D-Bar jabbed a finger at the screens. "What, this wasn't enough for you?"
"Cheer up, son," Saxon offered. "You'll get to see it from the sharp end for a change, yeah?"
Anna listened to the interchange and it was as if she were falling away from it all, being left behind with every passing moment. When she spoke, the words came of their own accord, without her conscious control. "I'm going, too." Anna searched herself for a good, convincing reason, but she came up empty. All she could grasp was the distant, undying anger deep in her chest.
Powell shot her a look. "No. We don't need you."
"How about she goes and I stay?" offered D-Bar.
"I have to!" she insisted, with a force that came from nowhere. Anna went on, her voice rising. "I've been chasing the Tyrants for months! I've thrown away everything-"
"Kelso is right," Saxon broke in abruptly. "She should be part of the team. We can use her."
"How, exactly?" Powell demanded.
Saxon made a look-see gesture. "She saw the faces of the Tyrants. Two sets of eyes, mate." He gave Anna a look that was unreadable. "Right?" he asked her.
"Right," she repeated. "Yes."
Powell seemed as if he was about to argue, but Saxon gave him a look and tapped his wristwatch. "We don't really have time to waste arguing, do we?"
"Get the veetol and head for the shore," said Lebedev, ending the debate. "I'll contact you with the details once you're airborne."
CHAPTER TWELVE
Cape Charles-Virginia-United States of America
The veetol was an old air-ambulance model stripped to the bare metal, a bulky and ungainly thing like a fat gull borne up on bright thruster nozzles that spat exhaust from the wingtips. They flew fast and low, following the line of the canal from Baltimore, until the river mouth opened up before them. Saxon felt it in the pit of his gut as the veetol rose up in a near-vertical ascent, trading altitude for thrust. He made an attempt to glance out the porthole; along with the Kelso woman and the hacker, Saxon was crammed into the rear of the flyer with Powell and four of his men from the New Sons. None of them looked like soldiers of any stripe he thought worthy of the name; they had a different air to them, which reminded him of the feral intensity of the gang kids he'd grown up with on the streets of North London. He pegged them for ex-cons or militia types. Kelso sat with her head down, lost in her own thoughts.
D-Bar gave him a smile that was all fake bravado. "What's wrong? Don't like flying?"
Saxon didn't allow himself to dwell on the similarity between this veetol and the one he'd rode into the wilderness six months ago. "Something like that," he offered. It was a tight fit in here, and he was starting to get tired of it. "Hey, Powell!" He had to shout to the other man to make himself heard over the roar of the engines.
Powell had the distracted look of someone using a comm implant. He glanced at Saxon but said nothing.
He nodded at the FR-27 rifle slung over the man's chest. "Do I get a weapon?"
"I only give guns to people I trust."
"What are we doing?" Saxon went on. "As cozy as this is, we can't fly to Switzerland in this thing."
Powell smiled thinly, reacting to something only he heard. "Don't sweat it," he called back. "Our ride is here." He jerked his thumb at the porthole.
For a moment, Saxon couldn't see what he was talking about; then his perception caught up with what he was looking at, and the shape he'd thought was just another churn of storm clouds took on a different aspect.
From out of the easterly front emerged a massive, elongated ellipse. Lined with fins and stabilators, great hoops hung from its flanks, the centers of them blurred by the motion of wide, fluted rotor blades. Along the flank of the aircraft he saw a blue-on-blue livery and the name: LEBEDEV AIRCARGO.
"Whoa!" said D-Bar, crowding in to take a look, "Cargo zep… Good cover." He trailed off as he thought it through. "But… how are we gonna get on board?"
Powell was getting to his feet. "Not the easy way."
The veetol's deck dipped and the hull of the airship rose to fill the window. The other men were securing their gear, checking straps and gear pockets. Kelso met Saxon's gaze with a questioning look and he gave her a shrug as a reply.
D-Bar turned to him, catching on. "He's not serious-"
A red light flashed and along the side of the veetol, a seam opened to peel back a long drop-hatch. Cold air howled into the cargo space and
Saxon felt his gut tighten. He closed his eyes and for a moment he was remembering blackness and the shriek of wind.
