by LC Champlin
He released Albin from the handcuffs, then repeated the jaw grab. “It ain’t even broke. I had to put a little life into the show, y’know? Move out.” He waved for them to follow him out.
Nathan and Albin exchanged glances before following the lunatic warlord.
As they stepped onto the asphalt, Red clapped them on the shoulders. “Fucking hell, boys, you got that old bitch good. She actually trusts yer asses.”
“So we hope. Is the boy your men took—”
“The brat’s fine,” Red drawled as he ushered them through the service entrance of a tan three-story office building.
Fluidity of headquarters defined Esau’s strategy for command. Since crime didn’t rank as one of Silicon Valley’s leading industry sectors, the raider from Oakland had likely moved into this location during the weekend’s disaster. At any rate, it ranked as a vast improvement over the kennel.
They marched down a staff hallway that matched every other back-office employee hall in America.
“Now that yer side hustle is percolatin’, it’s time to get down to them files. Yer Commie fag and my Buck are comparing collections. The lil’ news hippy wants to talk to ya too. I gotta give her respect; she made a slick sound bite. Makes us look tolerable.”
“She comes in handy now and then.”
Red directed them through a door that opened on a cubicle farm, or rather, garden. Six worker boxes filled the room’s center.
Josephine and Mikhail appeared from opposite sides of the cubicles.
“You're back!” Then Jo stopped, eyes widening when she saw Albin’s injuries. “What did they do to you? Are you okay? Why—”
“I will survive.” Brushing her hand off his shoulder, the attorney turned away. The blood staining his shirt front and drying on his face made for a brutal sight.
“I’m relieved to see you’re both alive.” Mikhail’s wrinkled brow and pained expression revealed his concern.
“The feeling is mutual,” Albin replied.
Now if only Badal and Marvin would surface, the pack would be whole again. Ah, outside Red’s clutches, of course. Hopefully they had found protection with the National Guard or other armed group.
But enough wound licking. “Josephine, your broadcast seems to have satisfied Esau. Very good.”
“Thanks.” Her expression twisted as if she’d taken a gulp of sour milk.
“What did you—”
“I said the Goats were military veterans from Oakland who’d braved the chaos to help Silicon Valley. I kept it vague.”
The better the opinion among the general populace regarding the Goats, the more the group could spread its roots. Once it stabilized the eroding city’s banks, he could step in and reap the benefits. Yes, the small matter of Red’s leadership remained, but God would provide the opportunity to sacrifice the Goat.
He turned to Jo. “What updates do you have for me?”
“Come here.” Her face brightened with the exhilaration of discovery. She led the men to her work station, a two-monitor setup that once belonged to a Marvel fan, judging by the horde of action figures that guarded the desk.
On the screen, she opened an image viewer and pulled up a photo of—“Birk at the Japanese Tea Garden.” Nathan squinted at the forty-something brunette beside the twit. “That woman was in the picture that hid the encryption key.”
“Do you know who she is?” the reporter asked in a tone that indicated she knew the answer.
“Siblings?” Albin suggested.
Nathan whipped around to stare at him.
Josephine snapped her fingers. “You win the In ’N Out Burger coupon. She’s Lexa Birk.”
“Lexa Birk?” Where had he heard—of course! “Her address was in Birk’s black book from the car. Albin discovered it,” Nathan added, giving his adviser a smile.
Albin nodded in acknowledgment. “Ms. Josephine, you were about to divulge how this is relevant to our situation?”
“I hunted through Vic’s emails and documents. This woman is also a researcher. She works at LOGOS Biotherapeutics Institute, which, coincidentally or not, has an office in the Silicon Valley area.”
“I see.” Nathan ran his thumb along the edge of his goatee. “Other than looks and profession, does she bear any similarities to her oxygen-wasting brother?”
“I take it you mean is she selling files to terrorists? I didn’t find anything, but this is Victor Birk’s computer, not Lexa’s. It looks like she’s pretty far up LOGOS’s ladder, though, so she might be.”
