Burn (8 page)

“That is an important objective,” Race replies. “But you are correct—it wasn't the only one. Until last night, however, we were unaware of how urgent the situation had become. And now that we've scanned the body of Charles Willetts, we know it's dire.”

My mother looks stricken. “What did the Sicarii do to him?”

“As I said, they are parasites,” says Congers. “We don't know how they move from host to host, or even if they can exist outside of the bodies of their hosts. We do know that they crawl inside a person and take over.”

“But when they landed on the H2 planet, what did they look like? Wouldn't they have had to look humanoid?” Mom asks.

“Or they'd already obtained humanoid hosts,” says Race. “We don't know that the H2 planet was the first to be invaded.”

“But how exactly do you know that they're parasites?” I ask. “Have you seen one invade a host? Have you done an autopsy on Willetts? Did you find something inside him?”

“Now that we've confirmed he had been taken over by a Sicarii, we will autopsy the body as soon as we are in an appropriate facility.” Congers once again rubs his finger along the ridge of his beaky nose, the only nervous mannerism I've seen from him. “Right now, we only have what we witnessed in the last few days, the information recovered from the ship wreckage of our ancestors, and the stories passed down through generations. We've already told you most of what we know to this point.”

I squint at him. “Sounds like most of what you know is based on a multigenerational game of telephone.”

“We're constructing plausible hypotheses from the information we have,” says Race. “We know the leaders of the government on our home planet turned on their own people. We know they paved the way for the full invasion force and that they scanned orange, which means we know they were Sicarii, because of the technology developed by Bill's ancestor.”

“And we know they're here,” Congers continues. “And that this is only the beginning of something much worse.”

“Why do they need to sneak around, though?” asks Leo. “That scout ship thing destroyed Mitra's van like nothing. If they were so much more advanced hundreds of years ago than we are now, it seems like they could come in and blow us all away without breaking a sweat.”

“Then we should conclude that they don't want to blow us away. They want to invade peacefully because we have something they need,” says my mother. “That's it, isn't it? They need the
people
on the planet.”

“Like . . . for food?” Christina asks, her voice breaking.

“Or for a hospitable biological environment that enables them to adapt to the microorganisms here,” says my mother.

“Their behavior is consistent with either hypothesis,” says Race.

“No, it's not,” blurts Leo. “They came right out in the open a few hours ago. If their strategy really is stealthy infiltration, why fly a spaceship over Jersey?”

“Because
we
have something they want, too. Enough for them to risk being seen,” I say, looking to Congers for confirmation. “The scanner. You had it in the SUV, didn't you?”

He nods. “The events of the last week have not only made us aware that the technology exists and is being used—it may have alerted the Sicarii to it as well. And this device is one thing standing between them and their ability to secretly take over.”

“How did they know it existed, though?” asks my mom, leaning against the wall like she needs to sit down. Her olive-toned skin is paler than usual, save for the dark, puffy circles beneath her eyes, and I'm reminded that she was in surgery only a day and a half ago. “And why would they be so threatened by it?”

“We have no idea what occurred in that final meeting with my ancestor who invented the scanning technology,” says Congers. “My guess is that event made the Sicarii aware of what the technology can do. Even if we haven't figured it out yet.”

“But you suppressed information about what happened at Tate's school.” Mom bows her head, probably thinking of my dad. I wonder if she knows he's been branded a terrorist. “Even if the Sicarii knew the technology once existed, how would they know where to look now?”

“The lunch lady,” I say. “Helen Kuipers. She was on TV. Everyone else might have dismissed her as crazy, but maybe the Sicarii didn't.”

Leo grimaces. “And she disappeared a few days ago. Didn't you guys silence her?”

Congers shakes his head. “But the Sicarii may have, after they questioned her about what she saw.”

“So we think the Sicarii want to destroy the scanner?” Christina asks. “They could have done that on the road a few hours ago. Problem solved.”

My mother shakes her head. “They could have, but they destroyed our vehicle instead, right as we attacked the vehicle carrying the scanner. And when the Core agents put up a fight, they backed off.”

“Maybe they don't want to destroy it,” I say. “Maybe they want it.”

