He knew more military vehicles would be stored underground, as well as off the island altogether. He wouldn’t be able to get to all of them, but he could diminish their numbers considerably.
Balidor’s initial estimates were that they should be able to disable or confiscate between forty-six and sixty-seven percent of the remaining transport and offensive capability in Manhattan within the first three days, that variance depending primarily on how much of the city had been accurately mapped by the seers at the hotel.
That wouldn’t be enough to keep all of Shadow’s allies on foot and weaponless, but it would raise a fuck of a lot of security issues for whatever and whoever remained, given the fact that they were having population control issues already. Revik fully intended to exploit the fact that a lot of humans and seers were already starving inside this New World Order of Shadow inside Manhattan. He also intended to help as many of them out as he could. To that end, he had zero qualms about feeding some of those same dirty masses out of Shadow’s own stores, which had been part of the point of knocking shielding off buildings that had been constructed specifically with the idea of keeping those less fortunate out.
If he made a point of knocking out local and outside transmissions, as well as exploding every aircraft they tried to aim at that door in the OBE field, even more of Shadow’s ‘followers’ would likely panic...as well as start to doubt Shadow’s ability to keep them safe, at least without some kind of cooperation from Revik himself.
He knew Menlim.
Menlim would want to negotiate.
He would also be certain he could get Revik to ‘see reason.’
Revik even had a good idea of where Menlim would start. He would make promises around fixing Allie, to begin with...of returning his child, keeping his people safe inside the quarantines, maybe even giving them a quarantine zone of their own. He would promise to stop killing humans and seers on the Displacement lists. Revik couldn’t bank on what Cass would do, despite the number of scenarios he, Balidor, Wreg, Yumi and Tarsi had run over the past few months, but he could guess in terms of Menlim.
As far as Cass herself, all he had to go on was what he’d been told by Chandre and others, as well as the contents of his own dreams.
He knew from the latter that Cass was harboring some delusion of being the queen of this shit-heap she and Shadow had created, by unleashing the disease and killing off so many humans. He also knew, despite her pretend flippancy, that she had genuine feelings about his and Allie’s child. He didn’t know what those feelings were, precisely, but from talking it over with Yumi, Chan, Balidor and Jon, he guessed that Shadow was using their kid to control Cass in some way, too.
Revik hadn’t figured out how to use either of those things yet, but he would.
He’d spoken to Wreg and Loki about it, too, as well as Tarsi, who had stayed in New York. Tarsi seemed to think, even more strongly than Chan, that the key was the child, that the child was what mattered to Cass.
Revik agreed, but still had trouble wrapping his mind around that fully...or maybe he just didn’t want to.
Allie shifted in his lap at the thought, and he glanced down, in spite of himself.
He knew he was reacting to her again. The telekinesis didn’t help. He looked at her now, at the faint glow of green in her irises and shifted uncomfortably in his seat, aware suddenly of the lights of the other seers in the Humvee, and how attuned all of them were to the two of them, especially now.
Allie looked up at him then, and smiled at him, and Revik’s guard fell, almost without him meaning it to.
He smiled back, and she curled her arms more tightly around his neck, shifting deeper into the curve of his body where she leaned partway against the door. He found himself watching her look at him, feeling ripples of pain off her light as she studied his features in the daylight through the tinted organic glass.
He knew the other seers had watched him kiss her by the pier.
He struggled to care about that, too, or the fact that he didn’t know precisely what he thought about that fact himself. The thing was, he could convince himself he could feel more of her now...more of her in tiny increments every few days. He knew he might be deluding himself. Hell, he knew he was probably deluding himself. He’d been warned about that very thing by Balidor and Wreg both, but the greater part of his mind clung persistently to the belief anyway.
When she leaned her face down, kissing his neck, he closed his eyes, murmuring in her mind, hoping none of the others would hear it.
Come back to me. Come back to me, Allie...please...I need you...
She touched his face, trailing her fingers down his jaw, making him shiver.
