by Nick Thacker
“Here,” she said. “One that heads west and another that shoots up to the north.”
“Yeah,” Reggie added. “That’s all I’m seeing, too. Damn.”
“There has to be something else,” Ben said.
“Why?” Reggie asked in response. “It’s hard enough building a mine, and Garza’s not really the hospitable type. He doesn’t want company, and when he does he probably wants to keep them where he can see them.”
“Right,” Julie said. “He’ll want to be able to control the entrances and exits, so having only two — or three, if you include the way we came in — is much more manageable.”
“Okay,” Ben said. “Fine. Only two real exits. They’ll be guarded, and there’s no way we can fight our way through.”
“Especially not against whatever those Exosuit things are,” Reggie said.
“So what do we do?” Mrs. E asked.
“The same thing we always planned on doing,” Julie said. She enlarged a section of the map by using the scroll wheel on the mouse. Ben saw that the area she’d enlarged, filled with square-shaped rooms and spaces, was labeled with the letter O. “Offices. This is where Garza will be.”
“We’re still going through with the plan?” Reggie asked.
She shot him a glance that told Ben everything he needed to know.
“Why wouldn’t we?” she said. “If we take out Garza, then everything — including getting the hell out of here alive — gets easier.”
Ben nodded. “She’s got a point. His army will still be pissed and likely put up a fight, but without their leader in place, their organization will crumble.”
“Okay,” Reggie said, slapping the magazine of his assault rifle. “Let’s get to it. Down two flights of stairs and we’re dumped out into the offices? Nothing to it.”
Mrs. E and Julie stood and walked over to join Reggie and Ben near the door.
Nothing to it, Ben thought. If only it were that easy.
He turned to leave, then stopped short at the doorway.
He realized he and Reggie hadn’t been guarding the door.
“What the…”
“What is it?” Julie asked.
“Not what. Who.”
He turned to the side, revealing the person standing at the door.
Victoria Reyes.
43
Edmund
Father Edmund Canisius slammed the phone’s receiver down. This is an outrage, he thought.
He stood and paced the room, talking to himself. “All flights are full?” he said to no one. “Not even a flight to another city.”
The conference was going to be over in a day, and it appeared that everyone was planning to leave town at exactly the same time. He hadn’t previously booked an outbound flight due to the nature of his work here. Namely, because he had no idea what that work was truly supposed to be.
He took a few breaths to calm himself down. Do not overreact, Edmund. There has simply been a misunderstanding.
He knew he was still frustrated at his peers and superiors at the Vatican — they had sent him on this fruitless quest to do… something. In a foreign country where he did not know anyone, and to close a deal for which he did not understand the deliverables. Sure, his side was providing the funding, but he was still unsure of what the Orland Group was to provide.
Rebecca St. Clair had been cryptic, but nice enough. She was a polished bureaucrat, a trained executive, a role for which acting skill would be a notable plus. So it was highly possible that she had simply been playing with him, working against his emotions and confusion to extract something from him.
But… what?
He couldn’t figure out what game was being played — in what game of chess he was acting as the pawn. He knew he was one, he just didn’t know the other pieces. Was St. Clair the Queen? Or the King?
Or was she one of the players?
The call with the front desk of the hotel offered little to calm his nerves. The woman’s voice, while soothing, was laced with exhaustion, and he knew he was only exacerbating things by asking over and over again whether she could book him a flight back to Rome. It was an antiquated way of doing things, but Edmund knew of no other way. His assistants usually did that sort of thing back home, and he was simply given the itinerary.
It was becoming more and more clear to him that he was here in Peru because he had ruffled someone’s feathers in the Vatican. It was not an uncommon thing, but to force him to travel around the world, tasked with signing a deal that was all but finished, without the means to seek help from anyone around him, was another thing altogether.
He had upset someone, but he wasn’t sure who. Nor did he know what exactly he had done. Was he here to make a mockery of himself? To expose to the world just how little of the world he understood? He was a man of the cloth, and he took his faith seriously, but he couldn’t understand what God would be asking of him in this moment.
He turned to the phone once again, and reached for the number he had hastily scribbled onto a notecard a few days ago.
He picked up the phone, waited for the dial tone, and then dialed the number. He didn’t expect anyone to answer, but he heard the connection by the third ring.
“Hello, this is Rebecca St. Clair.”
“Hello, uh — Ms. St. Clair? This is Father —”
“Edmund!” the woman on the other end seemed positively joyous to be hearing from him. She is like a politician, he thought. Trying to make me feel good.
“Yes, hello,” he continued. “I was, uh, wondering if you received the transaction?”
“Indeed, Father. Thank you. All is well.”
“Wonderful. In that case, I was hoping we might be able to wrap up this —”
“We need to sign the papers, Father. Remember? The contract is not yet signed, and we are scheduled to meet in another day.”
