The engine kicked over, purring like it had been put together yesterday. “Same thing,” Nick said.
Jack stared out the window of the Charger as it pulled up outside the main walk of Riverport University. “It’s all gone.”
Gone were the few square blocks of lawn dotted with Colonial Revival-style wood buildings, interstitial spaces crowded with maple and birch. This was a modern, high-tech campus. Founders’ Walk remained in place, a token gesture to tradition, next to which a slab of locally quarried marble bore, in gold Sabon font: Riverport University-Innovations Campus. Someone had slapped a HISTORY NOT PROFITS! sticker on it. A sticker slapped over that one read: NINJAS ARE COOL!
A small black-and-gold plaque announced that the Quantum Research Laboratory was the winner of the 2013 Pritzker Architecture Prize. The manicured lawn behind that-a perfect green flattop through which Founders’ Walk cut-was strewn with traveler cups, sodden flyers, beer cans, and the occasional abandoned sign requesting those participating in the sit-in to not litter the area. A tent city was in place, forming a frail protective barrier between the old library-a bright-red Gothic Revival anachronism amid a herd of glass and steel-and the outside world. Jack flashed back to an incident on the New York subway a few years back: a group of thirteen-year-old girls shielding an old lady from some crazy dude with a screwdriver.
He opened the car door, got out. “What the hell happened?”
Nick stepped out of the driver’s door and sprawled his arms across the car’s roof, pleased at Jack’s reaction. “Impressive, huh?”
“It’s like a moon base designed by French aliens. All this in six years?”
“We live in an age of great change.” Nick had the tone of cartoon millionaire. “Something I heard on a podcast.”
Jack peeled a wet flyer off the sidewalk. The date of the library’s execution was set for tomorrow. Right now the tent city was mostly quiet, some of the residents laid out where they’d passed out. He thought about the BearCat, all those frickin’ bangin’ uniforms Nick liked so much, the tower overlooking the entire city, the 2013 Pritzker Prize-and he didn’t like the old lady’s chances.
“Where are you meeting your friend?”
Jack pointed to the plaque. “Quantum Research Lab.”
“Your brother… that all gonna be cool? I have some experience with wards. If you need me to place a call-”
Jack waved the offer away. “Nah, whatever it is it won’t be anything I haven’t dealt with a dozen times before.”
Nick thought about that. “Listen, I’m gonna take a break and hang around for a while. Here’s my card; you need an escape, call me.”
Nick had an actual business card, the central feature being the presidential seal, with the eagle holding two hockey sticks.
“Will do. What are your hours?”
Jack’s phone rumbled in his jacket pocket: Will. He wasn’t ready for a brotherly reunion just yet. Best to get a coherent answer from Paul first. He let it ring out. A text message flashed up:
I’m at our house. Where are you?
“Between meds and errands and where’s-the-remote, Dad keeps me going all hours,” Nick said. “That espresso machine isn’t just for the customers.”
Jack watched Nick pull away, then turned his attention to the university. He hoped Paul had answers.
3
Saturday, 8 October 2016. 3:45 A.M. Monarch Tower, Riverport, Massachusetts.
On the twenty-ninth floor of Monarch Tower Beth Wilder watched a two-year-old girl take a short staggering run and head butt the palm of her father’s hand. Full of beans and still on Kyoto time. Her mother looked like she needed a drink, but happy to be in America and reunited with her husband.
Lorelei Gibson was the unofficial mascot of Chronon-1, Monarch Special Project’s pride and joy. The 1 percent. The nine operatives out of 112 candidates who had the experience, adaptability, and mental fortitude to get through basic and advanced chronon training without losing their shit and washing out.
Chronon-1 wasn’t the only squad of chronon-enabled operatives. Technicians were trained for lightweight short-term operations. Strikers were heftier, flashier. Juggernauts… well, Juggernauts were still in the test phase. They were scary as shit, but overdesigned in Beth’s opinion.
Randall Gibson’s crew was different. Trained to adapt, survive, and operate at peak efficiency within prolonged zero-state exposure were using minimal gear, with negligible psychological impact. They were rock stars and they were concrete.
Gibson, his second-in-command Donny, then Irene, Reeves, Dominguez, Voss, Mully, Bristol, and Chaffey. Chronon-1-the jewel in Special Project’s shiny crown. Proof of what was possible.
Question was, why were they gathered here?
Beth watched as Gibson hunkered down in front of his daughter and held up his palm again.
“What does the billy goat do?” he drawled, thick as molasses. “C’mon now, show me whatcha got.”
Beth knew he was playing up to the crowd that had gathered on the mezzanine, groupies from admin, Industrial, Pharma, and all the rest.
Lorelei giggled, toddled at her dad, and flumphed her head into his hand. Onlookers cheered. Lorelei plopped her hands over her face, embarrassed.
Her mother swept her up, blew a raspberry on Lorelei’s fat little cheek. Lorelei reached for her dad, grasping inexpertly, all big brown eyes and “Hug Dada!”
Gibson took her, Lorelei pressing to his fatigues, arms clamped around his neck.
“I gotcha punkin’ butter, I gotcha.”
Yeah, the Gibsons have it all. Beth envied Lorelei’s ability to love like that. Beth barely remembered her own father’s face.
Horatio nudged her. “Don’t feel bad.”
Horatio was a white dude in his thirties, handlebar moustache, wearing a theater sports T-shirt. DON’T SHOOT, I’M A PLOT DEVICE!
Hilarious.
“Do I look like I feel bad?” Beth wasn’t super tight with most of the other Monarch Security personnel, but the guys over in Innovations liked her just fine.
“Cheer up, dude. Better people than you washed out of the C-1 program.”
Beth blinked. “‘Better people’?”
Horatio backpedaled. “I mean… you know what I mean. Shit.”
“Yeah I know what you meant. Do you know what’s going on?”
Beth had made it a good way through the tryouts. Further than most. Flaked at the last hurdle. Now she was mid-level Monarch Security. Stable. Vanilla. Unremarkable.
Just how she liked it.
Horatio shook his head. “Nah. I’ve spent half of today trying to get our product demos into a showable state for the gala tomorrow night, so I haven’t been poking around as much. I was banking on Will Joyce helping me to get the platform stable but he totally flaked out on me. Hey, are you free? I need a newbie to run through our flow, see what you get snagged on.”
“Sorry. Plans.”
“Yeah, right.”
The mood on the mezzanine changed, the crowd dispersed. Gibson’s smile vanished. He handed his kid back to his wife without even looking at them. Which meant Martin Hatch had just made an appearance.
His wife understood, turning and leaving without a word, child in one arm, dragging her luggage with the other.
Yep, there was Hatch: A tall, good-looking motherfucker with a killer smile he rarely deployed. Luminous midnight skin and a voice that was pure alpha-wave richness.
He scared the shit out of Beth.
“Ugh.” Horatio rolled his eyes. “Gibson may be big dog, but Lord he’s got daddy issues. The way he looks at Hatch I’m surprised they’re not picking out curtains.”
The elevator doors opened. Gibson’s wife dragged their luggage inside. Lorelei called for her dada. If Gibson heard, he didn’t react. The doors closed, and they were gone.