Agency

85 Multitasking

The feed from the very different bipedal drone Conner was piloting, through this rocky scrubland adjacent to CLG, New Coalinga Municipal Airport, meshed strangely with the motion of the bike.

There was no audio, so the roar of Grim Tim’s engine and the occasional whomps of displaced air, when vehicles passed them in either direction, became a soundtrack for the thing’s roadrunner trot through brush and rocks. It looked, she assumed, like the other three running with it, controlled, Conner said, by a swarming program. Like elongated tortoiseshells, mounted atop the hindquarters of miniature robot greyhounds, about a yard tall, assuming they could stand upright, something she hadn’t yet seen one do. They ran canted forward, which they’d done constantly since Conner had opened the feed, and were armless, their legs blurring when not confronted with an obstacle. “Where are they going?” she asked Conner.

“To the personality test,” he said. “Dixon dropped them off nearer the airport.”

“Where is he?”

“In the parking lot there.”

“And where are we going, on the bike?”

“The hell away from Coalinga.”

The feed’s perspective rushed up a low ridge and froze. Which was confusing, given the momentum of the bike beneath her. To this drone’s right, she could see another like it, equally immobile. “Why’d they stop?”

“Look where it’s looking.”

Between the drone and the lights of the airport, she made out a vehicle, neutrally colored. The feed zoomed in on it. Some species of bad-boy pickup, its cabin extended, the bed enclosed. “Who’s that?”

“Pryor. I gassed him this morning, leaving the hotel.”

“Why’s he out here?”

“Man pads,” said Conner. “May have one in the truck.”

“Huh?”

“Acronym. Man-Portable Air-Defense System. Shoulder-launched surface-to-air missile. MANPADS. Singular, never plural.”

Something particularly large passed them, on the highway, headed in the opposite direction, she assumed a big truck. “To shoot down a plane?”

“Howell’s Honda just took off from SFO, flight plan filed for CLG. They’ll barely reach cruising altitude before they start descending.”

“The guy from in front of the Clift is going to shoot down Stets’ plane?”

“Not if I see him looking like he means to. If he did, though, your ex has it equipped with Israeli infrared countermeasures.”

“Honda’s armed?”

“Nah. Launches decoys, flares. And the pilot’s combat-experienced.”

“Stets’ pilot?” Remembering the ones she knew, this seemed unlikely.

“Got somebody else, for this.”

“Crazy.”

“Prom night, like I said.”

The drone suddenly sprinted forward. “What’s happening?”

“Left-flanking unit saw someone get out with a folded tripod. Pryor or the other one. That’s our red line, the tripod.”

“What are these things?”

“Land mines with legs.”

Grim Tim shifted and sped the Harley up, which had to be coincidental but was still weird, the feed simultaneously giving her a full-on charge through brush and over rocks. “This is a video game,” she said, surprising herself, sincerely wanting to believe it was. “Resolution’s not even that high.”

“Video’s encrypted,” Conner said, “but whatever. Want out of the loop? Save you being any more of a witness. Your call, either way.”

“Witness to what?”

Their drone froze again, this time behind a rock slightly taller than it was. The cam rose, either its legs straightening or a neck, which she hadn’t known it had, extending. They were closer to the truck now. Something darted out of the brush then, from the left, greyhound-legs blurring, toward the truck.

Then exploded, the feed whiting out.

“Going for the tripod with that one,” said Conner, the feed returning, revealing the truck on its side, burning. “Overkill.”

Movement from the right, equally fast, charging the burning truck, the feed whiting out again. All of this in complete silence. “That was two at once,” Conner said, “but the warhead on the MANPADS still hasn’t blown. Now I go in, find it if I can, detonate this one. So I’m partially fuzzing the feed”—its lower half pixelating as he said this. The drone lowered its head or carapace and darted around the rock, toward the burning wreck, most of which was pixelated.

“Why?”

“Save you the trauma,” he said, matter-of-factly, very close to the blaze now, rounding it.

Whiteout.

“Shit,” he said. “Got me.”

“What happened?”

“Heat must’ve reached the warhead. Took me out with it, when it blew. Be precious little of the truck left.”

“Did you see anyone?”

“Yeah, but it was whoever the other one was, not your guy. Fire and emergency are hauling ass over here from the airport now, trying to guess what they’ve just seen.”

“How do you know?”

“Got a spotter, at the airport.”

“What about Stets’ plane?”

“Pilot reported seeing explosions on the ground, canceled his approach, heading back to SFO now.”

“Who’s on it?”

“Just the pilot. But we made it look like Howell and the Frenchwoman were with him, when it took off. That was the test. To see if he’d go for it.”

“Who?”

“Pryor, but Cursion signed off on it.”

“They’d try to kill Stets and Caitlin?”

“Ainsley wanted to know if they would. They thought there were three people on board, including the pilot. Pryor and his partner doing anything like setting up the tripod for the MANPADS, that was when we’d move.”

“You know this feed’s still whited out?”

“Sorry,” he said, the feed disappearing, leaving the lower rear rim of the white helmet, black leather below it.

“Where’s Dixon?”

“Headed for a pit stop ten minutes from the airport, get the green off the roof and sides of the van, plus a change of plates. Cursion may assume you’re still in it. Ainsley wanted to see how bad Pryor is, Cursion, or both of them together. No idea what’s going on with that. Cursion was fed the idea that Stets was picking you up there, heading out of the country.”

“And they’d have blown it up on takeoff, not landing?”

“Yep. With you in it.”

“Why would they have assumed the plane would be shot down? Isn’t that kind of drastic?”

“Pryor’s idea. He had a MANPADS. Been trying to sell it on a darknet.”

“How many people did we just kill?”

“One for sure. I saw him. But not Pryor.”

A rig whomped past, in the other direction. She felt the cold now, but part of it was what Conner had told her.