“You’ve all been put under my discretion, Mr. Happling,” Bendix said.

Happling studied the ID and looked past it at Bendix’s young-old face. Then the big redhead turned and spat thickly onto the ground.

“Fucking Spooks,” he said.

XXIII

Day Nine: I Can’t Even Imagine Why You’re Still Alive Now

Leering at Happling with my wrists bound behind me, I was snugly secured to the seat as we waited for liftoff, held in place so tightly I had to regulate my breathing to avoid choking myself. Happling, face almost purple, stared at me from the seat directly across from me, so near our knees were touching. I wondered if he was going to stroke out right before me. Hense was to my right, but I couldn’t turn enough to get a good look at her. From what I could tell, she’d closed her eyes and gone to sleep.

The Stormers were seated all around us on the perimeter of the hover cabin, headgear off, smoking cigarettes. I didn’t like looking at them, with their weird, ghostly bodies and their normal, sweaty heads.

My hands were going numb. I distracted myself by trying to figure out where Ty and Mr. Marko were hiding themselves.

I had no doubt they were on the hover-Techies couldn’t survive without their tech, their black boxes and endless, snaking cables, the guts of one machine soldered into another. Considering that for hundreds of miles in any direction there was nothing but creeping wilderness and some untamed Monks, when I put myself in Ty Kieth’s huge, soggy brain it was pretty obvious he’d head for the one place where he’d be in control: the hover. For someone like Ty, wiring into a standard government hover was child’s play. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover he was already controlling the damn ship.

I looked back at Happling. His jaw was working feverishly, bunching and unbunching as if he were chewing something. His eyes shifted right and his face turned even darker, and then Bendix was at my elbow, holding a large digital clipboard in his good hand. He stood there staring down at us for a moment.

“Complaints, Mr. Happling?” he said. Happling’s head jerked around and up, the cords on his neck bunching out as he fought against the tele-K’s pull. “If you don’t want your neck broken, keep your bullshit on simmer, okay?”

“Stop calling me mister,” Happling growled. I could hear the straps on his wrists creaking. “I am a Captain in the System Security Force, you piece of shit. You don’t have any authority over me.”

Bendix flipped his clipboard around, the screen lighting up. “You have been released, dishonorably, from the SSF, Mister Happling, along with your friend here, and handed over to Undersecretary Ruberto’s authority. This is a copy of Marin’s memorandum, if you care to read it.”

Happling stared at Bendix. The air around him had gone quite still.

“He burned you,” Bendix went on, flipping the clipboard back around. “So quit your bellyaching. Unlike Mr. Cates here, I don’t need you.”

“Did they explain to you that you’re a dead man, that you’re dying right now?” I asked, smiling.

Bendix smiled back. “Yes, Mr. Cates, I am aware of the risks involved in contact with you. Unlike these two pieces of shit, these traitors, I am not going to kidnap you in a pathetic grab at a few more days of life. I am happy to sacrifice myself for the good of the System of Federated Nations.”

“Holy fucking bullshit,” Happling muttered. Bendix’s eyes flicked to him, and then Happling screamed, his whole body tensing up as he struggled wildly with his restraints. The Stormers all shifted in their seats, watching.

“My training,” Bendix said slowly, “has been very thorough, Mr. Happling. I can break bones without touching you, so please be quiet.”

He turned to look at me as Happling continued to shiver and choke across from me. “Mr. Cates, I’m bringing you back to be dissected and tested, so we can solve this little problem and put it behind us. You probably won’t survive this process. I know you were granted a pardon of sorts by Director Marin as part of your dealings with him, but the System has technically been in a state of emergency since the Monk Riots, and it is completely within Undersecretary Ruberto’s authority to declare you property of the state.”

I nodded. “We’ll see how patriotic you are in a few days, kid.”

Bendix smiled, his face twisting in various contradictory ways. Behind him, Happling’s face had gone a shade of reddish blue that didn’t look healthy. I had to hand it to the government-they apparently knew how to train their tele-Ks.

“I think you’ll be dead before me,” Bendix said, tucking his clipboard under his arm and turning away. “New York isn’t a secure area at the moment,” he said as he strode away. “Once we’re in the air we’ll be heading for Washington, where a team has been assembled to analyze you, Mr. Cates. So you know that no remnants of your organization will be on hand for any bullshit.”

I watched him exit the cabin, the hatchway popping open as he approached and snapping shut as he stepped through it. Showy bastard, I thought. Happling slouched forward, sucking in an endless, shocking breath as his face returned to an almost normal color.

I leaned in so close I could have licked his ear. “We have to gain control of this hover.”

The big man was sucking in air desperately, his chest heaving. “Are you fucking crazy?” he gasped. “We’re restrained. Disarmed. Surrounded. By Stormers. With a goddamn. Spook.”

“And if we end up in Washington on this hover, we will be dead. Shit, you will probably be dead somewhere over the fucking Atlantic. I can’t even imagine why you’re still alive now.”

Hense spoke, her voice rough and blurry. “Because we’re surrounded by SSF, and even a jackass like Bendix is afraid to kill two cops in cold blood in front of them.”

I flashed back to a Vid show announcing that the civilian government was resurrecting the military, and suddenly thought it made sense. Every branch of government needed to be able to kill the members of the other branches. It was how things got done.

“Hey.” I lunged forward and hit Happling lightly with my head. “Pull your shit together. We have to gain control of this hover.” I had no idea how we were going to do this, but knowing for a fact that you were a dead man if you didn’t move soon was a great motivator.

He glowered at me from under his eyebrows. “Fucking hit me again, and-”

“Kill me later,” I said. “Kill me after.” I glanced at Hense. “I think our Techies are stowaways.”

Her head twitched slightly, the tiniest movement toward me. “How do you know?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I think. Ty Kieth is the key to our survival. I think he’s hiding on this hover. Now get your heads out of your asses, officers, and help figure out what to do.”

I didn’t think Hense was going to respond, that maybe she’d had the fight kicked out of her. Then she nodded curtly, looking me in the eye. “All right, Avery,” she said. She held my gaze for a moment. “You never give up, do you?”

I shrugged my eyebrows, picturing Glee and thinking I’d love to give up. For a moment it was just Hense and me, and I knew she understood at least one thing about me, because she was exactly the same: we knew only one way. She scanned the cabin, looking at all the Stormers, who looked back at her expressionlessly. Finally she oriented on one, a round-faced veteran, maybe twenty-five, receding hairline shaved close, his face pale and glistening with sweat. A crappy filterless cigarette dangled from his lower lip, burning, forgotten.

“You,” Hense said, her voice suddenly the clipped, projected colonel’s voice she’d perfected. “I know you.”