State of Order

by Julian North

  “I wish for the feud between our families to end. I want you to gain control of Rose-Hart, for many reasons. And I alone have the power to make that happen.”

  “What is the price?” Alexander demanded.

  “Ah, yes, there is always a price in this game we play.” Jalen sounded wistful. “You will vote Rose-Hart’s voting shares as I wish for two years, without question. Additionally, once installed, you will use your influence to cause the company to sell twenty-five percent of Rose-Hart’s stock to ArgoGood at ten percent off fair market value.”

  Alexander ran in silence, thinking. “What else?”

  “I want to know how you managed to get the controlColonies out of the Ziggurat.”

  My heart pounded, even though we ran at an almost leisurely pace. He knows we took the rods, and when. How? At least he doesn’t know all of it, or he wouldn’t be asking how we did it.

  “ArgoGood would control the single biggest voting bloc in the country,” Alexander said. “If you believe I will keep my word.”

  “I do, or I wouldn’t make this offer. You have honor. I believe you are different than your father and your sister.” He glanced back at me without altering his pace. “Very different.”

  “Sounds too altruistic to be tr—” Alexander halted midsentence. He stared at the man running toward us. Not jogging—sprinting. The runner’s almond-shaped eyes were cold, the color of slate. His face was flat, expressionless. He wore a black insulated track suit, but there was something not right about it. He had entered the path from behind a thicket of trees. No one ran in this direction. He was going to attack.

  I gathered my will, my cold power. As I did so, a shot rang out, the vibrating echo of sound-suppressed projectile fire. The approaching runner’s head jerked backward, as if struck by a hammer. He fell, his head striking the ground first. Blood pooled beneath his skull. We all stopped. Jalen’s bodyguard dashed ahead of us, a steaming pistol clutched in both hands.

  “Get back,” Jalen’s man called out as he approached the fallen attacker. The dead man’s face had been twisted to the side by the force of the bullet and the impact with the ground. Blood covered his cheek and seeped downward to the high black collar that wrapped around his neck. I had seen collars like that before.

  My spider-sense jolted me. I spun. The second assassin was nearly on top of us. He wore the same outfit as his companion, and he too looked to be of Asian ancestry. His eyes locked on Jalen with a deadly focus. His hands were empty, but I knew he was no less lethal for the lack of a visible weapon. If he got too close, I knew Jalen would die. Ten feet away. Time slowed. I already had the power inside me, the delicious cold strength that allowed me to trill. Even if madness was the price I would eventually pay, there was no other choice. If I did nothing, all of us were in danger. I unleashed my will.

  “Stop!” I shouted, commanding obedience with the force of my mind.

  My power sallied forth, a spear of desperate will. It found nothing. There was no wall protecting the mind of the man galloping toward us, no will to control. There was only void. He was five feet away, arms reaching toward Jalen, who tried to spin out of the way. Jalen was fast, but this man was quick as well, and he was already too close. Jalen was going to die; we all were.

  A second shot erupted.

  Another head shot took down the would-be assassin—this time from behind. The man fell forward, his skull cracking as he descended. Blood splattered onto my face, my hands. He was dead, but my spider-sense hollered that I should run. The danger had not passed. I had a mere second to glance at the man who had saved us, partially concealed behind the trunk of a towering maple tree. His eyes met mine. I shivered. It couldn’t be.

  Alexander was staring at the dead assassin when his eyes grew wide with sudden horror. His hand, large and powerful, grabbed me and hurled me toward the dark water of the Reservoir.

  “Into the water!” Alexander shouted, sounding as desperate as I had ever heard him. It was enough to snap me back to the present. I didn’t think about why I should jump into the freezing depths, I just obeyed. Jalen did the same. We leapt, Jalen and me first, Alexander right behind us. We flew over the low iron fence that separated the land from the water, plunging into the frigid pool beyond. A boiling explosion ripped through the chilled air, its hungry fire biting my legs as I struck the water. Ice surrounded me, numbing my skin in an instant, but I was glad for the safety of its freezing embrace. A second denotation echoed through the dark depths of the Reservoir. I saw the distorted images of fire through the water above. When it was gone, I broke the surface to find smoldering ash where there had once been men; several great maples, dried by the cold, had caught fire. The jogging track had been singed to black. The bitter air burned in my lungs. But I was alive. And so were Alexander and Jalen.

