Empyre

by Josh Conviser

  “You want more than that.”

  “Have you slotted it then? Have you seen my creation?”

  “No.”

  Krueger laughed. “I knew you wouldn't. Pity, though. I want someone to see it—to appreciate it.”

  “The virus will destroy us.”

  “No! It will free us. You had it right, Laing. Destroying Echelon. We humans don't prosper under kind conditions. Evolution requires hardship. That's the truth. Look around. You think this would have come from peace and prosperity? Progress comes over the rubble of the weak. We need chaos.”

  “And you're here to supply it.”

  “I am—in just the right measure to both inspire and assure our survival. Fear. Terror. It's our base desires that push us to strive. I will end the long coddle. It's a big job. An important job. I could use your help.”

  “You're no different from Echelon.”

  “I am, Ryan. I see that humanity needs fear to hold it together. Manipulation only stifles. But fear inspires! Everything I've done has been to that end. EMPYRE taught me the power of fear and the judicious application of terror.”

  “No—it justified your psychotic needs.”

  Krueger pushed on unfazed, his voice tipped with conviction. “EMPYRE was my incubator. It honed my skills as Echelon did yours. And look how well I've learned. Look at what I've done to you.” Krueger placed his hand on Sarah's shoulder. “I found your lever, and I pushed.”

  Ryan itched to throttle Krueger—to watch his life wither. Above Laing, Taylor shifted slightly, reasserting his presence.

  “You and I don't need to fight,” Krueger continued, his voice echoing through the cistern. “We are not so different. Both of us want to save humanity from itself.”

  “I only want her.”

  Krueger stared at Ryan, penetrating him. “You're a coward, Ryan.” The words filtered through the musty air. Krueger let them settle, then continued. “I think maybe I used to be like you. Unwilling to make the hard decisions. Maybe that's why Turing created EMPYRE for me. Maybe I needed it to become the man standing before you.”

  “And who is that?”

  “A man willing to become a monster to hold humanity together.”

  “You don't seem so noble to me.”

  “Then look more closely. I'm not a psychopath, Ryan. Each move I made, each death, has been for a reason. I will continue my wave of terrorism, priming the world for my arrival. Fear will run thick. Then, I'll reveal myself. I'll reveal the virus.”

  “And take the world back to the Stone Age?”

  “No, Ryan. The ability to destroy a thing is the ability to control it. Without Echelon, there needs to be a control—a stop point before the brink. I'm supplying that.”

  “And the masses will cower under your thumb.”

  Krueger laughed. “Forget what you know. Look from a larger perspective. What will keep us walking this green earth? What will keep the global organism from dying?”

  “Your divine presence?”

  “Just look at our history,” Krueger continued. “Those times when fear reigned were also the most fruitful. Take the Cold War between the USSR and the United States. Both sides built armories capable of destroying the world. And each held the other in check.”

  “Mutually assured destruction,” Ryan said.

  “That's right. Under that umbrella of fear, the world had relative peace. And it wasn't the numb, forced peace of Echelon. Human evolution ran its course. Advances came lightning fast. But always, there was the fear to hold humanity in check—to keep any one faction from pushing the envelope. Then, the USSR fell and the world tumbled into chaos.”

  “Not really a model for enlightenment,” Ryan said.

  “Isn't it?”

  “Maybe humanity can take care of itself.”

  Krueger looked down at him with pained condescension. “Please. The mechanics of the universe don't run on optimism. Humanity has many abilities. Dealing with change isn't one of them. Without Echelon to dampen the rate of progress, the world is moving too fast for people to get comfortable. To the average man, the world is out of control—slipping ever faster into an era he can't fathom.

  “Look at the two of you,” Krueger continued. “Man-machine hybrids, pushing the edges of what it means to be human. That's evolution, Ryan. And it will not slow. Progress will not give humanity a breather. So all the inequities you see in the world, the haves and have-nots, the restless masses gripping ancient religions to ground them, the anger and confusion, all that will increase. There are only two options, Ryan. Stifle the evolution or impose a larger threat that brings the world together. Echelon failed at the first. As to the second, there is no larger threat than me. If this really is a global village, the ability to poison the well puts me in control.”

