Extinction Game (38 page)

I looked at Howes.

‘I guess it doesn’t hurt to tell you,’ said the Major, regarding me wearily. ‘I refused. They were asking for unrestricted access to the main stage, without authorization
or orders, and actually seemed to expect me to keep Kip Mayer locked up when my primary job’s to protect him.’

‘So Greenbrooke backed down?’ asked Oskar.

Howes shook his head. ‘Greenbrooke wasn’t there. His agents drew their weapons and ordered my men through to the main stage, then locked me in my own office. I’m guessing they
sent my men back home so they wouldn’t have to worry about dealing with them here.’

I realized all this must have occurred after Chloe and I had left the hospital, when jeeps full of Patriots had driven past us on their way to the compound.

‘So how did the two of you get out of there?’ asked Yuichi.

‘Stupid bastards didn’t think I might have a spare key for my office, so, as soon as I was out, I waited until the coast was clear and sprang Miss Ludke,’ he said, nodding at
Rozalia. ‘I needed some backup, and had a feeling that, if they’d locked her up, it might mean she had a better idea what was going on than I did.’

‘You couldn’t get Mayer out?’ I asked.

‘No,’ he said heavily. ‘They took him somewhere else, but I need to go back and get him. I don’t even know if he’s still on the island. But whatever we do, we have
to do it quickly. We just ran into a pair of agents, but we managed to kill them. The others will have heard the shooting.’

‘I told the Major everything I knew on the way here,’ said Rozalia.

Beside her, Howes made a face as if he wanted to spit. ‘Not that I’m having an easy time believing it.’

I gathered up my predecessor’s notes and handed them to the Major. ‘If you want proof,’ I said, ‘I’ve got a fat chunk of it right here.’

Howes regarded the bundle of pages wearily. ‘Maybe later. In the meantime, we have a job to do, and that’s stopping your friend carrying out this threat of his to commit genocide,
assuming it’s real. Miss Ludke was very clear about the consequences if we fail.’

‘And then what?’ said Selwyn, coming to stand directly before the Major. ‘Everything goes back to the way it was, with us running around like rats in a cage until we drop dead?
Because I just got told there’s no retirement plan for any of us, and never has been.’

‘And who told you that?’ asked Howes, with surprising equanimity.

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ asked Rozalia. Chloe pulled her to one side and quickly told her what we had learned from Wallace.

‘So you admit it’s true,’ said Randall, coming to stand by Selwyn’s side and glaring at the Major.

Howes looked around us all and sighed. ‘I guess I do.’

‘Then there’s one thing that doesn’t make sense to me,’ Randall continued, nodding over at me. ‘How could you retrieve Jerry more than once, if you only ever had
the one set of coordinates for his alternate? How come you can find more than one alternate with a version of Jerry on it, but you can’t find somewhere that’s safe for us to
retire?’

Howes shook his head. ‘Alternates with minute variations in their histories are bundled together in “braids”. The first time you program a coordinate into a rig, it grabs one
particular strand – an alternate – out of that braid of highly similar universes. The Mr Beche standing over there we found by picking a different strand from the same braid that the
first Mr Beche came from.’ He looked around us. ‘Each one of you comes from a braid containing a multitude of alternates just like your own, with only very minor variations. To find one
where your world
didn’t
end, so the theory goes, would require us to find an entirely separate braid, and that’s what the scientists can’t work out how to do. Now, we
can’t waste any more—’

‘One moment,’ said Oskar. ‘I get the how. It doesn’t tell us
why
you’d lie about retirement.’

I could see Howes’ patience was wearing thin, but he clearly understood that we needed answers. ‘They were sure they were on the verge of figuring out how to program the stages right
at the start,’ said Howes. ‘I guess they thought wrong, because they’re still trying. I’m sorry you were lied to, but I swear it had nothing to do with me.’

‘Enough of this,’ I said. ‘He’s right. We need to act
now
.’

‘We’ve got maybe one gun between all of us,’ said Yuichi, pointing at Howes’ pistol. ‘That’s hardly enough to do anything.’

‘There’s an armoury in the basement of Government House,’ said Howes. ‘It’s got an electronic lock. You’ll need the entry key, or you won’t get
inside.’ He rattled off a short sequence of numbers. Yuichi went behind the bar and found a pen, quickly writing the key out on the back of his hand.