  “Sorry about your man,” Alexander said.

  “Alen,” Jalen replied, grim. “I’m tired of people being killed all around me.”

  “You think they were Virginia Timber-Night’s people?” Alexander asked.

  “Who else?”

  Authority drones descended upon the Reservoir as we swam to the edge and pulled ourselves from the chilly water into the colder air. Sirens blared from all directions.

  “There was something wrong with those men,” I said, shivering, but not from the cold.

  “Fanatics,” Jalen spat. Even drenched and freezing he stood tall, regal.

  “No, not fanatics. Something else,” I told him.

  “They were suicide bombers. What else do you call them?”

  I looked at Alexander. His jaw was locked, tense. He understood. “Their outfits—the collars. It concealed their necks. The assassins at Masterman Stadium were the same. They killed themselves too.”

  Jalen’s eyes fixed on me. “Tell me, then.”

  “They were chipped.”

  Chapter 14

  The black boots arrived in a swarm. They drove on electrocycles and ran on foot. Their machines accompanied them: drones, analyzers, interrogators, whatever. They were too late to do anything except clean up.

  They sealed off Central Park, of course; witnesses were rounded up to give statements and have their identities checked. But I didn’t see him among the witnesses—the man who had saved us. I shook my head. It didn’t make sense.

  The frigid water had busted my crappy old viser, but Alexander’s and Jalen’s still worked. They established their bona fides with the thugs and vouched for me. That got us each a thermal blanket and kept me out of the back of an Authority interrogation van—at least for the moment. Several black boots kept a wary eye on us, but no one seemed to be in a rush to question two of the richest scions in Manhattan. Jalen glared down any Authority officer who ventured too close. I actually began to think we’d get off easy, until the wind started. From above came a sleek v-copter, its tilt rotors unleashing an ominous squall. There wasn’t enough open space for the machine to set down, so it descended over the Reservoir, hovering close enough to the shore to deposit its cargo of jackbooted bruisers. They hopped from the machine’s side ramp onto the shore, sinister in their dark armor. A blazing red slash across their chest plates and upper arms distinguished them from their brethren. Six of them strode toward us.

  Jalen drew himself upright, his eyes focused on the approaching men as he prepared for battle. Alexander stood beside him. I hung back slightly on Alexander’s left. This was their world, not mine.

  The leader of the newcomers positioned himself directly in front of Jalen. His leathery face was dominated by thick brows and a tightly trimmed silver goatee that tapered to a single point just below his jutting chin. The obligatory head nod was cursory.

  “I am Major Varin-Lynn, Special Threats Force,” he told Jalen in a steely voice that welcomed battle.

  Special Threats Force. My blood ran cold. It was only announced yesterday—or at least that was the first time I had heard of it. Yet here they were, with men and uniforms and machines. This had all been planned.

>   Jalen nodded, his head bobbing almost imperceptibly. “You were formerly in charge of border enforcement, were you not, Major?” No introductions, no pleasantries. I hoped Jalen knew what he was doing.

  “The attorney general asked me to lead the new unit. Fortunately, I had a dependable team in place so we were able to get started immediately.”

  The attorney general. He was Virginia Timber-Night’s man.

  Jalen feigned surprise. “Terrorist activity has continued unabated. When can I expect the threat to myself and my family to be dealt with in a satisfactory manner?”

  Steam oozed from Varin-Lynn’s nostrils. “Why would terrorists want to harm you, Mr. Aris-Putch?”

  “I thought that was your job to figure out, Major.”

  Varin-Lynn turned his head toward Alexander, then graced me with a sneer. “What are you all doing at the Reservoir?”

