The Burning Skies

PART V RIPTIDE

Claire,” a voice whispers.

But it’s an eternity before she can process it. She’s dwelling in some darkness far beyond all pain. She hears her own name dripping down across some sky some sound in a world where all that lives is silent. She drifts in toward the voice.

“Claire,” it says. “Can you hear me?”

She can. But she’s not sure what she’s supposed to do, save to keep on forging toward it. But now she’s being buffeted by hurt that slams against her. She stumbles onward, upward, toward the light.

“Open your eyes,” the voice says.

She tries to. Fails. Tries again—manages to get one of them open. Through a blur she can see Carson’s face. She groans as headache engulfs her.

“That’s it,” he says.

She opens both her eyes. It’s agony. But she’s keeping them open all the same. She’s back in that room, still strapped to the chair. Carson’s floating in front of her. His legs are crossed.

“How do you feel?” he asks.

It’s a good question. She struggles to come up with an answer. Only to find she can’t.

“I found everything I needed to,” he says. “I’m done.”

“So am I,” she whispers.

“No,” he says. “You’ve just begun. Go back to sleep.”

She drifts away.

Drifting in toward the heart of SpaceCom power: the transport’s passed through four parking orbits, each one tighter than the one before. It’s now well within L2’s outer perimeter. Stars fall past the window. Ships are everywhere.

“Welcome home,” says Lynx.

“Looks like it did when I left it,” says Linehan.

“You’ve only been gone a couple weeks.”

But that was all it took to come full circle. L2 set him in motion. L2 has pulled him back into its maw. He seals his visor in place, grabs onto the wall as the ship fires motors, leaves its latest orbit.

“So what’s the first step?” he asks.

“We do some honest work,” says Lynx.

The ship’s turning. A webwork of metal scrolls past the window, so close that Linehan can see numbers and lettering painted upon it.

“Jesus,” he says. “We’re right up against it.”

“Try inside it.”

“What the hell?”

But as he stares through the window, he sees that Lynx isn’t kidding. The transport has entered the hollow of a much larger, half-built ship. It stretches all around them, like the bones of some vast animal. The rest of the L2 fleet flickers beyond it. Linehan whistles.

“One of the fucking colony ships,” he says.

Lynx laughs. “That’s a strange thing to call them.”

“That’s what they are.”

“That’s what they’re registered as.”

“That’s what they’re built for, man. Straight shot to Mars.”

“By way of Moscow,” says Lynx.

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning look at those guns.”

Which don’t look small. They also don’t look like they’d be visible from beyond the construction.

“That’s why they’re building them in here,” continues Lynx. “Armaments to augment the L2 fleet, unreported to Zurich or anybody else. Soon as the shit hits the fan, they can blow the hatches and start laying down the law.”

“Don’t the Eurasians have some of these things, too?”

“Over at L4, yeah. Ours and theirs make for one more piece of glorious joint infrastructure in the wake of Zurich. The next great pioneering fleet. How much do you want to bet that the East is working to rig its behemoths with similar enhancements? Who knows, they might blow the top off Mons Olympus. But I’ll bet you the real target’s a damn sight closer.”

“I don’t take bets I can’t win.”

“Then you’ve come to the wrong place,” says Lynx. The ship’s speakers start barking orders. “Let’s go.”

“We’ve got everything we need?”

“We’ll pick it up as we go.”

Linehan shrugs. They open the interior hatch of the room they’re in, climb through into a corridor, pull themselves along it and into the transport ship’s spine. Right now there’s a lot of traffic. Supervisors are herding the workers out of their quarters, into the spine, and then out through where the nose has been peeled back. Lynx and Linehan head the other way. Crew members pass them. So do supervisors. But no one challenges them. They exit the spine, proceed through more hatches, exit the transport.

They’re moored against some of the more complete parts of megaship infrastructure. Two other transports are tethered alongside. Workers and supervisors are everywhere. One of the supervisors challenges them.

“Who the hell are you guys?” she asks.

“Engineers,” says Lynx. “Who the hell else would we be?”

Linehan doesn’t see the codes get transferred. But it must have occurred. Because the supervisor turns away—and he and Lynx keep on going, alight on the interior of the giant craft. Scarcely ten meters away is the nearest of the cannons: what’s clearly a medium-grade particle beam. Heavy lifting’s easy in the zero-G—workers are maneuvering the weapon into place by hand. Lynx and Linehan move past it.

“Those guys had better pick up the pace if they want to make a difference,” says Lynx.

“You seem so sure it’s gonna happen.”

“Lightning doesn’t strike twice, right? It was a fucking miracle we evaded Armageddon back when you were going head-to-head with the Jaguars. We’re not going to beat the bullet this time.”

“Even if we take out Szilard?”

“That’s all I want to do, Linehan. Take him out. After that, the whole of this can go to hell.”

They head into the enclosed portions of the colony ship’s interior. No one pays them the slightest attention. Lynx leads the way through a labyrinth of weightless corridors and half-installed machinery.

“Let me guess,” says Linehan. “Szilard’s somewhere in here with us.”

“Yeah right. Far as I can make out, he’s on the Montana.”

“He went back to the flagship?”

“Apparently.”

“And how exactly do you propose we get from here to there?”

“We won’t. Someone else will.”

“And we’ll be that someone.”

“And how.”

The jet-copter streaks in amidst snowcapped peaks. Valleys drop away at impossible angles. Slopes are like walls that are way too close. The craft is buffeted as it hits turbulence.

“Getting close,” says Sarmax.

“We’re pretty much there,” says Spencer.

“You’ve found what we’re looking for?”

“I’ve found where we’re going to look.”

Abruptly, the jet-copter slows perceptibly, banks. Spencer finds himself staring straight up toward some higher peaks. He sees something stretching between two of them. Something that’s clearly man made. The craft arcs up toward it, decelerating all the while. There’s a rumble as the landing gear lowers.

“We’re landing on that bridge?” asks Sarmax.

“Not exactly,” says Spencer.

Because he can see things that Sarmax can’t. Like what’s really going on. They’re not the only vehicle about to hit this bridge.

“A rendezvous,” says Sarmax.

“Roger that,” says Spencer.

The jet-copter soars above the level of the bridge just as a train emerges from one of the tunnels that the bridge connects. The train’s maglev. But it’s operating at almost a crawl—scarcely thirty klicks an hour. Freight cars fill the bridge, slowing all the while. The copter settles down toward them. Sandwiched between freight cars, an empty flatcar slides from the tunnel—the copter wafts in, touches down upon it. No sooner has it done so than the train speeds up. Mountain disappears as tunnel wall kicks in. The jet-copter’s engines die. Only stone’s visible outside the windows now.

But there’s a lot more than that going on inside Spencer’s mind, now that there aren’t a thousand tons of rock separating him from this train’s systems. Now he can see where this thing’s going. The train accelerates, racing ever deeper into the mountain. Spencer sees the rail it’s on as one smooth line of light. He becomes aware of more rails sprouting off from this one—and of still more rails sprouting off from those …

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he says.

“What’s the story?” says Sarmax.

“The story is this place ain’t small.”

The train’s slowing again, coming through into a gigantic railyard-cavern. Electric lights hang from a ceiling far overhead. Activity’s everywhere. The far side of the cavern lights up in the zone in Spencer’s mind. As do vast grids of light beyond that …

“We’re close,” he says. “We’re real close.”

“Are we trying to get to where this train’s going?”

“I have no idea where this train’s going.”

“Well, try hacking the drivers.”

“Already did. They don’t know either.”

“This place is that compartmentalized?”

“It’s not just one place. They’ve dug out half the goddamn mountain chain as far as I can tell.”

“What’s down here?”

A better question would be what isn’t. It’s almost like a series of cities. There’s that much activity. It stretches on for scores of klicks, all the way beneath Tibet and then some. Spencer can see why he had so much trouble getting a fix on it. Because the infrastructure he was getting a glimpse of beneath the Himalayas is actually above what they’ve now reached. And the way this place is organized, it’s as though the whole thing is …

“Counterforce,” he says.

“What?” Sarmax glances at him.

“This place is counterforce. It’s intended as reserve. We barely know about any of it. Which is the way they want it. They’ll commit it in the later stages of a war.”

“Which could be ten minutes after it kicks off.”

“Sure.” Spencer’s downloading more data into Sarmax’s head. “But the point is that even if the Eurasians strike first, I’ll bet they don’t strike with any of the shit that’s in here.”

Sarmax says nothing.

“How else would you explain it?” asks Spencer.

“I wouldn’t,” says Sarmax. “You’re right.”

“We need to get word of this back—”

“No we don’t.”

“What?”

“They already know it.”

“They do?”

“That the East has hidden reserves? Absolutely.”

“But they don’t know the extent of this.”

“If you send word back to the U.S. zone, you risk compromising our position.”

“It’s worth the risk.”

“Not if there’s something else in here we haven’t found.”

“Maybe this is what we’re looking for,” says Spencer.

“And maybe it’s not.”

“You know something, Leo.”

“I know a lot of things.”

“Including what was in the book you found at Jarvin’s safe house?”

Sarmax stares at him. Says nothing. Just smiles.

“So you do have it,” says Spencer softly.

“Of course I have it.”

“What’s it say?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“That’s why we’re having this conversation,” says Sarmax.

“But where the fuck did you hide it?”

“I didn’t. I burned it.”

“But not before you scanned it.”

“Can’t afford to be as risk-averse as Jarvin was.”

“Christ, Leo. Not filling me in is a risk in itself.”

“Not at all. If you were going to be of any help, you’d have been able to figure out the file’s existence from the rest of what you’ve got. Which apparently you’ve done.”

“Which was easy enough once I knew I was looking for what wasn’t there. Jarvin’s files are littered with coded references to an overall master file. One that was written down on paper. Making it impossible to hack.”

“He was the last CICom handler in HK. Every intelligence organization on the planet was hunting him. He had good reason to be paranoid.”

“Said the guy who killed him. So where was it?”

“Under his floor.”

“And how’d you know it was there?”

“I didn’t, Spencer. I just tore the place apart while you were ransacking his data.”

“You got a tip.”

“So what if I did?”

“You were going to let me know eventually, right?”

“Depended how frustrated I got with it.”

“How much progress have you made?”

“Nowhere near enough. All I can make out is the first section. It talks about the Eurasian secret weapon being an ultimate one, Spencer. It leads straight into several layers of cyphers. It’s—”

“Something you need to give me right now.”

And Sarmax does. Spencer stares as the data clicks through.

“Jesus Christ,” he says.

“Yeah,” replies Sarmax.

“This is more than a thousand pages.”

“Yeah.”

“What the hell are all these symbols?”

“I don’t fucking know.”

“And where the hell did he have this?”

“On a microfiche. He must have burned the original paper.”

“And you burned the microfiche.”

“And something’s getting ready to burn us. We’re not looking for a bunch of tunnels, Spencer. We’re looking for something specific. Something that’s down here. I should have given you this earlier. I admit it. But I need you to start figuring this thing out.”

“While I simultaneously hack this place.”

“You think you’re so good, now’s your chance to prove it. How much access have you managed to get to what else is going on within this labyrinth?”

“A lot.”

“But not enough.”

“It’s too cauterized.”

“Deliberately so,” says Sarmax. “We need to get deeper.”

“That’s where this train’s going.”

“So we ride it.”

He leans back. The train keeps on rushing into the root of the mountain.

This time she comes awake in a single instant. Carson’s still floating cross-legged before her. The ghost of a smile flickers on his face. “How do you feel?” he asks. “Like shit.”

“But better than you did previously?”

“That wouldn’t take much, you prick.”

“I apologize.”

“It’s a little late for that.”

“Indeed,” he replies. “I found the back doors.”

“Who put them there?”

“We’re still figuring that out. Maybe the Rain. Maybe Szilard. Maybe Sinclair. Maybe all of them.”

“Maybe none of them.”

“Who else would have done it?”

“You.”

He smiles. “You’re not making sense, Claire.”

“I’m making far too much sense, Carson. Since it wasn’t the back doors that you were after.”

“I never said they were our only motive.”

“So let’s talk about the most important one.”

“You have a hypothesis?”

“I’m on more solid ground than that.”

“Go on.”

“You were searching for a way to figure out how the Rain almost fucked the president at the Europa Platform.”

“We already know how they did that.”

“Do you?”

“Sure. They took out the zone by sabotaging the legacy world nets and—”

“No,” she says, “not enough. It wasn’t enough for them to do that. What really almost nailed us was that they were preventing him from transferring the executive node as well.”

“Precisely. Because they’d taken out the zone.”

“Don’t play the fool,” she says. “I know what happened. The Rain collapsed the zone, sure. But they also had a little something in reserve, in case the zone didn’t go down. In which case they knew they’d have to jam the executive node itself, to prevent it from being transferred to the Throne’s successor.”

“They did prevent it from being transferred. They were jamming the whole fucking Platform, Claire. Getting a signal off that place was virtually an exercise in impossibility—”

“That’s not the kind of jamming I’m talking about, and you know it. That kind of jamming wouldn’t have worked. The president could have just sent the code in a laser, and even if he hadn’t had the chance, the zone’s structured so that the successor’s software activates the backup executive node in the event of the destruction of the Throne’s—”

“Right, but—”

“But the Rain deployed a far more specialized hack in advance of their grand slam, didn’t they? One that undermined the executive node itself, and prevented it from being transferred to Montrose under any circumstances—”

“What makes you think she’s his successor?”

“I know she’s his successor, Carson. That was the price she exacted for InfoCom’s support of the Throne back when SpaceCom made its big move after the Elevator. In fact—”

“You’re assuming a lot.”

