The men around him were still talking at him, and he tried to follow Shy’s advice. Relax. Enjoy yourself. After all, it’s your party.
SIMON AND MAX WERE going to be late. Their limo was a mile away from the hotel. They weren’t worried. It was expected of Simon.
Simon had his head back against the seat, his eyes closed. Max had not seen him look so peaceful in a long time.
That only made Max worry more.
“This seems premature,” he said.
“You and David are more alike than you know,” Simon replied. “He said the same thing. In a few months, we will have the formula running from the taps if we want. Will that be enough for you then?”
“It’s not exactly the same as the Water. You’ve said so yourself. His cure works for now, but in fifty years? A hundred? What then? Will it break down and fail?”
“True. It feels different, somehow. It’s not as powerful. I can’t quite explain it. David admits there are properties of the Water that have eluded him. But this is as close as we’re likely to get. We have David’s formula. We will begin FDA trials soon, but we know it works. There’s no earthly reason to wait any longer.”
“Then we don’t need David anymore,” Max said. “It’s time to ease him out of our lives.”
Simon smirked. “You’ve really never liked him.”
“I don’t like anyone getting too close to the truth. You’ve given him enough clues, Simon. He’s not an idiot. He could figure out our secret, and then what—”
“Max. He knows.”
Max remained very still for a moment. Then he turned and nearly spat venom at Simon.
“You told him?”
Simon decided to let him have his moment of pique. “No. You’re right. He’s very smart. He put the pieces together himself.”
“Jesus Christ, Simon! And I suppose you told him everything else!”
Simon couldn’t help laughing at Max. Just a little. “Don’t be ridiculous. Most people cannot fathom what we are, even when it’s right in front of them. Even someone as intelligent as David. He believes we’re old men who use the Water to keep ourselves stiff and virile. Senior citizens at most. He literally cannot conceive of anything older.”
Max breathed deeply, trying to calm down. “That’s small comfort. We’ve worked for years to maintain our secret. You know this. You know why. They would kill us for what we have. What we are.”
There was no question who Max meant by “they.” He meant ordinary humans. The ones who had to face death every day.
Simon was impatient with Max’s old fears, however. “The world has changed, Max. You don’t see it yet. But we have changed it, with David’s help. The old rules no longer apply.”
Max clenched and unclenched his fist. “You have still risked us all, Simon. You have gambled our lives.”
“You’re being dramatic, Max. You should be grateful that we have a way to survive now. You know, David told me he wants to give up his profits in order to make sure everyone gets a chance at the cure. Wants us to offer it for free to the starving and the poor.”
“You must be joking.”
Simon sighed. “I’m not going to do it, Max. Don’t worry. David will see the light.”
“Once you offer him a place on the Council, you mean.”
“That’s right. I think he’s earned it.”
Max was literally shaking with fury, but he kept his voice low. “That is a mistake. You allow him inside, and he will use that leverage to tear us down. He’s already got far too much power over us by controlling this new cure.”
“You think someone like him, given the chance to see the future happen, would turn it down? No. He will grapple with himself, and then he will realize: he cares more about knowledge than anything else. He will want to keep living if only to keep finding answers. And after a few decades, or a century at most, he will come to understand that this is the way of the world: there are rulers and there are servants. I know which side he will choose.”
“He won’t. I told you, he clings to his own morality. He really believes he’s a better man than we are. He will follow his conscience, no matter what the cost.”
Simon smiled at that. “Maybe we need a conscience like that. To remind us of what we once were.”
“This is not a joke,” Max snapped. “It’s a massive risk. You are undoing everything we have, everything we’ve ever done, with your faith in someone you barely know.”
“We owe him our lives. I think that earns him a little gratitude. I don’t believe we have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice,” Max said. He felt a twinge of triumph amid the burning anger. He knew Simon would make this error. He knew Simon better than anyone.
The limo came to a halt. The driver stepped out and opened the door for them.
“You might be right, Max,” Simon said, yawning hugely. “But sometimes the choice is so uneven that it’s no choice at all. I’m comfortable with my decision. If you’re not . . . Well, then, find a way to deal with it. The matter is closed.”
Simon got out of the car and walked toward the front entrance.
Max sat for a moment longer, his face still hot. He bit back several replies. Simon wouldn’t have cared about any of them.
Simon didn’t care about anything else, as long as he got what he wanted.
Well, it was Max’s job to protect Simon—to protect all of them—from Simon’s worst impulses.
Max was glad he had Aznar nearby. David Robinton didn’t know it, but tonight was the beginning of the end of his life.
He took a few deep breaths and then followed Simon, jogging to catch up.
CHAPTER 18
SHE FOUND ORTEGA wandering around near the restrooms on the far side of the ballroom. There were only a few people around, and they didn’t pay attention when she went to his side and took his arm.
She drew him around a corner and stood close. If anyone was watching, they looked away politely. An older man and a much younger woman. It was a fairly common sight in Florida.