“If so, they'll try again,” says Congers. “It's only a matter of time. And strategy.”

I swallow hard. “And of who they get to next.” I look at Leo, and then at my mom again, hating to drop this bomb. “George scanned orange when he came to take the scanner from me at the Walmart.”

Some of the blood drains from Congers's face. “They've infiltrated both sides. They must have been watching us already. And when they discovered the existence of the scanner, they moved quickly to intercept it, using what they'd already learned about who was connected to whom. Somehow, they knew of our movements tonight.”

“We don't know how many of them might be here,” Race says to him. “Or whether there are already more within our ranks.”

“I think I know how many there are,” I say quietly. “My dad scaled up the technology and was scanning the planet using a satellite.” I tell them about the population counter and the anomalies—along with the question mark that indicated Dad didn't know what they were. “There were fourteen, but when I checked it again yesterday morning, there were only twelve.”

“Because George and Willetts were killed,” Leo says. “They probably got George in Chicago—that's why there were signs of a struggle in his room.”

I remember being on the phone with George on Tuesday morning. I remember hearing someone bang at his door. My hand is sweating in Christina's grip. “If they were in Chicago . . . that's where all The Fifty were meeting.”

My mom pushes herself off the wall. “If there are twelve Sicarii on this planet and we know they're after the scanner, we need to protect it.”

“We need to do a lot more than that,” Race says. “We need to scan our people.”

“And ours,” Mom adds. “We also need a controlled environment. Defensible but contained, so that we can establish security and maintain it. Black Box Enterprises.”

“You're not suggesting we invite the Core into our weapons factory,” I say quietly.

“What if I am, Tate? After all you've heard tonight, surely you understand we have to work together. Black Box is a self-sufficient fortress. It's invisible to satellites, unlike official government agencies. And it has highly advanced perimeter defenses. It would allow us to prevent infiltration while we plan how to eliminate the Sicarii scout force, and, if possible, prevent the mass invasion they're trying to facilitate.” Her brown eyes are intense and commanding. “There is no better place than Black Box.”

Race and Congers don't disagree, but it's not like I expect them to suggest we head to the Pentagon or Quantico. This is like killing two birds with one stone for them. They can maybe defend against the Sicarii, but also learn all the secrets of The Fifty.

“We also need immediate access to Frederick Archer's lab,” Congers says. “We know he must have the wreckage we've been looking for. If there ever was a defense system to protect against Sicarii invasion, even if it simply alerts us to their presence and gives us a chance to fight, we need to find a way to make it work. We believe the technology can be weaponized.” He looks down at the scanner as if it's going to tell him the answer. And part of me wonders if it can, in the right hands.

“We know Dad had at least one scanner satellite in orbit,” I said. “I could take a look at his stuff and—”

“Our team will investigate,” says Congers. “And I hope you've heard enough now to cooperate.”

“If you'd told me all of this earlier, instead of having your son beat on me, asshole, maybe I would have cooperated
then.
”

Congers merely stares at me, unapologetic. But he only started playing nice when he knew the Sicarii had gotten to the H2, and his decision to keep me in the dark has cost us valuable time.

Race clears his throat, looking at my mom first, then me. “We've all lost people in this fight,” he says. “We've all made mistakes, and the toll has been high. I know that will make it hard to trust each other.”

I stare at him.
I will
never
trust you,
I think.
And I will never forgive you.
But as I squeeze Christina's hand, as I picture some creepy parasite crawling out of Willetts and taking her over, a chill rides across my skin. “What are you proposing? I'm not helping you get into my dad's lab unless I go in, too, and unless I have a say in what happens to whatever we find.”

Congers's eyes light with frustration. “Have you even graduated from high school?” he shouts. “You have no idea what we're facing, and we don't have time to waste like this!”

“Exactly,” I yell, releasing Christina, my hand clenched around the grip of my gun. “Which is why you need
me.
And I'm not just going to hand over my dad's inventions and technology to the same people who killed him!”

Race steps between us, his hands up. “He has to be included, Bill. He's proven himself more capable than the average teenager, and he knows more about the lab than we do.” He sighs. “And he has a habit of causing enormous destruction when not properly informed or contained.”

