by Karen Hayes
"Why, do you want to volunteer?" Adam asks with a vague smile.
I stare him down. Does he really think I'm not up to it? Or that Chris isn't up to it? He can take on three men if necessary!
"Why not?" I say. "You need someone to help security at Times Square, right? I can do that. And Chris most definitely can."
Adam shakes his head. "Sarah, what are you talking about? This is tomorrow. You've only just started training. You've no idea of crowd control. Don't overestimate yourself."
"I don't," I say lightly. "This isn't some complex undercover mission, is it? This is right here in the heart of Manhattan. Am I right, Mr. Coleman?"
The security chief perks up, seeing a solution to his problem. He nods, then looks expectantly at Adam.
Adam shrugs. "If Mr. Coleman doesn't mind... very well. You can do it."
"These two are an excellent start," Coleman hurries to add. "Who else is coming?"
"Who else?" Adam repeats. "I didn't mean... Okay, okay. You can take Greene and Heaven and also Emma and Sam. And these two. That's on top of Trace and Job who already know they're coming. They'll be deployed simultaneously with your people. Are you happy?"
Coleman nods. "Excellent."
I heave a mental sigh of relief. It worked.
There's just one little problem left to iron out: Chris will kill me.
Chris
What was she thinking of? I cast a sideways glance at the girl sitting next to me in the minivan. I'd kill her, really! Just as I decided to stay in Hermetis to investigate and hopefully collect some intel about this eerily familiar Adam Vector person - she had to get us involved in bodyguarding some obnoxious politician!
She seems to enjoy it, though. She can't sit still. There're eight of us in the van. The dual pair we already met on the ferry are sitting in the front. Sarah's to my left, Greene to my right. The fiery-haired Heaven, the mousy Emma and Sam, her guardian, are sitting opposite.
I've never met Sam before. He's how can I describe him... he's nondescript. A stocky guy a few years older than myself, with short arms and sloping shoulders. He keeps himself to himself. In this respect he's very similar to Heaven.
I wonder if all guardians are like these two? Big, silent and a bit simple? Then again, I'm not like them. Not completely. Heaven doesn't appear dumb either - I'd say she's sort of cagey. And Sam isn't even that big: he's just above medium height.
The van turns into a side street. The guy sitting next to the driver is Trace. The driver's name is Job. That's all I know about them.
"Ten minutes," Trace drops over his shoulder.
A fast, rhythmical drumbeat cuts through the outside noise. Electronic music adds to the hum of the crowd creating a complex, addictive pattern: chaos rising to a melody.
Sarah next to me beams. She rises from her seat and peers between the others' heads into the window. "Kanye West..."
She and her music! I try to calm down. After all, this situation isn't that hopeless. There must be some positive sides to it... somewhere.
I could look at it at a recon mission, I suppose. This is my first group assignment. I can talk to security guards as well as other duals. I can see for myself how involved Hermetis is in all this politicking business. This information might prove useful at some later date. At least I hope so.
Trace and Job are wearing dark suits and ties. The others are dressed casually - if Heaven's shiny, hugging leather costume counts as casual. Sarah's wearing a track suit. I got rid of the stupid beak cap I'd bought at the station, trading it in for a more unpresuming seven-day stubble. This way I'm quite unrecognizable.
The van takes another turn, then again. A car honks. Job cusses under his breath. The van swerves, throwing me first onto Sarah, then in the opposite direction onto Greene.
"What are we supposed to do, anyway?" I ask. "So we go there, and then what?"
Contrary to my expectations, Heaven replies first, "We'll just blend in with the crowd."
I wait for her to continue but she turns away. Greene takes over from her, apparently welcoming the opportunity to talk,
"We play a very special role," he rubs his hands. Just like Sarah, he seems to be looking forward to this. "Our job is different from what the police and McAllister's bodyguards are supposed to do. Why do they need us?" Greene looks over us expectantly, then raises a freckled finger. "They need us because only we can pick up on the really subtle clues."
