The God Wave (24 page)

She set her jaw, tucked Jorge's rose behind her ear, and marched into the building. The effect was half flamenco dancer, half toreador on her way to find the source of this bullshit.

EUGENE WAS CREEPED OUT. THERE
was no other phrase that described it. He'd gone off campus to get what Mini called “candy coffee” at a local bistro—so heavy on the whipped cream and extra mocha that he couldn't be sure there was any actual coffee in it at all—and had decided to stop at a drugstore to grab a handful of PayDay bars and some red Twizzlers to restock his desk drawer.

He'd thought nothing of it when a young man in an Orioles T-shirt and mirrored shades had lined up with him at the coffee shop, but when he saw the same guy in one of those angled overhead mirrors at the drugstore, it sent a chill all the way from the top of his geek-chic hair to the soles of his high-tops.

He somehow managed to look nonchalant as he walked back to his car and climbed in. He pretended to mess with the radio and the cell phone charger for a minute or two. It allowed him to see the guy out of the corner of his eye when he exited the store and stood on the sidewalk.

Eugene couldn't tell if the guy glanced at him, thanks to the mirrored shades, but he wasn't surprised when he fished out a cell phone and started talking into it as he paced back and forth in front of the store.

Fine. Play that game.

Euge started his car and backed out of the parking place. He drove across the lot to the exit, his eyes flicking to the rearview mirror. Somewhere between one glance and the next, the Orioles fan had disappeared. By the time Eugene had made it across the parking lot to the street, a silver-gray Honda was pulling out.

He drove back to Forward Kinetics via an alternate route that included the drive-through window at a Dairy Queen, where he forced an Oreo blizzard down on top of the macchiato. He last saw the silver Honda as he turned in at the business park's main entrance. It drove straight past.

Eugene headed directly for Chuck's office, the queasy feeling in his stomach caused by something other than a sugar overload.

ALL WEEK LANFEN HAD LOOKED
for an opportunity to get behind the scenes at Deep Shield. The problem was, of course, that she was rarely alone. She was escorted everywhere and spent the bulk of her time with her class.

The opportunity finally came when her class broke up on Friday afternoon. They'd quit a bit early to attend a debriefing, and the limo and driver usually assigned to her were otherwise engaged.

“Do you mind waiting for your driver here?” Brian asked her,
gesturing around their practice room. His classmates had already marched their bots out of the room, but Thorin was standing at attention next to him. “It should only be about twenty minutes.”

Lanfen shrugged and dropped to the mat cross-legged. “I'm fine with that. I'll just sit here and wind down. A little extra meditation never hurts.”

He smiled at her then turned, taking a mental hold of Thorin.

Lanfen closed her eyes to slits and focused on the big robot. In a moment she was looking out at the world through its optics. She'd wondered if she'd collide with Lieutenant Reynolds's consciousness when she finally accomplished this, but she didn't. Then again, she didn't try. She just went along for the ride as the bot and his rider left the practice chamber and entered a part of Deep Shield that Lanfen and her associates had not been allowed access to.

The corridors—gray on blue—looked no different from the ones in the more public areas except that there was an armed guard on either side of the doors. Reynolds gave them each a nod and kept Thorin moving down the hall. They passed by several sets of closed doors, and Lanfen was beginning to despair of seeing anything of interest when the bot turned and pushed through a door on the right side of the broad corridor.

The room they entered was long and lined with what reminded Lanfen of the sort of charging stations the Borg used on
Star Trek
. There were dozens of them. The ones closest to the door belonged to her class members, but beyond them . . .

Back in the practice room, Lanfen sucked in a breath.

Beyond the now-familiar larger Hob-bots were rows of machines that dwarfed them. They were more massive, heavier, and seemed somehow misshapen. Their legs were as thick as tree trunks and ended in constructions that were definitely not feet. They looked more like smallish tank treads.

“What the hell?” Lanfen murmured.

Thorin swung to the left and mounted a low pedestal before turning about to face the room. Lanfen watched through the dwarfed fu-bot's optics as Lieutenant Reynolds left the room. She waited for the door to close before she took charge of the bot and swung its head about to give her a sweeping view of the entire chamber. She wished desperately she could take a picture, but all she had were her powers of observation and memory.

She tried focusing on the treads, the strangely thickened lower arms. But she couldn't quite make out some of the details.

She needed to get a closer look.

She had started to move Thorin back down to the floor when a door at the rear of the room swung open, and a pair of uniformed men entered, engaged in conversation. She froze the bot, one leg half-raised to step down, its head turned toward the newcomers.

