by PJ Manney
It was high tide, but the waves were louder and more powerful than usual. Tom mentally checked the weather. A rare summer cyclone far off in the Pacific was making its presence known. With the moonless night and their lights on inside, only his devastated reflection showed.
“We need to talk about this . . .” murmured Talia, but she couldn’t finish. Tom stopped fifteen feet from the glass, ripped the sunglasses off his face and threw them at the windows. They shattered and fell to the hardwood floor. Striding back to Talia, he grabbed her upper arm and dragged her into a spook-proof walk-in closet.
Huddled among the coats and hand luggage, he spit out, “How do you think I’m feeling right now?”
She twisted in his grip. “Tom, you’re hurting me . . .”
He let go. “She was in on everything . . .”
“How do you know that?”
“Couldn’t you see how happy they were?”
“So? You were dead, and she needed her best friend’s support. She may not know any more than you did about him. Even if she was suckered into a conspiracy, it could be self-preservation.”
“She’s too happy for self-preservation.”
“I know you think that stuff in your head gives you some special insight, but I’m telling you, as a woman, you’re on the wrong track.”
“Right. Your female intuition trumps my implants. That’s a joke. Look at the evidence. They didn’t kill her!”
“There’s more than one motivation for that.”
“Of course. It was an idle threat regardless. But I can’t be sure of the motivation and neither can you.” He couldn’t admit he needed to hate Amanda to keep revenge’s flame burning bright. “And she knows I’m alive.”
“How can you be sure of that?”
“ ’Cause I’ve got a husband’s intuition from spending more than half my life with her and knowing her better than I know myself! She held my hand. She knows it’s me. And I have no clue if she’s going to tell Carter or not. Do I kill her now to protect my identity . . . ?”
Talia paled.
“Oh! So now you’re sensitive all of a sudden?” He turned away from her and leaned his head against the smooth teak door. “My God, how bizarre can this fucking world get when Carter Potsdam goes straight and impregnates my wife?” He didn’t want to cry, so he beat his head against the door. Maybe it would shake some wires loose.
“Your ex-wife . . .” She tried to stop her own tears.
He tried counting breaths, counting numbers, counting sheep to the point of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Like a sibling’s endless taunts, nothing shut up Amanda-thoughts on the Cortex 3.0. He wished the prosthetic were still attached to the outside of his head. He would have thrown it back in the ocean. If he could have ripped open his femoral artery with his fingernails and yanked out the wires tickling his brain, without bleeding to death, he would have. Tom had to stop the impulse to run to the kitchen for a knife. Suddenly, the closet was suffocating. Or was it Talia’s presence? He flung open the door, hard, cracking the wall’s plasterwork.
In the foyer, he took a huge breath, struggling for oxygen to clear his brain. Goddamned Amanda . . . If he analyzed her motives dispassionately, which he couldn’t, she might maintain the status quo for now. She was pregnant, rich, and happy, and wasn’t the type to rock the boat, for fear of losing it again. But he couldn’t trust her to keep secrets from Carter for long. If he couldn’t kill her now, he’d have to avoid seeing her, so she had no more reasons to doubt herself and ask her new husband’s opinion of her sanity.
Talia was behind him. Desperate for more air, he moved to the windows again. “I’ll get more evidence before I kill her, if it makes you happy.”
“Is this about making me happy?” She squatted on the floor, picking up pieces of broken sunglasses.
“Amanda is the enemy. Isn’t that enough?”
“And what if she isn’t?”
“But she is!”
“But what if she isn’t?”
Breaching his fortification, he threw open the glass doors to escape onto the teak deck that ran the length of the house. He closed his eyes, as the wind whipped drops of seawater onto his face, and the crashing waves drowned out sound. He gulped salty air, pungent and bitter.
Talia’s voice at his shoulder overwhelmed the ocean’s roar. “No. I need to know now. Where does that leave us? Before I go any further, I need an answer.”
“Us?”
