Before the Dawn

Chapter nine Eyes only

Even in the post-Pulse world, the ringing of a doorbell was, generally, an innocuous thing.

Right now, with midnight approaching, the doorbell in Logan Cale’s condominium was trilling the hello of an unannounced guest. The building was secure, and the lobby guard would normally call and check before sending anyone through.

But there had been no call — just the ringing of the bell.

And in the life of Logan Cale, answering a doorbell could mean his last act on earth.

First, there was the risk that someone with the government — or some “civic-minded” citizen looking for reward money — would enter and discover the not-terribly-secret home studio from which Logan broadcast the cyberbulletins of his very secret alter ego, Eyes Only.

Second, Logan was one of a long line of Americans born to wealth who developed a sense of shame — even guilt — for his life of privilege, a sentiment that had blossomed into genuine social concern. And, while his underground identity as Eyes Only seemed secure, his reputation as an aboveground left-leaning journalist was well known.

This of course did not prevent Logan from being perceived as just another fat-cat target. The Cale family had the kind of affluence that had easily weathered the Pulse and its various upheavals and problems... one of which was kidnapping the rich for ransom.

As in the Great Twentieth-Century Depression, this left-handed entrepreneurial pursuit had become the “racket of choice” of many criminals, from down-on-their-outers to sophisticated career criminals. And as in the Lindbergh era of “snatches,” the victims usually turned up dead, even after full payment had been made.

So... if this caller wasn’t who Logan thought it was, he just might never get to open the door again.

Logan could ignore the bell. His two-hundred-fifty-pound ex-cop bodyguard, Peter, had the night off, and — unless this was a full-scale raid, in which the door would be battered down, anyway — Logan could just continue with his research and wait for whoever-it-was to go away.

But if this caller was who Logan suspected it might be, he would prefer to take the meeting during Peter’s absence. If this was someone else, well, that was why Peter very seldom got a night off, and on the rare occasions when Logan did answer his own door, he did so in the company of a shotgun.

The bell rang again.

Paranoia runs deep, Logan thought with a wry little smile, quoting a very old song as he rose from his massive array of racked computer gear — including half a dozen monitors and a networked laptop — and strode from his work space with an easy grace suggesting an acceptance of whatever might befall him in his quixotic but so-necessary crusade.

A shade over six feet tall, dark blond and blue-eyed behind wire-frame glasses, Logan Cale had rowed crew at Yale, and continued to work out, maintaining a slender yet muscular physique worthy of a college athlete; his apparel — jeans, a pullover gray sweater, and sneakers — added to an eternal-college-boy air of which he was wholly unaware.

His surroundings — the sprawling, modern condo, decorated with quality and taste (or at least he liked to think so) — were the one indulgence of wealth Logan allowed himself. With hardwood floors in each room, and the occasional area rug, the place had a stark, masculine feel; translucent panels separated the rooms, track lighting bathing his world in pale orange, peach, and yellow.

In the living room, each wall bore a different color, earth tones or a combination thereof. Two walls came together to form the corner of the predominantly glass high-rise, allowing a great deal of light into the room by day. Though the furniture was expensive — hard woods, sleek lines, designer stuff — the overall statement was minimalism. A plush brown sofa dominated the center of the room with simple white and silver end tables and a matching coffee table in front. Chairs sat perpendicular to the couch, completing the feng shui of the room.

Shotgun in his hands, Logan approached the double doors that were the front entry to the apartment; a small video screen to the right served as an electronic peephole.

About Logan’s height, his visitor was a sullenly handsome young man of maybe twenty or twenty-one — short brown hair, green eyes, and a long, angular face — in a black leather jacket, dark blue T-shirt, and black jeans.

Logan opened the door.

“Take your goddamn time, why don’t you?” the young man said, his voice deeper and older than his years, his barely contained rage evident.

“Why hello, Seth,” Logan said. “Forgive me — from now on, I’ll just sit by the door, waiting for you to stop by, unannounced.”

Seth grunting a humorless laugh was his only reply.

Logan tried not to take Seth’s dark attitude personally; the boy had this kind of quiet contempt for just about everybody and everything.

Logan gestured for Seth to come in, which he did. While Logan shut the door, pausing for a moment to look at the video security monitor, just in case someone had followed Seth up, the young man crossed to the couch and fell onto it with the kind of casual familiarity of a family member.

“Make yourself at home,” Logan said, dryly, ambling in after his guest.

“I’d feel more at home with a drink,” Seth said, a condescending smile tickling the thin lips.

Logan took a deep breath and let it out slow, fighting irritation; this screwed-up kid had a way of looking both happy and miserable at the same time, like that old-time movie actor... what was his name? Then Logan remembered: James Dean.

Deciding not to slap the smirk off the young man’s face, Logan asked, “Scotch, I suppose?”

“I been off Bosco for a while.”

What a charmer, Logan thought, went to the kitchen and came back with a glass filled with ice and clear liquid. He handed Seth the glass.

“This is water,” the young man said, just looking at it.

“Can’t get anything by you.”

