north of St. Louis.” The tearing sound was heard again. Then the chopper passed low overhead.

  Ross leaned out the motel room door to look up into the sky.

  The barest glow of dawn showed on the eastern horizon, and an AH6 Little Bird helicopter raced low along Main Street, its twin miniguns blazing. Tracer rounds streamed from them like orange lasers. He could see the phosphorus-coated bullets ricocheting in a shower of sparks into the predawn sky farther to the west—over by the American Legion Hall. There was more shouting and gunfire as a second chopper zipped overhead, launching rockets.

  “Jesus Christ!” Ross ducked back into the motel room. “No markings on them.”

  “We saw the photos of those rail yards. But I don’t think it really sunk in.”

  The rockets exploded in a series of deafening booms. It was followed by a large volume of gunfire erupting from the western edge of town. It sounded like a couple hundred people were involved in an intense firefight—an odd assemblage of large- and small-caliber weapons crackling like green pine in a fire. The sounds of women and children screaming among the refugees and the shadows of dozens of people racing past the open motel room doorway gave a sense of rising panic.

  OohRah rushed to the doorway and shouted, “Get out of the street! Get out of the street! Come in here!”

  He ushered a dozen people inside, men, women, and children—people of all ages. Carrying backpacks and suitcases.

  One woman kept screaming at Ross, “What’s going on? What’s going on?” These people weren’t darknet operatives, so they appeared to have no idea what was happening.

  OohRah grabbed the woman by the shoulders. “Get ahold of yourself. We’re going to get you to a storm shelter.”

  One of the other refugees pulled her back into the group, where she quickly broke down sobbing.

  “Let’s get these folks to the middle school.”

  Ross was already busy flipping through an array of D-Space street cameras in his HUD view. Most of the town’s public cameras were still functioning. They showed a series of buildings ablaze and bodies, or parts of them, in the streets. People were rushing around retrie
ving wounded. Others were firing out toward the edge of town at attackers Ross knew must be there. “Looks like the route to the middle school is still clear. Here . . .” He slid the prepared camera layer over to OohRah.

  “Thanks. So we’ve still got network power, anyway.”

  Ross nodded. “The bank was hit, but they’ve got ultrawideband transmitters and fuel cells in the vault. It’s pretty thick concrete.”

  OohRah was already looking out the doorway and motioning people to follow. “Let’s go, folks! Follow me!”

  A dozen frightened people ran after him. Ross brought up the rear, sprinting beneath the porch roof along a line of motel room doors. Some of the doors were open, but he didn’t see anyone inside the rooms. Another chopper zipped overhead startlingly low and fast, guns braapping down the street. Empty shell casings rained down in a jingling cascade of brass that bounced in all directions.

  Ross looked out at the call-outs ahead of him. He could see lots of names he didn’t recognize, and he heard frantic voices over the comm lines.

  [Barkely_A]:We’ve got wounded over here! We don’t have anything to stop these armored cars.

  [Creasy]: Jack, about two dozen infantry coming through Courtney’s field.

  [BullMoose]: Near the propane yard?

  [Creasy]: Ten-four.

  Ross reached up and dialed down the volume on nearby chatter not directed to him. OohRah brought the civilians down an alley behind Main Street. It was cluttered with Dumpsters, pallets, and cars that had been idled by gas prices. As they crossed to the next block, they saw a car burning in the middle of Main Street. The car’s side and fenders were riddled with bullet or shrapnel holes. The silhouette of a person was still sitting in the front seat, enveloped in fire. Someone with the call-out DoctorSocks raced past the flames, and then headed off into the night.

  Another huge explosion ripped the dawn air, and Ross turned to see what he suspected was the propane yard going up in a roiling fireball a couple hundred yards away. Metal and wood debris spun into the air in a wide arc. Ross ducked around behind the nearest building.

  “Up ahead!”

  The sheriff brought them across the street to the arched granite-and-brick entryway of the Eisenhower Middle School. Mercifully, the steps led down to a cellar door lined with sandbags and away from prowling choppers.

  Ross stopped in the entryway and let the others go in. He stood next to farmers with assault rifles as they watched the skies.

  One of the other volunteers, a thirtyish, heavyset operative named Farmster in a Halperin Seed hat, pointed to Ross and grabbed a scoped AR-15 rifle from a table just inside the doorway. “You know how to use this?”

  “I’m better with an AK.”

  “An AK?”

  Ross shrugged. “Russian army.”

  That brought out gales of laughter amid the distant gunfire.

  “Well, I’ll be damned. I never thought I’d be handing a gun to a Ruskie to shoot up the town with.”

  The guy fished through the pile of weapons and came up with a scuffed AK-47. He also grabbed a satchel into which he stuffed several thirty-round clips. “We can’t let them reach this school.”

  Ross looked up at the choppers crisscrossing the sky in the distance and realized that this was just the beginning.

  In the darkness Sebeck and Price peered at an abandoned, crumbling farmhouse from the shelter of a creek bank. The new Thread led directly toward a weathered barn behind it. The entire place was choked with weeds and bushes.

  The sound of frogs and crickets filled the night, but miles behind them they heard loud explosions and the zipping sound of helicopter miniguns.

  Price gazed back over his shoulder as the horizon flashed and flickered. “They’re really getting pounded back there, Sergeant. Whatever we’re supposed to find better be worth it.”

  Sebeck nodded. He’d been surprised they made it past the blockade, but then, whatever powered the Thread might have been able to create a path . . . somehow. He’d seen the Daemon do stranger things.

