“I know that up here,” she said, pointing at her head. She then put her hand on her chest. “It just hurts here.”
“Ariel, how old are you?”
“I’m eighteen.” She paused for a moment. “I’m pretty sure. My records aren’t, you know, complete.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Wow, there’s a way to get some guy in trouble.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Look, what I’m getting at is, you’re too young to be doing this stuff. You’re making life-or-death decisions for others and you haven’t even lived your own self yet.”
“I already told you. I’m right where I’m supposed to be. This is where I can do the most good.”
“Is it? Seems to me that those guys just scapegoated you, and probably won’t be listening to you much from here on out.”
“I don’t know,” she said quietly.
“Yes, you do. Hell, if anybody knows, you do. Just like you knew all that other stuff about them. You know. So you probably know what I’m going to suggest next.”
“I can’t just leave.”
“Why not? You don’t owe these people anything.”
“They saved my life and gave me a home. They took care of me.”
“No, Ling rescued you. I helped, by the way. Besides that, you’ve more than paid your debt. Has it ever occurred to you that they’ve just been using you?”
“It’s not like that,” she said, a little defensively.
I shook my head. “I was a mercenary for years, kid. I know what it means to be an asset. To be honest? Your services are worth a hell of a lot more than room and board. I’ve heard what you can do. They give you an Internet connection, feed you intel, let you see what’s going on and connect the dots and you’re a goddamn oracle. How many successful operations have you fed them?”
She sniffed. “Sixty-four.”
“They are the ones who owe you, Ariel, not the other way around. They saved your life, granted, but that doesn’t make you an indentured servant, and it’s pretty hypocritical of an organization like Exodus to treat you like one.”
“It’s not like that!” she insisted, more forcefully. “They asked me, you know, if I wanted to go home. I didn’t. I have nowhere to go.”
“How’s Europe sound?”
“What?”
“You’ve been cooped up in this mansion for years. Have you been out, even once, since you’ve been here?”
“Yes,” Ariel said softly. “I’ve actually traveled quite a bit, but it’s usually to some safe house or base or whatever place. The last time I got to actually go outside was a few months ago. They took me shopping down in Baku. I even got to go out on a boat on the Caspian. It was so awesome that I wanted to sing. It was like in Tangled when Rapunzel got to leave her tower.”
I didn’t admit to having seen that movie, but in fact we’d watched a bootleg copy of it, with Chinese subtitles, in Mexico. I didn’t want to lose points off my man card.
“Why?” she asked. “What are you getting at?”
“Catch up, genius. That’s where the heart of the Montalban family business is. I can use you more than Exodus can right now. Come with me.”
“They won’t like that. That’s where Katarina Montalban will be.”
“You said I had to make this my war? Then fine. I’m drafting you. Help me figure out Blue. And frankly, I don’t trust that these guys are going to let me talk to you once I leave here. I want you to come with us.”
Ariel suddenly looked very unsure of herself. Her eyes darted back and forth. “I don’t know. It’s unexpected. I didn’t think of this. It’s an unknown, a rogue variable. I don’t like rogue variables. I don’t know about this. I need to think about this. There are implications that—”
“To hell with the implications. You’re overthinking it. Stop trying to see every end, every possibility. You can’t. I don’t care if you actually are psychic or whatever, you’re not omnipotent.”
I could almost see her thinking. “You . . . you’re right. I do need to go with you. I can’t do much from here, not anymore. There isn’t a lot of time left, Michael. I think I can see the end of the world from here.”
“Then pack your shit.” I stood up. “We’re going on a road trip.”
Sir Matthew Cartwright was, as I expected, not happy.
“Absolutely not!” he insisted, raising his voice. His secretary, Penelope, hurried alongside us, her heels clicking and clacking on a polished wooden floor. “You can’t take her!”