“What are you... my daddy now? I’d like a goddamn Scotch.”

“Maybe ‘daddy’ doesn’t feel you need your judgment impaired any worse than it already is.”

Seth obviously knew immediately what Logan meant, and sipped the water, putting the glass — thoughtfully — on a coaster on the nearby coffee table.

The relationship between the two had been strained from the beginning — neither liked the other’s style, or manner. But they needed each other (codependents, Logan thought), each offering abilities and knowledge the other didn’t have. It had made for a rocky ride thus far, Seth with his gift for alienating almost anybody who came into his life — particularly anyone who got at all close — and Logan, always focused on the struggle, with little patience for those who did not share his passion.

The pair had been introduced less than a month ago by Ben Daly, a mousy middle-aged med tech who was a mutual acquaintance. Among Logan’s Eyes Only efforts was a sort of Underground Railroad, and the cyber — freedom fighter had been working on securing safe passage to Canada for Daly, where the tech hoped with Cale’s help to disappear into a new identity.

Daly was on the run from his former employer, a private corporation that had been taken over by U.S. government black ops. The med tech and his fellow employees had been experimenting in bio-enhancement technology, but the new covert project — Project Manticore — moved the experiment into using recombinant DNA to produce a superior combat soldier. When Manticore started using children as guinea pigs, Daly decided he’d had enough.

Another research scientist at the facility gave notice, and this encouraged Daly to make an appointment to see his boss, to tender his own resignation... and the next night, said research scientist was a hit-and-run fatality. The head of Manticore, the spookily soft-spoken Colonel Donald Lydecker, had said to Daly, “A dangerous world out there — what was it you wanted to talk to me about, Mr. Daly?”

So Ben Daly settled in, did his job, and waited for his chance. It wasn’t until well after the Pulse that he’d gotten away — Manticore was the kind of job you couldn’t quit... you had to escape from it, like the prison it was — and he’d stayed hidden for years, the last three in Seattle, working as a lowly (but alive) lab tech.

And then Daly had been tracked down by Seth. At first Daly thought the X5 had been sent by Manticore, but it quickly became apparent he was simply looking for a solution to the seizures that had afflicted him, and his siblings, since their youth. A runaway. Still, Seth’s turning up gave Daly a sudden, desperate desire to leave Seattle, and find some new rock to crawl under. If Seth, a kid on the run, working by himself, could find Daly, it was only a matter of time until organization-man Lydecker came calling.

Though he hadn’t been able to solve Seth’s health problem, Daly had informed the renegade X5 that tryptophan — a homeopathic neurotransmitter — could help control the symptoms. In an effort to keep from getting his ass kicked by Seth for failing to end the seizures, Daly had introduced the volatile young man to Logan.

Daly, of course, was unaware that Logan was Eyes Only; but he did know that Logan was an anti-establishment journalist from a very wealthy family.

“Maybe you can track down some doctor or research scientist,” Daly had said, “who can address Seth’s condition... maybe you can network with this Eyes Only character. Who knows?”

“Who knows,” Logan had said.

Logan suspected Daly didn’t care if the X5 got help or not. Likely the med tech only hoped that Seth would latch onto Logan as a new target of his dark moods. If so, Daly’s strategy had proved successful: the tech was in some little town on the edge of the Arctic Circle, and Seth was still in Seattle, playing a dangerous game with Logan Cale.

Sprawled on the couch, running shoes up on it, Seth might have been a patient in a psychiatrist’s office. Referring to Ryan Devane — the corrupt sector chief who had been selling everything from under-the-table sector passes to minority teenagers into slavery overseas — Seth said, “Problem solved.”

Few in Seattle, no matter their political persuasion, had any doubt that Devane was a bad man... many would have called him evil; but his position had been so well insulated, he couldn’t be touched... except by Eyes Only.

“Solved,” Logan echoed emptily.

“Did what you wanted,” Seth said.

“What I wanted, and more.”

“You wanted him stopped.” Seth smiled over innocently at Logan, who had settled into a chair. “I stopped him.”

“You killed him.”

Seth shrugged, folded his hands on his tummy, stared at the ceiling. “That’s pretty much the most efficient way to stop somebody.”

Shaking his head, Logan said, “The most efficient way isn’t always the best way.”

“I agree... but in this case, it was. You’re not going to lecture me on that ends-don’t-justify-the-means b.s. again, are you? They taught us ethics at fuckin’ Manticore.”

“I’ll just bet they did. They teach you anything about justice?”

The younger man thought about it for a long moment. “Justice was served... What’s next?”

“Never mind what’s next,” Logan said, rising, propelled by rage. “How the hell do you figure ‘justice’ was served by murder?”

Seth glanced over with an expression of mock innocence. “Any children sold into slavery lately?”

“That doesn’t justify—”

“Sure it does. Bastard got what he deserved.”

Logan began to pace, hands in the pockets of his slacks. “Seth — that’s not justice, that’s revenge.”

“Same difference,” Seth said, and swung into a sitting position, leaning back, arms outstretched on the back of the couch.

