Aimee moaned quietly as she dozed. She had paced her cell for the early hours of her confinement, pausing to try to eavesdrop on the interrogation taking place across the hall. She heard Major Zander’s sharp tones but had difficulty making out the words; North’s voice never grew above a low rumble as the MPs came and went. Major Zander might have gone out for a time as well, but if so it had been after she had decided to lie down on the concrete-hard cot.
From the cot she could hear even less of what unfolded across the corridor, but she realized that none of it mattered. If they could never confirm that North was guilty, she felt confident that at some point they would at least decide that she herself had not participated in his crimes. She could prove it if they would give her access to a computer. It might take a while, but eventually she would be released.
Aimee rolled that calming mantra around in her mind and tried to make herself believe it was the truth. She had lain there, just breathing and reassuring herself, until she had drifted off to sleep with murmurings and occasional bursts of violence as her lullaby, all coming to her from North’s cell.
A shout woke her.
She clung urgently to sleep. There came another shout and then a series of loud thumps from across the hall, the crack of wood, and the muffled snap of a gunshot. Only then did Aimee open her eyes. She lay on the cot and stared at the wall.
They killed him, she thought. They just executed North. No matter what kind of traitorous bastard he’d turned out to be, the idea that a man she’d made love to had just died less than twenty-five feet away from her…she could scarcely imagine it.
A loud thump echoed across the hall, followed by two more in quick succession. Would they do the same thing to her? Had the world changed so much since this morning that if they did not like her answers they would just kill her?
She heard the hinges squeak on the door to North’s cell but no voices. Major Zander and the MPs had finished their work and now they remained silent, as killers often did. Would they try to be surreptitious now, hide what they’d done, or did it not matter? Perhaps this was meant to be a warning to others who would betray their uniforms—a warning to me.
She leaped from the bed and rushed to the door of her cell. There might be no such thing as a court-martial in this new world, where the only people they could be sure were safe were those underground with them, but she would argue her case.
“Look,” she said, “if you give me a chance, I swear I can prove—”
A shadow ran past her cell. Boots hammered the floor, maybe two dozen steps, and then a second gunshot rang out, this one echoing up and down the corridor. The boots returned and a moment later the shadow slid into view. A man stood just outside her cell, staring in through the small mesh window.
Thomas North.
My God, she thought. Three armed men against one unarmed prisoner. The idea that North had prevailed had not occurred to her.
“If it helps,” North said, leaning against the outside of her cell door, “Major Zander never believed you’d been working with me. He couldn’t rule it out, but he had faith in you.”
Aimee brought a hand up to cover her mouth. “You killed them?”
North stepped aside so that she had a view across the hall. His cell door hung open and she could see one of the MPs in the open doorway, the man’s head dented and bloody from where North had bashed it against the wall or the door frame. Beyond him, Major Zander lay crumpled and dull-eyed, a bullet hole just to the left of his nose. Aimee figured the gun had been fired at an upward angle, the bullet tearing through Zander’s brain.
“This whole thing was supposed to be an equalizer,” North said. “Put the world on a level playing field. I’ve got family out there, people I love. They’re gonna be taken care of, as long as I do what I promised. And I get to live. You think Zander would’ve made me the same deal? Hell, even if he would have, there’d be no way for him to guarantee it. The old world is over.”
He jangled a set of keys in front of the mesh.
Aimee felt sick. “What are you doing?”
“I couldn’t work the door release, but these ought to do the trick,” he said as he began to try each of the keys in the lock.
Aimee backed away from the door as if it had burned her. “You son of a bitch. Just stay out there, all right? I’m locked up. You’ll either finish what you started or they’ll shoot you. Killing me won’t change that.”
The lock tumbled with a clank that made her flinch.
North stared at her through the mesh. “I’m not going to kill you, Aimee. I didn’t want to kill those guys—I don’t want to kill anyone.” He hauled the door open and stood face-to-face with her, stolen gun aimed at her chest. “But I’ve resigned myself to doing what needs to be done and that means shutting down the Hump’s defenses and unlocking the doors. I know where I’m going, how to move around without being seen, but I don’t have your skills. The techies will be on guard now, but you’re like a fucking virtuoso with this stuff.”
Aimee shook her head, her face flushed and her breathing short. “You don’t actually think I’m going to help you?”
North lifted the gun, aiming it at her heart. “I know you are. Think for a second on the difference between brave and stupid. You opened your heart to me, Aimee. I know you have family, friends…people who would be devastated if you died.”
“If they’re still alive after today,” she said, “they’d be ashamed of me for helping you.”
“Not if you only did it because some lunatic held a gun to your head,” North replied. He nodded to her. “Hurry up and decide. I shut off the cameras on this corridor just now and most everyone’s attention is elsewhere, but it won’t be long until someone comes to check on the major.”