“If you find out she’s innocent. What then?”
“What do you expect me to say?”
“I expect you to stop being a coward!”
Whipping around faster than she could see, he backhanded her face.
She landed on her backside on the wet deck. Stunned, she crab-crawled back into the living room and staggered to her feet to run upstairs.
“Talia?” Tom stumbled in, but his second cortex had the presence of mind to make sure he closed and locked the doors behind him. “Talia? I’m sorry!” This was inconceivable. He’d never hit a woman in his life. He could clearly remember how it happened, but why? He needed to contain his rage and delete the file. As he imagined it, a crushing pain gripped his chest and he gasped, staggering. Was it another cardiac episode?
The pain crested and subsided. He tried to catch his breath. Slowly, he followed her upstairs. She wasn’t in the bedroom or bath. Red hair gently fluttered over the back of a chaise lounge on their bedroom deck. She huddled in a wool throw like a lost child.
He knelt next to her. “Talia.” He reached out to gently touch the red patch of skin on her left cheek, but she pulled away. Keeping his hands at his side, he said, “Talia. Please believe me. I’m sorry . . . I don’t know what happened. I reacted without thinking . . . I know that sounds impossible, but . . . I don’t want to hurt you.” Talia stared at the black ocean as though she were deaf. “You said you wanted to tell me something. What did you want to say? I’ll listen. I promise.” But he was a ghost. He withdrew and, after a minute, returned with a more substantial blanket, tucking it around her body. She did not thank him.
An attache and suitcase stood by the front door. Out front, the limo and driver waited on Pacific Coast Highway. The storm passed and it was overcast at dawn, Malibu’s annual “June Gloom” still around in July.
Tom crept onto the balcony, perching on the edge of her chaise to stroke Talia’s damp hair. He kissed her forehead. Even with her closed eyes, he knew she wasn’t asleep.
“I’m sorry . . . you have no idea how sorry . . .”
She didn’t stir.
“To answer your question: It leaves you with me. You won’t lose me—as long as you want me. Because I won’t leave you. And I promise I will never hurt you again.”
Her eyes opened, as pained and vulnerable as the night before. “If we don’t stand back-to-back . . .” She stopped, for fear of being overheard, and mouthed, “they’ll destroy us.”
“Is that the only reason you’re still upset?”
The look of disappointment in her eyes said that, for all he thought he knew, he still didn’t understand. Or he wouldn’t be foolish enough to ask.
“I’m sorry I’m such an idiot. I’m trying . . .” He kissed her forehead again and stood, but she reached out and pulled his torso down to her.
“What is it?” he whispered.
Her voice was muffled against his sports coat. “You might not come back . . .”
She was right. At least her concern was something. He kissed her again, gently removed her arms, and headed for his limo that would take him to his Gulfstream VI.
CHAPTER SIXTY
I hate to tell you all the history you’re missin’. It’s a mighty impressive lookin’ place we got here!”
Thomas Paine tapped his way down the central hall of the Phoenix Club in Washington, led by Josiah as his nominating member. Lobo claimed his schedule was too tight to assume responsibility for Paine’s nomination and membership.
“Sometimes, ignorance is simple
r.”
“Amen, son!” guffawed Josiah. “Speakin’ of which, we’ve tried to keep the initiation ceremony as traditional as possible for you. We’re tryin’ to respect your wishes to treat you like you’re not blind. But it’s all a formality anyway. I’m really lookin’ forward to camp this year! It’s the most important one in generations. Can’t miss it.” Josiah leaned a little closer. “You’ll bunk with me and President Stevens. That way, I can guide you around and make sure you get the most out of our proceedin’s. Just stay away from the president’s Long Island Iced Teas. They’ll peel the stomach linin’ outta you!”