Lanfen felt sweat trickle down her back but refused to be distracted by it. Slowly she lowered the bot's leg and swiveled its head back to true.

“Jesus,” one of the men swore, staring at her (or rather at Thorin). “Did you see that?”

“See what?” The other guy turned to follow his gaze.

“I'd swear that bot moved.”

“Stop that. This room is creepy enough without you saying that sort of shit. Let's get some dinner before I'm so spooked I can't eat.”

They left.

Lanfen took a deep breath and began to turn Thorin's head again.

“Ms. Chen?”

A hand came down on her shoulder, making her yip audibly.

She opened her eyes and stared up into the face of her perennial escort and driver.

“I'm sorry,” he said, looking abashed. “I didn't mean to startle you. We can leave whenever you're ready.”

Lanfen made herself breathe again. “Good. Fine. I'm ready now.” She rose and followed the escort from the room, giving Bilbo a parting glance. A part of her wished she could take him back with her, get him out of that place. It was an irrational response; Bilbo wasn't sentient and didn't really care where he was housed. Any personality he had was hers.

She hung on those thoughts for a moment—on the idea that Bilbo was, in some sense, a home for her consciousness, a familiar landing pad in this unfamiliar place.

“Are you okay, Ms. Chen?” the driver asked as he held open the Humvee's rear passenger door for her. “You look kind of pale.”

“I think I might be coming down with something.” She sniffled for good measure. “Long day.”

“Yes, ma'am,” he said agreeably and ferried her back to Forward Kinetics, where she knew the first order of business would be a walk in the park with Dice.

Chuck had, once upon a time, enjoyed working late. There was a special sort of contentment that came with the peace and quiet of the Forward Kinetics building at night, when most people—excepting often Eugene, Dice, and Brenda—had gone home for the day. There were few if any interruptions, and those were usually caused by Eugene or Dice popping in with a question, an idea, or an epiphany that Chuck also found engaging. Sometimes the four of them would gather to brainstorm ideas and chug coffee.

Now Chuck found that, increasingly, staying after hours left him feeling as if he were doing something subversive and annoying to the Deep Shield people charged with keeping the labs secure. He felt like a stranger in his own lab and found himself going home on time far more often these days.

Tonight was an exception. He had some data he wanted to collate and study, so he stayed. Gone were the days when he could take his work home. General Howard had made it clear that any
data related to his agency's work was not to leave the premises. Chuck had a government-issued external hard drive for Deep Shield work.

As the sun dipped behind the trees, and the light filtering into his office turned a lurid red, Chuck gave up trying to concentrate on the data sets, leaned back in his chair, and wondered what the hell they'd gotten themselves into with this government contract: armed men and women wearing suits and earpieces prowled their halls. Their work was no longer their own. He wondered sometimes if their labs and offices were bugged.

He shook that paranoid thought from his head and tried to focus his tired eyes and his mind on the test data from Sara's class of recruits. The sound of a man delicately clearing his throat caused him to glance up at his office door. The man who stood there was a complete stranger. He was tall, thin, and angular, with a long face and thick, wavy hair that was just going to silver at the temples. He wore a frock coat and a string tie that made him look as if he'd just stepped out of a Mark Twain novel or a time machine.

“Dr. Brenton?” The stranger's delicately accented voice was soft but every bit as penetrating as his dark gaze.

“Yes, I'm Charles Brenton. May I help you?” He must surely be one of Howard's people, or he'd have been stopped at the reception desk and turned back.

“I was actually hoping I could help you.” The man came into the office and closed the door behind him. He took a device the size and shape of a pitch pipe out of his coat pocket and held it up in the palm of his hand. It made no sound, but a light atop it went from red to yellow to green.

“Ah,” he said. “There.” He pocketed the device and turned his attention to Chuck. “My name is Kristian Lorstad. I represent a venerable academic and cultural institution that is very inter
ested in your technological breakthrough. We see it as a potential benefit to humanity.”

“Wait . . . you're not part of Deep Shield?”

“No.”

“Then how did you get in?”

Lorstad smiled. “I simply showed my credentials to the gentleman at the front desk.”

“Then you're with the government.”

“No, we are most definitely not with the government. Our aims are not political, and a great many of the movers and shakers in government, at this juncture, are slaves to political dogma. That is a poor atmosphere in which to grow programs that will benefit humankind.”

Chuck wondered what sort of credentials would get a nongovernment or nonmilitary player admitted to Forward Kinetics, but he didn't ask aloud.