I got in front of him and blocked his way. The aristocrat and his secretary were quickly surrounded by Ling, Shen, Antoine, and Skunky. Four badass Exodus operatives, all of whom had been there to rescue Ariel in Mexico, all of whom had been at the Crossroads, and all who were ready to openly revolt, and me, the meddling outsider. It turned out Ling’s guys were a lot more loyal to Exodus’ mission than to the parties running it. They took this protecting the helpless stuff real serious.
I looked Sir Matthew in the eye, coldly. “Try and stop us, Elton John. Ariel is an adult, and she’s going with us of her own free will. We’ll be driving her right out the front gate. I suggest you not be in the way.”
“Ling,” Matthew said angrily, turning toward the woman he’d worked with for years. He should have known better. “When the Council said no, I knew you’d disagree. Yet, I said I’d allow you and your assets to leave without repercussion if you felt you must. Those assets did not include the Oracle.”
Ling glared right through him. “Exodus fights against slavers. It is a sad day when we become them.”
“You know it isn’t like that! We need to keep her here.”
“What difference does it make?” Ling asked, pointedly. “You’ve made that abundantly clear you won’t listen to her. What good does she do here, literally locked away in a castle tower, if you’re not going to use her talents?”
“Bloody hell, it’s not about that!” he insisted, lowering his voice a little. “It’s about keeping her safe. She’s safe here. She won’t be safe out there in the world.”
“Kid’s gotta grow up sometime, man,” Skunky said.
“Not like this! You understand nothing.” Desperate, he turned back to Ling. “If you do this, you will be cast out of Exodus. You would throw away everything you’ve worked for, everything you stood for?”
“I’m standing now,” Ling stated.
“I won’t allow it! Stop this madness at once or I’ll get security down here!”
“Do not do this, Matthew,” Ling stated flatly. “Not like this.”
I felt for Shen, Antoine, and Skunky. They were true believers. They’d devoted their lives to this outfit. The security they were being threatened with were their friends, but they didn’t back down. Ling was like a rock. Her principles never wavered. If doing the right thing meant turning her back on Exodus, which had freed her from slavery, which she’d fought and fled for ever since, she would, in a heartbeat. That was one of the reasons I loved her.
“Penelope, get the guards.”
“Don’t, Penelope,” I warned. This poor woman looked like she was going to faint. She looked at me, looked at Matthew, then back at me. She then hurried off down the hall without another word.
A pulse went through my body, a muscle twitch, and my heart rate slowed, ever-so-slightly. I was carrying one of Ariel’s bags in my left hand, my gun hand. I slowly set it on the floor and stared Sir Matthew down. “If that’s how you want to play it, we’ll paint the walls red. I promise you this, bullets start flying, you won’t make it out alive.”
He didn’t bend. Sir Matthew may have put on airs of being a foppish rich guy, but right then I could tell from the way he carried himself that he was made of sterner stuff than that. He wasn’t going to come out of this confrontation alive, but I doubted I would, either.
“Stop it!” Ariel shouted. I had not heard her approach. “All of you, stop it!” She pushed her way in between Shen and Antoine, and walked up to Sir Matthew. “Pleas
e,” she said. “Don’t do this.”
“My Lady,” Sir Matthew said, “I can’t let them take you. It’s too dangerous.”
“Matthew, you’re such a sweet man,” she said, putting a hand on his arm. “But I need to go where the work is, and it’s not here, not anymore.”
“But, Ariel . . .”
“You’ve kept me safe for the last few years, but you can’t keep me safe from the world forever.” She looked at me, then back at Sir Matthew. “Besides, Michael isn’t joking. This time the future is perfectly clear: he will kill you. But the five of them would not make it out of here alive. Among these are beloved heroes to the rest of your soldiers, and their death at Exodus’ hands will shake the conviction of your remaining soldiers, leading to desertions and betrayal. Exodus would never recover. In the next few seconds you will decide the fate of the entire organization. It’s not worth it, not for me.”
He clenched his jaw, torn, but believing. Do the right thing, man. I really didn’t want to get into a gunfight with people I nominally liked.
“So just let me go. Please. I need this.”