Please, he begged her in a murmur. Please come back to me...please...
Her fingers wrapped around his neck, clutching him there briefly before she slid them under the edge of his shirt. He knew he shouldn’t be letting her touch him in front of the others, not when he felt like this, not with the ripples it created in his light...ripples he knew they could see...but he couldn’t seem to make himself care about that, either.
Not enough to ask her to stop, anyway.
She’d always been turned on by the telekinesis. He’d gotten off on doing it in front of her, as soon as he noticed the consistency of her reactions to that higher intensity of his light.
That had been before, of course.
Shifting again in the cloth-covered seat, he forced his eyes off her face, training his gaze out the window. Ignoring the careful, almost rhythmic touch of her hands and fingers...well, as much as he could...he tried to force his thoughts back down more tactical lines.
Over half of the seers who traveled with them in the Chinook split off after he’d cleaned out that airstrip in the park. The three carloads that remained had done so more to protect Allie than Revik himself. Revik mainly relied on protection from the Barrier, anyway, since numbers probably wouldn’t have been enough, given what he was doing with the telekinesis.
Jon had done an amazing job, really...better even than Revik hoped.
Those who split off in the park were met by an even larger group of House on the Hill seers. Together, the sixty or so armed infiltrators had orders to make their way back to the hotel, taking out as many tactical targets as they could along the way.
Revik had already heard back that they’d been mostly successful in this. As they were getting ready to leave the airfield after stripping it of remaining weapons and ammunitions, including in all of the hides that Revik and the other infiltrators mapped via the Barrier and their organic sensors, as well as a few more ground vehicles, the secondary team immediately engaged another group of seers. From all accounts, those had been Salinse’s people, led by rebels that some of the fighters on Revik’s side recognized.
One of those seers had been Ute.
Rigor and Tan had been there, too, according to Loki.
Revik hadn’t seen any of those seers face to face since he gave them his ultimatum about leaving the Dreng if they wanted to continue to follow him. Ute had been the first to go. Rigor and Tan left shortly after, disappearing from that stronghold in the mountains, probably as soon as it sank in that Revik was serious about his demand.
Wreg had stayed. So had Holo and Jax, Loki, Raddi, Mila...
Revik found himself sending up a silent prayer of thanks that Wreg hadn’t been one of those to leave, something he hadn’t remembered to do in a while.
Even as he did it, he glanced briefly at Neela, then at Jorag, also both ex-rebels.
It was difficult to remember what they’d all been like back then. Their light shone so differently from the Barrier now; Revik strongly suspected he wouldn’t have recognized this version of their light back when he still worked for Salinse. They’d all resonated with such a similar tone back in those days, like a single, monotone note of the same musical instrument. It was what happened under the heavier and more controlling light of the Dreng.
Allie slid her arm inside his jacket, massaging h
is side and ribs.
Closing his eyes briefly, he remembered how sick he’d been back then, with Allie in China, working for the Lao Hu. He hadn’t known where she was...or who she was with.
The memory pounded behind his eyes.
Leaning back in the fabric seat, Revik scanned pieces of the construct to find out where his secondary team was now. He knew they’d decided to detour to hit a few buildings after they got the rest of the storage lockers in the park. He could feel now that they’d added a recon trip to the loop as well, for a larger garrison they didn’t expect to be able to take on their own, but that they might bring back reinforcements to go after tomorrow.
That, or they’d bring Revik, once they’d mapped the target.
Revik pinged his approval to Loki, their leader, telling them to take aleimic scans of every aspect they safely could, including anything they could feel underground, as well as any smaller constructs or Barrier signatures that might be protecting the structure. He told Loki that once they had a better picture of the city’s remaining defensive capabilities, Revik would take them out in descending order of threat.
He felt a pulse of appreciation and even humor from Loki. Sending him an amused blast of warmth in return, Revik withdrew, with a final message to ping him again if they needed him.
Understood, laoban... the seer sent.