He knew. Tomorrow evening, to be precise. At the same restaurant they’d met previously. But he didn’t know why they had to wait so long. Can we not simply sign the contract and then be done with it?
“I know you are interested to get back to the Vatican,” Rebecca said. “And I apologize for the fanfare and charade, but it is crucial that we adhere to the timeline.”
Father Canisius mustered up a small bit of courage from somewhere inside. “Why?”
It came out blunt, and, he guessed, rather rude.
“Well, Father, because that is what our stakeholders and investors have requested.”
He nodded to himself. A blunt response to a blunt question. It didn’t answer anything, really, and they both knew it.
“And I am glad you called — you must have received the updated instructions from your superiors?”
Canisius frowned. Updated instructions? And who were these superiors? He worked with an office of cardinals and bishops, as well as assistants and program directors from the layman sector. Someone was pulling the strings — his strings — and it did not sit well with him.
He cleared his throat, attempting to feign knowledge of what exactly she was talking about. He wished, in that moment, that he was as savvy with technology as he was with scripture. He should have had some way to check emails, be it on a cellular phone or a laptop. As it was, he had planned to get to the hotel’s business center on the way to dinner to log in and check in with his Vatican office, but he hadn’t done that yet.
“I, uh, apologize,” he finally said. “I have not.”
There was a pause on the other end, and he heard the muffled sound of St. Clair speaking with someone else.
“I believe it is my turn to apologize, Father,” she said. “I was informed earlier this morning that your presence will be requested at the time of purchase.”
“I do not even know what it is we are purchasing.”
“Of course,” she said. “Yet that is what the updated itinerary states. The parties have personally requested your presence.”
He squeezed the area above his nose. So much for catching an early fligh
t home. “And just where is this transaction going to take place?”
He hadn’t intended to sound so irritated, but he knew it was no secret that he was frustrated. St. Clair might not be playing him, but someone was. And whomever it might be — whomever was calling the shots back in the Vatican — was going to have a long conversation with Edmund when he returned.
“I apologize, but I must be going. All the information you need is in the itinerary update, and I am told you have been emailed personally with the request.”
He thanked St. Clair and hung up the phone.
He needed to clear his mind, to try and make sense of this. Someone wanted him to be in Peru, but did not want him to know why he was there. He didn’t like the feeling of being a pawn in someone else’s game, nor did he care for the implications that he was disposable.
He decided to take a walk. He could log into the hotel’s computer on his way out, and perhaps the itinerary email would give him more information. He wasn’t sure he would be able to do anything with that information, but it was information nonetheless.
44
Julie
Julie rushed forward and embraced Victoria. “Oh, my God,” she said. “I thought you — I didn’t know you were still alive.”
Victoria stood straight, not embracing Julie. When Julie released her, the woman seemed to relax a bit and exhale, though her eyes seemed to be looking straight through her.
Weird.
“Follow me,” Victoria said.
Julie turned to Ben and waited for his reaction. Her husband didn’t move at first, and Julie wondered if he’d even heard her. Julie was about to nudge Ben when he turned to her. “What do you think?” he asked.
Before she could respond, Reggie jumped in. “Do you know a way down? Besides the stairs? Somewhere there won’t be a bunch of your dad’s army men crawling around?”
Victoria nodded.
“Great — let’s move.”
“Reggie,” Julie said, her voice wavering.
But he was already gone. Victoria led Reggie and Mrs. E out of the room, to the right.
Julie grabbed Ben’s arm before they left. “Ben,” she whispered. “Something’s not right.”
“Yeah,” he said. “We’re in an ancient mine, being chased by mutant machines, and —”
“No,” she said. “I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about her. Victoria.”
Ben frowned. “What do you mean?”
“She’s… not right. Something about her seems off.”
Ben paused for a second, then looked down at Julie. “She’s our best option, Jules. At least for now. Let’s try to see what she knows — she’s been here longer than we have.”
“That’s exactly my —”
Ben pulled Julie out of the room and in the direction they’d seen Victoria and the others moving. Julie had assumed the hallway ended there, in the dark and shadowy corner of the mountain base, but she noticed that Victoria was pressing her hand up against the wall, and the wall itself appeared to be moving.
It danced and swayed, and then Victoria stepped through it. Reggie and Mrs. E followed closely behind.
“What the hell?” Ben said. “How did she —”
“It’s a curtain,” Julie said. “We must have missed it.”
Julie stepped forward and pressed her own hand against it. Sure enough, what she’d thought was a wall of stone was nothing more than a heavy piece of burlap fabric, the same grayish color as the rest of the walls. In the low light spilling out from the communications and video room they’d just exited, the fabric faux wall was identical to the others.
“Trippy,” Ben said as he stepped through next to Julie.
They found themselves in another hallway, this one darker than the one they’d just exited, but Victoria had retrieved a flashlight from her pocket and was pointing it down the tunnel. Julie saw that the stone here was like the entrance tunnel they’d ascended, the one that had connected the drainage shaft to the rest of Garza’s base.
