by Sean Platt
Nathan watched Meyer’s face. It wore a totally banal, matter-of-fact expression.
“As we know you have surmised, extracting the fugitive Piper Dempsey was exactly what we wished for you to do.”
“You’re welcome.”
“It was, however, unexpected. The plan was to ferry Dempsey out of the city. Your intervention was helpful, though not anticipated. But you did not know of our plan. You believed you were acting against, not for us.”
“I heard you didn’t speak,” Nathan said.
“Viceroy Dempsey speaks.”
“Is he still in there, or have you completely taken him over?”
“Details of the surrogate process are irrelevant. How do you answer the charge?”
Jesus. It was such a formal, stilted way of speaking. Nathan found himself fascinated. Dempsey knew English, so apparently that allowed Divinity to speak the language through him. But the syntax and diction was nothing like it had been a moment ago.
“I was provoked. You struck first.”
“There was no strike against the Andreus Republic,” said Puppet Dempsey.
“Against the rebel camp outside of Moab.”
“That did not concern you.”
“My wife was there. My daughter was there.”
“This was not known to us.”
Andreus felt his jaw work. “I don’t believe you.”
“Belief is irrelevant. It was a counterstrike meant to eradicate a threat.”
“A threat you allowed to survive for two years.”
“It became a threat.”
“And that just so happened to occur after I helped Cameron Bannister cross to Heaven’s Veil.”
“Also our intention. And also, a betrayal you made of us, without knowing it was our intention.”
Dempsey stood still, waiting, accusation in those not-quite-his eyes.
“My wife was killed. By you.”
“We have come to comprehend human attachment. There was one surviving member of your party. She was watched by one of our droids, and when the Moab facility was destroyed, she was spared as a gesture.”
For some reason, that made Nathan’s blood want to boil. Grace was safe. But what? Was she a cookie earned for a job well done?
“What do you want me to do?” Nathan asked. Not as a request for command, but as an expression of futility. Dempsey — or Divinity — seemed nevertheless to take it as the former.
“Command the outlands. They are your domain. The only way for us to truly control your population is to enslave it, as we may soon need to rule Heaven’s Veil if the fugitives are not found. We do not wish this. You must be controlled for your own good. But it should be by your own, as your society understands.”
“You’re saying you need me.”
“We do not wish to patrol the outlands. Our domain comprises the capitals and select cities. We do not wish to destroy human command structures.”
“You don’t want to micromanage us,” Nathan said.
“If you wish.”
“Why me then? Why the traitor?” Part of Nathan wanted to rebel, to take it back and play nice. The whole reason he’d done this was to get his audience, then lie down and roll over. But now that he was here, being pandered to, being commanded, being treated like a child, his instinct rebelled.
Remember what you came for.
“You have an established power structure. If we must replace you, we will, but we believe you want what we are not equipped to desire.”
“What is that?”
“Power.”
Nathan stopped. He felt the need to sit, and did. Something Dempsey had just said was clanging in his head, refusing to settle.
“I have an established power structure.”
“Yes.”
“The Republic. You didn’t destroy it.”
“Your actions at the Cottonwood outpost were not anticipated. An error was made.”
“Oh, it wasn’t an error,” Nathan said. But something about the surrogate’s voice told Nathan that the error referred to wasn’t the rebels’ mistake.
“Harm was caused. We do not wish to continue along this path. It is not ideal. You can be controlled, and — ”
“I can ‘be controlled,’ huh?”
“Your position harmonizes with checks we are easily able to make.”
“Which controls?”
“If you do not wish to comply, your outposts may yet be destroyed. Easily. And your daughter’s position is still known to us.”
Nathan bolted to his feet. He almost punched Dempsey out before realizing it would solve nothing.
“I knew it. You kept following us. You kept watch. Because that’s how you treat your ‘human partners.’ And that shadow thing. So that was real. You sent it to watch us.”