Aimee stared at him. Her throat tightened and her mouth went dry. She told herself that if she lived she could be the base’s best hope. Even if he dragged her along with him, she could find a way to thwart him. Dead, she would be of no use to anyone. North took a step nearer and lifted the pistol, aiming between her eyes.
“Don’t think I won’t kill you if it buys safety for me and the people I love,” he said, as if he could read her mind.
In the end it was the anguish in his eyes that convinced her. It tore him up, but he meant it. Safety for the people he loved. Once she had thought she might be one of those people.
He ushered her into the corridor with the barrel of the gun and then followed behind her.
“Into the guard booth,” he said. “First thing you’re going to do is take down the internal surveillance cams. All of them.”
Aimee wanted to tell him to go to Hell. The words were on her lips. But the presence of the gun seemed to burn a small spot at the base of her spine, and she knew that she would do as he’d asked. It would make it harder to locate them, maybe buy North enough time to complete his mission.
Unless she could stop him.
Kate barked orders as the hydroptere skimmed toward Piraeus. The signal had grown louder as they approached Athens and she had intended to sail the ship directly toward that signal, but now it seemed the signal had been coming from Piraeus itself.
“Birnbaum, you’ve got to slow us down!” she shouted.
Kate still knew next to nothing about sailing the trimaran but Birnbaum had done a credible job of teaching the others the basics. Sails began to furl and shift and soon they were gliding slowly enough that the angled foils beneath the hydroptere’s wings slid into the water. When the floats touched the undulating sea, the ship began to roll with the waves and Kate realized just how much smoother their journey had been on a hydrofoil than it would have been on any other vessel.
“Travaglini!” she called. “I want you and Broaddus in the water on my mark. Each of you take a line and tie us off.”
Danny stood on the right wing, staring into the sea spray and the darkness ahead. “You’re taking us into the marina?” he asked.
“Why not?” Kate called back.
“Just look!”
The wind had died down with the easing of their speed and she could hear the voices of her squad, mostly Birnbaum snapping commands to Torres and Zuzu. Kate had been so focused on their speed and general direction that she hadn’t glanced at the horizon in a minute or two. Now she looked westward and saw the fires burning in Athens. Even from this distance, the orange light of those flames gave a terrible amber aura to the sky above the city. Black smoke drifted in clouds that seemed to swallow moonlight.
Several smaller fires burned in Piraeus, much closer to their position, and as the hydroptere cut its threefold trail across the water Kate realized she could make out the Zea Marina after all. Hundreds of yards wide, it had been constructed as a vast circle with long docks all around its circumference. The only gap in the circle was at the mouth of the marina, between a pair of sea walls. One was stationary but the other looked as if it might be a swinging gate to protect the marina from the sort of storm surge that had been devastating to oceanfront areas around the world. The marina could have held hundreds of yachts and sailboats. At this distance, with the eyesight of a robot and in the light of the moon and stars, she could make out only a handful of masts. The yachts remained, their engines useless, but most of the sailing ships were gone.
“Birnbaum!” she called. “Get us in close to the sea wall but don’t enter the marina!”
There would be people looking for any path out of the chaos in Athens. Most of those who had thought of sailing away were already gone, but Kate wasn’t about to take chances. They could not afford any complications.
She bent and then extended the arm Birnbaum had reattached. The hand and elbow joints worked fine but the shoulder had limited range of motion. Kate didn’t mind the charred blackness of her carapace or the places where it had warped a bit from the heat of the explosion, but she feared that partially frozen shoulder could cost her in combat. She hoped not to find out.
The hydroptere continued to slow. As they glided toward the marina, Kate glanced back at Hanif Khan. The anarchist had been stitched up and the bullet hadn’t hit anything vital, so the wound wouldn’t kill him, but he’d lost a lot of blood and they had no way to replenish it. He looked drawn and tired, hunched over to protect himself from the wind and the sea spray. Zuzu kept a gun on him at all times. Once he’d been an Afghani warlord and later a Bot Killer; now he was a wounded prisoner.
Wounded or not, Kate thought, don’t underestimate him.
Khan couldn’t do the bots any harm—not without a high-powered gun and the time to aim—but a man that dangerous would always be dangerous, and they had Alexa to think of.
As if summoned by the thought, the girl began to make her way forward. She had spent the past twenty minutes in Kate’s old spot at the rear of the central float but now she stepped carefully along it, ducked under the sails, and hurried up to the prow.
“What’s the plan, Kate?” Alexa asked.
“Sergeant Wade,” Kate corrected. “And the plan is to rescue the president and whatever remains of his entourage, with POTUS our priority.”
“President Matheson and your dad, you mean.”
Kate nodded. “That’s right.”
Alexa held herself differently now than she had when they’d met at the embassy earlier in the day. Seventeen could be a strange age even in the best of times. A kid could go from petulant and whiny to wise and courageous in the space of minutes, and then back again. But most seventeen-year-olds didn’t cross that bridge in the midst of combat, and most didn’t have to witness the murder of a parent. Alexa had crossed that bridge today and from what Kate could tell, she’d burned the motherfucker down behind her. The girl had a sharp glint in her eyes and a bold tilt to her jaw that bespoke a hardening of the heart.
