The Sovereign Era (Book 2): Pilgrimage (33 page)

“Well, I guess we’ll get on with it, then.”

Croy seemed to take that as his cue.

“Her name was Yvette Schwenck. Her body was recovered in a ditch on Highway 200, one third of a mile west of Garnet Range Road.”

Vic Mazmanian said, “I believe she was thrown from a car.” His voice was low and not quite emotionless, but it just didn’t come naturally to him like it did with Croy. “She was killed when they drove back to run her over.”

Schulmann asked, “Who did it?”

Croy said, “That’s not known at this time.”

Ed Kelso’s voice was like a rock grinder. “At what time will it be known, then?”

Croy didn’t answer that directly. “We know of one other Sovereign expected at the Institute before today who has not arrived. We must assume he met a similar fate. We have also received reports from new arrivals this week of harassment from members of the local speciesist militia group.”

Ewing Kass spoke up. “Rayford Greene’s people.”

Croy didn’t respond; everyone knew Croy never responded to things he considered obvious, so maybe the comment was meant for the rest of them.

“Hey,” Byron said, “that’s the guy you guys were talking about Wednesday.”

“That guy’s the asshole your dear old dad’s been hanging out with, too,” Schulmann said.

Byron found himself more than a little bugged by Jon today. “Look, my dad’s a fuckwit, and a total asshole…but he wouldn’t kill somebody. He’s all bark.”

Mostly.

Fontino stood with his legs slightly apart. He cupped an elbow in one hand and thoughtfully covered his mouth with the other. Byron thought he looked like a male model in a department store catalog.

“You think the Schwenck killing is a message.”

“I cannot speculate,” Croy said. “It is reasonable to assume that the local militia is involved. Possibly responsible. It is a given that group will be represented at the Visitors Center today. Provoked, violent engagement during Declaration Day festivities is expected.”

“Figured as much,” Kelso said.

“I have revised the agenda. We will not wait for an incident. The SCET will be onsite all day. I want you all back here and ready to deploy by 0830. Byron, you will accompany Mister Kelso and Mister Schulmann.”

“I will?”

Doc Mazmanian said, “You got fitted for your uniform yesterday, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, then.”

Haze said, “Mister Croy.” Byron almost forgot she was there.

“Yes.”

“Who called it in?”

“Can you be more specific?”

“Sure I can. How did we know where to find the girl’s body?”

“Doctor Donner sensed her death.”

That gave everyone in the room a little pause, except for Ewing Kass, who bowed his head, and Derek Fontino, who, Byron noticed, focused very hard on Spencer Croy.

Haze seemed really tense. “Wait a minute. You said there was ‘one other’ Sovereign who was expected but hasn’t show up yet, right?”

“Correct.”

“Back when I got here, I just, y’know, walked up to the gate. Did these two Sovereigns, like, call ahead, or something? Make an appointment?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Then…how—?”

Croy anticipated her question. “Doctor Donner was aware of them.”

Byron saw Haze’s eyes narrow and her face tighten. “I’m going with you guys.”

Schulmann shook his head. “No way. Sorry. You’re not trained.”

“I’m a Sovereign individual, by your boss’s made-up laws and by rules of the Compromise.” She strode up to Schulmann and got in his face. “You wanna stop me?”

Byron felt the heat coming off of Haze from ten feet away. He saw beads of sweat pop on Schulmann’s face.

“You really want to play firefly with me, girl?” Schulmann said.

“You think I’m gonna wait for you to run and get your little suit?” Haze said.

Kelso said, “Zing!” Schulmann reddened from more than the heat.

Doc Mazmanian said, “Seriously? This is not the day for this kind of bickering.”

Croy turned to Byron. “Mister Teslowski will vouch for Ms. Edgars. Or not.”

Byron realized Haze had never told him her last name. “I—why me?”

“Works for me,” Doc Mazmanian said. “You know Haze better than anyone here.”

Croy just looked at him, waiting.

Byron assumed this was another on-the-spot test he didn’t understand. It was stupid.

“Like she said. Who’s gonna stop her?”

It wasn’t really a glowing endorsement. Haze’s sarcastic half-smile let him know she knew it, too.

“Settled,” Croy said. “Oh-eight-thirty.”

