The Next Chronicle (Book 2): Damage

by Guess, Joshua

  Robinson looked up, surprised. “I honestly didn't think you would, not after learning secrets I've kept.”

  “It isn't because we have a history,” Kit said, her matter-of-fact tone as cutting as any insult. “That's done with, as far as I'm concerned. Any goodwill you've earned from me was used up tonight, when I didn't snap your neck and throw you over the edge for the vultures. I gave you a chance to explain because you earned that much. I believe you because I've been paying very close attention to you the last few hours.”

  “What do you mean?” Robinson asked, clearly confused.

  “I pushed my senses to the limit,” Kit said. “I've been listening to your heartbeat, watching your pulse beat in your neck. Looking at your mannerisms, your skin, how much you sweat. I can't measure your galvanic skin response, but there are little things I noticed that are almost as good. You've been straight with me.”

  “Why are you telling me this now?” Robinson asked. “Are we through here?”

  “I'm telling you because your honesty got you a little more of that goodwill I was talking about. Before we leave, I have one question, and I before I asked it I wanted you to know I'd be able to tell if you're lying.”

  Robinson swallowed, but nodded. “Ask.”

  Kit met his eyes. “Are you planning to take me down for what I did tonight?”

  The old man's eyebrows shot up, and he laughed. It was a deep belly laugh, a rarity. “Are you serious? Come on, Kitra, you know me better than that. I'm not thrilled you seem to have a small conspiracy going on here, but knowing what I've had to go along with, do you honestly believe I don't understand why you did this?”

  He was being honest. Kit could tell, and knew that logically she should believe him, but the part of her brain stuck on his reaction had nothing to do with reason. “I took you from your home, kept you in the cold. Threatened to kill you.” She said it flatly, with no softened edges.

  Robinson shrugged, hands out in a 'What do you want?' sort of gesture. “You thought I organized the deaths of a city full of people,” he said. “Hard to blame you for wanting answers. And so I've said it clearly; no, I won't tell anyone about this if you don't.”

  He took a deep breath, holding out a hand to stop her from talking. “There is one more thing you should know before we head back to civilization—assuming you don't plan on leaving me for the birds.” He said it with a smile, but there was a smidgen of genuine concern.

  “You get a pass,” Kit said lightly. “This time.”

  “Thanks so much,” the old man replied mockingly. “While I don't have any real desire to end your career over this—though I'd rather you'd have just asked me—I would still need you regardless. Before you took me from my house, I spent the day in meetings with nearly every top-level official across the various security agencies. I also met with the senators and congressmen from your confirmation. Early yesterday morning, a DSA black site was hit.”

  Kit gaped. “Wait, the Department of Superhuman Affairs has black sites? Why?”

  “Don't pull that innocent bullshit with me, girl. I know better.”

  Kit smiled. “Don't call me a girl if you don't want broken teeth,” she said.

  “At any rate,” Robinson said, pushing on. “We have several of them, and for the same reason other agencies keep them. To house people and information we don't want getting out. This particular site was a...holding facility. Not a prison, exactly, but housing fourteen Black Bands whose personalities are unstable. These individuals are incredibly dangerous.”

  Kit knew what was coming before he said it.

  “All fourteen were taken.”

  They appeared in Robinson's office a few minutes later. James stepped back, waiting by the door. Robinson eyed him for a moment, then walked around his desk. He opened his laptop and pulled up several files, gesturing for Kit to look.

  “These are stills taken from the scene,” Robinson said, pointing. “The abductors were thorough, and left almost no evidence. The guards were tied up and gagged, but one of them heard two of the abductors talking. The first argued that the guards should be killed, the second told him that 'the doctor' wouldn't like it.”

  Kit shivered. “Nunez again?”

  “That's my guess,” Robinson said. “One of the friends I tried to talk to about Nunez was the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time. When I asked why we were just letting the man walk, he told me that Nunez claimed it was the only chance of avoiding 'phase two'.”

  “Fairmont being phase one,” Kit guessed.

  “Your guess is as good as mine,” Robinson said. “The Chairman didn't get much out of Nunez other than phase two would be much, much worse. I think this might be a sign things are going south.”

  Kit scanned through the files, looking at the dossiers of the kidnapped Next. The news was terrible, but that was par for the course with this job.

  “Okay,” she said after a few minutes. “You want me to deal with all of this, that's fine. But the only way that happens is if I get full disclosure from you on everything. And I mean everything. I think I've proven by now I'm not going to disseminate information, but I can't work blind.”

  Robinson nodded. “There's a lot to bring you up to speed on, but I'll make the time.”

  “Don't agree so quickly,” Kit said, wagging a finger at him. “I have a few other needs, too. This isn't just about doing my job anymore. If Nunez is up to something and I'm going to stop him, I need control.”

  Robinson narrowed his eyes. “Over what, exactly?”

  “To start with,” Kit said, pointing at James, “I need him.”

  The old man grimaced. “You want me to make sure he's cleared and at your disposal instead of sentenced and put to work doing god knows what for the NSA or CIA.”