“I’m assuming nothing. I was practically in the Hand’s head—in the president’s head—all that time. And we both saw the node-freezing hack hit just before the zone collapsed. Once the zone went down it no longer mattered—but if the Rain’s universal ass fuck hadn’t worked, they had plan B already activated. As the Throne knows all too well. And he knows I know it too. I showed him how the Rain pulled the rug out from under the zones of East and West. But I never showed him how the exec node paralysis worked.”

“You told him you didn’t know.”

“And he didn’t believe me.”

“And he was right not to. Why did you withhold it from him?”

“I wanted some kind of counterlever if the Throne tried to turn on me.”

“Which is why he sent me here,” he says.

“But he didn’t have to send you very far.” He says nothing. Just looks at her and smiles. “So now we get to the heart of the matter,” she adds. “Was wondering when you would.”

Outside again: they’ve crossed the entirety of the colony ship and reached the docking facilities that occupy the space where the ship’s nose has yet to be built. Several small shuttles hang like bats around them. The doors of the nearest one are open. Lynx and Linehan enter.

The pilot within is sprawled in his chair. The expression behind his visor’s one of intense boredom. It doesn’t change as he regards them.

“Yeah?” he asks.

“We need to get to Redoubt G16,” says Lynx.

“What do you think this is, a fucking taxi service?”

“Pretty much,” says Linehan.

“My orders are to sit tight until—”

“You got new orders,” says Lynx. He beams code to the pilot, who grimaces in annoyance—and turns, starts up the engines.

“You guys ain’t even officers,” he mutters.

“No,” says Lynx, “we’re engineers. Who do what the officers tell us. So back the fuck off.”

“Relax pal,” says the pilot. “We’re all in this shit together.”

“You can say that again,” says Linehan.

He’s staring out the window at a wilderness of lights and shapes. Craft of every description are strewn against the crescent Moon that dominates the sky beyond. But one of those lights is swelling by the moment—fragmenting into several smaller lights, set against a larger shape. The shuttle vectors in toward it. Linehan watches as it wafts in.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he says.

“At least it’s a lot smaller than that Eurotrash rock,” replies Lynx.

It may be nowhere near as large as what was once the pride of the Europa Platform, but it’s still an asteroid, about fifty meters long, studded with guns and mirrors and the occasional shaft opening. The shuttle drifts in toward one such opening that’s been drilled along the axis. The pilot’s hands fly across the controls as he lines the ship up with the rotating rock.

“Fucking redoubt,” he says. “What the hell’re you guys doing here anyway?”

“Telling you to land this bitch,” says Lynx.

The pilot mutters something inaudible. Rock walls replace space as the ship glides into the shaft. They emerge a few moments later into a cave that’s been carved within.

“Here we go,” says the pilot.

But Lynx and Linehan are already hopping out, firing their thrusters as the pilot starts reversing back the way he’s come. The cave itself is empty save for mechanics working over another shuttle. They ignore the two newcomers, who continue along the shaft and into the labyrinth that honeycombs the asteroid. They encounter no one else. Linehan feels like he’s walking into a tomb.

“Don’t tell me there’s no one else in here,” he says.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” says Lynx.

Linehan knows he’s not kidding—that there’s got to be enough of a crew on this rock to make Lynx’s scheme work. No shuttle runs from the ships in the outer perimeter directly to anything that’s even near the Montana. Shuttles reach the flagship only from places that are almost as secure. Meaning that the plan to infiltrate L2 depends on seeing SpaceCom’s fleet as an archipelago. Linehan knows that Lynx is playing the game called island-hopping: moving from ship to ship toward the heart of it all. But each locale he selects has to be big enough to allow him to lose himself amongst its garrison. Linehan follows Lynx off the axis and into the domain of gravity.

And now they’ve got company. Workers squeeze past. They reach an intersection, turn down one of the tunnels. A power-suited soldier blocks the way.

“This is a restricted area,” he says.

“I know,” says Lynx. “Here’s our clearance.”

The soldier’s expression doesn’t change. “Clearance for what?”

“Sorry?”

“So you’ve got the codes. So what? I can’t just let you through here without you telling me where you’re going.”

“Oh,” says Lynx. “Sorry. We’re going to the armory.”

“To do what?”

“Got a report that some of the suit-batteries were on the fritz.”

“How come I didn’t hear about this?”

“Feel free to check,” says Lynx. “But we’re behind on our schedule and really need to hurry it—”

“Cool your jets,” says the soldier. His eyes seem to lose their focus as he transmits via zone. And gets his answer.

“Fine,” he says. “Let’s go.”

“Great.”

“But I’m coming with you.”

“Then who’ll stand watch?”

“They’re sending down a replacement.”

“I’m telling you we’re running late already—”

“You don’t have to wait. Let’s go.”

“You’re leaving this place unguarded?” Lynx looks nervous. “Is that standard procedure?”

“Shut up,” says the soldier, and turns, leading the way down more tunnels. In short order they reach a dead end. The soldier shifts against the rock, swivels a piece of it aside. They proceed through into the armory as the door closes behind them.

The place looks like it’s been wallpapered with weapons of every description, from suits to small arms and everything in between. Chances are if this place sees combat they won’t get used. But that’s what war is these days—a question of contingencies. This asteroid is mainly intended as a KE strongpoint. And yet there’s more than one scenario in which it might need to shelter soldiers who have been moved from more vulnerable nearby ships. Soldiers whose own battle capabilities might have been degraded. Soldiers who might need the things this room contains …

“So get on with it,” says the soldier.

“So we will,” says Lynx. He heads toward the diagnostic panels set beside the door. Checks it out. The door slides shut.

“And hurry it—” The soldier’s voice suddenly cuts out. Along with the power in his suit. Lynx turns back toward the now-drifting figure.

“What was that? I didn’t quite catch that.”

The soldier’s yelling at him. It doesn’t take an expert in sign language to get the gist of what he’s saying.

“Yeah,” says Lynx, “sorry about that. Linehan, can you help out?”

“With pleasure,” says Linehan as he extends a drill from his suit and plunges it into the soldier’s back. The man’s defenses aren’t up. He can’t dodge. It’s over pretty quick. Linehan basks amidst the rush.

“Enjoyed that, did you?” Lynx looks at Linehan, hits buttons, starts pressurizing the armory. “Well, don’t let your sadism cloud your grasp of the big picture. This just became a clusterfuck now that there’s no one at that guard post.”

“I thought they told him there’s another sentry coming along—”

“That was me he was talking to, you dipshit!” Lynx is pulling off his suit. Linehan starts doing the same. “He was too curious. Too great a risk. He would have done some extra checking. So he had to come with us. But we haven’t got long before they figure out a sentry’s gone missing. We gotta get off this fucking rock and fast.”

“In what?”

“Well, as luck would have it another shuttle’s departing in three minutes. And by a strange coincidence, it’s en route to our next stop. So you’ve got thirty seconds to get that on.” He points. Linehan follows his gaze to two suits. He stares at the insignia on them.

“I like it,” he says.

“Thought you might,” replies Lynx.

Tunnel walls surge past as the train charges ever deeper into the world beneath the mountains. On the zone, Spencer’s watching grids dance within his head. He’s pulling strings across the Eurasian zone, closing in on the moves that will take him and Sarmax to the next level within this place.

But he’s also trying to make sense of a whole new factor. He’s realizing just how out there the man who called himself Alek Jarvin was. The handler’s book consists of hundreds upon hundreds of pages of symbols, grids, numbers. And letters, of course: Spencer reckons he’s dealing with at least six different alphabets. None of which are even remotely discernible. The only thing he can make out is the initial section that Sarmax spoke of. Which seems to serve as a preface. Written in a low-rent cypher that was easy enough to crack, probably because all it does is make promises.

Though threats might be a better word. It goes on and on about a Eurasian weapon that will change the face of war. A device so revolutionary that nothing the Americans can put into the field will stand against it. Spencer wonders whether it’s for real—wonders if Jarvin transcribed what he’s reading from Eurasian propaganda. He wonders why he didn’t sell the details to the Americans if he really had them. Was CICom’s rogue handler killed by Sarmax before he could? Or was he playing his own game? Did he give up on America because he’d been declared a traitor? Did he send his nation’s agents on a wild-goose chase? Spencer knows there’s only one way to find out. He sets his own software upon the cyphers—even as the software continues to run patterns on the place around him too—and on the train that’s now moving in on parallel rails behind the one he’s on. It’s a lot shorter, gaining steadily on the flatcar and the jet-copter that sits upon it. Within the jet-copter, one of the officers starts giving orders. Spencer and Sarmax get to their feet, open the copter door, and hop out.

As they steady themselves upon the flatcar, more freight cars haul alongside theirs. The door of one of the cars is open. Suited soldiers are standing there, extending some kind of makeshift bridge. Spencer and Sarmax grab it as it reaches them and secure it to the flatcar. More soldiers are leaping from the door of the jet-copter, pulling prisoners along with them—past Spencer and Sarmax, onto the bridge and into the arms of the soldiers who wait on the other side.

Fifteen prisoners later, and the bridge retracts. The freight car’s doors slide shut, and the train beside them accelerates. Cars stream past Spencer’s visor, leaving tunnel wall flashing in their wake.

“Any idea where they’re going?” says Sarmax.

“Probably where we want to be.”

“But you don’t know where.”

“When I do, you’ll be the first to know.”

“You’re saying we’re high and dry?”

“Actually I think we’re under arrest.”

“What?”

Looks that way. The other soldiers on the flatcar are pointing guns at them. One of the officers steps forward. The sergeant flanks him.

“Spies,” he says in Russian.

“That’s a lie,” says Spencer in the same tongue. But he and Sarmax are getting worked over now by their fellow soldiers, who start stripping ammo from their suits, disengaging their guns, detaching and then removing their helmets.

“What the hell are we guilty of?” says Sarmax.

“Being American,” says the officer.

“Sir,” says Spencer, “that’s not true.”

“It’s total rubbish,” says Sarmax.

“You’re the rubbish,” says the sergeant.

“And you can take it up with them,” says the officer, gesturing at the rail. Something else is emerging from the darkness, moving along the train’s cars, catching up with the flatcar, matching speeds. It’s a single gun car, running sleek and low to the rail, not much higher than the flatcar. Another bridge extends.

“Get them in there,” says the officer.

Soldiers start hustling Spencer and Sarmax onto the bridge. The anxious look on the soldiers’ faces isn’t due to the narrowness of the bridge they’re on. It’s the dreaded military intelligence insignia upon the gun car. The soldiers shove Spencer and Sarmax inside and hastily retrace their steps.

The door closes behind Spencer and Sarmax. They’re standing in a railcar, a cockpit at each end, and a turret hatch in the ceiling. A driver’s sitting in the cockpit that faces forward. He doesn’t look round, just hits the throttle. Spencer grabs onto the wall to steady himself, looks at the driver’s back.

“Uh … hello?”

Legs emerge from the turret. A man drops down to face them. He wears a Russian captain’s uniform and a scruffy beard. He looks at them.

“Your codes,” he says.

Spencer transmits codes. The man salutes.

“Sir,” he says. “What now?”

“Now we root out the state’s enemies,” says Spencer.

“Any news from HK?”

“Those scientists are a poison pill. We’ve got a traitor on the loose.”

“As we feared.”

“Worse than that. The West’s involved. They’re trying to take advantage of the scientist roundups to infiltrate some of their agents. And someone in this place is turning a blind eye. We’ve got to proceed with utmost caution.”

“We’ll have to,” says the captain. “This place is moving onto full war footing. It’s like we’re expecting an attack at any moment.”

“Or else we’re going to launch one,” says Spencer. “Something the traitors might be counting on. I need your data, and I need it quickly.”

“Take the rear cockpit,” says the captain. “Access whatever you need from there.”

Spencer turns. The captain goes up to confer with the driver. Sarmax joins Spencer in the rear cockpit, activates the one-on-one.

“What kind of a fucking plan is this?” he demands.

“I figured we might not have enough leverage on escort duty,” replies Spencer. “So I’ve been running some scenarios to get us a better view.”

“By working with this guy?”

“The captain’s just an errand boy, Leo. Albeit a discreet one. He thinks our infiltration of the escort was part of our cover. That our arrest will make any traitors rest easy.”

“But there aren’t any traitors.”

“If there are, more power to ’em. Now how about we start the investigation?” Spencer leans forward, starts punching commands into the terminal.

“How about you keep me in the loop going forward?”

“You’re one to talk.”

“I outrank you, Lyle.”

“Look,” says Spencer. “I had to be sure they weren’t hacking our one-on-one link. Anything we said there had to be chalked up to part of the cover.”

“You are playing one dangerous game.”

“I’m just getting started,” says Spencer, who jacks into the dashboard, starts running code from a whole new vantage point. He doesn’t doubt that Sarmax is on board with the logic—that he gets that the best way to infiltrate an impregnable fortress is to make like you’re here to stop the infiltration. Because the East is just like the West: purging its own, divided against itself, compartmentalized to the point where the right hand has no idea where the hell the left one was last night. Infiltration works on the same principles. Which is why Spencer’s been less than forthcoming with Sarmax.

Though that sort of thing can cut both ways.

“I guess it’s time I gave you this,” says Sarmax. He’s pulled something from his mouth. Something that looks like—

“Your tooth?”

“Just take it,” says Sarmax.

“What am I, the fucking tooth fairy?”

“Not unless you’re into cross-dressing. This contains a chip. Which contains—”

But Spencer’s already grabbing the tooth from him—loading it into his own data-socket, scanning the information revealed.