"Like what?" Sarah asks, even though the answer is pretty self-explanatory.
Greene leans forward to have a look at her past me. "Take our little Emma here," he says with a cunning squint. "She's a mind reader, isn't she? She can sniff out a terrorist from miles away, can't you, Em?"
All eyes turn to Emma. She nods, visibly embarrassed by the attention.
"And once she's done that," Greene continues, "little Sarah here can ask him to be a good boy and not to do anything stupid. Can't you, Sarah?"
Sarah gives a resolute nod. She's not embarrassed at all. She seems rather defiant, as in, "this is the way I am whether you like it or not".
The van slows down. It's now driving past a tall, dark building. The inside of the car submerges into gloom. It's late afternoon already.
"Our job is to cruise inconspicuously through the crowd in front of the stage," Trace says without turning his head to us.
"By 'inconspicuously' he means we're supposed to act like normal people," Greene adds.
Tracy casts another look over his shoulder. Not at Greene but at me. "Is it true what Adam said that you can sense another guardian?"
I nod.
"So what?" Greene butts in again. "She can do it too," her leans forward and slaps Heaven on a leather-clad knee. "That's nothing special."
"It is special," Job finally joins in the conversation in a low, raspy drawl. "I don't think any of the others can do what he can."
"Good," Trace sums up. "So your job will be to sniff them out."
Are those two also duals, actually? If they are, which one of them is a guardian? And what can his carrier do? I've no idea. I don't feel like asking them point blank.
The music grows louder. I can make out the singer's voice. The van moves slowly through the busy street.
Trace reaches into the glove compartment, producing a handful of flesh-colored earbuds and tiny transmitters. He shows us how to pin the transmitter inside the jacket and how to attach the earbud.
"The controls are here," he points. "They regulate volume and allow you to switch between channels. You don't need to touch them. The transmitter is switched to background mode, so it's constantly on. Every ten minutes we activate it and report even if there's nothing happening. There's also an alarm button. If you press it, all the other ones will switch on automatically. If you feel a vibration, that's me signaling you that something's going on. In that case, activate your set straight away. The activation button is long and raised to make sure you can find it straight away."
The van stops. Job gets out first, then slides the side doors open for us. We climb out.
The van is parked up right next to Times Square. It's crowded as hell. I can make out a large stage decorated in blue and red. Kanye West is singing, the music is playing, the crowd is seething. A literal sea of human heads heaves before us.
Coleman walks over to us. He is indeed McAllister's security chief. With a nod to everyone, he draws Trace and Job aside. We stay by the van, doing nothing. No, not quite: Sarah immediately begins to clap her hands, singing along with the music, while Greene stares at her, grinning and tapping the rhythm with his foot.
I find it very annoying. The music, the singing, the tapping... I wish I could tell her to shut up. Screw this music! I can't stand it!
Actually... what kind of music do I like? I just can't remember. Damn those Agency bastards with their mind wiping machines! I probably need to hear my favorite music again in order to recognize it. One thing's for sure: this rapper guy really gets on my nerves.
Finally Cole
man leaves, taking Trace with him. Together they walk toward the two other vans parked nearby, both bearing McAllister's logo. Job returns to us and says out loud, straining his voice over the surrounding noise,
"You all know what to do. Just blend into the crowd and don't stray too far away from the stage."
"Is McAllister here?" Sarah asks. "I'd love to have a look at him."
I do a mental facepalm. She's so childish it's embarrassing. Still, the others don't seem to mind.
"Nothing there to see, really," Greene offers eagerly. "You know what politicians are like. Once you've seen one, you've seen them all."
"I've never seen one," Sarah blows a gum bubble and pops it with a loud snapping sound. "What are they like?"
"They're all show and no substance," Emma suddenly says.
Oh. We're awake now, are we? She's standing next to Sam, mirroring his body language. They look almost identical, both grim and concentrated.
"Sure," Greene butts in. "They're out to impress everyone. Nobody cares what they're like on the inside."