Mom lifts her chin as she speaks to Congers. “The Core is not the only group that prepares its youth to carry the torch. You should not underestimate my son. Or any of us, for that matter.”

Her words lower my blood pressure, especially when she looks my way. Only a few days ago, she was the one trying to protect me, trying to make plans without me. But now she's realized just how well Dad prepared me. As I think about what lies ahead of us, though, what's coming for us—an enemy that wears our skin and disables us from the inside out . . . I can only hope he prepared me well enough.

AS THE DRIVER PARKS ON THE STREET OUTSIDE THE
Upper West Side building where I've lived my entire life, Mom turns to me. “Are you ready for this?” she asks me in a low voice.

“No,” I say honestly. “But that doesn't mean I can't do it.”

She gives me a pained smile and gets out of the vehicle. The others disembark, too. Race and Congers stand stiffly near the front stoop while the other agents remain near the two SUVs and one truck, scanning the sidewalk warily. It's Saturday, four in the morning, but our neighbors are mostly middle-aged professionals. Not a lot of night owls, so the street is pretty quiet.

The last few hours have been a flurry of phone calls and planning.

I'm still not happy about taking Core agents into Dad's lab. But I know what I saw on that road in Jersey. I know the avarice I saw on the faces of Willetts and George as they worked in concert to steal the scanner. I know how I feel when I think of a parasitic alien trying to take over the body of the girl standing next to me, or anybody, for that matter. And I believe the Sicarii are already in the early stages of an invasion that could come as soon as they disable the threats to their plan. Including us.

For all those reasons, I want to find out what my dad was doing, and why he called the scanner the key to our survival. The Sicarii wanted it, and that makes me wonder more than ever what the device can do, what might happen if they turned it against us, and what we could do to them if we could figure it out.

Leo touches my arm as everyone else gathers on the sidewalk. “Can I go in with you?” he asks, his voice just above a whisper. He gives Graham a nervous glance as the guy glowers at us.

I return Graham's glare. I'm hoping he's decided we're even, but I know the last few hours have been rough for him. “Absolutely, Leo. I need you.”

Leo's eyebrows rise, and I see the question there. “You knew my dad, Leo. And you notice things others don't.”

His eyes brighten. “I do?”

“Yeah. So keep an eye out, and speak up. I need people I trust in there.” I reach for Christina's hand as she joins us near the steps.

“Thanks,” Leo says, scuffing the toe of his oversized soccer cleat against the sidewalk.

We all file into the building. My body aches as we climb the stairs to the apartment, but I grit my teeth and resist the urge to lean against the banister and catch my breath. Standing behind me are Race, Congers, Graham, and another young agent named Daniel Sung, an Asian guy with black hair buzzed high and tight—the only Core member thus far who has politely introduced himself. My mom, Christina, and Leo follow them cautiously. All are tight-lipped and tense as I stride to the keypad and type in the entry code. The door swings open. “You guys really made yourselves at home last time you were here,” I growl at Congers, striding into my living room and taking in the disarray. “Where's my cat?”

“Agents delivered the cat to a kennel under your name,” Congers responds.

I squint at him. “They did?”

He shrugs. “It was going to starve if it was left here.”

I should say “thanks,” but instead I say, “I hope you didn't destroy the one thing that's gonna get us into his lab.”

“You keep talking to me like you expect an apology,” says Congers, following me back to my room with the others trailing behind. “Stopping an invasion of this planet far outweighs the invasion of your home.”

“Dude, shut up,” I grumble, eyeing the mess they made of my space. I mean, it was always messy, but now it's total chaos. I don't know what they thought they were looking for, since the lab is in the basement, but they tossed my shit all over the place. Congers and Race stand in the hall. My mother peeks in and makes a noise that tells me she can probably smell my dirty socks. I go over to a pile of laundry and kick it aside, then pull up the loose corner of carpet. My dad—and the Core agents, apparently—never thought to look under it because of the pile of stinky workout clothes that was always there. Beneath the loose carpet is the little compartment I dug into the floorboards, and out of it, I pull the small plastic case containing my dad's fingerprint. “Let's go downstairs,” I say.