The dorsal hull of the airship drifted past below them, a curved stretch of ridged aluminum as wide as a football field. He saw guide rails set into the metal and thick maintenance cables. The veetol dropped, almost bumping into the hull of the cargo carrier as a gust of wind pulled at the wings.
Two of Powell's men went first, the gale-force airstream catching them. Before Saxon could stop him, Powell went forward and shouldered D Bar out through the open hatch. The hacker screamed as he fell, but the men on the hull were there to grab him.
Powell turned on Kelso and shouted, "You should stay behind. Go back with the flyer."
Saxon saw the shift of emotions on her face and she shoved the man out of her way. She dropped from the veetol, a flash of panic on her face and then she was down and safe, clinging to the guides.
"You next" Powell ordered.
Saxon frowned and made the drop; it was less than a meter and a half of open air, but a sudden burst of wind shear hit him like a punch in the gut. He felt his foot touch the curve of the hull and slip out from under. His balance wasn't there and he was falling.
Suddenly, slender but strong fingers were gripping his wrist tightly. It gave him the moment he needed, and Saxon's cyberarm snagged a cable and held fast. He turned his head to see Kelso holding him steady with no little effort.
Saxon nodded his thanks and scrambled back up the curve of the hull. Powell and the last of his men dropped to the deck as the veetol curved away, and he led them forward to a windbreak and a hatch set flush with the hull. D-Bar barged his way to the front and made sure he was first in. The rest of them followed suit. The hatch slammed shut as he dropped into the airship's maintenance bay, cutting out the roaring cold. He frowned; his face was raw with windburn.
"You okay?" Kelso asked.
He nodded and gestured to his cyberlegs. "It's these new pins. Still working out the gyro synch. Thanks for the assist, though. Hope you didn't strain anything."
"It was just reflex," she snapped, suddenly terse.
"One suh-skydive without a chute is enough f-for anyone," said D-Bar, fighting back the shivers.
"Can't argue with you there," Saxon replied, with feeling.
"Okay, listen up," Powell ordered. "The zep crew know the drill. They don't ask, we don't tell. The ship'll make a speed-run over the
Greenland-Iceland-UK gap and then on down to Switzerland." He looked at them all in turn. "We need to be ready to go the moment we reach
Geneva, so I advise you all to get some rest, because the moment we touch down, we don't stop until the Tyrants are dealt with, you read me?"
The other men gave a chorus of nods, and Saxon glanced at D-Bar. The young hacker was quivering and wiping tears from his ruddy face.
"Wow," he managed, crack-throated, "that was some rush, huh?"
"Get below," said Powell, cutting off any reply.
Geneva International Airport-Grand-Saconnex-Switzerland
It was late evening, and a light drizzle was falling in desultory waves across the gray runway and the aircraft apron. Namir listened to the rattle of the raindrops off the apex of the open hangar cowling overhead; the wide, low metal shed was dimly lit so as not to draw attention from the civilian traffic passing only a few hundred meters from the nose cone of the Tyrant aircraft parked within. Once again, the jet's livery had been reprogrammed and reconfigured to conceal its true nature. Currently it wore the black and gold of the private military contractor Belltow
er.
The PMC had a long-standing relationship with the Swiss government that proved a useful cover for the Tyrants. They would be left to their own devices.
Namir walked the length of the aircraft, casting a glance across the darkened hangar to where Hermann and Barrett were working at the back of an unmarked commercial van. The ruin of the German's right eye was hidden under an adhesive patch, but he showed no signs of suffering for the injury. Namir didn't intervene; they knew their jobs, and after the recent incident on board the plane, they knew better than to do anything that might be considered a further failure of their duties. He reached the jet's cargo hatch and halted, studying the door. The seal was undamaged, but there were clear signs of surface damage around the hinges and opening mechanism. It had never been designed to be operated while airborne.