Logan said, “I wanted to stop him — expose him, entrap him—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa — isn’t entrapment illegal? I thought the ends didn’t justify the means?”

“When law enforcement itself is corrupt, certain extreme measures have to be taken. It’s a matter of degree, Seth — some laws go beyond politics. These are laws that have to do with society, with civilization, even religion.”

“Oh, shit, you’re not gonna go religious on my ass, now!”

“No... no. But ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill’ is part of the social contract, Seth. You can’t—”

“Bullshit! The social contract got ripped up when the Pulse went down — where was the social contract when Manticore was makin’ me, like instant soup in a damn test tube?”

Logan stopped pacing. He sat down next to Seth. “Don’t make me regret taking you into my confidence.”

Seth’s grin was a terrible thing. “Thought you had a supersoldier to play with, didn’tcha? And now you’re afraid all you got is a loose cannon... am I on to something, ‘Eyes Only’?”

“Seth... please... We have the opportunity to be a team. To make a difference...”

“We’re already making a difference!” Seth sprang to his feet; now he was the one pacing, but there was a raving and ranting quality to the words that accompanied it. “Logan, you were unhappy when a corrupt official was ruining lives and selling children into slavery... and now you’re telling me you’re still unhappy, even though we stopped the mofo!”

“I’m not unhappy he’s been stopped—”

“But you are unhappy this blight on society is dead? Are you fuckin’ high?”

Logan sighed. “You were acting as my... agent. I feel responsible for that man’s death. And I don’t like it, not one little bit.”

Seth stopped in front of Logan and put his hands together in a prayerful gesture. “How touching... but your liberal guilt doesn’t negate the fact that the mission was accomplished and we saved maybe hundreds, who knows, maybe even thousands of kids from being sold into slavery.”

Logan could see he wasn’t going to prevail in this debate. And he feared the moral complexities would continue to elude this kid — the supersoldier genetic makeup perhaps had made Seth a literal killing machine.

Maybe over the long haul, Logan could convince Seth that justice didn’t necessarily mean the summary execution of everyone they went after. He only hoped he could control and shape Colonel Lydecker’s nasty lab rat into something positive for society.

Now Seth plopped down in a chair opposite the couch. A tiny, almost naughty smile formed on the sullenly handsome face. “I think it’s time.”

“Time?”

“Time we went after Manticore.”

Logan sighed again. “It is not time.”

“Well, I think it is.”

That was the level of their discourse, Logan thought: Is too, is not, is too, is not...

Meeting the young man’s unblinking gaze with his own, Logan said, “We don’t know enough. Really, we don’t know anything. We still don’t know where their headquarters is, we don’t know where you were raised, other than the Wyoming mountains somewhere...”

Seth exploded out of the chair. “What have you been doing while I been risking my ass?” Seth gestured with both hands, his arms wide in frustration. “What are you doin’ with those fancy-ass computers? Downloading porn? Hitting the cybercasinos?”

“These things take time.”

Bouncing on his heels, Seth said, “You’ve had what — three, four weeks? Enough time for me to take out Devane, and you haven’t found out anything?”

Seething inside, Logan resisted the urge to tell Seth to use his abilities to take a spectacular flying fuck, and said, “I’ve started looking into old factories, abandoned prisons, military bases. But these people are smart, and they’re dangerous, and they don’t want to be found. If they did, you would have found them already.”

Seth seemed almost to pout, and said, somewhat childishly, “But you’ve had three weeks, man!”

“You’ve had how many years? And you haven’t found them, have you, Seth?”

“I haven’t been looking — I’ve been hiding. But now I got you, and your resources... we can take ’em on, Logan! We can take ’em down!”

“And we’re going to. We are. And I do have a lead...”

Seth’s eyes widened, like a child anticipating Christmas. “What kind of a lead?”

“I take it you didn’t see the bulletins on the LA Massacre — I ran it three times yesterday.”

“No... I was... busy.”

“I guess you were. Come with me.”

Logan walked Seth to the office-cum-broadcast-center, where the main monster computer was (as always) running and each monitor had several windows open. The cyberjournalist played the X5 a video CD of the bulletin that included the grisly footage of the Chinese Theatre slaughter. At the mention of the troops in black rumored to have supported the Brood in the massacre, Seth perked up.

“That’s Manticore... that’s got to be Manticore.”

Logan ran the VCD again, with the sound down. “What would draw Manticore into helping one side of a street gang war?”

“I’d like to know the answer to that.”

“Good.” Logan smiled at Seth, rather blandly. “Because that’s where we’re going to start... assuming you don’t kill our target, before we find anything out.”

Seth smirked. “Who is he?”

“Well, it is a him... but it’s more than a him. It’s a ‘them.’ ”

“The Brood?”

“The Brood is part of it. You heard the bulletin: they’re expanding to Seattle.”

“Who did they send here?”

“They didn’t ‘send’ anybody — the top man himself came... Mikhail Kafelnikov.”

Logan brought up another picture: a muscular blond man who had the good looks of a pre-Pulse rock star, and the rap sheet of a serial killer. “He’s rumored to have ordered or taken part in as many as one hundred murders in Los Angeles.”

