by Terry Schott
Ariel tapped Curtis on the arm. “You should likely leave.”
“No way.”
“He should leave," the old man agreed as he patted Aleksy on the cheek.
“Fitz?” The captive’s eyes widened. “What are you doing here? Untie me right now, you old fart.”
“I don’t answer to you anymore, tart," Fitz said. “If I did, you wouldn’t be on my table.” He nodded at Curtis. “Send your boyfriend out, Ariel. Time to get started.”
Ariel pushed her boyfriend gently on the back. “Trust me, you don’t want to see this. Wait for me at the hotel.”
“Is it safe there?”
“I think so.” Ariel smiled. “You walking back will show us if there are any others on the hunt. Don’t worry, I have you covered.”
“Where did all these friends suddenly appear from?”
“That’s why we came to New Orleans and it’s what I went to arrange before we ate.” She nodded at Aleksy. “This is one of their best. When people like him—like me—are on a hunt, it’s usually solo.”
“Okay. By the way, you did your part perfectly, babe. I’m proud of you.”
Curtis smiled. “Thanks. When will you be back?”
“Few hours.”
She watched him leave. When the door closed, Ariel turned and made eye contact with Aleksy, who stared at her with a blank expression. She smiled. “Hiya.”
He did not reply.
“Did my boyfriend surprise you? I bet you had no idea he knew Krav Maga. I know I didn’t. Turns out his best childhood friend is a master in the art.”
Aleksy smiled. “It was a good throw. Came out of nowhere and was like getting hit by lightning.”
“Right? I wasn’t so sure, but after seeing him in action, well, I think some of our love time activities can get a bit more physical.”
Aleksy’s smile faded. “What do you want from me?”
“The truth.” She leaned forward and tapped his foot. “I can’t get you out of this one, Aleksy, but I can make it quick and painless.”
“I can’t help you with anything, Ariel.”
“Sure you can.”
Aleksy looked toward Fitz. The old man had his back turned to them as he worked on something at his side table in the near-darkness. “Maybe. What you need?”
“Two things. First tell me where to find the other chip in my body.”
Aleksy closed his eyes. “And two?”
“How many more are after me? Give me names and numbers.”
Aleksy licked his lips and took a deep breath through his nose. “The answer to your second question is that it’s only me.”
“Will they send more if you fail?”
“I doubt it.”
“That one was a lie,” Fitz called out over his shoulder.
Ariel smiled. “They want me bad?”
Aleksy shook his head.
“Yes or no?”
“No.”
Ariel glanced at Fitz, but he said nothing. “They want Curtis.”
He closed his eyes and nodded. “Yes. They are convinced he’s the Harbinger, or at least the author of Sticks and Stones.”
“He is the author.”
“Wow. Then he’s likely the Harbinger too.”
Ariel shook her head. “He’s not. What about my first request?”
“I can’t.”
“If you don’t tell me where the second chip is, I’m gonna have Fitz trim every piece of flesh from your bones to find it. If it’s in your bones, he will start cracking them to look in there.” She shook her head. “You know Fitz. He will keep you alive at least long enough to feel a few bones split open. Any idea what that will feel like, Aleksy? Being flayed alive, then dressed up like a deer on the trail? It’s gotta be terrible.”
Aleksy shook his head.
“Or tell me where it is. Fitz gets it out of me and, if you told the truth, then we shove a blade into your brain and you head out without feeling much of anything.” She shrugged. “I know which one I would pick.”
“You wouldn’t give it up.”
“Knowing that I was gonna die anyway? Of course I would.”
He shook his head.
“Tell ya what.” She patted his right calf. “I think it’s in this leg. Normally, I would start as far away from that spot as possible to drag out the pain, but I do like you. I’m gonna let Fitz go rooting around below your knee. After he’s done, if he hasn’t found it, I’ll offer you the deal again.” She turned and walked to a chair near the door. “He’s all yours, Fitz.”
The old man turned around, a strange smile on his face as he wheeled the steel table closer. Gruesome instruments flashed in the light.
Aleksy’s eyes widened. “Wait a minute, it’s not in that leg. Please, Ariel, don’t do this.”
“Sorry, bud.” She crossed her arms. “The next offer for a deal doesn’t come until he finishes with your leg.”
Fitz turned toward his worktable and picked up a thin filleting blade, four inches long. He walked toward Aleksy and bent down over his leg. The man on the table began to whimper.
Ariel turned to leave but stopped and raised one hand. “Oh." She swivelled to face Aleksy again. "By the way. I know for sure that Curtis isn’t the Harbinger." She smiled. “Because I am.”
41
March, 2018
The boy looked down at the pair of legs sticking out from under his house. “What ya doing, Beckett?”
“John? That you out there?”
The boy nodded.
“Well, is it?”
“Yeah!”
Muffled laughter sounded from under the house and a hand appeared, fingers wiggling. “Good. Now hand me the screwdriver with the blue handle, will ya?”