He looked right at her and, again, completely failed to recognize her.
She looked into his eyes. She recognized the loss and confusion there. He’d been cut off. Now he was drowning in his past, the years washing over him. He was clinging to his most recent memories as if they were a raft that would save him.
It was cruel, when viewed from the outside, but it wasn’t enough.
For a moment, she wondered why Ortega was being punished like this. If Ortega was still here, then in his more lucid moments he must have believed that Simon would take pity on him and give him a drink, restoring him.
Whatever Ortega had done to anger Simon, it had been good luck for her. She would have been recognized otherwise, and that might have meant failure.
She was done hesitating. No more good-bye kisses. It was time for an end to all of this.
“I know I know you,” he said.
“You know me,” she agreed. “Do you remember?”
He tried. He struggled to bring it back up to the surface.
She helped.
“You had a sword. My family was all around you, running. One man tried to stop you, bare-handed, and you slashed open his throat. The women screamed. The children cried. And you were laughing.”
There it was. Finally. A spark of recognition.
“No,” he said. “That wasn’t— It was a different time. It was so long ago.”
“Not long enough,” she said, and slid her dagger—the one she’d strapped to her other thigh—up under his ribs and into his heart.
“Shako,” he said.
She set him down more gently than he deserved and left him there. If anyone found the body, it wouldn’t matter now.
This was where it ended. And she’d already begun.
SIMON TOOK THE LECTE
RN on the stage at the front of the ballroom.
The gabble of conversation immediately quieted down.
David stood on the floor, in front of the stage. Here we go, he thought. This is the last moment of your normal life. This is where it starts. This is where you finally begin to save everyone.
Once the announcement was made, there would be frenzy and skepticism, praise and scorn, a million Internet headlines, ignorant people talking knowledgeably about it on every TV channel.
There would be millions of people clamoring for a spot in the clinical trials, and millions more who would want to use his formula the same way Simon had, to look and feel twenty years old again.
But eventually, there would be acceptance. Eventually, it would get to the right people.
This was where everything changed, but it would be worth it in the end.
“FRIENDS,” SIMON SAID. “THANK you all for coming tonight. Even those of you who are just here for the free booze.”
Polite laughter.
“People always asked my father, ‘Why is the company called Conquest?’ I mean, it doesn’t make sense, does it? We’ve always been a medical firm. We’ve made vaccines, drugs, and devices that are all about keeping people alive. So, why Conquest? Why name the company after something that sounds like blood and war and death?”
Simon smiled and leaned forward. “This is what my father and his father always said: ‘Because Conquest is what we do. We conquer markets. We conquer our rivals. We conquer diseases and human frailty and age and sickness of every kind. That is what we do, and that is why it is our name.’ ”
Spontaneous applause. Simon could really work a crowd.
“But today, that name is more fitting than at any time in our history. Today, we are announcing a new product, developed exclusively for our company by Dr. David Robinton, who is here with us tonight. Take a bow, David.”
David did not bow. He got a round of applause anyway. People near him patted him on the back and smiled.
“Today, we announce a product that is nothing less than revolutionary. And I don’t mean in the usual bullshit marketing way. I mean this really is going to change the whole world. You will tell your grandchildren you were here this evening. You will tell your great-grandchildren, and their children. You will tell them in person. Because that is what we have done. Conquest has finally achieved the goal it was built for: we have conquered death itself.”
The movie theater–size screen behind Simon lit up with a stylized logo: REGENESYS.
“We have created a drug that reverses the effects of aging.”
Simon let that sit there for a moment. The crowd seemed unsure of how to take the news.
“I know what you’re thinking. This sounds like some crazy fountain-of-youth infomercial scheme. But it is the truth. ReGenesys will actually turn back the clock, physically, on every process in your entire body. It will cure almost any disease, and will halt senility and aging. I know it sounds too good to be true, but I would not be telling you this if I had not seen it with my own eyes. This is an actual miracle, made by science. And you get to be a part of it. Now, we cannot release everything yet. We still have enemies out there in the world. But I would not be telling you this if the product did not work, and if we were not ready to begin human trials. In less than a year, you will see this on the market. And everyone in this room will be richer than you ever dreamed possible.”
That brought about the loudest applause of the night.
“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for listening. Now it’s time to celebrate. The future is bright—and every one of us will be around to see it. Thank you.”
SIMON SHOOK OFF THE dozens of people who wanted to question him, who kept demanding answers. He wanted to see David.
He walked over and embraced the scientist.
“ReGenesys?” David asked.
“Best our marketing people could do on short notice. We didn’t give them a lot of time to focus-group it.”
“Whatever you want to call it. I don’t care. As long as everyone gets a chance at it.”
The crowd pressed at them both from all angles. Simon nodded and smiled. “Just a minute,” he told someone. “Be right there.”