The young man studied the picture. “You made a good point, Logan — Manticore and a street gang... it just doesn’t compute.”

“Seth, back in the early part of the last century, street gangs of Italian kids evolved into the biggest, most successful organized crime syndicate in the history of man.”

“And this history lesson is because?...”

“The Brood may evolve into something much bigger than a street gang... particularly with covert support from Manticore.”

“So what is this... Haselhoff guy up to, in our great city?”

“It’s Kafelnikov...”

“Whatever.”

“... and he’s selling art and Americana to foreigners. Any precious remnant of our past that he can get his hands on, really, he’ll sell to whoever offers the most.”

Seth arched an eyebrow. “And we care, because?...”

“Because he’s selling off priceless works of American art.”

Seth was not following this. “The point being...”

Logan knew he could never make Seth understand how he felt, and why this battle was important.

No Americana would eventually mean... no America. He’d watched other countries sell the heritage that was their symbolic soul, during financial hardships since the Pulse. People needed that cultural bedrock to build their societies on, and when that bedrock was peddled to other nations, it took away a country’s sense of permanence, a people’s sense of home. Citizens began to feel like renters in their own land.

“I can’t explain this easily,” Logan said. “You were Manticore’s prisoner for how long?”

“Ten years. What’s that got to do with it?”

“Even though you hated it, even though you eventually ran from it, Manticore was your home. When you escaped, didn’t part of you miss it?”

“You are high!” Seth’s eyes blazed. “No, hell, no!”

Logan put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You mean to say you didn’t... you don’t... miss your siblings? The sense of belonging that comes from being with a group you know you can trust to take care of you? That sense of wholeness? You didn’t miss any of that?”

Seth looked at him for a moment, then the young man’s eyes fell away and he found something on the floor to study.

Logan said, “That’s what I’m talking about, with these people selling off American art. It destroys, one piece at a time, who we are... how we feel about the American family... making it easier to divide us. We’re all abused children, now, Seth — and this kind of abuse to our... national spirit... well, it’s one thing we don’t need.”

“Run for fuckin’ office, why don’t you? Look, this art scam — it’s the first hustle the Brood’s working on our turf?”

“Yes.”

“Well, Logan, why didn’t you say so. We got to stop the bastards.”

Feeling a little embarrassed, and a bit like a pompous ass, Logan couldn’t keep himself from smiling. “Kafelnikov isn’t moving the stuff out of LA — somehow he’s moving it out of the country through Seattle.”

“And you want to know how he’s doing that?”

“Yes — who’s working with him, and where the deals go down — maybe we can... rescue some Americana.”

“Groovy,” Seth said, still unimpressed by the cultural flag-waving. “Any clues at all?”

Logan leaned in, used a mouse to open a window on one of the many glowing monitor screens. A picture popped up of a blond, trimly bearded man in his late twenties, next to a painting called Death on the Ridge Road.

Pointing, Logan said, “That’s Jared Sterling.”

“Looks like an upstanding citizen.”

“As upstanding as they come... major art collector, philanthropist, and billionaire computer magnate.”

“Sterling... Sterling — the Internet guy?”

“The Internet guy.”

Seth leaned in, taking a closer look at the Grant Wood painting. “Looks like he’s into, what’s-it, Americana, too.”

“Oh yes.” Using the mouse, Logan brought up pictures of various American art pieces. “These paintings — American Gothic... Whistler’s Mother... Jackson Pollock’s Key, works by Thomas Hart Benton, Winslow Homer, and several other major American painters — have come into Sterling’s hands... legally... and then disappeared.”

“Disappeared?”

“Perhaps that’s overstating. He acquires these pieces — sometimes with great fanfare — seems to have them for a while, loans them for a museum showing or two... and then they vanish into his ‘collection.’ As art pieces the public can appreciate, they drop out of sight, and are never seen again.”

“If he owns them, I guess he’s got the right.”

“Well... I don’t want to venture into ethical waters with you again, Seth. But you should know also that Jared Sterling is considered to be one of the most ruthless and, yes, unethical businessmen to emerge in the post-Pulse world.”

“Even if he’s selling this stuff overseas, Logan, it’s no crime — he owns the shit, right?”

“Yes he owns the ‘shit’ — but it is a crime.” After the Cooperstown and Statue of Liberty debacles, there had been a backlash, and a number of bills had been passed to protect what remained of America’s heritage. “The American Art Protection Act, of twenty-fifteen, makes it very illegal for any paintings on the protected list to be sold outside of our shores.”

Seth frowned. “There’s a list of paintings like, what? Endangered species?”

“More like historic landmarks, important buildings that can’t be torn down to make room for another detention center. Jared Sterling owns dozens of paintings on the Smithsonian American Masterpieces list.”

“So Sterling can own these paintings, but he can’t sell them?”

“Not overseas — the paintings would be confiscated, and he’d be a felon. In addition, I suspect he’s moving stolen art, and some of the ‘legal’ transactions include such odds and ends as the original owner of Sterling’s latest acquisition washing up dead on a beach.”

