by Marcus Sakey
As Aaron stepped into the room, John had grabbed the sink and yanked. The metal feet grumbled across the concrete, revealing a hole in the wall about two feet square. Without a word, John had stuck his head in and started wriggling his way forward. For a moment Hawk had just stared, hoping John was going after weapons, but the shadow swallowed more and more of Smith’s body until he was gone.
Hawk had taken a deep breath and followed.
The first few feet were just the space behind the wall, but then they hit a ring of concrete, and beyond that, hard-packed dirt. He wasn’t normally claustrophobic, but the space was tight enough that his shoulders touched on both sides as he squirmed diagonally downward. With every forward inch, the darkness grew more complete, until there was nothing but the sound of his breath and cold dirt and the silky panic of spiderwebs brushing his face. In that womb-dark all he could think about was the weight above him. His imagination painted a picture of all that earth, the tonnage of soil and cement and building and street. What would happen if he got stuck? Would someone come to save him? In the chaos, maybe he’d be forgotten, trapped here, buried alive. Panic twisted in his belly, a blind and toothy worm, like the worms moving through the dirt around them, and who knew what kind of pale, crawling nightmare lived down here—
Don’t you quit in front of John. Don’t you dare, you pussy.
Slowly the tunnel leveled out. He kept moving, his breath fast and humid. He really needed to pee. After an eternity, John’s voice drifted back. “Here we are.” There was a metal-on-metal squeal, and then a ringing thud, and a burst of light ahead.
Pulling himself out of the tunnel felt like being born again. He panted, bent over, hands on his knees until he trusted himself enough to straighten.
They were in a long hallway lit by widely spaced bulbs. The ceiling was about eight feet high, but the top third was crammed with a dense lattice of wire that forced them both to stoop. John fit a metal panel back into the wall to conceal the hole they’d just come through, glanced both ways, then started moving. “Come on.”
“What is this place?”
“Maintenance shaft. Tesla was planned and executed as a whole, so the first thing the engineers dug was an infrastructure support system.” John put a hand up, traced the cables above. “All the data in the city runs through these lines.”
“Where are we going?”
“Out. The nearest access hub is a quarter mile up. There’s a truck parked nearby.”
“A truck?” Hawk straightened, banged his head on a metal brace, winced. “You knew they were coming?”
“You think we’d have been there if I knew?” John glanced over his shoulder. “The truck has been parked there for two years. That’s how you win, Hawk. Never focus everything on just one route to attaining your goal. Develop as many contingencies as possible. Like you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Most options never get used. But if you have them at the right moment, you can change defeat into victory. Like turning a pawn into a queen.”
Hawk tried to imagine the effort that had gone into just this escape route. Locating the exact spot in the maintenance passage. Digging the tunnel. Hauling away the dirt. Dodging maintenance engineers. Buying the truck, finding a place to park it where it could sit for years, checking it regularly to make sure that the battery hadn’t died and the tires hadn’t gone flat. A huge amount of effort, and all just in case someday, someone attacked your home—oh.
“Wait.” He froze. “What about the others?”
Ahead of him, John stopped. He sighed, rubbed at his face. Then he turned and came back. “These are bad people we’re playing against, Hawk.”
“Are they—will they be—”
“I don’t know.” John put a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know.”
“Sensei Yamato. And Ms. Herr, and—oh my God. Tabitha. What about Tabitha?”
John cocked his head. “Were you and she . . .”
“No. I mean. No. Will she be okay?”
“Probably. As long as she doesn’t do anything stupid. And Tabitha isn’t stupid.” John paused. Hawk could see that he was weighing something.
Finally, he said, “I need to tell you something, Hawk. Something important.”
At this distance, the explosions sounded like firecrackers, but Shannon recognized them for what they were. Breaching charges. The assault had begun. Seconds later, there were more firecrackers, fainter and faster, and she recognized those too.
You should be there. The Wardens are good, but John is better. If you were there, you could shift, scout, make sure that Cooper didn’t walk into an ambush.
There was nothing for it now but to wait. Wait, and hope that Cooper knew what he was doing.
Waiting was frequently part of her job, and sometimes she’d even enjoyed it. Her ability to move unseen meant that very often she was someplace she absolutely shouldn’t be, a place where one wrong move could kill her. To be honest, she enjoyed that too. Everything was brighter when it was at risk. The colors more vivid, the air sweeter.
This time, though. Lately, though. All the fun had been going out of it. What she’d once considered the great big adventure that was her life had soured. Turned grim. The decline had started with the explosion at the stock exchange this spring, when Cooper had stopped her before she could prevent it. He hadn’t known what she was doing, of course, and in truth, she doubted she could have succeeded anyway. A thousand innocent people had died that day, and many more had died since.
And if this goes pear shaped, a lot more will join them. So pay attention.
She’d never spent any time in this part of Tesla; it was all warehouses and distribution centers. There were a surprising number of civilian cars, which struck her as strange until she remembered the New Sons of Liberty. As the militia pushed forward, a huge percentage of the Holdfast population was falling back to the safety of the Vogler Ring. Tesla must be full to bursting, every hotel room booked. People would end up sleeping in gymnasiums and churches.