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
Eyes barely open behind his sunglasses, he glimpsed a portrait he missed last time. Balding and mustached, the subject resembled the actor and film director Ron Howard. A gilt plaque nailed to the gold frame said, “Horatio Alger Jr.,” the nineteenth-century dime novelist whose rags-to-riches stories of young boys throwing off the shackles of poverty through industry and integrity to place their foot on the middle-class ladder immortalized the American Dream. Of course, none of the boys became wealthy like the men who walked these halls, because neither honesty nor simple hard work got its members there. However, the club was happy to encourage Alger’s fairy tales, motivating the worker bees to construct the empire for them. Tom knew Alger had exposed the terrible conditions homeless youth lived and worked under in American cities, but decades later it was revealed the American Dream’s mythmaker had been a molester of the very boys he claimed to help.
They descended into the building’s bowels and made their way through the horror-movie antechamber to the dressing room, where Josiah put on the red-and-black member’s toga, then helped Tom dress in the white initiate’s toga. He guided Tom into the cave.
The painted walls vibrated with ancient energy, and the cries of terrified men it encircled for centuries echoed. But was it all his imagination?
The anonymous, hooded figures stood as they had before. None of them felt like Carter.
Sampled over whispered subfrequencies of the past, Todd Rundgren’s “Initiation” played in his head as it had the last time he stood here. Painful experience shaded the lyrics with a sinister cast. Power did change hands, hidden from view . . .
Josiah handed Tom the drugged goblet, and he knocked it back without a second thought, handing it over only after licking his lips clean.
From the moment the Praetor Maximus uttered, “Step forward, candidate!” Tom was sure the Praetor Maximus intoning the initiation rite was the president of the United States, John Stevens. He should have felt honored. As the Praetor Maximus asked questions and Tom answered clearly and correctly every time, hooded figures gave sidelong glances with greater frequency. The humiliation-of-a-drug-addled-initiate script was not being followed, because Tom was unaffected by the hallucinogenic elixir. President Stevens stumbled in his performance, realizing his anger was inappropriate. How could he demand obedience like a drill sergeant with a clueless recruit if the recruit wasn’t clueless?
After a flawless Pledge of Allegiance, Stevens sagged, shrugging shoulders at Josiah. He couldn’t scream Paine wasn’t worthy. Brant plunged ahead without his cue, halfheartedly swinging the wooden stick at Paine’s shins. Tom parried with his Hoover cane, deflecting the blow, but snapping his cane in two.
There was silence in the cave, then the Praetor Maximus burst out, “How did you see that?”
“What happened?” Tom asked Josiah.
“You blocked a blow!” shouted a hooded Decemvir.
“Sorry if I messed up . . . it’s automatic . . .”
“Just answer the question!” yelled another.
Tom turned to Josiah. “It’s blindsight . . .”
“I checked his medical records. He has it,” said Josiah.
“What the fuck is it?” asked yet another.
“Can we just get on with the show?” boomed Josiah. The scolded schoolboys went quiet. It was clear who the real Praetor Maximus was. There was a shuffling of feet, the Decemviri reluctant child actors. They parted to reveal the altar and the eagle.
“We’re walkin’ to a table. Follow my lead,” whispered Josiah. At the stone platform, Josiah moved Tom’s hands to the altar and then, ever so gently, to the eagle tethered to its surface.
His fingers jumped with shock at a living creature. “What is it?”
“Bald eagle,” whispered Josiah.
The eagle seemed more lethargic than last time, but Tom couldn’t trust drugged memories. Even on Valium, the bird was nervous and capable of attacking with its beak. Tom gently stroked the bird’s back, until he could measure its length with each stroke. The enormous bird calmed at his steady touch.
“Amazing,” muttered Tom, a huge grin on his face. Fingers continued to explore. He tugged at the leather strap that imprisoned the great bird to the altar.
The Praetor Maximus took Paine’s hand and placed the ceremonial knife in it. “Kill it.”
Tom carefully felt its circumference, identifying the object and finding the cutting edge. Satisfied, he raised the knife high, paused for dramatic effect . . . then brought it down hard, slicing the leather strap. Free at last, the relieved bird rose on great wings. Men ducked to avoid a face slapped with feathers. It perched on the top of the American flag hanging over them.
