Revolution: Luthecker, #3

by Keith Domingue

  “And I want one other thing,” the agent added. “The whereabouts of one Nicole Ellis.”

  Yaw’s face showed a flash of confusion.

  The agent didn’t miss the look. “I know what you’re thinking. Why aren’t they asking about Alex Luthecker?” the man in the suit and badge added. “I can officially inform you that we’re not interested in him now.”

  Yaw kept his cool, and stayed quiet.

  “I know you think you’re protecting your friends. And that you can survive this place. You’re a big, physical guy. But the Vietnamese kid. He might not fare as well. And those refugees? Well—deported is about the nicest thing that’s going to happen to them. So what do you say?”

  Yaw finally spoke. “Lawyer. That’s what I say.”

  “Not going to happen. You’re a person of interest, suspected of terrorist activity. And being off grid works against you here, big time. If you’re not part of the system, you can’t really rely on the system, now can you? Which means you’ll disappear if I say so. Just another black man up to no good, found shot on the street.”

  Yaw remembered his training and did his best to show no emotion. He also thought back to his brother’s incarceration many years earlier. How quickly things had escalated. How, for African American men, the penal code was a death spiral.

  Once a black man was in the system, he was enslaved by it. In order to stay safe from the law, people of color had to err on the side of caution. Always. Walking down the wrong street at the wrong time could end in death. Say the wrong thing to the wrong person? Do time in jail. It was an undercurrent of threat felt by all minorities in America.

  Yaw’s brother’s difficulties with the law had made him hyper aware. And yet, despite that diligence, here he was. If you rebel, the system will find you, he thought. He decided to play along, at least for the moment. He would bait the agent, try to buy time, try to extract information himself that may prove useful later.

  “You know the last time, the last two times y’all messed with Alex, it didn’t end well for you. What makes you think it’s gonna be different this time?”

  “You are referring to Alex Luthecker. As I told you, we have no interest in him. He’s free to go about his business. But Ms. Ellis, we need to speak with her.”

  “It didn’t work out for the guy who tried that angle either.”

  “She’s going to want to talk to us.”

  “About?”

  “National security issues. You tell us where to find her, you and the refugees are free to go.”

  Now the agent was baiting Yaw.

  Yaw would give the man nothing. “I don’t know where she is. And the one thing I have confidence in is my friends. So do what you have to. ‘Cause you’re right—in the system, I will survive. And Joey’s been training. He’s tougher than he looks. So if you’re gonna kill me, go on and do it now. I ain’t afraid.”

  “We’re going to deport her, your Russian friend,” the man in the crisp navy suit said to Chris. “And you’ll never see her again.”

  “She has papers.”

  “ICE has full power now to deport anyone at any time, for any reason. Papers don’t matter anymore.”

  “Masha can take care of herself. She’s done it all her life. What are you charging me with?”

  Chris instinctively pulled against the handcuff that chained him against the steel table. He wanted nothing more than to put his hands around the Coalition agent’s neck. And regardless of his words, he was very concerned for Masha. Nikki had arranged green card status for Masha, with the help of PHOEBE. Chris hoped that those papers were still valid.

  “We’re not charging you with anything just yet.”

  “That’s because you have nothing. Because I, we, have done nothing illegal.”

  “You were trafficking in illegals.”

  “That’s a lie and you know it. We found those people. They were being sold into slavery, and we were setting them free.”

  “The truth is what we say it is. But there’s a way out for you. Where’s Nicole Ellis?”

  Chris thought it odd that they were asking about Nikki. Still, he showed no reaction.

  “I have no idea.”

  The man leaned in to Chris, motioned him close. “I’m going to level with you. Because we don’t have time, and all of you, well, you’re all acting the same and it’s getting us nowhere. We are not concerned with Alex Luthecker. But we need to find Nikki Ellis. We need her to stop her program PHOEBE. Because it’s wreaking havoc in cyber-systems worldwide, and we need to stop it before it literally starts the apocalypse.”

  17

  Shut Down

  Jeff Billings walked the floor of the refinery checking gauges. He was nearing the end of his shift. It was Thursday night and he was bone tired and ready to go home. He only had his last rounds to do, and then he was off for the next three days. He planned on going fishing with his brother. He couldn’t wait.

  Jeff had worked for Coalition Refineries for over a decade. He worked hard from day one, and his efforts had not gone unnoticed. His career at Coalition Refineries began fresh out of high school where he started as an operator, responsible for the desalter unit, a complex piece of equipment that rids crude oil of natural salts before it enters the next stage of refining. It was a critical step not only for the quality of the product, but also for the life of the machinery.

  Jeff was pulled from floor operations and put on a management track early on. He climbed the ladder fast, adapting well to the administrative life, but he still loved the technical side of the business. Whenever Jeff spoke of the details behind the crude oil refinery process, he spoke of them with pride. Now he was a process engineer manager, responsible for leading the efforts of over twenty operators, as well as overseeing the quality of the product and the maintenance of the facility. If there were any equipment related problems in his sector, it was Jeff’s responsibility to solve them.