“This is some kind of hack,” he says.

“Yeah. I need you to upload it.”

“I need to know more about it—”

“Upload it and you will.”

“I’m getting really sick of these surprises, Leo.”

“This is the last of them.”

“Where the hell did you get this?”

“Where do you think? The Throne.”

“He could have handed me this to begin with.”

“He trusts me more than you.”

“Fuck’s sake—”

“Don’t take it personally Spencer. If we’d been busted in the opening rounds, you might have tried to bargain with the East. Might have tried to sell this for your hide.”

“And now?”

“You no longer have that option.”

“I’m not following.”

“Run the program and you will.”

I’m still dreaming, aren’t I?” she asks. “Not exactly.”

“But I’m still trapped inside my head.”

“More like a zone-construct I’m creating with your help.”

“My help?”

“However involuntary.”

“You’re in here with me,” she says.

“Yes.”

“We’re both still on this ship.”

“Yes.”

“And the Throne is on board too.”

“Of course,” says Carson.

“He wants me close at hand.”

“He needs you for what’s about to happen.”

“He’s going to start a war,” she says.

“He’s going to finish one. One that’s been going on for decades. One that’s torn our planet at the seams.”

“I thought he believed in peace!”

“There’ll be peace, sure. When the East lies in wreckage at our feet.”

“And détente?”

“Failed at the Europa Platform. As I said.”

“But you also said the Throne was still hoping to avert war.”

He shrugs. She snarls.

“Goddamn it, Carson, why the hell didn’t you tell me earlier? Why this charade?”

“Because I’d never have gotten so far inside you otherwise.”

She cradles her head in her hands. Says nothing.

“Your conscious resistance accounts for only so much,” he continues. “It’s your unconscious resistance that’s the bulk of the challenge. Had you known that we intended to harness you as the primary node in a first strike against the Coalition, you would never have let me get to the center of your mind.”

“But now you’re here.”

“And now the time for hiding’s over.”

“Someone should tell the Throne that.”

“We’ve crossed behind the far side of the Moon,” says Carson. “In mere minutes we—”

“Land outside Congreve,” she says. “Go to ground in the Throne’s bunker beneath the city suburbs.”

“You’re guessing.”

“It’s not that hard. Tell the Throne to come in here and face me.”

“You’ve got it all wrong,” says Carson. “You’re the one who’s going to face him. Once the last of your resistance has dropped away. Once you wonder why you ever wanted to call him anything besides sir.”

“You can’t make me do anything.”

“Can’t I?”

On the wall beside Carson appear two vid screens: two sets of grids. One depicts a cross-section of the Himalayas and the labyrinth beneath them, the other the L2 fleet. Each grid shows coordinates of something moving through it.

“The missions,” breathes Haskell.

“Now approaching their last phases. And ready for a little nudge from you.”

“Right now?”

“Can’t you feel it?”

And suddenly she can. Even though she can’t do anything about it. Dashboards light up within her mind and it’s like someone else is hitting her controls. She looks at Carson.

“So you really did give it to me backward,” she says.

“That’s always the best way.”

“You don’t want to do a surgical strike on the Eurasians to stop them from starting something. You want to do it so you can.”

“And we will.”

“And Szilard? He’s not really trying to unleash war?”

“Does it matter?”

“Sure it does.”

“It doesn’t. What matters is that when the shit hits the fan the president can’t have someone running the L2 fleet he can’t depend on. If Szilard didn’t personally organize the SpaceCom conspiracy to hit the Throne, then he gave it the green light. And if he didn’t even do that, then he should be executed for incompetence. For allowing treason to sprout under his nose. He’s dead regardless.”

“And so am I.”

“Not at all. You’ll be the Throne’s prime razor.”

“But I won’t remember anything before that.”

“You’ll remember everything you need to.”

“That’s all I’ve ever been allowed to do!”

“But don’t you want to know the reason why?”

“What?”

He says nothing. Just gestures. A door’s appeared between the two wall-screens. Haskell stares at it. It seems familiar. She wonders where she’s seen it before.

And then she remembers.

“No,” she says.

Grey, metallic. It’s just a door. But she can feel the presence of what lurks behind it. Something she hasn’t felt for so long. Something that reminds her how much mercy there is in being able to forget.

“Don’t do this,” she says.

“I already have,” Carson replies.

The door starts to open. Light pours in from the void beyond.

The view from the shuttle window shows machines of every description. Their shadows practically blot out the stars. Their lights are like some mini-galaxy The shuttle’s heading toward where the lights clump thickest.

“Ever read Dante?” says Lynx.

He and Linehan are sitting behind a pilot who’s maneuvering their shuttle toward a medium-grade war-sat that’s part of L2’s inner defenses. It’s swelling steadily within the window.

“What?” asks Linehan.

“The Inferno. Ever read it?”

“Never heard of it.”

“That’s too bad.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s the only way you can understand what we’re heading into.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“The circles of hell, man. We’ve run the outer ones. Now we’ve got to beat the ones that really count.”

“And let me guess: Szilard’s the devil.”

“Except he’s not. He’s just a man. Which is why we’re going to nail him.”

“But we’re men too.”

Lynx just laughs. Because he knows that’s no longer true. Because the download that’s suddenly reaching him has made him far more than what he was a few seconds back. The Manilishi’s codes surge through his brain, right on time, right as Carson assured him they would. Close at hand, too—coming from the ship now closing in on the farside. Lynx’s mind writhes in the rush of power he’s never known. He feels himself building up to heights he’s never dreamed of. He’s got all the leverage he needs and then some.

So he makes his move, seamlessly reaching out into the mainframes of the shuttle’s destination, rigging them so they don’t even know they’ve been rigged. He steals right under the eyes of all the watching razors. He’s got them so beat it’s as if their eyes were his own. He’s almost frightened by how much better he’s suddenly gotten—suddenly realizes that all his razor prowess has been mere show beside the real master of the game. All those moments searching through the corridors of the Moon for keys and clues and fragments of some greater knowledge that’s finally rushing through him—he struggles to control the rush that sends his heart beating faster than it ever has before. He takes a deep breath.

“You okay in there?” says Linehan.

“Can you feel it?” mutters Lynx.

“Feel what?”

“Crosshairs.”

“What?”

“All those … crosshairs. Tens of thousands of them. The Eurasian lunar batteries. Their guns at L4.”

“Aimed at us?”

“And everything else that’s up here, Linehan.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The average DE cannon’s not firing, you think it’s just sitting there and you’d be wrong because it’s cycling through a thousand different targets a second, making itself unpredictable, right?” Lynx is talking so fast he’s pretty much babbling. “Keeping those who might try to hack it out of the mix. There’s no one war plan, man. There’s infinite plans. Infinite scenarios. In the time since you last spoke, hundreds of guns have flicked their sights on and off this fucking shuttle. The only weapons tracking us without interruption belong to our own side.”

“I’m not following.”

“Because you’re not listening. There’s a difference between war scenarios and in-fleet security, right? This crate we’re in is getting close to the SpaceCom flagship. It’s thus a threat of the first magnitude. Along with all the other craft that are doing the same thing at any given moment. Normal transport, right? But nothing’s normal up here. So they designate certain guns to do nothing but track stuff like us so that the lion’s share of the gunnery can worry about the East. Right?”

“Sure,” says Linehan. “Whatever you say.”

“That’s what I thought. Two particle-beam cannons, one microwave gatling, three high-energy lasers: they’ve got our number. At point-blank range.”

“Are you going somewhere with this?”

“Are you a fucking moron? They’re the back door to reach the ID configurations with which we’re getting inside L2’s inner perimeter. Got it? The guns that are tracking us can be hacked, and then it’s just dribble and shoot to figure out what their computers think we are, and then we get in there and change their mind so we can get clearance to get to the Montana itself—Jesus, will you look at that.”

The war-sat’s swelling through three-quarters of the window. Turrets jut out in every direction. The shuttle drops toward huge doors that are opening to receive it—floats into the landing bay, touches down. The pilot springs the hatch.

“Have a good ’un,” he says.

“Sure thing,” replies Linehan. He and Lynx get up, pull themselves out of the shuttle and into the landing bay—only to find themselves surrounded by SpaceCom marines who aren’t intimidated in the slightest by the officer insignia on the suits of the men they’ve got their weapons trained on.

“Sir,” says the squad’s sergeant, “we need to run a few checks.”

“We’re running late,” says Lynx.

“Orders, sir,” says the sergeant. “This way.” The marines escort Linehan and Lynx to an airlock. The sergeant and two marines step within, motion the two they’re escorting to join them. Doors close. Atmosphere pressurizes.

“Remove your helmets,” says the sergeant. Lynx and Linehan comply. “We need DNA swabs,” he adds.

“Since when?” asks Lynx.

“Since new regulations got handed down twelve hours back. Sir.” The last word seems like an afterthought.

But the DNA scan clearly isn’t. The marines take it from the inside of each man’s mouth. They also do a retina scan. Not to mention—

“Sir,” says the sergeant, “we need a voiceprint.”

“Don’t you already have that?” says Linehan.

“He means keyed to a lie detector as well,” says Lynx on the one-on-one. “Plus a covert brain scan.”

“Great.”

“Shut up.”

“Sir,” says the sergeant, “what’s your name?”

“Stefan Moseley” says Lynx.

“Position?”

“Major. Intelligence.”

“And your business on the Montana?”

“A meeting with my boss.”

“Who is?”

“Rear Admiral Jansen.”

The questions continue, but there’s nothing that Lynx hasn’t expected. It’s all getting relayed to the Montana, into databases that Lynx has already hacked, and from there back to the war-sat. It’s the same with Linehan’s questions. He’s less polite than Lynx is, but just as responsive. Two more minutes, and the sergeant salutes.

“Where’s the shuttle?” says Lynx.

“We’ll take you there,” replies the sergeant.

They leave the airlock room behind, proceed through the corridors of the war-sat. The atmosphere definitely seems pretty tense. Everyone looks like they’re going somewhere quick. Everyone’s averting their eyes.

“Feeding me those answers in real time,” says Linehan. “Jesus Christ, you were cutting it close.”

“How about you cutting me some fucking slack? I only just figured them out myself.”

They reseal their helmets, pass through another airlock, reach another docking bay. This one’s even larger. The marines hustle Lynx and Linehan into a shuttle—which starts its motors, floats from the bay and out into the heart of the L2 fleet. One shape in particular looms ever closer.

“That’s the Montana all right,” says Linehan.

“And I can’t fucking wait.”

“So what the fuck’s up here? How the hell did you snag a meeting with the acting head of SpaceCom intelligence?”

“By being Com intelligence ourselves. Obviously.”

“Yeah? When did you switch our IDs?”

“About ten minutes ago.”

“And the guys who really had a meeting with Jansen?”

“Got carved up in a Congreve alley behind a seriously nasty bar. This was one of several ways in, Linehan. I was playing a couple of other angles, but when we got to the war-sat this was pretty much the only way to keep moving.”

“So you keyed the SpaceCom comps to recognize the faces we’re wearing.”

“Yeah.”

“And if Jansen took a look at the camera feeds?”

“He’ll see just what he expects to.”

“And when we’re standing in front of him? Won’t our faces be an issue then?”

“Not if we skip that meeting.”

On the loose beneath the Himalayas, the train streaks unmonitored through the hollows. Spencer’s watching rocky walls whip past. Data flashes by far faster. Something’s taking shape within his head.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” he says.

“It’s just a logic bomb,” says Sarmax.

“No,” says Spencer, “it’s not. It’s a logic nuke. It’ll open up a link to the U.S. zone and bring this whole place down around our ears.”

Sarmax shrugs. “Shit happens.”

“What the hell’s going on here, Leo? This is an act of war.”

“And sabotaging a superweapon isn’t?”

“This might collapse the whole Eurasian net.”

“And that’s a bad thing?”

“That’s a crazy thing. For all we know, the Eurasian weapons will fire if their zone gets disrupted.”

“Not if that little fucker does its job.”

Spencer keeps staring at the data that’s flitting through his head. He’s breaking down all its layers, all the way to binary. Those 1’s and 0’s look so innocuous on the screens within his mind. But put enough of them together in enough sequences and they’re capable of anything. Spencer’s starting to think that so is he.

“We’re not here to stop a war,” he says slowly.

“We’re here to make sure it’s as one-sided as possible.” Sarmax’s face breaks into a half-smile. “Now how about you figure out where we’re gonna set this thing off?”

A tricky question. Especially because Spencer is still unsure whether he’s found everything in these catacombs. He certainly has access to more than he did. The maps roll through his brain, which takes them apart in all their detail: floor space, transport, logistics, wiring. The scale of the place beggars description. It’s even larger than he thought. Several hundred ground-to-space directed-energy batteries and about fifty heavy launching pads; yet so far it’s just standard stuff. There’s no sign of any one thing that’s particularly special. The scientists got shipped to the complex’s control center. But according to the readouts they’re just being held there. It’s unclear what for. A voice sounds in Spencer’s head.

“How’s it looking, sir?” It’s the captain.

“Not good,” replies Spencer. “Can you get me some files from Moscow?”

“I can try, sir.” The captain sounds nervous. “What do you need?”

“The comprehensive dossiers on the chief of this place. General Loshenko. And his five subordinates. And quickly.”

“And his Chinese counterpart?”

“This is an investigation, captain. Not an instigation of civil war. Now move your ass.”

“Sir.”

