“WELL?” ROMULUS’S EYES, BRIGHT WITH THE STIMULATION OF ALCOHOL AND adventure, seemed to bore into Kord’s skull. “What are they saying about our beloved friend Mr. Stedman?”
Kord thrust his hands behind his back and lifted his eyes to the edge of the walled garden as he searched for words. They were walking amid the lush greenery outside Adrian’s French chateau, but the weather was far more suited for an indoor conversation. The black clouds overhead hung so low they seemed to compress the earth itself.
“They say,” Kord measured his words with care, “that he will survive. John Miller seems committed to following your leadership. The American Congress will have to ratify the Millennium Treaty, of course, but the people seem to support the emergency measures he has installed.” Kord lifted one shoulder in a most unmilitary shrug. “The Americans are saying that Miller is the man of the moment, and Adrian Romulus the man of the hour.” He turned and found it impossible not to return Adrian’s disarming smile. “Congratulations, sir.”
“This is wonderful!” Adrian stopped to clap Kord on both shoulders, then folded his arms and resumed his walk. “But what of General Archer? They do not suspect him?”
“He is in charge of the investigation into both the automobile explosion and the president’s mysterious illness. He is so busy rounding up suspects that no one has dared look in his direction.” He paused, hesitating to mention the niggling fear that stirred in his brain. “I am speaking, of course, of the usual investigators. There are others, I fear, who suspect Archer if only because of his close association with me on my visits. But no one would dare accuse him without incontrovertible proof.”
“Good.” Romulus’s grin flashed briefly, dazzling against his olive skin. “I shall have to do something special to thank him. Perhaps a new position in our new community—even one to rival yours, General Herrick.”
Kord flinched. “Mine, sir?”
“Yes.” Adrian continued down the garden path, ignoring the rising wind that threw the tree branches first one way, then another. A flash of lightning stabbed at the sky as the darkness thickened and congealed in the garden. Kord walked on, knowing that a hard rain could fall at any moment, but Adrian seemed not to care.
“General, you are very efficient—some would say ruthless.”
Kord gave him a look of gratitude, which Romulus acknowledged with just the smallest softening of his eyes.
“But I gave you a task to perform months ago, and I regret to say that you have failed me.”
Kord stopped on the path, his mind congesting with doubts and fears. What had he not done? He cast about for some logical explanation of his master’s abrupt statement, but he could find none.
Struggling for breath, he hurried to catch up with Adrian, who walked on as if nothing had happened. “I don’t understand, sir,” Kord said, his heart beating faster than usual. “I removed Stedman, and the bomb had the desired effect. The Americans have joined the community, which is what you wanted—”
“I want Daniel Prentice.” The shifting storm shadows hid Romulus’s face, but there was no mistaking the splinters of ice in his voice. “I specifically told you that I wanted the man’s genius, and yet you have done nothing to bring him to me.”
Reeling with disbelief, Kord shook his head, then brought his hand to the bridge of his nose. “You have his computer code; you have his Millennium Chip.” He lowered his hand, struggling to contain his swirling emotions. “Prentice did everything you asked.”
“I want him.” Adrian’s dark eyes glared at Kord, shooting sparks in all directions. “I want to know that a man of his genius would vow allegiance to our cause. I want the world to see that a man like Prentice appreciates our vision of the world community. I want Daniel Prentice to forsake his country and vow his allegiance to me!”
Kord stepped back, momentarily astounded. Adrian had demonstrated these fits of prideful ambition before, but Kord had never been on the receiving end of his anger. He was tempted to turn away, to leave the chateau, and not look back, but one did not walk out on the man who held the world’s power in his hands.
“Prentice is not easily won,” he said when he finally found his voice. “That woman in the White House, Lauren Mitchell, exerts a tremendous influence upon him. His best friend is a traditionalist, his mother a fundamentalist Christian. Moreover, he seems content with what he has, so I cannot offer him much—”
The stark white bones of lightning suddenly cracked through the black sky, followed by a roar of thunder that shuddered through the trees like a bellow of rage.