‘That’s it, then,’ said Yuichi. ‘We’ll grab some guns and go find Casey, wherever he’s headed.’

‘Wait a minute,’ said Howes, raising a hand. ‘Someone’s going to have to try and find Kip Mayer and spring him, if he’s still here.’

‘Why?’ I asked.

‘Rozalia told me you had proof that the Patriots recruited Casey, right?’ I nodded. ‘Well,’ Howes continued, ‘you’re going to need Mayer to get that evidence
to the right people. And since my own men aren’t around, that means you’re going to have to take Mayer, as well as that evidence, back to the Authority yourselves.’

‘Where is everybody?’ asked Yuichi, looking around the reception area of Government House when we walked in some twenty minutes later.

There was no sign of the half-dozen men and women who normally staffed the building where Bramnik and Mayer usually kept their offices. Doors stood open around us, and I saw signs of disarray
that suggested a scuffle. The Patriots had undoubtedly been here.

‘I’m guessing they’re holed up in their rooms in the Hotel Miranda,’ I said. ‘Or they were ordered to stay there.’ The Miranda had been appropriated by the
Authority to house their staff.

‘Yeah. I guess.’ Yuichi looked around. ‘Which way from here?’

‘Down there,’ said Rozalia, pointing towards a door. ‘Howes said the armoury was in the basement.’

We had split into two teams. Four of us – myself, Yuichi, Oskar and Rozalia – were going after Casey. The others – Winifred, Randall, Chloe and Selwyn – were going to
return to the base with Howes to try and release Mayer. Then, if all went well, they’d either cross over to the Authority’s alternate via the main stage or, if they couldn’t get
to it, hightail it to the wrecked trawler and make use of Casey’s stage.

First, our team was going to grab whatever weapons we could, so we’d at least be able to defend ourselves.

I tried to ignore the churning in my belly every time I thought of Chloe walking into danger. She was smart and capable, and her presence here on the island told me everything I needed to know
about just how much shit she could take and still walk out smiling. Even so, I had to work hard not to show my dismay when she decided to take part in Mayer’s rescue operation.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she had said, leaning in close to me. ‘And I know you’re not that guy.’

‘What guy?’ I had asked, the smell of her hair intoxicating me.

‘You know,’ she said. ‘The overprotective guy.’

‘I’m not that guy. I
know
you can handle yourself.’

‘Yeah. I
hear
that. But that’s not what your face is saying.’

Even so, she had leaned up and kissed me, ignoring the snickers and muttered comments before I headed for the armoury with the others.

Yuichi led the way, and we followed him down a narrow staircase to a low-ceilinged basement half-filled with cardboard boxes and discarded computers. Yuichi stepped towards a
steel door at the far end, punching the sequence of numbers scrawled on his hand into a number pad mounted on the wall.

I heard a soft beep, followed by a clunk, and the door swung open to reveal a rack of assault rifles and a considerable number of small black snub-nosed pistols.

Yuichi grabbed a rifle, stuffing two of the pistols into the pockets of his trousers, before kneeling to scoop up an armful of boxed ammunition from a tray on the floor.

‘Me next,’ said Oskar, stepping eagerly forward, while Rozalia and I waited our turn.

We exited Government House as cautiously as we had entered it. The preferred option by far was to avoid any confrontation whatsoever. According to Howes, there were at most a
few dozen Patriot agents on the entire island; even so, the chances were high that they’d be better armed than us, and able to call on reinforcements.

The more I thought about it, and about all the things that could or probably would go wrong, the more I didn’t want to think about any of it at all. I looked at the grim faces of my
compatriots and decided they were all thinking the same thing.

‘All right,’ said Yuichi, looking around us. ‘I guess we’re good to go.’

We headed back up to the reception area, and I opened a large canvas gardening sack that Yuichi had dug out of a closet in the Mauna Loa. I waited as everyone put their rifles and ammunition
inside the sack, until Oskar came before me, his arms full of deadly weaponry.

‘This is fucking
madness
,’ he exclaimed. ‘If we run into any Pat—’

‘If we run into any Patriots,’ I interrupted him, ‘I’d much prefer to look like a confused and concerned Pathfinder desperately trying to find out what’s going on,
instead of a heavily armed maniac.’ I shook the bag, and the rifles inside clanked against each other. ‘These guns are just as a last resort,’ I reminded him, ‘so hurry the
hell up. We don’t have all day.’

