The Sovereign Era (Book 2): Pilgrimage (16 page)

“Get out,” Kelso said.

Encouraged, Byron added, “And…y’know, I heal really fast. And I’m pretty strong, pretty fast. I was CIF All-Star my sophomore year.” He laughed a little. “I didn’t know it was ‘cause of all, y’know, this stuff.”

“Remarkable.” Schulmann looked at Croy. “Do you think he’d adapt to my emissions?”

Byron was convinced they were messing with him
that
time, but Croy shook his head, once, firmly.

“That will not be part of the exercises.”

Schulmann looked at his hands, folded on the table. Byron thought he seemed bummed out all of a sudden.

“That’s probably a good idea, all things considered,” Schulmann mumbled.

Byron said, “I don’t get it. What—sorry, I never found out—what’s your ability?”

Kelso spoke up. “Jon’s a microwave oven. He makes perfect popcorn.”

Schulmann raised the middle finger of his right hand and directed it in Kelso’s general direction. To Byron, he said, “Best way to put it would be that I’m a living particle accelerator.”

Byron had heard the term, somewhere, but it didn’t mean a thing to him.

“Huh?”

Schulmann’s lips twitched up at the corners. “Like radiation, you know? I…hm. How to put this simply…” He suddenly looked appalled. “Sorry! No offense!”

Byron laughed. “Dude, none taken. Simple is good.”

Schulmann caught a go-ahead nod from Croy before proceeding. “Okay, great.” He laughed. “So it’s like this: X-rays, radio waves, even light and, like the lummox said—"

“Hey!” Kelso chuckled.

"—microwaves, too…they’re all pretty much the same thing, just at different levels of energy. I can take atoms and…get whatever energy I need out of them.”

“Whoa,” said Byron. “I mean, I don’t, y’know, totally get all that, but…you said radiation. Like an A-bomb?”

Schulmann coughed into his hand. “Well, uh…not so—not so big. And not…exactly.”

Spencer Croy said, “In terms of Mister Schulmann’s field effectiveness, he is essentially a ranged energy weapon.”

Byron looked at Jon Schulmann and Ed Kelso. “Holy fuck. You guys are…you guys are fucking awesome. I don’t even get what you’d need someone like me for.”

Croy said, “Your role will be defined through training and, eventually, field experience.”

Byron looked at Croy. “You guys always know more than you tell me. Can I get, like, a hint?”

A muscle twitched on Croy’s cheek. A smile?

“Mister Kelso has strength, and mass.”

“I’m the hammer,” Kelso said.

“Mister Schulmann’s energy manipulation abilities offer a range of tactical advantages.”

“I’m the needle,” Schulmann said. “Or the flamethrower.”

“You,” Croy looked at Byron, “are very fast and suitably strong and, with training, could prove to be functionally invulnerable. Also, you are not readily distinguishable from baseline humans.”

“Wait…” Byron looked at Schulmann. “You look normal.”

“Sure,” said Schulmann, “but if I want to use my abilities without burning myself, or, I don’t know, giving myself cancer in twenty years, I have to wear my containment suit. You’ll see; it’s pretty conspicuous.”

“Oh.”

Croy continued. “The expectation is that you will serve in a variety of roles, depending on the nature of the operation.”

“Oh, okay.” Byron smiled and looked at the three of them. “Good thing I’m, like, adaptable. Right?”

Kelso’s laughter was loud, but when he slapped his knee, Byron flinched, hard.

“Great.” Schulmann shook his head and smiled. “Another one.”

“Laugh or cry, Jiffy Pop,” Kelso said. “Laugh or cry.”

There was a beat of silence between the two men as the mood around the table dropped to the ground. Byron was about to ask about it, but Mister Croy spoke first.

“We need to talk about Friday.”

“Ah,” said Schulmann. “Right.”

“Big day.” Kelso ground his left fist into his right palm.

Croy said, “We assume the number of demonstrators at the Visitors Center will peak then. We also have intelligence suggesting our enemies will instigate a coordinated act of terror to take advantage of this.”

Byron felt like he was a guest at this meeting, but he was dying to ask a question. It must have been obvious. Croy looked at him. “Yes?”

“Our…enemies?”

Kelso said, “You would know, Byron.”

Byron looked at him. “Seriously? You think the company that wanted to experiment on me would do something? But…I figured, what with all the court stuff, and the news being, like, all over it…”

“Not Tyndale Labs,” Croy said. “Their masters.”