"Enough," Heaven interrupts him, seemingly fed up with the banter. "Let's do it," she tags Greene by the sleeve, drawing him into the crowd.
I turn to Sarah. "Come on, then."
"Check in every ten minutes," Job instructs us. "Keep your eyes, ears and noses peeled. Report the slightest thing that gets your radars working. Trace and I will be around."
'Check in', 'report', 'radars' - this isn't funny anymore. This sounds like some secret militarized organization. Our mission sounds pretty stupid, anyway. We have neither the skill nor experience of professional security guards. Those are tough guys with guns under their dark suits. Now look at us! The lanky leather-clad Heaven, the freckled chatterbox Greene, the withdrawn Emma/Sam tandem - and last but not least, the gum-chewing Sarah with all the social graces of a rapper groupie. Security personnel? - more like a slapstick comedy cast!
This is all utterly stupid. They can't be serious.
I'm so consumed by my indignation that I can't concentrate. The fact that we have to thread our way through the crowd doesn't help. The singer sashays around the stage, spattering the audience with megawatts of dubious-quality lyrics.
Sarah's lips are moving. I lean toward her.
"It's almost finished!" she repeats louder. "This song is called Power! He normally closes his shows with it!"
"Do you like this sort of music?" I ask just in case.
She laughs. "Why not? It's good, isn't it?"
"Sorry, but I personally think that it's-" I stumble as some guy pushes us aside, trying to balance a girl on his shoulders who's busy waving McAllister's colors, "I think it's absolute and utter crap."
The music stops. My last words ring loud and clear in the quietened crowd. Heads turn in our direction. Someone cusses at me. Any other time I'd have never let him get away with it but not now.
I grab Sarah by the hand and pull her out of the crowd, away from the stage, while the grinning singer makes an appeal to the crowd to donate to some charity fund - one owned by McAllister, naturally - while a bald-headed man climbs the stage and waits patiently for him to finish.
Sarah wrests her hand away from me. "What's wrong with you?"
"Why, what's wrong with me?" I ask.
She raises her hands in dismay. "You're like an angry dad at a kids' party."
"Exactly," I agree. "My point entirely. There's nothing wrong with me. It's just that we're not supposed to be doing this!"
"What do you mean, not supposed to?"
A Mickey Mouse mascot walks past us, shaking his enormous fluffy head and blinking his large plastic eyes. He beelines for us, shouting over the surrounding noise,
"Get your pictures taken with the Presidential candidate in the background! A one-in-four-year opportunity!"
"Do we look like freakin' tourists?" I snap at him.
He promptly makes himself scarce, apparently realizing that I mean it.
"What do you mean, we're not supposed to be doing this?" Sarah repeats. "What are we supposed to be doing, then?"
"I don't know. Not this," I slide my hand inside my jacket and feel for the long raised button on the transmitter. "It's Chris," I say, pressing it. "Do you read me? Everything's fine here."
The singer has already vacated the stage. The bald man announces the next speaker - some sort of McAllister donor.
A lady with a complex tall hairdo steps up to the microphone. As she speaks, Sarah reaches under her own jacket.
"We'll carry on patroling," her voice sounds in my ear. "Is everything okay?"
"You're one minute late," Trace replies. "The others have already reported. You need to be more punctual. The next report is in nine minutes. Where are you?"
I look around me over the seething sea of heads, "We're right in front of the stage, slightly to the left if you stand facing it."
"Go right until you make a full circle."
"Will do."
I switch the transmitter to background mode and turn to Sarah. "This isn't our game. This is Adam's game. That's something you just can't understand. What have we got to do with all this election BS? Tell me!"
Sarah continues walking, obeying Trace's instruction. I'm obliged to follow her through the flag-waving, motto-chanting, camera-flashing crowd.
"McAllister is good for us," Sarah finally says. "He supports the duals and our cause." That's what we've got to do with him."
"I thought Adam said he didn't even know we exist?"
"Maybe not but he supports Hermetis. He depends upon us. Just as we depend upon him. Because Hermetis-"
"Because Hermetis belongs to Adam," I remind her.