Nathan grinned, wolfish. “That helps explain little Vic’s inferiority complex.”
“He—” She broke off as the door behind them opened to admit Buck.
“I’ll feed the stray mutt if I want to!” she yelled over her shoulder at one of her cohorts before turning to the civilians. She wore her fatigue top open to reveal a T-shirt that bore the structural formula of a molecule and the word CAFFEINE. A semi-auto clung to her right thigh in a drop holster.
“News, Buck?” Nathan asked.
“I’m supposed to brief you on what we found, but Mike here”—nod to the Russian, who edged away from her—“is a big girl, so he can handle it.” With that, she passed them to disappear into the cubicles. Mouse clicks and keyboard taps followed.
“The Goats have files from people they kidnapped at St. Regis and other locations.” Mikhail swallowed, less gray now. “Many of the files are encrypted. However, we do have the decryption key for 30% of them. We’re still looking through them.”
Thirty? The urge to hug Mikhail seized Nathan.
“Only thirty percent?” Albin asked, brow raised.
“The encryption key was given by one of the St. Regis guests. I’m not sure where the Goats are holding the hostages, though. We didn’t find any more keys in Birk’s collection, including his sports cards.” He paused to lick his dry lips.
“But we have 30% of the other files.” Nathan patted Mikhail on the shoulder.
“I suppose,” the engineer continued, “there are other hostages around the city farther afield who might have encryption keys.”
“Perhaps.”
The assemblage of Marvel heroes on the desk watched Nathan with dead eyes. Captain America, Thor, Iron Man. A scene intruded on his thoughts: a boy with an Iron Man figure waiting with his sister and her unicorn while their family packed to evacuate. Was the family still alive? Nathan straightened. We will solve this.
Buck meandered around the corner to join the conversation with, “There are some really ace diagrams of neural conduction patterns, and a whole folder of images of microscope slides on the weird guy’s USB.”
“Weird guy?” Jo asked before Nathan could.
“Yes.” From his pocket Mikhail pulled the yellow bean that had fallen from the oni mask. “It was on the drive I found at Mr. Oshiro’s.”
It was a USB drive? Damned typical.
“I’ll show you.” After dropping into an office chair, the Russian inserted Ken’s USB. He opened a folder titled Network Slides. The window populated with thumbnails of colorful lines and dots on white or pink backgrounds.
“Dots and lines,” Josephine read Nathan’s thought.
“Yes, fascinating,” he grunted. “I fail to see how it applies to the cannibals.”
“They have PDFs explaining them.” Mikhail opened the PDF closest to his cursor. “They say the images are of graphene neural nets that act as microscopic nerve stimulators.”
“We haven’t gotten through ’em all yet,” Buck related after a sip of coffee. “I don’t see anything about keeping an infection down, though, if that’s what you’re expecting to pop out of these drives like a jack-in-the-box.”
Graphene neural nets, bacterial meningitis, Ebola, neural regrowth. What connected them? Or had he and the Goats taken the wrong files?
Chapter 78
Connections
Gravedigger’s Blues - Last Train Home
Now
that Nathan had reunited with his people, the locomotive-drive of adrenaline dwindled, died. Everything hurt again. Hand on his side, he eased a sigh. Another half a Percocet would feel—No. If he kept taking pills, they would soon take him. In response, the demon bird of pain raked its talons over his nerves. Fff . . .
With a grunt, Buck headed back to her slot. “Read the files for yourself.”
Mikhail glanced at where she disappeared, then leaned toward Nathan. “I don’t know what the affected are, but we were wrong about the bacteria.”
“Not meningitis?”
“I moved one of the files when Buck was distracted. It discussed the . . . the . . .” Waving for the word, Mikhail cast a desperate look around. “Rewiring. The graphene forms a net that . . . hijacks or otherwise directs the brain’s major neural impulses.”
“Then Badal was partially correct when he said the neural nets make the cannibals?” Too soon to say if that would turn out for good or ill.
“It’s not bacteria that spread it, either.”
