Tyrants willingly, eyes open. But you?" Namir cocked his head, weighing Saxon up. "The man I wanted for my team, the man I know you can
be, he was being held back." He nodded again. "Throughout your entire military service, first to King and Country, then to Belltower, you've
been shackled to some kind of outdated moral compass. You have a dream of being the 'good soldier.' And while other men have had that
beaten from them by harsh reality, you hold on to it, Ben. Against all odds, you hold on. That's why you never rose in rank. We've both been
leaders of men. And that means sometimes you have to send men to die, and do it without flinching."
"I'd never make my men take a risk I wouldn't take myself!" he shot back.
"Indeed," Namir allowed. "That's your failure. You've been abandoned by every family you had. Your parents, your nation, your army, your
employer ... And yet still you refuse to see the callous truth. You're blinded by your own hope." He smiled. "I took that from you. I broke those
bonds because I thought it would make you stronger."
"The falsified data for the mission ... You had it substituted for the real thing!" Saxon's muscles tensed. He wanted to strike out, but he had to
know the full dimensions of the betrayal. "How?"
"We have assets inside the Belltower corporation. It wasn't difficult." He sighed. "Those men, they were a hindrance to you. They had to be
sacrificed. It was a test. If you perished there in the desert alongside them, then you had no place with us. But if you came out alone ..."
"I tried to save them!" Saxon shouted. "Duarte ... I could have saved his life!"
"He was expendable," Namir countered. "They all were. I gave Hardesty the order to break Rainbird because I needed to know. I wanted to
see if you were willing to live, Ben. If you had the courage to survive."
Saxon's voice was low and hard. "You heartless fucking bastard ..." His hand slipped toward the pocket where the Buzzkill was concealed; but
the weapon would be barely an insect bite to the Tyrant commander, with dermal armor sheathing what there was of his flesh.
"Survivor's guilt. That, and your instinct to be loyal to a man who saved your life." Namir studied him. "The psych profile said that was all I
needed to control you. But these things are so hard to determine. The human mind is a chaotic system. And as much as men are exactly the
animals you expect them to be, sometimes they are not." He frowned. "I don't need to ask you to choose. I can see the answer in your eyes. You
can't let go. Hardesty was right. You don't have the strength to kill cold."
"I'm pleased I can prove you wrong." With a blink, Saxon shifted vision modes, getting ready.
Namir drew a wicked-looking combat blade from a sheath on his belt. "You are going to fight for it, aren't you?" he asked. "At least show me
that courage. Let me know my faith in you wasn't entirely misplaced." Saxon drew the stun gun and thumbed off the safety catch. The other
man laughed. "Oh, that's a choice you'll regret," he sneered.
Saxon met his gaze. "I'm not going to use it on you." The reflex booster kicked in and he brought up the nonlethal weapon, firing two rounds
into the flat, glassy surface of the main display console. The stun darts, thick shells the size of a shotgun cartridge, discharged a powerful surge
of voltage on impact; the console erupted in a violent shower of sparks and acrid smoke. Surge buffers in the ops room tripped, plunging it into
darkness, but Saxon was already seeing the space in low-light mode.
Namir reacted, sweeping in with a lunging, lethal attack that Saxon dodged by a hair, the blade cutting the air near his face.
The stink of burnt plastic reached the fire sensors in the ceiling and immediately triggered a carillon of buzzing alarms. Saxon snatched at a
monitor screen and tore it from a desk, with a snake nest of cables trailing behind it. As puffs of fire-retardant powder began to rain from safety
nozzles overhead, he slammed the display into Namir's head with such force that the screen shattered and the Tyrant commander staggered
back under the blow.
Saxon took the moment and vaulted over a workstation and into the corridor beyond. As he ran, the familiar itch in his jawbone arose, Namir's
voice issuing out of his mastoid comm. "All call signs, ignore the alarms" he snarled, "Gray is rogue. Intercept and terminate!"
Dundalk—Maryland—United States of America
"Hello," said the voice, bereft of anything that could make it possibly seem human. "I'm pleased to see you are unharmed ."
Anna glanced at the videoscreen set up inside the army tent, and then back at Lebedev, who stood near the door flap, watching her reaction.
"What's this? More games?"
"Some of the people we work with prefer to keep their identities a secret," he noted. "Isn't that right, Janus?"