Schulmann immediately went to the golf cart and puttered off, back to the apartments. Byron yelled after him, “That’s cool, Jon! We’ll walk!” Quieter, he said, “Dick.”

Haze went with Byron. Alone with her, he couldn’t put their fight out of his head.

“I’m surprised you want to come with us.”

“I have my reasons,” she said. “Don’t think I’m joining up or anything.”

“I know.” Byron shook his head. “That girl. It’s totally fucked.”

“Uh-huh.” She moved stiff and fast, practically power-walking.

“It got to you, huh?”

“They knew she was coming, Byron. Donner
himself
knew she was coming, and no one went to pick her up and make sure she got here. What is wrong with these people?”

Byron thought about it. “That is fucked-up,” he agreed.

She hawked and spat as they walked. “Something is, all right.” They reached the apartments. “I don’t have a stupid uniform, thank god. I’ll wait here.”

“Okay.”

“Happy fucking Declaration Day,” she growled. “And hurry up, because I cannot fucking wait to start burning shit.”

From The Journal Of Nate Charters – Twenty Nine

Less than a mile short of our destination, every vehicle crawling northbound on the two lane mountain road leading to the Donner Institute for Sovereign Studies collectively surrendered. The road was a parking lot.

“Looks like we walk from here,” I said.

“This is gonna be a bitch,” Denver groused. “Shoulder’s not paved.”

Sandy said, “Don’t fuss, Denver. We’ll wheel you right up the road. No one’s moving; it won’t matter.”

Andrew growled quietly. “Lots of people. Lots.”

That was for sure. Having left their cars behind, people streamed the last little way to the Visitors Center in clusters. It was as if we’d parked in the farthest lot from the gate of Disneyland…except I didn’t see any little kids anywhere.

Probably for the best.

I exhaled. “We’ll be all right. Right?”

“Sure.” I had the feeling Denver’s upbeat tone was strictly for Andrew’s benefit. He knew better. If
I
could smell traces of anxiety on our sweat, we must have reeked to my father.

Sandy opened her door. “Come on, men. History beckons, etcetera, etcetera.”

I got out of the car. The morning air was crisp and cold, refreshing after the last two slow hours in the car. It was hard to savor, though. I felt a little exposed just standing next to the car and found myself scanning the woodsy hillside and the faces of the people trudging past.

“Help me out, Nate?” Sandy called from the back end of the car.

“Right.” I helped her get the wheelchair out of the trunk and Denver into it, not that he needed a whole lot of help. Only Andrew remained in the car.

“Time to go,” I said through his window.

He looked at me, then stared straight ahead. I thought we were going to have a problem, but he tapped on the window, so I took that as a signal to open his door for him. In his on-again, off-again state, he’d probably forgotten how to do it himself.

Andrew got out of the car and maintained a low crouch. His nostrils twitched busily. “Sovereigns…”

“What? How do you know? Where?” I looked around.

“There. There…there…all around.” He pointed at various people, mixed in with the throngs making their way up the road. “Smell ‘em. You can’t?”

I couldn’t. Or could I? Maybe it was just a matter of knowing how to filter it out. I’d ask him about it later, when we were safely at the Institute. Might be a handy trick.

Each of the people my dad pointed out looked like tired, road-dirty, haggard travelers. Just like us, in other words.

“Wild.”

In fact, I thought we probably stood out. Guy in a wheelchair. Me with my double-take features. I wondered how long it would be before I was recognized. It gave me the willies, like the feeling someone’s standing behind you.

“Let’s get going, you guys.”

“I’ll lead the way,” Denver said. I quickly saw the sense in that. People instinctively cleared a path for a guy in a wheelchair. The rest of us followed close behind, with Andrew right after Denver and Sandy bringing up the rear.

We made it about ten minutes before a ripple of excited noise from down the road made us stop and look behind us.

“Duck.” My dad’s warning was so calm, it almost didn’t register with me.

A shirtless, flying man buzzed us. The buffeting air from his powerful, flapping wings smelled like body odor. He climbed about fifty feet, laughing, and leveled off for the rest of his flight to the Institute.

My tongue dried out, which cued me in that I’d been staring after him with my mouth hanging open. I closed it.

The last time I had seen that guy, a Sovereign whose name I would later learn was Gary Chancellor, it had been on grainy news-copter video footage on TV, one year ago tonight.

