Acolyte (35 page)

When Sly got back in, Annabel was looking bemused.

‘Your, uh, “security expert” in London was compromised some time ago,' said Sly, shrugging. ‘The moment you used the systems he'd set you up with, they could start to locate you.'

‘Ah,' said Annabel. The damn phone.

‘Yep. Fortunately, I was keeping tabs on
them
, so I knew your location too. And I was closer.'

Annabel noted the slight bruising on the woman's forehead, right where she'd hit her with the iron. She pointed. ‘Uh, sorry about that,' she said.

Sly put her hand to the bruise. ‘Yeah. Don't do that again. I needed to get you out fast and quiet, and I knew damn well you wouldn't trust a word I said. In, spray, and get you the fuck out of there; that was the plan. I wasn't expecting the iron.'

‘It kinda took me by surprise too,' said Annabel.

Sly rummaged a little more in Annabel's bag. ‘Yay!' she said, grinning. She pulled out the white canister Annabel had taken from the hotel. ‘Did you get rid of the gun?'

‘Yes.'

Her smile turned into a frown. ‘Shame. Nice weapon. Pricey.'

‘Sorry.'

‘Yeah, well. You're rich. If we both live through this I'll bill you. Oh, something you should know. Your friends, Miller and Geary? They're fine, last I heard.'

Sly gunned the car, and Annabel was glad of the noise.

Wet and shivering, Jonah and Never had emerged from that cramped tunnel into the night, following Kendrick's instructions with the kind of numb shock they'd both seen many times in the grieving relatives of dead subjects. Jonah thought of Katherine Leith, of the expression he'd seen on her face as he'd talked to her about bringing her dead son back for a final goodbye; he thought of himself, lying in the mud as a fourteen-year-old boy, his mother dead in the nearby car.

Kendrick insisted they put an hour of driving in before even allowing them to change out of their sodden clothes. He was prepared, as always: there was a bag of spare clothing in the trunk. Dry at last, they each took three-hour shifts at the wheel. Jonah found that the routine of driving helped his state of mind. The shock settled, and the distance they covered over the next two days was as much mental as physical.

When they reached the new safe house, a one-storey end-of-street place in the north of Reno, it was early morning. They slumped onto the soft seating there, Never taking the couch, and within moments Jonah found himself tumbling into the deepest sleep he'd ever known, barely coming round when Kendrick shook him to tell him the news. ‘Annabel's safe,' he said. ‘She's on her way here.'

Jonah woke four hours later to find Kendrick and Never still sleeping. He was certain Kendrick's words had been in a dream;
tears pricked his eyes at the thought of how cruel that kind of dream was, where reality was a painful thing to wake up to.

Then the thrum of Kendrick's phone woke the man; he took the call and looked over at Jonah with bloodshot eyes. ‘They'll be here in less than an hour,' Kendrick said.

‘They?' said Jonah.

‘Annabel and a friend of mine,' said Kendrick. ‘I told you, didn't I?' He seemed genuinely uncertain. ‘You should grab yourself a shower.'

Fifty minutes later she walked in, smiling, another woman coming in with her. One of Kendrick's people, he assumed, although she looked decidedly less lethal than he'd been expecting Kendrick's inner circle to be. His own age, he thought; slight, short.

Annabel's expression was a giveaway when she saw Jonah's face – a shock she failed to hide, one he understood. He'd seen his own face in the mirror when he'd showered, cuts and bruises underscored by haunted exhaustion.

Annabel, too, had been through it. She was wearing a beanie and took it off carefully, pulling a cotton pad away from the side of her head that was brown with dried blood.

‘Be careful,' said the woman. ‘You don't want to open it up again.'

Annabel put a tentative hand to the injury and took it away, clean. ‘Busy few days,' she said, and Jonah could hear her voice breaking as she spoke. They took a step towards each other and embraced, saying nothing. Just holding on, breathing. All they could do. All they needed to do.

‘This is Sly,' said Kendrick after a discreet moment. ‘She's tougher than I look.' He smiled, and Sly smiled back.

‘I'll vouch for that,' said Annabel, breaking off the embrace but not letting go of Jonah's hand.