"I'm afraid so, Juan," said the voice. "It would compromise not only me, and Juggernaut, but also your lives if I were to tell you who I am."
Anna folded her arms and gave the hazy shape on the display a level stare. "After all that stuff about conspiracies and distrust, you're playing
the need-to-know card?" She shook her head. "If I know anything, it's that the less truth you have, the less trust follows. You could be anyone.
You could be working with the Tyrants or the ... their masters."
"You find it hard to say the name, don't you?" On the screen, the digital shadow shifted slightly. "Illuminati. A layered word, heavy with
meaning and counter-meaning. You don't want to believe. It's an understandable reaction."
"Our colleague here has been opposing them for a long time," said Lebedev.
"How did you get mixed up in all this?" Anna demanded. "What's your angle? Are you in it for the kicks, like D-Bar, or for the greater good like
him?" She inclined her head toward Lebedev.
"Neither," came the reply, and for a moment Anna thought she sensed something like melancholy under the words. "I found Juggernaut and
became one of their circle. I'm doing this for the same reason as you, Anna. Because they killed someone who was important to me."
It didn't sound like a lie; but then with all the layers of digital masking in place, she wondered if she could ever read anything about the ghost
hacker.
"Trust is a rare commodity these days. But you can only accumulate it by spending it. An ironic fact, in present circumstances." There was a
pause. "You have questions. I'll answer them if lean."
Anna frowned. "This ... vote. The United Nations. You're telling me that all the assassinations have been to set that up to fall one way?"
"Yes. " The screen blinked and became a map of the world. As Janus spoke, dots of red appeared across the span of nations, each briefly
displaying a data window with death certificates, accident reports, security camera footage, and other information sources. "What you're seeing
are the targets of the Tyrants. Hundreds of people, all of whom have lines of influence that can be drawn back to the proposed regulation
vote, and how it will play out. "
Over the map, a matrix of connections formed, a web bringing each person together, showing the human effect of the targeted individuals. Anna
was suddenly reminded of a stone dropped in a lake, the ripples radiating outward; only here, the ripples were being guided, controlled—and in
many cases, erased.
One thread through the complex knot of effect was highlighted. "Consider this " said Janus, displaying an image of a smiling middle-aged man
and his family. "A midlevel minister in the Italian government, with many friends in the Euro-Parliament. His son was cured of debilitating
brain damage because of a neural implant. He is well disposed toward the spread of human au
gmentation technology. The
recommendations he makes carry weight. A committee of United Nations representatives are currently entertaining a suggestion from
certain groups to call for a vote on the regulation of H.E. development..."
Lebedev nodded slowly. "But before the minister can be consulted on behalf of his country, his wife is suddenly diagnosed with a variant neo
SARS strain. His family comes first. He's unable to fulfill his duties. Instead, the man who replaces him on Italy's technology advisory board is a
known associate of William Taggart, the pro-humanist... and now that country is supporting the push for the ballot." He spread his hands.
"That's just one story. You saw another, more violent approach firsthand, with Skyler and Dansky."
Anna's eyes narrowed. "What happened to the minister's wife?"
"She died from complications. The minister has been suspended on medical grounds and is currently undergoing treatment for depression."
The map returned. "This is how they work, Anna. Hundreds and hundreds of tiny actions, individually small, collectively gigantic, all
working in concert. Every person they have exerted control over has been a part of a plan to dominate a vote that has yet to happen. And
even this is only one element of an even greater schema."
"The Illuminati are working in tandem with one of their satellite groups, a faction called Majestic 12 born out of the Cold War era, a technology
division of sorts ... Together, they're in the process of securing a power base for something beyond the scope of the UN vote. Something much
bigger."
Anna was reeling from the import of what she was hearing, caught between incredulity and acceptance. "Bigger than regulating the most radical
science ever created?"
"We can see only the edges of the conspiracy " Janus told her. "But what we can be sure of is that the Illuminati s goal is and always has
been command over the future of humanity. A New World Order, without freedoms, without questions. Without end."
She turned away, shaking her head. "No ... No! It's too much! I've come here looking for a murderer and you're telling me that the world is
turning on all this?" Anna looked toward Lebedev. "Listen to me. I don't care about your damned conspiracy theories! I don't care about who
else they've killed! I've thrown away everything I have because I want just one, single thing—Justice, for Matt Ryan." Her voice caught. "He
saved my life. I couldn't save him. So I am going to find the person who killed him and make them pay. If you won't help me do that, then I'll be
better off alone." Furious, she stormed out of the tent and strode away over the uneven concrete floor.