It felt like a lifetime. That night, I’d been dragged to my grandmother’s empty summer cabin in Kirby Lake by my paranoid mother, who had been freaked out by Donner and what his declaration might mean to the world and to her “special little guy.” Lina and I had just met. I had no idea Byron Teslowski was anything more than a schoolyard bully.

Now I was maybe just hours away from meeting Donner himself. Byron was there, right now, at the Institute, far as I knew.

And Lina and I were probably totally over.

When we finally got to the Institute, I almost wanted to meet Chancellor more than anybody. Seeing the flying man was like bookends on either side of the last year.

We watched him do loops in the air. I heard distant cheers.

“I wonder if we can catch up to that guy…?”

Andrew frowned and wrinkled his nose. “Stinks.”

Sandy said, “Even I could smell his backdraft. I wonder if his wings have sweat glands? Like big radiators?”

“Already taking notes, eh?” Denver said with affection.

“Of course!”

As someone with a hyperactive metabolism to fuel my augmented abilities, I had an idea of what she was talking about. “You mean he burns hot…because it takes so much energy to fly?”

She winked at me. “Bright boy.”

We walked on, using the literal aerobatics of Chancellor as a marker. We could hear the white noise of a crowd somewhere ahead. We were really close.

I think I was the first one to see the thrown rock hit Chancellor and the flying man’s head snap back. His back arched, his wings faltered, and he fluttered dangerously close to the ground before he got it together and shakily gained altitude. I lost sight of him somewhere beyond peak of the hill ahead.

The attack had a bad effect on the crowd. Shouts swelled into screams of shock and fear…and very quickly, rage. Things were going to get nasty.

I looked at Andrew, Sandy, and Denver. “We have to… Come on!”

Andrew narrowed his eyes and bared his teeth. I saw a moment of regret and frustration cross Sandy’s face before she put a hand on Denver’s shoulder.

“You two go. Find out what happened.”

I slapped my dad’s shoulder. “Come on! Let’s go!”

I got to the top of the hill and stopped. About fifty yards away were the gates of the Donner Institute for Sovereign Studies Visitors Center.

About fifty feet away, a line of cops were having a very difficult time keeping two angry mobs from tearing each other apart. There was no sign of the flying man.

Someone screamed, “Look!”

I didn’t know they were talking about me until the first rock bounced off the pavement at my feet. It left a chalky streak on the asphalt.

While I stared at it, the second rock hit me right below my left clavicle.

From The Journal Of Nate Charters – Thirty

The mob on the right must have seen someone in the mob on the left throw the stone. They must have seen me get hit. Just like the anti-Sovereign gang on the left had already figured out, folks in the pro-Sovereign gang on the right started recognizing me.

I heard my name screamed from many different mouths on both sides, and then it got crazy.

Ever hear of a slam pit? It’s when people in the audience at a punk-rock show start jostling and shoving each other. It’s not really
American Bandstand
-style dancing. More like human pinball. It probably looks violent and crazy to an outsider, but there’s a logic and a flow and a friendly etiquette to the whole thing. No one wants to hurt or be hurt.

This was the biggest, most crowded slam pit I’d ever been in, except there was nothing friendly about it. The two sides rushed each other, tentatively at first and then with blind abandon. I found myself in the middle of it, standing back to back with my dad.

I didn’t feel particularly endangered. I knew if I watched out for myself, stayed alert, and worked toward the edges, I’d get out of the human storm with nothing worse than a few bruises.

My crazy, half-feral dad with the razor sharp fingernails and the metahuman strength and speed was another matter. I wasn’t scared for him. I was very worried for the people around us. These poor fools, friendly or otherwise, were in the deadliest situation of their lives, and they didn’t even know it.

“Andrew,” I screamed. “Dad! Hold it together! No killing! No killing!”

The roar from my dad’s throat sent a shiver through me. Some of the people pressing against us recoiled automatically. I could smell their fear slicing through the tang of adrenaline.

“No slashing,” I yelled. “Push them away—head for the gate!”

I did just that, shoving hard against the shoulders of the person closest to me. I’m not as strong as my dad, but I’m stronger than most everyone else I might meet. The effect was human bowling pins. I used the sudden space to get us closer to the gate of the Visitors Center.