“Oh.” Byron remembered the parent company of Tyndale Labs, and the one that creep Lester Brenhurst really worked for, was called PrenticeCambrian. It was a trip to think the same corporation that owned a bunch of laundry-soap and snack-cake brands could be behind some organized effort against the Sovereigns.

Byron didn’t know a whole lot about it, and no one had seen fit to really fill him in since he’d arrived at the Institute.

Jon Schulmann said, “They’re probably a puppet group as well, if I had to guess.” His upper lip curled. “But hell, they don’t even really need to encourage anyone. Plenty of home-grown hate out there.”

Kelso’s snort was loud. “Fuck ‘em.”

Croy continued. “The two of you will supplement our regular security force. It is Doctor Donner’s hope that the presence of the SCET in an official capacity will be enough to keep the peace between demonstrators and discourage any blatant instigators.”

“Um…” Byron saw Croy’s subtle nod and went on. “You said ‘between demonstrators’?”

Kelso answered for Croy again. “Heck, kid—we didn’t hire
all
the pro-Sovereign people in the country.” He laughed. “Got all the ones in Montana, though, I’m pretty sure…”

Schulmann said, “When you say official capacity, you mean…?”

“Full-dress,” Croy said, “and your field-rated containment suit.”

Byron said, “Will, uh…what about me?”

“Doctor Donner would like you to remain on the grounds,” Croy said. “We’ll formally announce your induction into the SCET at a proper press conference the following week.”

“Benched!” Kelso shrugged and grinned. “Sorry, kid.”

Byron wasn’t used to being off the court when the ball went up. On the other hand, the idea of facing off with a bunch of anti-Sovereign nut jobs made his stomach a little queasy.

“I’m cool,” he said.

Croy was watching him. “You may be needed, and you may not. You’ll get a uniform tomorrow. Wear it on Friday.”

Byron still remembered how it felt when Lester Brenhurst’s augmented assassin nearly disemboweled him. The memory of his own blood, sticky and hot between his body and driveway gravel, made him shiver. He blinked. This wasn’t a game. Not even. “Yes, sir.”

“Mister Croy,” Jon Schulmann said, “how reliable is the intelligence insofar as the chance of violence on Declaration Day goes? Has Mrs. Franklin seen anything?”

The name distracted Byron from difficult memories. “Beth…?” Schulmann nodded at him and turned back to Croy.

“No,” Croy said. “We have no precognitive intelligence. Just chatter picked up from the local militia.”

“Ah,” sighed Kelso. “The speciesists.”

Byron had never heard the term. “Who?”

Schulmann said, “There’s a militia group headquartered on a ranch not far from the Institute. They used to be white supremacists…you know, neo-Nazi, racist stuff.”

Kelso said, “Until we started coming out of the woodwork and gave those fucktards something real to worry about.”

Byron didn’t get it. “Why be worried about us, though?” He looked at Croy. “I mean, seriously. There’s, what, like a few thousand Sovereigns in the world, right?”

“Less than six thousand,” Croy said.

“Okay, but most of us can’t even really do anything, right? And even if they were all, like…I don’t know…”

“Living weapons?” put in Schulmann.

“Yeah. Even if, we’re still, like, outnumbered a gazillion to one. Why be scared of us?”

Kelso managed to look dreamy and sinister at once. “I don’t know about you, Byron, but as soon as I can find a nice big girl, this guy here’s gonna make as many little Sovereign babies as he can. Gotta balance things out for the team, right?” His eyes narrowed. “Let’s see how mean they feel when there’s sixty thousand of us. Or six million.”

Schulmann grunted. “That’s why.” From Jon’s tone, Byron got that he liked the idea.

Kelso said, “Don’t get me wrong—I’m not saying we should take things over or anything. But if the norms think we’re gonna just hide here in this…gimme a word, Jon.”

“Ghetto?”

Kelso pointed an index finger at the other man. “Bingo. That’s bullshit. This is our world.” He looked a little sheepish, but Byron thought it wasn’t entirely genuine. “Our world,
too
, I mean.”

Mister Croy said, “We are dangerously outnumbered, and for now, our distribution makes us vulnerable. Some think that makes us dangerous.”

Jon Schulmann seemed focused on something far away. “Watch what happens if they make us prove them right.”

“Damn straight,” Kelso said.

They looked at Byron.

“Yeah!”

He kinda wanted to throw up.