John looked at the tools scattered on the ground. When he spotted the blue-handled screwdriver, he picked it up and placed it in Beckett’s palm.
“Thanks.”
John knelt down and peered into the space where Beckett was working. “Whatcha doing under there, anyway?”
“What?”
“I said, whatcha doing under there?”
“Come look.”
John crawled under the house, making a face at the musty smell assaulting his nostrils. Beckett had placed a large tarp on the ground and was on his back, both hands working on wires over his head.
“You the one that turned our power off?” John asked.
Beckett grinned. “Yeah. Am I cutting into your video game time?”
“A little.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” He watched the man twist two wires together and tuck them back into a metal box before grabbing another pair. “Does Dad know you’re doing this?”
“Of course he does. He’s the one that asked me to do it.”
“Something broken?”
“No. You’ve heard of the Harbinger, right?”
John’s eyes widened. “Yeah. That guy’s cool.”
Beckett laughed. “Maybe. You know how he came out with free internet for everyone?”
“And paid all their big bills, yep.”
“Well, a few weeks ago he started giving away plans for free energy.”
“Electricity?”
“Kind of. It does the same thing, only it’s not as dangerous.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Maybe not. Still, he posted blueprints on the net to show anyone interested how to make new generators which will pull free energy from the air.”
John laughed. “That’s crazy.”
“Why?”
“We learned about electricity last year in science. It’s impossible to get it out of the air.”
Beckett’s hands stopped moving. “You ever hear about a guy named Nicola Tesla?”
John frowned. “No.”
“A long time ago, I think before I was even born, there was this guy who did some pretty amazing stuff, especially with electricity. He could make it travel through the air.”
“Really?”
Beckett laughed. “You don’t believe me.”
“Electricity going through the air would hurt people, wouldn’t it?”
“It didn’t. He could send it across a field and make a light bulb come on without any wires. And no one got hurt.”
“Huh.”
“Yeah. The Harbinger says that he found blueprints left by this Tesla guy. Now he’s sharing them so that people could get power without paying for it. He’s posted it all on his internet and invited people to build the generators.” Beckett smiled. “I built one a couple weeks ago. My place has been off the grid for over eight days.”
“Pulling electricity out of the air?”
“I guess.”
“Wow, that’s cool.”
“Your dad thought so too. So now I’m wiring up your house to do the same thing.”
“You’re putting new wires through the whole house? But you just said it doesn’t need wires.”
“Not to get energy from the generator, but it’s still quickest to send the power through your house using wires.”
“And the ones that are already here won’t work?”
“They will, once I nano-coat them.”
“Nano? Like tiny computers?”
“Kind of. The word nano means”—Beckett paused—“well, basically it means super small.”
“You lost me.”
Beckett laughed. “That’s okay. Basically, I’m going to put a very thin coat of material over top of the wires in your house.”
“All the wires?”
“That’s right.”
“How you gonna get to them behind the walls and in the ceiling? I asked dad to show me some wires when we were taking electricity in science. He said we would have to rip the walls apart to get to them.”
“See that box and drill?”
John turned and then nodded. “Uh huh.”
“That box is a little receiver. I’m going to run the drill and it will cause the nano coating to spread from the box through the house and cover the wires, like water flowing down a pipe.”John frowned. “Okay, Beckett.”
“After your house has been treated, the wires won’t carry regular electricity anymore. Instead, they will carry the power from the box.”
“From the air?”
“That’s right. Pulled from the air and sent through a box like the one beside you. I made one for your dad.”
“Wait a minute, you said the wires won’t carry electricity anymore?”
“You’re a clever kid.”
“Mom says I’m too clever.”
“No such thing. The wires won’t carry electricity anymore, but they don’t need to.”
“What if your box doesn’t work?”
“It does.”
“What if it stops working?”
Beckett paused. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
John grinned.
“I’m sure it will be fine.”
“I guess. As long as your magic keeps working.”
“It’s not magic.”
“Sounds like it to me.”
42
Curtis turned off the engine and leaned back in the seat of the SUV, swivelling his head to view the scenery around them.
Ariel reached over and rubbed his back. “What do you think?”
“It’s amazing.”
“There isn’t another house for thirty miles.”
“I bet we can see it from the edge of the yard.”
“That’s a bet you would win. We are on the most elevated piece of land all around us for over two hundred miles. No one can approach without our noticing.”
“Trees are in the way.”
“We will clear them back.”
He nodded. “For building and firewood. Still.” He shook his head. “There are a lot of trees, babe.”
“If things go as planned, we are going to spend the rest of our lives here.”
“And so will our grandkids?”
She slid over and nuzzled his neck. “I love it when you talk like that.”
“If an old dog like me can still reproduce.”
She bit him.
“Ow!”
“I don’t love it when you say that kind of thing.”
“I was joking.” He grimaced and rubbed his neck. “Mostly.”