“What about the files we read?”
“They concerned early experiments. Later, the bacteria were genetically engineered to produce substances like steroids that would stop the body’s immune response, but it wasn’t good enough.”
“Then what creates the nets?”
“It’s . . .” Squeezing his eyes closed, Mikhail shook his head. “It’s all very sketchy, but it looks like pseudo-protozoa, like slime mold.”
“The orange slime on logs? It’s creating graphene nets in people’s brains?” It didn’t make sense.
“We could be wrong about this, like we were wrong about the bacterial meningitis. I don’t know if we’re any more informed than we were at Mr. Oshiro’s lab. We’ll have to keep reading the files.” Then the Russian brightened. “But we have Internet! Satellite.”
“Excellent!” Nathan clapped him on the back. A shipwreck survivor who’d spent a month floating in a life raft couldn’t have felt more joy at seeing a US Coast Guard chopper descending than he felt now. Surely Janine would have transitioned the private servers to satellite by now.
He turned to one of the unoccupied workstations, then paused. “Mikhail, I need you to put that engineering degree to use and devise a way to jam a drone’s controller.”
“I would need your help designing a program. Then we would have to find the right hardware—”
“I need it ASAP.”
Brows pulling together, the Russian squinted into his mental file system. “I know a way, but it’s imprecise and very low-tech.”
“The more low-tech, the better, short of a shotgun blast.”
++++++++++++
Unable to connect.
“Still?” Nathan slumped back in his chair.
Retry. Nothing.
They’re fine. Janine could take care of herself and Davie. Maybe a hardware or software glitch blocked the connection. Or she might have unplugged the servers from generator power. That would breach emergency-situation protocol, but . . . perhaps a waterline ruptured and she had no choice.
“Yo, dude.” Buck.
“I’m working.” Go the fuck away.
His chair jerked back. He shot to his feet and rounded on the mortal foolish enough to disturb him. Hot ice picks jabbed his ribs, but he braced himself. “Does Red Chief want the files exploited or not?”
By her expression, she might be seeing a day-old Mickey-D’s burger rather than him. “It’s been three hours. The chief’s ready for you to get your asses back to Upper-Crust Land.”
“Ah.” Carolyn, the Musters, Milquetoast Jeremy. Shit, Zander. Nathan’s shoulders hunched, as if he could duck the weight of dereliction of duty. I should have made an attempt to check on him.
“Find anything useful, or were you checking your FB account?” Not waiting for a response, she moved to retrieve Albin.
After Nathan gulped the last of his cold coffee, they trooped back down the hall and out into the parking lot. Dusk swathed the world in its blood-warm murk. Time? Twenty-thirty, according to the phone.
“Get your game faces on, boys.” Red’s voice preceded him as he strode from behind a shipping container. “You’re gonna be the Big Damn Heroes of this show.”
“Lovely.”
“A’ight!” Hand up over his head, Esau set off toward a white cargo van. “Bring ’em out.”
Two mercenaries who flanked one of the shipping containers swung the doors open. As they entered, two more mercs moved from the shadow of another container to act as guards.
Chains clanked, men barked unintelligible orders, someone cried out. Nathan’s tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth as four people—two men and two women—stumbled down the gangplank. Black hoods covered their heads, while handcuffs secured their wrists to a central chain. The mercs herded the chain gang toward the cargo van, up the ramp, into the dim hold.
Reaching into a drop pouch at his thigh, Red produced two pairs of cuffs. “Ready for yer close up, boys?” He smiled, white teeth flashing in a nearby truck’s headlights.
Outrage seethed in Nathan’s veins, fire and ice in his blood. “So long as you remember who’s on your side.”
“Don’t worry your pretty little head.” The bracelets clicked around Nathan’s wrists at the last word.
Albin remained silent, passive, as Esau cuffed him.
At the van, the ridged steel ramp rattled as they stomped up to join the herd.
“Turn yer backs. I got one more.”