She shakes her head. "No. Hermetis belongs to us all, the duals."
I check if the transmitter is off and lean toward her, "Are you sure? What's gonna happen if he becomes next President? You think he's gonna make us legal? You think we're gonna line up in front of television cameras in our Superman costumes and announce our existence to the world? You really think we can make our abilities public? I don't think so. So what's in it for us? You tell me."
Her face freezes. Have I just struck a chord with her, touching on something personal? She peels off her glasses and clenches them in one hand, staring blindly in front of her as if trying to remember something.
"Sorry, Chris," she finally says. It's not about you or me. It's about us all. The duals. I'm one of them. I want to be one of them. This is where I belong. No one is gonna take that away from me!" she swings round and buries her fist in my chest.
Once again the air seethes with a charge of power ripping through the small space between us. This time it's not as strong as it was back in Adam's office but still my temples start to ache.
"No one!" she repeats. "I don't give a shit what you think!"
She spits the last words in my face, fists clenched, teeth grinding, tense and angry.
What's wrong with her? Is she so uptight because I didn't turn to my father for help? Or because she didn't have a father to turn to even if she'd wanted to?
The lady on stage keeps pontificating. Her booming voice echoes over the crowd as she speaks about everything from minority rights to economic collapse, insisting on the need to "embrace new changes".
I look at Sarah, trying to come up with something to say. I can't. One single thought keeps playing over and over in my mind: there's no 'you and I'.
Time to face it: Sarah and I don't belong together. We're strangers, two completely incompatible persons who just happened to share the same boat for a while. We don't even like each other.
That's settled, then. Today I'm going to leave Hermetis. Pointless hanging around. I have the memory stick which apparently contains some crucial information. I need to look into it and hopefully get to the bottom of all this. No idea whether Adam really needs the files but if he does, he's very welcome to speak to me and negotiate. Not the other way round.
"Do I make myself clear?" she hisses, leaning toward me and punching my
chest with her little fist. She has to rise on tiptoe to do so. Her angry face is now close to mine, her glare boring a hole in me.
"You do," I ease her away and keep walking. "I just hope you still belong with them tonight because that's when I'm leaving you. Without me, you won't be a dual, will you?"
She scurries after me. I can physically sense her angry stare piercing me.
We keep moving in a large arc, circling the stage. Twice we contact Trace and Job without saying a word to each other. The pontificating lady has already surrendered the pulpit to some other McAllister supporter. The crowd grows thicker, expecting the man himself to arrive at any moment. Heaven and Greene walk past us: he with a friendly wave of a hand, she completely ignoring us.
Suddenly Sarah catches up with me and then turns off. I'm just about to ask her what on earth she's doing when I notice Emma and Sam standing by a large concrete jardinière with a plant sticking out of it.
Sarah comes to a halt next to them, hands on her hips. "I have a question to ask you. Is there such a thing in Hermetis as lone carriers?"
Aha. That's what she's up to. I walk over to them just in time to hear Emma's reply,
"Lone guardians work for the Agency."
"I know that," Sarah says. "I'm talking about carriers. What happens to a carrier if their guardian is dead or... or if he leaves?"
"Guardians can't leave," Sam objects.
Emma, however, averts her gaze, mouthing something. She looks lost, embarrassed even.
Sarah leans toward her. "What did you say?"
"You'd better ask Adam," she murmurs.
Sarah stares at her, uncomprehending.
"There he is!" Sam points at the stage.
I can see the police forming a corridor for Ben McAllister to walk through. Coleman is walking next to him, followed by three more men. McAllister beams, waving his hand and flashing a smile in all directions. His entourage is grim and serious.
"Attention, team," Trace's voice sounds in my ear. "The subject is on his way to you. Report your positions."
Greene says something. I don't follow, distracted by Sam's weird behavior. He jumps to his feet, mumbling unintelligibly as he points at something behind our backs. Both Sarah and I turn for a look.