A strange thing happened. Dempsey’s brow wrinkled. Nathan again found himself fascinated. It was somehow working through Dempsey’s actual person, not just moving him as if on strings. How would Divinity wrinkle a brow when confused? It was a human reaction, known only by a human body.
“You were watched from above.”
Nathan let it go.
Apparently, you don’t know everything after all.
CHAPTER 46
Dempsey/Divinity laid out the proposal. It was simple: Nathan would resume his duties as warlord of the roads and lands surrounding Heaven’s Veil. He was in charge of Salt Lake City and dozens of smaller outposts. He would, as before, be considered autonomous. He wouldn’t need to check in. He would be supplied with fuel, and the Astrals would stay out of his way. He would maintain order, exactly as he’d always done, with his past transgressions forgiven so long as everyone agreed that getting back onto the same old rails was a good idea.
And really, it was a good deal. Nathan would be entirely absolved of any responsibility for his previous actions. No harm, no foul. All had worked out as it should, and Nathan Andreus was still the best choice for the job. It was the epitome of a logical, non-emotional decision. A human would have wanted to punish Nathan. But the Astrals, who saw larger and further, knew it was cutting off the nose to spite the face.
It was a good deal right up to the point where Nathan considered the “check” the surrogate had mentioned.
Of course Nathan would do the job. He’d requested this audience, and he’d betrayed his supposed cohorts to do it. He’d helped the Astrals, even though they’d botched the handoff by allowing Bannister’s escape. He still wanted the same things, and it was always — even now — better to live atop the hill rather than under another’s heel.
But (and this was irrelevant, considering that Nathan wanted to comply for other reasons) there was the small matter of the check.
The small matter of the gun that would perpetually be held to the back of Nathan’s head to ensure that he’d be good, just in case.
If he didn’t do as he was asked, it was simple to kill his daughter.
As much as Nathan wanted to blame the Astrals for Julie’s death, he believed what Divinity had said. It was an accident. But either way, the aliens had killed her. And that death had given them an important piece of information to consume and assimilate: that for Nathan Andreus, the most effective lever was his family’s blood.
“Is that all?” he asked, his hands wanting to form fists.
“Do you agree to retake your post?”
“Yes.”
“We have sent a shuttle to face your people outside the city. No harm befell them. Pattern matching has shown that one is your lieutenant, as known, Jeanine Coffey. The other, also as known, is your daughter. The third is Benjamin Bannister’s partner, Charles Cook. They will be allowed to live. As will all Andreus outposts.”
“What about Cameron and Piper?”
“Not relevant to your concerns.”
“And the Apex? If you find what you want in the Apex?”
“Not relevant to your concerns.”
“Benjamin Bannister believed it was a weapon.”
“Not
relevant.”
“Bullshit!” Nathan felt his blood chilling, his voice rising, knowing he’d trapped himself in a snare. “If you set off a weapon, the whole, you won’t kill me and my people agreement falls apart.”
“No harm will befall you.”
“And my people?”
“The agreement will be honored.”
Nathan’s jaw worked, sliding side to side. He watched the surrogate through slits. He still wanted to punch it. To cause harm. But there was nothing to do. Nothing to do but …
Something popped to mind.
“You’re honorable beings, aren’t you?” Nathan said.
“We do not have that concept.”
“But you do as you say.”
“Yes.”
“Including your agreements with Dempsey. To protect his people, too.”
“Yes.”
Again, Nathan’s jaw slid to the side, as if searching for his tongue.
“Does he know about his son?”
Something in the surrogate’s face changed instantly. No delay. For a moment, Meyer Dempsey was back, and Divinity was gone. Then it changed again, and Andreus found himself facing the surrogate.
But something must have remained because the surrogate’s fist clenched once, twice, three times. In Meyer Dempsey’s voice — not the identical but tonally distinct voice of Divinity — the man in front of Nathan said, “I’m supposed to ask you about Trevor.”
