THE 4400® WELCOME TO PROMISE CITY

“Don’t even think about it,” Tom warned him.

“Look at yourself. You’re losing blood fast. No way you’re getting past the two of us.”

The kid nervously licked his lips. His trembling arm started to dip.

“You just tried to incinerate a federal agent,” Diana reminded him. “Not even Jordan Collier can get you out of that.”

Wild, bloodshot eyes reminded Tom of a cornered animal. “I’ll never betray the Movement,” the teen vowed. “You can’t make me talk.”

“That’s what you think,” Tom said darkly.

“No, no …” The kid’s gaze darted toward the cremator. He took a deep breath. An eerie sense of calm came over him. “I won’t give you a chance to break me.”

Too late Tom realized what the besieged embalmer had in mind. “No!” he shouted, lunging forward, but Braces had already thrown himself facedown onto the trolley. The conveyor belt sped the suicidal youth straight into the open mouth of the cremator. A fresh burst of heat spilled from the oven as flames engulfed the teenager’s flailing body. Flesh and clothing blackened and burned. Skin sizzled and popped. His dying screams were mercifully brief.

“Oh my God!” Diana exclaimed. She placed her hand over her mouth in horror. “What kind of fanaticism inspires a sacrifice like that?”

The Vesuvius Prophecy
Greg Cox

Wet Work
Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

Coming in October
Promises Broken
David Mack

GREG COX

Based upon
THE 4400
created by Scott Peters and René Echevarria

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

^®
and © 2009 by CBS Studios Productions LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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First Pocket Star Books paperback edition August 2009

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Cover design by Alan Dingman

Manufactured in the United States of America

10   9   8   7   6   5   4   3   2   1

ISBN 978-1-4165-4322-0
ISBN 978-1-4165-6550-5 (ebook)

Dedicated to the city of Seattle and
the entire Pacific Northwest.

The future enters into us, in order to transform
itself in us, long before it happens.

—Rilke

“I
T’S TIME
, D
AD
,” Kyle said.

He handed his father a syringe of luminous amber fluid. Tom Baldwin turned the syringe over and over as he contemplated the promicin shot in his hands. For most people, the illegal injection offered fifty-fifty odds of gaining a remarkable preternatural ability—or dying a horrible death. But Tom was destined to survive the shot, or so he had been told. According to his son, the future meant for him to gain an ability of his own.

Maybe today … ?

“Your ID, sir?”

The voice snapped Tom out of his memory, bringing him back to the present. Knuckles rapped against the driver’s-side window of his blue Chrysler sedan. He rolled down the window and handed over his ID to one of the border guards posted at the barricade. A damp January breeze invaded the car, as well as the gassy odor of auto exhaust. Dozens of vehicles were backed up on I-5 while they waited to be allowed to exit Seattle. Judging from the
boxes and suitcases strapped to the roofs of many of the cars, as well as the ubiquitous U-Haul trailers, many of them were leaving for good.

Less than two months had passed since an outbreak of airborne promicin had ravaged Seattle, killing over nine thousand people, and the city had yet to fully recover from the disaster. The fact that another nine thousand–plus people had been endowed with unnatural abilities against their will had only added to the instability. Not surprisingly, thousands of survivors, especially ordinary people with no special abilities, had chosen to seek safer pastures elsewhere. Over four million people had once lived in the Seattle metro area; nearly a third of that number had now pulled up stakes.

Tom couldn’t blame them. Seattle was a dangerous place these days.

And getting more so all the time,
he thought.

The guard examined Tom’s credentials. A high-collared, pine-colored uniform with silver trim identified her as one of Jordan Collier’s self-appointed Peace Officers. “NTAC, huh?” The woman’s face hardened; the National Threat Assessment Command was not exactly popular with the followers of Jordan Collier, the undisputed leader of the Promicin-Positive Movement, which had largely taken over Seattle, now known in some circles as “Promise City.” During the disaster, his people, who were immune to the plague, having already been exposed to promicin, had stepped forward to maintain order—and had yet to surrender Seattle back to the authorities. Although Collier had yet to officially declare the city’s independence, and
had refrained from taking any formal title or position, he and his acolytes were pretty much in control of the city’s government and infrastructure. As far as the Movement was concerned, NTAC, a division of Homeland Security, was part of the oppressive old order they had usurped— and best relegated to the dustbin of history.

“That’s right,” Tom said. He couldn’t help wondering what kind of a special ability the guard possessed; all of Collier’s people had been changed by promicin in one way or another, and believed they had a sacred destiny to change the world. Even the name of the disaster was controversial. Collier and his followers referred to it as “The Great Leap Forward.” Most everyone else called it “fifty/fifty.”

He kept his voice neutral, not wanting to provoke her. The guard did not appear to be armed, but that hardly mattered where p-positives were concerned. For all Tom knew, this woman could kill him with a thought. “I think you’ll find my papers are in order.”

The guard squinted at his ID. “I suppose,” she conceded grudgingly. “If I were you, though, I’d keep going and never come back.” She thrust the papers back at him. “Your kind doesn’t belong here anymore.”

Tom was tempted to point out that he’d been born and raised in Seattle and had as much right to live there as anyone else, but held his tongue. He had more important matters to deal with today, assuming he ever got out of the city. “See you later,” he said curtly. “On my way home.”

The guard scowled, but waved him on. An automated aluminum gate arm lifted to let him through. A pair of orange metal pylons flanked the roadway. Although
dormant now, the pylons were capable of generating waves of intense pain when activated. They were Promise City’s first line of defense.

Tom didn’t bother to roll up his window before driving north as he only got about fifty feet before running into a
second
set of checkpoints. This one was manned by grimfaced soldiers toting automatic weapons. Their uniforms and insignia identified them as members of the U.S. Army. A guard approached the driver’s side of the car.

Here we go again,
Tom thought.

An uneasy stalemate existed between the federal government and Promise City. Needless to say, the Powers That Be were hardly happy to surrender a major American city to a messianic drug dealer with a cultlike following, but the extraordinary abilities of Collier and his people, as well as the futuristic technology at his command, made taking back Seattle a risky endeavor. Even before the plague, Collier’s community of p-positive revolutionaries had managed to repel any government attempts to take them into custody. Now, with his army swollen with literally thousands of new recruits, Collier was a force to be reckoned with—and not only in Seattle. It was well-known that he had sleeper agents, capable of generating tornadoes and hurricanes and God knew what else, positioned throughout the entire country, ready to create havoc if the Feds tried to send in the troops to reclaim Seattle.

Which they’re bound to try eventually,
Tom thought. Everyone figured a major confrontation was inevitable, but nobody wanted a city-sized version of Waco just yet, so
forces on both sides were biding their time and holding their breaths.
Just like the rest of us.

He showed his ID to the soldier, a fresh-faced young man who looked to be about Kyle’s age. The guard relaxed only a little when he saw Tom’s NTAC credentials. His armed comrades stood by warily, tightly gripping their M16 assault rifles. He didn’t blame the soldiers for being edgy; they were on the front lines of an evolutionary civil war. “Please exit your vehicle,” the young guard requested. He stepped away from the car door.