“I should have a gun,” Alexa said.
Kate frowned. “I don’t think so. We can handle the fighting. Besides, you won’t be going anywhere near combat. You’re staying right here on this ship with Birnbaum. She’ll be guarding Khan and keeping you safe, just in case anyone decides to try to borrow our boat.”
“Not a chance,” Alexa said. “No way am I staying behind!”
“Alexa, listen—”
“You’re not leaving me!”
The Tin Men who weren’t occupied with sailing the trimaran looked up, staring at the furious seventeen-year-old. Khan kept his head down, as if he hadn’t even heard Alexa raise her voice.
“You’ve been in enough firefights for one day, kid—”
“Stop calling me that.”
Kate nodded. “Okay. Alexa, then. Do you see the fires burning all over the place? I can hear gunfire from here. It’s going to be more chaos, more risk of you being killed. On top of that, if my people have to look out for you, that makes us less effective. I’ll say it one more time. I’m sorry, but you are staying right here.”
“And I’ll say it again,” Alexa replied, the wind whipping her hair across her face. “Birnbaum’s going to have to shoot me to keep me on board. What happens when you find the president? Maybe you get cut off and you can’t make it back here, what do you do then? I’ll tell you what you do—you put the safety of the president of the United States ahead of the safety of some fucking teenager. I am not running the risk of being left here alone!”
Kate flinched at the edge of fear in her voice.
Alexa went on. “You’re gonna leave me with Birnbaum and the guy whose buddies murdered my dad? If you don’t come back, where do I go then with the three of us as the only possible crew? So I cover Khan with a gun while Birnbaum tries sailing the hydroptere by herself? I’m coming, Kate. Get it off your conscience. If I die, that’s on me, but I’d rather be dead than left alone!”
Kate stared at the girl for a second before glancing at Danny. He gave her a nod and she couldn’t argue with it.
“All right…Alexa,” Kate said. “You’re coming along.”
“Damn right I am.”
As the hydroptere edged toward the marina’s sea wall, Kate turned toward the rest of her squad.
“Someone’s got to stay here and guard the ship,” she said. “Alexa is right. There’s always the chance we’ll be cut off and need to find another way out of the city, so staying behind is a gamble. But we can’t leave this ship unprotected.”
Zuzu raised his hand. “I’m your man, Sarge.”
Tanya Broaddus shook her head. “Naw, Zuzu. The rest of our squad is dead. I’m not leaving you here.”
“Actually, you are,” Kate told Broaddus. “We’re not voting on it. Zuzu volunteered, and I’m grateful. Zuzu, you’re on your own. Don’t let anyone take this boat. Broaddus, we’re taking Khan with us—”
The Bot Killer lifted his head in surprise. Though pale and drawn, he still had hate burning in his eyes.
Kate pointed toward the hotels and shops on the other side of the marina. “We’ll start in one of those hotels. Alexa, you’ll stay with Broaddus and Khan while we check out the signal. If we have to move more than a couple of blocks, we’ll come back for you and we’ll all advance together. That’s the way it’s going to be.”
No one argued the point. This was her squad.
“All right. Trav, over the side and tie us up to that sea wall. The rest of you, check your ammo. Whatever you’ve got left, now’s the time. We run into any rocket-men, I want them dead before they’ve even had a chance to pull the trigger. Go!”
As the last of the sails furled away, Danny and Trav grabbed lines of rope and dropped off the left-side float and into the water. They vanished instantly, sinking hard to the bottom, and moments later they were clambering from the sea twenty yards away on the sea wall, already dragging the hydroptere toward the rocks.
Kate rotated her arm, testing out her stiff shoulder. It would have to do.
Trav signaled that the hydroptere was moored to the sea wall.
“It’s go time,” Kate called to them. “Watch one another’s backs, eyes open for snipers and rockets. We follow the signal to the source.”
“What if POTUS isn’t with the bot giving off this signal?” Broaddus asked.
“Signal must be coming from one of the bots on the Secret Service detail. If he’s not with the president, the bot’s got to know his whereabouts. One way or another, we’ll know soon enough. Move out!”
One by one they jumped over the side. Zuzu dropped Hanif Khan into the water, where Broaddus waited to carry him up the sea wall. Soaking wet, the anarchist hung his head as he stood among them, not even looking up as they started to march.
Kate hesitated, wondering if she should just shoot him now and be done with it. Leaving him alive to make trouble felt like keeping a crocodile for a pet. But President Matheson would want answers, and Khan remained the best way for him to get at least some of them.
“Watch him!” she called to Broaddus, who gave her a thumbs-up.
Alexa climbed from the water nearby and Kate went to her.
“Stick by me,” she told the girl. “Think bulletproof thoughts.”