A few minutes later, I'm doing what I've done so many times before: slipping the film containing the fingerprint onto my finger and pressing it to the tab while typing in my dad's password. It makes my chest ache. The last time I did this, he was alive.

The door opens, and it feels like we're unsealing a tomb. Congers tells Sung and Graham to stay in the hallway, and both look unhappy but obey without arguing. The rest of them file in behind me, looking around as I flick on the lights. “Don't touch anything,” I tell them. “Trust me. Some of this stuff looks harmless, but none of it is.” Race appears at my shoulder, and even though his face doesn't give much away, I can tell he's impressed by the eager sweep of his eyes across the weapons racks. “Look at this,” I say, walking over to the black screen that shows the population count. “This is what I was telling you guys about.”

The numbers on the screen read:

2,943,287,964

4,122,239,895

12 (?)

“So you think the bottom number denotes the Sicarii scouts,” Race says.

“I do. Like I told you, it was fourteen before George and Willetts were killed,” I reply as Congers and my mother join us while Christina hovers near the door.

Race peers at the screen. “I'd say that's a preponderance of the evidence.”

“It's a good hypothesis,” my mother replies, always the scientist.

I touch the screen, and it flashes with a bunch of blueprints and plans before going red and asking for the password, just as it did before. I take a deep breath.
Please let this be right.
I've tried it in other places, and I'm scared to hope that it's going to work now, especially because I'm not alone in that hope—everyone else is tense and silent with anticipation. My fingers shake as I type.
When the time comes, it's Josephus
 . . . As soon as I type that name, the red dissolves, and I let out a shaky, relieved laugh as the plans are revealed. For what, I have no idea, but since that password was the last thing my dad ever said, I know I'm looking at something important. And relentlessly complicated. The agents and my mother narrow their eyes as they try to read the tiny words and equations. “Do you guys have any idea what it is?”

“I might,” says Race. “And if I'm right, your father was much further along than we anticipated—we thought he'd just made a single device, but he seems to have built his own system. Bill, look at this.”

Congers leans in, and he might have a good poker face, but he can't hide his surprise. His eyes get wider as he zooms in on the lower left quadrant of the plans. “This . . . could be it.” He tears his gaze from the screen to look at me. “You mentioned that your father had scaled up the technology. Did he utilize its full potential?”

“You're gonna have to rewind and tell me what you're thinking.”

“The scanner technology differentiates the species. Human. H2. Sicarii. And if those numbers you showed us are indeed from a population counter, he's scaled up the technology using a satellite, as you said. But these plans are for a
network
of satellites.”

Race points to a list of names, all pharaohs—Amenhotep, Thutmose, Hatshepsut, and so on. “These designate each one.”

“You might be right.” I walk over to the shelf and grab the mobile satellite controller, the size of a small cell phone, the one I found the same day I stole the scanner from this lab. I enter the password—Mom's middle name—and show them the display. “This one is for Ramses.” We look back at the screen's listing of pharaoh names designating each satellite. Ramses is the only name listed in red. The others are white. “Maybe Ramses is the only one in the air?”

“Or the only one scanning,” suggests my mom. “If all of these are activated and working in concert, they'll form a field. Anything passing through the field will be scanned.”

“Like incoming Sicarii,” I say. “So it's like an early warning system? How much good will that do us?”

“Look at that,” says Leo from behind me, reaching around to poke the screen.

I stare at the small diagram of the satellite. “Is that a . . . laser?” If so, it's more complex and advanced than any kind of laser tech I'm aware of.

“Sounds like the satellites can do more than scan,” Leo comments.

“These are like giant weaponized scanners,” I say. Somehow, my dad knew we were under threat. He'd already planned ahead. I nudge my mom's shoulder. “Why do you think he hadn't activated the entire satellite shield yet? He'd figured out so much.”

Her brow furrows, and she presses her lips together for a moment, then says, “He assumed he'd be alive, Tate. He may have wanted to consult with The Fifty once he was certain there was a threat, or once he'd confirmed what it was. We'll never know.”

Congers clears his throat in the heavy silence that follows. “We need to transfer these schematics so we can examine them,” he says. “As much as Archer built and discovered, we don't even know if the additional satellites are aloft or what it would take to construct them.”