He sensed someone approaching and turned. Federova walked toward him, folding down a hood from her dark hair, flicking rain from her shoulders. Her expression was unreadable, but Namir knew her well enough to see the irritation lurking there. She didn't enjoy the surveillance operations; she liked the hunt and the kill better than the stalking. "You're late," he said.
She looked up and saw the same scarring on the hull, and cast a questioning look at him. He smiled slightly. Yelena loved the sound of her own silence; sometimes it seemed as if he had never known her to speak at all.
"It's nothing of concern," he noted. "I'm afraid Ben Saxon made a decision to part company with us. He chose the time and place rather poorly."
Her eyes narrowed and she made a throat-cutting gesture.
"Likely." He held out a hand, changing the subject. "So. Give it to me."
Federova produced a small digital slate from her pocket and handed it over. Namir tapped the screen and scrolled through the images in the memory. The display was full of shots of the Metropol Grande, one of the more opulent of Geneva's great hotels. The footage highlighted locations for monitor cameras and security posts around the front entrance and throughout the underground garage beneath the building; others showed corridors on the executive penthouse level, accessways, and the like. The last image was at an angle, a surreptitious shot captured in a moment of opportunity. In the frame was an older man flanked by a coterie of bodyguards and personal assistants. The profile of
William Taggart's face was unmistakable. He scanned the other people in the frame, measuring them against himself, looking for anything that could be a threat. Some of the faces he was already familiar with from the files that Temple had supplied to the Tyrants; there was Isaias
Sandoval, the Humanity Front's right-hand man and chief of staff alongside Taggart's personal assistant Elaine Peller, and a few others. Not one of them possessed even the most basic of augmentations. Namir wasn't foolish enough to believe that his implants made him invulnerable, but they did make him superior. Quite how these people believed they could ever hope to protect themselves from the threats of this world threats like the Tyrants-was beyond him.
"Good work," he told her. The rest of the slate's memory was filled with copies of itinerary files and route maps, but the majority of that data had already been in the hands of the unit for some time. "Take this to Gunther. Make sure there are no last-minute variables, then help him secure the payload."
She walked off, casting a sideways look as she crossed paths with Hardesty coming the other way. The operative ran a hand over his bald pate.
"Ice queen's back, huh?" He watched her traverse the hangar. "So, I guess that means we still have a green light?"
"We still have a green light," Namir repeated. "Gunther can function, despite his injury. This sanction is too critical to the group for postponement. It must go ahead." Hardesty nodded, but he didn't leave. After a moment, Namir spoke again. "Was there something else you wanted to say, Scott?"
The other man folded his thin arms over his chest. "I was right about Saxon."
"Yes, you were." Namir met his gaze and waited for the rest of it.
Hardesty didn't disappoint. "He was weak. He never had the steel for this work. You made the wrong call-"
"Enough," Namir silenced him. "What do you want from me? An apology?"
"You misread him, and it almost cost us the operation!" Hardesty was emboldened by Namir's admission of error, and he was pushing it.
"Do you know why I wanted him to join us?" said Namir. The ice in his tone chilled the air between them. "It's because he had a code of conduct, Scott. Unlike you. Because this unit needs balance."
Hardesty was on the verge of launching into an argument, but he caught himself before he said something he might have regretted. As much as he was a braggart, Hardesty wasn't foolish enough to cross swords with Jaron Namir. Instead, he allowed himself a belligerent smile. "Balance, huh?" He glanced up at the scarred hull of the jet. "Look what that got you," he said, walking away.
Aerial Transit Corridor-Maury Sea Channel-North Atlantic
It was cold inside the airship's cavernous cargo bay. Faint layers of frost gathered on the sides of the container pods filling the length of the compartment. Breath emerged from Saxon's mouth in streams of white vapor as he walked the length of the companionway; the Caidin replacements for his lower legs were starting to bed in at last, and he'd used the downtime to get himself back into fighting condition. He didn't want a repeat of what happened when they boarded.
Powell and his men kept close to the aft service bay, where noisy electric motors fed the airships rotors and kept the area a little warmer than the rest of the cargo spaces. Without comment, he crossed into the group and helped himself to a couple of cheap YouLike self-heating coffee cans and power bars.