The captain disconnects. Spencer imagines he’s guessing that Spencer’s got his own sources to scope out the Chinese. But the truth of the matter is that Spencer’s just trying to keep the captain busy. He doesn’t need any official requests to Moscow to figure out what they’ve got on the men they’ve sent to run this place. He’s already tapped into Moscow’s files to get to where he is now, reached out across the long-gone steppes to that city he’ll never see, slipped through its streets and basements while he pulled together everything he could find. He’s back beneath those streets now, looking for the key to the place he’s in.

And not finding it. Maybe his clearance just isn’t high enough. Or maybe everything’s just that compartmentalized.

“What’s the story?” says Sarmax.

“The story is I can’t find a goddamn thing.”

“What about the handler’s mystery file?”

“The book’s divided into three sections.”

“And?”

“And that’s it.”

“That’s what you call progress?”

“It’s what I call a start.”

“You’re not funny.”

“Easy Leo. The first part deals with this base. The second part deals with the weapon that’s in here.”

“And the third?”

“I haven’t a fucking clue. And I’m not even that sure about the first two. It’s just pattern-recognition algorithms I’ve been running. The first part contains at least a few disguised maps. The second part seems to be technical descriptions. The third’s Christ knows what.”

“So you’re stonewalled.”

“So I am.”

“So let’s do this.”

Spencer shrugs, closes a circuit in his head, connects the logic bomb’s software to the Eurasian zone. Only there’s no detonation. Just lightning racing out onto the zone—and Spencer’s riding that lightning, getting hauled up along a new path, up through the mountains and into one of the hidden wireless aerials that the Coalition has secreted in the peaks. The signal churns out into space. Out toward a point just behind the Moon.

But the answer comes back long before it arrives.

It’s the Manilishi. There’s no doubt. It’s her face, her touch. And Spencer gets it now—sees that he’s been prepping the ground this whole time. He and Sarmax are the inside guys. Though he wonders why the Manilishi wasn’t in on this from the start; why it wasn’t just her and Sarmax. Perhaps the Throne figured he’d hedge his bets with a razor physically on the scene. But then why wasn’t she running cover from the beginning? Or was she? Spencer wonders what he’s missing. He wonders if the answer’s bound up in the thing he’s seeking.

Or whether it has something to do with the Manilishi. Because there’s something strange about her. Maybe it’s just the pressure she’s causing in his head. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t have the bandwidth to accommodate her. But there’s something almost… tentative about her movements. Not that that makes her any less hell-on-wheels. She starts using the bomb like a missile homing in on its target: straight into the heart of this complex, straight out to its edges. Coordinates flash into place. A new grid locks in to replace the old. The presence fades.

Spencer is breathing heavily. His heart feels like it’s about to explode. He’s covered with sweat. He’s almost shaking.

“You okay?” says Sarmax.

“I think so,” he replies.

He’s lying. He’s more than okay. He’s never felt anything like this. For one moment he was the most powerful creature in existence. And he can still feel her somehow lingering back there within his mind. Though according to his screens there’s no live connection. Which makes no sense.

And the map of the place he’s in makes even less. Because it seems to have shifted. He’s trying to put his finger on precisely how. He can’t see anything tangible. It’s just more of the same: endless corridors and chambers and munitions posts and barracks and fuel-dumps and guns and soldiers and trains.

Trains.

Suddenly he’s scanning the handler’s book with new insight. Suddenly it’s all starting to make sense. Some of the tables in the first section—numbers packed into as-yet-undeciphered column headers—he’d thought those numbers were disguised coordinates. But now that he’s ablaze with fresh insight, it’s all too clear: he realizes that factoring those figures in certain ways means they line up a little too neatly with some of the historical data in the logistics mainframes of this base. Because they’re really inventories. That contain schedules.

Of trains.

Like the one he’s in now … no. Larger than the one he’s in now. Much larger. Like the one he and Sarmax came in on. Those trains are everywhere. They’re the main conduit for supplies coming in. They come from underground and above-ground railways that stretch for hundreds upon hundreds of kilometers, all the way to the Ural and Altai mountain ranges. They’re all accounted for.

Except they’re not.

“What the hell are you talking about?” says Sarmax.

“There are way more freight cars coming into this place than there are leaving.”

“So they’re doing a mega buildup.” Sarmax looks unimpressed. “That surprises you?”

“You don’t fucking get it.”

“Get what?”

“Those trains aren’t accumulating anywhere. They’re disappearing.”

“To where?”

That’s what he’s trying to figure out. Some of the excess is getting piled up in plain sight. The entrances to the base are getting pretty jammed. But not all of the rolling stock is accounted for. There are a lot of locomotives that are just vanishing. Which ought to be impossible. But now Spencer’s seeing how it’s been done. Because the Manilishi’s hack is wiping away the false camera feeds and showing Spencer the real views into this base’s chambers. Focusing him in on a series of rail yards on the western extremity of the complex where several trains are waiting.

Only problem is that those rail yards are empty.

Spencer double-takes. Double-checks: these trains are there on the screens. They’re there in the base’s databases. They’re crystal clear on zone.

Just not in real life. That yard’s empty. Spencer’s checking out the last forty-eight hours of actual footage and it’s showing him that the trains have gone west from there, into tunnels where there aren’t any cameras. Tunnels that supposedly dead-end almost immediately. Tunnels not wired for maglev, either. He mentions this to Sarmax.

“That makes no sense.”

“It makes way too much sense,” replies Spencer.

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning let me show you something I’ve just realized about the schematics for these trains.” Spencer beams Sarmax the data. But even as he does so, the Eurasian captain suddenly turns toward them:

“Sir. I just got the Moscow data—”

“Thanks,” says Sarmax. He fires at the captain and the driver in quick succession, strikes each man in the head. Bodies sprawl in their chairs.

“Can’t trust anyone these days,” says Sarmax.

“Tell me about it,” says Spencer.

Light transfixes her. Faces surround her. She’s shaking, coming apart amidst the maelstrom of impressions. Marlowe and Morat and Lilith and Hagen and Indigo and all the others these last few days, all the years before that into which so much has been crammed and all of it could just be—

“False memory I’m triggering right now,” says Carson. “That’s all it was. It all stats now. You’ve been sitting in this room the whole fucking time dreaming of being something you’re not.”

“Not?” Her voice is weak. She can barely hear it.

“You’re not Manilishi, Claire. You’re just human.” He says this last word like it’s a curse.

“That’s not true,” she says.

“It’s true to you,” he says. “Because it’s your fantasy. That’s all it is.”

“Then why are you devoting so much attention to me?”

“I’m not,” he says. “I’m not even here. You’ve gone insane.”

“Bullshit,” she snarls.

“So fucking prove it.”

Specific words, couched in a specific tone, heard in a specific emotional state. The moment she hears the trigger phrase she turns the lock within herself, opens the door in her mind—the one that leads to the lost country of the true past. Though at first it seems so familiar. She steps past the missions on which she’s riding shotgun behind the Moon and beneath the Himalayas, moves through all the events she already knows. The last week stretches out before her in all its fucked-up glory, the Europa Platform, the Rain’s base beneath HK, the spaceplane, Morat, Sinclair, Jason. Jason.

Jason.

She remembers him as the years streak by—remembers being with him so long ago. She misses him so much. She sees the members of the Rain once more: sees herself as a child at play with them. She remembers a garden at night. There was nothing then. No sense of destiny. No sense of mission. No sense they’d ever get old. They were just children. They were just there.

And then they weren’t. She was separated from them. She never saw them again. She and Jason are the only ones left. They’re brought up, trained as CICom agents. The others get pushed beyond the brink of memory. Replaced by a man who she’s forgotten until now. But there’s no such thing as forgetting. Particularly not this man.

Who calls himself Carson.

“No,” she says.

“You made it,” he says.

“Fuck you.”

“Is that all you can say to an old friend?”

“You weren’t my friend.”

“No,” he says. “I wasn’t. Tutors don’t befriend their pupils. They can’t. They—”

“You taught me nothing.”

“I taught you how to forget.”

“Fuck you,” she repeats.

“How to keep out of sight from yourself,” he continues. “How to build up your talents till you were bursting at the seams and didn’t even know it.”

“I didn’t even know I wanted it.”

“But you did.”

“And I’d trade it all for—”

“You were a trojan horse, Claire. One that contained yourself. We didn’t even know what you were becoming.”

“You still don’t know.”

“We’re still finding out.”

“And thus you’re here.”

“You’ve got your missions, I’ve got mine.”

“The Throne ordered you to—”

“Get right up inside you.”

“Fuck you.”

“I wouldn’t be averse. Especially now that you’ve broken all your chains.”

“Except the one you’re holding.”

“Guess I’d better hang onto that one, huh? At least until the runs are over.”

“You mean until the war’s finished.”

“The war will end in a single strike.”

• • •

The SpaceCom flagship Montana. The first permanent structure established at L2. Forty years ago it was little more than a glorified tin can. But that was before decades of near-continuous construction. Now it’s a little more impressive.

“The hub of it all,” says Lynx.

Three massive metal wheels are rigged around a central structure that’s larger than any of the colony ships will ever be. It bristles with gun-platforms. It shimmers with lights. The shuttle starts its final approach toward a landing bay that’s opening like some giant mouth.

“How’s it feel to be back?” asks Lynx.

“What makes you think I ever got inside this thing?”

“You never did?”

“Christ no. I was strictly outer perimeter material.”

“So you’re moving up in the world.”

“So?”

“So congrats.”

The landing bay engulfs them. The shuttle slides into its dock. The hangar that’s revealed is a flurry of activity. Ships are getting prepped, worked over. An airlock tube locks against the shuttle’s hatch, which then slides open.

“Leave your suits here,” says the pilot.

“What?” asks Linehan.

“Standard procedure,” says Lynx on the one-on-one.

“But this is a fucking officer’s battlesuit—”

“And you really think they’re nuts enough to let you run around in here with it?”

Linehan grimaces. Starts to take off his suit. Lynx does the same.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “I’ll get you another one.”

They leave the suits behind, exit via the docking tube, which leads through the hangar wall and into a room that’s clearly intended as a waiting area. The hatch to the docking tube slides shut with a hiss.

“Now what?” asks Linehan.

“Now I shoot you.”

“Very funny.”

“No, really” says Lynx—and flicks the dart gun that’s set into his wrist, sends a dart flying into Linehan’s forehead—even as the man launches himself at Lynx, who steps lightly out of the way, lets paralyzed flesh drift past him.

“Don’t fight it,” he says.

Linehan definitely is. He’s trying to speak. He’s not succeeding.

“I’m serious,” says Lynx. “You just said hi to a curare derivative. One that plays hell with your software interfaces and your voluntary muscle functions. People get aneurysms trying to be heroic. Everything’ll be fine.”

Linehan clearly has his doubts about that. Or else he no longer gives a fuck. He’s foaming at the mouth. Garbled transmissions on the one-on-one reach Lynx’s brain.

“Ahh shut up,” says Lynx. He fires a second dart into Linehan’s back, turns to the two suited marines now entering the room. “Was wondering when you guys would get here.”

The marines salute, say nothing—just start strapping Linehan onto a gyro-powered gurney They fire the gyros up. One pushes the gurney. The other gestures at Lynx.

“After you, sir.”

Lynx smiles, starts moving. They leave the room, proceed down a corridor, transition into one of the Montana’s rotating areas. Gravity kicks in. They step inside another room. Sensors sprout from every corner, along with what are presumably weapons. Lynx feels the prickle of spectra probing him. He feels the software in him going dormant. He stretches. Yawns.

“Looks like you got them all,” he says.

“Sir,” says one of the marines. He gestures. The sensors switch off. One of the walls slides away.

The office that’s revealed looks like it could have been ripped straight out of any modern corporation. Lavishly appointed furnishings center on an oversize desk. A man’s got his feet up on the desk. The name on his uniform says JANSEN. He claps slowly. Almost mockingly.

“The prodigal son returns,” he says.

“Just in time for the mother of all parties,” says Lynx.

Somewhere beneath the largest mountain chain on Earth is a tunnel. Just one among many. Only this one’s much darker than the rest. It’s off all the maps. No wires are strung along the walls. The maglev doesn’t go down here.

But something a little more primitive does.

The train now rushing down the tunnel was built to ride magnetic current. But it was also configured for old-fashioned rails—and the wheels that have extended out along each side are making for a far more bumpy ride than any modern mode of transport. Though the two men who just got aboard aren’t complaining.

“And here we are,” says Spencer.

“But where’s that?” mutters Sarmax.

It’s a good question. They’ve dropped from the tunnel ceiling. They’re spread-eagled in their suits, on the roof of the third car back. They’re worming their way into the gaps between the cars.

“Somewhere off the zone,” says Spencer.

But somehow the Manilishi’s still with him all the same. He’s trying to figure out how she’s doing it. He’s guessing that she’s staging in from the end of the maglev rails—broadcasting via wireless down the tunnels. But that seems more than a little risky. Not to mention increasingly difficult as the tunnel steepens and the descent continues …

“The Eurasians rigged a classic tech barrier,” says Sarmax.

“Only way to beat the zone is to end it,” says Spencer. “But where exactly are we going?”

The last of the lights overhead are gone. They’re in total darkness now. The train’s accelerating. Spencer’s not even sure anyone’s really at the helm.

“Where indeed,” says Sarmax. “Any thoughts?”

“I’ve got lots of thoughts. The question is—”

“What the hell the handler wrote down,” says Sarmax.

And Spencer’s making progress. The second part’s definitely a technical treatise. Of that much he’s now sure. Or rather, the Manilishi is. She’s cranking away behind the scenes while he’s struggling to keep up. The specifics are still holding out. But he’s ready to make some guesses.

“There are only so many things it could be,” he says.