This side street, though, was largely deserted. Few cars, no foot traffic. She stayed out of sight anyway, her mind processing every witness, the trucker a hundred yards away watching as a team unloaded his semi, the cameras mounted on every corner—nothing she could do about those—the electric car turning down the block, the drab metal hut with a sign on the door that read, MAINT TRUNK HUB N4W7—
A door that was swinging open.
Shannon put all her focus on it, subconsciously plotting the vectors of sight, the increasing angle of the door, the human eye’s tendency to dart rather than scan, the blind spot created by the parked truck that was actually a danger zone because it would draw attention, the change of light from inside the hut to the sunny Wyoming afternoon, and confirmed that she was in the best position given what she could see now. She sent up a silent prayer that Cooper had been right, and more important, that he was okay.
Two figures stepped out. The first paused to look around, a careful, professional gaze, but she read the intentions and the directions and shifted right around it.
John Smith. Her onetime leader, her onetime friend. Behind him was a kid she didn’t recognize, thin and tall given his age. They were both filthy, clothes smudged brown, cobwebs in their hair. The boy had the clenched-leg gait of someone who really needed to pee.
Shannon stepped from the shadows of the loading dock, shouldered the shotgun, and said in a loud, clear voice, “Don’t move.”
The kid jumped, and she could see that at least some of his bladder problem had been resolved.
John, on the other hand, only stared. They were separated by fifteen feet, and she could see he was deciding whether to run.
“Don’t.” She stared down the barrel. Her finger had pressure on the trigger.
“Shannon. Of course.”
“Put your hands on your head, take two steps forward, and drop to your knees.”
“Okay.” John laced his fingers behind his head. In a conversation
al tone, he said, “Run, Hawk.”
“Don’t move!”
“Run.”
The kid hesitated for a second, and then spun on his heel.
She couldn’t miss at this distance. But did she want to take the shot? It would mean murdering a fleeing teenager.
More than that. It means shifting your aim from John. How many people have died because they took their eyes off him for a fraction of a second?
The boy started back into the hut. She let him go. Without releasing pressure on the trigger, she circled to put John between her and the doorway in case the kid came back with a weapon. “Another of your holy warriors?”
“Hawk? He’s a friend.”
“You don’t have friends.”
“That’s not true.” His voice was mild. “What about you?”
“Last time we spoke, another of your teenage suicide bombers was about to blow me up. Along with a trainful of civilians.”
“It wasn’t personal, you know that.” He smiled wryly. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance we could talk about this?”
“Sure there is,” she said. “As soon as you take two steps forward and hit your knees.”
Cooper hauled the wheel sideways without letting up on the gas, and the truck slewed and rocked. Almost there.
The moment it had been confirmed that Smith wasn’t in the warehouse, Cooper had sprinted outside. As he’d ordered, a Warden was waiting in an SUV, the engine running. The commando hadn’t seemed too happy to be kicked out of the vehicle, but one look at Cooper’s face and he’d done as he was told.
There wasn’t really any need to go this fast, but Shannon was out here alone, and that scared him, scared him more than he had expected. She was one of the most capable people he’d ever met, but so was John Smith, and Cooper’s imagination was conjuring all kinds of unwanted ugliness.
Be okay, Shannon. If it comes down to you or him, please choose right.
He spun around the last corner, hoping for the best and fearing—well, everything.
Then he saw her, his Girl Who Walked Through Walls. Silhouetted against a burning sky with a shotgun braced on her shoulder and John Smith kneeling at her feet. His heart howled with joy. He screeched to a stop, snatched the assault rifle off the passenger seat, and climbed out to lock in a second line of fire.
The man Cooper had chased for most of a decade squinted up at him. “Hello, Nick.”
“John. Game over.”
“Looks like. Well played.” Smith was trying for cool, but Cooper could see the tremble in his hands. “Mind if I smoke?”
“Why not? Gently.”
The terrorist reached into his pocket very slowly. Cooper watched, ready to fire at the first hint of danger, but all Smith withdrew was a crumpled pack. He took one, lit it, inhaled deep. “How did you know?”
“I’ve been chasing you half my adult life, man. I’ve got you patterned. It’s all options and fail-safes with you. As soon as I saw that fifty yards away there was a maintenance passage that didn’t connect to the warehouse, I knew.”
“That’s funny. I purposefully didn’t buy a warehouse above the passage for that reason, and it’s what tipped you off. So now what?”
“Finish your cigarette.”
“Hmm.” Smith smiled. “It’s like that, huh?”
“After all the blood you’ve spilled? Yeah.”
“Only way to build a new world. Gotta burn the old one down. History is written in fire.” He took a long drag at his cigarette, then looked at Shannon. “You’re okay with this?”
“You once told me,” Shannon said, “to decide who I really care about. I have.”
A ghost of a smile flitted across Smith’s lips. “Good for you.” He turned to Cooper. “You’re a lucky man.”
