“Nothing,” Matt said, shortly. If Hope had captured the President, the Vice President would take over—assuming that everything worked as planned. But no contingency plan had really accounted for superhuman powerhouses. The collapse of the military network implied that the Vice President might not be able to order the missiles launched, assuming that he was prepared to fire on Washington, DC. “Is there any chance of help from the European Union?”
“Nothing has been decided yet,” Knight said. “After what happened to Libya, and to the United States, there is probably going to be a certain reluctance to challenge the Saviours openly. A lot depends on just how quickly Hope secures control of the country...”
Matt smiled. “Do you want someone like Hope in permanent control of the United States?”
“No, but we didn't want someone like that nutty Colonel in permanent control of Libya either,” Knight pointed out. “The cost of unseating him was always judged to be too high, by you as well as us. And the cost of unseating Hope might be even higher.”
He hesitated. “I can pass on your words to Sir Brian,” he added. “He might agree to provide covert assistance to an insurgency.”
Matt shrugged. Knight didn't really believe what he was saying, which wasn't a great surprise. Hope’s reaction to Libya’s moves against the Congo had been a massive overreaction—the same could be said for his actions in America—and no one in the rest of the world wanted him coming after them next. But it might not matter. It was easy to wonder if the Redeemer had her own plans to take control of the world, using Hope as her weapon. Just how deeply had she sunk her claws into his mind? There was no way to know.
“I need to borrow one of your covert phones,” he said. “Apart from that, I think I’d better make my way out of Washington.”
“It’s the least we can do,” Knight agreed. “Just be careful. We always suspected that Fort Meade was reading our emails—and now Hope has the NSA under his control. Watch your back.”
***
The walk out of Washington had been nightmarish. Matt had stolen a cycle and ridden it most of the way, only to run into a police barricade on the road leading out of the city. There were thousands of civilians near the policemen, shouting curses at the cops and demanding that they let them flee Washington before the mad superhumans came to kill them all, but the cops refused to budge. A very nasty riot was in the making, Matt decided, as he snuck through the barricade before the police started to use water cannons and tear gas on the maddened crowd.
Once outside the barricades, it was depressingly easy to steal a car and drive towards New York. The roads seemed to be empty, although Matt suspected that that would change very quickly if the police lines broke or they decided to just stay home. He flipped through the radio, hoping to hear good news, but most of it consisted of chat show hosts speculating endlessly about what would happen in the future. Some of the callers were completely insane, ranting about the End of Days, while others seemed to believe that Hope could hardly do worse than the previous government. Matt rolled his eyes at the concept as he drove onwards, finally reaching New York. His SDI ID managed to get him through the barricades this time, thankfully.
New York seemed to be in chaos too, with shops being emptied of vital supplies by civilians who seemed to have only the faintest idea of what was going on. The NYPD were on the streets in force, but not enough to stop riots from breaking out in a dozen different locations and threatening to spread across the entire city. Large queues had formed outside the banks, people waiting to withdraw their savings; the radio claimed that the Saviours had already shut down most of the banks, intending to try the bankers for crimes against the economy. It seemed that that, thankfully, was untrue; the situation would almost certainly be a good deal worse if people were denied access to their money.
But it might not matter anyway. If the currency plummeted in the wake of Hope’s invasion of Washington, the population might not be able to buy food and other necessities. What would happen then?
He abandoned the car near the police lines around the SDI building, only to discover that a smaller group of Hope’s allies had taken up position and were searching the rubble for the remains of the overt team. Matt felt cold anger flare through him and wanted to run at them, to tear them apart for what they had done, but his talents didn't lend themselves to fighting such powerful superhumans. He did have tricks that might beat one of them, yet the others would tear him apart before he could take down a second.
Not too far away, New York’s other superhumans had gathered near Central Park. Matt wasn't impressed with most of them, even if they did have a remarkable amount of raw power. None of them had served in the SDI, and most had never fought another superhuman. So far, an uneasy truce appeared to be holding; Hope’s reputation was bad enough to cow even a mob of powerful superhumans. Matt had no idea how long that would last, or what the New Yorkers could do if they decided to fight, but they needed a leader. They needed someone they could all respect. And those of them who knew Matt knew him as nothing more than an investigator for the General.
The streets seemed more crowded as he walked towards Hell’s Kitchen, keeping one hand on the pistol in his pocket. New Yorkers were shouting angrily at each other as their cars became gridlocked, law and order breaking down despite the best efforts of the NYPD. Everyone wanted to be somewhere else, preferably away from the city and the anticipated superhuman clash. It was almost a relief when he reached Layla’s apartment and walked up the stairs. She wouldn't have left the city until it was falling down around her.