“Wanna see the rest of the place?”
“If you promise not to chew on me anymore.”
“That’s up to you, old man.”
“I never said I was an old man,” he grumbled as he opened the door and waited for her to join him.
“You’d rather be a dog?”
“All men are dogs.”
She joined arms with him and they began to walking. “Then you would rather sleep outside?”
“Let’s not be too hasty.”
“No no. It’s a good idea. What if you start to snore and keep me awake at nights?” She nodded. “Maybe outside is the best place for you.”
Curtis laughed. “I already snore. So do you.”
She snorted. “I do not. But you go ahead and keep talking that way. It will make me feel less guilty when you’re sleeping on the porch.”
They emerged from the woods and Curtis stopped. “Oh my god. The porch is bigger than my last apartment. This place is really ours?”
“It is.” She coaxed him forward.
“It’s a palace.”
“Yeah.”
Curtis glanced up. “Are there three stories?”
“Five. Three aboveground and two below.”
He laughed. “Not a palace. A fortress.”
“Both, depending on what we need at the time. I’ve spent years putting this place together.”
“Did you always suspect”—he paused—“that things would go bad?”
“People in my line of work don’t often retire.” They climbed the steps and stopped in front of the door. “Most set up offshore accounts for their family and leave it to them. I never had any family, so I decided to play a game.” She gestured at the house. “I built this place secretly, imagining that one day I would be one of the few to get out alive.”
“Are you certain it’s safe?”
Ariel touched her abdomen where the second chip had been buried. “As safe as any place can be. They came for me because the chip made it easy to track me. Now that we’ve disappeared, I’m certain they have bigger problems to deal with.”
Curtis kissed her on the forehead. “Let’s hope so.”
43
“Um.”
Beckett sighed and closed his eyes, pausing for a second before turning to face the class.
Twenty grown men were crammed into high-school desks looking confused and uncomfortable. One of the men in front, a younger guy, had his hand up.
“What is it, Al?”
“I don’t see how coating the wires in the houses will help pull electricity out of thin air.”
“Power.”
Al frowned “What?”
“It’s not electricity. Well, it is, but not exactly.” Beckett shook his head. “Better to call it power or energy.”
“Okay.” Al’s frown deepened. “The rest of it, though, it doesn’t sound real.”
“But it is,” an older man said from the seat behind Al. “You saw it yourself, son. My house, the entire neighbourhood, we haven’t been pulling electricity from the grid for weeks. Instead we’re using this other electricity”—he paused and nodded at Beckett—“power, for free.”
“Yeah yeah, I know that.”
Beckett leaned against the empty wooden teacher’s desk. “Then what’s the problem?”
“I can’t understand what it is we’re doing.”
Laughter rippled across the room and Al’s dad smiled. “None of us do.” He tipped his head toward their instructor. “Maybe he does.” Beckett shrugged. There was more laughter. “Point is that it works and Beckett has agreed to show us all how to retrofit houses for the rest of the neighbours.”
“That’s right.” Beckett pointed
at the chalkboard over his shoulder. “I’m fuzzy on the details too, but it works and I know how to set it up.”
“That don’t bother you?” Al’s desk scraped against the floor as he shifted.
“Nope. There’s a lot of stuff that makes the world run which I don’t understand.”
“I suppose.”
“If you want to know the specifics, email the Harbinger. Maybe he can explain it. I know it has to do with quantum mechanics and there’s a lot of math involved.”
Al laughed. “No, that’s fine. We can keep calling it magic. Just show us how to set it up.”
Beckett stood and walked to the board. “It’s not magic.”
“Sure.”
“Fine. Whatever it takes to keep your attention. Can I get back to it?”
Heads nodded. Beckett continued his lesson.
***
Luke checked the last item off his list and smiled as he looked around the table at his lieutenants. “Anything else to discuss before you head home?”
Heads shook in turn until he reached Sandy, who raised her hand.
“What is it, newbie?”
“There are no game releases slated for September.”
Luke frowned and the rest began to mutter. In the video game industry, September was when all the big games were released. It was when seventy percent of the billions of dollars were generated. To suggest it wasn’t happening was, well, it was unheard of. He rapped his knuckle against the table and the murmur faded. “Why do you say that?”
“Cause it’s true.”
“But the web is filled with trailers, gameplay, release dates, all the standard fanfare that leads up to September release.”
Sandy shook her head. “All lies.”
“Says who?”
“The Pickle.”
A silence fell over the room. Luke sat forward. “The Pickle?”
Sandy nodded.
“On his website?”
She shook her head.
“A rumour?”
“No. He told me.”
Luke raised his eyebrows and laughed. “He told you?”
Sandy nodded.
“You know the Pickle?”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah.”
“How come you never told me?”
“You never asked.”
Luke leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, shaking his head. “That’s cruel of you, Sandy. Having someone who has access to the Pickle is a huge advantage for us.”