63
Near Dupont Circle, Washington, DC
USA
JON SMITH SIFTED THROUGH the piles of dirty dishes, selecting the only glass clean enough to see through and filling it from the sink. He leaned against the counter, staring vacantly at a wall of yellowing pizza boxes as he considered what Zellerbach had said.
Was the discovery real or just another delusion? His mild clinical paranoia had caused all kinds of problems in the past, including a lengthy episode when he thought people were putting poisonous spiders in his locker. When it came to computers and technology, though, his vision tended to be a hell of a lot clearer. Crystal, in fact.
Randi appeared in the doorway and leaned against the jamb. “So what now, boss?”
“I don’t know,” Smith admitted.
“The cat’s just about all the way out of the bag. I’m not sure we can stuff it back in.”
She was right. There was no way that Zellerbach was going to just let this go. All his other psychological issues paled in comparison with his obsession over intellectual closure. Left unresolved, this mystery would slowly drive him into a frenzy and eventually make it out onto the Internet.
“We’re going to have to call Fred, Randi.”
She shook her head. “What if he orders us to drop it again? What do we do with Marty?”
Smith took a sip of his water, trying to overcome the growing dryness from his mouth. It was the million-dollar question: What do we do with Marty?
Once again, he’d inadvertently put his friend in danger. But this time that danger came from the people he worked for. Both Klein and the president were good men, but they had responsibilities that far outweighed one reclusive, unstable computer hacker. What lengths would they go to in order to make sure none of this ever saw the light of day?
“Look, I want to know what this is as much as you,” Smith admitted. “But if Marty can’t figure out a way to do a simulation, my people certainly won’t be able to.”
“He said we should test it out on his neighbor who keeps calling the cops on him.”
“That may not be an ideal plan.”
She shrugged. “Probably not. But we need something. A vague report of a bunch of doodads moving at the same time isn’t all that compelling. It’s going to be too easy for Fred to walk away from.”
He took another sip from the dirty glass. “The head of my tech team is a good man who’ll back me. If I tell him to take credit for the discovery, then it becomes a military issue.”
“An issue you’re dead-ended on. Marty can’t figure out a way to simulate it and neither could Dresner if the graves in North Korea are any indication.”
“You’re suggesting we try to get to the man himself?”
“That seems a lot like jumping into a pool without checking if there’s water in it. He went through a lot of trouble to hide something in this system and he hasn’t historically been a big fan of the military.”
“You think it could be something dangerous?”
“I don’t know. Maybe we should ask the people in Division D. Oh, yeah, we can’t. They’re all dead.”
Once again, she was right. His loyalty to the president and admiration for Dresner were preventing him from staring at this thing clear-eyed. The bottom line was that they needed to know what that hidden system did so they could take it to Klein. And they needed to know now.
“I guess I’m going to have to volunteer then,” Smith said, “We’ll test it on me.”
“Always the selfless hero,” Randi replied, digging in her pocket for a quarter. “Tell you what. We’ll flip for it.”
She was about to toss the coin when something that sounded like a air raid siren started wailing through the house. A moment later a sultry woman’s voice came over hidden speakers. “Intruder alert, Marty. Intruder alert.”
They ran back into Zellerbach’s office and found him staring into a monitor displaying multiple feeds from cameras on his property.
“Do you know who they are?” he said in a shaking voice.
A man had come over the hedge next to the gate and another two were over on what appeared to be the south side. One more was already moving toward a gazebo rotting away at the back of the house. The cameras’ light amplification created a bit of distortion, but not enough that Smith couldn’t immediately identify all of them as pros. Their long coats swept back almost in unison, displaying a glimpse of body armor as they pulled out American-made assault rifles. One of them seemed to be talking and his head moved in subtle, vaguely unnatural jerks. They were Merged up.
“Are the defense systems you used against us activated?”
Zellerbach nodded. “They’re automatic.”
Randi moved closer to the screen. “Is that the best you’ve got? Is there anything more deadly?”
“Deadly? No. Of course not.”
“Call the police,” Smith said as a turret rose from the ground and started firing paintballs at the man near the gate. “These kind of guys live and breathe anonymity. The sirens might scare them off.”
“The police won’t come. I have this sort of feud with some of my…” His voice faded when a man sprinted across the dying grass and disappeared into the same trap Randi had.
“One down,” she said as two others started firing at the turret tracking them. The man by the gazebo went for the house and tripped the weapon Smith dreaded above all the others. A flounder rocketed out of a skeet launcher and caught him in the side of the face hard enough to knock him to the ground.
“Are there any more underground traps that we could funnel them toward?” Randi asked.
“No. Just the paintball guns, some flash grenades, and stink bombs. Oh, and a couple of pressure washers that I haven’t really been able to get the targeting working on. It’s a fluid dynamics issue. The force of the water is kind of unpredictable in the way it—”
“So you’re telling us that in about thirty seconds, these guys are going to realize none of this crap can hurt them and come right for the front door,” Smith said. “You’ve still got the Mace that shoots out there, though, right?”
Zellerbach shook his head miserably. “I got sued over it and one of the provisions of the settlement was that I had to disable it. Stupid Girl Scouts…”
“What about other weapons? Do you have any in the house?” Randi said, pulling out her Beretta. That and her ever-present blade were all they had. Once again, Smith had left the house unarmed.
“No.”
“What about the back way out,” Smith said. “Is that still there?”
Zellerbach seemed to be having trouble concentrating. He had an uncanny ability to apply laser-like focus to one thing at a time, but was easily overwhelmed. “Yes.”
On screen, one of the men took fire and went down on the same slippery sheet of plastic that Smith had.
“Then get us the hell out of here, Marty.”
Zellerbach grabbed something that looked like a television remote and they followed him into the bathroom, where he punched a sequence of commands into the device. A moment later, the bathtub started to rise and a trapdoor beneath slid open. Randi dropped into the crawl space first, followed by Zellerbach and then Smith. The hatch closed above them and emergency lights came on as they moved into an abandoned sewer pipe. It ran a few hundred meters before dead-ending into a ladder leading to another trapdoor.
They climbed quietly, exiting into the pitch-dark interior of a similar bungalow that Zellerbach owned on the next street. The lights snapped on and Smith was about to tell Zellerbach to shut them off again when he realized that his old friend wasn’t responsible.
James Whitfield moved away from the switch holding a Colt in his right hand. A quick glance behind confirmed that Randi was similarly covered by two men with assault rifles.
“I’ve underestimated you in the past,” Whitfield said. “But I think you’ll find that I learn from my mistakes.”
Randi was completely ignoring the retired marine, instead staring furiously at the red-haired man holding a gun on her. “So you’ve gone over to the other side, huh, Deuce?”
The young soldier frowned and gave a disappointed shake of his head. “What other side, Randi? We need the Merge and you’re doing everything you can to screw that up. All the major wants is to make sure we’re the best-equipped army in the world.”
Whitfield activated an old-fashioned throat mike beneath the collar of his dress shirt. “We’ve got them. Pull back to defensive positions.”