“Matt,” she said, as he opened the door. “You should have called ahead.”
Matt shrugged. “The cell phone network appears to be dying,” he said. “Do you know anything about that?”
“Someone has pushed themselves into the network,” Layla said. Her face seemed almost bloodless. “Do you know that I have never met anyone with similar talents to myself?”
“No,” Matt said. Could Layla have found someone she could greet as an equal? “What’s happening to the network?”
Layla smiled, thinly. “Someone has taken over the main router nodes in the country,” she said. “The internet, the cell phone network, even the secure data network used by the military. All communications are being routed through that person’s mind, allowing him to scan for anything that might alarm the Saviours. This person must exist partly in informational space, just like myself. There’s no other way it could be done.”
“I’ll pretend I understood that,” Matt said, shortly. Layla let out a chuckle. “Are you saying that we cannot trust the networks?”
“Not at all,” Layla said, flatly. “Right now, someone is scrutinising every single message going through the internet. You send a message to one of your friends, and that person will see it.”
Matt shook his head. “That isn't possible,” he said. “There are billions of emails sent every day...”
“You can if you happen to be a superhuman with a brain that works partly in informational space,” Layla said. “I plug myself into these machines”—she waved a hand at the mishmash of computers around her—“and I extend my mind into the space inhabited by computers—my mind works faster in there. I could do what he does easily.”
“So we cannot depend on the networks,” Matt said, slowly. “I assume that the SDI database is down, or gone?”
Layla smiled, coyly. “Well, the main database has been taken out,” she said, and waited.
Matt took the bait. “And what about the other databases?”
“Well,” Layla said, with a droll smile, “it just so happens that I used to copy everything from the SDI database into these computers. Everything that was in them up until the moment they were destroyed is in here.”
“Right,” Matt said. “And did the General know about this?”
“I thought it best not to tell him,” Layla admitted. “It would only have upset him.”
Matt started to laugh.
She cle
ared her throat. “What do you want to know?”
“We need someone to serve as a leader when we take back our country,” Matt said, flatly. “How many SDI superhumans are left alive?”
“I’m afraid that isn't clear,” Layla said. “You’re alive, of course, but many of the others will have gone underground to wait until they can get back in touch with legitimate authority. Besides, you don’t need a covert operative, do you? You need a superhero.”
“Hope killed America and the others,” Matt said, sharply. There had been more than one America, but three of them had now died in the line of duty. “We need a real warrior...”
“We have one,” Layla said. She swung one of the screens around for him to see. “You may have heard of this guy. Everyone has heard of this guy.”
Matt saw who she meant and had to smile. “Fireman himself,” he said. “Do you think he’ll come back to us?”
“I hope so,” Layla admitted. It wasn't like her to doubt anything. “I don’t think there’s anyone with his status left in the United States, certainly not from the first superhuman era. There’s Invincible, but he’s British. You think that the United Kingdom would agree to loan him to us for a few months?”
Matt shook his head. “Do you have a way of contacting him without being detected by your counterpart?”
“I believe so,” Layla said. “It's a system of innocuous code words that won’t mean anything to anyone without the key. And they were never stored outside the SDI database, which was destroyed rather than captured. Do you want to take the risk?”
Matt hesitated, and then nodded. “It will take too long to reach him without it,” he agreed. “Send the message.”
Layla tapped her computer for a few moments. “Something else,” she said. “Mr. Harrison left a note behind, to be opened in the event of something happening to him. I suggest you take it and read it.”
***
Night was falling over upstate New York as Matt parked his second stolen car by an abandoned farmhouse. According to Layla’s scan through the records, the owners had skipped town after losing their money on the stock market; the lawyers had kept the property in limbo until the new owners were identified, a task made harder by the sheer morass of transactions the former owners had created to hide their tracks. Matt had no difficulty in hiding the car where it wouldn't be seen from the road.
He waited close to the farmhouse, and tried to relax. He had always loved the countryside, even though it threatened to overwhelm his senses with the sheer pulse of life running through the world. It was natural, not man-made. He’d always intended to retire to the country after resigning from the SDI.
He sensed the gust of air left behind by a Level 5 superhuman before the man dropped out of the sky, landing next to Matt’s hiding place. Oddly, his mouth felt dry; the man he was looking at was a legend, even in the superhuman world. Fireman had been the first true superhero, and also the best. But then, he hadn't sold out to the corporations and PR groups that had created nightmares like the Young Stars or the Butch Boys.
“Fireman,” he said, almost stammering. “It’s an honour to meet you.”
“Just call me Michael,” Fireman said. “My name is Michael Lee. Fireman is just the tag the reporters gave me when they got over their shock at seeing a man fly.”