  “And you want my help with this?”

  “Well, you're to blame for a lot of the pain in the world right now. It's on your shoulders. I can lighten that load. You see it, don't you? The elegance of it? Join me, Ryan. Help me like you helped Turing. Take the harder path.”

  Ryan shook his head.

  Krueger's eyes ran cold.

  “I had hoped it would be different. But in the end, you're like the rest—like EMPYRE. Small-minded.”

  “I won't help you sow chaos.”

  “Oh, you will,” Krueger said, throwing a look at Sarah's spike. “One way or the other.”

  Sarah's past trickled out. The slow draw diminished her, bit by bit, memory by memory. The spike was pulling at random from her life. She grasped at images with ferocious intensity, but couldn't place them in order. Soon, there would be nothing.

  There was a freedom in the loss. She saw fresh, without the filters of a lifetime, without the confusion. In her mind, there was only light. She was the product of her memory without the hang-ups. Two men stood before her. Both were familiar.

  One had to die.

  47

  BASILICA CISTERN, ISTANBUL, TURKEY

  Ryan pulled himself from the dank water and got up onto the platform where Krueger held Sarah. He drew the disk from his pocket. Within it, Krueger's virus festered. The disk, so thin in his hand, weighed Ryan down. So much revolved around the next seconds.

  He hated this and knew he wasn't the right man for the job. Yet he wouldn't be content anywhere but at the nexus. He craved that moment at the needle point of decision where the wrong move spelled disaster. The intensity spurred him, drove him. From this moment, the course of history would shift.

  “Give it to me, Ryan.” Krueger's voice had gone soft, almost fatherly.

  The urge to plunge into Krueger's vision tugged on Laing. It was a cruel world Krueger would create—but a workable one. Not a world Ryan wanted to live in, but neither was the one he himself had triggered. Maybe Turing was right. Maybe Krueger was the last, best hope.

  “Reverse the spike,” Laing replied, “or I destroy this and we can all go to hell.”

  Krueger smiled, stretching out his hand. Laing stepped forward. Why shouldn't he do this? What was there without Sarah?

  He placed the disk in Krueger's hand.

  “Thank you, Ryan.”

  Krueger turned to Sarah and touched the pad on the spike's flank. It read his bio-signature and shut down. “I've stopped the pull.”

  “Reinsert her memories.”

  “That will happen automatically—when I'm far gone from this place. Then, and only then, her memories will return and the spike will disengage. Pull the spike before I disengage it, and her memory will be lost forever.”

  Ryan burned hot. “You have what you want.”

  “Please. I'm no fool. You're not a man who walks away. Your vision is too narrow, Ryan. You care too much about the individual. It's your flaw. And the reason you can't stand in my shoes.”

  “Maybe no one should,” Laing growled, making the threat clear.

  “You won't come after me, Ryan. Because I'll hold up my end of the bargain. It's in my best interest. If you're not with me, I wan
t you out of the game. Sarah will come back—all of her. I grant you a small life with this woman. You can have love . . . marriage. Maybe you'll have children. And, with each passing day, the web of dependence will tighten around you. You won't risk it all just to come after me. You'll survive—like the rest.”

  Ryan glanced at Sarah and knew Krueger was right. He would leave the fight to others. Sarah looked at him, tears beginning to flow from her good eye. He didn't know what she remembered at this point, but he hoped she saw the love in his eyes.

  “I...Don't do this,” she said.

  “Maybe I want that small life,” he replied. He wouldn't let Sarah fade. That was a step he could not take, and Krueger knew it. The rage crimping Ryan's features relaxed to acceptance.

  Sarah reacted to the transition. She opened her mouth to speak. Before she could, an explosion ripped through the cistern's cold peace.

  Sarah's confusion ran thick. She had only vague recall of the men before her. Yet she knew them. Knew them both. One she feared. The other . . .

  White light bleached her vision. An instant later, the shock wave slammed her into the prefab's hard carbon wall, as the percussion blast reverberated through the cistern. A part of her understood what was happening, but she couldn't seem to lock reality into conscious understanding.