Loki’s thoughts felt almost cheerful.
Revik smiled, shaking his head.
The impression struck him as funny, given how stone-faced Loki looked most of the time, but it made sense, too. Loki was a fighter at heart. He’d probably been climbing the walls from all of the relative inaction in San Francisco, especially after that taste of action in South America. For someone of Loki’s temperament, this trip probably felt long overdue. It occurred to Revik in the same breath that he should be using the Middle Eastern seer more often in these on-the-ground ops. Revik, Wreg and Balidor had assigned Loki to the infiltration unit because of his high sight rank, but maybe that had been a mistake.
Revik was still mulling this over when the Humvee pulled into the half-moon driveway leading up to the House on the Hill hotel.
“We’re coming in the front?”
Revik turned, realizing Jon had spoken.
Jon was staring out the window, wide-eyed at the crowd of seers and humans waiting for them under the organic glass overhang just outside the lobby. Revik saw Jon’s eyes scanning faces with a kind of stunned, numb look, even as Jon’s fingers rose to clutch at his own chest, probably without him being fully aware of the gesture.
Revik found he understood. He couldn’t really think about the last time they’d been here, either...which was why he’d been determined they would arrive differently.
“Yes,” Revik said.
He cleared his throat, glancing around at the faces of the other seers crushed together in the back of the Humvee, sweat on their faces from the close quarters and closed, armored windows.
“We’re going through the goddamned front door,” he added, aiming a faint smile around the back of the Humvee before he glanced at Jon. “Do you object, brother Jon?”
He knew it wasn’t much of a smile, but it seemed to do what he’d intended.
Neela grinned back.
When Revik glanced sideways, he saw that something in Jon’s face had relaxed, too. Not quite a smile, but he hadn’t seen many smiles on Jon lately, not since the last time they’d been in New York. For the first time, Revik found himself really thinking about that. As he did, he glanced at Wreg, who seemed to be watching Jon, too, although he hid it better. Feeling a pulse of pain off both men, Revik frowned.
He’d been staying out of things between the two of them, but he found himself thinking now that maybe he’d been doing that for long enough, too.
“Brother Jon?” he prompted again.
Jon looked at him that time, tearing his eyes off the faces waiting for them outside with a visible effort. Revik saw Jon’s eyes shift to Allie then, right before a look of near-pain crossed his face. Jon had lost weight, too, Revik realized. A lot of weight, maybe.
“No objection,” Jon said.
He gave Revik a faint smile as he said it, but Revik felt the constriction in the other man’s throat, as much as heard it. Jon looked back out the window, and Revik realized suddenly that he could almost hear the beating of the other man’s heart, through the aleimic connection between them. It struck him that Jon was afraid.
He was afraid of what the others would do to him, once they saw Allie.
Feeling a sickness in his own gut, Revik curled his arms tighter around her. She raised her head once he did, and he felt another, more urgent pulse of pain in her light. Strong enough to wipe his thoughts away briefly, and to get him to look her in the face.
When he did, she touched his cheek with one hand, caressing him down to the jaw. Her eyes held his that time. The distance remained, but gods...he could almost see her there. He fought with his own perceptions, even as he looked at her, wanting to believe it so badly he almost couldn’t hear the part of him that waved warning flags for even going there.
He was still staring at her when she lowered her mouth to his, kissing him.
He kissed her back. He did it unthinkingly, for once not letting himself care at all what the others might see in what he was doing with her. Her fingers tightened abruptly in his hair when he put light in his tongue, and his arm slid further around her in reflex, his fingers half-clenched on her side when she made a low noise against his mouth.
He was instantly hard...painfully hard...which made him panic.
Gods, Allie...don’t. Not here...please. Please, not here...
She released him.
She did it at once, so fast it disoriented him, raising her head and unclenching her hand in his hair before she rested the same hand on his shoulder. Revik looked up at her, feeling his chest struggle with breaths, conscious of the others’ focus on them again, even those who appeared to be looking away. When Revik looked at Jon that time, he saw guilt in the other man’s eyes, right before he jerked those eyes off the two of them.