Mention of a murder seemed to have finally caught Seth’s attention. “Where would we come in?”

“Well, he’s obviously making these transactions discreetly... and he may be using the same conduit to move his artwork as Kafelnikov. In fact, Sterling may be that conduit... that may be what brought the Russian to Seattle.”

“So Sterling’s scam will lead us to the LA guy’s scam.”

“My instinct is it’s the same scam.” He handed Seth a slip of paper with an address on it, and some security info Logan had hacked. “Your next stop...”

Seth glanced at the paper, memorized in an instant, and tossed it on the nearby computer station. “You’re the boss,” Seth said, with only the faintest sarcasm.

Logan walked him to the door. “And do me a favor, Seth?”

Seth smirked. “Why not?”

“Please don’t kill this one right away.”

“Which one you talkin’ about — Sterling, or this Russian guy?”

“Either. Neither.”

Seth shrugged. “Fine — but take this Russian, for example. Look at all those gang kids he massacred. Guy is an evil dude — and he’s tied to damn Manticore! Wouldn’t the world be better off without him?”

“Just gather the information, Seth.”

Seth was shaking his head, truly not getting it. “If this Kasselrock is the problem...”

“Kafelnikov.”

“... then killing his evil ass ought to end the problem... his part in it, anyway.”

Logan grasped the X5’s arm. “Seth, if you kill him, we’ll never know what happened to the paintings he’s already smuggled... assuming, of course, that he’s the right guy to begin with.”

“If these paintings are gone, they’re gone. What’s the difference?”

Logan wasn’t sure whether Seth was... teasing him, or really was this bloodthirsty; probably the former, but that he could even be considering the latter was very disturbing...

“Seth, we need to know if Kafelnikov is tied to Manticore... and if so, how, and why. That’s our best lead, at the moment.”

“You don’t mind if I let that motivate me,” Seth said, “and not some sense of preserving ‘Americana.’ ”

“Not at all. But watch your all-American ass, my friend. The Russian, whose name you refuse to learn how to pronounce...”

Proving he’d been yanking Logan’s chain all along, Seth said, “Kafelnikov.”

“Any way you say it, Seth, he’s a dangerous man.”

Halfway out the door, the X5 shrugged. “I’m a dangerous man.”

Logan couldn’t think of anything to say to that.

Colonel Donald Lydecker sat at his desk, drumming his fingers on its Lucite-covered metal top.

Had Max been there to see him, she would have noted that he looked little different than he had when the X5s broke out of Manticore back in ’09. The years had been kind to Lydecker, despite an alcoholism problem that he had kept in check during that same time span. His blond hair now contained a few straggling grays but was thick as ever. His icy blue eyes had changed only in that he now needed glasses for reading, and more “smile” lines had been etched in the corners. His body was still tight and muscular... it just took a little more effort these days, to keep it that way.

His office was strictly government issue, the walls and ceiling a pastel mint green, the file cabinets, chairs, desk, and computer table all standard institutional gray. Not one personal item adorned the top of his desk or any other part of the anonymous, no-nonsense office. Only his black shirt, slacks, and leather jacket were — because of his sub-rosa status — not GI.

Across the desk from him were two subordinates — a kid in his early twenties, Jensen, and an African American in his mid- to late thirties, Finch. The two men stood at attention, soldiers in civilian suits and ties, and Lydecker thought he detected a slight trembling in both.

It pleased him that they feared him — in his lexicon, fear and respect were analogous. He let his breath out slowly, calming himself, getting centered, just as he’d taught his kids.

“I’ve been watching video footage of one of our X5s — a male.”

“Yes, sir,” they said in unison.

“And where do you suppose I got that footage?”

They glanced at each other quickly, then turned their eyes front. Neither man spoke.

“Perhaps I got it from our own intelligence efforts. Do you think I got it from our own intelligence efforts, Mr. Jensen?”

“... no, sir.”

“How about you, Mr. Finch?”

“Yes, sir... I mean, no sir...”

Lydecker sighed, just a little. “I got it from SNN.”

The two men stared straight ahead; they might have been carved from stone... if stone trembled.

“Would someone please tell me why the Satellite News Network can find one of our kids, and we can’t?”

Finch and Jensen had no answers.

“Mr. Finch, I want our people at the offices of SNN within the hour.”

“Yes, sir,” Finch said.

“Mr. Jensen, I want to know the source of this tape.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And I don’t want it tomorrow. Dismissed.”

The two men saluted, turned, and left.

Lydecker turned to the TV and VHS machine on a cart near his desk, and played the tape again. He watched the grainy picture as the young man leapt across the screen. He knew immediately it was one of his X5s. Judging by the athleticism of the boy’s moves, Lydecker figured the young man on the tape was Zack, or perhaps Seth. The two oldest subjects, they had always been the best athletes of the X5 program.

Lydecker could only appreciate the athleticism of the young man, the beauty of his discipline. If this one was anything to judge by, these kids were growing up to be just what he and the others had dreamed they could be. Watching his creation clean the clocks of five police officers in less than forty seconds, Lydecker felt a surge of parental pride...

