by Marcus Sakey
“Okay,” he said. “Focus on the job.”
“What does that—”
“You’re in charge here, Ethan. Run your team. See if you can figure out where those tanks went. Failing that, figure out how we can beat the virus.”
“Cooper—”
“A vaccine. A shot. A fucking antidote. I don’t care. But you dig in and you work until you find something, you hear me?” Cooper gripped the man’s biceps, squeezed hard. “This was your project, Doc. You and Abe built this. Clean up the mess.”
“But—”
“Just do it.” He stalked away, had to find a place to think, to reach out to Epstein, figure out the next move. Maybe together they could pattern John Smith well enough to guess what he intended. Everything had happened fast, Smith couldn’t be that far ahead of them—
His phone rang, and he was about to silence it when he saw the name. He answered, said, “Natalie.”
Across the lab, Shannon stiffened. He didn’t blame her, but there wasn’t time to worry about dating niceties right now.
“Nick? Are you okay? You don’t sound good.”
“Busy. John Smith is dead.”
“Are you sure?”
“I killed him.”
“Oh,” Natalie said, her voice strange. Why? Natalie had never loved violence, but she had always known what he did. And after the way they had mourned Bobby Quinn, he would have expected, maybe not elation, but something other than the flat tone she used as she said, “That’s great.”
“What’s wrong?”
“So you haven’t seen the news.”
“No.”
“The militia, the New Sons of Liberty. They’re approaching the Vogler Ring.” She took a ragged breath. “And they’re marching children in front of them.”
CHAPTER 28
“—this footage, streaming live from a CNN newsdrone, shows the New Sons of Liberty approaching the farthest borders of Tesla, capital of the New Canaan Holdfast. Now, at this altitude it’s a little hard to make out details, but when we zoom in, you can see that these smaller figures at the head of the column are children, approximately six hundred of them. Given current relations with the Holdfast, information is limited, but sources have confirmed that all of these children are abnorms captured by NSOL since their dramatic attack—”
The news was always playing in the Situation Room, and the Laurel Lodge conference room at Camp David was no different. What was unusual was that the volume was turned up, and the people around the table were silent.
It can’t be considered a positive, Owen Leahy thought, when the American president is watching the news to find out what’s happening.
Beside the tri-d was a larger screen showing a similar angle, although this one was far more distinct. Government satellite footage, dialed up high enough to make out individual faces. The video rotated through different perspectives, a montage of roughly edited abominations:
A ten-year-old girl weeping as she walked, tears carving clean streaks down her dirty face.
A teenage boy carrying a four-year-old child in one arm and a ratty stuffed bear in the other.
A kid stumbling, rising hurriedly, his pants torn and his knee stained with blood, fear in his eyes as he looked over his shoulder.
And behind them, a long line of men carrying rifles. The ones in the front had them aimed at the children. The column stretched for half a mile.
Leahy checked his phone for the fiftieth time. Still no response.
The newscaster continued, “The New Canaan Holdfast has long been rumored to have a defensive perimeter surrounding the city of Tesla, and we presume that the purpose of these children is to serve as a kind of human shield—”
“Enough,” President Ramirez said, and an aide quickly cut the sound. “Owen, how quickly can we intervene?”
“Madam President, we can’t.”
“Bad enough when the New Sons were burning abandoned cities. Now they’re using children as mine detectors. I want American troops in there—”
“Ma’am, we can’t.” Leahy caught his tone, quickly reeled it back in. “The militia is only five miles out of Tesla. We simply cannot get a sizable enough military presence there in time.”
“What about drone strikes, or tactical bombardment? Even just as a warning, to turn them around.”
“Most of those capabilities have been disabled on your orders, ma’am.”
“Re-enable them.”
“That would take time. And it would be a terrible risk. The only way we could intervene would require using the same technologies Epstein’s virus took advantage of. Simply put, if it’s more advanced than a bayonet, it might be turned against us.”