Lorstad seated himself in one of Chuck's side chairs and regarded the neuroscientist soberly. “You wish to benefit humanity, do you not, Dr. Brenton?”

“Yes. Yes, of course I do.”

“Do you feel that your current arrangement with Deep Shield furthers that aim?”

“What do you know about our current arrangement with Deep Shield? In fact, how do you even know about Deep Shield at all?”

“The institution I represent is composed of very powerful people, Dr. Brenton. We know what we need to know.”

Powerful people. Chuck was up to his eyebrows in powerful people. He was leery of them, weary of them. He wanted no more. He rose. “I'm sorry, Mr. Lorstad. I've about had my fill of powerful people and organizations. From where I sit, they seem to be running my life. All our lives.”

Lorstad remained seated. “You'd like that to change, would you?”

Chuck blinked. “Yes.”

The other man spread his hands as if that change were the easiest thing in the world to accomplish. “Then I can help you after all.”

“No. I don't think you can. I think you might be able to help me exchange a devil I know for a devil I don't know. I'm not up for that, thank you. I'm tired of mysteries. Tired of secrets. Tired of overseers and spot checkers and security cameras and probably bugs as well. This conversation is most likely being recorded.”

“Oh, yes,” said Lorstad, glancing around the office. “Most definitely bugs. But, no, this conversation is not being recorded. It's not even being heard. The bugs are inoperative and will be until they reinstate them.”

“What—you expect me to believe you just took them out with that device?” Chuck nodded at Lorstad's coat pocket.

“Believe what you will. This conversation, as far as the surveillance equipment at Deep Shield is concerned, never occurred.” Now he stood. “Dr. Brenton, I'm offering you freedom. Don't you want that? Don't you want to be free to run your labs the way you feel they should be run? Free to help all of mankind instead of just this elite arm of the military?”

“Actually, I just want to be left alone by powerful people. No,” he added when Lorstad opened his mouth again. “I'm not interested.”

“Very well. I'll leave you with this then.” He produced a plain white business card and laid it carefully on Chuck's desk. “And a question: has it occurred to you to wonder what department of government Deep Shield answers to?”

It had, actually, and Chuck found that Lorstad's choice of words prompted discomfort. Because the more he thought about General Howard, the more he had a sense that the man was
answerable to no one. That couldn't be true, of course. But
who
were his superiors? Matt thought it was the DoD, but it could just as easily be the CIA, FBI, or NSA or an obscure black-ops branch of any arm of the military.

Hell—who's to say anyone in the government even knew about this at all?

Now there was a warm, cozy thought.

Lorstad watched these things parade through Chuck's head for a moment, then turned and left his office, striding through the outer lab. Chuck crossed his arms, listening with half an ear to the progress of the other man's footsteps. They paused. A moment later Chuck heard the door to the gallery open.

He sighed. Chuck almost felt sorry for the guy. To make that grand exit with its oh-so-mysterious question only to take the wrong door and end up in a second-floor gallery with no way to leave gracefully. He rounded his desk and listened for the man's footsteps again. Had they stopped at the top of the gallery stairs?

He went to the bottom of the gallery stairs and called up. “Mr. Lorstad? The exit is on the other side of the room.”

There was no answer. Chuck went through the open door and climbed the stairs to the gallery. There was no one on the staircase, and the gallery was empty. The guy must have been snooping. He probably opened the door to the gallery and left via the main hallway.

Chuck went back down to the lab and out into the corridor. He looked both ways but saw no one except a roving guard. The man was a stranger, which made Chuck wonder how many such security people were actually on duty these days.

“Is something wrong, Doctor?” the guard asked.

“No, I was just wondering . . .” He balked at mentioning his visitor, though he couldn't have said why. “I was just wondering if Dr. Pozniaki is still around.”

“No, sir. Dr. Pozniaki left approximately forty minutes ago.”

“Ah. I see. I guess I'll go home, too. I can talk to him in the morning.”

“Yes, sir.” The guard swung around and continued on his rounds.

Chuck returned to the lab and made a quick search of any place a grown man might hide, but he found nothing. Feeling suddenly exhausted, he packed up his laptop, locked the Deep Shield–mandated external hard drive in his safe, and turned off the lights. A small splash of white atop his desk caught his eye: Lorstad's card . . . and with it something he hadn't noticed—the little device the man had told him jammed surveillance. He picked both up, stuck them into the pocket of his backpack, and went home.