Thud. Something hit the wood bed a foot from Nathan. Grunts, a whimper from . . . a child. Zander? Sniffling followed. “I want Mama and—” The rumble of the pull-down door drowned the rest. The engine revved to life, making the chassis tremble.
Reaching toward the last place the whimpering sounded, Nathan’s hand found the boy’s head. Zander jerked back. Sadness pushed a needle into Nathan’s heart, made it twitch around a beat. He dropped to a knee. “Zander, it’s okay, buddy. I’m your daddy’s friend.” He reached toward the hyperventilation.
The breathing stopped for a beat. “Where’s Daddy? I want Mama.”
“We’re going to take you back to your Mama, okay?”
“Promise?” the boy squeaked.
“I promise. Come here, Zander.” He located a small shoulder and laid his hand over it. The joint fit completely in his palm, just like Davie’s did. Davie. The black-haired, green-eyed wolverine of a child grinned in Nathan’s mind. His son was safe. He must be.
When Nathan made no move to pull Zander over, the muscles under his grip began to relax. Then the child crashed into him. Arms locked around his neck as Zander began shudder-sobbing. Cuffs prevented a return hug, so a hand on the ribcage sufficed.
“Mama’s sick,” Zander managed between gasps.
“I know. She’ll . . . make it through.”
Beside them, Albin took a knee as well. “Zander, you’ll see your mum and dad soon.” His Animal and Small Child Mode. Operating on the theory that the two differed only in language capability, he treated them alike. No surprise, they responded well.
“Zander,” Nathan murmured, “this is Albin. He’s a friend of your dad too.” A gentle pull up and back freed his neck. “Albin—”
“Come here, mate. I have your toy.”
The little body detached itself and shifted right. Albin provided reassurances in his easy tone.
One, two, three, four. Showtime. “Is anyone hurt?”
One of the women started sobbing. Shuffling, sniffing, and hyperventilating came from the others.
Nathan sighed. “It’s all right; we’re not with them. Now, is anyone injured?”
“Uh.” A male. “I-I don’t think so.”
“They haven’t fed us,” one of the women supplied.
The other female added, “They gave us one bottle of water all day for all of us.”
“Who are you people?” Fear and frustration colored the man’s question.
&nbs
p; Nathan took a breath. “People who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, just like you.”
“Do you know where they’re taking us?”
“By all indications, they’re taking you home.”
Chapter 79
Divide and Conquer
The Moment We Come Alive - Red
Brakes whined. The box rocked as the driver parked. Two little arms wrapped around Nathan’s knee. Any tighter, and his leg would go numb. He put a hand on the boy’s head and ruffled his hair.
“Put your backs toward the door!” a mercenary yelled.
The roller chattered up. Light blazed, washing over the floor. Headlights. Screeee-clang! Ramp down. Footsteps rattled it.
“Hands out,” a man ordered.
The cuffs on Nathan’s wrists dug into his flesh as the merc pulled the keyhole clear. Click. Click. Freedom.
“Your turn.” A silhouette against the high beams, the merc dangled a set of keys in front of Nathan’s nose.
Nathan snatched them.
Not turning his back, the thug sidled down the ramp. He shoved it back into the rack, then disappeared around the corner of the truck.
Still clinging to Nathan’s leg, Zander stared up at him with eyes bloodshot from crying. The boy would recover. In a few years, he might not even remember this night.
Turning from the all-consuming gaze, Nathan freed Albin. Next, the flock in order of appearance. Seeing him as their savior, even if only on a subconscious level, would earn their loyalty.
“Let’s go.” He recovered his satchel, which lay beside Albin’s near the door, then eased to the pavement. The attorney followed before lifting Zander down. Nathan took the boy’s hand as Albin supervised the rest of the flock’s exit.
“Zander!” Jeremy burst from the darkness behind the headlights and dashed to his son.
“Daddy!”
They embraced in a tearful tangle. The rest of the hostages, however, moved with caution. When no gunmen emerged to beat them into submission, their postures relaxed. Smiles edged out cringes.