Sir Matthew looked up at me, bitterly, daggers in his eyes, then back down at Ariel. His expression softened, and I could tell that he really did care for the girl. He wasn’t protecting her because she was an asset; he protected her out of love. “Perhaps you’re right.”
The Exodus operatives all breathed a sigh of relief. That had almost gone sideways.
“I pray you are right. In any case, as you say, you’re an adult now, Ariel. You’re free to go. Exodus is not in the business of keeping captives.”
“Thank you, Matthew.” She hugged Sir Matthew, squeezing him tightly.
“Just mind yourself, child. It’s an ugly world out there. Worse than even you know.” The British councilman then looked at Ling. “Promise me you’ll keep her safe. She’s more important than you know.”
“We are in the wrong line of work for guarantees, Matthew, but I will do my best.” Ling began walking away. She was done here. “Come on.”
“One last thing, Mr. Valentine. If anything happens to her, I will hold you personally accountable. Please believe me when I say that I have great resources at my disposal.”
I picked Ariel’s bag back up. “Yeah, well, get in line.”
Chapter 5: Rogue Variables
VALENTINE
Wels, Austria
September 4th
Ariel was waiting for me when we arrived at our safe house.
“Oh my God, what happened?” she said, as we made our way through the door. The three-story house on the outskirts of Wels had been our base of operations for several months at this point. Progress had been slow in our efforts to track down Katarina Montalban and her cronies; there had been many days when we had nothing to do, so we just sat around the safe house trying to stave off boredom. This was the most excitement we’d had in a while.
Ariel was freaking out. “You need to tell me everything!”
“Okay, okay, everybody is fine,” I said, setting my gear bag down on the floor.
“Something went wrong,” she said pointedly.
“Indeed,” Ling agreed. “Stefan Varga is dead.”
“Well, okay, yeah, Varga’s not fine. I meant none of us got hurt.”
Ariel looked confused, like she sometimes did when things didn’t go how she expected them to. “What? How?”
“Lorenzo’s alive,” I said.
It wasn’t often that I left Ariel speechless, even momentarily. “What? I didn’t . . .” She trailed off, eyes darting back and forth. “He’s a variable. Too variable. The probability is . . . I didn’t see this. I should have. It makes sense.”
“I’m glad this makes sense to you, honey, because I was surprised as hell.”
“Ariel,” Ling said, “did you suspect Lorenzo was still alive?”
“No . . . I mean, yes. Kind of. I didn’t want to say anything because, well, if he was alive, that meant that Sala Jihan was keeping him alive, and that was just too awful. I need everything you have, the video, the pictures, and you need to tell me everything Lorenzo said. Where is he? I have so many questions for him. He’s a rogue variable. Don’t you see, this totally changes everything?”
“Slow down,” Ling said. Ariel tended to talk faster and faster the more excited she got, as her vocal cords struggled to keep up with her mind. “You can debrief us after we get cleaned up, I promise. Here are the SD cards from our cameras.”
That seemed to satisfy Ariel. She took the cards from Ling, hugged me, and headed upstairs, to where her personal command center-slash-bedroom was. The house had six bedrooms, enough accommodations for all of us to have a bit of privacy. This was good, since Skunky’s hobby was playing the banjo, and Ariel enjoyed listening to Japanese heavy metal.
Like I said, she was a strange kid.
Despite our earlier disagreement with the Exodus Council, occasionally a runner would stop by, bringing either supplies or information that was deemed not safe to transmit. Apparently kidnapping their oracle had forced their hand. Better to help us not get caught than to stay out of it and lose their precious asset. Aside from that little bit of aid, we were more or less on our own.
Ling looked over at me, smiling. “You called her honey.”
I thought about it for a second. “I did? So?”
“Then she hugged you.”
I was confused. “Is that bad?”
Ling sighed, shaking her head. “Michael, you are incredibly dense sometimes. Think about it for a moment. That girl doesn’t have any family, just like us. You know what happens. You find yourself a family. She’s picked you as a father figure.”
