by Sean Black
So far, there was no sign of Meredith, and no phone call to explain her absence. Julia sipped at her coffee. The place was busier than she would have suspected. It was a young post-club crowd, or perhaps a post-bar, early-club crowd, of students and hipsters, along with a few shift workers having dinner at four in the morning before they headed for the bridges and tunnels to take them out of the city and home. The city shifted from hour to hour, all the while becoming something different, depending on who you were. Right now, she was ravaged with nerves and lack of sleep and beginning to get irritated at the no-show.
She dug out her cell phone and called the number. The first time it had gone to a generic computerized voicemail message. This time someone picked up. A man.
FIFTY-NINE
Graves
Graves was shaken awake. He opened his eyes to see his desk, covered with papers. He felt like shit. The manhunt for Tibor was nationwide, the resources devoted to it unprecedented, and with every minute that passed they seemed to be getting further away from him rather than closer. They could have had him in Vegas if they’d gone public. But they had waited, which had cost them dear. Now they had the worst of both worlds – rampant public speculation and panic, no clear idea of where he was and, worse, no idea of what he was thinking or even what he wanted. Was he already dead in a ditch somewhere, having pulled the same trick Lewis had but without them being able to do the clean-up? Was he running? Or was he out there, plotting some kind of revenge spurred on by his wife?
Graves looked up from the hand on his shoulder to the face of a young agency tech analyst from the NSA. They had been tasked with using the direct electronic surveillance and the powerful algorithms that filtered every email and phone call in the country to gather intelligence. The more mundane task of racing the three possible escape vehicles had been kicked down to state and local law enforcement, guaranteeing, as Graves had known it would, a complete cluster-fuck.
‘You have something for me?’ asked the analyst.
‘Call on the wife’s cell phone.’
‘Incoming or outgoing?’
‘Out,’ said the analyst.
Now Graves was wide awake. That meant they had a number they could trace, either by triangulating the position of the device receiving or doing it more directly if it was a landline. They also had a protocol in place if it was to a computer device using, say, a Skype account. Even if Byron was gone by the time they got there, they had a definite point to start from. They could establish a cordon around it and work their way in.
‘She must have had a number for him,’ said Graves. ‘How come we didn’t know about that?’
‘It’s not Tibor,’ said the analyst. ‘We didn’t have a name for the cell phone but we ran a voice analysis and it came up with a match. It’s an individual by the name of Eldon James.’
Fuck. What the hell was she calling Eldon James for? He wasn’t even involved anymore. He’d been stood down after the Vegas fiasco, a boy sent to do a man’s job. ‘You have a recording I can listen to?’
‘Right here,’ said the analyst.
The more he thought about Eldon, the more he was freaking. ‘Where’d she call him from? We have a team on her, right?’
‘They lost her, but we do have a location. A diner on 34th Street. They’re on the way there now.’
Graves was going to ask how they’d lost her but there would be time for that later, and a partial answer would be that a bright woman, such as Julia Tibor, married to someone like Byron, would have acquired a few skills of her own, as much by osmosis and close proximity to her husband as anything else. Surveillance took manpower and expertise; counter-surveillance was a good deal more straightforward, especially if the person knew they were being watched. They had much smaller RDF tracking devices now that could be injected on a crowded subway platform, but the White House lawyers would have had a shit fit if Graves had suggested using one on a civilian who hadn’t yet been charged with any crime. That was something else to figure in. The President was now taking a personal interest, never a good thing for someone in Graves’s position. The White House position seemed to be that they wanted this whole deal closed down as quickly as possible. They were then counting on the American public’s limited attention span and the media’s quick-moving news cycle to fill the grave. It would be spun as a tragedy, an American hero for whom the government had done its best but who had cracked up. Of course, Julia Tibor could blow that whole narrative to pieces and, contrary to what the internet conspiracy theorists believed, her civilian status meant they couldn’t just take her out without risking major blowback.
Graves grabbed his suit jacket from the back of his chair, and jogged for the door. If he survived this he really would have to make some lifestyle changes. Two minutes later he was in a car and heading for the diner. If Eldon James got to her first, they were all screwed.
SIXTY
Julia
The man at the other end of the line had asked her to meet him outside. He had also said that he didn’t have much time, that he was a friend of Byron’s from way back. The clock would already be ticking, he said. Their window was limited. He apologized for the initial subterfuge. He would explain his reasons in person because they might be listening. He didn’t have to explain who they were to Julia. Not anymore.
He ended the call before she could ask any more questions. She paid the check, grabbed her jacket and walked outside. She could see him standing across the street. He was short, slim, with a shaved head. His hands dug into the pockets of his long overcoat. He looked like a strong breeze would carry him away. He certainly didn’t look threatening. She waited for the Don’t Walk sign to flip over, and started toward him.
He smiled at her, then turned and beckoned for her to follow him. She did, then stopped. Something wasn’t right. She had rushed into this. He had used time as a pressure. She had no idea whether he was or wasn’t a friend of Byron’s. He could be anyone. She had created a lot of enemies at the press conference. That was one thing she could be sure of.