Thirteen of them had escaped that night, the group of twelve and their leader, Zack, with Seth immediately captured but overcoming the two guards and slipping out in the confusion; and the colonel had spent much of the last ten years trying to round up this deadly baker’s dozen.

He knew the higher-ups considered his recapture record less than stellar; the irony was, he had done his job so well with his young soldiers that they had made him look incompetent. Two out of thirteen in a decade did seem a shade paltry... he still remembered the general staring at him in contempt, saying, “You mean to say you can’t recover a goddamn bunch of little kids?”

Little kids.

When they’d escaped, the youngest one had been seven. That meant six years of full-bore Manticore training... Kavi had been the first to be recaptured and that had taken over five years. Even then, it had been luck that they’d stumbled onto him in Wolf Point, Montana.

Kavi, then twelve, had been spotted by a Manticore operative — Finch, in fact — who’d stopped to watch some kids playing baseball. Kavi made a throw on the fly from the outfield fence to home plate... a major leaguer would have envied that throw... and Finch knew immediately where the kid had gotten the golden arm.

Two and a half years later, Vada, a female — eleven at the time of the escape — had been surrounded in the desert outside Amargosa Valley, Nevada. She had grown into a shapely young woman in a T-shirt and jeans and running shoes — soft brown hair, huge brown eyes, full sensuous lips.

Noting the sexual attractiveness of one of his own kids, Lydecker felt a twinge of something... guilt? Embarrassment? But the colonel could hardly fail to notice that Vada’s blossoming physique looked ready for a whole different set of sins than those she’d been designed for.

When she fought back, dropping three members of the TAC team without losing a drop of sweat, Lydecker had drawn his pistol, warned her once.

She cursed him and came running at him, like a wild beast, her fists tiny hard things raised to pummel...

When he put that bullet between her pert breasts, Lydecker surprised himself with an immediate feeling of loss.

Self-defense, his mind assured him.

But it wasn’t that easy: Vada was, after all, one of his own. He had reminded himself that this was his job, and if anyone was going to kill one of his kids, it should be him. After all, the X5s were his responsibility.

And it wasn’t like she was the first.

After the unpleasantness in Los Angeles — he’d found dealing with the Russian and his rabble extremely distasteful — Lydecker had returned empty-handed again. The amazing reports of the dark-haired young woman — Jondy?... Max, maybe? — had all the earmarks of an X5.

But after aiding and abetting the slaughter at the Chinese Theatre, Lydecker had come home with bupkus, the trail cold, ice cold...

Now, a reprieve, a real shot at getting back another of the X5s, a male, and he didn’t want to let that chance get away like the girl in LA.

He picked up the phone to arrange transport to Seattle. No matter what his men learned or did not learn at SNN, Lydecker had a trip to take.

One of his kids had turned up in Seattle...

... and “daddy” longed for a reunion.

The child Lydecker sought was creeping down the hall of the uppermost floor of Engidyne Software, the computer infrastructure company whose youthful CEO... and owner... was Jared Sterling. Seth had bypassed the alarm, opened a window in a lunchroom, and gotten inside.

This was the executive level of a steel-and-mostly-glass six-story suburban box that was otherwise primarily rabbit warrens of underpaid computer geeks. This floor, unnervingly quiet after hours, served the top echelon, half a dozen wonks who had been with Sterling from the start, millionaires thanks to Engidyne stock options. No one on this floor had to stay late to prove him- or herself, and — while a few geeks on the floors below labored into the night, seeking advancement that would never come — that left only a token security staff, about half a dozen... who had just finished their hourly rounds of the floor.

With its deep plush carpeting, expensive oak paneling, and gilt-framed examples from Sterling’s art collection lining the walls, the executive floor felt more like the mansion of the company’s owner than his corporate office. Seth moved down the darkened hallways, spidering himself to the wall, avoiding the built-in video cameras. Slick and unobtrusive, the security cams had a flaw: they were stationary, and could be maneuvered around.

Without any trouble — and with the help of Logan’s info — Seth easily made his way to Sterling’s office. Even without Logan, Seth could hardly have missed the egomaniacal display that was Sterling’s name, embossed in gold on a black plate on the rich wood door. He picked the lock and went in.

To the right sat the desk of Sterling’s executive assistant, Alison Santiago (or so said the nameplate). This reception area gave Ms. Santiago a generous space that any nerd downstairs would have given his or her pocket-protector collection for.

Stepping to Sterling’s door, Seth found this inner barrier locked as well, used a pair of picks to open it in 3.5 seconds, and stepped inside, closing and relocking it. If the security guards checked while he was inside, they’d find this door locked and likely move on: all Seth would have to do to facilitate that was conduct his search in the near dark. Between his sharper-than-shit eyesight, and blinds he adjusted to let in moonlight, Seth knew that would be no prob.

He settled in for a thorough search.

Seth didn’t even turn on a lamp or use a flashlight to take this unguided tour of Sterling’s office. The CEO’s desk was clutter-free and not quite big enough to accommodate an ice-skating competition, his computer station a second, smaller desk behind. An immense painting took up the whole wall above the computer...