“Right,” says Sarmax. “Let’s list out possibilities. Work from there.”

“Well, for a start, how about another breed of nano.”

“Christ, let’s hope not.”

“They’d have had to solve the hack vulnerability.”

“Which won’t have been easy. But I think we’re thinking along the right lines.”

“With nano?” asks Spencer.

“Actually I meant with some kind of zone breakthrough. Look at the sort of hacks that the Rain unleashed. What if the Eurasians were working on similar lines?”

“Then they wouldn’t have let themselves get buttfucked in their Aerie so easily.”

“Maybe,” says Sarmax. “Maybe not. But we’re heading into something that’s been cauterized from the rest of the zone, right? That’s not online, right? Maybe studying the Rain’s incursions allowed the East to put the finishing touches on their own stuff. Or maybe this lot just got caught napping.”

“You could be right,” says Spencer.

“You don’t agree.”

“I think we ignore the physical at our peril.”

“Got something in mind?”

“I’ve got too many things in mind,” says Spencer. “Fifth-generation nukes. Tesla disruptors. Weather control. Anti matter bombs. Gamma ray pro—”

“Half that shit isn’t even possible.”

“Leo. We’re riding a train going Christ knows where beneath the Himalayas precisely because we don’t know what’s possible.”

“But we’re about to find out,” says Sarmax.

And gestures at the faint light that’s growing up ahead.

So what the hell are they heading for?” says Haskell.

“Don’t know,” says the Operative. And how the fuck am I even seeing this?”

“The zone,” he replies.

“But Spencer’s cut off from zone.”

He and Sarmax vanished beyond its edges five minutes ago. There’s been no sign of them since they took the train into the dark. But now this image is wafting through her head. She doesn’t know where it’s coming from. She can’t see why it should even be here. Unless she’s somehow found a way into whatever shard of zone Spencer’s now in. Or—

“You’ll figure it out soon enough,” he says.

“None of this adds up.”

“Not everything does.”

“And the fact that you don’t know what the fuck they’re making for doesn’t make you think twice about starting a war?”

“It doesn’t even make me think once. Because whatever it is, we’re about to take it out.”

“And I can’t do anything save fly cover.”

“Not as long as I’m right here with you.”

She looks at him. He’s just like the Carson she remembers. He’s the man whom time never seemed to age. He’s been with her all this time. Ever since the day when he first came to her. Ever since she asked him how he could possibly teach her anything.

Ever since he told her.

“Why did you sell out to Szilard?” she asks.

He laughs. “You really think that’s what’s going on?”

“You’re saying Lynx isn’t under your control?”

“You think he ever was?”

“You think I can’t see through the game you’re playing.”

“Maybe you should spell it out for me.”

“Your team’s gone rogue. You’re going to hand the Throne over to the Lizard.”

“Along with my fucking sanity? Fuck, Claire. I practically lost my life battling the SpaceCom conspiracy on the Moon.”

“Not the SpaceCom conspiracy, Carson. A SpaceCom conspiracy. One among many that Szilard maintained outside of normal command channels. Only this particular network got infected by Autumn Rain. Szilard tried to use the Rain, and they just ended up playing him. He knew when to cut his losses.”

“He still wants to be president, though.”

“God only knows what contortions he’s going through to keep his game afloat.”

“Nothing anywhere near as contorted as the logic twists you’re putting your own mind through.”

“But that’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“You think so?” he asks.

“You’re testing my capabilities even as you try to figure out what makes me tick. You want me running new theories through my feedback loops, so that you can study me all the closer.”

“Keep talking.”

“Oh you bastard. Why did you sell the Throne out?”

“I haven’t. I’m still loyal.”

“You don’t know the meaning of the word.”

“I’m the one guy who’s stuck with him through everything.”

“You’re the one guy capable of this kind of treachery. Harrison’s a fool to have trusted you. And for that matter, so’s Szilard.”

“Though it certainly made it a lot easier to finish the job against SpaceCom small-fry like Matthias.”

“So you’re admitting it.”

“What?”

“That you’ve been working for the Lizard.”

“In this game, the more bosses you have, the more leverage you get.”

“But sooner or later you’ve got to prioritize.”

“Well,” says Carson, “that’s the art.”

So you made it,” says Rear Admiral Jansen.

“So yeah,” says Lynx. Jansen stretches, comes out from behind the desk, walks to where Linehan’s strapped to the gurney Looks at Linehan, who stares up at him helplessly. Jansen laughs, nods to the marines who stand in front of the door. “Wait outside,” he says.

The marines salute, exit the room. The door slides shut behind them. Jansen walks back behind the desk. Looks back at Lynx.

“It’s about fucking time,” he says.

“I got here as fast as I could. A more direct way wouldn’t have been safer.”

“Don’t I know it. The fleet’s riddled with traitors of every stripe.”

“And the Montana?”

“Far too quiet.”

“What about Szilard?”

“He sees no one.”

“Not even his bodyguards?”

“You mean his latest bodyguards?”

“Guess I just answered my own question.”

“You bet your sweet ass. Christ, fuck the bodyguards: that’s how the Rain got in the last time. That’s how the Lizard beat the Rain’s hit team—purged his bodyguards and everybody else while he was at it. And then he ripped the head off the intelligence apparatus and placed me atop the bleeding stump.”

“He’s lucky he had his own private network to draw from.”

“Not lucky. Farsighted. Now, tell me what’s going on.”

“What’s going on is that the Praetorians sent me in here to kill Szilard.”

“That’s as predictable as it is funny.”

“They’re coming apart at the seams. They’ll do anything to hang onto power.”

“Like setting off a war?”

“How do you know—”

“You’re not the only agent we’ve got in the field.”

“Yeah? Got anyone aboard the president’s ship?”

“You’ve got the location of his fucking ship?”

“For you, anything.”

Jansen gestures at Linehan. “And what about him?”

“The last piece of the puzzle,” says Lynx. “The key to stopping the Rain once and for all.”

“Aren’t the Rain history?”

“I’m sure they’d like you to think so.”

“Go on.”

“This man Linehan—they met with him. They rigged him. In HK. He’s still got their software in his head. Reverse-engineer that and we can figure out how they ran rings around Matthias. How they brought down the zones. How they got into the Platform. How they got in here.”

“You’re going to be moving up in the world,” says Jansen.

“You too,” says Lynx.

They look at each other.

“You really think they’re still on the loose?”

“I don’t think it,” says Lynx. “I know.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Call it a hunch,” says Lynx—just as a sentinel beam on the wall spits fire, strikes the acting head of SpaceCom intelligence in the back of the head, knocking him face first onto the desk. The smell of seared meat fills the room.

Lynx looks around. He gets up, turns as the door slides open and the two suited soldiers enter the room; next moment, they’re sprawling on the floor as their armor malfunctions and electrocutes them. The door slides shut.

For a moment Lynx stands there. Then he steps over to one of the dead soldiers, opens up the suit, pulls out the body, climbs in to take its place. The sweat of the man he’s just killed fills his nostrils. He pays it no heed, turns to Linehan, injects him. Another moment and Linehan has his bare hands around Lynx’s armored neck.

“That’s not constructive,” says Lynx.

“You twisted fuck.”

“Look, I’ve got this room in lockdown but I don’t know how long I can keep it that way.”

“What the fuck was that about me being rigged by the Rain?”

“Total bullshit. And by the way, while me and Admiral Dead were talking, the queen-razor Manilishi has been shutting down the Montana’s defenses. So how about you get in that other suit and let’s go waste the Lizard.”

Linehan releases him. He stares through the visor at Lynx’s face. He’s so angry he looks like he’s about to lose his mind.

“And then I’ll waste you,” he says.

“And then you can try.”

This is just demented,” says Spencer. “Tell me something I don’t know,” says Sarmax.

The train’s bending right, along a curve. The angle of descent has steepened. Immediately to the left is a wall. About ten meters to the right is an edge. And past that edge …

“Christ almighty,” says Spencer.

“It’s at least a kilometer across,” breathes Sarmax.

They’re in a cavern that redefines the word vast. The railway runs along a route carved into the cavern’s edge, descending in long circles along a spiral. Sarmax and Spencer can see all the way to the other side of the cavern, to where another train that’s farther ahead has descended to the level beneath. Rows of lights line the cavern ceiling above, illuminating what lies below. Whatever’s down there isn’t visible from the current vantage point. The train keeps on rumbling downward.

“Let’s get out and take a look,” says Spencer.

“I’m guessing all we need to do is wait.”

“We need more data before we ride this thing all the way in.”

“Good point.”

Though either way it’s a risk. They adjust their camouflage, leap lightly from the train, roll along the ground, stop just short of the edge. The camo makes minute refinements. They peer over. Vertigo kicks them in the face.

“Holy shit,” says Sarmax.

But Spencer’s saying nothing. He’s just looking down what must be at least half a kilometer. He feels like his eyes are rebelling at what they’re taking in. As if he’s lived all his life to see something so completely gone.

“What in God’s name is it?”

“Christ only knows.”

If that. It’s some impossibly mammoth structure—the top of a huge dome, curving down to where it’s swallowed by a webwork of platforms and catwalks. The exact size is impossible to discern. But if the curve of what’s visible is any indication …

“Fucking insane,” says Sarmax.

“It must be at least a klick high.”

“Sure, but what the fuck is it?”

“I think the better question is what does it contain?”

“You still can’t access zone?”

“There’s clearly one down there. Lot of wireless activity.”

“But the answer’s no.”

“The answer is I’m working on it.”

“We need to get inside.”

“I realize that.”

“Any ideas?”

“How’s this for starters …”

This is bullshit,” she says. “Is it?”

“It’s something you’re projecting.”

“You don’t think it’s real?”

“I think you’re making me hallucinate.”

“Or maybe …” says Carson.

“Or maybe what?”

“What else would account for what you’re seeing?”

“Don’t do this to me, Carson.”

“Think about it, Claire.”

“It’s fucking real, goddammit!”

“Of course it is.”

“You’re fucking with my mind.”

“Of course I am. But not with that image.”

“But what the hell am I seeing?”

“The Eurasian superweapon. Obviously.”

She keeps on staring at the image in her head. It’s a structure that would be regarded as large were it standing on the Earth’s surface. The fact that it’s beneath the ground makes it pretty much unprecedented. Haskell looks down toward it. She takes in the platforms that jut out to encompass it, the doors here and there along its vast sloping wall …

“No,” she says. “Spencer’s right. That’s not the weapon. That’s a fortress. Which contains the weapon.”

He stares at her. Almost as though he expects her to continue. Yet she’s got nothing more to say.

But then she realizes she does.

“And the Rain,” she whispers.

Alarms are howling, but Lynx can barely hear them. Vibration’s pounding through the walls, but he can barely feel it. All he’s got is his own mind, lancing out in all directions and gathering everything in under its sway. The mainframes of the Montana are giving up the ghost. The ship’s defenses are going down before him.

And Linehan as well, who’s blasting his way through strongpoint after strongpoint and none of the defenders even see him coming. All their sensors show the threat’s coming from some other angle. They show Linehan as friendly. By the time they realize otherwise it’s way too late. Linehan’s leaving only mangled flesh drifting in his wake.

Though he’s getting more than just a little help. Lynx has unleashed viruses through the armor of everyone who’s standing in Linehan’s way. The only thing that’s out of reach is this station’s own inner enclave. Which is where Szilard’s holding out. Linehan’s heading there as fast as he can shoot. Lynx is doing the same, along a different route. He’s taken off his armor. He’s taking one hell of a risk. But that’s the only way he’s going to be able to squeeze through the spaces he needs to.

Though it’s still a tight fit. Even the larger maintenance shafts aren’t intended to be serviced by humans. They’re accessed instead by a whole taxonomy of robots that double as sentinels. Clawed drones, welders, moving drills—they’re hurling themselves from out of the dark and onto Lynx, doing their best to cut him to ribbons.

Only they can’t. They’re getting stopped just short of him. They’re getting out of his way. It’s not their fault. Lynx has reached into their brains, giving them a little twist, making them forget just why the hell they were getting so agitated. He’s the one thing in these tunnels that’s managing to stay focused. He keeps on moving.

And now he’s in the inner area. He can see the blueprints of this section stretching all about him. All twenty levels of it. All of the Montana beyond it, and the whole fleet stretched out beyond that. The word’s spreading among the closest of those ships that something’s going down on the Montana. But they’re also getting word that the situation’s under control. That any attempt to land forces on the Montana will be seen as insubordination. An attempt to seize Szilard’s power. It’s all playing out as Lynx intended. All he’s doing is taking advantage of the underlying contours. This fleet is as divided against itself as the whole fucking country—as the whole fucking world. Leaving the game wide open to those who can play every end against the middle. Lynx crawls down one last shaft, wedges down one last vent. He kicks a metal grille aside.

And leaps feet-first into the Montana’s control center.

They’re dangling on a tether that’s feeling ever more precarious, descending toward a sheer wall of metal that drops down into eternity. Their camo is put to the ultimate test as they close in on the structure’s summit. Neither man says anything. They’re preserving absolute radio silence.

Though Spencer can sense the Manilishi in his head anyway, echoing through his software. He still has no idea how the fuck she’s doing it. And he’s got other things to think about anyway. Because the curve of the dome wall’s stretching in toward him. They’re close enough to make out lettering painted upon it. Cyrillic and Mandarin, telling the ones who read it absolutely nothing other than where the doors are. There aren’t that many. They’re so airtight they’re almost impossible to spot. Spencer’s praying he is too. Most of the activity he can see is confined to the labyrinth of catwalks that obscure the foundation of this gigantic building. But there are eyes and sensors everywhere. Spencer’s pretty confident about the ones out here. He’s far less certain about whatever lies inside. He’s managed to get a tentative grip on the zone within—managed to pry his fingers through a crack in the defenses. But only barely. He can’t make out what’s going on. He’s figuring he’s going to get busted at any moment. He’s figuring he needs help.

