Romy raised a hand. “Don’t say it. Better if we don’t know. That way they can’t make us tell.”
Betsy’s face blanched. She nodded, then hugged Romy. “Get the hell out of here before they find you.”
The three women and the baby roared off.
Romy watched for a few heartbeats, praying for the baby’s survival, then Patrick was tugging on the sleeve of her scrubs.
“Romy. Let’s move.”
Zero reached the van a few seconds before they did. He pulled off his ski mask as he climbed into the rear seat, moving like an arthritic old man.
“Will you drive, Patrick?” he said in a voice barely above a whisper.
As they got moving, Romy turned in the passenger seat and looked back. Kek was in the far rear; Tome sat next to Zero who was staring at the floor in silence.
“What’s wrong, Zero?”
“What?” he said, blinking and looking up at her. “What’s wrong? Everything’s wrong.”
“Meaning?”
“Please don’t ask me about it.” The lost look in his yellow eyes constricted Romy’s throat. “Not yet.”
“Where are we going?” Patrick said as they shot out of the parking lot.
“To pay a visit to someone who has answers I need.”
“Who?”
“Ellis Sinclair.”
29
“Fan out!” Luca shouted. “They could still be in the building!”
He doubted it, but that might be just what they wanted him to do: figure they’d taken off and go on a wild search through the streets, leaving them safe right here, laughing at him. That was what they’d expect him to do, only this time he wouldn’t.
“Everyone take a floor, take a hall, go from room to room. Look for a baby, a newborn baby girl.”
Luca kicked back through the operating room doors and grabbed the old guard by his collar. “The nursery! Where’s the nursery?”
“Th-third floor,” the old man cried, cringing.
“Take me there!”
A few minutes later he was standing before a plate-glass window, staring at the rows of bassinets, only half a dozen of them occupied. To his right a frightened new mother cried out and asked him what was wrong. He ignored her.
These babies, all so human looking. But that didn’t mean the sim baby couldn’t be among them. No way to tell. The safest thing would be to kill all the girls, but he didn’t know if he could do such a thing.
Movement on the screen of the monitor over the nurse’s station at the rear of the nursery caught his eye. The sim operation film…the one Lowery had supposedly shot up…it was still playing. Suddenly the film cut off and a man appeared. Luca knew that face…the Reverend Eckert! Somehow he’d got hold of the film. Eckert was broadcasting it all over the world!
Luca turned and began a stumbling trot back toward the elevators. Only one thing to do now.
Run.
30
MANHATTAN
It’s over, Mercer Sinclair thought as he turned away from his plasma screen TV and staggered to his living room window. He stared out over the oddly silent Fifth Avenue at the pale, dawn-lit shadows of Central Park. We’re done.
He hadn’t been able to sleep so he’d turned on the TV and begun channel surfing. He’d paused when he recognized Reverend Eckert’s face—that damn fool seemed to be on some channel somewhere every hour of the day and night—and stayed when he heard him rant about a sim giving birth to a half-human baby. And then he’dshown the birth.
Portero and SIRG had failed. Miserably. And worse, the sim baby was a girl, an all too human-looking girl.
What do I do now? he wondered, his gaze wandering to the squatting granite mass of the Metropolitan Museum a few blocks uptown. The markets were closed today in the US and most of Europe, and the trading day had already ended in Asia. But when the Pacific Rim markets reopened later tonight, SimGen stock would go into freefall.
Money wasn’t the issue; even without SimGen he was worth more than he could spend in a dozen lifetimes. No, it was the company itself that mattered. He’d devoted his life to building SimGen. It was his child, his only family, and now the wild dogs he’d kept at bay for so long would leap upon her and tear her to pieces.
Mercer thought of the .38 caliber revolver he kept in the drawer by the bed. Maybe that would be the best way, the easiest way. Better that than—
He stopped.
What am I thinking? It’snot over! I’ll fight this! Stonewall any questions, deny any and all allegations. Sims aremy property, and it will take years—decades!—before someone can say otherwise. And that someone will be the Supreme Court of the United States, because that’s how far I’ll take it. And I’ll win that fight.
Oh, no. This is not over.
31
FAR HILLS, NJ
Ellis stared at the screen, fascinated, shouting, “They’ve done it! They’vedone it!”
He didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. He didn’t know what tomorrow would bring, or even what the rest of today would hold, but everything in his life was going to be different from now on. If nothing else, today promised a brighter future for the sims of the world.
His phone rang. “Ellis,” said a deep voice he immediately recognized.
“Zero! Congratulations! I just saw the film of the birth. Tragic about poor Meerm, but uploading the film to Eckert was a brilliant move. Where are you?”
“At the front gate.”
That startled Ellis. And something about Zero’s voice wasn’t right. “I’ll open it right away. Have you got the baby with you?”
“No. But I have questions. Alot of questions.”
Ellis’s stomach plunged: He’d been dreading this moment, dreading it for decades. “Yes, I suppose you do. I’ll open the gate.”
He pressed a button on a wall unit that operated the gate mechanism, then went to a front window to watch a black van climb the long winding driveway to the house. The cook and the maid had the day off; he’d planned to visit Robbie and Julie later, but he might have to delay that.
Ellis stepped outside as the van pulled to a stop before the front door. Zero alighted immediately and Ellis was surprised to see that he’d removed his mask, his simian features naked to the world. He walked past Ellis without a word, without a handshake, without even eye contact, and stepped into the foyer. A man and a woman emerged—Romy Cadman and Patrick Sullivan, looking perplexed. Ellis introduced himself and welcomed them. The last to debark were Kek and an aging sim, but they did not approach.
“You two are welcome inside,” he said.
“No, sir,” said the sim. “We stay. Good air.”
“As you wish.”
As Tome and the mandrilla wandered out onto the frosty lawn, Ellis stepped back inside and faced his guests.
“Can I offer anyone some—”
“You’ve seen the film,” Zero said, his voice thick. “Meerm’s baby is a girl, a very human-looking girl. Dr. Cannon told me she should look more like a sim and she told me why. She also gave me a possible explanation for why the baby looks so human. She didn’t want to believe it and neither do I. Do you know what I’m talking about?”
“Yes, I believe I do.”
“Then tell me it’s not true!”
“I only wish I could.”
Zero lunged toward him, teeth bared, hands clawing forward. Ellis braced himself for the impact.
“Zero, no!” Romy cried.
Her voice seemed to pull him back. He turned away and leaned a hand against the wall.
“Monster!” The word came out half growl, half sob. “How could you?”
“I didn’t. At least not knowingly.”
“Can someone tell me what this is all about?” Romy said.
“Yes,” Ellis replied. “I suppose it’s time I told someone. Let’s all sit down and I’ll try to explain.”
He led them to the two-story cherrywood library that housed the book collection that had once been a pride, but had long ago stopped meaning anything. Romy and Patrick took a couch. Zero dropped into a wingback leather chair and stared at the floor; the pale morning light through the tall windows washed out what little color was left in his face. Ellis remained standing. This was going to be too painful to tell sitting down. He needed to be up, moving about to release the tension coiled like an overwound spring in his chest.