If he had expected things there to be any less weird or more relaxing, he was doomed to disappointment. He arrived at his house in the early dusk and dropped his laptop bag on the sofa before heading for the kitchen. He was contemplating a beer when there was a tap at the back slider. He only just avoided uttering a startled yelp and turned to find Euge and Mini gesturing at him to unlock the door and let them in.

“Thanks, Doc,” Eugene said. “We need to talk—”

There was a knock at the front door.

Eugene blinked. “Oh, man,” he said.

Chuck gestured for them to wait and went to the front of the house. Two shadowy figures were on his darkened doorstep. Through the side panel, he recognized them as Dice and Lanfen. He started to turn on the porch light but hesitated. Instead he pulled open the door and let them into the dimly lit front hall.

“Go on into the kitchen,” he told them, then retrieved his backpack before joining them. Feeling a bit silly, he got out Lorstad's jamming device, flipped the switch on its side, and watched the light atop it go immediately to green.

“What's that?” Eugene asked.

“I think . . . I think it means my kitchen isn't bugged.”

Dice's face went pale. “Bugs? In our houses?”

“Maybe not. In my office it went red first.”

“Where did you get it?” Dice wanted to know.

“Not important,” said Chuck. “Why are you all here? This looks like an intervention.”

“Of a sort,” said Lanfen. She glanced around at the others. “I have a feeling we all have something important to say. Who goes first?”

No one said anything. Chuck ran his fingers through his hair. “Okay, can I get a brief preview first? Mini?”

“The entire gardening staff has been replaced by Deeps.” That was worth a chill. And the way she blurted it, like something out of
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
.

“Euge?”

“I was followed this afternoon. A guy in a silver Honda. He followed me into two stores then all the way back to HQ.”

Chuck looked at Dice. “I'm almost afraid to ask.”

The robotics expert glanced at Lanfen then said, “It came to my attention that there are things and locations in the Deeps that are strictly off-limits. Stuff they won't let us see even if a robot's in need of repair. I got curious, so I asked Lanfen to take a look behind the scenes if she could.”

“She could,” said Lanfen. “I piggybacked a ride on Lieutenant Reynolds's bot and got a look at their storage area. Chuck, there are robots in there that . . . well, let's just say it's hard to imagine them having any humanitarian applications.”

All eyes were on the martial arts master now. “Can you describe them?”

“They had treads instead of feet. They were huge. Bigger than even the Dwarf series. They seemed to be armed—in the
truest sense of the word. I think their arms may have contained weaponry.”

Chuck sat down hard on one of his kitchen bar stools. His lips felt stiff, frozen. “Weaponry?”

“I'm not one hundred percent certain. I'd need a better look. The thing is: what then? We can't exactly confront them.”

“Why not?” Mini asked. “Our contract specifies that our tech is not to be used for offensive weaponry, doesn't it?”

“Yes, but they could easily just claim it's
defensive
,” said Eugene.

“Or even that it isn't weaponry at all,” said Lanfen. “Those big arm rigs might be for grapples for all I know.”

“If they are grapples,” Dice said reasonably, “why would they hide them from us?”

“So we won't use their designs?” asked Mini.

“That's not the way it's supposed to work, though,” said Chuck. “It's just not . . . I'm going to call Matt.”

They all stared at him.

“What?”

Dice was the first to speak. “Are you sure that's wise, Doc? He's pretty tight with Howard. If we let Matt know we're wigging out over this, he may say something to the general. If they're following us now, what'll they do if they think we're getting ready to bolt?”

“Are we?” asked Mini quietly. “Are you thinking of bolting? I know I am. Those men in the garden aren't gardeners anymore, Chuck. They're government agents, and more and more I think they're there to guard us from going out as much as to keep people from coming in.”

“I know what you mean. And I still can't get over the fact that we really don't even know who they
are.
I kind of doubt they have the kind of oversight most branches of the military do.”

“I'm not even sure I know what that means,” said Dice.

“I'm thinking black ops,” Chuck said.

Dice ran his hands over his face. “I thought that was only in the movies.”

Chuck was on the verge of telling them about Lorstad, but he didn't. If they thought black ops was just for films, what would they make of Lord Lorstad the vampire? “I think we should sound Matt out,” he said carefully. “But very gently. Very obliquely. And we should probably talk to other members of the team. Find out if there's anything more going on than we know about. Then . . . I don't know.”

“Then is then. But right now,” said Eugene, “I think we should order pizza.” He answered the others' looks quickly. “It'll make this seem like a party to anyone who figures out that we're all here.”