  He’d been a P.E.M. of Coalition Refinery #7, the Coalition’s third largest refinery, for the past two years. Located in Louisiana, #7 as it was called, refined over five hundred thousand barrels of crude oil a day. The facility itself was over three hundred acres of pipes, tanks, warehouses, and refinery equipment. It was all computer controlled with state of the art technology, and other than a few minor technical issues, Jeff’s time in management had been a problem-free tenure.

  There had been an enormous spill on the previous manager’s watch, one that had caused considerable environmental damage, and it had cost that man his job. But for Jeff, the disaster had created opportunity. He just had to keep things running smoothly, which, with the upgraded technology, wasn’t too hard.

  Jeff’s end of shift routine was easy. He’d simply check all readouts of his sector, engage in a bit of small talk with his men, and then go home. It was a relatively stress-free job and one that paid well. And he was lucky to have it. The computer systems did most of the work these days, and his crew kept getting smaller and smaller. It was only a matter of time before Jeff’s job would also be automated, and he knew it. But Jeff was in good with the boss, and he had been reassured that his job was safe for the foreseeable future. Jeff had no reason to suspect that today would be different from any other day.

  His first indication that things would be otherwise was a pipe shudder that shook the whole of building seven, followed by the eardrum breaking sound of an alarm.

  Jeff dropped his clipboard and ran toward the control booth.

  “It’s shutting off, all of it,” said Bill Caldwell, one of Jeff’s senior operators.

  Jeff entered the control room and watched as Bill desperately hit buttons on the control board to no effect.

  Both men froze as the building shuddered once again, several pipes throughout the refinery shaking this time, setting off a multitude of alarms.

  “Dear Jesus. Jeff, look at this,” Bob said to his boss.

  Jeff looked to the control panel. There were a dozen display monitors, all showing the
same words: GET OUT. NOW.

  “What the fuck do we do?” Bob said.

  “Get out now, don’t you think? Tell everyone—get out of the building. Do it now,” Jeff said, before sprinting out of the control room and onto the refinery floor.

  The refinery floor was pandemonium. Operators were in a panic as the refinery operations slowly ground to a halt.

  “Everyone out. Get out now,” Jeff screamed as he ran in the opposite direction from the exit.

  Jeff knew what was happening, even if he didn’t know why. Something had gone horribly wrong, something dangerous, and the emergency shutdown of the refinery had been activated.

  He knew what would happen next. The doors would seal shut, trapping the workers inside the building. He had to get to the operations booth above the floor to stop it.

  Jeff ran across the refinery floor and hustled up the steel ladder to the crosswalk that led to the operations booth. When he arrived, all the lights in the facility started going out.

  He scanned over the facility from the higher vantage point, and his eyes went wide when the darkness revealed a small fire at the base of the largest pipe, the pipe responsible for bringing in fresh crude.

  He had less than five minutes before the emergency doors would shut, trapping those left to face a fiery death. Jeff would not let that happen.

  He ran inside the operations control booth, only to find another operator working the controls.

  “What the hell is going on?” he yelled.

  “Everything’s shutting down,” the operator yelled back.

  “Is it the fire?”

  “I can’t say. But the computer systems are dead. They’re not responding to any commands or overrides.”

  “What about backups?”

  “Nothing’s working, Jeff. We’re losing everything.”

  “The doors are closing in less than three minutes. We’ve got to get out.”

  Jeff didn’t need to say it twice.

  Both men hustled out of the operations booth, climbed down the ladder, and sprinted across the refinery floor.

  Jeff could see the large bay doors up ahead. They were beginning to close.

  “Let’s go!” he yelled, as both he and the operator sprinted toward the door as fast as their legs would move.

  Jeff got to the door first and waited for the operator to squeeze through. Jeff immediately followed—the doors ripping through his shirt and deep into his skin because he barely fit through—before the doors closed behind him. He was out.

  Jeff did a quick head count. He sighed in relief as he confirmed all of his men had made it out of the building. The sound of emergency vehicles fast approaching provided a small sense of relief.

  Bill Caldwell approached, his face covered in sweat. “Everyone got out.”

  “Thank God. And the crude?”

  “Contained. No leaks.”

  “What the hell happened, Jeff?”

  Jeff looked over the building. Wisps of black smoke drifted from several vents. “I have no idea.”

  18

  Observation

  “He has located the target,” Ostap Kosylo said into his secure cell phone. The burly Russian stood in the alley between abandoned buildings on Terminal Island.

  It was not the first time the Russian had visited abandoned military towns. Kosylo had once chased enemies all the way to Murmanskaya, a Northern Russian province that housed an abandoned Soviet military base, on the Kolsky peninsula. That base was in far greater disrepair than Terminal Island, where he currently stood. For Kosylo, this operation should be easy.

  “Are you sure?” the Barbarian asked, his voice booming loud enough for Kosylo to cover the phone.

  “Yes I am sure. I saw him in the window.”

  “Is he alone?”

  “No. There is a young girl. Maybe ten years old. She moved to the window. And it was Luthecker who moved her away.”

  Kosylo looked at the small black and white security photo of Alex Luthecker.

