She fixed him with an expression of such need. “Paul, are there more papers like these?”
He shook his head. “William Joyce stole them during his time with us. Kept them at his house. Those were all I could save.”
She seemed to forget him almost immediately, returning to the printouts and diagrams. “I… I will need some time.” Then she surprised him by grasping his hand, fixing him again. “I love you. Do you accept that?”
He laid his hand atop hers. “I do.”
His heart hurt for her, for his Sofia.
She didn’t know, couldn’t know, that once the endgame began, she would never see him again.
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 7:58 P.M. Riverport Swimming Hall.
The acoustics in the swimming hall were fantastic.
“Beth! You need to see this!”
Nick was in the dry pool, in one of the castor chairs. The portable TV was on. She came in from a back room, sleeves rolled up. She’d been running maintenance on her gear while she had a moment.
As Beth climbed down the three-step ladder and dropped to the bottom near the deep end, Nick turned up the volume.
“… details again: The state’s most wanted man, Jack Joyce, was apprehended here, on the sidewalk outside Sullivan’s Deli, about a half hour ago. According to witnesses Joyce, age twenty-eight, approached a uniformed patrolman, hands raised. What happened next remains unclear. Shots were fired, and evidence at the scene suggests Joyce was wounded. However we’re told he was soon after wrestled to the ground and handcuffed. WSRP-TV understands he was taken to Riverport Police Department where…”
“Turn it off.”
Nick clicked the remote.
“I thought he was upstairs.”
“He was! He said he was gonna catch a few hours’ sleep. I don’t get it.”
“The cops’ll hand him over to Monarch. The idiot thinks once he’s inside the building he’ll be able to bust out and save the day.”
“Too many of them?” Nick asked.
“That and he’s not that good, is completely unprepared, has no security clearance, no clue what Sofia Amaral looks like, and no idea what the layout of the building is.”
“Ah.”
Beth checked her watch. A few hours until the gala kicked off. Guests would be arriving soon.
“Plus they’ve got the means to suppress chronon levels, which will almost certainly impact his ability to recover from whatever horrible shit they’re about to do to him. You need to drive me to Monarch Tower. Right now.”
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 8:10 P.M. Floor 49, Monarch Tower. Paul Serene’s Quarters.
The axe was about to fall on the only life Paul had known for almost two decades. Gone would be his protection from the unknown. In twenty minutes he would record a statement. When the time was right that statement would be released.
From that moment the world would change forever.
Every day was déjà vu. The closer he got to the end, the more rapidly the unknown gave way to memories of a future he had not yet lived. He expected that, in the days before his death, he would be a man walking through nothing but memory until he found himself enacting the recollection of his own death.
And then there would be nothing.
He glanced behind himself. Sofia, at his desk, the singed remains of William Joyce’s research spread across the black glass, going over each page one at a time, dictating notes into her phone in a low murmur.
Footsteps in the hall. The urgency of their beat told Paul there would be no knock at the door.
The door opened. Martin Hatch entered, one hand resting on the brass knob.
“Jack’s here,” Paul said.
Martin stopped. “He’s been transferred from holding, to this building.”
“Sofia.” Paul took her hand. “I have to go. Would you meet me after? For a toast.”
She smiled, nodded assent.
“I’ll see you then.” He released her hand, swept his uniform from the lacquered arm of thirty-six hundred years of history, and went to meet his future.
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 8:15 P.M. Outside Monarch Tower.
Nick pulled the cab up three blocks from Monarch Tower. Spotlights were on early, panning across the midnight surface. The lights of the forecourt and lobby could be seen from here: limousines and armored town cars, a Monarch Security detail in two-piece formal wear opening doors while scanning sidewalks and streets. Camera flash, camera flash.
“They’re bringing him here tonight?” he asked Beth.
“They’ll want to get Jack inside a dampening field as fast as possible, before he realizes he’s made a mistake and makes a move. This is the best and only location. Okay listen up: Serene will evacuate Dr. Amaral as soon as she makes her presentation. So I’m going to have to get her out of there via helicopter before she takes the stage. What I need you to do is park close and keep your phone handy. If something goes wrong, you’re our backup escape. Got it?”
“I’m going to trust you’ve at least sketched this plan on a napkin.”
“Go Team Outland.”
“What?”
Beth got out, shutting the door behind.
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 8:17 P.M. Floor 35, Monarch Tower.
The elevator carriage lowered toward the thirty-fifth floor.
“The studio is set up for you on forty-nine,” Martin said. “Adjacent to your quarters. They’re ready to go, once we’re done with Joyce.”
“And the Peace Movement teams?”
“In place, as per your visions. They know what to do, once the stutter hits.”
“Good.”
“Paul,” Martin said. “You and I have worked toward this for half our lives. We’re at ten minutes to midnight, and even so I have to ask: is there no alternative to your sacrificing yourself in this way?”
“None,” Paul said. “Everything is at risk. Just promise me Sofia will be cared for, after I’m gone. Helicopter and pilot are on standby. Have her out of here and secured off-site as soon as the formalities have ended.”
“If you feel it’s necessary. We have Joyce.”
“And he may at some point use a time machine. Infinite variables. Secure her off-site.”
“As you say.”
They walked into a plain hallway, glass-walled on one side, strip lighting along floor and ceiling. Armed guards flanked a door on the right at the far end. “I’m doomed, Martin. Always have been. From the moment I stepped into that machine.” Paul stopped, glanced at his compatriot. “The stutter’s close. Have the Peace teams activate their rigs now. I’ll feel better. No mistakes.”
Martin’s face was somber, almost mournful. “That’s it, then.”
Paul clasped Martin’s arm. “Knowing my fate has been a gift. It has allowed me to make decisions that made Monarch the force for salvation that it is. But that will count for nothing if the company does not emerge heroically from the coming chaos. For that to happen, we must have a villain.”
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 8:20 P.M. Outside Monarch Tower.
Red carpet, velvet rope, and camera crews choked the sidewalk outside the Monarch Solutions Visitor Center: the entryway to the Tower’s atrium. Security, plainclothes and otherwise, ringed the block. Locals had turned out hoping to get a look at some of those big West Coast names they’d heard were flying in for the bash. The reporter Beth had seen on TV back at the hall was there, noting that Monarch had chosen to go ahead with the gala despite the all-too-recent tragedy at the university, and that Martin Hatch was expected to make a statement.
Beth crossed the street, headed for the western entrance, away from the crowds. A couple of guys were on duty, all groomed, tuxedoed and bored.