“Hawke’s not there!”
“What?” Quinn says. “He must be.”
I check again. It’s just the secret service agents, seven in total. Unless Hawke is still inside the car, and I can’t see why he would be. Then the occupants of the van hop out.
“Uh-oh,” I say.
“What?” Evyan asks.
“Robin,” I say, eyeing the three figures lugging cameras and lighting equipment. “They’ve brought their own filming team.”
“Damn,” he says.
One of the crew begins mounting a large satellite dish on the roof of the van. They’re obviously going to be doing the live transmission from here, via their own team. I should have anticipated this. Of course Hawke and Roth wouldn’t allow public media contingents at the headquarters of their precious games and secret agenda. They’d want to keep control of what gets filmed and released to the public.
“We’ll just have to wing it,” Robin says, drawing Evyan aside so they can rethink their director-and-camera-operator plan.
At least the presence of the film team must mean that Hawke is still expected. As they set up their tripods, cameras and lighting reflectors at the foot of the stairs to PlayState’s main entrance, Sofia has another crack at the guards. They’ve lost interest in the convoy now that it’s clear the president isn’t among them and have drifted back to the gate.
“Oh no, they’re going to melt,” Sofia says, looking down at her basket of soft-centered chocolates and jelly eye-bites. “What a waste. Sure you won’t have some?”
Big-Belly edges over. He definitely looks tempted.
“Why don’t you want it?” Rat-Face asks, narrowing her eyes at Sofia.
“Oh, we’ve got loads back in the car.” Sofia gives her a bright, innocent smile.
“Excuse us for trying to be kind to our folks in uniform,” I snap. “I thought we were supposed to support our servicemen and thank our troops and all that.”
Big-Belly perks up at this, clearly flattered at being included in the ranks of the armed forces. I can see his reluctance crumbling, and he’s actually taken a step toward Sofia when another distraction snags his attention.
Sofia groans softly in frustration and rests her forehead against the bars of the gate, staring down at the dirt. But my eyes are focused on the sky, my ears attuned to the whup-whup-whup of an approaching helicopter.
“Helipad,” Cameron murmurs beside me.
I follow his pointing finger and see for the first time that there’s a helipad located to the left of the PlayState building. The film crew swing their cameras, one toward the sky, one toward the helipad. The two gate guards wander a little way down the drive, the better to catch sight of the president’s arrival. Their backs are to us. Everyone’s attention is diverted by the impending arrival of the VIP.
The helicopter appears — a glinting flash of blue above the tops of the distant line of trees. I’m guessing that even in the security room inside PlayState, all the officers will be watching the monitors showing the feed from the cameras trained on the helipad.
This is the perfect moment.
Chapter 36
Passed out
The helicopter begins its noisy descent, whipping up swirls of dust beneath it. Hiding behind Quinn, I lift my cloak and extract my rifle, all the while keeping my gaze fixed on the camera pointed at the gate. I’m already gauging distance, calculating angles.
“Gate?” Cameron asks me.
We’d planned to do it later, but it would be better to do it in this moment of distraction.
“Yes! Get ready for the gate, move on my command.”
Everyone but me and Robin, who takes the spyglass from Quinn, stations themselves right up against the gate. From the leg of his padded costume, Bruce pulls out a large crowbar, being careful to keep it hidden behind him. The din of the helicopter must now be at its maximum.
“They’re landing,” Robin says.
He lifts the telescope and trains it on the chopper, while I raise my weapon, rest it on Quinn’s shoulder, and train it on the problematic camera.
I take a second to steady my arm and perfect my aim. Then I fire.
I get it right on my first try, just clipping the rear bracket of the camera so that it swivels marginally on its mount. Its view will now be directed just slightly off — to the other side of the gate, not picking up action where it opens, and at the guardhouse. With any luck, those monitoring the surveillance feeds will think that the strong drafts of the landing helicopter buffeted it slightly off its usual range of vision.
“Go now!” I say urgently, slipping my rifle back under my cloak and across my shoulders.