“You should offer him glory,” Adrian answered, his dark hair lifting in the wind. He lifted his face to the swirling clouds, completely unafraid. “When we return to the United States, you will find Daniel Prentice. Offer him a place at my side. If he does not have the good sense to accept, kill him. He who is not for us is against us. It is that simple, General Herrick.”
Kord could not answer, but gripped his hat in the bawling winds and wondered if any of Romulus’s professions of loyalty could be trusted.
THIRTY-TWO
SUMMER’S HOT BREATH GRADUALLY COOLED TO THE GENTLER BREEZES OF autumn. The world continued its frantic search for the terrorists of the Morning Star Trust, and three other suspects were discovered and their weapons confiscated. All three suspects, like the one held in Brussels, died before the world court could try them. One suffered a heart attack, one was killed while resisting arrest, one committed suicide, and the fourth overdosed on drugs he had managed to smuggle into the prison.
But there were no other nuclear explosions. The people of the world inured themselves to fear just as they had learned to harden their hearts to tragedy.
By November first, President Samuel Stedman’s doctors had prepared their patient for his return to the White House. Lauren watched with tears in her eyes as the tall, once-powerful man walked out of the hospital between two Secret Service agents, waved to the crowd, and slowly sank into the presidential limo. The political climate had shifted so dramatically during his three-month hospitalization that she wondered if he would be able to adjust. He had left his office determined to fight for American sovereignty; he had returned to find his country in the hands of a foreign diplomat, guided there by his own right-hand man. And as Americans dreamed of a more prosperous economy and the ambiance of Europe, each passing day increased the likelihood that the Congress would ratify the Millennium Treaty in January, after their return from the holiday break.
Lauren was afraid Samuel Stedman could do little to wrest his authority away from those who had snatched it while he slept.
If Stedman was disappointed in the turn of world events, he disguised his feelings well. On a balmy November Monday, he returned to the Oval Office and received heartfelt welcomes from his staff and a horde of visitors to the White House.
That afternoon, after seeing that the president had a gentle schedule for his first week back to work, Lauren welcomed the opportunity to retreat to her office and gather her own thoughts. She pulled a sheet of White House stationery from her drawer and wrote Daniel—in a hand-written letter, the most secure way to communicate within her office—that Sam Stedman seemed content to finish out his term quietly. Victoria’s death and his own brush with eternity had mellowed the man, and Lauren knew he would not publicly criticize the vice president. Though Stedman strongly disagreed with Miller’s decision to move the United States into the evolving global community, Miller was the best Republican hope for the year 2000 election.
Lauren wrote:
I think it’s terribly ironic that John Miller will owe his future to Samuel Stedman. A truly great man is stepping aside to make way for a lesser one, and the fact that he is willing to do so only emphasizes his magnanimity. This country will lose a great leader but will probably never feel the loss, for the position of president will never be what it was as long as we are confederated with the European Union. Adrian Romulus clearly controls that body now—his personality pervades every press release, comm
uniqué, and teleconference. But Sam Stedman has resigned himself to the inevitable. Perhaps he remembers what Victoria said about the coming one-world government . . . or perhaps he is too weary and grief-stricken to care. I can’t ask about his feelings. He has put up a wall of reticence that no one dares approach. I only know that a shell of the man I once admired occupies the Oval Office. His calendar is filling with senseless photo ops and hand-shaking meetings—trivialities, really. And all of us who love him count the days until January 2001, when we will depart the Oval Office and leave it to a more ambitious and flexible statesman.
As Lauren signed the letter and sealed the envelope, she took stock of her own feelings. As Sam Stedman’s future had diminished, so had hers. She had committed herself to serving in the White House throughout his presidency, but that presidency had all but vanished in the wake of tragedy. More and more Lauren found herself thinking of Daniel Prentice . . . and hoping for a way to tell him that her situation had changed.