They had walked a half-block. He stared at her as she stood there.
‘Up to you what you want to do,’ he said. ‘But I can take you to Byron. Or …’
She followed his gaze to the dark sedan pulling up outside the diner. It was followed by a second. She recognized the man getting out. It was Graves. He looked pissed. His hands were clenched into fists as he barged through the other men spilling from the two sedans.
‘Up to you,’ the man repeated.
SIXTY-ONE
Byron
The Ford Escape rattled its way toward the cabin, Shakti in the passenger seat next to me. Even with all the windows open, the smell of death had settled into every corner of the vehicle.
‘There’s an old barn out back. We can do it there,’ Shakti suggested.
I moved Muir into the center of the barn. Because the tools we had at our disposal were fairly primitive, and because we were looking to establish something other than cause of death, Shakti had proposed a more direct method. We would first separate Muir’s head from his torso, then take the head into the kitchen.
Removing someone’s head was trickier than it might have seemed. I had seen enough jihadi executions to know that. At least we had the advantage that the person was already dead, and less likely to squirm. I took an axe from a wooden workbench that ran along the side of the barn. ‘You might want to step back,’ I said to Shakti.
I lifted the axe high over Muir’s head. Once I had inflicted the major trauma, Shakti would set to work with the knives to cut through the spinal column. She seemed very calm about the whole procedure. It occurred to me, not for the first time, that soldiers and scientists had more in common than others might have thought. For a start, neither could afford to be squeamish or overly sentimental when there was a job to do.
Two hours later, her kitchen sink full of blood, Shakti had located two devices. ‘From what I can tell they’re probably prototypes. It’s fairly usual for peopl
e working in this field to use themselves as guinea pigs,’ she told me.
‘You think more of the research team would have had implants?’ I asked her.
She shrugged. ‘No way of knowing, and in any case I’m not sure what it changes if they did.’
At least I had been right about Muir. But, as Shakti had said, what did it matter? Muir hadn’t demonstrated any strange behavior or the kind of problems that had affected Lewis or me. I said as much to Shakti.
‘Why would he have?’ she said. ‘Both you and Lewis had suffered some form of emotional trauma.’
‘So the technology would work fine with people who hadn’t?’
‘Too many factors, Byron. And Muir didn’t seem to demonstrate any of the enhanced abilities that you have and Lewis had.’
‘That we knew of,’ I said.
I stared at the remnants of the part of Muir’s skull that held his face. The mask of flesh stared back at me. She was right. What did any of it matter if Muir had had an implant too?
SIXTY-TWO
Graves
There was no sign of Julia Tibor. And they couldn’t issue a general alert for Eldon, not without it seeming that the whole situation was spinning out of control. They had found something, though. In an alleyway less than two blocks away, they had found a young woman beaten so badly that she was in a coma at Mount Sinai, having suffered severe brain trauma. The prognosis was that she would likely survive but that her brain had been deprived of oxygen for such a length of time that she was as good as dead. She lay in the grey zone between life and death. Graves knew it had to have been Eldon’s work but he didn’t know why he hadn’t just killed her. Why leave her alive?
It was a question for later. Right now they had to find Eldon and, more importantly, Julia Tibor before she suffered the same fate. If she turned up dumped in an alleyway, alive or dead, Graves and the White House would face some tough questions after how she had reacted at the press conference. A situation they were aiming to contain was only getting larger.
They left it to the NYPD to talk to potential witnesses. They were focusing on the girl found in the alleyway. No mention was being made of either Julia Tibor’s proximity or even the fact that she was missing. They would leave Eldon’s name out of it for now too. There was already enough in the mix. With any luck, if Julia didn’t surface, the media would assume she had been forced underground by their spotlight. The situation was best served by Graves saying nothing. If it came out later, they would distance themselves from Eldon, and Julia’s disappearance. They wouldn’t even have to lie. They had tried to help Julia Tibor. But some people just didn’t want to be helped. If she had stayed on their side, she would have been safe.
SIXTY-THREE
Byron
After Shakti and I had cleaned the kitchen, we sat down to talk, both of us too hyped to sleep. Shakti sat opposite me, the dogs at her feet. Even now the two animals retained a certain wariness. Outside, the wind had picked up. I could hear the groan and creak of trees that had been there long before either of us, and would likely remain long after we were both gone.
The smaller dog twitched in its sleep, and Shakti soothed it with a rub to the back of its neck. ‘You’re welcome to stay as long as you need, Byron. I rarely have visitors. I collect my mail in town. I doubt anyone would find you.’
‘That’s kind of you, but me hiding out here doesn’t solve anything.’
‘What does?’ she asked.
‘You ask good questions,’ I said.
‘It’s not always seen as a positive thing.’
I still didn’t have a clue why Muir had sent me there. I had learned a little more about the origins of the program, how it had come into being, how it had quickly departed from its original aim, but Shakti hadn’t been able to offer anything that even approached a solution to my current predicament. I was a prototype gone awry, a mess to be cleaned up, which in itself would have been fine, if it hadn’t been for Julia.