No one spoke, but the members’ hoods fell back as they watched the bird’s ascent and forgot to pull them up as they stared in silent amazement at each other. Tom recognized every bare head from the previous year’s camp. Carter and Bruce were definitely not among them.
“What the fuck is going on here?” yelled President Stevens. Attempting his own improvisation, he grabbed the front of Tom’s toga. Disturbingly, the walls’ painted warriors danced, whooping and hollering in Tom’s ears.
Surprised, Tom defensively twisted the president’s wrist while holding his knife high. The leader of the free world fell to his knees, no match without his Secret Service, who paced nervously in a parlor upstairs.
“Gentlemen! Please control yourselves!” barked Josiah. “Tom, let go of the president!”
“Oh dear . . .” he gasped, and released his grip, stepping back apologetically. “I’m so sorry . . . I didn’t know . . . Mr. President!”
Josiah snatched the knife from Tom’s hand and leaned in, asking with quiet menace, “Why did you release the bird?”
“It was clearly a test. No true American would sacrifice such a creature and symbol of our great nation. Wouldn’t our job, as the best and the brightest, be to protect it and what it represents?”
No one bothered to look to the president, who sat on the cave floor nursing his wrist, for a final decision. They all stared at Brant. After a moment, he said to the initiate, “Of course.”
To a man, their expressions broadcast disbelief.
Stevens whined from the ground, “What about him suffering the fate of those who break the oath of obedience?”
“Forget it,” snapped Josiah. He took the blind man’s hand and shook it. “Congratulations. Welcome to the Phoenix Club, son.” Then he glared at his Decemviri. “And perhaps, gentlemen, we’ve all learned a lesson to not underestimate a blind man!”
It was a cue for the Decemviri to laugh at themselves. But the laughter was strained. Tom made initiation history by circumventing the burning man ritual. It was silly to hope he’d be as lucky in his second initiation.
Painted warriors howled in congratulations as bison bellowed and horses whinnied. And Todd Rundgren sang. The new world would be revealed.
Tom approached his beach house’s front gate with trepidation. Was she home? Was he forgiven? The chauffeur hadn’t reached the doorbell when the door flew open and Talia threw herself into Paine’s arms. He was never so gratefully hugged in his life. She started to speak, but he gently shushed her, and they entered the foyer. The chauffeur deposited his cases inside and left. They were finally alone, and Paine still hadn’t said a word.
“So te
ll me . . .” she said quietly.
Paine put his fingers to his lips and held her close. He missed her so much. His lips kissed her cheek, and he barely whispered, “It’s begun.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
The nantidote worked perfectly. Stone-cold sober.” Tom didn’t tell Ruth about the wailing natives and cavorting megafauna.
“Ach, thank Carter. He was schmuck enough to hint the recipe. And you always had a good memory. The rest was easy.”
Ruth sat hunched over a monitor in the lab running algorithmic translations of Dulles’s final memories from the sea-damaged Cortex 2.0. Tom applied tremendous pressure on her to work beyond her expertise and do neural network modeling. Pilfering Prometheus’s data made it easier, but the system was far from perfect, and Ruth was frustrated she couldn’t speak to their engineers to fix their mistakes. She didn’t understand how she had taken their data so much further, while Prometheus’s research had stalled.
He pulled up a chair and studied the monitor, teasing out a story from an enormous flow chart, with thousands of interconnections covering just the brief amount of thought-time the chip contained. Ruth had assigned only a handful of thematic thought flows with different colors to make graphing easier. Its complexity demonstrated how tagging the thoughts in an entire brain, even with a supercomputer, would be overwhelming.
“Tell me what I’m missing, Ruthie.”
“You see? In yellow?” she pointed. “Fear of death. Dominant concept. Takes up lots of space.”
“Not surprising.”