Psion Omega (Psion series Book 5) (30 page)

She blinked again,
and ran away.

Wednesday, November 5, 2087

“FIFTEEN MINUTES UNTIL the evening
broadcast,” Thomas reported.

Commander Byron and
his team took the parking garage elevator up to the lobby of the forty-story
Continental Broadcasting Network headquarters in downtown Los Angeles. They
wore casual clothes over light body armor with non-lethal neural impulsers
concealed in their holsters. Commander Byron smiled as he remembered how Sammy
had called them jolts when he’d been picked up in Johannesburg.

Byron liked the men
and women on his team. All experienced and battle-tested. All focused on the
task at hand. It was a well-planned mission. His father, Thomas, would bring
his own team from the north entrance, while Byron’s group punched in from the
south. Security would be quickly overwhelmed from both sides.

“Teams check in,”
Thomas announced over the com.

“Strand Team in
position,” Li said.

“Drake Team in
position,” Commander Byron said.

“Duck Team in position,”
Thomas said. “‘Remember, remember, the fifth of November. The gunpowder treason
and plot.’”

“‘I know of no
reason,’” Byron finished, “‘why the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot.’”

The elevators
opened and Byron led his team out. The CBN building was bustling with shoppers
and tourists who wanted to be in the building during the primetime evening
broadcast. Most of them shuffled around the first floor which boasted a company
museum and overpriced food and gift shops. In order to reach the elevators for
access to the upper floors one had to pass through the security gate,
quarantined off by walls of bulletproof glass three meters tall in the middle
of the indoor plaza.

Byron’s team
approached the south security checkpoints as though they were a group of
tourists. From across the lobby, he saw his father’s team doing the same.
“Drake Team ready to move in.”

“Standing by to
intercept the signal,” said Li from Strand Team.

All at once
commotion erupted at the north side of lobby. “Get down! Get down!” voices from
Thomas’s team shouted. Every security guard on the south side closed their
gates and ran to help out at the north end. Byron watched them, waiting.

“Now,” he said.

The two Psions on
Byron’s team jumped the walls using mild blasts to help them, and fired their
jolts at the backs of the security guards.

* * * * *

The sun’s last rays cast waves of
blood red and navy blue against thick white clouds. The Los Angeles weather,
despite the overcast conditions, was pleasant, even for November. The wind
whipped Brickert’s hair as he stood in the open door of the stealth cruiser,
Natalia next to him. They stared at the massive city, its skyscrapers
stretching on for kilometers in both directions. Some of the buildings boggled
Brickert’s mind, standing twelve hundred meters high and as round as a small
lake. With its buildings of bewildering size, downtown Los Angeles was said to
be the pinnacle of human achievement.

Li and the rest of
the Psions waited behind Brickert and Natalia. “Thomas’s team is moving into
position. Let’s go in three … two … one.”

One by one, Li’s
team dove out of the cruiser toward the roof of the CBN world headquarters.
Between their flight suits and their blasts, everyone managed a safe landing.
Li injected a tube of blue goo into the lock, waited for it to set, and
shattered the lock. Once the door had been forced open, they made their way
down a utility staircase until they reached the floor of the control rooms for
the broadcast centers.

“Canisters in
hand,” Li ordered.

Each member of the
team held a small gas canister smaller than a deck of cards.

Li gave the signal
and simultaneously his team slid their gas canisters under the doors of the
control rooms to release their contents. The gasses worked quickly, rendering
the men and women in the rooms unconscious before anyone could sound an alarm
or disable communication between the building, orbiting satellites, and outside
transmission towers. “The guests are sleeping,” Li reported to Thomas. “Headed
to London now. Standing by to intercept the signal.”

“London” was code
for the broadcast studio. Li’s team split three ways: two teams heading toward
the east and west stairwells, while the third group remained, keeping the
communications floor secure while hacking into the security channels.

Once Thomas and
Commander Byron’s teams engaged security on the ground floor, a silent alarm
went out to alert local authorities. Li’s team hacked and rerouted the signal
while several of Thomas’s men used com jammers to prevent any outgoing emergency
calls from tourists and CBN employees. Pandemonium was breaking out in the
lobby, but no one knew about it. When Brickert and Li reached the doors to the
main studio, they paused and checked in with the rest of the team.

“At the gates of
London,” Li reported.

“Do it.”

Li nodded to his
team. “Now.”

* * * * *

After securing the ground floor,
Commander Byron and his father left most of their forces in the lobby to
maintain order and assure no one left while the rest took the elevators up to
meet Strand Team in the studio. By the time they arrived, Strand Team already
had control of the floor. The news anchors, technicians, and cameramen had been
escorted away to another room and locked inside while the resistance assumed
operation of the studio equipment.

“Good work, Li,”
Commander Byron said, surveying the room. “I like the precision and command you
showed.”

Li grinned
modestly. “I was trained well, sir.”

“All right
everyone,” Thomas called out. “We have ten minutes to prep for the evening
news. Just do what we practiced and everything will be fine.”

“Are you ready,
Pop?” Byron asked his father.

“I feel like
I’ve been
preparing for this my whole life.”

“Are all systems
secure?” Commander Byron asked over his com.