I watched the flicker of light from one of the candles. ‘Mind if I ask you a question?’
‘Go right ahead.’
It was something I had dwelled upon for a long time, and yet I wasn’t sure if I had ever uttered the words to a single living soul. It was a question so basic as to seem absurd, not to mention self-obsessed.
I met the Indian woman’s gaze. ‘What am I?’
She clasped her hands together. She didn’t answer at first. Her eyes betrayed someone as devoid of an answer as I was. ‘I think, Byron, that it’s far too early to say what you are. That probably wasn’t a very helpful answer. I told you I was better at questions.’
‘You really think I’m going to be around long enough to find out?’ I ran my hands through my hair, feeling the pulse of my implants at the tips of my fingers. ‘I’m not sure I even deserve to live.’
She stayed silent.
I told her about my journey so far. I told her about the four people at the lab, and how I had executed them in cold blood. Shakti let me talk myself out. The more I talked, the worse I felt. It wasn’t proving cathartic, or therapeutic. If anything, it was leading me to the same conclusion that Lewis must have reached.
When I next looked at Shakti she was smiling at me. It was a warm, beatific smile that pissed me off. It reminded me a little of Julia, which darkened my mood further.
I would leave. Muir had sent me on a goddamn wild-goose chase. This woman, with her life in the woods, separated from society, had no more answers than anyone else did. She had already told me there was no going back, that any attempt to remove the technology inside my head would kill me. Meanwhile, there was an army out there, looking for me, and with good cause. I was a danger to society. I had killed in cold blood with no greater motive than my own survival. There was nothing noble in what I’d done. It had served no higher purpose.
I started to get to my feet. ‘I’m talking in circles here. I appreciate your hospitality, but it would probably be best if I left.’
She ushered me to sit down. ‘What you just told me about the people you killed. Those were hardly the words of a machine. A machine wouldn’t have those thoughts. Guilt’s a human trait, isn’t it, Byron?’
‘My feeling bad doesn’t change what I did.’
‘That’s true but I’m not sure you can be held entirely responsible either. Byron, the politicians may have got cold feet this time, but this research, this whole field, isn’t about to go away either. For one thing there’s way too much money at stake when you think of all the possible applications. And there’s something else, which the human part of you has to deal with.’
I looked at Shakti.
‘If you die now, Byron, or somehow manage to disappear, you’re leaving your wife behind with no answers. Maybe that’s worthy of a little guilt too.’
Perhaps Muir hadn’t sent me to Shakti for a grand answer, or a clue to unlock the situation I was in. She had given me something far more valuable. She had given me a reason to go on. Even if I couldn’t rid myself of the implant, perhaps I could find a way to allow the human part of me to reassert itself. The guilt I felt now was a sign of that. When I had killed the two muggers, I had felt nothing approaching guilt. The last guilt I had felt was over the death of Sasha, although my remorse and grief at that had stemmed from what I hadn’t done rather than what I had. But, however you cut it, it was still a human emotion, one that I could place alongside my love for my wife.
I asked Shakti for a paper and a pen. There was a small wooden table near the window that I hadn’t noticed when I’d first walked in. I sat down and began to write. After years of pushing buttons, swiping screens and using keyboards, the physical act of writing, of making a mark on paper, seemed alien to me at first. Technology had changed humanity as much as humanity had pushed technology forward.
As the night moved toward a fresh dawn and my hand cramped, I wrote a letter to my wife. I engaged my human side. I told her how much I loved her. I told her what she meant to me, how much better she had made my
life, and how lucky I was to have found her.
When I was done, I read it over, feeling closer to her as I turned the pages. Then I folded it, placed it in the envelope Shakti had given me and wrote Julia’s name on the front. I hoped I lived long enough to give it to her.
My plan was a simple one: to stay alive long enough for the firestorm surrounding me to begin to die down. I would work my way slowly back across the country, traveling at night, walking if I had to, using all the evasion strategies and skills I had amassed, and drawing on only what I needed from the technology inside me. My hope was that by the time I had worked my way back, I would have achieved some kind of balance between the old and the new, the natural and the artificial parts of myself.
My plan lasted as long as it took Shakti to return in the early afternoon. She had gone to pick up some provisions and her mail. She had also returned with a newspaper. She folded it out in front of me. ‘I’m sorry, Byron,’ she said. ‘I’m so sorry.’
My eyes flitted from my letter to Julia, on the cleaned-up kitchen counter, to the picture of my wife on the front page of that morning’s LA Times.
SIXTY-FOUR
The first bomb blew out the cabin windows. Glass punched through the air. I dove for the ground as fragments flew over my head. A triangular tooth of glass spun over my head before finally embedding itself into the far wall. I looked around for Shakti, the dogs, but they were nowhere to be seen. I heard the low whistle of another bomb as it descended from the heavens. I hunkered down in a corner, bowed my head and held my hands up to my face.