Seth’s wide eyes traveled over severed arms, bull’s heads, image upon image, screaming women, dead people... it was the strangest, most bizarre painting he had ever seen and he wondered what weird shit had been going on in the mind that created such a horrific, yet undeniably beautiful scene.

He also wondered what sort of a man would have a painting like this in his office — would want to live with such a violent collage of images, who might find this nightmare in oils soothing, or somehow inspiring...

Slipping behind to the computer, Seth sat down, touched a key, and the monitor came alive, the flat screen glowing brightly in the dark room; the computer itself was already on.

What a thoughtful host, Seth thought, and started breaking Sterling’s security.

Coming from a company so supposedly adept at computer tech, Sterling’s system caved pretty quickly; on the other hand, X5s had hacker training and physical abilities that would put the best system to the test. Once in, however, Seth searched through thousands of computer files with no luck.

He did find one promising folder, though... an encrypted one with its own password. No matter what he tried, he couldn’t open it, which was starting to piss him off (admittedly, his rage threshold was easily crossed).

Finally, giving up, Seth copied the file onto a disc, covered his computer tracks as best he could, and crept back to the door. He unlocked it quietly, slipped into the executive assistant’s space, then opened the hall door a crack to peer out and down, both ways, to see a wonderfully empty corridor.

Seth was halfway back to his lunchroom entry point, on a floor where no geeks labored, when he saw a member of the security team, a heavy guy in his midfifties — probably an ex-cop or maybe somebody’s uncle, passing the days until retirement. The guard had no firearm, but he did have a Tazer and a walkie-talkie on his belt.

Keeping to the shadows, Seth followed the guard down the hall toward the entry point. All the guard had to do was keep moving and Seth could slip out as easily as he’d slipped in.

But as they passed the lunchroom, the security man looked in casually... then stopped — cold.

Seth didn’t think the guard could’ve spotted the window from that vantage point, but, damn, the guy must have! Here Seth was, a lean young genetically tuned engineered soldier, less than twenty feet from his access out of here... and this old fat friggin’ guard decided to pick now to be on top of his job.

Fatso reached for the radio on his hip, his head swiveling as he looked down the hall in the other direction, apparently checking for more evidence of an intruder.

Seth had hoped to get in and get out without raising any suspicion; but that seemed impossible now. The guard had lifted the radio from his belt, poised to put in his call — a call that if Seth let him make meant the rest of a (presumably slimmer) security force would be on the way in seconds. But taking the guard out first would tell Sterling that his company’s security had been breached...

Manticore training, and life on the streets, had taught Seth long ago to pick the lesser of evils.

The guard had just pushed in the TALK button, and sucked in a breath to form the first word, when Seth chopped him on the back of the neck, and the guard folded up like a fat card table, pitching awkwardly forward, the walkie-talkie clunking to the carpeted floor and bouncing away a few feet. The guard had barely hit the indoor-outdoor carpeting when Seth had him by his collar, to drag the man away.

“Hey!”

The voice came from behind Seth, off to one side.

“What the hell?”

Another voice.

“What’s going on?”

Another!

Spinning toward the lunchroom, Seth saw four more guards sitting around a big table, sandwiches spread out before them, two empty chairs, their eyes all now turned toward the boy in shock.

Shit, the X5 thought. Fatso hadn’t discovered Seth’s entry point — the guard had simply been calling to the last member of the security team, to invite him to join the group for their midnight lunch!

So much for getting away clean.

Seth didn’t wait for them to gather their wits; he’d been trained to use surprise, and the surprise on their faces invited him to join them, in the lunchroom...

As the nearest guard rose from the table, Seth jammed a fist up under the man’s nose, the X5 thrusting hard, the guard unconscious, possibly dead; as the guy toppled, Seth grabbed the man’s Tazer before he landed, taking the chair with him.

Seth aimed the Tazer at the guard across the table, out of the X5’s reach — a kid barely his own age. The two darts flew and struck the young guard in the chest, the charge dropping the kid to do a twitching dance on his back on the floor.

“Fuckin’ kill you!” another of the guards spat, a square-jawed probably ex-military boy, on his feet, going for his own Tazer; but then, like a jump cut in a movie, Seth was suddenly beside the guard, and triggered the weapon in the man’s grasp, sending the shocking darts sailing down, sinking into the guard’s own trousered leg, to convince him to do his own convulsing Riverdance before he dropped in a spasmodic heap, to duet with his twitching buddy.

Seth allowed himself a laugh at that, which may have been what sent the final guard’s scare level into overdrive, inspiring the guy — another older, overweight waste of a security-guard uniform — to make a run for it.

The X5 merely walked quickly — running was not necessary — and grabbed the guy by the hair on the back of his head and guided him, face first, into the door frame. The guard dropped to his knees, a glistening red clown’s nose in the midst of a pitiful expression.

The red-nosed guard wasn’t unconscious, though, able to say, “Please,” before Seth put him to sleep with a right hook that caught the guard on the side of the jaw, knocking him over like a potted plant, blocking the lunchroom door.