And suddenly he’s got it. From the Manilishi. She’s showing him what he needs to see—exactly what pressure to apply as he alights on the surface of the structure, right at the point where the dome starts to really slope toward the vertical. He activates his magnetic clamps, starts crawling down the metal like an insect toward the nearest door. Sarmax is right behind him. And the Manilishi’s right beside him, encroaching through the circuitry of the door, toward the comps that crouch within. The door is barely discernible, but it seems real enough. As is the hack he’s now running on the pneumatic equipment on its other side. He’s streaking through endless wires, forestalling fail-safes, fending off countless counter-commands from deeper within the building. He’s ignoring the commands without them even knowing it. He’s sending in his own instructions.

The door slides open.

Spencer slides in. Sarmax follows. The door shuts behind them.

“Weirder by the second,” says Spencer.

They’re standing in a chamber. Each wall contains another door. One of them is open. Sarmax starts toward it, just as it slides shut and a panel in the wall beside it swivels aside. A wicked-looking barrel protrudes from within. It’s aimed directly at Sarmax’s visor. Sarmax leaps to one side. The gun tracks him.

“Fuck,” he says.

“It’s okay,” says Spencer. “I got control.”

“So tell it to point somewhere else.”

“Tell me what the fuck’s going on and I just might.”

Two people in a room that’s no room. The woman’s sitting. The man’s starting to look more than just a little tense. “Don’t you control Spencer?” he asks. “You tell me.”

“I thought—”

“You thought wrong. Someone got to him.”

“You don’t know what I was about to say.”

“Oh yes I do.”

“How’s that?”

“I’m reading minds now, aren’t I?”

And even as she speaks, the room fades out. To be replaced by the room she started in. She’s back in that chair, strapped in again. Only now she’s encased within a suit, staring at Carson through a sealed visor. He’s dressed in battle harness. The room’s shaking as the engines of the president’s ship fire. The forces of acceleration are pressing against the walls.

“All you’ve got is all I want you to see,” says Carson.

“We’re landing,” she says.

“We’ve started our final approach into Congreve.”

“And you’re going to kill the president.”

“And I’d want to do that why?”

She says nothing. She’s too busy testing the barriers around her. What she’s wearing is no normal suit. It’s more like a cage whose bars are wires that extend into her nerve endings. She can see how it’s been done—can see how this thing has been rigged to give whoever’s running it every advantage. It’s like it’s a well and whoever’s wearing it is at the very bottom …

“Because you’ve gotten what you came for,” she says.

“How to hack the Throne himself to forestall the transfer of the executive node. And now you’re going to take him out and take it for yourself.”

“Actually I had in mind giving it to someone.”

“Who’s that?”

“You.”

She stares at him. “Why would you want to do that?”

“Because I’m still in love with you.”

She laughs. “That is so much bullshit.”

“You say that without even hesitating.”

“You don’t even know the meaning of the fucking word—”

“I tried to warn you, Claire.” He shrugs. “Tried to tell you just how beyond the range of ordinary definition you are. Transhuman in a way that the rest of us can barely fathom. Think: your intuition, what does that really mean?”

“Ability to compute in advance of stimuli,” she says, almost automatically.

“And how the fuck could that be taking place?”

“Retrocasuality” she says. “That’s the only way.”

“Signals from the future.”

“I’ve felt them.”

“I’m sure you have.”

“God help me, Carson.”

“If you think you can reach Him, let me know.”

“Only thing I can reach out there is Lynx and Spencer. And Lynx is on the zone only—”

“And what about the Rain?”

“I think they’re inside that building beneath Eurasia.”

“And they’ve turned Spencer?”

But that’s not true. She suddenly remembers what she’s done, remembers what she’s apparently just communicated by some kind of telepathy to Spencer, telepathy that interfaces with both flesh and zone: she’s told him to keep that gun pointed at Sarmax and stand by for further orders. Because the Rain aren’t in that Eurasian structure after all. And the person who tampered with Spencer was—

“Me,” she says. “I turned Spencer. Just now.”

Carson smiles softly. “So now you see.”

She does. All those nights with Carson all that time ago, energy going through her body and across her mind and out into the universe beyond her. She suddenly gets where Carson’s been coming from all these years. He looks like a man. He’s really something more. The leader of the last Rain triad looks at her and she meets his gaze and doesn’t turn away.

• • •

At the heart of L2 is a ship around which all rotates. Somewhere in that ship there’s a room set apart from all else. Somewhere in that room’s the truth.

If only you can find it.

“Don’t fucking move,” says Lynx.

The man he’s got his pistols pointed at stiffens, raises his hands in the air. Which makes him even taller—he turns around, looks at Lynx.

“How the fuck did you get in here?”

“By being unstoppable.”

“Whatever you’re getting, I’ll double it.”

“This isn’t about cash,” says Lynx.

Though it looks like plenty has been blown on this room. It’s not small. The Moon floats in the window that comprises most of the ceiling. A massive map of the lunar surface covers the center of the floor. The walls are lined with console banks and the occasional door, one of which now slides open. Linehan enters the room. His armor’s been scorched in several places. Smoke’s still drifting from his guns.

“Did I miss anything?” he asks.

“We were just getting started.”

The door slides shut.

You got the short end of the stick,” says Spencer. Sarmax doesn’t turn around. Spencer’s viewing him through several crosshairs. Getting the drop on a man in powered armor isn’t easy. It helps to know your target’s suit inside out. It helps to have the Manilishi as a guardian angel upon your shoulder. Spencer monitors the voiceprint as Sarmax speaks.

“How do you mean?”

“I mean did you guys draw straws or something? Lynx hits the SpaceCom fleet and you get inside the Eurasians and meanwhile Carson gets his hands on the Throne?”

“Something like that. So—”

“So your luck’s run out, Leo. Carson’s going to rule and you’re going to die.”

“I’m not going to die,” says Sarmax. “And neither will you if you manage to grow some brains in time.”

“Thank fuck I wised up when I did.”

“You didn’t. I’ll bet it was the Manilishi telling you what was what.”

“She thinks you and Lynx and Carson got created in the same moment.”

“She’s right.”

“But that’s bullshit. You’re all different ages. You were born separately.”

“And reborn together.”

You no longer control Spencer,” says Haskell. “That’d be all you,” says Carson. “You’re doing great.”

“He’s got a hold of the trigger in that room.”

“Let him keep it.”

“And if he tries to kill Leo?”

“Let him.”

“You haven’t changed a bit.”

“Sarmax hid Jarvin’s file from me, Claire. It wasn’t Spencer he didn’t want to share it with, it was—”

“You.”

“Us,” says Carson. “You mean that?”

“You’re lucky,” he says. “You flew from the start. I had to adapt. Had to deal with it. I was only twenty-eight—”

“That’s how old I am now.”

“Except you’re not. Accelerated growth in the vat—”

“I know that, Carson. You don’t need to tell me. Let me out of this suit.”

“I can’t. Until it’s done.”

“The missions?”

“Everything. The battle for the world and moon goes down tonight. And then you’ll be at my side.”

“I need you to let me out of this.”

“And I will. But right now I have to let you steer yourself as you activate your powers. You have to ride the raw wave of moment, Claire. Your memory—tell me what you remember.”

“Everything.”

“Go on.”

“I know it all now. Where the implants start. Where they stop. What lies beyond them. I remember my sixth birthday for real and the counterfeit birthdays before that. Six days after being decanted and here I am thinking I’m a normal fucking kid.”

“And you weren’t even a normal member of the Rain. Just the capstone on the whole project—”

“You need to tell me exactly what you mean by that.”

“I’d rather have you show me everything instead.”

The head of U.S. Space Command has the look of an animal that’s been brought to bay. He’s staring down the barrel of the minigun mounted atop Linehan’s suit. But he’s maintaining his composure.

“The chickens have come home to roost,” he says slowly.

“That’s for sure,” says Lynx. His voice wafts out from behind the consoles he’s busy working on. Everything aboard the Montana has gone haywire. None of Szilard’s marines can get anywhere near this room. Half of them are dead due to suit malfunctions anyway. The lights of the L2 fleet flicker in the window.

“You bastard,” says Linehan. “Do you recognize me?”

“Should I?” asks Szilard.

“I was a member of the team you sent to help the Rain take down the Elevator.”

“An interesting theory.”

“I was there, asshole. In the heart of HK, meeting with those fucks. They fucked me good. So did you. And now I’m going to rip your fucking heart out—”

“So what are you waiting for?”

“Me,” says Lynx. “I might need to ask you a question or two about how you’ve wired this ship’s inner enclave.”

Szilard’s expression doesn’t change. “So you can control it.”

“I already control it, as swipe. I’m talking about the rest of your fucking fleet. To deliver to the president.”

“You mean Matthew Sinclair,” says Szilard.

Because that’s who we’re really talking about, isn’t it?”

“Have it your way,” says Sarmax. “But he—”

“Did it all through Carson? I know. Carson came to you and dragged you out of retirement and explained Sinclair’s whole scheme. Poured honey in your ears and—”

“You’ve got it all wrong.”

“Yeah?

“We almost killed each other first.”

“And I’m supposed to be surprised? When the whole MO of the Rain was to devour each other? Dysfunction junction from the word go and—”

“Fuck, Spencer, I know. Jesus Christ, that’s why I got the fuck out of all that.”

“I heard there was a different reason.”

“Don’t even go there.”

“The conditioning may have backfired on you. But the rest of it didn’t matter. You and Lynx and Carson were the originals: three Praetorians who’d kicked ass together for so long you could practically complete each other’s sentences. What better subject matter for the initial experiment? What better prototypes for the world’s most dangerous hit team?”

“The Manilishi’s telling you this?” asks Sarmax.

“Yeah. And I’m pretty sure the third part of the handler’s book says the same damn thing. Along with all the specifics.”

“The crown jewels, huh?”

“The exact nature of the Autumn Rain experiments, Leo.”

“The compiling of which drove the handler mad.”

“That may be its basic condition.”

“We were flatlined,” says Sarmax. All those years ago. That’s all I know. They took out our lights together: meshed us on the zone, crashed our systems, and then woke us at the same fucking time and after that we were fucking linked in some way. I don’t think it worked out quite as well as they wanted, though. I think they were thinking they were going to get some kind of group-mind effect, and it wasn’t anywhere near that precise. But our reflexes were off the charts. And we could sense when the others were near. I know that Lynx and Carson are heading toward each other behind the Moon right now. I know they know I’m back here. I know that—”

“It has to do with consciousness.”

“Yes. Obviously.”

“It was a specific process.”

“Or more than one.”

“Was it used on me?”

But Sarmax only smiles.

“Or am I Rain myself?” asks Spencer. “Goddamn it, Leo—”

“You’re just a guy who ended up running with the big dogs. Far as I know, anyway. Carson managed to hook you up to the Manilishi, but that was only thanks to software the Throne gave him to implant in you.”

“Rain software.”

“Presumably.”

“From the original tests?”

“Who knows? I’m just telling you what I was told. But the master process—whatever it was—was refined with the second team. They weren’t like us. They weren’t modified. They were—”

“—created. For that purpose.”

“They were hell on bloody wheels, Spencer. They put us in the fucking shade.”

“And now they’re in the shade forever.”

“She told you that?”

“And more besides.”

The final descent is under way. The last of the engines are firing.

“You shouldn’t have trusted Sinclair,” she says. But Carson just grins. “Who said I trust him?”

“Then why the fuck are you carrying out his orders?”

“Sinclair came to me two days before the Elevator went down. He restored what the Praetorians had stripped from me. My memory of those times. The training I’d received. The training I’d given. Said he was worried that his protégés were getting out of hand. Said he might need me to run some interference. Sarmax had left the service with his memories intact. His little secret. Arranged by Sinclair without the Throne’s knowledge. After the Elevator blew, I went to Leo. We struck a deal. We dealt Lynx in on the way back to Earth.”

“And after the naughty little children were defeated, why didn’t you just seize everything on that ship on the way back?”

“Because we needed you to find and destroy the rest of those fucks. Seizing control of everything with them still out there would have made us the target.”

“If Sinclair’s in prison, then how are you in touch with him?”

“I don’t need to be.”

“What?”

“You still don’t get it, Claire, do you? Sinclair’s sitting in his fucking cell watching the universe spin around him.”

“He’s reading minds too?”

“Have you sensed him? On any level?”

She shakes her head. “Not as far as I know. All I’ve got is Spencer’s and a shade or two of yours. Have you?”

“I don’t think it works that way,” says Carson. “It works like this: when he restored my memory, Sinclair explained to me exactly what would happen. Exactly what levers I would need to pull—and when. He laid the whole thing out—said how it would go down if I gave it the right set of shoves. Said it all led up to something that’s coming up, something past which he can’t see. He’s on a whole different level, maybe even your level, and I don’t even pretend to understand—”

“That’s why you’re so crazy to be dealing with him.”

“That’s why I need your help.”

“He went through the Rain process himself. He must have.”

“I’m convinced he saw it as the best way to get the drop on Harrison,” says Carson.

“Is he really on this ship?”

“Harrison? Absolutely. And by the way, he’s going to remain president, no matter what the head of SpaceCom thinks.”

“As a figurehead.”

“As an expedient.”

“A temporary one?”

“Everything is, Claire.”