I shake my head. “You're not transferring plans to an unknown machine.”

“Tate.” Mom touches my arm. “We could manage all of this at Black Box. In fact, it's likely that Black Box actually supplied the Ramses satellite. They may have the information about the others, even if they didn't know how they were being used.”

I chuckle. “Knowing Dad, that's entirely possible.” We spend a few minutes preparing the plans for remote retrieval. It involves removing a few layers of security, but now that I'm inside, it's nothing I haven't done before. The others wait quietly; it's clear they took my warnings about Dad's weapons seriously, though Leo is eyeing the seizure bags and Race is watching my computer maneuvers with interest. When I'm finished, we search the other computers for any sign of where Dad hid the actual H2 wreckage.

What I find instead is his weapon design files—and specifically a set marked “SIC.” Race respectfully stands back as I explore. There are plans here for the lasers on the satellites, but also for a combat vehicle. It resembles the eight-wheeled Stryker used by the US Army, but with a ton of modifications, including double autocannons—along with additional plans for the custom artillery shells—and a giant lens on the roof of the vehicle. I look back at Race. “I have no idea what that lens is for, but I kind of wish we'd had these when we met the Sicarii on the road.”

Race looks at the plans and nods. “Does Black Box have these schematics?”

“No idea.”

“Perhaps we should take them.”

I smile grimly. “Definitely.”

He glances around us. “Any idea where your dad kept the actual wreckage? He wouldn't have placed it in storage elsewhere, would he?”

“Unlikely,” mutters Leo before I can say the same thing. My dad didn't trust anyone but himself.

“But we don't know whether we're looking for plane-sized wreckage or shoe-box-type wreckage,” I say. “Mom, did he ever talk about it?”

She wraps her arms around her slender body and stares at his desk, the only place in the room that's even a little bit cluttered. And by “cluttered,” I mean there are three pencils, a ream of printer paper, and his old black Princeton Tigers mug sitting on its otherwise clean surface. “No,” she says quietly. “He showed me files, but never the artifacts themselves.” And I can tell it hurts her.

Leo looks back and forth from my mom to the desk. He walks slowly across the room and looks down into the mug. I shake my head—I didn't really
see
it, because it's always been there. I join him as he squats in front of it. “He didn't drink tea,” Leo says quietly.

“Or coffee,” I add, glancing at my mom.

She frowns, and I can tell she's realizing how odd it is, too. Now that I really think about it, I've never seen him with it upstairs, never seen it in the dishwasher, never seen it anywhere but
right there.
“Maybe we should—”

Before I can finish my thought, Leo snatches it from the desk. As soon as he does, there's a soft click that I hear like cannon fire. I brace, expecting some kind of lethal onslaught . . . but all I feel is a hum beneath the soles of my shoes.

A panel in the floor slides away smoothly, forcing Leo—who's holding the mug and grinning like an idiot—to jump aside. What's revealed is a small chamber beneath the lab, with a set of rungs set into the wall. White cloths cover several irregularly shaped objects sitting on the floor. I stare at Leo for a moment, trying to suppress a smile and failing because his is contagious. “You could have gotten us all killed, dude.”

He bounces on his heels. “But I didn't.”

I catch Race's eye. He's shown respect, and it's time for me to do the same. “Let's take a look.”

He looks mildly surprised at the invitation. I descend the rungs and wait for him at the bottom while my mom and the others watch from above. With my heart thumping heavily, I slowly pull the cloth off the largest object, which is about the size of a bicycle. It's a twisted, charred jumble of metal and wire and circuitry, with smooth panels and cracked display screens. And it happens to be over four hundred years old. It's traveled countless light-years. It came from another planet. Another galaxy.

“Where did he get this?” Congers asks in a hushed voice, leaning over the edge.

“His ancestor witnessed the crash. It's been in the Archer family for centuries. But my dad was the one to figure out the technology, and he used it to make the scanner.”

Race tears his gaze away from the wreckage. For the first time, I see true regret in his eyes. “I'm sorry he's not here. I'm sorry for the part I played in that. If I could bring him back, I would.”