“I’m not old enough to be her father.” At least, I didn’t feel old enough. Still, what Ling was saying made sense. After losing my parents, I’d found myself a family first in the military, then later on with Switchblade 4. Skunky had been like my brother, as had Tailor, whom I hadn’t heard from since we left Zubara. I still thought of Hawk almost like he was my father.
Looking smug, Ling watched me as I came to the uncomfortable realization that she was right. “Well, that’s intimidating.” I had spent a lot of time with Ariel during my stay in Azerbaijan, but I figured she liked hanging out with Ling and me because she didn’t have any friends in the sprawling estate, and certainly not any friends her own age. “It’s just, you know, she’s a grown woman.”
“Is she now?” Ling asked, as we made our way upstairs. “Were you all grown up when you were eighteen?”
“I was in BMT at Lackland,” I said. “But not really.”
“I had already been conscripted into the PLA. This was before Shanghai was destroyed and the ceasefire talks began anew. But I was still very much a child, and I missed my parents dearly.” She paused. “I still do.”
I put my hand on her shoulder. “I know. Me too.”
“If that poor girl needs a stand-in parent, then so be it,” Ling said. “She’s been through enough hell. I’m glad you brought her with us, Michael. That was a good decision.”
“Does that make you Mom then?”
“Oh, of course not. I’m far too young. And . . . hip? Is that what they call it? In any case, I’m more like her big sister.”
Ling was actually a couple of years older than I was. “Sure, baby, hip. I’m just glad Sir Matthew didn’t have me shot.” I stopped at my door. I had my own bedroom, but spent most nights in Ling’s. The others in the house were polite enough to pretend they didn’t notice. It was the sort of thing that was probably frowned upon in Exodus’ bylaws, if they had such a thing, but I didn’t really give a damn about such nonsense anymore. I was a fugitive working for a paramilitary organization that had been labeled as terrorists by the UN, the European Union, and Interpol; breaking Exodus’ fraternization rules with Ling didn’t even register, compared to all that.
“Hey, I’m going to get cleaned up and maybe take a nap. Wanna meet downstairs in a few hours for dinner? We all need to sit down
and have a hot wash about what happened, too, make sure everybody’s on the same page.”
Ling raised an eyebrow. “Hot wash?”
“Air Force jargon. We’ll just go over the operation, what went right, what went wrong, stuff like that.”
“I see. Right? Lorenzo didn’t shoot you. Wrong? The man we needed to question fell to his death. Good call. Yes. I’ll see you at dinner.” She kissed me on the cheek and continued down the hall.
I usually didn’t leave the house if it wasn’t necessary. Majestic, and every organ of the United States government that it could influence—which was probably all of them—was still looking for me. If I were spotted, I’d have to run, and the entire effort to stop Katarina Montalban would be compromised. Even though Dr. Silvers had finally believed me when I said I didn’t know what Project Blue was, they weren’t just going to let me go after escaping from their black site, especially since I was the one who gave Bob Lorenzo the Project Heartbreaker files. Shadow governments weren’t big on forgiveness or loose ends.
I thought about exposing them, from time to time, just going public with the whole thing. Calling up some big network news outlet back in the States and saying “My name is Michael Valentine, I was the one who originally acquired the Project Heartbreaker files, and boy, do I have a story for you.” I doubted it would accomplish anything, though. One way or another, it’d end badly for me. If Majestic didn’t kill me outright, they’d use the legal system against me and I’d end up in prison. I’d broken countless laws back home, killed people, and there were those who thought that whoever released the Project Heartbreaker files was guilty of treason. My only hope of avoiding that would be to try to defect to another country, live in exile, getting worked over by their intelligence organizations. Fuck that. I’d spent enough time being interrogated and held captive. Just because my own country had gone to hell it didn’t mean I wanted to work for somebody else’s.
No, trying to come clean, tell the truth, shine the light on everything, would end up with me discredited, imprisoned, and probably dead. That was the way the world worked. All I really wanted to was to go home and live a quiet life, but I doubted that that would ever be an option for me.
Alliance of Shadows (Dead Six Series Book 3) Page 10