  “Stay here.”

  “No problem.”

  Sebeck climbed up from the creek, and started moving through the tall grass, electronic pistol at the ready. He kept scanning the darkness for trouble but made it the couple hundred feet to the barn door without incident.

  The glowing Thread proceeded right through the twin doors. Sebeck looked down and noticed fairly fresh tire tracks in the mud. He nodded to himself. Whatever the next segment was leading him to was apparently inside, and recently arrived.

  Sebeck pulled open the right barn door partway. Stealth was not an option because it sagged on its hinges. He peeked in and noticed a dark late-model panel van with dealer plates. The Thread continued straight through the closed back doors of the van itself.

  Sebeck scanned the interior of the barn and saw nothing except old stalls, a workbench, and piles of rusting equipment on either side of the van. Above he could see stars through the gaping holes in the barn roof.

  He moved inside and came up to the shiny van doors. No sounds came from inside. He held the pistol in one hand, stepped aside, and tried the handle. It clicked open. He slowly pulled it open, peering in with the pistol aimed and ready.

  “It’s you.”

  “Me?” Sebeck stared at an oddly dressed man sitting on a folding chair in the cargo bay of the van. Mirrored sunglasses and a balaclava obscured the man’s face, and he wore a camouflage outfit with knee pads and body armor. Before him he held what looked to be a transparent video panel or glass screen through which he was viewing Sebeck. It gave the effect of carrying a huge set of spectacles in front of him. The Thread led right to the tip of a wand he was clutching in his gloved right hand. A nearby call-out identified him as PangSoi, a first-level Weaver with a two-point-five rep score on a base of three.

  Sebeck was puzzled. “What the hell are you supposed to be?”

  “I’m PangSoi.”

  “I can see that.” Sebeck clicked his pistol into its holster and opened his visor. “But why the hell did the Thread lead me to you? And cause me to leave all those people to get attacked?”

  “It’s hard to say.”

  “You’re not a high-level, high-rep operative—you’re a weaver-trainee for chrissake. And what’s with the panel?”

  PangSoi gazed at him, following Sebeck as he shifted on his feet.

  “Why are you doing that?” Sebeck noticed wires running down from the panel to a large box draped in black fabric. It sat next to PangSoi’s chair like an end table and gurgled from some tiny motor.

  “We must hurry.”

  “What the hell . . . ?” Sebeck flipped up the fabric covering the box and came face-to-face with the severed head of a young Asian woman wearing HUD glasses—bolted into a metal frame. Her dead eyes looked forward, the lids pinned back. Tubes ran into her neck and wires into her HUD glasses. A tiny pump was burbling on a frame. “Oh my god. . . .”

  Suddenly what felt like an entire football team tackled him from behind. He felt rough gloved hands prying at his face, but the van he was pressed against kept him from falling down. “You son of a bitch!” He pushed his open helmet visor against the van door to close it, and the weight of several people pulled him backward, where he fell onto the muddy floor. Several strong bodies piled onto him shouting, “Get him! Hold him!”

  Sebeck spoke the keywords to electrify the surface of his armor. The tangle of men fell off him yelping, as he rolled free and stood.

  Now he could see that he faced half a dozen commandos in full tactical gear. Some of them carried beanbag guns and Tasers. Clearly, they hadn’t expected Sebeck’s Armor of the Warrior—the gift of a faction supporting Sebeck’s quest.

  He eyed them through his mirrored faceplate. “I could say I don’t want to hurt you guys, but I’d be lying. . . .”

  He turned and jumped up into the back of the van, past the severed head of the young woman in the box. The soldiers pursued him. Sebeck grabbed the ghoulish PangSoi a
nd drew his electronic pistol. “She was practically a child, you sick . . .” He fired a short burst into the man’s chest and watched him fall.

  Price.

  Sebeck suddenly saw Price being dragged in through the barn doorway—a gun held to his head.

  “Detective Sebeck! We’ll kill him if you don’t put the gun down and come out peacefully!” The man had a vaguely Asian accent, but like the others his face was covered.

  Sebeck kicked both of the panel van doors open to get a clear view of the situation.

  Price looked very muddy and very irritated.

  “Laney, they’re hired guns here to capture us. They’re not gonna kill us. We’re both too important to them.”

  “Oh for chrissake, Sergeant . . .”

  “They somehow figured out a way to hack into my quest Thread. No, there’s something big going down.” Sebeck noticed a row of several plastic ten-gallon jugs of gasoline in the cargo bay. “I guess with gasoline so expensive and hard to find, you guys planned ahead. Smart.”

  The man with the gun pressed it into Price’s temple. “Don’t do anything you can’t undo, Sergeant!”

  Sebeck grabbed a magnesium flare from his suit belt. “You gonna tell your commander you killed an irreplaceable prisoner because I fucked with your van?” He sparked the flare. “I don’t think so.”

  He dropped the flare onto the gasoline jugs and jumped from the van as everyone ran for their lives.

  Sebeck was clear of the barn doors by the time the gasoline flared up and filled the entire barn with a rolling fireball that lit up the night, destroying the van and all the hellish things in it.

  The moment he came out of the barn he was faced by several dozen commandos charging at him from several directions simultaneously, trying to knock him down. He emptied his pistol at them, wounding several, but he got struck from the side and slammed into the mud. Someone stepped on his weapon hand, pinning it to the ground, and then two men aimed fire-extinguisher-like devices at him, spraying thick white foam all over his legs and arms.