“Why would the Holdfast do that? We’d be coming to their aid.”
“Frankly, ma’am, I doubt they’d believe that. I certainly wouldn’t, in their position. You’d be asking a man who killed seventy-five thousand soldiers and blew up the White House to let you bring your deadliest weapons into his living room to ‘protect’ him. Besides”—he gestured at the tri-d—“they already have defenses. The Vogler Ring isn’t a minefield, it’s a microwave emplacement. Casualties won’t weaken it.”
“Meaning that even if the New Sons march children into it to burn alive, they still won’t breach it.”
“It’s horrific, but it’s not our defense grid, and it’s not our army. Think of it like it’s happening on the far side—” Leahy’s phone vibrated. There was no name, but he recognized the number immediately. He should; it belonged to a radiation-shielded cell he’d delivered himself. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I need to take this.”
“Go. DAR, what’s your view—”
Leahy rose swiftly and headed for the door. Leaving was a breach of protocol, but he was betting no one would call him on it under the circumstances. He kept his eyes down and his steps quick through the door, past the Secret Service agents, down the hall, and outside.
Camp David had a winter wonderland look, all evergreens and Christmas lights and fresh powder. The network of paved paths had been shoveled and salted, but there were too many people on them. Leahy stepped off the porch toward the woods, his leather oxfords sinking into the snow as he accepted the call and said, “Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“What we said we would.”
Leahy froze. That’s not Sam Miller. He checked the phone display; the number was correct. The voice was one he’d heard before. It took him a moment to place it—Luke Hammond, the lean soldier with the killer’s eyes. “We never discussed taking children hostage. Or using them to try to break through the Vogler Ring.”
“We’re doing what’s necessary.”
“Necessary for what? I told you, genocide isn’t the goal.” Why does no one get that? There was a balance to be maintained, a utility to conflict, so long as it was held in check. The political scientist Thomas Schelling had pinpointed that back in 1966, when he’d written that the power to hurt—the unacquisitive, unproductive power to destroy things that somebody treasures, to inflict pain and grief—was a kind of bargaining power. Arguably the most foundational statement of geopolitics, and yet some days it seemed like Leahy was the only person to understand that the word was hurt, not obliterate. “We don’t want to destroy the Holdfast. We just want to bring Epstein to—”
“That’s your goal. The New Sons of Liberty aren’t part of your army. We’re patriots fighting for our nation’s future.”
“Come on. Wake up. Chest beating is for football games. ‘Once more unto the breach, dear friends,’ is not a real-world policy.”
There was a long pause. “Mr. Secretary, you’re talking to a career soldier with forty years of special operations experience. Do you realize how ridiculous you sound?”
Leahy leaned against a tree and rubbed his eyes so hard they hurt. “I’d like to talk to General Miller.”
“He’s busy.”
“Put him on, please.”
“He’s busy.”
Leahy
imagined having the power to reach through the phone and wrap his hands around the man’s neck and squeeze until his eyeballs bulged. What was Miller thinking, going off the reservation and then not even answering the phone? You’re losing control of the situation. “Luke. May I call you Luke? We don’t know each other well, but I was a soldier too.”
“I know, Mr. Secretary. Four whole years, right?”
“Followed by decades in intelligence before serving as the secretary of defense to three presidents,” Leahy snapped. He caught himself, took a breath. “It should go without saying that I respect your service. You’re right, you are patriots. But now the patriotic thing to do is stop. You’re risking civil war.”
“We’re not risking it. We’re declaring it. And we’re going to win.”
“By burning civilian cities? Kidnapping children and marching them out to die?”
There was a pause. “That’s war.”
“Luke, listen to me. Even if you succeed, you think anyone will thank you? President Ramirez already wants to label you all criminals.”
“Up to her.”
“Hammond,” Leahy said, using his command voice, “I am ordering you to stop. This isn’t a discussion. You are acting against your country’s interests. You are wounding America. Maybe mortally.”