Bruce wedges the crowbar under the bottom rail of the gate, then he and Cameron thrust it down, levering the gate backward off the sliding rail. Everyone grabs a couple of the vertical rails, and on my count, they lift it up and shuffle to the right, leaving a gap just wide enough for Evyan to slip through sideways.
“It’s him. It’s the president,” Robin confirms.
“Now back,” I instruct as Evyan disappears around the rear of the guardhouse. “One, two, three, heave.”
We lift the gate up, move to the left and settle it back into its original position on the sliding rail.
So far, so good. Evyan is nowhere to be seen, and the gate guards are still watching the president, who alights from the chopper and strides toward the building, holding his hair down with one hand. He’s accompanied by what I assume is a personal bodyguard, a suited man so big and burly, he makes Bruce look petite.
With a little wave to the waiting agents and camera crew, Hawke bounds up the stairs, and a couple of people cluster around him. I can see the figures but not the details of what’s happening.
“What’s he doing?” I ask.
“He keeps a comb in his pocket, and he’s combing his hair!” Robin says, sounding half-amused and half-disgusted at the president’s vanity.
“What is that chick in front of him doing?” Bruce asks.
“Applying makeup,” Robin says. “And hairspray, I think.”
Bruce snorts in deep disgust.
“What a putz,” Evyan says.
Someone comes out of the building and shakes Hawke’s hand. I know who it is before Robin confirms, “Roberta Roth.”
She disappears back inside then re-emerges to shake his hand again. The performance is repeated twice more, until, presumably, the real director is satisfied they’ve got the perfect shot.
Quinn glares at Hawke and Roth, who’re now posing for photographs. “Look at them, smiling and waving as if they weren’t corrupt crooks and killers.”
After another few minutes, the camera crew packs up, and the whole entourage enters the building via the multi-person decon unit. The agents go in together first, followed by Roth and Hawke, who go alone together — no doubt seizing the moment of privacy for some last-minute secret conversation. The camera crew are the last to enter.
Now that the excitement is over, the gate guards swivel and walk back to their station.
“Sofia?” I say, giving her basket a significant look.
“Hey guys, we’re about to go. Sure you don’t want the candy?” Sofia asks the two guards. “It’s almost lunchtime. You must be so hungry.”
“I really shouldn’t,” Big-Belly says.
“I’ll have some,” I say, snatching up a bloodypop, unwrapping it and sucking it with exaggerated relish. Only the soft-centered candies have been injected with fast-acting sleeping medication. We included a few ‘safe’ pieces in case of just such an eventuality.
“Me, too,” says Quinn. He grabs a piece of rat’s whisker licorice.
“Save some for us,” Bruce says, elbowing his way through as if intending to devour all the treats in one monster gulp.
“Oh, go on then,” says the guard. “Just a few won’t hurt.”
Sofia grabs fists full of the spiked candy and drops them into his cupped hands. After a token hesitation, Rat-Face comes over to
claim her share.
“Bye, guys,” we call as we peel away from the gate. “Enjoy the candy, and give the president a wave for us when he comes out.”
“Sure, sure,” Big-Belly says.
“You go straight home, now, you hear?” Rat-Face calls after us.
As soon as we’re out of sight of the gatehouse, we signal Neil on the walkie-talkie. By the time he pulls up to the arranged waiting spot, we’ve tossed the signs into the bushes and stripped off our costumes. We climb inside the van, stuff the Halloween suits under the seats, and then I hand out the ID tags Evyan lifted from the agents to everyone except Robin and Evyan.
“Right, Neil, drive us to the gate,” I say, disassembling my rifle and hiding the pieces under all the equipment in Robin’s duffel bag.
It’s been ten minutes since we handed the guards the candy. If they ate any, they’ll already be asleep. If they didn’t, we’ll have to move to plan B, which I don’t want to think about.
But as we pull up at the gate, it slides open. Evyan appears, now wearing the black jeans and long T-shirt she had on under the catsuit, and hops into the van.
