Michael tuned the guy out. That seed in his gut had blossomed into full-fledged panic, slicking the palms of his hands with sweat and making his throat feel stuffed with cotton. The waiting was going to drive him crazy.
Finally, the door of the cop car popped open and swiveled upward on its hinges. An armored man stepped out of the vehicle, his suit the standard bulky black of the police, the visor on his helmet pulled down to cover his face. Michael understood why cops in this part of the city wanted to protect themselves, but it still made him nervous. He had visions of this guy pulling him out of the car and beating him with those black gloves until he bled head to toe—the man looked more like a robotic monster than a human.
The cop walked around to the driver’s side of the cab and rapped on the window. The cabbie waited a beat before he rolled it down—probably just to prove that he could.
“What’s the problem, Officer?” he asked, his tone neutral, like he’d done this a thousand times. “There’s no way I was speeding, and I’ve got all my permits.”
The visor muffled the cop’s voice a bit, but it still had a menacing ring. “I need you to sit there and keep your mouth shut, sir. Think you can do that? Do you think you can do that for me? Sir?”
Michael could only see the back of the cabbie’s head, but the muscles along his neck tensed and he didn’t respond. At least, not vocally. Just a short, stiff nod.
“That’s better,” the cop replied. “Now I’m going to need your nice law-abiding passengers to step out of the car. And make it snappy.”
He had them line up against the cold brick wall of an old building. Michael felt the rough edges of the poorly done mortar job poking through his shirt. The cop refused to lift his visor, making him seem even more like a robot to Michael. He remembered the robot in the Sleep, the one who’d programmed out his Core—ripped it out even though as a Tangent he hadn’t really needed one—which made him think of Kaine. What if he was somehow behind this supposed traffic stop?
Please, no, Michael begged the universe. How could Kaine be that powerful? He refused to allow himself to believe it. But even so, he looked at the cop and wondered if he was a Tangent come to life.
“What are your names?” the man asked, just as a section of his visor lit up. Michael could see symbols and pictures running across the inside. “And before you answer, I’m only going to say this once: Do. Not. Lie. Do not. You have one chance to tell me the truth. Now, what are your names?”
Sarah went first, then Bryson, then Michael. They’d all been busted more times than Michael could count within the VirtNet. And they’d always gotten away, just a few lines of code combined with the calm and cool … massaging of the truth. It was a little different in the real world, but the principles were the same. One by one, they gave their fake names as smoothly as if they’d used them their whole lives.
The cop grunted some odd sound that perhaps meant he was listening and recording. But it came across more like he was a monkey with stomach issues.
“We had some reports of a sighting,” the cop said, walking slowly down the line of his captors. He stopped directly in front of Michael and stared at him—it seemed so, anyway—through his dark visor. “Of one Jackson Porter, missing for close to two weeks. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you? What was your name again? Ah, yes. Michael. What do you have to say, boy? Seen anybody that looks like a cyber-terrorist?”
Every part of Michael wanted to close his eyes and access the code. Hack himself out of the situation. He suddenly wished for his old life as a Tangent, oblivious and happy. Lying to this cop seemed like a terrible idea, especially since the man had probably recognized his face, but he just didn’t know what else to do.
“No, sir,” he said. “I’ve seen the NewsBops, heard about this Jackson guy. But I haven’t seen him. Have you guys seen him?” He looked at his friends for their response, knowing he’d already made a mistake, that he’d come across as a smart aleck to the policeman. Bryson and Sarah shyly shook their heads, but he could see in their eyes that they knew Michael had screwed up. Maybe they should’ve just told the truth and relied on the authorities to keep them safe.
The cop finally lifted his visor, revealing the face of a guy who was born to be a man of the law. Stone-hard angles, eyes that were pools of unreadable darkness. He didn’t seem too happy.
“Get in the hovercar,” he said tightly. “All three of you. One wrong move and I’ll LaserCuff you. I’m not in the greatest of moods today.”
The cabbie yelled over at them from his car. “Hey! Officer! Can I leave? Please?”
“Get lost!” the cop yelled back at him.
Obviously happy to oblige, the cabbie squealed away down the street. Michael watched the cab disappear, along with all his hopes.