The stone seemed weathered, and it had a lighter, more brown color. She wanted to examine it with her dive light, but Victoria was leading them quickly down the slightly descending passageway toward what appeared to be an intersection.
“I didn’t see any of this on the map,” Ben whispered.
Julie shook her head. “Me, neither. I think it’s part of the original mine.”
“Yeah, what did they mine here, anyway?”
“No idea. Beale’s guys said they weren’t sure — there aren’t any official records of what type of mine this was, but judging by the others in the area they figured it was silver or copper.”
“Hmm. Yeah, I just don’t see any ‘mine’-y stuff, like tracks. Or mine carts.”
“Or trolls or dwarves,” Julie said, chuckling. “It’s not like we’re mine experts, Ben. Just because we don’t see any stereotypical mining apparatus doesn’t mean there wasn’t ever any of that stuff here.”
“True,” he said. “But I feel like we’d know if we were in a mine, you know?”
“Maybe. Anyway, these walls are like those other ones we saw. Like a different type of stone or something.”
“Older,” Ben said. “Way older. We’re in one of the original shafts. The rock could even be of a different composition, or it had more or less contact with natural subterranean water, so there’s a completely different style of deposits here.”
“Whatever it is, it feels different. And that brings me back to Victoria. She’s just… off.”
“She’s been acting strange since our wedding.”
Julie thought about this for a moment as the group hustled along the shaft. “Yeah, that’s fair. But it seems like we’re missing something else.”
“We’re always missing something else,” Ben said. “At least, it feels like that. We’re always getting in over our heads with stuff like this, and end up having to play catch-up.”
“At least we’re alive.”
Victoria turned and entered a room to the right — one that had a door crudely mounted on it. To her credit, Julie thought she saw the woman looking both directions before entering, no doubt looking for any of the Ravenshadow men who might be patrolling these forgotten corridors.
She ushered Reggie, Mrs. E, and Ben into the room, all of whom had their guns drawn and at the ready, waiting for any sign of a Ravenshadow ambush. Julie had a sidearm, but it was still holstered at her waist. As she passed her friend, Julie flashed the dive light into her eyes.
“Are you okay, Victoria?” Julie asked.
Victoria seemed confused. Her eyes flitted left and right very quickly, very slightly, but they didn’t seem affected by the light shining into them. Even her very demeanor was an oxymoron. She appeared to be off-balance a bit, like a stone statue on uneven ground. Her hands were steady, matching her eyes, but they were almost too steady.
“Victoria,” she said again. “Are you —”
Victoria pushed Julie a bit into the room, then slammed the door shut.
“What —”
“Oh, for the love of God,” she heard Reggie shout from behind her.
I knew it, she thought. I knew it.
Julie grasped for a handle, but realized that the door’s inside didn’t have one. Her hands slid against the rough surface of the shoddy wooden door, trying to find purchase.
“Push it back open!” Reggie yelled. He and Mrs. E rushed forward.
Julie heard a sound she immediately recognized. A lock.
“Victoria!” she shouted.
But instead of a response, she heard another sound. A deeper, heavier sound. It sounded like metal-on-metal.
Or…
Metal on stone.
“She’s dragging something in front of the door!” Julie shouted. “Hurry!”
Ben and Mrs. E looked around the room, using their lights to look for something to use to push the door back open. Julie knew they wouldn’t find anything. She and Reggie started kicking at the door haphazardl
y until Reggie pulled her gently away.
“We need to take turns. Aim for the center of the door, just off the side of where the handle should be. That’s the structural part, and if we can kick through that, we —”
She didn’t let him finish. She reared back and slammed her boot, still a bit soggy from their dive, into the bulk of the door. It didn’t move.
The sound of metal dragging outside came to an end, and Julie could almost sense the weight of whatever object had been placed in front of the door.
Sure enough, her second kick seemed to land on pure stone. It felt like kicking a boulder; the impact of her boot — even Reggie’s, when he tried — hardly resonated through the room. Their kicks were nothing but dull thuds, the heavy rubber soles nothing against the massive friction of the obstacle.
“We’re locked in,” Reggie said. “Shit!”
“She tricked us,” Ben said, his voice low and his breathing heavy. “You were right, Julie.”
But Julie was barely listening. She was now pacing the room in the darkness, trying to put the pieces together.
She had some theories previously, just inklings of ideas, but she hadn’t been able to formulate a cohesive hypothesis.
Until now.
Her mind raced — what she knew of Victoria, what she remembered from their past encounters, her own memories.
And what she knew of Victoria’s father.
“It wasn’t Victoria,” she finally said.
Everyone stopped talking and turned to face her. “What are you talking about, Jules?” Reggie asked. “I saw her — she’s right outside --”
“No, no. I know it’s her. But she’s not the one who did this.”