CHAPTER 47
Jeanine Coffey woke and saw that the sun wasn’t yet over the horizon. The networks still seemed to be entirely down, but there was a small clock on the RV’s dashboard that, she guessed, was keeping approximately correct time.
Not that the time of day mattered much anymore, but it appeared to be 6:13 a.m.
She yawned then poured some of the water Nathan had packed into a coffeemaker and set a pot to brewing. It was using water and power from the batteries. That power, courtesy of the sun, was plentiful and free. As to the water? Fuck it. There were so many more interesting ways to die than thirst, and last night necessitated a strong wake-up this morning.
She peeked in on Grace — a bundle of blankets at the rear. Her own bunk was at the front, and (obvious jokes aside) she’d been sharing it with Nathan, keeping two separate sets of sheets. But last night, she’d had it all to herself.
It wasn’t until the coffee was halfway brewed when Jeanine realized the final member of their party was missing. Charlie had been on the fold-out couch in the RV’s middle, but now it was tidily away, sheets folded into neat squares and sitting on a small shelf along the window.
The window.
She looked through the glass. They were behind some trees, but their hiding place was fooling no one. The way Nathan figured, the Astrals knew exactly where they were and had from the start. It wasn’t line-of-sight cover keeping them alive.
“It’s not in there.”
Jeanine jumped. If she’d been holding a knife, she’d have stabbed someone with it purely out of shock. And if she’d been holding a gun, Charlie Cook would probably have been turned to paste.
Instead, he remained where he’d greeted her: in an alcove near the bathroom. Just standing there. Possibly, he’d recently emerged after having washed his hands, or maybe he’d stood there all night waiting to scare the shit out of her.
“Don’t you ever say good morning?”
“Good morning,” Charlie said. “It’s not there.”
“Care to give me some context?”
“I’ve been looking through Benjamin’s research. The longer I piece it together, the more obvious the conclusion: Thor’s Hammer, at least according to Benjamin, is not in Vail.”
Jeanine let her shoulders relax. She turned away and watched the coffee brew. Looking into Charlie’s eyes was creepy; so was looking in his general direction. He wasn’t lecherous; she was reasonably sure he wouldn’t know what to do with a woman if she wrapped herself around him naked. He was just … there.
But the coffee wasn’t finished. She resisted the urge to flick the pot, hurrying it up.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard you.”
“Are you going to do anything about it?”
Jeanine sighed. She turned, steeling herself for his gaze. Charlie had a way of making her (and, surely, everyone) feel stupid for not knowing things they had no way of knowing and never would.
“First of all, what makes you so sure?”
“Benjamin.”
Jeanine put her tongue under her lip, assessing him.
“Go on.”
“Benjamin makes me sure,” Charlie repeated.
“Let’s play a game, Charlie.”
“No.”
“Let’s pretend you’re a normal human being, on the same side as me. And as part of that game, let’s suppose you want me to understand what you’re saying rather than this intellectual one-upmanship wherein you get to win the knowledge war but nothing is learned or accomplished.”
“I do want you to understand.”
“Okay. Then just tell me. No one-word answers. No assumptions of things I should know, followed by eye rolls when I don’t. Just fucking tell me, okay?”
Now it was Charlie’s turn to look pensive. This had to be hard for him. And, she thought, he must have barely slept. The bed had been out last night; he’d definitely used it. But it was early, and he’d clearly been up for hours. His collared shirt, buttoned to the top, looked almost pressed, as if he’d decided it was worth ironing.
“Cameron didn’t know where to begin when he was looking through Benjamin’s files. He didn’t understand Benjamin’s organizational system.”
“But you do,” Jeanine said.
“Yes. In that he didn’t have one. He saved anything he was working on to his desktop, and then when it got too cluttered, he made a folder and dumped everything into it. Some of the techs who worked with his stuff tried to get him to make bookmarks lists, to put things in logical places so they could make sense of it. He’d try for an hour then go back to his old way.”
“So?”