  “We were running, Major,” Alexander said. His face was statuesque, serene.

  “Surely you are familiar with running around in circles?” Jalen added icily.

  Varin-Lynn squeezed his lips together and smoothed the hair dangling from his chin. “Ah, I see. Just some exercise, with a young woman from Bronx City. A woman whose brother is a known terrorist?”

  I swallowed hard. The drone. The first shot fired. Of course, they had identified Mateo by now.

  Jalen’s eyes darted over to me, wary. He hadn’t known about Mateo.

  “I wasn’t aware we hold the crimes of one family member against another. Miss Machado is the Manhattan fifteen-hundred-meter track champion,” Alexander said without blinking. “A star pupil at the Tuck School, and my teammate.”

  The star pupil thing was an exaggeration, but I appreciated it nonetheless.

  “If it is your intention to declare probable cause to arrest any or all of us, Major, please state so clearly. I have placed my attorneys on alert,” Jalen added.

  The major nodded, as if pleased with what he was hearing. His voice became a throaty whisper. “While it is not public knowledge, you should know that in connection with the order creating STF, certain emergency powers were activated under the Domestic Terrorist Act. I don’t need to explain myself or answer to your fancy suits. I can do whatever I want with you. All of you.”

  “I find it odd, Major, that your suspicions fall upon the intended victims of a terrorist attack. Or are they Virginia Timber-Night’s suspicions and desires that you act upon?” Alexander asked, his voice so calm that I wanted to scream.

  A buzz of conversation rose from behind Varin-Lynn and his henchmen. The major paid it no mind. He stepped to within a hair’s length of Alexander, raising a black gloved finger in the scant space between them. “The world where your father was king is over—”

  “Major Varin-Lynn, please step back from the witness.” The words were coarse and commanding. The speaker’s bearing matched his voice—he was a towering wire of hard flesh, with a worn face that would not have been out of place in the barrio, except for its color. A jagged scar extended from his right eye toward his ear. His uniform was polished black and adorned with a silver badge.

  The major turned, his eyes widening at the man who had cut a hole through the line of STF officers at the major’s back. “Director-General…you are here—”

  “A masterful statement of the obvious, Major. Are you surprised? I am in charge of the Authority, and I serve at the pleasure of the president—not his subordinate. But I am wondering what you are doing here. I would have expected you to be in Queens City or Bronx City, dealing with the threat to order there. That is why your force was created, according to the attorney general.”

  Varin-Lynn’s lips pressed together, stifling the words he wanted to speak. “Sir, I am investigating special terrorist—”

  “Did I hear you mention the Emergency Detention Act to Mr. Foster-Rose-Hart? President Hoven did not authorize the creation of your unit to harass highborn citizenry. It is part of my responsibility as your superior officer to ensure special detention powers are not misused.” The director-general watched Varin-Lynn closely as his words sank in. “You and your men are dismissed, Major. I’ll expect your report on the source of the force weapons that mysteriously appeared in the tributary cities by tomorrow morning.”

  Varin-Lynn’s face twitched as the director-general issued the order. “Yes, sir.”

  “Oh, and Major, don’t bring your flying windmill within the Central Park boundary again. Someone will give you a ride to the nearest PA port-station, I’m sure.”

  Varin-Lynn gave a sharp salute and turned hard in the other direction. His men sulked away like disappointed hyenas. But there was no triumph for me in Varin-Lynn’s humiliation. The existence of these red-slashed goons was a bad omen. If they weren’t afraid of people like Jalen and Alexander, they were even more dangerous than the regular black boots. It seemed they answered to Virginia Timber-Night. I thought about the measures Major Varin-Lynn would be implementing in BC, where no one seemed to care what happened. The Emergency Detention Act sounded ominous, although the Authority had never really cared about laws or rules when they operated in BC anyway.

  “You can give statements directly to my men, then you are free to go,” the director-general said to us.

  Jalen bowed his head, deeply this time. “My thanks, Director-General Van-Maker.”