  “Who is the girl? Did she see you?” the Barbarian asked.

  “I do not think she saw me. I do not know who she is. They rescue refugees. She is perhaps one of them. Do you want me to go in and get him?” Kosylo prompted.

  “No. We want Luthecker’s cooperation, and that cannot happen if we appear to threaten the child in any way. Continue to observe. Find out who else is with him. But stay with Luthecker. Report back to me with any movements. We want to avoid the appearance of hostility. We want him alone before we approach him,” the Barbarian answered.

  The line went dead before Kosylo could respond.

  “She’s the girl from Mexico, isn’t she?” Kirby asked, in reference to ten-year-old Maria. The young girl’s gaze had spooked Kirby.

  “She’s not your concern,” Alex answered. He nodded at Nikki, and Nikki ushered Maria out of the room.

  Kirby turned back to Alex with fascination. “You’re a hard man to find.”

  “Well you’ve found me. Now what do you want?”

  “Did you anticipate this meeting? Was it inevitable in your mind? Is that why you let me in? Do you see patterns simultaneously in the macro and micro scale?”

  Alex didn’t answer.

  Kirby took a deep breath to calm his nerves. He was rattling off questions, and he could feel himself starting to sweat. “Of course you anticipated this. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have opened the door. When you look at me, what do you see?”

  Alex examined Kirby for several seconds, his eyes moving over the scientist’s every nuance with ravenous intent.

  In Kirby, Alex saw both opportunity and threat. The scientist had a heightened awareness of Alex’s abilities. Unlike the self-affirming ideologies that former Coalition CEOs Richard Brown and James Howe possessed, Kirby used that heightened awareness with adherence to the self-correcting nature of scientific principle. This masked his true intent.

  In other words, despite having rigid goals, Kirby was willing to learn new things. On one hand, for Alex, that made Kirby a bit of a tougher read. On the other, it made Kirby more amicable to change.

  “That was incredible what you just did with your eyes. Is that a conscious act, or is it reflexive?”

  “A better question would be is it trained or untrained.”

  “I think I already know the answer to that.”

  “I’ll ask you one more time. What do you want from me?”

  “You couldn’t get that information? From reading me?”

  “I find that personal narrative provides additional insight.”

  “So you’re doing this old school. Like a lawyer. I was hoping we could avoid all that psychological chess.”

  “You made the first move by attempting to test me.”

  “Fair enough. I apologize for the cheap shot. I’ll get right to it. You probably already know from your own large-scale pattern recognition and your five minutes examining me why I’m here. The next great extinction is upon us. My first question to you is whether or not that fact is irreparable.”

  “Too many variables for a clear pattern to emerge.”

  “So even you have limits.”

  “I’m only human.”

  “Then what does your gut tell you? Or is there a place in your calculus for trusting instincts considering your ability to recognize patterns?”

  “My instincts tell me that every person matters.”

  “That’s very Buddhist of you and perhaps reassuring to those who don’t like to look at the big picture. But I think you’re holding out. The patterns I can measure say it’s a near certainty, so unfortunately I don’t have time for the psychological tit-for-tat with you. I sincerely want to do everything I can to stop our species from going extinct, and to do that, I believe that I need your help. And I have faith that you see that sincerity in me.”

  “You work for the Coalition.”

  “Yes I do.”

  “The momentum of their efforts and the ideologies that are behind their actions are a root cause in m
uch of what you seek to stop.”

  “I know. It’s a very old ideology, the one where people believe in their superiority over others in order to justify enslavement for profit and empire. It’s very hard to unseat once it’s established itself. But I believe we can work around it.”

  “I believe differently than you.”

  “I don’t have your gifts of insight. I just do what I have to in order to accomplish what I need to in the world I live in now. Look, the Coalition is a compensation scheme for a handful of greedy men, like any other large-scale corporate structure these days. Money and power are their only goals and therefore their biggest weaknesses. And right now, they have assets I need to accomplish my goals. It’s that simple.”

  “And you think that by knowing all this, you can outmaneuver them. And somewhere in your mind, your ego wants to see if you can outmaneuver me as well. You think only you can accomplish what you seek, and to you, what you seek is all that matters.”

  “Isn’t that everybody on some level? And I’m not trying to outmaneuver anyone. Look, I’m not hiding anything. Read both my fate and intentions if you want. I’m not afraid to reveal myself to you. I’m one hundred percent sincere to my goal, and I have no choice but to play the hand that I’ve been dealt. If turning you in to the Coalition helped me reach my goal, I’d do it, but I don’t believe that’s the case. Maybe that’s what you’re reading when you look at me.”

  “You confuse belief with truth.”

  “And the truth is in the eyes of the beholder. Just look at religion and how it’s twisted to propagate outright lies. People want to believe in something more than they want to know the real truth about themselves or the world that they create. Isn’t that exactly what you force them to face?”

  “People want to be heard.”

  “Enough with the Yoda crap. There are scientific explanations behind your abilities, and I know what they are. I know exactly where you come from and why you have your unique abilities. If you help me, I’ll help you.”