If he tried to go back to a normal life, he would spend his life looking over his shoulder. Wars did not last forever. What if Quicksilver was the best hope of bringing this battle to a rapid conclusion? Be drafted. Do a tour of duty. Help his father. Stop Henry and make him pay for what he’d done. Knowing what we know now he must have killed her. He must have. Luke thought of the time he’d spent comforting Henry, reassuring him. A cold anger ignited in his chest.
‘What would you have me do?’
‘I think you could handle field assignments, given time.’ Warren cleared his throat, risked a smile. ‘But you would be brilliant as a terrorism profiler. You sifted through thousands of people to find the Night Road. You could find them again. You could help us find the next wave of terrorists long before they strike. Identify them, perhaps find ways to keep them from embracing violence, or alienate them from groups like the Night Road.’
Henry had tried to make him believe, in his old innocence, that the world was not dangerous. That the world’s most dangerous people were on the other side of the glass, in their own distant Wonderland, and he knew now they were everywhere. Waiting. Hoping to strike. And the world needed ordinary people like himself to stand and fight and to win that war. To not be afraid; to live for a while, in the secret wilds of the world. He didn’t have to forgive his father right now. That would come in time. But he could take the anger he felt, channel it into kicking down the right doors. He could make a difference.
‘We’ll find Henry and the rest of the Night Road,’ Luke said, ‘You and me. I’ll stay for a while.’
And he sat with his father and he watched the sunset slide over the lake, creating a pool of a thousand colors, the first of the new memories.
60
The Next Day
On the internet (encoded)
Welcome to the new site for the Night Road. We have had a number of setbacks, but our strength as a network is our ability to recover quickly and with great nimbleness.
Despite the recent and unfortunate delays, I have relocated overseas and I have acquired new funding to share, based on appropriate projections of economic and mortal damage that you can inflict. As well, I have secured powerful friends around the world sympathetic to our cause. I expect further funding from them, so we can all pursue our plans.
Know that we face a real danger. The corporate titans – the globalizer, the power-mongers, the moneylenders of our enemies – have formed their own version of the CIA. They are called Quicksilver, and they will be hunting us. This is not the time to hide. Not the time to lose nerve. This is a time to rise and fight like we have never fought before. To join together in common cause. To know our enemy – the one who will engage us first, even if in secret – and to destroy him, utterly.
I made a mistake that I must confess. I placed my hopes in the wrong person. This caused our network no permanent or troubling harm, but it has reinforced to me that we must be careful in choosing our allies. In recognizing each other, in allowing no one to infiltrate us.
Instructions on proposals to be sent to me will follow shortly. Those who accomplish their initial missions will qualify for further investment. So think big, people.
Think very big.