Andrew Charters – Three

Denver Colorado sat in his wheelchair on his back yard deck, reading
The Kirby Grizzly
, drinking coffee, and occasionally picking at a brand-name coffeecake from its long white box.

Denver’s backyard blended gradually with the light woods growing around most every house on this side of Kirby Lake. There was plenty of shadowy cover there in the trees, especially for one so preternaturally adept at stealth as Andrew Charters.

Crouched on his haunches, perfectly still, Andrew watched Denver for some time. Once in a while, the light breeze would send Denver’s scent, along with the bite of the coffee and the doughy, soft impression of the dessert, across the sixty feet to Andrew’s nostrils.

Each time, Andrew smiled. Denver was his oldest and only friend. His scent was calming, encouraging…and stirred in Andrew a bit of rueful regret. For the last decade and a half or so, their friendship had been unfairly one-sided. That wasn’t going to change today.

For the umpteenth time, Andrew’s hyper-alert nature drew his gaze to the wooden slat fence running up the left side of Denver’s yard. That hadn’t been there a year ago. Most of the backyards along Denver’s street just blended into one another even as they blended into the woods.

The fence disturbed Andrew. It was something different, it was new, and it smelled like chemicals, sealer, and paint. He didn’t care for unexpected changes, especially to a place so familiar to him. Who would have put it there? Why was it there now?

Andrew chuffed, a hard sigh through his flared nostrils. He was in for a whole lot of changes. The damn fence was a…

A…

The answer was in his head, tucked away and making itself scarce, what with all the fierce animal stuff crowding higher concepts out of the way. His brain dedicated a lot of itself to processing the world. Switching gears to remember something esoteric, something symbolic—it required an effort part of Andrew deeply resented.

A symbol.

That was it, right there.

Andrew grinned widely. The timid parts of his brain—the scientist, the intellectual—sneaked one in.

The damn fence was a symbol. A symbol.

There might as well be a fence between the woods where Andrew hid and where Denver—poor, unsuspecting Denver—sat reading the paper. Between Andrew staying out in the cold, literally and figuratively, and stepping back into the world in which he had been born as a human being.

Andrew stood up, cleared his throat, hawked a thick ball of phlegm, and stepped out of the cool shadows of the trees and onto Denver’s roughly manicured lawn.

“Hello, Denver,” he croaked.

The newspaper in Denver’s hand quivered for a split second, but if Andrew’s appearance surprised him, he did a great job of concealing it.

“Well, now,” Denver said. “Look what dragged itself in. Where’ve you been keeping yourself?”

Andrew couldn’t fight feeling dangerously exposed on the lawn. He loped to the covered deck. “In the woods. Breathing. Hunting. Staying away.”

Denver nodded. “Uh-huh. I was a little surprised when you didn’t show up this past winter. Kept the blankets out for you. Even made a run down to the DAV and picked you up an old coat.”

Denver got him a coat? Andrew licked his lips and focused down. “Thought I should stay away. After…”

“Ah. Yeah.” Denver frowned. “You sure did a number on that poor asshole, Andy. Made things pretty bad for the boy, too. For Lucy.”

“Deserved what he…” Andrew blinked, flashing on the feeling of the PrenticeCambrian mercenary’s flesh parting for him, the hot splash of blood, the slippery slap of entrails against his feet.

Denver said, “Come on back, Andy.”

Andrew blinked again. “Deserved what he got,” he said firmly.

Denver tilted his head. “You’d know.”

Andrew nodded slowly. “Why I’m here.”

Denver set down his newspaper. “What’s why you’re here?” He broke off a piece of coffeecake.

“The boy…Lucille.” Andrew swallowed past his tight throat. He coughed. “Want to help.”

Denver’s handful of cake stopped halfway to his bearded mouth. “You want to
help
?”

Back in the woods, a squirrel scrambled down the trunk of a tree and rummaged in the mulch of pine needles and dirt below. Andrew struggled against the urge to turn around and pinpoint the little prey with his sensorium.

He took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah. Thought I…thought I could. Should.”

“So…” Denver regarded him. “Huh. Well, I guess that could change things. Probably for the better, too. Good for you, Andrew.” He squinted at him. “Good for you.”

Andrew licked his teeth behind closed lips. As always, his augmented canines snagged on his tongue: a rough, alien feeling, even after all these years. Maybe it was a good sign, that he’d never gotten used to that.

“Thing is…”

He found it difficult to push any more words out of his mouth. Another fence.