  Through her shock and fear, she registered a figure snaking down one of the columns and dropping next to the man she loathed.

  “Taylor. What's happening?” Krueger's voice had upshifted an octave.

  Taylor replied, quick and choppy. “Breach. Perimeter compromised. Jamming tech blocked our surveillance and countermeasures. I'm reading American signatures off the 'ware.”

  “Laing!” Krueger's fury blossomed—then calmed as quickly as it had arisen. “No. It doesn't matter.” He turned to Laing. “Whatever you did—it doesn't matter now. You will slow them down. If we don't escape—well . . .” he motioned to Sarah.

  Laing's eyes burned with rage—and acceptance. Something in that look cut into Sarah. She couldn't allow the slow death this man had embarked on. And she couldn't let Krueger escape. Assurance pushed up through her. She knew.

  Another explosion. This one closer. Part of the cistern's ceiling imploded. From the gap, men in dark coveralls dropped down. The firing began.

  Sarah had one chance at this. She had to act while the men were distracted. She stared at Laing, realizing that if she had her memory, she'd probably be as helpless as he was. Her connection with him was so strong. She pushed it away. The promise of her memory, of a new life, melted before her. She lost it to action and the moment.

  Sarah drew her hands up to the spike. It was cold to her touch. She gripped it with both hands, feeling how firmly it had bored into her skull. With a deep breath, she twisted and pulled. Pain blasted through her cheek and eye. Her cry pierced even the gunfire chattering through the hall.

  The men turned in unison. Krueger's eyes went wide in surprise. Laing leaped at her, hands outreached, trying to stop her. She torqued the spike, felt it rip free from her bone, and she pulled.

  The spike came free of her eye socket with a slushy pop. Blood gushed from the wound.

  A kaleidoscopic burst of images blasted through her mind. She watched transfixed. Then, darkness. Nothing.

  She opened her eyes to see the man, her man, standing before her, dumb struck. She let the spike fall to the floor.

  “No, no!” Krueger screamed.

  Laing's eyes filled with pain. Something gray fell from them. His arms reached out, drawing her into him. She felt warmth there. Contentment.

  Krueger's wail fell to a growl. “Kill them. Get me out of here.”

  The figure next to Krueger raised his weapon. Sarah didn't hesitate. She spun, getting herself between the two she hated and the one she had to protect.

  When the shot came it was almost a relief. She didn't feel the impact, only the slamming force of the blast throwing her forward. The man in her arms crashed into a column and she landed on top of him. She heard splashing behind them. Men running. Sounds ebbed as pain engulfed her.

  She could not breathe.

  Ryan felt the blast as if he had been hit himself. It lifted him off his feet. His head hit the column with a dull thump. He slid down it and Sarah tumbled with him. Her eyes found his. Her mouth opened and closed. Nothing came out.

  The sudden loss wiped Ryan clean. The life he had seen so clearly just a moment ago was now gone, obliterated. He looked into Sarah's good eye, refusing to acknowledge the pitted one. His hands slipped over her back and came away blood wet.

  Above Sarah, Ryan registered movement. Mercs swarmed down, soup thick. In their black body armor and Hazmat masks, he couldn't distinguish one from the next. They landed around him, then pushed into the cistern, engaging the enemy. Enemy: the word rang hollow.

  After the mercs, another man rappelled into the cistern. He moved with a bearish confidence that Ryan recognized. The man reached Ryan and loomed over him. He pulled off his mask.

  Frank Savakis gazed down at Laing. There was no anger in the face. He stooped and Ryan flinched, drawing Sarah close to his chest.

  Savakis tried to pull her off him. Ryan resisted.

  “It's okay, Ryan.” Savakis's words just reached him over the chattering firefight ripping through the cistern.

  Something in that voice released Ryan from shock. He let Frank pull Sarah from his chest. Savakis propped her against the column. Her mouth continued to flop open and shut, like a fish sucking air.

  Laing pulled himself up to his feet.

  Frank stooped over Sarah, put his hand to her cheek. “Breathe,” he said.

  She looked at him, eyes wide, suffocating.