Without thinking, Revik sent to him, his light and thoughts holding zero compromise.
No one’s going to hurt you, Jon, he told him. I won’t allow it.
Jon flinched, staring at him.
Relax, all right? Revik said. You did great today. Better than I could have asked of any of my senior infiltrators. “You’re a commander,” Revik added aloud. “Don’t forget it. You and I need to talk later...” He glanced at Wreg then, almost without meaning to. “I might need to talk to a few people around here...”
Jon just stared at him, almost as if he couldn’t comprehend his words.
“So don’t run off, all right?” Revik said. “I’m serious about the talk.”
Jon frowned. He glanced at Wreg himself, only to look away sharply when the ex-rebel met his gaze. Wreg’s jaw tightened noticeably once he had, right before he gave both of them openly irritated looks.
Fuck you very much, Illustrious Sword, Wreg muttered in his mind.
Revik ignored that, too.
Jon? Revik prompted.
Jon nodded to him, his throat moving in a swallow. “Okay.”
“Okay?” Revik said, sharper.
Jon gave him a harder look. “Okay...sir.”
Revik grinned. He realized the ridiculousness of the sudden flush of optimism that hit him, but he smiled anyway.
“Damn straight,” he muttered.
Something about the way he said it made everyone else in the back burst into laughter.
Maybe they felt that optimism, too.
Whatever it was, it dispelled the tension that had lingered there, ever since they left the docks. Neela grinned, giving another half-laugh as she leaned into Yumi’s side where she sat across from them. Up front, behind the driver’s wheel, Jorag laughed, too, from where he sat next to Jax, Illeg and Maygar.
Jon smiled along with the rest, almost as if he couldn’t hel
p himself...and even though that underlying irritation and bewilderment remained in his eyes. Balidor clapped him on the shoulder, but Jon barely seemed to feel it. Revik saw Jon aim a scowl in Wreg’s direction, too, but the ex-rebel looked openly angry at that point. Wreg was the only one in the Humvee who didn’t laugh at Revik’s words.
Revik felt tempted to bump the older man with his light, if only to get that closed look off his face, but decided to wait until he could get him alone, too.
The Humvee pulled to a stop, and something in that final jerk against the brakes seemed to snap Jon out of wherever his mind had gone.
That time, when his hazel eyes returned to gaze out the window, Revik saw Jon focusing on the human faces that stood there, including Dante, that hacker girl Wreg and Jon picked up before the quarantine, and a few others Revik knew from their discussion of resources on the human lists. Revik’s eyes followed Jon’s gaze past two Adhipan seers, Deklan and Vikram, to a handful of Allie’s friends from San Francisco, as well as her cousins and her uncle and aunt. Revik felt a brief closing in his throat when he saw her family standing there, even though he’d been in contact with them from San Francisco.
He’d made sure they knew from him, personally, what had happened to her, even if he left out some of the grimmer details, mainly about who had done it to her, the pregnancy, and the fact that she might never wake up.
When she had regained consciousness, he’d called them again, talking to her Uncle John and her Aunt Carol personally, as well as two of her cousins, Kara and Marco.
He’d needed them to understand why she wasn’t quite herself still, and while he left out details around the addiction to the wires, he’d talked to them about it for hours until they understood the full scope of how she would be when they finally saw her again in person, and why they couldn’t speak to her on the line.
Still, he knew this would be a shock for them. Hearing about a loved one losing some aspect of their mind was one thing...experiencing it was another.
And Allie still wasn’t talking. Not even in his mind.
Revik looked away from the cluster of humans as he thought it. He knew he’d have to talk to them first, and probably give them significant time to be with Allie, supervised or not. Her cousins would be easier, he suspected...more confused than hurt, much less devastated by what had happened to his wife.
Allie's War Season Four Page 27