Then he turned back to David, his eyes serious, the mask of youth gone for a moment. “I keep my word, David. Be sure that you do the same.”
David felt cold. Whenever Simon let down his guard like this, David had the feeling that something more dangerous lurked underneath. It reminded him, uncomfortably, of the sound of a gun being cocked.
But he wasn’t about to back down. “You’ve got no reason to doubt me,” David said. “I’ve never lied to you.”
If Simon heard the veiled reproach, he gave no indication. Just like that, the grin was back. “That’s what I like to hear,” he said. “So, you going stag at the biggest party of your life? That’s really pathetic.”
“My date’s in the restroom.”
“Of course she is.”
Irritation swept over David, displacing any unease he’d felt a moment before. For someone who was actually a senior citizen, Simon could be incredibly immature. Then he caught a glimpse of Shy as she headed toward them. “In fact, here she is now,” he said.
Simon turned in the direction David was looking.
Shy was partially blocked by the crowd, but David still felt an absurd pride, the science geek who’d managed to bring the prettiest girl to the prom.
Simon’s mouth actually dropped open. David wasn’t expecting that much of a reaction, but he wasn’t going to say he didn’t like it.
Simon kept staring as Shy quickly stepped to David’s side. The crowd kept pushing them all together. She moved in close, wrapping her arm around his, her other hand holding her clutch purse. She kissed him quickly on the cheek, but her eyes did not leave Simon’s.
“Simon, this is Shy,” David said.
“We’ve met,” Shy said.
Simon said, “No.”
Then Shy brought up the hand with the clutch purse. The purse dropped. A blade appeared there, as if from nowhere. It was already spotted with blood.
Someone began to scream.
IMPOSSIBLE, SIMON THOUGHT, AND lost a precious few seconds to disbelief.
He was safe. He was surrounded by security and hundreds of his supporters. He had not seen her close-up in more than a hundred years. It had to be some kind of mistake.
But it wasn’t. He knew that.
And yet he watched her entwine herself with David, place a kiss on his cheek and smile at him, all while he stared like an idiot.
Shako. Close enough to touch.
Touching David.
She raised her hand, and he saw the knife.
He finally began to move.
THE WOMAN SAW THE man’s skinny ankles from behind the potted plant, black socks sagging, revealing a pale stripe of hairy leg.
She’d gone looking for a quiet spot to sneak a cigarette at the back of the ballroom, away from her husband, who still jogged every morning and could quote morbidity statistics for smokers off the top of his head. What she got for marrying a cardiologist.
She wondered if the man was ill, or perhaps drunk, so she stepped around the plant and leaned down to speak to him.
Then she saw the horrible red blood all over his shirt, the horrible second mouth opened in his chest.
She began screaming, and everyone turned to the back of the room to look.
IT WAS ENOUGH TO distract the bodyguards for a crucial second.
They were having a hard enough time keeping an eye on Simon as he moved into the crowd. They thought he was safe in the scrum of expensive suits and dresses. Besides, he liked to have space to do the meet and greet.
Only one of them turned from the commotion at the rear of the ballroom in time to see Simon suddenly dancing backward, k
nocking people out of his way, a bright red slash across his tuxedo shirtfront.
The woman with the knife went after him.
At this point, people still thought Simon had bumped into them because he was drunk or stoned or simply rude. Their brains had not quite caught up to what their eyes were seeing.
The bodyguard, however, had been trained for this. He didn’t hesitate.
He withdrew his gun, a Glock nine-millimeter loaded with wadcutter rounds, and opened fire.
MAX SAW HER AT almost the same time Simon did. From across the room, near the bar. He saw her take David’s arm and kiss him.
Then the screaming started a panic, and the gunshots only added to the stampede. The noise went from one woman wailing in the back to a universal screech that filled the air.
Chaos.
Max did not stop to wonder how Shako had gotten this close, or how she’d gotten a knife inside the party. Pointless questions. It was Shako.
He shouted at Peter and Sebastian, who were rooted in place a few dozen yards away, trying to see what was going on.
One word: “Shako!” Then he ran toward the shooting.
The bodyguard was trying to hit Shako. Max was sure he was a good shot under other circumstances. But he would never even get close to her. She was too fast. Max had seen her dance around automatic-weapon fire before.
The bodyguard was putting his bullets every place she had been a moment before. As a result, he was doing a lot of collateral damage.
A clot of people blocked Max’s way. Max didn’t slow down. He leaped and cleared them all, rising eight feet in the air and covering twenty feet of distance.
The Water had given them all great gifts. He hadn’t used his in some time.
Shako spun and dodged the bullets again, and, as she always did, found a way to turn an enemy into an advantage.
She hesitated for a second.
The bodyguard drew a bead on her.
She danced away, just before he pulled the trigger.
Simon was behind her, now directly in the line of fire.
Max reached the bodyguard just in time, hit the man with a full-body block that sent him spiraling across the floor, skidding to a rest against the wall.
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