Aerial Transit Corridor—Gulf of St. Lawrence—North Atlantic
Saxon tried to think of a worse tactical situation he had been in, and came up empty. Trapped on board an airborne jet with four heavily
augmented mercenaries and no means of escape, armed only with a couple of rounds of stun-dart ammo that was nearly useless against these
adversaries ...Yeah, it's pretty grim, he told himself. About the only positive point he could find was that without Federova among them, at least he would see the other Tyrants coming. He wondered how much good that would do him.
Despite Namir's commands, the fire alarms were still in full effect, but retardants had only been triggered inside the ops room. Saxon moved
quickly through the galley area, panning the Buzzkill this way and that, going forward.
His mind raced through the tactical options open to him. He had to make a choice; he needed a better weapon, something lethal, and he needed
it fast. He could set up a quick-and-dirty ambush, try to kill one of the others when they came for him, and take their gun—but that would cost
him time. The second option would be to get into the cockpit, lock himself in there, and force the crew to land the jet on the nearest piece of
ground, maybe Newfoundland or Nova Scotia. Without at least one pilot, he'd have to handle the aircraft alone, and Saxon wasn't willing to trust
himself on that score. With his rudimentary understanding of piloting, the best he could do in that case was ditch in the coastal shallows and
hope he survived.
Every second he spent deliberating, they were getting farther and farther away from land. He nodded to himself. Take the plane, then, he
thought. Figure the rest out later.
He could hear noises behind him. Namir hadn't come back on the mastoid comm after his first announcement, and Saxon imagined he'd be
passing a new channel assignment to each of the others by hand. Another reason to move fast; once they were ready, they'd box him in and
that would be that.
He thought about weapons again; at least it cut both ways. None of the standard-issue firearms used by the Tyrants could be discharged inside
the jet, not without taking the risk of overpenetration. A 10 mm round could pass right through flesh and punch a hole in the fuselage, causing a
catastrophic depressurization.
Saxon grimaced. Back down the length of the aircraft there was a weapons locker stocked with all he needed—a crossbow, maybe? A pulse
gun? But he was thinking like Namir, and Namir would have posted someone there already. He'd have to make do.
Saxon checked his pockets for anything he could use, and his fingers touched the vu-phone. He drew it out and considered it for a second before
hitting the redial key. There was a good chance he wasn't going to get out of this alive; if he could make his last few minutes count, maybe
contact the hacker-movement from the corner of his eye spun him around, and he forgot the phone, coming up with the Buzzkill. He saw a flash
of spiked blond hair and a figure in black combat gear burst from the shadow of a storage cabinet. Gunther Hermann collided with Saxon with
such force that they were both propelled across the galley and through a folding partition into the next anteroom.
"This time it will be different," Hermann snarled. "I think I will enjoy this." He struck out with a storm of blows that made Saxon's skull ring,
lighting flares of pain behind his eyes. Blood hazed his vision and he threw a punch that cut empty air but little else. Hermann came in and hit
him again; each shot to the head was like taking a hit from a sledgehammer. Saxon's body possessed a base level of subdermal armor, the
Rhino-class augmentation commonplace on Belltower spec-ops soldiers, but it wouldn't be enough to prevent the German's rain of punches
pushing him into a concussion. He had to stop the mercenary, and he had to do it quickly.
Hermann had learned his lesson from their brief battle in the fight room, moving constantly, using his nerve-jacked speed to stay outside the
swings from Saxon's cyberarm. He punched at air, drawing a sneer from the German.
He feinted into another haymaker that the younger man easily sidestepped; but while Saxon's other arm was only meat and bone, it was still
deadly. His attention fixed on his opponent's augmentations, Hermann stepped into Saxon's range and he rushed him. He slammed the heel of
his palm upward, breaking the other man's nose, and rode the momentum of the attack. Saxon's augmented legs powered him back across the
cabin, with Hermann shoved out before him.
The mercenary slammed into a glass-fronted refrigerator and crumpled with a cry of pain. Saxon punched him hard in the chest, feeling the
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