“Cameron was just searching. First, he tried looking for words in documents, and what led us here was sorting by file dates, to see what Benjamin was working on last. We can’t ask him why he was so interested in the Apex near the end, but seeing as we were all focused on finding the key and Thor’s Hammer, it seemed a safe bet. Ditto that there are some Thor’s Hammer notes in that chain, but that was just Benjamin hopping around.”
“Do you miss him, Charlie?”
“Do you miss Nathan?”
“Nathan isn’t dead.”
Charlie’s lips formed an ultra-rare, slightly bitter smile. “Next time I see him, maybe he will be.”
Jeanine decided to let it go. She’d started the diversion; maybe she could bring it back on track. Nathan wasn’t around right now. She thought she knew where his motives lay, but the man wasn’t always an open book and resented explaining himself.
“I still don’t see what makes you so sure Thor’s Hammer isn’t at Vail.”
“Because I find it unlikely that it would be so coincidental. The Hammer mentions in Benjamin’s file history lift right out. They don’t overlap with the Apex research at all.”
Jeanine shook her head. “I feel like I’m missing something.”
“He was researching the Apex for a totally different reason. So if Thor’s Hammer is there too, it would be a coincidence.”
“What makes you so sure he wasn’t — ”
Charlie’s voice slipped into its usual impatience. “We’ve already seen that things are changing out there. There was a surge of some sort last night, and its pulse rate, at least according to Piper, has increased. Benjamin seemed to think it was pushing out some sort of a beacon, or at least preparing to do so. We saw that grid it’s projecting among the monoliths — another tidy coincidence. Between what I’m seeing here,” he pointed toward the small built-in table, where Jeanine now saw Charlie’s laptop, “and w
hat we’ve seen, it’s clear that they’re ‘powering up’ in some way, and it has something to do with the Apex. So you tell me. As a matter of deduction, does it seem coincidental that Benjamin would have been spending all his time investigating power use in these Apex structures for its own right … and just so happen to also have been thinking that the Vail Apex is the resting place of Thor’s Hammer?”
“But Cameron — ”
“Cameron isn’t a scientist.”
“He said Benjamin told him where it was.”
“He said Benjamin told Cameron that he, Cameron, already knew where it was,” Charlie corrected.
“But if he assumed Cameron would know — ”
“Benjamin was a good man but an idiot as a scientist. He didn’t organize his research. He didn’t document his findings properly. He didn’t take enough notes. Half of the notes he did take were dictated emails sent to himself. But he never went through them to clean the dictation. A lot are undecipherable. He dragged Cameron all over the world. I was there for some of it. The kid was fascinated 10 percent of the time, bored to death the other 90. To Benjamin, those trips were the ultimate bonding experience because he assumed Cameron shared his interests, even when he clearly didn’t. He was always quizzing him. When Cameron didn’t know the answers to the obscure archaeology or ancient aliens theories Benjamin asked about, he rolled his eyes and goaded him. The man was a good friend, but a total narcissist in his own way. If he’d been sensible, he’d have talked to Cameron. It would have been simple. But instead, it was a game to him. Something obvious.”
“So you’re saying — ”
“Benjamin clearly assumed the Hammer’s location should be obvious to Cameron. And in retrospect, it might turn out to be, but for now it clearly wasn’t as important a memory to Cameron as it was to Benjamin. But it’s not in Vail. That’s not enough of a hilarious ‘obvious joke’ to be the answer. I’m sure he was quizzing Cameron all over. Recalling some ‘joke’ Benjamin assumed was between them. But until Astral Day, our lab had no interest in Vail. The only way Benjamin took Cameron there in the past was to ski.”
Jeanine watched Charlie, wanting to disagree on principle. There was no upside to what he was saying: They’d sent Cameron and Piper in with the key, and Nathan (whose allegiance Jeanine still wasn’t sure of) was in the city now. They were vested in Vail, and she wanted to argue and make him wrong. But his words rang true, and he’d known Benjamin best.