“I know.” The moment had a surreal heft to it. So much of life slipped by like a breeze: sweet, brief, gone. This would linger, the impressions sharper than the details. Pale light from a white sky. Attenuated shadows. The smell of gun oil. The smear of dirt on Smith’s cheek. The cigarette in the hinge of his fingers, the crackle of tobacco as he took a final drag, then grimaced and flicked it away.
“Want another?”
“No. Thanks.” Smith inhaled a short, fast breath and rolled his shoulders. “You should know. Killing me isn’t the same as beating me.”
Cooper said, “It’s a step in the right direction.”
Then he pressed the trigger and blew three holes through John Smith’s heart.
The report echoed out across the plain to the distant mountains beyond. A bird startled from a nearby roof with a screech. A few blocks down, a trucker flung himself to the ground.
John Smith blinked. His head drooped as he looked at the wound. For a moment, his muscles held him in place, wobbling.
He fell over.
“Target located,” Cooper said, triggering his earpiece. “Come get him. Bring a body bag.”
Then he lowered the weapon and stared across the corpse at one of the women he loved. She stared back.
Neither spoke.
Not with words, anyway.
CHAPTER 27
Cooper didn’t know what to feel.
Killing Smith had been the best option. Sure, he could have captured him, tried to interrogate him, but the man had been the game player. They wouldn’t have been able to believe a word he said, couldn’t have trusted any cage to hold him. Ending him was the safe, sane tactical decision.
It wasn’t that he had regrets. There was no cop-who-came-to-understand-the-criminal RKO Pictures vibe, no sense that they could have been friends under other circumstances, no reluctant respect for John Smith. The man had had options, same as anybody, and the choices he’d made had left the world a darker place.
But still, there was a strange void in Cooper. He wasn’t overjoyed, didn’t feel victorious. And maybe it was just that. After years of fighting Smith, some part of him had expected more out of the moment. Like after he pulled the trigger the music should have swelled and the credits rolled.
In the absence of emotional or philosophical clarity, though, there was always the job. The same job as always, he’d joked with Quinn more than once: saving the world.
He imagined Bobby responding, saying, Yeah? How’s that going?
Same as always, Bobby.
“Huh?” Shannon looked over at him; evidently, he’d spoken aloud.
“Nothing.” Cooper realized he’d been staring blankly out the windshield. He turned the key and the SUV started with a rumble. A quick three-point turn, and the scene was behind them, a team of Wardens zipping John Smith’s corpse into a body bag.
He glanced sideways, saw Shannon glancing in her side mirror. She was a slight woman, but looked especially so now, her shoulders tucked in, something in her diminished. Before he could decide if it was a good idea, Cooper reached across the space between them and touched her hand. For a moment, she hesitated, then laced her fingers in his.
The roads were packed, the sounds muted by bulletproof glass. He steered one-handed for a few silent blocks. Finally, he said, “Are you okay?”
She seemed to consider the question. “Yeah.”
“I know he was your friend.”
“Yes,” she said. “He was.” She looked like she was going to add more, but decided against it. “I heard about Quinn. I’m sorry.”
He nodded.
“You want to talk about it?”
“Maybe later.”
The street outside the warehouse had been transformed into a confusion of vehicles, the trucks they’d arrived in, plus Holdfast security vehicles with lights spinning, ambulances, prisoner transfer vans, all surrounded by a ring of gawkers. Cooper steered through the crowd and parked by the door. When he turned off the ignition, he could hear the ticking of the engine and the soft sounds of her breath.
He looked over, found her looking back. Her expression was complicated. He imagined his was too. They held the gaze. There was a moment when they could both lunge in, h
ands and lips and skin finding each other. Then it passed, and they were still sitting there.
“I should go check on Ethan,” Cooper said.
She nodded.
He started to get out, paused, looked back. “Do you want to come?”
After-action, and the warehouse had that surreal filter that battle overlaid on the normal. Normal drywall, apart from the bullet holes; normal rooms, apart from the blood spray. The Wardens had cleared the building, found the last stragglers hiding in closets and cupboards. Most had surrendered and were awaiting transport, their arms and legs flex-tied, their eyes filled with hate and shock. Those who had fought back waited considerably more peacefully.
Cooper and Shannon walked to the lab in silence, found it busy with people in white coats. He asked one of them where to find Ethan, and she jerked a thumb over her shoulder without looking up from her terminal.
The door she pointed to led to what once might have been a supply closet. Ethan was standing in it, his back to them, facing a cage. It was made of metal lattice, seamless and strong. There was a man inside.
Strike that.
There was a body inside. It was so badly mangled that it took Cooper a moment to catalog details—he was white, older, thin. His flesh had been torn in a hundred places, some shallow red scratches, others deep gashes with pale flesh bulging through. His eye sockets were ragged and ruined. Cooper had seen him before, a few days ago, on the streets of Manhattan. Dr. Abraham Couzen.
Ethan didn’t turn, but Cooper could tell by the tightening of his shoulder muscles and a quiver in his throat that the scientist knew they were there. Cooper auditioned a dozen statements, then another dozen, but couldn’t find anything that sounded even remotely helpful.
“I’d say rest in peace”—Ethan’s voice sounded flat—“only Abe believed the afterlife was a lie idiots told to make it past breakfast without killing themselves.”