  Alexander nodded respectfully as well. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. This man was the embodiment of the Authority itself. Men killed on his order. Van-Maker was still a wolf; he merely served a different master. He had rid himself of a group of competing predators by sending them to feed in my home. If the director-general noticed my slight, he gave no sign. He returned the offered bows, then left, two black boot lackeys in tow.

  “You contacted him—the director-general?” I asked Jalen.

  “No, but I signaled my backup team. They must have seen the v-copter and got a message to President Hoven.”

  “My thanks to them,” Alexander said.

  Jalen’s jaw locked, his face grim. “I have good people around me. But that won’t be enough. I need allies, and so do you. This has all become very messy and public. Virginia Timber-Night will think we have made an alliance. She may see us as a threat. We’ve seen how deadly she can be. Her power grows, even within the Authority. We need to act. Speed is now more important than stealth.”

  “When and where?” Alexander replied.

  “Your house, this evening. I will bring security this time, however. Acceptable?”

  “Done.”

  Any blood feud between these two seemed quickly forgotten. Manhattan was no different than Bronx City; need came before all else.

  The Authority men split us up to take our statements. The officer assigned to me had a pumpkin-shaped face and shrunken eyes. I offered him few words, and nothing he didn’t already know; I kept my suspicions about chipped assassins and our mysterious savior to myself. Fortunately, the black-booted officer seemed as anxious to conclude the interview as I was. In less than half an hour the questions were over and I was free to go. Jalen had already departed, but Alexander was waiting.

  “I arranged for a car,” he told me. “It will meet us at Eighty-Fourth Street.”

  “Let’s walk to school. There’s more to tell. And it’s worse.”

  Alexander didn’t argue. He fell in beside me, flicking a few fingers to alert his driver. We both still had blankets around our shoulders as a shield against the cold. “Walking isn’t exactly safe.”

  “You think a car is any better? We know that’s not the case. Besides, this area is flooded with black boots. Nythan said the Authority doesn’t usually monitor conversations on the streets in Manhattan, not without a warrant.”

  Once we had left the park and were again surrounded by the privileged masses of the Upper East Side, Alexander asked, “What else has happened?”

  “The person who saved us. I saw him,” I told him. “It was just for a second, then he was gone, like a ghost.”

&nbs
p; “Who?”

  I hesitated, reliving the moment in my head. I had gotten the briefest of glances. The glare of the sun had been on me. Yet there had been a flash of recognition in the gunman’s eyes when our gazes locked. I hadn’t imagined it.

  “It was Havelock.”

  Chapter 15

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Alexander said. “Why would he help us?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t understand why he would be here. But it can’t be a good thing.”

  Alexander glanced about as we walked, as if danger could be seen so easily. Our blankets drew stares. “How could he even know we were there?”

  I chewed on my lip. It was a good question, but perhaps the wrong one. “Maybe it wasn’t about us. Maybe our being there was a coincidence.”

  “You mean he was there for Jalen.”

  I talked, walked, and thought. The words came slowly. “Jalen wanted to know how we got into Rose-Hart. He seems to know or have guessed about the controlColonies. He might know about other things too. Like juche workers being grown or whatever… to be assassins.”

  “You think Havelock told him?”

  I bit harder on my lip. “I doubt it. Havelock was always jealous about his secrets—he knew a lot of things he never told me or Nythan. But there could be a connection to Jalen. Or to us too, I suppose. We need to know who those slave-assassins belong to.” We were only a block away from Tuck. Alexander noticed too.

  “You up for school today?” he asked. “It hasn’t exactly been an easy morning.”

  “I need to change. I don’t want to go back to Anise’s place right now. She was pissed I didn’t let her come out with me.” I sighed, realizing there was something else I needed to do. Something I dreaded. “Besides, there’s someone at school who might know more about chipped assassins.”

  Alexander frowned. “Who?”

  “Lara. She was the expert. With everything that happened, you never really knew her… her family ran afoul of the Corporate Council in Korea. She knew about the juches from her parents, I think—that’s how Havelock knew. She was the source.”