‘Sly,' said Kendrick, ‘this is Jonah Miller, and Never Geary.'

They gave each other a nod.

Jonah caught the expression on Never's face as he looked at Sly, and felt himself wince a little inside; auburn hair and a great smile had often been Never's weakness.

‘Aren't you, uh, a little short to be a stormtrooper?' said Never, his grin horribly nervous.

Sly's eyebrow arched high. She looked at Kendrick, her thumb jabbing back to Never. ‘Keep this one away from me,' she said. ‘And tell me we have beer.'

She went to the kitchen, Never following her, looking like a kicked puppy.

*

Kendrick left the safe house without explanation, emphasizing that Jonah, Annabel and Never were confined indoors. He left Sly there to watch them; she sulked at being a babysitter but kept herself to herself, while Never avoided looking anywhere near her when she was around. They spent much of their time resting. Jonah and Annabel slept spooned in one of the beds, the simple pleasures of contact and sleep feeling like the greatest of luxuries. They told each other everything that had happened since Bob Crenner's car was ambushed, but neither mentioned the biggest thing on each of their minds: what the hell they were going to do next. When Kendrick finally came back late evening, they put the question to him.

‘Me and Sly will be gone for a few days,' he told them. ‘In the meantime, you'll be here, alone. Stay indoors. You have plenty of food. We're arranging for the three of you to meet up with an acquaintance of mine who'll take you somewhere safe.'

‘What about Andreas?' said Jonah.

‘It's not your fight any more,' said Kendrick.

There was silence for a moment, as they took this in.

‘And you?' said Annabel. ‘What are you going to do?'

Kendrick smiled. ‘Take care of things. More than that, you don't get to know.'

A welcome two days of
nothing
followed.

They were all still numb. Jonah kept his eye on news about the research at Winnerden Flats; all the revivers who had been accepted were at the site now, and in the most recent interview with Stephanie Graves she revealed that updates would be monthly.

‘Just let us get on with it,' she told the interviewer, smiling.

For most of the time, they avoided talk of what came next. Whenever the topic did get raised, it was usually Never who started it.

‘We can't go back,' said Never. ‘Our old lives are gone and I don't even know
what
to feel about that. If Kendrick fails, we'll need new identities for the rest of our lives.'

‘If Kendrick fails,' said Annabel, ‘the rest of our lives is likely to be pretty short.' Jonah scowled at her, and she smiled back. ‘But in good company,' she said.

After three days, Jonah was sitting with Annabel and Never eating through a mountain of junk food and watching terrible movies. He had almost started to feel human again. Whatever happened next, he would be with Annabel. There were worse ways to face the end of the world.

Just after 5 p.m., Kendrick and Sly came back. Kendrick stepped over to the television and switched it off. He set the black holdall he was carrying down on the floor, with a heavy metallic thunk. Sly had one as well, and when she set it down it made the same kind of sound.

‘Time for answers,' Kendrick said.

*

‘My plan was always to kill Andreas,' Kendrick began. ‘One way or another. Tess didn't know for certain if killing him would really
end
this, and any attempt on his life would always be a one-off. One chance, so it would have to count. Even before Tess told us
when
we could make it count, we already had a means in place to
get a team inside Winnerden Flats, armed to the teeth. When I found out what Andreas really was, I set about making sure people loyal to me got themselves into positions that could be important. Two of them are already in Winnerden Flats, in Baseline security. We have a good idea what's happening on the Baseline side, but very little about the restricted areas. We know Tess and Andreas are both there. But things have accelerated. We're out of time. We'd hoped to find out about the final component Andreas needed for his machine, and try and stop its construction, but we've just learned that we're too late. The last component has been delivered. Whatever the process of Andreas's rise is, it begins in the next day or two. We have no choice but to act now.' He laid out a few sheets of paper, a four-page mosaic of the site plan. ‘Winnerden Flats,' he said. The complex was, overall, a rectangle. Two sets of tall wire fencing were marked, the innermost flagged as electrified. The main gate was at the long, lower end of the rectangle. ‘This area in the middle is open, a courtyard with hard surfaces for recreation. Living quarters for the Baseline staff are here.' His hand swept across the L-shaped building at the left. ‘Sleeping area here. Indoor recreation area, canteen. Kitchen. Gym and swimming pool at the top. There are a hundred revivers working at the facility, a further hundred research and support staff. Over here –' his hand moved to the lower right of the rectangle – ‘this is Lab One, for Baseline research. Used only by day, this is our way in.' Then Kendrick pointed to the top right of the rectangle, at the heart of which was the large dotted circle labelled MCH. ‘This area is called Lab Two. Officially the cryogenics lab. Off-limits to Baseline staff, and that includes the main security team. It has its own security, is self-contained, and even has supplementary power generation. Most of the complex is four storeys, concrete floor at ground level. Here, though, two levels are underground. The circular construct that houses their
machine
covers both levels. We know that those close to Andreas live in this area. They don't leave it. They don't mix with the research staff.'