They look at each other.

“Because that’s the core of it,” says Carson. “Harrison and Sinclair. Lifelong partners, lifelong rivals, and the guy you thought of as the old man always had to play second fiddle. He and the president cooked up the Autumn Rain scheme together, back when they were both admirals.”

“Before they ruled the country.”

“Why so surprised?”

“Morat told me it was after Harrison assumed power.”

“Second-generation team—your team—sure. Not the first. Not us. Besides, Morat was a low-grade punk. He never knew the half of it. How the fuck do you think Harrison and Sinclair took over? Me and Lynx and Sarmax took out everyone opposed to them. But Sinclair was keeping his own options open the whole time. And by augmenting himself, he must have figured he’d be ready if the shit ever hit the fan.”

“But why did he let them put him in the L5 prison?”

“I’m pretty sure he thinks that’s the safest place to be.”

“I’d rather be within some kind of rock when the shooting starts,” she says.

“Makes two of us,” he replies.

She nods. The ship drops toward the Moon.

We were seduced,” says Szilard.

He steps away from Linehan, steps out onto the lunar map that dominates the floor. “That’s far enough,” says Linehan. Szilard stops. Looks back at him. Holds up his hands in what looks almost like a protest. “But we were,” he says.

“Perhaps Sinclair was, too. Because it wasn’t just their lack of inhibition. Any sociopath can do as well. What made the Rain so lethal was a radioactive creativity. Seeing patterns where ordinary people see only chaos. An ability to grasp opportunities invisible to anyone else. It wasn’t just the telepathy either. Look at the games they’ve been playing. So twisted you can’t even follow the threads. They’ve got all of us wrapped up in the same fucking web and all they need to do now is suck out the goddamn juice.”

“Why are you telling me this?” asks Linehan.

“Because you’re just one of the victims,” says Szilard.

“Yeah?” asks Lynx. His voice echoes from an open hatch in one of the mainframes. “Is that a fact, Jharek?”

“It is. You’re using this man.”

“I’m giving him the chance to kill you.”

“And I wish you’d let me go ahead and do it,” says Linehan.

“You’re just a jackal on a leash,” says Szilard.

But Linehan only laughs. “I’m riding shotgun on history, and I’m about to put the head of my original boss all over that wall. It doesn’t get any better than this.”

“Maybe you should ask your drug-snorting Rain razor what he intends to do with you once I’m dead.”

“Hey Lynx,” says Linehan, “what’s next?”

“We unleash the war.”

“And what’s my rank?”

“My bodyguard.”

“And what’s yours?”

“I thought I’d start with commander of the L2 fleet.”

“Fucking cool,” says Linehan, “let’s do it.”

• • •

Two men sit in a room in some structure beneath the Himalayas. The pieces of that structure are like a grid within Spencer’s mind. He’s trying to grasp the nature of this place. He’s trying to focus on the face of Sarmax, but it’s as if the walls are blurring around him—as if the floor is undulating beneath his feet. Everything’s starting to swirl inside his head.

“Fuck,” he says.

“Don’t fight it,” says Sarmax.

“Ayahuasca,” says Spencer. “It’s resurging—”

“Is that what it feels like? Being mind-melded with the Manilishi can’t be easy—”

“Fuck’s sake—”

“—especially now that bitch has been trying to pull your strings. And all the while we’ve been pulling hers.”

Spencer stares at him. But he can no longer speak. Pressure keeps on growing in his chest. The images of the pages of the book pulsate within his head. The face of the Manilishi blazes like some dark sun inside him.

What the hell are you doing?” she mutters. “Having my way with you once more.” Though really he’s just holding onto the wall right in front of her while the ship shakes about them, dropping through ten thousand meters. The dome of Congreve is visible below. Haskell’s struggling to remain calm. Carson’s smile isn’t helping. Nor is what he’s doing to her mind.

“You miss the essence of the problem,” he says. “The Rain weren’t some mythical force. They were just men and women who had been engineered to think without fetters. The solution to an equation no one had even dared to postulate. Not a question of ends—”

“But means. Carson, I know this. But—I—fuck!”

“Sure you do. But you were never asked to prove it. You were kept within the system and everything stayed nice and simple. And all the while the ones with whom you were bred were out in the cold thinking like normal humans never could. Putting together a plan more convoluted than a goddamn Gordian knot.”

“Which was nothing compared to what you were doing.”

“Which just proves the point,” he says.

“Even though none of it was your fucking idea.”

“At least I know a good one when I see it.”

“Christ, Carson, you’re hurting me.”

“Someday you’ll forgive me.”

“I’m damned for ever having known you.”

“But let’s try to make the most of it, anyway,” he says. “Some kind of process, right? But what? What was it that the Rain were made of? Sinclair knows it all, and everyone else is in the dark. But somewhere in you—”

“No one besides Sinclair? Not even the Throne? Or you?”

“I know only fragments.”

“What did you use to bind me to Spencer?”

“Death.”

“What?”

“We killed you. When we got back to Earth.”

“That was a risk.”

“The Throne said you’d have to be executed anyway unless we could find a way to harness you. And the Praetorian med-teams know what they’re doing: simultaneously flat-lined you and Spencer and then shocked you back while your minds were wired together on the zone. Sinclair had already given me the sequence and Harrison was the one who gave the order but I’ve no idea how he—”

“And why not Lynx?”

“Too risky. It had been done to him once already, right? And Spencer’s mind had been dosed with ayahuasca, which made him particularly receptive. But the real question isn’t what was done to him a few days ago or what was done to me and Lynx and Sarmax more than two decades back; the real question is what was done to you and the rest of the Rain when you were in the fucking incubator. The first team was jury-rigged and the second was created wholesale. And only Sinclair knows that formula—”

“And Harrison—”

“—thinks he does, but his files are rigged with false data.”

“You really think you’ve beaten the Praetorians?”

“You’re the one who’s done that. It’s what you were designed for. Though finding out how much of you goes beyond anybody’s planning is what I’m setting in motion tonight.”

“I’ll tell you what I know,” she says, and she can’t help but say the words. She can’t help but tell him everything she can and then some. She has no idea what he already knows. She has no idea how she knows what she does. It doesn’t matter. Her mind twists and turns and it’s all she can do to hang on …

“I was to be the key node in the Autumn Rain mass-mind.”

“Go on.”

“The one that the second generation became. The one that Marlowe and I were shorn from.”

“The one you detected traces of at the Europa Platform.”

“And that I killed every last member of.”

“You sure about that?”

She stares at him. “What do you mean?”

“You sure you got them all?”

“Are you saying that—”

“You know exactly what I’m saying.”

“Don’t—fucking do this—”

But he’s already pulling more levers somewhere deep within the canyons of her skull. Everything blurs around her—

“For the love of Christ, stop fucking with my—”

And suddenly her vision’s burning white.

Let’s get this show on the road,” says Lynx. He emerges from an open hatch in one of the mainframes, wires trailing from it to multiple places in his skull. He looks at Szilard.

“Kill him,” he tells Linehan—but Linehan’s already opening up on Szilard, even as his target dives away, starts rolling across the floor. But he’s got no chance against a suit of armor. Linehan turns, catches up with Szilard in a single stride. Laughs.

And stops. For a moment he’s balanced on one foot. And then he topples over. His armor hits the floor with a crash. Szilard’s on his feet, leaping Linehan’s toppled suit, running straight at Lynx. Who’s fumbling for his pistols, raising them, opening up as Szilard hurls himself to one side once more and darts behind the mainframe to which Lynx is attached. Just as the back of the armor that’s sprawled on the floor opens and a very pissed off Linehan climbs out.

“What the hell’s your problem?” he screams at Lynx.

“What the fuck’s yours?”

“My armor just got hacked, and you didn’t stop it!”

“I never even saw it! For fuck’s sake, this is a live situation! He’s behind this console! He’s fucking with it and I’m losing control!”

“Give me that,” snarls Linehan, snatching one of the pistols from Lynx’s grasp. He turns toward the consoles, starts firing, advancing on the place where Szilard vanished.

“Does he have a way out of this room?” he yells.

“Back there? There’s nothing.”

“You hear that?” shrieks Linehan. “Szilard! This is it! You’re dead!”

“Don’t just tell me about it,” screams Szilard, “come over here and fucking do it !”

With an unearthly cry, Linehan starts forward.

You lose, Leo.”

“What?”

“I just lost the Manilishi.”

“She’s—”

“Not calling the shots anymore. And neither’s Carson.”

“Where the fuck did they go?”

“How the fuck should I know? I’m my own man now.”

And he is. The waters of his life roar around him and he lets himself get caught in the rush. His mind’s still ablaze with static, but now it’s all insight that he’s gathering into himself. He focuses on Sarmax, wonders whether he should pull the trigger.

“One last chance,” says Sarmax.

“You’re one to talk.”

“I’m serious. Join us.”

“What?”

“Fuck man, we’re inside the Eurasian superweapon. No reason you can’t have it once I’m ruling bigger empires.”

“You’d put one through me as soon as you saw an opening. I’m not one of your fucking trinity.”

“I hate both those fucks, Spencer. Don’t—”

One of the doors slides open. A suitless Russian soldier enters the room. His eyes go wide with astonishment.

“It’s not what it looks like,” says Spencer.

“Drop your weapon,” says the soldier—and tries to signal backup. But Spencer’s hacking the signal. The soldier’s backing up through the door, but Spencer gets his mind around the door, slides it shut with full force, smashing the soldier against the doorway, crushing his rib cage—but not before the man’s gotten off a shot. Spencer leaps aside as the projectile sears past him—even as Sarmax whirls to face him. Their guns are right up against each other’s visors.

“Shoot and you’ll lose your zone coverage,” says Spencer. “Shoot and you’d better believe I’ll get a shot off,” says Sarmax.

“I’m your only hope to crack the handler’s files.”

“I’ve done more runs against the East than anyone alive.”

“So? You still need me more than I need you—”

“To do what?” yells Sarmax. “To do fucking what? Are you going to try to take down this place or are you going to take this all the fucking way? Don’t you get it? The secret of the Rain is out there and whoever finds it can build more of them. And you really think you can get to the next level of this fucking game when you’re flying solo?”

“I think we should see what the hell’s in here with us.”

“I can think of worse ideas,” says Sarmax. Spencer nods.

What the fuck,” says Haskell. “What are you seeing?” says Carson. “You just overwrote half of Lynx’s hacks! And God knows what you just did with my link to Spencer!”

“Never mind that,” snarls Carson, “tell me what you’re fucking seeing!”

She knows damn well what he means even though she doesn’t know how the fuck it’s happening. All she knows is that there’s a new light burning out on the edges of her awareness—a light that’s like a cross between a star and fire, that can only be one thing—

“Another mind,” she whispers.

“Not Spencer’s either.”

“Rain—”

“Yes,” he says. “Go on.”

“It’s—Autumn Rain—someone—”

“Who?”

“I—can’t tell—”

“Who? How many?”

“I can’t tell—it’s blurring—”

“Location,” he says, and his voice is very calm.

“L5,” she answers without hesitation. Vast mental geographies loom around her. “But—that’s where Sinclair—”

“That’s no coincidence.”

“But it’s not him—”

“Of course not.”

“He’s got someone else up there.”

“Maybe more than that.”

“Not all the original batch went rogue,” she mutters.

“And not all of the Praetorians who guard Sinclair are who they seem.”

“So I see.”

“Sinclair told me you’d read it loud and clear.”

She nods. Her mind is blasted open. She’s draped in the glow that lights up the no-sky of no-zone. She can’t communicate with whoever’s out there—doesn’t even know who the fuck it is—but it’s Rain, of that much she’s certain, because the mere presence in her head is more vivid than anything she’s ever known. And yet it’s all a mere fraction of how it was all supposed to be. Horizon sets within Haskell’s mind even as realization dawns. Lines align within her head, and it’s all she can do to keep up with them. Someone she was born with is still alive—she’s weeping and she’s conscious of almost nothing else.

And then there’s nothing she’s not conscious of. Reality clicks around her and something just folds. She gazes at Carson and it’s like his face is falling away from her down some endless shaft …

“What am I really?” she asks softly.

“Something that’s come unstuck in time.”

“That Sinclair can’t predict.”

“Presumably.”

She exhales slowly. “And the rest of the Rain?”

“May be related to that fact.”

“I can feel the Moon out there,” she mutters. “It’s hauling against me like a fucking lodestone.”

“It may yet drag you under.”

“What the hell’s happening?”

“You’re changing.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“You’re welcome. I’ve been doing my best to crank you up across the last few hours. That suit I’ve rigged you with is worth the price tag. Overstimulating your system with electric shock and circuit overload and—”

“Fucking bastard.”

“We’re still not sure what we’ve got in you, Claire. And maybe it doesn’t fucking matter: off-the-charts AI or ESP gateway or crack in the fucking cosmic egg—doesn’t matter what we call it as long as we can use it. And with the East about to bring its own superweapon online we’d better make sure we’re maxing out on ours.”

“So why the fuck did you just shove both missions off the goddamn rails?”

“Getting exciting, isn’t it?”

“Because you fear Lynx and Sarmax more than anything else?”

“Because I’m giving up on breaking you open. For now.”

“You’re—”

“Out of time. And remember what I said about multiple bosses? I got way too many assholes on line one.”

“Christ almighty, Carson. Are you obeying Sinclair’s orders or have you sold him out too?”

“I like to think I’m carrying out the spirit of them.”

“And all your talk of love?”

“Just talk. But there’ll be time for action later.”

“I swear to God I’ll destroy you if I ever get the chance.”

“That’d be by boring me to death with your threats?”