  Kit nodded. “Also, you need to authorize a panel of telepaths. His sister was attacked because she's Next, unregistered, and the remaining attackers are currently in my custody. I promised James we would punish those men if we determined their guilt. Telepaths are the best way.”

  Robinson sighed. “They're only valid in an OSA court,” he said.

  Kit shrugged. “It's an OSA matter. If they're guilty, they serve maximum sentences in my facility.”

  “Fine,” Robinson said. “Anything else? That's already going to be a mountain of paperwork.”

  “Other than having the freedom to manage my teams, time, and resources as I see fit without consulting you all the time, just one other detail.”

  “Nothing too spectacular, I hope.”

  “Not at all,” Kit said. “Since I'm allowed to drop the charges against James for the attack on my agents, I will. That just leaves the suspected murder of Robert Lile.”

  Kit leaned in, eyes gleaming. “Lile's death will be ruled an accident. James walks, no strings. In exchange he agrees to work for me until we stop Nunez.”

  Robinson nodded. “Fine. I was thinking the same myself. Not going to ask him about it?” He jerked a thumb toward James, who stood watching silently by the door.

  “Already did,” Kit said. “Now, let me get home so I can take care of Nunez.”

  Kit appeared in her office, now completely used to the sensation of teleportation. James stepped to the side, wavering slightly.

  “Go get something to eat,” she said. “Then wait for me here. Make sure your direct line is open.”

  “What about these?” James asked, holding up his hands. The silvery bands gleamed in the low light.

  “I'm taking you at your word,” Kit said, unlocking his many restraints. “Everything I've read about you says you're a decent guy, James. I won't go back on my promises to you, and I won't lie. We're probably going to need you. If you skip out, I won't have the time to track you down. But a lot of people could die if you do.”

  He smiled as Kit pulled off the last band. “You put those fuckers away, and I have no reason to go. Just as long as I have time to take care of my sister.”

  It was her turn to smile. “Ac
tually, I'm going to need as much of your attention as I can get, so I'm arranging full-time care for her, as well as rehab and medical care here. I told you before we'd help, and I mean it.”

  “Thank you,” James said, briefly closing his eyes. “Uh, anyway, I'm gonna get Mexican. You want anything?”

  “Depends on where you're going,” Kit said.

  James raised an eyebrow. “Mexico.”

  Kit laughed. “Surprise me. I'll call you if I run into trouble with Nunez.”

  He was gone an eye blink later, and Kit was on the move.

  She took the back exit out of her office, wanting to avoid being seen if at all possible. The small door set in the tiny bathroom was hidden from casual inspection, meant to serve as a bolt hole in an emergency. It pivoted closed behind her as she slid down the ladder inside, coming to a stop in the private service tunnel housed in the space between the first and second floors of the main office. It was tight; she had to move forward on hands and knees. Archer would have had a much harder time.

  Kit followed the small tunnel to its eastern terminus, another ladder leading down into the facility itself. This was a better fit, as she only had to climb instead of moving forward. Less than two minutes from leaving her office, Kit found herself standing in one of the long walkway tunnels snaking through the facility like veins.

  Though it was early in the morning, she wasn't worried about Nunez not being there. The man lived in quarters inside the lab complex, after all, and was usually up before dawn working. Chances were even she would find him guzzling a cup of coffee instead of waking him.

  She jogged through the tunnel until she found one of the access panels placed at regular intervals. Kit entered her override, causing a small wedge of wall to pop out with a hiss. She entered the emergency transport section and punched in her destination.

  Kit stepped into the lobby of Research and Development five minutes later. It was strange to see the place without employees bustling about. The lighting was minimal, a handful of LED lamps recessed near floor level to give just enough illumination to see.

  She stalked silently across the smooth stone floor. A forced calm filled her, a necessary precaution. Kit knew herself well enough to know that if she allowed the enormity of Nunez's crimes to drive her, or even the personal betrayal of knowing the man had insinuated himself into her life as a friend deliberately, she would do something stupid. Probably fatal.

  The door to Nunez's private office stood open a few inches, soft light filtering into the dark hallway. Kit pushed on it gently, trying to get a look inside before committing.

  Nunez sat behind his desk, a large single piece of wood shaped and polished into an elegant set of curves. Various projects, components, and diagrams lay scattered about the space, taking up the majority of the room.

  He looked up from the touch screen embedded in the desk, and smiled. “Kitra,” he said in his usual honey-smooth accent. “This is an early morning surprise. How can I help you?”

  The pleasant tone caught her off guard for a moment. Not because it was pleasant—Nunez was infallibly polite at whatever hour—but for the nearly imperceptible false note in his tone of voice. Had she not been focused like a laser on the man, she would have missed the subtle strain in his manner, the slight creak in his words.

  He knew something was wrong. How?

  In the second it took Kit to have these thoughts, Nunez tapped something on his desk. A bolt of lightning slammed into her back, locking her muscles as she pitched forward. White hot rage flared to life inside her as the assault ended, control returning to her limbs. Kit managed to push herself into a crouch, breath coming in ragged gasps.

  She tried to curse him, but her mouth wasn't as quick to regain contact with her brain as her arms and legs had been.