  “Breathe,” he said again.

  The gunfire held for an instant. In that relative silence, Sarah gasped. Then she began pulling in huge gulps of air.

  “The tat,” Ryan said in dumb relief. “It held.”

  Frank turned back to Laing. “Krueger?” he asked.

  Ryan pulled himself from Sarah and peered into the gloom. “He's there. Out there. He has the disk.”

  Frank nodded.

  A need rose in Ryan, blood thick. An itch that would not relent. He craned his neck, peering into the darkness.

  “Go on,” Frank said. “I got it here.” He gave Laing a nod—as close to an apology as Frank could offer. “I will take care of her,” he said. “End this fuckin' thing.” He pulled a Glock 60 from its holster and extended it to Ryan, butt first.

  Laing nodded, taking the gun. He turned from Sarah and plunged into the firefight.

  48

  BASILICA CISTERN, ISTANBUL, TURKEY

  Thoughts of Sarah fell from his mind. There was only fight left in him. Part of him had died, and part was reborn.

  He caught the radiation flicker of Taylor dragging Krueger through the water, away from the firefight. The manic ardor of Krueger's men had stalled the invasion force. Their hard-fought deaths would give Krueger time to escape.

  Ryan moved faster, reaching the point he had been driving for. He pulled himself out of the water onto the flat base of a column. Behind him, gunfire lit the cistern in sporadic flashes, illuminating the columns and then blanking the ancient space to black. Time slowed to a glacial drip.

  Ryan jacked his drones. Adrenaline surged through his system, muscles fired and released in expectation. He remained still, going quiet against the column, grinding into its gritted surface.

  Taylor came into sight below, pushing Krueger before him. Ryan tensed for action. There was no way Taylor could have heard him, and yet the man turned as if on instinct, throwing Krueger into the water and swiveling with fluid grace. The gun appeared as if by magic, rising lightning fast in Taylor's hand. Ryan felt the weight of its black eye on him. He sprang from his perch. Too late. The gun fired, the bullet spinning Ryan in the air and sending him sprawling.

  Laing splashed down, pain lancing his gut. He felt the cold lurch of water sloshing into his stomach wound.
It permeated his entire body in an instant. Before Ryan could find his footing, Taylor was over him, gun held with cool assurance.

  The eyes pierced Ryan. It was like staring into the eyes of a shark. No sympathy. No emotion. Fear surged through him. Drones seeped from his wound out into the water, then receded to his core. The violation ran to max. And the man before him, looming, eyes gleaming with carnal ferocity—a will to act without hesitation, without doubt.

  For a moment, Ryan longed for that peace, that confidence. To climb out on oblivion's edge and push the world away.

  No.

  The chain wrapping him broke. He refused to take his last breaths smothered under the shield he'd spent a lifetime forging. If this was the end, he would live it raw. A tidal surge within him. He opened the gates to love and hate, fear and hope, rage and sorrow—to the full measure of emotion.

  A baseline shift, like blocks locking into place and allowing a new structure to rise. The drones jacked his perception. The flow, in its entirety, coursed through him. This time, Ryan didn't back away from the deluge of data, but allowed it to sweep him up. He opened himself to the vision—his mind going porous, matching state with his body. But his sense of self did not dilute under the crush. The power of his emotions, and his acceptance of them, kept him on keel.

  “Good-bye, Ryan Laing.” Standing over Ryan, Taylor uttered the words from a place beyond contempt.

  Taylor was right. This was the end of Ryan Laing—and the beginning of something new. Something that didn't require an icy distance to act, something that could take in the world's flow and still operate. There was action and will. There was also emotion, and perception.

  Ryan surged into this new existence, charged to fracture. He saw Taylor's smile unfold, watched the man's finger curl on the trigger. Ryan relaxed into action.

  His arm shot from the water with a speed far beyond his previous capabilities. He reached Taylor's gun just as the trigger was pulled. The pistol's crack and flash filled reality. The bullet accelerated down the barrel as Ryan's hand slapped the gun, altering trajectory by centimeters. It was enough. The bullet missed his heart, blasting through the meat of Laing's shoulder.