The door slides open. Armored Praetorians enter the room. They’re wearing the uniform of the Core. They fan out, take up positions. Carson looks at them. One of them salutes.

“Sir,” he says.

“Half of you come with me,” says Carson. “The other half stay here. Seal this door. Don’t let anybody in until we’ve landed.” Soldiers head back through the door. Carson follows them—and stops as Haskell starts screaming at him.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“Like you even need to ask,” he says.

The door slides shut behind him.

Laughing like a maniac, Linehan fills the air with fire while he strides toward the console. Lynx has his last pistol trained on the only other exit from behind the equipment. He’s waiting for Szilard to come running out to get shot down like a dog. He’s desperately trying to bolster his disintegrating zone position through the wires that sprout from his skull. His connection with the Manilishi has been severed. He has no idea why. But something’s obviously gone wrong. And it’s rapidly getting worse. Szilard’s marines are right outside the door, trying to burn their way through.

But it’s not too late to salvage the mission. Linehan leaps forward, just as Szilard springs out from behind the console, dodges under Linehan’s gun, starts grappling with him. Staff officer versus wet ops veteran: it’s no contest. Linehan seizes Szilard, tosses him out toward the center of the room. Szilard mutters something.

“Finish him!” screams Lynx.

“Or you,” says Linehan—and turns, grabs Lynx, knocks the pistol out of his hands, hauls him bodily away from the mainframe. Lynx screams as the wires extruding from his skull snap. Linehan hurls him against the console.

And shrugs.

“I’m a conflicted man,” he says.

“Christ,” mutters Lynx. Blood dribbles from his mouth. He stares up at Linehan. “You’ve been rigged.”

“By us,” says Szilard.

“But InfoCom wiped all that—”

“You’ve made your last assumption,” says Szilard. “Soldier, kill this traitor.”

“Gladly,” says Linehan who whips up his pistol at Lynx, fires. The shot goes over Lynx’s head. Linehan fires again. The shot flashes past Lynx’s face. Linehan’s face is starting to twitch.

“I said fucking kill him!” screams Szilard.

But now Linehan’s convulsing. He’s pitching forward. Szilard’s standing open-mouthed behind him. Lynx starts running. He’s got no weapons. He’s got nowhere to go. He’s heading there as fast as he can.

They’re getting the fuck out of that room at speed. They did their best to hide the body of the soldier who crashed their chat—pulled a panel aside, stuffed it in there. And that’s about all they’ve got time for. They’re climbing down ladder after ladder, descending through shafts, seeking out the depths of this place, since that’s where the heart of its zone activity seems to be. And Spencer’s riding toward it. Though without the Manilishi he doesn’t dare to try and hack the core. Not until he understands more about what’s going on.

Because it’s pretty clear something’s going on. There’s a lot of activity under way—a lot of soldiers and technicians going about their business. Spencer and Sarmax are doing their best to look like part of the scenery hiding behind doors, concealing themselves within shadows, keeping equipment between them and the other men and women within this place.

But it looks as if they might have been detected anyway. Sirens start going off everywhere. Activity’s suddenly cranking up to a new level of intensity. Shouting echoes down the corridors. They crouch behind some stowed equipment and wait to be found. Soldiers race into the room.

And keep going. It looked like they weren’t searching for anything—just getting ordered into position. Spencer and Sarmax slink out, find more ladders, climb down. The ladders start to get shaken by a distant rumbling, like something’s starting up. Spencer’s got a feeling that something probably is.

The Operative leaves the interrogation quarters behind, fires his suit’s thrusters. The soldiers wearing Praetorian colors swarm in behind him. He lets the Manilishi’s hack carve out ahead of him. He’s got control of her as long as she remains within the suit. He has no intention of letting her outside it ever again.

He rounds a corner and starts firing. As do all those with him. Their targets’ suits are getting shredded. Walls start to buckle under the fusillade. Shots whip past the Operative’s head. But he’s got the advantage. The fact that his team’s maintaining zone integrity allows them to coordinate their shots with deadly precision. He blasts through the dying Praetorian defenders and smashes through into the ship’s forward areas.

But now the president responds. The executive node roars out to do battle, bulldozes straight into the Manilishi. Two titanic forces strain against each other. The president has the resources of the whole zone to draw from. The Manilishi is the most powerful razor in existence. Penetrating the U.S. zone is no problem for her. She’s already inside it anyway. But assailing its very core is something else altogether.

Which is why the Operative’s not counting on her to finish the job. He’s planning on doing that the old-fashioned way. He surges forward, tearing his way through more Praetorian defenses. He’s not surprised to feel the ship accelerating, surging toward landfall and the president’s forces in the base at Congreve. But unless the forces within the ship can stop him, the Operative is going to reach the president before they hit the Moon. He’s picking up the pace, too—blasting his way through wall after wall, taking Praetorians by surprise for just the fraction of a second long enough to allow him to destroy them. He’s almost at the threshold of the bridge. He can feel the ship’s descent quicken toward plummet. He wonders how the hell they’re going to stop in time.

And then he realizes they’re not.

Haskell’s trying to brace herself but there’s nothing left to brace. She’s already strapped in. The soldiers around her are grabbing onto the walls. The ship’s coming in at lethal speeds. She can feel Carson somewhere in the back of her mind. Clarity’s bursting on her far too late. She understands that Carson knows that his real enemies are his fellow plotters—that he’s riding some deeper scheme.

But apparently he’s been too devious by half. Because the president’s so desperate to reach the Moon he’s going to crash them all. Haskell feels her stomach lurch as the craft accelerates still further—feels herself involuntarily gasp. She feels her whole life start to flash before her eyes—and it’s really her own life this time. She understands it all. She gets it—sees her mind caught in the jaws of Carson’s trap, sees how he’s turned her against herself. How there’s no way out.

Not in this world anyway.

Howling heat and burning light … the universe opens up around her, rises in her like some voice she’s never heard, yet sounds exactly like her own. The minds of everyone she’s ever known and everyone she never will flare through her head, pour past her like some runaway torrent. And in that flood she can see it all: the grids of zone and the reins of power that end in the man who holds them within the bridge of a ship that’s a blip of light above the horizon that’s cutting across a million watching screens—and the woman who’s watching all of them knows it’ll be the last thing she’ll ever see. She’s finally free. Retrofire’s slamming through her. The ship’s firing its brakes. It’s way too late. They hit.

There’s an explosion. The doors burst open. Szilard’s marines hit the room. But Lynx is already gone, through the duct and into the shaft he used to enter the room. Shots streak after him but they’re way too late. He’s running on all fours like some kind of hunted animal. The mechanized guardians of the Montana’s crawlspaces swarm toward him—and scoot away as he uses what’s left of his crumbling zone position to talk them out of it. He keeps on moving past them.

He knows he’s reached the end of the line. He’s out of options. Save whatever’s available to him inside all this crawl-space. He’s got a feeling he’s going to know this place all too well before he dies. The maps gleam within his mind. In their stacked grids he catches glimpses of deeper patterns—how triumph turned so swiftly to debacle, how nasty what’s about to happen is going to be. He wonders if it’s already begun.

• • •

But if it has, it’s news to them. Because down in the lower levels everything’s silent. It’s as if they’ve stumbled into the domain of ghosts.

“We’ve gone too low,” says Sarmax.

“I don’t think so,” says Spencer.

He’s starting to evolve a theory about what’s really going on within this place. He and Sarmax descend through several more levels, pass through several open hatches.

And arrive in a strange chamber. One where metallic conveyor belts drop from the ceiling, run along walls, pass through slits in the floor. Spherical objects are slotted within the belts. They look like metallic eggs. Sarmax walks over to them. He stares at the objects. He studies one of them in particular.

“Is this what I think it is?” he says.

“I think so,” says Spencer.

“Probably five-kiloton yield.”

“Probably.”

The room has two more exits: a hatch in the floor and one in the ceiling. Spencer does a local hack on the ceiling hatch. They climb a ladder and head on through.

“Hello,” says Spencer.

A room that looks to be filled with what must be thousands of those nukes, stacked from floor to ceiling, ready to slot onto the conveyor belts. Spencer breathes deeply.

“Weirder by the second,” he says.

“I’d say we’re getting close,” says Sarmax.

The presidential ship plows into the landing pad and then through the underground hangars stacked beneath, disintegrating as it goes. The base through which it’s now spearing comprises about twenty levels. The ship makes it through half of those before momentum peters out. Stars are visible through the hole the ship’s just bored …

The Operative opens his eyes to find himself staring at those stars. He’s lying on his back. He’s lost contact with the zone. His armor’s taken a serious beating. But it’s still functional. He activates its backup comps, surges to his feet.

Wreckage is all around him. As are plenty of bodies. But not the one he’s most interested in. He can’t see Harrison anywhere. Worse, he’s lost contact with the Manilishi. He reactivates his links to zone, hoping it’ll have some answers.

It does. The Manilishi’s nowhere in sight. But the executive node is clearly visible, still intact, still moving, very close. The Operative fires his thrusters, blasts away from the wreckage and in between the gnarled remains of floors and ceilings. He quickly reaches the more intact areas of the base. He can’t see any Praetorians anywhere.

But he can see the president, right ahead of him. Crawling on his hands and knees, in a suit so fucked it’s a wonder it’s still pressurized. The Operative blasts toward him, just as more figures emerge from the far end of the corridor. The Operative hits his brakes, starts to engage his weapons. But then he stops.

And relaxes.

There are five of them. None are in Praetorian colors. They hit their thrusters, reach the president a fraction of a second before the Operative does. He looks at them. Four are men. One’s a woman. She steps forward. He salutes her.

“Ma’am,” he says.

“At ease,” she replies.

“Stephanie,” says a voice, weakly.

The Operative looks down. The president is looking up through a bloodied visor—looking past him, at Stephanie Montrose, the head of Information Command. Her bodyguards stand around her. She looks down.

“Andrew,” she says.

“Carson is—this man’s a traitor.”

Montrose laughs. “On my payroll,” she says.

Harrison stares at her with the expression of a man in whom understanding’s dawned way too late. “You too, Stephanie?”

“Kinda looks that way.”

“You were my fucking successor.”

“Until now,” she says—nods to the Operative. Who places his boot on the president’s chest, fires a single shot through his visor. Looks at Montrose.

“Consider the torch passed,” he says.

The look on Montrose’s face is the look of someone who’s just received the software upload that comprises the executive node. The software that holds the reins of the U.S. zone. A transition that’s occurred automatically now that Harrison’s dead. Montrose turns to the Operative.

“The Manilishi,” she says.

“Missing,” he replies.

“You’re shitting me.”

“I wish I was.”

“She’s dead?”

“Or escaped.”

“I thought her suit prevented her from—”

“It might have been damaged in the crash.”

“Or shattered altogether. You’ve fucked up.”

“I know.”

“If she really has broken loose—”

“We’ll find her.”

“The tunnels beneath this base are endless.”

“We’ll find her.”

“They say the Rain themselves were down there before we burned them out—”

“I said we’ll find her.”

“Let that be your next task.”

“I’ll need soldiers.”

“You’ll have my best.”

Carson salutes, turns away. Montrose turns, too, gets rushed by her bodyguards down the corridors of the base. It used to belong to SpaceCom, before the Praetorians cleaned them out. But InfoCom assisted with that takeover, and it was child’s play to lay the seeds of yet another one. Now Montrose’s soldiers control this whole place.

And more besides. Montrose gets hustled into one of the underground trains that connects the various military bases scattered beneath Congreve. The train she’s in is heading out of Congreve, out beneath the crater perimeter, toward the walled plain of Korolev, dropping ever deeper beneath the surface the whole while. Its destination is the largest command center beneath the lunar farside.

But Montrose doesn’t need to get there to make the call she’s now making. Szilard’s face appears upon a screen within her head. The left side of his face looks like one big bruise.

“Stephanie,” he says.

“What’s the situation?”

“Harrison almost fucked me,” he replies.

“But he failed.”

“And I guess I have you to thank.”

“I guess you do. He’s dead.”

“Then we’ve won.”

“Except that the Manilishi may have broken loose.”

“Fuck,” he says. “Your man—”

“Did the best he could.”

“Then we need to wait until—”

“No waiting,” she says. “We’ll recapture that cunt within the hour or else we’ll dig her out of wreckage. Our forces are primed. We’re at total readiness. We’ll hit the East without mercy and I swear to God they’ll never rise again. It’s now or never.”

“And our latest diplomatic overtures—”

“Are worth whatever we make them. There’s no reason to delay.”

“Twenty seconds prep?”

“But no prep that’ll tip our hand.”

“So give the order,” he says.

“With pleasure.”

Somewhere else below the lunar surface, someone’s listening. Someone who feels like she should start fucking with the commands Montrose is giving. But she’s not. And she won’t. Partially because she’s got pursuit hot on her tail. But mostly because she can’t see any way around what’s about to happen. And because she’s sick of being played. She’s getting in this game for real now. She’s riding the moment that’s breaking like a wave throughout the U.S. bases. The moment they’ve all been waiting for. Her eyes roll back in her head as it begins …

With sirens sounding throughout the bases of Earth and Moon and space. Pilots and gunners are sprinting to their stations. Launch codes are flashing down the chains of command. Failsafes are releasing. As one, the directed energy weapons power up, ride astride current capable of lighting every city and then some. Hundreds of thousands of hypersonic missiles slot through the silos. The electromagnetic rails on the mass-drivers surge. The battle management nodes lock in.

The satellites take the range. The warheads prime.

The shutters on the zone close.

And then the sky—

TO BE CONCLUDED