Throughout November, as the president resumed what remained of his schedule, Daniel and Brad sent a flurry of e-mails back and forth—all carefully encrypted. Daniel devoted himself to covert activities after the office had closed and most of his employees had gone home.
Over the weeks, as Daniel and Brad shared their thoughts and played devil’s advocate, Daniel’s suspicions about Adrian Romulus evolved into certainty. Samuel Stedman had his enemies on the home front, of course, but Brad insisted that only someone with advanced military technology— “make that foreign technology, Danny boy” one message read—could have slipped an explosive device through the White House gates. Yet this administration had managed to maintain cordial relationships with every foreign leader except Adrian Romulus, who, despite his smiles and condolences, had met his first major roadblock in the person of Samuel Stedman.
So who had Romulus tapped to do his dirty work? Any of the president’s cabinet members could be working for him; Vice President Miller himself could have been on Romulus’s payroll. Determined to find the traitorous link, Daniel convinced Brad to share some thoughts on how to invade the enemy’s territory, then he spent several long nights at his computer, working until sunrise, then catching a quick nap on the sofa in his office.
His employees must have noticed his bleary-eyes and distracted expression, but no one dared say anything.
Meanwhile, public support for the Millennium Treaty grew with each passing hour. Public service announcements touted the glamour of traveling to London or Paris for lunch without hassle and without a passport. American companies were urged to invest in European industries because “what benefits one member of the community benefits us all.” The symbol of Europa upon the bull, superimposed over a circle of stars to represent the star-spangled American flag, began to appear in travel ads and commercials for European countries.
Daniel suspected that anyone who publicly expressed loyalty to the idea of a sovereign United States would naturally fall under suspicion, so he ran his company as if nothing had changed. Many of his employees were quite vocal in their support of the Millennium Treaty and the nation’s affiliation with the European Union, and Daniel couldn’t blame them for thinking he felt the same way. Prentice Technologies, after all, had designed the computer code that served as the basis for unity.
But he and Brad had finally come up with a two-pronged plan that might delay Romulus’s rise to power. Even if it failed to delay the Millennium Treaty, it would still give Daniel an opportunity to warn the American people and tell the truth about the so-called nuclear threat. If Adrian Romulus could not be stopped, he could at least be exposed.
To that end, Daniel worked on a hardware virus device similar to the one he had installed in Iraq prior to Desert Storm. Brad continued his covert operations, spying on newcomers, mostly European loyalists, who suddenly appeared in Washington. Most important, Brad tried to keep an eye on General Herrick, who had taken a suite at the Watergate Hotel and now attended every cabinet meeting and security briefing.
While Daniel searched for technological ways to thwart Romulus’s purposes, he knew Lauren was corresponding with his mother to learn what she could about the Antichrist from a biblical perspective. Lauren sent encrypted e-mail messages to Daniel, too, but he asked that she send them only from her home—too many surveillance devices could literally capture computer keystrokes from the other side of a wall. No room in the White House, Daniel assured her, was truly secure.
During his annual televised Thanksgiving speech, a calm, placid President Stedman reported that 84 percent of the United States population had been successfully implanted with Millennium Chips. Thousands were already using the chip to handle their banking, shopping, and medical needs. As the president concluded his speech, he looked out at the camera with weary eyes and gave the public a smile containing only a shadow of its former warmth.
Daniel felt his heart sink. If he had not invented the Y2K fix, if he had not insisted that Millennium Chips were the wave of the future, would the world still be on this collision course with biblical prophecy? The question was unanswerable.
The first snow of winter fell on Friday night, December third. Daniel saw the snow from the PT cafeteria windows, thought suddenly of Lauren, and wondered if she would build a fire in that cozy den where he had sat with her on the sofa. He had resisted kissing her that night, but if she were to walk through the door, he wouldn’t resist now.
Shaking off the counterproductive thoughts, he returned to his office and sank into his chair. The green circuit card for his new hardware device lay on the desk, and he stared at it and tried to focus on his task. He had just begun to tinker with the relay switches when Roberta’s husky voice broke his concentration.