Luke laughed. “You know what the problem with politicians is? They always think they can control things they can’t. The genie doesn’t go back in the bottle, no matter what the story says.”
“Goddammit, listen to me. You’ve made your point. Turn your men around. Please. I’m begging you.”
Silence was the only response. A cold wind rattled the branches of the trees, dumping snow in a fine filigree like ashes. His socks were wet, his shoes ruined.
“Luke?”
More silence.
“Hello?”
And it was only then that it occurred to Owen Leahy that he’d been hung up on.
CHAPTER 29
The streets were jammed, cars and trucks everywhere, most filled to bursting, suitcases strapped to the roof, people piled in the back. Cooper had driven fast and disrespectfully, blasting through parking lots, jumping sidewalks, ignoring traffic lights. It was the way he used to drive when his car had a transponder identifying him as a DAR agent. Today he got away with it because the SUV belonged to the Holdfast Wardens. There was an irony to that juxtaposition, but he didn’t have time or inclination to savor it.
The crowd grew worse as they neared Epstein’s compound of mirrored buildings. It made sense; the pitchforks and torches were at the gates. The residents of New Canaan would feel safest close to their leader.
“You sure you want to be part of this?” Cooper spared a glance sideways as he squealed up to the door. “I’m not sure what kind of welcome we’ll get.”
“Are you kidding?” Shannon looked incredulous. “I rescued those kids. I planned the operation on the academy, I led it, I blew the damn thing up. You think I’m going to let a bunch of rednecks burn them alive?”
“Roger that.”
The lobby to the central building was airy and flooded with late afternoon winter sunlight. One whole wall was given over to a massive tri-d, the projection field showing children three stories high and terrified. People stood in the lobby staring, pale lips biting shaking knuckles. Cooper ignored the receptionist, strode across the floor to the unmarked elevator. No doubt the guard standing by it was normally very good at his job, but at the moment his attention was absorbed by the footage. Shannon smiled and faded back.
Cooper said, “Hey.”
“What?” The guard straightened. “Yes, sir?”
“I need to see Erik Epstein right now.”
“I’m sorry, but he isn’t seeing anyone at the moment.”
“He’ll see me. Nick Cooper.”
“I know who you are, sir. But Mr. Epstein was explicit. No one in at all.”
“Son, I’m sorry. But we don’t have time for this.”
The guard was about to reply when Shannon slid the sidearm from his holster, planted it in his back, and cocked it.
They left the guard cuffed to the elevator rail and sprinted down the hall, the thick carpet muffling their footsteps. He could hear the rush of the ventilation system, the air cold against his sweating skin, and then they were pushing through the door to Epstein’s private world.
It was different than the other times Cooper had been here. It was bright, and instead of constellations of data hanging in all directions, there was just one simple vector animation, a stylized blob intersecting a series of three concentric rings. Without the dizzying backdrop, the room looked cheap, the mystery deflated. A movie theater with the house lights up.
Three men stood in the center, their heads snapping around at the sound of Cooper’s entrance. The first was tan and wild-haired, with that skin-stretched-over-skeleton look. Slouching beside him, Erik Epstein looked paler than usual, his eyes haunted, his plump neck sweaty. In his usual five-thousand-dollar suit, Jakob looked like the adult guardian to a couple of precocious nerds. “Cooper? What are you doing here?”
“John Smith is dead.”
“We know,” Jakob said. “We watched the operation via the Wardens’ bodycams. Good work. But if you’ll excuse us—”
Cooper gestured at the animation. “Is that the Vogler Ring?”
The three men exchanged looks.
“Cooper,” Jakob said, “we appreciate your help, but you aren’t needed at the moment. This is an internal matter.”
“Tell me that you’ve turned it off.”
“Turned it off?” the third man said like he’d been slapped. “Of course not.”
“Who are you?”
“Randall Vogler.”