“Any problems?” I ask.
“Nah, they were stuffing their faces before they even entered the guardhouse, and asleep five minutes after that. And look, I got a remote control for the gate.”
She points it over her shoulder and clicks it, and the gate slides shut behind us.
We debated, when planning the mission, whether to gag and tie up the guards or tranquilize them, but decided against those ideas, because if someone arrives at the gate, wanting to enter or leave, they would be discovered and the alarm sounded. This way the guards will just be asleep, not unconscious, for a while, depending on the amount of candy they ate before they passed out. And with any luck they, or anyone else, will assume they just dozed off.
Neil takes us down the drive and backs into a far spot in the visitor’s lot where the gate guards won’t be able to see our van. We climb out, straightening our suits, and gathering our equipment. Robin grabs the duffel bag, and the rest of us each grab a handful of caltrops. These tire-puncturing tacks are designed to always have one spike pointing upwards, and they have hollow cores so that even with self-sealing tires, they’ll cause slow leaks and flat tires within minutes. We’ve learned from our previous disasters. This time, we don’t want anyone following us.
As we walk to the steps of the entrance, we surreptitiously toss the tacks just in front and behind the tires of the convoy vehicles, the staff people-carrier, and the only other vehicle in the lot — a sleek Mercedes-Benz sports car in a deep pokeberry purple parked across two spaces right by the entrance. I’d bet good money it’s Roberta Roth’s ride.
“GAME ON,” the custom plates read.
“Game over, bitch,” I mutter as I drop a few caltrops behind her rear right wheel, nudging them right up against the rubber with a toe.
As part of my disguise, I’m wearing black leather pumps. Even though they’re low-heeled, they feel uncomfortable and awkward. I’d feel way better in my sneakers. How are agents supposed to run and jump in these things?
We pause at the top of the stairs and peep through the glass frontage. This time, the lobby is not deserted.
I take a deep, steadying breath.
“Here we go, people. Good luck,” I say.
Sofia crosses herself, Neil whispers, “May the goddess protect us,” and Bruce pats the holster at his waist, saying, “In Winchester we trust.”
Saying nothing, Quinn presses the button for the decon unit.
Chapter 37
Out and in
All eight of us step inside the decon unit, immediately covering our eyes with our hands. As soon as the UV light bath and decontaminant spray process ends, a beep sounds, and the inner door clicks open.
As planned, we all walk out quickly and pass through the metal detector. It buzzes a protest with each of us — except Sofia — and no wonder. Bruce, Cameron and I are carrying concealed weapons, Quinn is armed with his knife, Neil has an external drive hidden in a pocket, Evyan has her lock-picking kit stashed somewhere on her, and there are more of our weapons and ammunition in the duffel bag Robin holds.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” says the security guard inside, holding his hands out to stop us.
I check him out quickly. He’s a young man, tall and thin as a rake, with a thick beard and multicolored eyes — he must be wearing rainbow contact lenses. A Taser hangs on his belt, and a communication device is clipped onto the epaulet on his shoulder, but he’s not packing any firepower.
“Hey, everybody stop,” he says.
The same central core of space, crisscrossed by walkways on the second and third floors, stretches above us. The same board behind the front desk lists the various levels and their offices. Our destination — the data center — is on the fourth floor, along with Roberta Roth’s office. This time, though, there’s a receptionist with a fuzz of purple hair seated at the desk. She stares up at us, clearly alarmed.
“What seems to be the problem?” Neil asks the guard.
We deputized Neil to handle this interaction because he’s the oldest, so we assumed that he would carry more authority. But I’m beginning to wonder if that decision was a mistake. His voice is breathy with nerves, and his forehead gleams with perspiration.
“The problem? I’ll tell you the problem,” the guard says. “One, I don’t know who you people are — I don’t have any further visitors listed as due for today. And B, y’all set off my metal detector!”
“We’re the president’s security officers,” Neil says.
I groan internally. That wasn’t what he was supposed to say. I shoot a look at Quinn. He’s the quick-thinking one here. And aren’t all Irish supposed to have a touch of the blarney?