Oskar shook his head in exasperation, and dropped a rifle and a couple of boxes of ammo into the sack. ‘But I can keep this, right?’ he asked, opening his jacket to indicate a pistol
lodged in his waistband.

‘I guess. Just make sure it’s well out of sight.’ I glanced at the others. ‘Same goes for the rest of you.’

We stepped back out onto the street, but there was no sound or sign of movement. I hauled the sack over one shoulder, struggling under the weight, and wondered if maybe Oskar didn’t have a
point after all. More than likely any Patriot agents who decided to treat us with suspicion would want a look inside the bag.

I felt my stomach sink half a block later at the sound of an approaching engine. I looked sideways at Yuichi, seeing his alarm. Rozalia was walking up ahead of us, and she paused at the corner
before looking back and mouthing
Patriots
at us.

Oskar hurried up behind me, grabbing hold of the rear of the sack. Together we carried it over to a dense patch of weeds growing around a tree which provided the perfect concealment.

A jeep drove past, slowing when the two Patriot agents inside it saw us. Both of them were conspicuously armed.

‘Hey,’ said one of them as he climbed out of the jeep. ‘Why are you out during the curfew?’

‘What curfew?’ asked Rozalia, sounding genuinely puzzled.

‘You’re supposed to be inside,’ said the other agent, stepping out of the jeep to join his buddy.

I stepped forward, putting myself between them and the patch of weeds. ‘Nobody’s heard anything about a curfew,’ I said truthfully. I tried to look scared and confused; it
wasn’t hard. ‘We just went to Government House to try and find out what’s going on, but there’s nobody there.’

‘You need to go home,’ said the second Patriot, his rifle held pointing to the ground, but angled so he could bring it back up in a moment. ‘And stay there.’

‘Absolutely,’ said Rozalia, nodding intently. ‘We’ll do that right away.’

‘You can’t tell us what’s going on?’ asked Oskar, with more than a touch of belligerence. ‘The way I see it, you people owe us an explanation. Or do you just drive
around with those big guns of yours for fun?’

I fought down the urge to turn and scream at him to shut up. If he screwed this up for us, the chances were that people were going to get killed.

The Patriot’s expression hardened, and I saw his hands tighten around his rifle. ‘Get the hell out of here,’ he snarled. ‘And if I see any of you out in the streets
again, you go in a goddam cell and stay there until someone maybe feels like letting you out. Do you understand me?’

‘Absolutely,’ I said, smiling and nodding as obsequiously as I could. ‘No problem, sir.’ I gave him a cheery wave which, in retrospect, might have been overkill.

The two agents glanced at each other and shook their heads, then got back in their jeep and drove off. Once they were out of sight I sat hard on the ground, my legs feeling like jelly.

‘We could have taken them on,’ Oskar grumbled. ‘We had the guns. What the hell were you doing, kowtowing to them like some damn—’

‘Shut the fuck up,’ Rozalia snapped. ‘You nearly got us all killed.’

‘I
said
we could have taken them,’ said Oskar, visibly bristling. ‘There’s four of us, we’re carrying enough guns and ammunition to—’

Yuichi stepped up to Oskar and punched him hard in the gut. Oskar doubled over immediately, staggering back before he slumped to the ground, struggling to draw breath.

‘Don’t
ever
do something that fucking stupid again, man,’ Yuichi shouted. ‘Or you can go the fuck home and sweat it out there while the rest of us get on with
this.
Your
choice.’

Oskar glared balefully at him. I sighed and pushed myself upright, then went over to help him back up. However right Yuichi was, the fact remained that we needed all the help we could get.

‘We’re all under a lot of strain,’ I told him, after he let me help him up. ‘I understand you’re spoiling for a fight. But that’s just what we’ve got to
avoid until we find Casey. Okay?’

Oskar scowled at me, and I wondered if I’d made a mistake, and he was in fact an even bigger asshole than I thought.

‘Fine,’ he said at length, to my considerable relief. He stabbed a finger towards Yuichi. ‘But if you ever –
ever
– pull a stunt like that again, I
won’t need a gun to rip your fucking head from your shoulders.’

Yuichi gave him a look as if to say he was welcome to try. All the laid-back hippie attitude seemed to have faded in an instant, replaced by something much harder.