“Vogler? You’re the genius who developed this system?”
“Well, of course my whole team gets credit, but—”
“Erik, what are you doing?”
Epstein’s eyes darted to his, then away. “Protecting us. The data—”
“Cooper,” Jakob said, “we understand your feelings, but this system is all that’s standing between the city of Tesla and a lynch mob.”
“A lynch mob that’s marching children in front of it,” Cooper said. “These aren’t game pieces. They’re kids, and you’re killing them.”
“Not all,” Vogler said. “This is a completely defensive system. I’m a pacifist, sir.”
“Tell that to their parents,” Shannon said.
Erik flinched. “We don’t have a choice.”
“You do. You’re making it, right now.”
“This is a civilian city,” Jakob said. “Just regular people, including thousands of children. This system is all that’s protecting them. The men coming for us are ex–special forces, paramilitary survivalists, and armed killers. None of us are twirling our mustache here. If we drop our defenses, those kids might live. But how many people here will die? How many children?”
“You. Vogler.” Cooper gestured at the animation. “There are three rings up there, and the militia is almost to the second. What does that mean?”
“The system is a directed-energy weapon, generating electromagnetic radiation in the 2.45 gigahertz range, but the effects are modulated by particulate disturbance, humidity, air currents. The first ring represents guaranteed safe distance. The second is the corollary to that, the line at which, no matter the range of conditions—presuming relative norms, of course—the effects will be felt.”
“What are the effects?” Shannon’s voice had a girlish lilt that caught Cooper’s attention. When he glanced over, she didn’t wink, but he could see that she thought about winking, with the tiny resulting muscular motion that entailed. God love her, she was playing them.
“The ring agitates electric dipoles like water and fat, and their motion generates heat.”
“Sort of like a microwave oven?”
“Yes, exactly.” Vogler beamed at her.
“So . . .” She paused theatrically. “It will burn them al
ive?”
“Well, the advantage of the system is that there is plenty of warning. It’s not like one moment targets are fine and the next they drop dead. The only way it would be fatal is if—”
Cooper said, “Somebody marched you into it with a rifle at your back.”
“In the absence of ideal options,” Erik said, “the only rational choice is the best of the worst.”
“Then why aren’t you watching?”
“What?”
“It’s easy to talk about the greater good,” Cooper said, “when you’re looking at a colored blob crossing a dotted line. But that’s not what’s happening.”
“I . . . I like people. You know I do, that children—”
“Stop playing the saint, Cooper.” Jakob’s tone was sharp. “How many people have you killed? How many have you killed today?”
“Today? Two. And I looked them both in the eyes.” His hands clenched and unclenched. “I’m not a saint, Jakob. Far from. But if you’re going to decide who lives and dies, have the stones to watch.”
Erik took a deep breath. “Computer. Quads one to fifteen, activate, drone and security footage, multiple perspectives, militia approaching Vogler Ring.”
The air shimmered to life. What had been empty space was suddenly filled with people, a mob of them, a horde of humanity. Cooper had heard the number over and over, the headcount of the New Sons of Liberty, but it was one thing to hear the figure and another to see the mass, a crowd that could fill a midsize stadium. At that scale, individual features were lost in a shifting whole, and the dust-coated clothing, coupled with the beards and the dirt and the rifles, compounded the impression that it was a single creature, some thousand-legged insect out of a nightmare.
“Better?” Jakob’s voice was cold. “You see what’s coming for us?”
“The children, Erik.”
Jakob said, “Don’t—” as his brother said, “Computer, group quads, refocus, front ranks.”
The hologram shifted vertiginously, the multiple angles replaced by a single stream of video.
According to the news, there were about six hundred children. A small number when compared to the militia twenty yards behind them, but seen altogether, it was about the same size as the school Todd attended. The youngest were four or five, the oldest in their late teens, the majority somewhere in the middle. They were dressed too lightly for the weather, and fear shone bright from their faces.