“An urgent e-mail message for you, Mr. Prentice.”
“Sender, please?”
“Lauren Mitchell.”
“Thank you, Roberta.” Daniel moved to his computer, selected the email program, then highlighted the icon that would decrypt Lauren’s message. In an instant, the jumbled symbols separated into words.
Daniel:
A stroke of luck! Just heard that AR himself is coming to U.S. to welcome in the new year. A White House reception is planned for 12-23, then AR plans to vacation over Christmas. But—get this—he wants to stand in Times Square on New Year’s Eve! Something about seeing the ball drop and welcoming in the new millennium. So if you want him in your backyard, you’ll have him then.
Hope you are well. Let me know how I can help.
L.
Daniel swiveled his chair and reread the message, then considered his options. He didn’t particularly want Adrian Romulus nearby on New Year’s Eve or any other night. But if Romulus was planning to appear at Times Square, he was undoubtedly producing some sort of televised address with lots of corresponding fanfare. The man couldn’t take a simple video call without playing to the camera. Even last year, when America had no idea who or what Adrian Romulus was, he had managed to snag prime face time on camera.
Surely this was a heaven-sent opportunity. Daniel could go to Washington for the reception on the twenty-third, plant the Trojan horse device he’d been designing, then move out and away. With any luck the device wouldn’t be discovered until after New Year’s Eve, and by that time Daniel would have found a way to tell the world exactly what he’d discovered.
Smiling grimly, he typed a note to Brad:
B:
Got a tuxedo? Keep the 23rd open. L’s planning a party at Casa Blanca, and we’re invited. Big wigs from Europe. Holiday celebration. Just what I need before my vacation.
See you there.
D.
Daniel encrypted the message with PGP and smiled as the letters flashed into incomprehensible nonsense. Even if Brad’s Romulus-loving coworkers pulled this note off his hard drive, it wouldn’t matter. The message contained nothing incriminating, but Brad would understand. December 23 was the launch date, and New Year’s Eve would bring a rendezvous with destiny.
Dan
iel leaned back in his chair, laced his hands behind his head, and stared for a moment at the garbled assortment of letters and symbols. If he proceeded with this plan, his life would change in the most dramatic way imaginable. He’d have to abandon his apartment, his company, even his loyal employees. Adrian Romulus’s steadily growing web of influence now covered every part of Europe and the United States; after January first there’d be virtually no place in those countries for Daniel to hide. His Millennium Chip would set off sensors everywhere he went; even his entry into a convenience store could trigger an alarm.
Romulus would certainly brand him as a wanted and dangerous criminal. He’d be lucky if he survived two days in the United States.
Still, someone had to do something. And since he had been the ambitious fool who provided Romulus with the means of controlling the world’s population, he might as well be the one to do it.
Resolved to follow his conscience, Daniel reached out and clicked the send icon.
THIRTY-THREE
7:45 P.M., Thursday, December 23, 1999
LAUREN ANXIOUSLY SMOOTHED THE IVORY FABRIC OF HER DRESS, THEN PAUSED and stared at her reflection in the small mirror behind her door. She should have taken an hour to go home and really put on the glitz; the other women at the reception would undoubtedly sparkle like nominees on Oscar night. But she had been too nervous to worry about glamour and too keyed-up to care. She peered out of her office into the West Wing hallway. Daniel, Brad, and Christine stood outside, the men both handsome in their tuxedos and Christine elegant in a simple silver gown. Lauren had lifted her brows at her first glimpse of Christine Hunter—none of her elementary schoolteachers had ever looked that gorgeous.
Lauren painted on a fresh coat of lipstick, threw the compact into her evening bag, then took a deep breath and stepped out in the hall to join her friends. Daniel’s eyes had been abstracted, but they cleared as she came into the hallway. “About time.” His dark eyes held more than a hint of flirtation, and she wondered how he could even think about charming her at a time like this.
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