Seth could not cover his break-in, but he could cover the reason for it, and turn this failure into a financial success, anyway.

He vaulted over the slumbering clown-nosed guard, leaving his lunchroom exit behind; he sprinted back to the stairwell and returned to the executive floor, and that hallway where he’d seen the paintings... but coming through the fire exit door, on the run, he collided with the last guard.

The two of them crashed to the floor in a mutually surprised mound of writhing flesh, each yelling angrily as they wrestled for position. Seth was stronger, of course, but the guard was wiry and young and kept his head.

The guard even managed to avoid most of Seth’s blows, and surprised Seth with an elbow to his groin, which sent nausea-tinged agony through his belly, and another elbow jammed into Seth’s left eye, which dazed the X5 and sent the hallway spinning.

Reaching for his Tazer, the guard struggled to his feet, and — as he freed the weapon from his belt — Seth swept his feet out from under him, and the guard landed on his ass with a hard thunk, Tazer flying.

Seth, on his feet now, nimbly leapt out of reach when the dazed guard tried to repeat the sweeping maneuver on him.

Looking down at the fallen guard with respect, Seth asked, “Nice work — we finished here?”

The guard looked up, his eyes blinking rapidly as he tried to clear his head and understand what was happening.

“You got cuffs?” Seth asked, conversationally. “I’ll cuff you and then I’m outa here.”

The guard shook his head, whether in protest or to clear the cobwebs, Seth couldn’t tell. Then the guard dived at Seth, and the X5 threw a hard right down, catching the man’s chin, breaking his jawbone, dropping the guy into an unconscious heap.

“That’s one way to get cuffed,” Seth muttered to himself.

Now that he had the luxury of time, Seth studied the paintings; there had been no Moody in his life, and Manticore was rather light on arts training... so this X5 took down half a dozen that pleased his eye, using his switchblade to cut the canvases from their heavy frames. He rolled them up together like a carpet and took the elevator downstairs.

In the lunchroom, the guards were all still out — one or two of them might be in comas, or even dead — but Seth didn’t care one way or the other. Feeling exhilarated — this had been fun! — the boy slipped out his window into the night.

Logan Cale took the computer disc from Seth, and loaded it into his computer, as the X5 filled in his benefactor on the night’s adventures.

“You did what?” Logan asked.

Seth grinned, proud of himself; this was the happiest Logan had ever seen the boy.

“I made it look like a robbery,” the X5 said. “With any luck, Sterling won’t even notice the breach in his computer security.”

That was smart, Logan knew; and the last time he’d dispatched Seth, homicide had happened... this was merely grand larceny, with assault and battery as a chaser. Maybe the team could work their way down to jaywalking.

Shaking his head, Logan asked, “What did you take?”

“Six paintings.”

“Where are they, Seth?”

“Trunk of my wheels... Know a good fence?”

Logan stared at Seth like the boy had gardenias growing out of his ears. “You’re kidding, right? These paintings could be evidence in a case against Sterling, might even implicate the Russian.”

Seth shrugged, what the hell. “There’s plenty more where these came from. Anyway, I thought they might bring in a little pocket change.”

Pocket change, Logan thought. More like millions...

“Get them,” Logan said.

“Hey, they’re mine! I did your damn job, for free — this is, whaddya callit, a perk!”

“Seth,” Logan said, “this is more important than money.”

“Easy for you to say, Donald Trump!”

“Sterling may be our link to Manticore.”

Seth let out a long, slow breath. “Okay... I’ll let you eyeball ’em... but that’s it.”

While the boy was gone, Logan struggled to open the disc. This was going to take time, and a lot of concentration, which wouldn’t be possible with the X5 underfoot. He set it aside; he’d deal with it later.

Seth returned with the rolled-up paintings, spread them, smoothed them out, on the sofa and on the nearby floor.

“Eyes Only” couldn’t believe his eyes.

He’d known Sterling had a mammoth collection, but to think these had been on display at corporate headquarters... N. C. Wyeth, Charles Russell, Norman Rockwell, Frederic Remington, Jackson Pollock, and John Singer Sargent... he was staggered, stunned.

“Leave these,” Logan said, “and I’ll have an art expert go over them.”

Seth’s head reared back. “You’re kidding, right? I mean, you’re not really thinking I’m going to leave these with you, are you?”

“You need them authenticated, Seth.”

“Do I look that stupid?”

“Is that a trick question? It’ll help you sell them, if you know what they’re worth.”

Seth thought about that for a moment, but then shook his head. “You get the art expert — call my pager... and I’ll bring the paintings back.”

“All right,” Logan sighed, patting the air with his hands. “All right.”

Rolling up the paintings like dorm room posters, Seth said, “Do it by tomorrow night, or I’ll take my own chances with a fence.”

“What if I can’t line somebody up by then?”

“Oh I got faith in you, Logan,” Seth said, the rolled-up masterpieces under one arm. The James Dean face grinned in all its awful boyishness. “Just like you got faith in me, right?”

Seth showed himself out.