Strand Team
confirmed that all systems were go for broadcast. Byron’s father took his place
behind the news desk, donning a white shirt, a tie, and a suit coat over his
combat pants that were hidden behind the desk. With slightly trembling fingers,
Thomas placed his tele-prompter contacts in his eyes. After straightening his
thick gray-white hair, he gave a thumbs up to the commander, who returned the
gesture. “Do I look like a man born to read the news, Walter?”

“Well, you look
better than you normally do.”

Thomas chuckled
heartily. “Good enough.”

“One minute to air
time,” one of the Elite said.

Commander Byron
watched his father assume a serious expression as he cleared his throat and
sipped water from a bottle. One of the female Elite working a camera counted
down on her fingers to tell him only five seconds remained.

At one, Thomas
turned to the camera and said, “Good evening. My name is Thomas Byron. I am a
citizen of the Continental American Government, and lead a group known simply
as
the resistance
. The aim of the
resistance is to restore liberty and freedom to the CAG. I come before you with
a warning that our government lied to its people regarding the multiple
terrorist acts committed by the NWG. Not only that, but the CAG orchestrated
and funded these acts against its own people in an effort to restrict our
freedoms and liberties with the ultimate goal of achieving absolute control
over our lives through an ambitious program called Project Orwell.

“And I have proof.”

Now, accompanying
his father’s face on the screen, were images of evidence the resistance had
collected over the years, pictures of purchasing documents, classified reports,
and clips of video to entice the viewers to delve deeper.

“You may think I am
crazy, dangerous, or perhaps some practical joker, but on the bottom of the
screen you will see the addresses of websites you can visit which will show you
incontrovertible evidence of our claims. Please take the time to read them,
discuss them, and decide for yourself. All I ask is for your uninterrupted
attention for the next few minutes while I reveal to you important
facts—problems that our great nation faces—and present you with a
solution.

“After reading the
information provided, I hope you will reach the same conclusion I did: that we
are no longer free.

“For the last two
decades, our government has manipulated our people through fearmongering,
terrorism, and isolation. It has made us think we need its ever-bloating power
to survive. But mankind has survived long before governments were given power.
We can feed and clothe ourselves. We can build homes over our own heads. We can
take care of our own poor, hungry, and sick.

“A government is
not a building, a man, or a gun. It is an idea to which we give power. Burn
down that building, kill one man, dismantle a gun, and the government will
continue if we let it. But once we collectively reject it and tear it down in
our minds, we can start to build a new one. It has been done countless times in
history.

“In six days we
celebrate a holiday, November 11
^th
, Armistice Day. The day tyranny
was broken in Europe in 1918, almost one hundred seventy years ago. I invite
you to join me on that day. We will march on the capitol in Washington D.C. and
overthrow a government which has grown corrupt, insatiable, and blind. A power
unrecognizable in character from what it was meant to be. I invite any member
of our government who has seen our capital’s black heart to speak out and join
us.

“I cannot do this
alone. You cannot do this alone. But we are not alone. We are many. Thousands,
hundreds of thousands, and millions, can do this together. The government can
ignore me, it can ignore you, but it cannot ignore us all. If we stand united,
bleed united, die united, our freedom is assured. There was once a promise we
believed in. That promise was life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Our
liberty is vanishing. Without it our happiness will perish. And without
happiness, what is life?

“We must fight
together, not only for ourselves, but for our children. For our children’s
children. And so on for generations until complacency sets in once more, and
the world calls for a great and new generation to rise up and assume the
mantle.

“Some of you may be
thinking, ‘Yes, that is a nice idea, but if we do not win I will be arrested or
killed.’ We do not fight because we know we will win. We fight because we know
in our hearts we are right. And if we lose, we will die side by side if that is
the price to be paid.

“Believe in an
America restored. An America rebuilt. An America free. If you share my belief,
my vision, and my hope, then join me on November 11. When the sun rises, so
will we! This nation, God willing, will be renewed, reborn, restored to its
roots:
of
the people,
by
the people,
for
the people, and will not perish from the earth.”

* * * * *

“The counter-insurgency team arrived
moments after the resistance escaped the CBN station in Los Angeles,” the
Queen, disguised as the fox, told the Council. She wanted to pluck their
disapproving eyes out of their ugly heads.

“What do our
analysts say?” one councilwoman asked. “Have the numbers shown what sort of
effect we can expect?”

“I haven’t sought
out an analyst,” the Queen answered.

Several Council
members frowned. “That’s unlike you,” another man said. “You always run numbers
in situations like this.”

“I didn’t feel it
necessary. I think our chances of success are still quite high. In fact, I
believe today was a boon more than a blow.”

“Explain.”

“A drone tagged the
rebel atmo-cruiser, and we traced it back to their base in Glasgow. I’ve
ordered the evacuation of our scouts who were already investigating the site as
a possible location for the resistance’s operation. As soon as they have
vacated the area, we will destroy the rebels. Our victory is assured.”

“What is the
anticipated time of strike?”

“A matter of hours.
We’ll have full press coverage of the aftermath. It will be painfully clear
that this resistance is quashed and the war is all but over.”

* * * * *

A sense of elation permeated the
resistance compound. Stage one of the plan, the mission to Los Angeles, had
been a success. No casualties were suffered, civilian or resistance, and the
website listed during the broadcast now reported huge traffic and downloads.
Right now, it felt like winning was inevitable.

Yet there was no
time for celebrations or parties; perhaps those things would come later.
Brickert didn’t know how people celebrated winning a war, but a huge
party—or at least a huge hamburger—seemed as good an idea as any.