  “Fascinating,” Nunez said. Kit raised her head to look at him, but saw no mockery on his face. “I calibrated that to match the curve of your power increases. I don't know that I can remember a time when my math was off.”

  He tapped the screen again, and this time the bolt made the whole world dark.

  Regaining consciousness was a slow process, made slower by Kit's unwillingness to make the trip back to the waking world. Some part of her was aware of what she faced, a testament to the level of pain her body must be enduring.

  Reluctantly, she gave up swimming against those currents and let herself surface.

  Her eyes opened along with her mouth, a scream choking off before it could escape. She looked down at her body, expecting to see burned skin if not open flame, every inch of her shrieking with the agony of being on fire.

  She wasn't. Aside from being strapped into a heavy steel chair, Kit appeared unharmed.

  “Here, allow me to help,” a voice said. Something cold touched her hand, followed by a familiar whine. The pain, all-consuming a second earlier, evaporated instantly.

  “Sorry about that,” Nunez said as he stepped back. “I didn't know your body had begun to adapt that way. You absorbed much of the second shock, but your system couldn't handle the load.”

  “What...” Kit coughed, her throat dry as any desert. “What did you do to me?”

  Nunez sat across from her, leaning against his desk. Even standing still, his manner was plainly different. A dozen little things, from the way he held himself to the expression on his face, added up to a seemingly different person.

  “First I hit you with two very high-powered taser blasts,” Nunez said, his accent and deliberately paced speech gone. “Then I locked you in that chair to keep you from taking my head off. The last bit was me hitting you with a pulse generator to knock your powers out, which forced your body to give up that extra energy.”

  Kit looked down at herself again, this time absorbing what she was seeing. The chair was the type they used to interrogate Next with enhanced strength, essentially a throne made of thick steel with heavy, long cuffs that clamped over the forearms to hold them against the arms of the chair itself. It was designed to restrain people with far more power than she could muster, so Kit didn't bother struggling.

  “Gonna torture me for information before you kill me?” Kit asked, staring daggers at Nunez.

  He looked genuinely shocked. “Kill you? Torture? I don't plan on doing either of those things, Kitra. As for information,” he said, looking slightly amused, “there isn't much you could tell me about almost anything I'm not already aware of.”

  “Then why are we having this conversation?” Kit growled. “If you aren't going to kill me, shouldn't you be running?”

  Nunez shrugged. “I can assure you, no one will be looking for me until well after we're done here. I'm willing to take the time to speak with you because that was clearly your intention. You must have questions—though I'm sure your meeting with Robinson answered many of them—and I will answer what I can.”

  Kit blinked. “How did you know about that? We weren't even in this hemisphere.”

  “Several months ago you were kind enough to swallow some experimental nanotechnology,” Nunez said. “There was a compound of my own design mixed in, which allows me to track you by satellite. As I designed the satellites, accessing them is no problem. I can do it from my phone, even.”

  “That was right after I got here,” Kit said. “You couldn't have known I would be onto you. I didn't even know until tonight.”

  Nunez waved a hand. “It wasn't hard to predict. Robinson has spent more than a decade looking for a way to bring me to justice for Fairmont. As soon as the news spread that he was appointing someone from Helix as Director, I knew it would be someone with his same sense of morality. He aimed you like a missile at me, hoping you would either discover the truth on your own or decide to come after me once he told you what happened. How else do you think you got this job, lacking administrative experience as you do?”

  Kit was unable to argue the logic. “So you admit to what you did at Fairmont.”

  Nunez nodded, regret in his eyes. “I do. It was monstrous, but necessa
ry, as I'm sure Robinson explained. A benefit of the act, of course, was to put me here. In charge of the largest collection of brilliant minds the world has ever seen.”

  “Why the fuck does that even matter?” Kit asked, forgetting herself for a moment and angrily trying to yank her hands free.

  “Be careful, or you'll injure yourself,” Nunez admonished. “To answer your question, it matters a great deal. What I did forced the world to act, to make plans and pool resources. I needed to lead the effort to address some of the many problems we face as a species. In short, Fairmont was necessary in order to avoid several catastrophic eventualities.”

  Kit shook her head. “But you stopped all the Battery Next from doing what Ray did...”

  “That was only the first—and smallest—of the problems in need of solving. I had hoped my time here would allow me the leeway to affect the necessary changes without resorting to more...extreme measures.”

  Kit was reading him the entire time, cataloging his body language and other indicators. He, like Robinson, was telling the absolute truth, so far as she could determine. “You're crazy,” Kit said. “You sound like a Bond villain.”

  “I'm not insane, Kitra,” Nunez said. “It's simply a matter of scope. Because of my unique ability, I can see and understand more than any thousand people could hope. I've been studying the world, every aspect of it, for more years than you might believe. I know more about everything than anyone else, and it all leads to one inescapable truth: if I don't act, the human race will go extinct. I have to save us.”

  Kit snorted, unable to help herself. “No, you don't sound crazy at all,” she said. “How are you planning on going about that, if you don't mind me asking?”

  Nunez sighed. “In order to set the proper variables where they need to be, I'll have to kill about seventy percent of the population.”