Up close, he was impressive, wearing a set of jeans and a shirt that was somehow more remarkable than Hope’s golden spandex. Like Hope, he was larger than life, with an impression of muscles on his muscles, but unlike Hope he had never lost touch with the mundane world. “The General is dead, then?”
“We assume so,” Matt said. “And Mr. Harrison is missing, presumed dead.”
“Hope has gone insane,” Lee said, flatly. “I assume you have a plan to take him out?”
“I’m working on it,” Matt admitted. “Michael...I need—the country needs—someone who can serve as the public leadership of the resistance. We need you.”
“I thought that it might come to this,” Lee said, slowly. “I said I never wanted to return to wearing the American uniform.”
He shook his head. “But the choice is between leaving Hope in a position to devastate the world, or fighting him. I don’t think that we have much choice; I don't have much choice.” His gaze sharpened. “How much of the SDI survived?”
“As far as I know, just me and a couple of others,” Matt admitted. He didn’t dare say too much, not with the Redeemer still in commission. “There will probably be other survivors, but they’re underground. And if they use the internet, the Saviours will probably be able to track them down before we can warn them.”
He hesitated. “But there may be somewhere else we can go,” he added. “And with you, we might be able to get the New Yorkers to join us.”
“And then see if we can take out the Saviours without destroying Washington in the crossfire,” Lee said. He grinned, brightly. “Let's be about it then, shall we?”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“They destroyed it? They destroyed it all?” Hope asked, incredulously.
“I’m afraid so,” Mainframe said. “They must have had a long-term contingency plan for something happening to the United States. The Pit had a nuke buried underneath, and they set it off the moment they realised that there wouldn't be any help from outside.”
Hope cursed. The Pit, the most secure prison in the world, had been designed for imprisoning superhumans too dangerous to be allowed to roam free. Some of them deserved death and he wouldn't have hesitated to kill them if they’d crossed his path, but others were effectively political prisoners, locked up for refusing to comply with SARA. He had intended to sort through the prisoners, execute those who deserved to die and use the remainder as an example of the positive changes he intended to bring to the United States, but now they were all dead.
“General Kratman used to say that the next war would be a superhuman war,” he said, slowly. Back when superhumans had first appeared, no one had realised just how many there would be within twenty years. The American Government had preserved as many supervillains as it could, just in case it needed them. Hope would have thought that the Slaughter Incident would have taught them better, but they’d still kept the superhumans in the Pit. Not that it mattered any longer. “Did we lose anyone?”
“They blew it up just after we approached the base,” Mainframe said. “No one died, but maybe we should have used Gateway to get into the prison first.”
Hope shook his head. Gateway could create portals to places she’d been, or places she’d seen pictures of, but not to places she didn't know at all. There were no images of the Pit’s interior available to the American population, something Hope suspected was intended to prevent them from protesting the treatment of the prisoners. Or maybe not; some of the prisoners were superhuman serial killers, rapists, or even thieves who had been damn near unstoppable without the SDI. The American population would probably cheer their execution.
“Never mind,” he said, finally. It had been a setback, but not one he intended to dwell upon. “What’s happening in the country at large?”
Mainframe hesitated. “A great deal of civil disobedience,” he admitted. “Whatever we may have hoped for from the United States, it may be a long time before we get it. People aren't showing up for work, companies and corporations are not cooperating with us...and large segments of the military are still out there. And we haven't tracked down the Vice President or the nuclear launch codes.”
Hope scowled. “I thought you had access to their entire military network?”
“The submarines that carry nuclear missiles aren’t linked to the network,” Mainframe reminded him. “And some of their bases are completely isolated from the military network as well. They had enough problems with merely human hackers to understand the value of computer security before we came along—and I bet that the SDI had someone like me to prove just how vulnerable the system actually was.” He snorted. “Plenty of civilians don’t realise it, Hope. They’r
e still sending messages stating their outrage in the clear.”
He shook his head. “We need to move ahead with the trials. Once we prove just what rotten fucks the government counted among its numbers, maybe things will get better. But right now, the economy is dropping like a stone and that’s going to spread pretty damn quickly. We have to fix this problem before it becomes impossible to halt.”
Hope nodded, remembering the brief—edgy—meeting he’d had with the British Ambassador, who was speaking for the United Nations Security Council after Bill Jefferson had been arrested by the Saviours. The Ambassador had warned him there was no way that the Security Council could recognise him as the new American leader, not after the chaos the Saviours had already caused in Libya. They might not do anything to remove Hope from the country—the Redeemer had confirmed they were still trying to decide what to do—but there wouldn't be any help from overseas.
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