“I don’t think so.” The guard shakes his head at Neil and hoists the pants hanging loosely around his skinny hips. “They all arrived earlier — we checked each and every one of them against the list.”
“All checked off,” the receptionist calls from across the lobby, waving a list in the air.
“Officer” — Quinn squints down at the man’s nametag — “Murphy, I’m Agent Long.” Quinn taps the identification badge pinned to his own chest, and I hurriedly check mine to memorize my supposed name. I’m Agent Morgan.
“That’s a coincidence,” the receptionist says. “There was an Agent Long in the earlier team, too.”
I surreptitiously turn my ID badge around, not wanting her to notice that all our names are duplicates of those on her list.
“What my fellow agent meant to say,” Quinn continues easily, gesturing at Neil, “was that we’re the presidential security team here to escort the film crew.” He gestures to Robin and Evyan, who holds a high-tech video camera in the palm of her hand.
“Everyone who was on the list of expected guests has already arrived,” the guard repeats, tugging at his sagging pants again. “And that includes the camera team.”
“That camera team is media,” Robin says, as though stating a deep insult. “We’re art!”
“Looks like Bert forgot again, like he always does,” Quinn complains loudly, treading on my toe. On cue, I groan.
“When I get a hold of Bert’s scrawny neck …” Bruce makes a brutal twisting motion with his hands.
“Who’s Bert?” the guard asks.
“I don’t have a Bert on my list,” the receptionist calls out to us.
“I don’t expect you would, ma’am. Bert is the admin assistant at HQ who was supposed to send you notification of our arrival, with all the details of our team,” Quinn says smoothly. “Obviously he screwed up. He tends to do that a lot. Couple of sandwiches short of a picnic if you ask me, but he’s the boss’s nephew, so what you gonna do?”
“Why do they need another camera crew?” the guard asks suspiciously.
“The first crew’s going to film the launch ceremony to televise live and distribute to the media.” Robin smooths his false beard. �
��But this,” he says in an awed voice, gently tapping Evyan’s device, “this is an augmented-reality camera. We’re going to film President Hawke and use the footage to have him pop up in the Go!Game.”
“It was a last-minute decision,” Quinn says.
“The president himself asked for it!” Robin’s eyes are wide with feigned delight.
“And Bert must’ve forgotten to send through the details.”
“I don’t know what the problem is here. They already cleared us at the gate,” I say, trying to make my voice deep, and using a cold, unfriendly tone. “They had all the relevant documentation. Are you certain you checked all your incoming authorizations?”
“And what about the metal detector?” the guard says.
I sigh in annoyance, as if at his stupidity. “Officer Murphy, we’re the presidential security team. We are, by definition, licensed to carry concealed firearms.”
“We need to hurry!” Robin says, clapping his hands together dramatically. “If we delay here much longer, we’ll miss the president’s performance.”
“You’ll be in trouble if that happens,” Bruce says in a rough voice, and the guard’s Adam’s apple bobs up and down. Bruce might not be wearing his Hulk costume, but he’s still pretty intimidating.
“Umm,” says the guard, clearly unsure what to do.
“I’ll call upstairs to check, shall I?” the receptionist volunteers.
I can’t let her do that.
I take a step toward her desk, weighing my options even as she reaches out a gloved hand to press a button on the phone system in front of her. But, unexpectedly, Neil is there before me.
“Is it because I’m black? Is that it?” he demands, frowning down at the young woman.
“Because … wh-what?” the receptionist stammers back, confused.
“You don’t trust us, because one of us is black, and another is Hispanic, right?”
“N-no!” she gasps.
“Now hold on a moment,” the guard protests, yanking his pants up to his ribs.
“I guess people of color can’t be presidential guards, right? Because they’ve naturally got to be felons,” Neil continues. Then he adds threateningly, “The president will hear of this.”
The Recoil Trilogy 3 Book Boxed Set: Including Recoil, Refuse and Rebel Page 67