‘Of course they don't,' said Jonah. ‘If the revivers caught sight of them, they might be able to see the shadows crouching on their shoulders.'

‘Almost certainly,' said Kendrick. ‘There are only twelve security staff for the main facility, but we don't know how many in Lab Two. Maybe another dozen.' He laid out another sheet of paper, the schematic of a cryogenic chamber he'd already shown Jonah and Never.

‘We think this is the centre of the machine, where Andreas will be as he undergoes whatever process they have in mind. The plan I originally devised had an eight-strong team. That team included four of my associates, long-trusted colleagues willing to do whatever it takes. Together with myself and Sly, we would gain covert access to Winnerden Flats. The two insiders from on-site security would complete the team. They would meet us, and take us to a secure storage room. We would hide there until the time was right, which, thanks to Tess, we now know means once the rise has actually begun. Two of the team would then evacuate Tess, get her out of there. The information she has access to could prove critical, even if the rest of the mission fails. The other six team members would gain access to Lab Two and blow the internal generator, then move in to kill Andreas.'

‘A nuclear weapon would be useful,' said Never. ‘Given how good Andreas has been at
not
dying.'

‘Wouldn't it just,' said Kendrick, irritated. ‘Not
quite
that easy to get hold of.'

‘So how do you plan to make sure he's dead?'

‘Do you know what the perfect murder is, Never?'

‘When there isn't a corpse to find,' he said with a shrug.

Kendrick nodded. ‘Precisely.' He reached into the holdall at his feet and produced an unlabelled black cylinder. ‘When I'm done, I'll know Andreas can't recover. Because there'll be nothing
left
of him.'

Everyone looked at the cylinder. Jonah wondered what it contained,
but he could see the top of the holdall, and a compact gas mask sitting there. ‘Good luck,' he said, but the look on Annabel's face was odd. He wondered if she'd taken it as sarcasm. ‘I mean it.'

‘I know,' said Annabel. She looked agitated; scared, almost.

‘What's wrong?' asked Jonah.

Annabel shook her head, looking at Jonah and Never. ‘Jesus, you two are slow sometimes.' She got blank looks. ‘He just told us his plan. Don't you get it?'

‘No,' said Jonah.

She turned to Kendrick. ‘The associates you'd been counting on … They're not coming, are they?'

Kendrick shook his head. ‘They were the team that took Lucas Silva, so no. We were trying to arrange alternatives when the news came in that the machine is ready. We're out of time and we're short-handed. Me, Sly and the two insiders can handle the assault. It's a smaller team than I'd like, but it's enough. Problem is, we can't spare anyone to get Tess to safety.'

Bemused, Jonah looked at Annabel, then at Never; he could see the penny drop on Never's face just as it dropped with him.

‘In theory,' said Sly, ‘all you have to do is take one of the patrol vehicles and drive away.'

There was silence for a few seconds as the news sank in. Finally, Never spoke up. ‘You said this wasn't our fight,' he said.

‘Things change,' said Kendrick. ‘We leave tonight. Welcome aboard.'

Jonah lay in the dark on a hard cold surface. He was completely enclosed, save for a small gap left at the top of the zip for ventilation. It wasn't anyone's idea of comfort.