He found Kelso on her own, huddled inside a solar foil blanket. She was miles away, her gaze fixed on a brass coin as she turned it over and over in her fingers. She looked up as he approached and palmed the coin, as if she'd been caught doing something wrong. He held out a can and she took it, striking the base on the deck to get the thermal tab working.
Saxon dropped into a lotus settle and did the same, tossing her one of the bars. She unwrapped it with her teeth, waiting for him to speak; he tried to frame the question the right way, then finally gave up.
He nodded at her hand, where she had the coin. "How long have you been clean?" When she didn't answer straight away, he went on. "S'okay. I know what the chip is for…" He drifted off, frowning at himself.
Kelso studied him. "You were in the program?"
He shook his head. "Not me. My old man." He made a drinking motion with the can. "He didn't do that well with it."
"Stims. For a while." Her eyes narrowed; she was taking this as a challenge. "It doesn't make me weak," she told him.
"Of course not" he replied. "If anything, they give you the chip, it means you're stronger, yeah?"
"Yeah." She didn't sound convinced by her reply.
He swigged at the coffee and made a face. It tasted like someone had stubbed a cigarette out in it; but it was hot, and that was what counted.
Saxon leaned forward. "You don't think you can trust me." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "Like Powell and the rest. You think I'm marked."
"After everything that's happened to me over the past few months, I'd question my own family." She grimaced as she took a pull from the can, then shot him a look. "Why'd you lie to Powell?"
"About what?"
"When I said I wanted to come. You told him I'd seen the faces of the Tyrants. That's stretching the truth."
"You saw Federova and lived to talk about it. Trust me, love, there's not a lot of folks can say that."
Her eyes narrowed. "Her and one other." Kelso's lips thinned. "I need you to tell me something. Washington, D.C., the hit on Skyler. Were you one of them?"
The question came out of nowhere and he took a second to follow it through. "When?" Kelso told him the date and he shook his head, his gut tightening as an old, hateful memory made itself known. "No. I was halfway around the world that day, trying not to die. Namir recruited me af
terward. He was a man down, he said." He eyed her. "Were you responsible for that?" He thought about Wexler, the man he had replaced, and the lines of invisible influence that had brought him to this place at this moment.
She ignored the question. "Why did you lie?" she repeated.
He gestured at his eyes. "You got the same look I see in the mirror. You're like me. You're looking for someone to pay a butcher's bill."
"They killed a man who saved my life," she said, her gaze becoming distant. "Did it right in front of me. And I couldn't do a damn thing. Then the Illuminati's proxies covered it up and buried him under the lies." Kelso shook her head. "I couldn't let that stand."
"Illuminati" Saxon turned the word over, sounding it out, connecting it with what he knew. "Namir called them 'the group,' like he was afraid to say any more. They're the ones pulling the strings, signing the death warrants, fronting the cash…" He sneered. "I've heard the name. Some bullshit secret society, something outta trashy thrillers… only not." The soldier considered it. "Makes a cold kinda sense, when you think about it. Ghost orders and missions that never were… men and women sacrificed for the sake of keeping the shadows long."
"If what Janus says is true, these people are positioning themselves to manipulate… everything. The future of humanity. The creation of a new world order."
"Maybe so." Saxon looked back at her. "But you want to know something?"
"Go on." Kelso clasped the heated coffee can, drinking in the scant warmth from it.
"I don't give a fuck about all that shit." He shook his head. "I'm a blunt instrument, me, I'm not a clever bastard like the kid or Lebedev." Saxon nodded toward the others. "I've got a very simple need, and it's the same as yours. I want some bloody payback."
She looked away. "I… I'll tell you what I need, what I want. I want my life back. I want to go home. I don't want to have to know any of this!"
Her voice rose suddenly. "Because now I can't walk away!"
"Ignorance is bliss, isn't it?" said another voice. Saxon looked up as D-Bar approached. He looked pale and sweaty.
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